2017 Big Sky Conference men's basketball tournament explained

Year:	2017
Conference:	Big Sky Conference
Division:	I
Gender:	Men's
Teams:	11
Arena:	Reno Events Center
City:	Reno, Nevada
Champions:	North Dakota Fighting Hawks
Titlecount:	1st
Coach:	Brian Jones
Coachcount:	1st
Mvp:	Quinton Hooker
Mvpteam:	North Dakota
Television:	ESPNU (final)

The 2017 Big Sky Conference men's basketball tournament was the 42nd edition of the postseason tournament for the Big Sky Conference, held March 7–11 at the Reno Events Center in Reno, Nevada.

In the final, regular season champion North Dakota defeated third-seed Weber State in overtime to earn the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA tournament. It was North Dakota's first NCAA tournament as a Division I team, after multiple appearances in the Division II tourney.

On October 8, 2016, Northern Colorado self-imposed a post-season ban amid an ongoing NCAA investigation into program violations, and did not participate.^[1]

Seeds

Only 11 of the 12 teams in the conference participated in the tournament due to Northern Colorado's self-imposed ban. Teams were seeded by conference record, with a tiebreaker system used to seed teams with identical conference records. The top five teams received a first round bye.

Seed	School	Conference	Tiebreaker 1	Tiebreaker 2
1	North Dakota	14–4
2	Eastern Washington	13–5
3	Weber State	12–6	0–2 vs UND	1–1 vs EWU
4	Idaho	12–6	0–1 vs UND	0–2 vs EWU
5	Montana	11–7	1–0 vs UND
6	Montana State	11–7	0–1 vs UND
7	Sacramento State	9–9
8	Portland State	7–11
9	Northern Arizona	6–12
10	Idaho State	3–15	1–0 vs SUU
11	Southern Utah	3-15	0–1 vs ISU

Schedule

-- Session Game Time* Matchup Score Television Attendance First Round – Tuesday, March 7 1 1 2:35 PM No. 8 Portland State vs. No. 9 Northern Arizona 80–67 Watch Big Sky 1,507 2 5:35 PM No. 7 Sacramento State vs. No. 10 Idaho State 91–76 3 8:05 PM No. 6 Montana State vs. No. 11 Southern Utah 109–105^3OT Quarterfinals – Thursday, March 9 2 4 12:05 PM  No. 1 North Dakota vs. No. 8 Portland State 95–72 Watch Big Sky 1,762 5 2:35 PM No. 4 Idaho vs. No. 5 Montana 81–77 3 6 5:35 PM No. 2 Eastern Washington vs. No. 7 Sacramento State 89–70 1,903 7 8:05 PM No. 3 Weber State vs. No. 11 Southern Utah 90–70 Semifinals – Friday, March 10 4 8 5:35 PM No. 1 North Dakota vs. No. 4 Idaho 69–64 Watch Big Sky 2,003 9 8:05 PM No. 2 Eastern Washington vs. No. 3 Weber State 80–72 Championship Game – Saturday, March 11 5 10 5:30 PM No. 1 North Dakota vs. No. 3 Weber State 93–89^OT ESPNU 2,025 Game times in PST. Rankings denote tournament seeding Bracket * denotes overtime period ^[2] NCAA tournament The Fighting Hawks received the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament; no other Big Sky members were invited to the tournament or North Dakota was seeded fifteenth in the West regional and lost 100–82 to Arizona in the first round It was the eleventh consecutive year that the Big Sky representative lost in the first round. External links ]

Notes and References

1. Web site: University of Northern Colorado imposed penalties on itself over NCAA violations. Associated Press. 2017-01-12.
2. Web site: The 2017 Big Sky Basketball Championships Schedule. SIDEARM Sports. 2 November 2016.