BYU Basketball to play University of Texas-Arlington in First Round of NIT

BYU will play UT-Arlington in the first round of the National Invitation Tournament. The game will be played on Wednesday, March 15 in the Marriott Center in Provo, Utah. The game will be played at 9:00 PM EST and will be broadcast on ESPN2.

Following their 3rd place finish in the West Coast Conference, the Cougars have a 22-11 record and were awarded a 3 seed in the NIT.

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The Mavericks of University of Texas-Arlington have a 25-8 record and will play with a 6 seed in the NIT. UT-Arlington are coached by Scott Cross, who has a career record of 202-147 (57.9% win-loss) over his 11 season career. He was only been the head man at Texas-Arlington. The Mavericks plays in the Sun Belt Conference where they finished as the regular season champions in their league.

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In the next meeting between these teams, the Cougars will have their hands full trying to handle Mavericks star forward Kevin Hervey. Hervey was this season’s player of the year in the Sun Belt. Hervey has led Texas-Arlington this season by averaging 17.1 points per game along with 8.6 rebounds per contest.

The Cougars have played UT-Arlington twice before. The teams have split the series 1 game a piece with the last time the two met on the hardwood in 1988. The rubber match will be in the first round of the NIT on Wednesday.

UT-Arlington is 1 of 2 teams to beat St. Mary’s this season

As a matter of interest, if BYU is going to play Utah in the NIT, both teams would need to advance to the Championship game. This game would be played at Madison Square Garden.