SIUE Wins OVC Championship To Clinch The First Auto-Bid

After a 68-48 over SEMO, the Cougars are the first team to go dancing.

The Ohio Valley Champions are officially the SIUE Cougars after defeating the #1 seed Southeast Missouri 69-48. This is SIUEs first ever conference championship, and their first trip to March Maddness.

Ray’Sean Taylor led both teams in scoring with 20 points, and also became SIUEs all-time leading scorers with 1952 career points. Taylor earned the OVC Tournament MVP as he also scored 24 points in the semifinals. Ring Malith and Brian Taylor II also had double digit points with 12 and 10 each. All tree of those players had 7 rebounds in the game.

For Southeast Missouri, Rob Martin led with 18 points and 4 rebounds, and Brendan Terry had 16 points and 6 rebounds.

SIUE will find out there first round matchup on March 16th during the NCAA selection show. 4 more teams look to clinch as Winthrop takes on High Point at noon for the Big South championship, North Alabama plays Libscomb at 2 for the ASUN final, Bradley plays Drake at 2:10 for the MVC title, and St Thomas-Minnesota faces Omaha for the Summit Leage championship at 9.