NIT bound, BYU to host UAB Wednesday

2016 NIT Bracket

PROVO, Utah – BYU basketball will compete in the postseason for a program record 11th-straight season as the Cougars accepted an invitation to the 2016 National Invitational Tournament Sunday.

No. 2 seed BYU (23-10) will host the No. 7 seed UAB Blazers (26-6) Wednesday in the Marriott Center at 8 p.m. MDT. The game will be televised live on ESPNU and broadcast live on the Cougar IMG Sports Network and KSL Newsradio 102.7 FM and 1160 AM. The winner of Wednesday’s game will face the winner of No. 3 seed Virginia Tech and No. 6 seed Princeton in the second round.

UAB, 26-6 overall and 16-2 in Conference USA, won nine of its last 10 games before falling to Western Kentucky in the quarterfinals of the Conference USA Championships. Robert Brown leads the Blazers in scoring at 13.5 points per game while Chris Cokley (13.1) and William Lee (10.7) also average double figures. Cokley is the team’s leading rebounder at 6.4 boards per game while Nick Norton averages a team-best 5.2 assists per game.

Brown earned All-Conference USA First Team honors while Cokley was named to the second team and Lee and Norton earned third-team recognition.

Coached by Jerod Haase, UAB averages 79.0 points per game while shooting 47.9 percent from the field and 37.0 percent from downtown. In four seasons as the Blazers’ head coach, Haase has posted a record of 80-52. Last season he led UAB to the Round of 32 in the NCAA tournament. 

BYU coach Dave Rose has guided the Cougars to the postseason in each of his 11 seasons at the helm, including eight at-large bids to the NCAA tournament (2007-12, 2014 and 2015) and three to the NIT. In 2013, the Cougars won three-straight in the NIT to reach the semifinals in Madison Square Garden.

This will mark BYU’s 12th appearance in the NIT. The Cougars have a 15-9 record in the NIT, including titles in 1951 and 1966. In addition to the 2013 appearance, BYU's prior years playing in the NIT were 1951, 1953, 1954, 1966, 1982, 1986, 1994, 2000, 2002 and 2006.

BYU is led by 2016 West Coast Conference Player of the Year Kyle Collinsworth, who averaged 15.2 points, 8.4 rebounds, 7.4 assists and 2.0 steals. The Provo, Utah, native is the NCAA’s career triple-double record holder and has the top two spots for triple-doubles in a season.

Fellow senior guard Chase Fischer earned first-team All-WCC honors while averaging a team-best 17.9 points to go with 2.5 rebounds and 2.0 assists. His 98 3-pointers are the third most in a season in BYU history.

Freshman guard Nick Emery also earned All-WCC honors as he was named to the Second Team and the Freshman Team. He has posted one of the most productive freshman seasons in BYU history, averaging 16.2 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.4 assists while making a Cougar freshman record 87 3-pointers.

The NIT Selection Committee conducted selections for the 2016 NIT. Any regular-season champion of an NCAA Division I conference (as determined by the conference’s tie-break protocol) not otherwise selected to the NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Championship secured an automatic qualification into the NIT. The committee then selected the best available teams to fill the 32-team NIT field. Once selected, teams were seeded and placed into one of four eight-team regions.

The first three rounds of the NIT are hosted at the campus site of one of the participating teams. For each game, the higher-seeded team will have the first option to host unless logistical circumstances preclude such an opportunity. First-round games will be played March 15 and 16. Second-round games will be played March 17-21 and quarterfinal games will be played March 22 and 23.

The 2016 Postseason NIT will be in its 79th season at New York City’s Madison Square Garden. On Tuesday, March 29, the four quarterfinal winners will square off with the Championship scheduled for Thursday, March 31.

Visit NCAA.com for more information.