Georgetown defeated San Diego 3-1 Saturday at
home to earn its first trip to the Final Four.

Baseball may be dead in Hoover (for the time being), but soccer lives on.

The Final Four compete at Regions Park this weekend for the NCAA Division I men’s soccer championship, with Georgetown against Maryland and Creighton against Indiana.

UAB (10-8-2), the sole team from Alabama, lost in the first round Nov. 15 to UNC-Charlotte (15-4-3). If that sounds familiar, the Blazers lost to Charlotte in the 2011 opening round, too; the 49ers went on to lose to North Carolina in the finals.

No. 2 Maryland (20-1-2) plays No. 3 Georgetown (19-3-2) in the first semi-final match; No. 16 Indiana (14-5-3) faces No. 12 Creighton (17-3-3) right after. Creighton’s trip to the 2011 Final Four in Hoover ended against Charlotte in a double overtime 4-1 shootout.

The first semi-final takes place at 4 p.m. Friday, while the second follows at 6:30. The championship game takes place at 1 p.m. Sunday.

All games air on ESPNU. Tickets are $20, for either both Friday semifinal matches or the Sunday championship, $35 for all three in advance online or $20 per day at the gate and free for age 1 and younger.

For more information, visit the NCAA College Cup Soccer website.

Also:

• Tournament bracket

Alabama’s Trevor Releford, left, and JaMychal Green
will face Creighton first in the Big Dance.

Alabama returns to the Big Dance this week. The ninth-seeded Crimson Tide (21-11, 9-7) will play No. 8 Creighton in the NCAA Men’s Tournament on Friday in Greensboro, N.C.

Alabama lost to Florida 66-63 in the second round of SEC Tournament Friday in New Orleans. In the 2011 NIT finals, Alabama lost to Wichita State 66-57.

The Bluejays won the Missouri Valley Tournament, beating Illinois State 83-79 in overtime, and finished with a 28-5 record. They face the Tide in the Midwest region.

The game airs at 12:40 p.m. Friday (time TBA) on CBS 42 TBS. [See all tipoff times.]

Brackets:

• NCAA Men’s Tournament

Also: Samford to face Duke in women’s tournament

Alabama top seed in NIT

Video: A look at the biggest surprises in the tourney field.

The college basketball post-season has a possible bright spot or two for state teams, depending on a couple of first-round games this week. UAB (22-8) faces Clemson in a battle of 12th seeds at 8 p.m. Tuesday in Dayton, Ohio, in the NCAA Men’s Tournament. The winner becomes the actual No. 12 East seed to play No. 5 West Virginia on Thursday in Tampa in the second round, which used to be the first round. Really.

UAB advanced one round in the 2010 National Invitation Tournament before losing to North Carolina at Bartow Arena.

Meanwhile, Alabama State (17-17) plays Texas-San Antonio at 5:30 p.m. Wednesday in Dayton to be the No. 16 East seed. The winner faces top seed Ohio State on Friday in Cleveland. In all, four play-in games — airing on truTV — have expanded the tournament to a field of 68 teams overall.

UAB’s inclusion was not without some controversy, especially after the Blazers’ early exit in the Conference USA Tournament on Thursday.

Alabama won’t be sitting out. The Crimson Tide (21-11), a top seed in the National Invitation Tournament, will welcome No. 8 Coastal Carolina to campus at 6 p.m. Tuesday, airing on ESPNU.

Brackets:

• NCAA Men’s Tournament
• NIT [PDF]

Video: NCAA selection committee chairman Gene
Smith defends the picks, including UAB.

The Blazers have pulled off the seemingly impossible: They’re the only men’s college basketball team from Alabama playing in a post-season tournament.

Update: As Jeff pointed out in the comments, Troy is also headed to the NIT, playing Ole Miss in Oxford at 7 p.m. Wednesday. Our thanks to him.

In 2009, Alabama State lost in the NCAA tournament play-in game. This year, zero teams from the state are in the Big Dance. The lone bright spots are Troy and UAB in the National Invitational Tournament. UAB plays at home against Coastal Carolina 7 p.m. Tuesday. Tickets are $15. No broadcast information is available.

The 2009 NIT tourney invited UAB and Auburn, which fired coach Jeff Lebo after 6 years and a 96-93 record.

The NCAA women’s tournament teams will be announced tonight.

Update: No state women’s teams are headed to the NCAA tournament. Instead, Ole Miss will play at Samford in the first round Thursday in the NIT’s first 64-team tourney.

Also: “State of Alabama tosses another NCAA air ball.”

Who’s going to the Big Dance? Not Alabama, nor Auburn, nor UAB.

Instead, the Alabama State Hornets are heading for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Sort of. They play Morehead State on Tuesday in the play-in match for the 64th spot, to face No. 1 Louisville on Friday.

Meanwhile, all’s not lost for other state teams. UAB plays at Notre Dame Tuesday and Tennessee-Martin comes to Auburn Wednesday in first-round NIT action.

Brackets: NCAA | NIT (PDF)

• Birmingham News: Alabama State to tangle with Morehead State in NCAA Tournament

• • •

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The Big Dance starts nationwide Thursday, and eight teams are headed to Birmingham to Step. It. Up. The BJCC Arena will play host to first-round East region games of the men’s NCAA basketball tournament on Friday and Sunday. The matchups:

Friday

• Game A: 2. Tennessee (29-4) vs. 15. American (21-11), 11:15 a.m.
• Game B: 7. Butler (29-3) vs. 10. South Alabama (26-6), 1:45 p.m.
• Game C: 3. Louisville (24-8) vs. 14. Boise State (25-8), 6:10 p.m.
• Game D: 6. Oklahoma (22-11) vs. 11. Saint Joseph’s (21-12), 8:40 p.m.

Sunday

• The winners of Game A and B, 1 p.m.
• The winners of Game C and D, 3:30 p.m.

(Specific times to be updated.)

The South Alabama Jaguars are the sole team in the field of 65 from the state, essentially playing a home game in Birmingham, which last held tourney games in 2003. UAB and Alabama’s men’s teams could be headed to the NIT, to be announced at 8 tonight on ESPN2/ESPNU.

Tickets for the Friday/Sunday games are still available, in three-ticket books at $153 each.

Update: Alabama State (but not Alabama) and UAB are headed to the NIT. Plus, zero Alabama women’s teams headed for the tourney.

Update 2: And the last team headed to post-season? Auburn, playing George Washington in the first round of the ladies’ tourney, 1 p.m. Saturday in Stanford, Calif.
• ESPN: 2008 NCAA tournament selections

• • •

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