The gym and facilities here in Bartlesville are as advertised. Great atmosphere for a game here, and while the crowd for the first game isn’t huge, it is making a fair amount of noise, which is great.

I’ve successfully raided the media room for every media guide I was previously missing, and also managed to get my hands on the media guide put together for the tournament. If you get a chance to get down here, track one down. The thing is full-color and full of great stuff. The folks at the LSC and Bartlesville, once again, doing an outstanding job.

And a note for the Abilene folks: I caught up with former local sports anchor Cayden McFarland, now working in Tulsa. He’s loving the new gig, he said, as is his wife. Look for his Game 1 highlights to show up on KRBC and KTAB tonight.

ACU vs. Southwestern

The Wildcat are hot on both ends of the floor right now, and some big defensive stops have helped ACU get off to an incredible start. A 15-point run has put the Cats in control and, with 11 minutes to play in the first half, they lead 25-12.

The Wildcat lead at the break is 15, 47-32.

The Bulldogs have finally started hitting their shots, but coming back from a double-digit deficit against ACU will be tough. ACU is the best-shooting team in the conference, coming in hitting 51.2 percent of its shots from the floor. Southwestern, meanwhile, is seventh in the LSC with a 44.8 percent average. That’s about what it hit from in the first half today (44.4) but ACU is hot at 57.1 percent and doesn’t look like it will slow down any time soon.

Leading the Wildcats in the first half was Cam Holson, who scored 12 and gave ACU a possession that led to another basket when he laid out for a loose ball on the sideline, swinging the ball back to teammate Corwin Ragland. SWOSU, meanwhile, got 9 from Kendall Smith in the first 20 minutes.

One stat of note: ACU outrebounded Southwestern 18-10 in the first half.

A pair of Nate Perry free throws an ACU turnover and a Kendall Smith 3-pointer from the corner have pulled Southwestern to within eight in the opening minutes of the second half, and the Bulldogs are playing much better right now.

ACU has regained a double-digit lead, and a 3-pointer from Dejan Sencanski with 9:25 to go has made it a 68-53 Wildcat lead.

Kendall Smith is trying to win this one on his own for Southwestern. He's come in off the bench and hit 7 of 8 3-pointers, and with 3:40 to play ACU's lead is down to six, 80-74.

WIth 3.7 seconds to play Nate Perry hits a clutch jumper in traffic to tie the game and we're now in overtime, with the momentum clearly in the Bulldogs' favor.

I promise I'll catch you up as soon as I catch up, but SWOSU tied it up again with a long three and ACU missed a 3 on the final shot. We're in double OT.

ACU wins ... update soon.

This one, in the end, was all attrition. Five Southwestern players had fouled out by the time the second overtime was just underway and the Bulldogs just didn't have any offensive firepower left on the floor. It led to a 10-point run for ACU to close it out.

“They had lost four straight and then it was funny how their films changed," Southwestern coach Todd Thurman said of ACU. "They went away from their motions as much and started going to their ball screen and attack and letting Corwin (Ragland) drive the lane. They found their niche. We tried really hard to work against it, but they worked it really well. They were scoring a high amount of points and we tried to slim it down. I thought we did a better job in the second half, but obviously the first half is what killed us.”

SWOSU will now have to sit and wait to see if it will make it into the regional tournament. The Bulldogs were seventh coming in, so they may be able to hang onto that No. 8 spot if there are no surprise winners in any of the conference tournaments that would give an automatic berth to a team not otherwise ranked in the top eight.

(WT's just been upset and Tarleton is about 45 minutes away .... stay tuned.)

Tarleton vs. Northeastern State

Fueled by a strong presence down low, Tarleton jumped out to a quick 11-5 lead but it seems to have gotten away from pounding it in the post. The Texans are low letting loose jumpers and 3-pointers, failling to get the offensive board. Northeastern's taken advantage, and now leads 18-13 with 8 minutes left in the half.

Tarleton has just two offensive rebounds, compared to Northeastern's nine defensive boards.

The Texans settled down through the last minutes of the first half, but with one tenth of a second to play Aaron Arango knocked down a shot on the run, getting fouled in the process. He hit on the free throw, and Northeastern has a 33-28 lead at the break.

Northeastern's winning the boards (33-28) and is ahead in the 3-point game (4 of 9 to Tarleton's 1 of 6). Terrence Gamble's got 11 for the Texans, while Arango's got 11 for Northeastern.

Tarleton's back to playing the way most expected they would, scoring the first nine points of the second half to pull ahead 37-33 with 16:20 to play, forcing a Northeastern timeout.

This one looks like it could go to the wire. Tarleton is clearly the better team in the post, but Northeastern continues to hit big baskets and just enough 3s to keep in it. with 8:30 to play it's a 51-47 Tarleton lead. Gamble's got 20 and Eric Williams has scored 14 for TSU.

The RiverHawks are imprssing me, finding ways to stay in this thing. But a 3-pointer from Avery Patterson just made the Texans’ lead four with 2:17 to play.

It's a two-point game, Tarleton ball, 53.7 seconds to play.

Two-point game again with 26 to go after Arango hit a pair from the line.

OK ... the update on the finish.

The RiverHawks put Mike Daniels on the line and he missed the front end of a 1-and-1, and after he missed on the front end Arango let go a rainbow 3 from the top of the key with 9.2 seconds to play. The shot fell straight through. And when Tarleton called a timeout with 4.6 seconds to play, it looked like this one was probably over.

But when the Texans threw in the inbounds pass, Northeastern’s Ricky Branham was whistled for a foul, putting Daniels back on the line. This time he hit both and, when Arango’s running jumper went off the mark, the game was over.

It was a foul - as Tarleton coach Lonn Reisman said following the game -- but I'm not sure it was the best time to call that foul. They'd been letting that sort of close-quarters contact go all day. Deciding to call it with 3.4 seconds left? I dunno. Seems a bit tacky to me, and I feel for Northeastern. Those guys probably deserved to win that one -- or at least deserved to contest a final Tarleton shot rather than watch a pair of free throws.