Ohio looks to get its first postseason win Thursday night against Marshall in The Convo.
Coach Bob Boldon didn’t watch the NCAA Selection Show on Monday night.
“I walked in as they put that we were the in first four out,” Boldon said. “That was the only part of the Selection Show I saw.”
That moment was like reopening a wound for Boldon. He said he started thinking back at how, if his team had beaten Buffalo just one of the three times — in the tournament or not — the Bobcats would have gotten a bid in the NCAA Tournament.
Instead, his team will face Marshall in the first round of the Women’s National Invitational Tournament at 7 p.m. Thursday in The Convo.
Hosting a home game is something Boldon is excited to do.
“I think it’s great,” he said. “I vote for all (our) postseason games to be in The Convo.”
A game inside The Convo is what the Bobcats need to rejuvenate them following a third conference loss to Buffalo. The team only lost once inside The Convo this season (against Buffalo), and it will be good for the team to not have to worry about traveling back-to-back weeks.
If Ohio were to be on the road, it would be ideal for it to be in the NCAA Tournament. And senior guard Kiyanna Black has tried to look at the positives of being in the Women’s National Invitational Tournament.
“It’s nice to know that we can do things that no one at this school has done even though we didn’t meet our goal from the beginning of the season," Black said.
Ohio has never won an postseason game other than in the Mid-American Conference Tournament.
For Boldon, he didn’t even realize the program hasn’t won a postseason game.
“I had no idea that (the program) didn’t have a postseason win,” he said. “But now that you say it, it sounds pretty cool.”
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And having the opportunity to get that first win in the Women’s National Invitational Tournament is good for the program.
Boldon said earlier in the season he didn’t see Ohio as an at-large team, yet the Bobcats were one of the first four teams out of the NCAA Tournament.
Boldon is proud of the success of the program so far in his three years at Ohio. He said competing in the Women’s National Invitational Tournament will be good for the program because a run in it would start to get Ohio and even the MAC the exposure they are starting to deserve.
Though things didn’t necessarily work out the way the team anticipated this season, Boldon realizes that playing in the postseason tournament is not all that bad, and he is trying to reiterate that to his team.
“We go to a lot of other schools and see that they have NIT banners in the rafters and we don’t,” Boldon said. “So the fact that we get to do that is about building the program, laying a foundation for your underclassmen, and I think we are doing that.”
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