Charlotte lost to Richmond despite shooting 53.8 percent from the field. That is no small accomplishment. SLU will head to North Carolina to face a team that has lost three straight by a combined seven points. I predict a close game on Saturday night. The slump has sent the 49ers into a tie for 9th and right now, with tiebreakers, they would be the 11 seed.

Richmond, meanwhile, is tied for second in the A-10 after being picked to finish 12th in the preseason. (We might have missed that one.) It is conceivable that by Saturday afternoon, Richmond will be alone in second.

Temple’s Mark Tyndale had a big game at St. Bonaventure as the Owls kept pace with Richmond. The Bonnies are real close to being eliminated from the conference tournament race.

Which reminds me that after the game last night, Majerus said “… if we’re lucky enough to make the conference tournament.” It’s still not official, but the potential scenarios for SLU not to go are getting pretty small. George Washington still has to play Richmond, Rhode Island and Xavier.

Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Ray Parrillo muses on how much St. Joe’s loss to La Salle will hurt them come tournament selection time. If St. Joe’s doesn’t make it, it would be the first time since 1976-77 that a Big Five team didn’t make it. (For the unitiated, the Big Five is St. Joe’s, La Salle, Temple, Villanova and Penn.)

Here’s an interesting stat courtesy Doug Harris of the Dayton Daily News, the A-10’s most prolific writer: In the past three games, Dayton players other than Brian Roberts are 23 of 51 on free throws. Which must really simplify the opposing team’s question of who to foul in the last minute.

There are two big games in the A-10 tonight, with 6-5 Rhode Island hosting 5-6 UMass on ESPN2 and 5-5 La Salle facing 5-6 Dayton in Philadelphia. If Rhody loses, I may have to reassess my feelings on their tournament hopes. And check this out: if Duquesne loses to Xavier, Rhode Island loses to UMass and La Salle loses to Dayton — none of which are impossibilities, though the parlay is tough – at 6-6 SLU would be tied for fifth in the league. Duquesne, Rhody, SLU, Dayton and UMass would all be 6-6.

Which might be a good time to review league tiebreakers. First is head to head, though this league doesn’t look to have many two-way ties. If the teams split, then you would go to who beat the best team in the league. Temple, with the league’s only win over Xavier, would have an edge over anybody else, for instance. 

In a three or more team tie, you look at the tied teams as a mini-league. For instance, right now Dayton, UMass and Charlotte are all 5-6. Dayton lost to UMass and beat Charlotte, so they’re 1-1. UMass beat Dayton and Charlotte, so they’re 2-0. Charlotte, if you were paying attention, then is 0-2. So UMass gets the higher seed, then Dayton, then Charlotte. If everybody was 1-1 or even at some other record, you would go to results against the best team in the league and work down. And once you get to having two teams left, you then go to the two-team tiebreaker.

And since teams don’t play everybody the same number of times, if a team is 2-0 against one team and another is 1-0, the 2-0 team wins. 0-1 is better than 0-2.

SLU’s RPI is back under 100 this morning at 99. That’s good news for the schools SLU has lost to, as it helps their record against top 100 teams. SLU’s record against top 100 teams is 5-9.