12 p.m. — (9) Kent State at (8) OHIO (MAC Sports Live Feed)
Kent State might be the most fascinating team of these lower eight seeds ... and two other teams got in a huge brawl earlier this season. Legendary coach Bob Lindsey has guided this extremely inexperienced team to a 6-20 overall record but 5-11 in the conference, earning them the "best" first-round road seed. It's about as good as he could've hoped given their start, but OHIO ought to have enough experience, led by Tenishia Benson, to move on.
Pick: OHIO
2 p.m. — (12) Ball State at (5) Central Michigan (MAC Sports Live Feed)
The glimmer of hope BSU has is that one of their rare nonconference wins was at home to the Chippewas, but unfortunately this game is in Mount Pleasant and CMU has been on a roll since that puzzling loss to the bottom seed. I have to think that CMU got in a terrible funk after getting in a slugfest with OHIO, having multiple starters suspended multiple games, but they're back on their high-tempo, high-energy horse and should roll into Cleveland.
Pick: CMU
2 p.m. — (11) Buffalo at (6) Akron (MAC Sports Live Feed)
It's been a rough hangover year for the Bulls after enjoying the services of Kourtney Brown, and even though Brittany Hedderson's scoring lines have resembled Brown's, but the forward play cannot be replaced and UB doesn't have much else going for them. Akron seems to be a team that passes well and always finds the open woman on offense.
Pick: Akron
4:05 p.m — (10) Western Michigan at (7) Northern Illinois (MAC Sports Live Feed)
Rarely do we see upsets in the first round. But just two days ago the WMU Broncos upset NIU in the Convo. We saw it with our own two eyes (assuming you're like me and actually watched the game on the Internet feed) so picking the upset is a very real thing that can happen.
Pick: WMU