Take out the BYU/CSU game from todays MWC tournament and you have yourself 3 of the most intense college basketball games thus far in championship week - and I'm talking all conferences.

San Diego St. just about blew a nice lead that they had built up for themselves in the first half by scoring just two field goals in the last 16:07 of the second half. But in the end the Las Vegas native Lorenzo Wade came up with the big free throws needed to seal the victory for the Aztecs.

The Aztecs now get a shot at the 1st place BYU Cougars tomorrow in semi final action. The Aztecs are the last team to beat the Cougars, as SDSU dismissed them on their home floor a couple weeks ago. Earlier in the year the Aztecs had a close game with the Cougars in the dreaded Marriot Center losing by just three points. It goes to show that the Aztecs are more than capable of knocking the top ranked Cougars out of the tournament tommorow evening. If they want to pull it off though, they will have to make more than two feild goals in the last 16 minutes. But my guess is that they will. As I said two days ago to Cougar fans on this very Blog, "Beware of the Aztecs!"

When a team goes 17-23 from the three point line in a game they usually win. But even with those odds Vegas still took the TCU Horned Frogs for all they had in their short stay. TCU didn't play like they were the number 7 seed playing the number 2 seeded team on their home court where they boasted a 21 game conference win streak. Rather, they assumed they had just as good of a chance to make it to the NCAA tournament than any other team playing that day. To them, it was just the first obstacle on their road to the dance, and that attitude almost gave them enough fuel to knock off my Runnin Rebels in the quarterfinals of the MWC tournament. If it wasn't for Wink Adams the rebels would be sitting on a real tight bubble right now, but now they are in a good position for an at-large bid into the NCAA tournament.

Tomorrow brings another challenge for the Rebels, and they will be expecting it this time, as they square off against the Runnin Utes and 7"1 Luke Nevill from the University of Utah. The Utes were able to pull off an overtime thriller against the New Mexico Lobos earlier today and will be looking to take advantage of another undersized team tomorrow. The Rebels and Utes split this year series with each team winning on their home floors, and that might just be the difference in tomorrow's game. The Rebels main focus will be to try to slow down Nevill as he brings in his 5 inch advantage over the tallest Rebel. It will take hard nosed defense and good excecution on offense, but the Rebels are more than capable of beating the Runnin Utes tomorrow. And of course, I predict they will.

So we'll see how it turns out, but I'm going to say to expect a UNLV/San Diego St. championship game this Saturday.