Marquette is dancing again

Marquette just earned it's 24th NCAA bid in our history and the 39th post season bid overall (that's 9th best in NCAA history).

Marquette received a 7 seed and will play 10th seeded Alabama in the first round. If Marquette wins, we might play UCLA in the second round. The game is in San Diego and yours truly will be there hard to cheer on the Golden Eagles.

The Alabama Crimson Tide enter the tournament with a record of 17-12. The Tide fell to the Kentucky Wildcats in the quarterfinals of the SEC tournmament last week.

We'll go inside the matchups later this week, but in the interim here's a few useful links:

- The official Bama men's basketball site.
- A personal profile of Ronald Steele, the Tide's talented sophomore PG.
- Alabama's Scout.com site covers the NCAA first round matchup here.

Common Opponents (Winthrop, Notre Dame, South Carolina):
-- Here is a recap of Bama's loss at home to Notre Dame back in December. The Irish topped the Tide 78-71.

-- Here is a recap of Bama's win over Winthrop back in December. The Tide rolled 60-57.

-- Here is a recap of the Tide's road loss at South Carolina. The Gamecocks won that battle 67-56 behind Renaldo Balkman's 28 points and 16 boards.

**Marquette went 3-1 against these same common opponents (two wins against the Irish, a loss to Winthrop in Milwaukee, and a victory over the Gamecocks at the GAS).