The 2011

Big East men's basketball tournament The Big East men's basketball tournament is the championship tournament of the Big East Conference in men's basketball. The winner receives the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship. As part of the 2013 ...

, a part of the

2010-11 NCAA Division I men's basketball season 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1 ...

, took place from March 8–12, 2011 at

Madison Square Garden Madison Square Garden, colloquially known as The Garden or by its initials MSG, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in New York City. It is located in Midtown Manhattan between Seventh and Eighth avenues from 31st to 33rd Street, above Pennsylva ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. This was the third Big East tournament to include all 16 of the conference's teams. The teams finishing 9 through 16 in the regular season standings played first round games, while teams 5 through 8 received byes to the second round. The top 4 teams during the regular season received double-byes to the quarterfinals. The tournament was won by

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...

, their seventh title, tying Georgetown for the most championships in Big East Men's Basketball Tournament history. Connecticut guard

Kemba Walker Kemba Hudley Walker (born May 8, 1990) is an American professional basketball player for the Dallas Mavericks of the National Basketball Association (NBA). Walker was picked ninth overall by the Charlotte Bobcats in the 2011 NBA draft. After gra ...

was named the tournament

MVP In team sports, a most valuable player award, abbreviated 'MVP award', is an honor typically bestowed upon an individual (or individuals, in the instance of a tie) whose individual performance is the greatest in an entire league, for a particu ...

Seeds

Bracket

Championship game

* Denotes Overtime Game

Rutgers–St. John's controversy

*In a controversial finish to a second round game, St. John's defeated

Rutgers Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was a ...

, 65–63, allowing the Red Storm to advance to the quarterfinals for the first time since 2003."St. John's holds on to beat Rutgers in Big East tournament second round"
ESPN.com. Published 2011-03-09. Retrieved 2011-03-09. The final seconds of the game were heavily criticized by analysts, including the live

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

crew, for a lack of officiating that appeared to hinder the Scarlet Knights' late rally, including two uncalled personal fouls against Red Storm players, and an incident in which St. John's forward Justin Brownlee appeared to prematurely celebrate by

traveling Travel is the movement of people between distant geographical locations. Travel can be done by foot, bicycle, automobile, train, boat, bus, airplane, ship or other means, with or without luggage, and can be one way or round trip. Travel can ...

, stepping out of bounds, and throwing the ball into the stands with more than a second remaining in the game."Spotlight glares at officials after blunder in Big East tournament"

USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...

. Published 2011-03-09. Retrieved 2011-03-09. Rutgers' head coach

Mike Rice Jr. Michael Thomas Rice Jr. (born February 13, 1969) is an American college basketball coach, formerly the head men's basketball coach at Robert Morris University and later Rutgers University. He is the son of former college basketball coach and Port ...

could be seen screaming frantically for an explanation for the missed calls, while officials Jim Burr, Tim Higgins and Earl Walton had already left the court. At end of the game,

analyst

Doris Burke Doris Burke ( Sable) is an American sports announcer and analyst for NBA on ESPN, NBA on ABC, College Basketball on ESPN, and College Basketball on ABC games. She formerly worked as an analyst for WNBA games on MSG, and has worked on New York Kn ...

was quoted as saying, "this was the bizarrest ending of a game I've ever seen," and in a later post-game analysis that "the officials won't sleep tonight.""NCAAM: Rutgers vs #18 St. John's (Second Round)"
ESPN.com. Retrieved 2011-03-09."Controversial End To St. John's-Rutgers"
ESPN.com. Retrieved 2011-03-09. Analyst

Fran Fraschilla Francis John Fraschilla (born August 30, 1958) is an American basketball commentator and former college basketball coach. Career Fraschilla was an assistant coach at University of Rhode Island for Jack Kraft, Ohio University for Danny Nee and Bi ...

also added that the officiating "crew lost its composure." Following the game, the head of the NCAA's officiating arm, John Adams, who is in charge of selecting 98 officials for the NCAA tournament, called the lack of officiating "unacceptable," but would still consider the overall body of work of each official throughout the season to determine whether or not they would be invited to the tournament."Ref head: St. John's end 'unacceptable'"
ESPN.com. Published 2011-03-09. Retrieved 2011-03-09. Big East

commissioner A commissioner (commonly abbreviated as Comm'r) is, in principle, a member of a commission or an individual who has been given a commission (official charge or authority to do something). In practice, the title of commissioner has evolved to in ...

John Marinatto released a statement acknowledging "two separate officiating errors" that occurred at the end of the game, but conceded that "neither error is reviewable or correctable under NCAA playing rules." The following day, the conference announced that all three officials had voluntarily withdrawn themselves from the remainder of the tournament, which was, according to Marinatto, "in the best interests of everyone involved — including coaches, student-athletes, game officials and Big East member institutions.""Officials withdraw from Big East tourney "
ESPN.com. Published 2011-03-10. Retrieved 2011-03-10.

References

External links

* {{2011 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament navbox

Tournament A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concentr ...

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