Mississippi State men’s basketball earns NIT bid

STARKVILLE, Miss. — The Mississippi State men’s basketball team earned a No. 4 seed in the 83rd National Invitation Tournament to be held in the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area. The 16-team tournament begins Wednesday.

The Bulldogs (15-14, 8-10 SEC) will face the top-seeded Saint Louis Billikens (14-6, 6-4 A-10) on Saturday at 4 p.m. CT inside Comerica Center in Frisco, Texas. The game will air on ESPN.

MSU fell to top-seeded and No. 6 Alabama 85-48 on Friday in a Southeastern Conference Tournament quarterfinal game. Saint Louis fell 71-53 to St. Bonaventure in the semifinals of the Atlantic 10 Conference tourney on March 6.

This will be MSU’s 10th time playing in the NIT. The Bulldogs last played in it in 2018 when they lost 75-60 to Penn State in the semifinals.

The winner of the MSU-Saint Louis matchup will play the winner of the Richmond-Toledo matchup on March 25. The championship game will be played Sunday, March 28, at 11 a.m. CT on ESPN.