TOURNEY CENTRAL

ST. LOUIS, Mo. – The Loyola University Chicago women's basketball team (15-14, 6-12 MVC) will be the No. 8 seed at next week's Missouri Valley Conference Tournament. The Ramblers will battle ninth-seeded Indiana State (5-25, 3-15 MVC) in Thursday's first opening-round game at 4 p.m. insdie TaxSlayer Center in Moline, Ill.

Missouri State, which clinched its 13th Missouri Valley Conference women's basketball regular-season title and first since 2011-12, has earned the No. 1 seed. The No. 23/21 Lady Bears finished the regular-season with a record of 26-4, 16-2 MVC,. Missouri State will be the top seed in the MVC tournament for the 11th time in program history. 

Drake (14-4 MVC) and Bradley  (13-5 MVC) are the second and third seeds, respectively. The Bulldogs  have won eight of 10 heading into the tournament. Illinois State (11-7 MVC) and UNI (10-8 MVC) earned the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds, respectively. 

This year's tournament - the 13th neutral-site event in the conference's history - begins on Thursday, March 12, at TaxSlayer Center in Moline, Illinois. The top seed has won the conference tournament in 19 of 34 seasons and a team that has won or shared the regular-season title has gone on to win the tournament title 22 times. Top seeds have six runner-up finishes. Teams seeded No. 2 have won the tournament five times and finished as the runner-up 12 times.

The tournament, which features nine games over four days, culminates on Sunday, March 15, with a the title game airing live on ESPN+ at 2:00 p.m. (CT). Both semifinals on Saturday, all four quarterfinals on Friday and the two opening round games on Thursday will also be available live on ESPN+.

Missouri State has won the most MVC Tournament titles, 11, of any Valley school, and will look to repeat next week in Moline. Drake has claimed seven tournament titles.