The month of March has not recently been kind to the Ohio Valley Conference during the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Currently four teams are vying for the 2003 automatic bid in Nashville and their reward for it will be a contest against one of the best teams in the nation.

“I think if Austin Peay or Morehead get the bid, you’re probably looking at a 15-seed but maybe a 14 is possible,” Eastern head coach Rick Samuels said.

In an interview with ESPN college basketball reporter Andy Katz, he predicted the OVC Tournament champion would get a 15 or 16 seed come Selection Sunday.

“I believe that our conference is better than that except Murray and Tech don’t have that season long credibility,” Samuels said.

Katz expressed his concern with the RPI ranking of mid-major schools affecting the judgment of the NCAA selection committee this March.

“It will probably affect teams like Butler and Southern Illinois but (the committee) needs to use common sense when they select schools,” Katz said.

Katz also mentioned the College of Charleston as a team that may perform an upset during March Madness.

Overall, since the NCAA changed to a 64-team tournament in 1985, the OVC is a combined 3-19 record and hasn’t won a game since 1989.

To find out the first upset by the OVC, all one has to do is travel down Highway 57. In 1987, the 14-seeded Austin Peay Governors shocked the three-seed Illinois Fighting Illini 68-67. Austin Peay went on to be defeated by Providence who was led to the Final Four by current Louisville head coach Rick Pitino.

1987 was also the only year the OVC received an at-large bid as Middle Tennessee State received a 12-seed after they won the regular season title, but lost to Austin Peay in the semi-finals of the OVC Tournament.

The next upset came one year later when 14-seed Murray State defeated three-seed North Carolina State 78-75. The Racers were defeated by Larry Brown’s national championship Kansas team.

1989 made it a three-peat for the OVC when 13th-seeded Middle Tennessee State defeated four-seed Florida State 97-83. The 14-point victory is still the largest margin by an OVC school in an NCAA Tourney.

Historically, the OVC has been defeated by schools that go very far in March Madness. In the last eight years, the OVC has been defeated by a team that reaches at least the Sweet 16, which includes the runner up once and a pair of other Final Four schools.

However, CBS must appreciate the competitive effort OVC schools put into recent first round games. The average margin of defeat is 12 points and the final tally has been less than 10 seven times. In fact, the 1990 Murray State squad became one of the few 16-seed teams to push the top seed to overtime where they eventually fell to Michigan State.

The highest seed the OVC has ever received was in 1998 when Murray State was given a nine-seed and ruined the opportunity by losing 97-74 to eight-seeded Rhode Island.

Eastern has made only a pair of trips to the Big Dance and have lost by an average of 32 points. In 1992, the Panthers won the Mid-Continent Tournament and lost 94-55 to Indiana, which reached the Final Four. Two years ago, Eastern ran into the eventual national runner-up in Arizona and were defeated 101-76.

The possible opponent for the 2003 OVC champion this season isn’t clear, but the leading candidates according to several NCAA Tournament projections to receive a two or three-seed are Kansas (22-6), Oklahoma (20-5), Marquette (22-4), Notre Dame (21-7) and Duke (20-5).

If the OVC can’t upset one of those teams, it will be the 14th straight first round loss for the nation’s eighth oldest conference.