With both No. 15 Cincinnati (26-5) and No. 11 Louisville (26-5) finishing 15-3 in American Athletic Conference play, the two programs will share the first regular season conference title. But the task of figuring out which team would claim the top seed in next week’s conference tournament was a complicated one, with both teams going 4-2 against the three teams (SMU, UConn and Memphis) tied for third and undefeated against the rest of the conference.
And with Memphis beating SMU earlier Saturday, the tie would be broken through use of the simplest method of them all: the coin flip. In the video above, complete with referees, CBS analyst Bill Raftery and other league officials in attendance and Cincinnati head coach Mick Cronin on the cell phone, Cincinnati wins the flip when the coin comes up “heads.”
But did the Bearcats land a tougher path to the title game as a result? Cincinnati will open with the winner of Wednesday’s first-round game between UCF and Temple, which they should be able to handle. But a possible semifinal matchup with either UConn, who beat the Bearcats in Hartford last month, or host Memphis awaits. Louisville, on the other hand, should enjoy the crowd advantage against the winner of Rutgers/USF and possibly SMU in the semis.
Video credit: Jody Demling (Cardinal Authority)