Big East Tournament 2015: Round 1 Schedule, Live Stream and Bracket Predictions

The Big Apple once again plays host to the 2015 Big East tournament, a can't-miss competition for those doing some all-important NCAA tournament scouting as we descend into the madness that is March.

Five teams from this conference finished with at least 20 wins this season, and Xavier was only just off the the pace with 19 victories of their own. The Big East is one of the deepest conferences in the nation, topped off by a 29-2 Villanova squad, easily one of the best teams in the nation with their kinetic offensive attack (76.7 points per game).

While the Wildcats are clearly the cream of the crop in this conference, they don't get started in the Big East tourney—set to take place at Madison Square Garden in New York City—until Thursday.

Wednesday's action is all about Round 1, where four teams from the conference's underclass compete for the right to face the Big East's heavy hitters and maybe, just maybe, spark up a little Cinderella run and shake up the bracketologists before Selection Sunday.

Here's everything you need to know to catch the first-round action.


Round 1 Schedule

Wednesday, March 11	Matchup	Time (ET)	Network
Game 1	Seton Hall vs. Marquette	7 p.m.	Fox Sports 1
Game 2	DePaul vs. Creighton	9:30 p.m.	Fox Sports 1

Live Stream

Fox Sports programming can be streamed online at Fox Sports Go.

No. 8 Seton Hall (16-14, 6-12 Big East) vs. No. 9 Marquette (12-18, 4-14 Big East)

Nati Harnik/Associated Press

It's not often that you find a program with a rich basketball history like Marquette scrapping on the first day of a conference tourney, but letdowns are a hazard when a good coach leaves a program.

Buzz Williams left Marquette for Virginia Tech before the start of this campaign after six seasons and a .668 winning percentage in Milwaukee. First-time head coach Steve Wojciechowski took the reins after spending several years as an assistant on Mike Krzyzewski's staff at Duke. Suffice it to say, he hasn't had Coach K-like results.

After a decent 10-6 start to the season, the Golden Eagles went into a tailspin, losing 12 of their last 14 contests. Those 12 games came in the form of two six-game losing streaks, runs of futility that came on either side of a 57-54 victory on Feb. 7 against—well isn't this convenient—Seton Hall.

Darren Hauck/Associated Press

Seton Hall was college basketball's darling in the early going with a 9-1 start to the season, but they too have struggled in conference play, winning just six games against Big East foes and losing eight of their final 10 regular-season contests. They did notch a satisfying win over powerhouse Villanova on Jan. 3, but the Wildcats have since avenged that loss with an 80-54 drubbing of the Pirates in February.

Seton Hall is led by junior guard Sterling Gibbs, who is averaging 16.7 points and 3.8 assists per game, and freshman guard Isaiah Whitehead. The latter's performance could be particularly key to Seton Hall's tournament hopes, as NJ.com's Maria Guardado noted the team has suffered without him on the court:

"

At first, the Pirates seemed to hold their own in Whitehead's absence. Seton Hall went on to upset then-No. 15 St. John's and No. 6 Villanova and climbed to as high as No. 19 in the national rankings -- all with its star freshman on the bench.

But following the win over 'Nova, the Pirates proceeded to drop four of their next six games and seemed to badly need Whitehead back on the floor. When the rookie finally rejoined the team on Jan. 31 against Xavier, he showed what a difference maker he can be, pouring in 19 points, four rebounds, three steals and three assists to helplead Seton Hall to a 90-82 win.

"

This is a matchup of the downtrodden, two programs yearning for bygone days—and for Seton Hall, that means only going back as far as November and December. Look for Gibbs and Whitehead to step up as Seton Hall puts Marquette out of its misery in this one.

Prediction: Seton Hall 66, Marquette 57 

No. 7 DePaul (12-19, 6-12 Big East) vs. No. 10 Creighton (13-18, 4-14 Big East)

Nati Harnik/Associated Press

One team will be left seeing red after the DePaul Blue Demons take on the Creighton Bluejays in what should be a competitive first-round Big East matchup.

DePaul, like Marquette and Seton Hall, has also suffered through a late-season swoon. The Blue Demons have lost 10 of their final 11 contests, with the lone win in that span coming against the Pirates on Feb. 3.

Despite the awful run of form, DePaul head coach Oliver Purnell believes the team can surprise some folks in this month of madness, and need only to look to past results within their own conference for inspiration.

“Every March there are four or five teams that get hot around conference tournament time,” said Purnell, per Steven Pivovar of the Omaha World-Herald. “Last year, Seton Hall won a couple of games in New York, and Providence won the whole thing."

Nam Y. Huh/Associated Press

However Pivovar noted the team's problems run deep: "DePaul ranks last in the Big East in rebounding margin (minus-5.4). The Blue Demons also are last in scoring defense (73.4 points per game) and field-goal percentage defense (.459)."

On the surface, Creighton's record doesn't look any better, but the Bluejays managed to recover somewhat from an atrocious late-December-January stretch to win four of their final 10 games.

Creighton lacks an explosive go-to player on offense—senior guard Austin Chatman is the only player averaging double figures at 11.6 points per game—and the team as a whole shoots just 41.7 percent from the field, 271st in the nation. Still, DePaul's defense and rebounding woes are nothing to brag about, so look for the Bluejays to snatch a victory here and advance to the tournament quarterfinals.

Prediction: Creighton 54, DePaul 50