The wonderful month of March is finally here.

And after spending the weekend in St. Louis watching six Missouri Valley Conference men’s basketball games in the span of 36 hours, this writer is ready for the real Madness to begin.

But first, let’s examine Eastern’s not-so-wonderful conference, the Ohio Valley, against the conference that has set the precedent for all mid-majors to follow, the MVC.

The MVC likes to refer to itself as the best non-BCS basketball conference in the nation – which it is.

Fan attention and media scrutiny is at an all-time high in the MVC, with 22,612 coming to watch Saturday’s semifinals. It was also the largest crowd ever to witness a college basketball game at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis.

And while there were some empty seats scattered among the Scottrade Center, signs plastered to the front of the arena an hour before the 1:35 p.m. tip-off of the Bradley-Southern Illinois game indicated the event is sold out.

And this was for the semifinals.

Compare that to the OVC championship game on Saturday night at Gaylord Entertainment Center in Nashville, Tenn., an arena (17,000-seat capacity) comparable in size to the Scottrade Center.

Only 3,652 attended the championship in Nashville.

But a big question could be: why can’t the OVC duplicate the success the MVC has had recently?

The MVC, according to realtimerpi.com, is sixth out of 32 conferences in the RPI ratings – one spot ahead of the Big 12.

The OVC is 24th, below conferences like the Metro Atlantic Athletic, the Mid-Continent, the Ivy League and the Patriot League.

Factors going into the RPI ratings include a team’s record and its strength of schedule. Of all 11 OVC schools, only one (Samford at 190), had strength of schedules below 200. Eastern’s was the only one above 300 (at 301 out of 336 Division I teams).

The MVC, however, had all its teams in the top 100 in terms of strength of schedule, with Creighton having the 17th most difficult schedule in the nation.

A decade ago, the MVC was in the same position the OVC is in now. Usually only one dominating team, only one team advancing to the NCAA Tournament, average attendance numbers for the conference tournament and no national attention.

Now, the MVC is booming, with sold-out arenas watching games, national television exposure, and most importantly, actually winning important games.

Bradley and Wichita State advanced to the Sweet 16 last year, and every MVC team that gets in this year (three, should be four), has a chance to reach the Final Four.

Eastern Kentucky, who earned OVC’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament this year, is a well-coached and intelligent team under second-year head coach Jeff Neubauer.

-For more coverage from the St. Louis Post Dispatch click here.