Though UVM men’s basketball will not participate in the NCAA tournament, they will still take part in the postseason.

The Catamounts will participate in the 2018 National Invitational Tournament and will be the No. 6 seed in their portion of the bracket. They will visit No. 3 seed Middle Tennessee State University.

The Catamounts automatically entered the NIT as a conference regular season champion who did not win their conference tournament.

Middle Tennessee’s exclusion from the NCAA tournament, and subsequent inclusion in the NIT, was seen as highly controversial.

USA Today listed the Blue Raiders as one of the seven biggest snubs from the tournament, as they were omitted from the field of 68 after falling in the Conference USA semifinals to Marshall University.

The two teams have never met, according to UVM athletics.

The game will take place March 13 in Murfreesboro, Tennessee and will be televised on ESPNU.

The winner will face the victor of the game between second-seeded University of Louisville and seventh-seeded Northern Kentucky University.

The NIT was founded in 1938. It is comprised of conference champions and power conference teams that did not qualify for the NCAA tournament.