ITHACA, N.Y. -- It's fairly simple now, really. A win and a Brown loss to Yale and the Cornell men's basketball team will be part of Ivy Madness.

But the waiting game.

Ugggghhhhh.

The Big Red will welcome Columbia to Newman Arena for a 2 p.m. Saturday tip on Senior Day, then potentially wait until approximately 9:30 for the completion of the Yale-Brown game to see if its season is still alive. 

That is, if it can beat a team that owns a win over first-place Yale, which is far from a given. Because otherwise it will be all over around 4 p.m.

By the end of Saturday, either Cornell or Brown will join Penn, Princeton and Yale (in some order) in competing for the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament when the games kick off at Jadwin Gymnasium on Saturday, March 11 at 11 a.m. The final entrant will be locked into the fourth seed and will play the No. 1 seed, either Yale (with a win) or the winner of the Penn-Princeton game, in one semifinal on ESPNU.

Cornell is attempting to earn its third Ivy League Tournament appearance in program history after dropping contests in both 2018 (to No. 1 seed Harvard) and 2022 (to No. 1 seed Princeton), and again will need to earn it. No backing in for the Big Red.

In 2018, the Big Red gathered around their cell phones in the locker room in Dartmouth's Leede Arena, watching an errant Princeton shot in the final seconds of overtime. Cornell's win that evening against the Big Green, coupled with Columbia's loss at Harvard and the Tigers' defeat at Yale, propelled the Big Red into its first-ever tournament.

In 2022, Cornell won its final two games of the season, including a Senior Day victory over league-leading Yale, to earn the fourth spot in the tournament over Harvard.

Prior to tip-off on Saturday, the Big Red will honor seniors Greg Dolan, Marcus Filien and Chuks Uzoka for their contributions and commitment to the program.