The College Hardwood

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Mason Will Win

Patriots are about to go 7-1 in conference. 84-68 Mason with 1:08 left in the game. More later.

Mason Goes Long

Cam Long has 23 points for the Patriots. Mason up 67-54 with 7:52 left.

Mason Up Fourteen

Patriots up 51-37 with 15:30 left. Ryan Pearson was having Halil Kanacevic for lunch. Greg Washington is now guarding Pearson.

Mason Up Eight at Half

38-30 Patriots at halftime. If I had a dollar for every time Hofstra had the ball to end the half with the shot clock off and started their play with 7 seconds on the clock, I could retire tomorrow.

Mason Up Seven

33-26 with 3;35 left in the first half. Cam Long has 10 points.

Mason Up Three

Patriots 22-19 with 8:08 left in the first half.

Mason Up Two

GMU 13-11 14:46 left first half. Mason has hit three 3 pointers, while Hofstra is scoring their points inside.

Tonight it's George Mason vs. Hofstra live from the Mack, being televised nationally on ESPNU. Mason looks to remain in a first place tie in the CAA while Hofstra tries to take its first step back to .500 with a win tonight. The Patriots defeated the Pride earlier this month 67-63. As per usual, I will be blogging and tweeting with live updates.

The Iona Lady Gaels won their fifth game in a row on Monday, downing St. Peter's 61-45 at the Hynes Center in New Rochelle. Thazina Cook, who was named MAAC player of the week, scored 24 points on 9 of 11 shooting. With the win, the Lady Gaels are now over .500 on the season at 9-8 and are now in sole possession of second place in the MAAC with a 5-1 conference record. The win steak coincides with Cook's return to the lineup. Over the current five game win streak, the preseason All First Team MAAC player has shot 31 of 59 from the field and averaged over 18 points per game. The Lady Gaels play three of their next four games at home before a critical three game road trip that starts with first place Marist.

And remember, after the 7pm Mason-Hofstra game on ESPNU, at 9pm, it's nationally ranked Northern Iowa traveling to Wichita State. Should be a dandy.

Monday, January 18, 2010

Mid Majors Baker's Dozen for January 18, 2009

It's time again for the Mid Majors Baker's Dozen. The tastiest thirteen teams in the mid majors. And remember it's A-10 free.

1) Northern Iowa (16-1, 7-0 MVC). The Panthers have hit the national rankings and just in time for tomorrow night's showdown at Wichita State (which follows George Mason vs. Hofstra on ESPNU, so I have to race home from the Mack and catch the game). A battle between the two best scoring defensive teams in the Valley. And the Panthers have their work cut out against the number one scoring team in the Valley in Wichita State. A win tomorrow night against the Shockers, and Northern Iowa will have a three game lead in the Valley. I think Adam Koch and Jordan Eglseder lead the Panthers to victory.

2) Gonzaga (14-3, 4-0 WCC). A great week with three road victories, including two over their main competitors in the West Coast Conference, Portland and St Mary's. Their first conference home game is Thursday vs. Pepperdine, the unlikely team they are tied for first in the conference. Elias Harris is the real deal folks. The key stretch for the Zags - over a week span in February they play Portland, then at Memphis, then home to St Mary's. With how weak the Pac10 is and the Mountain West coming back down to earth, don't be surprised if the Zags get a #3 seed in the West Regional come NCAA tournament time.

3) Butler (14-4, 7-0 Horizon). A two game lead in the Horizon for the Bulldogs. But a four game conference road trip awaits starting at 12-5 Loyola on Thursday. I noted last week in a post that because Matt Howard hasn't played well this year, the Bulldogs are vulnerable. So a reader decided to post a comment saying how vulnerable they are by linking to Ken Pomeroy's site. I know Pomeroy's site well, and I didn't say Butler wasn't good, because they certainly are good. Vulnerable means having a weakness, which in this case has been Howard not playing up to his level this season. But the 22 point effort vs. Youngstown State might be the start to fixing that weakness.

4) William and Mary (13-3, 6-1 CAA). The Mary have really picked up their play since a surprising last second loss vs UNCW. Four wins in a row, including an impressive 25 point road beatdown of Drexel the second Saturday in January. Forward Steven Hess has given the Tribe an inside scoring presence. In the last five games, Hess is 21 of 26 from the field, averaging 10 points per game, with three double figure scoring games. That may not seem like a lot, but in the eleven games prior, Hess had no double figure scoring games. This week is huge for the Mary -road game at VCU on Wednesday, followed by a home game vs. ODU on Saturday. Win two here and the media bandwagon gets even bigger.

5) Cornell (15-3, 1-0 Ivy) - The Big Red almost bagged their biggest road trophy of the season several days ago. For 39 minutes, they had the Jayhawks on the ropes at Allen Fieldhouse before the Jayhawks rallied at the end. Ryan Wittman, Jeff Foote and company got the ultimate respect of Jayhawks coach Bill Self, All American guard Sherron Collins and the rest of the Kansas team. After the non-conference schedule Cornell has had, the Ivy will seem like a welcome change. After the weekend road game vs. Columbia, it's four straight home games, including the January 30 showdown with fellow Baker's Dozen member Harvard.

6) Old Dominion (14-5, 6-1 CAA) - The Monarchs are on a roll. Five wins a row and in their last three games, one of the best scoring defensive teams in the country has only given up an average of 48.5 points per game. ODU's law firm of Finney, Hassell and Lee have helped the Monarchs lead the CAA in scoring margin (more than 11 points per game), rebounding margin, turnover margin and second in field goal percentage defense. Offensively, the Monarchs make up for their terrible three point shooting (29.6 percent which is tied for ninth) by being first in in the CAA in assists and second to assist to turnover ratio (William and Mary is first, which again reinforces the most important stat is assist to turnover ratio). The Saturday road game at the Mary is huge.

7) Siena (14-4, 7-0 MAAC) - After losing at Northern Iowa, the Saints have reeled off eight straight wins, average margin of victory nearly 15 points per game. Siena has four scorers in double figures, led by Edwin Ubliles nearly 16 points per game, while Clarence Jackson and Alex Franklin nearly average 15 per game. In the "Scary Stat of the Week" award, in their last two games, Siena has shot 19 of 37 from beyond the arc. Siena averages 77 points per game. With two straight home games coming up, Siena should be 9-0 before their three game road trip.

8) St Mary's (16-3, 3-1 WCC) - The Gaels played their hearts out against Gonzaga, but couldn't stop the combination of Elias Harris and Matt Bouldin on the defensive end. But the Gaels did not suffer a letdown and took care of business against Portland two nights later. Omar Samhan has been a second half machine. In the game against Gonzaga, Samhan had 25 of his 31 points in the second half. Against Portland, "Enter the Sandman" Samhan scored 24 of his 28 points in the second half. On the year, Samhan is shooting nearly 57 percent from the field, scoring 21.7 points per game and averaging 10.7 rebounds per game. Simply, a one man wrecking crew. For the Gaels, their season may come down to the mid February road trip - at Gonzaga, at Portland, and at San Diego.

9) Wichita State (16-3, 5-2 MVC) - A very tough one point loss at Creighton now makes tomorrow night's home game vs UNI even more critical. A loss, and the Shockers will be three back of the first place Panthers. A win, and it's only one game back. Wichita State shot an ugly 36.5 percent from the field (on the season the Shockers average nearly 46 percent) and only 11 of 18 - 61 percent from the line (on the season the Shockers average nearly 76 percent). Tough stretch of the season for Wichita State. Home to UNI, at Drake, home to Illinois State, then on the road at Southern Illinois and at UNI.

10) Louisiana Tech (17-2, 5-0 WAC) - Ten straight wins for the Bulldogs, who average 80 points per game. Not a surprise that all five starters average in double figures, led by Kyle Gibson who averages nearly 22 points per game and shoots almost 90 percent from the line. Louisiana Tech also features one of my "All College Hardwood Name Team" members in Magnum Rolle, who certainly doesn't shoot blanks from the field. The 6-11 Rolle shoots nearly 56 percent from the field and averages 13 points and nearly 9 rebounds per game. The next five games are critical for the Bulldogs. Three road games, with one of them being part of a home and home with second place New Mexico State over a nine day span.

11) Harvard (12-3, 1-0 Ivy) - The other Ivy team in our countdown. Cornell gets all the love, but Harvard may be just as good. At least Pomeroy thinks so (told you I read Ken's site). Ryan Wittman gets most of the publicity, but Jeremy Lin might be just as good. Lin is averaging 17 points per game and shooting 52 percent from the field. The team as a whole shoots 49.5 percent from the field while averaging 77 points per game. And remember, they have wins over the Mary and at BC. Biggest game of the year is January 30 at Cornell. Remember, no postseason tournament in the Ivy. It's all about the regular season. The statisticians better have their fingers loose for that January 30 game. There will be lots of scoring there.

12) Murray State (16-3, 8-0 OVC) - There are not a lot of mid major programs with the success of Murray State. Three times in the last decade, the Racers made the NCAA tournament. And seven times in the 90's, Murray State also made the big dance. They have had at least 17 wins the past eight seasons with no losing records during that span. And now they are trying to make their eleventh NCAA tournament since 1990 with what might be their best team ever. They have six players who average between 9.4 and 11.3 points per game. They shoot 51 percent as a team and score over 79 points per game . Their average margin of victory on the season is nearly 18 points (they give up not even 62 points per game) . How awesome is that? They will face a good test with three of their next four games on the road.

13) Western Carolina (14-3, 4-1 Southern) - A bad loss at Georgia Southern nearly dropped the Catamounts out of the Baker's Dozen. But the Catamounts can make up for it with easily their toughest stretch of the season. Four out of their next five games are on the road. Their only home game - against Charleston, undefeated in the Southern at 6-0. The test starts Wednesday at Davidson.

Honorable Mention - VCU, Western Kentucky, Charleston, Buffalo, Vermont and Fairfield.

Sunday, January 17, 2010

A Night Away From Hofstra Basketball. Well, Almost

Last night was date night for me. It's the rare occurrence, where my wife, Michelle, affectionately known to me as Chelle, and I can go out without the kids. So after her parents came by to play grandma and grandpa, we drove to Hicksville and took the 4:53 into the city for dinner and a broadway show.

Now I am going to share something with you all. I wanted this night to be special. Chelle and I don't get out often by ourselves. In fact the last couple of times we have been out by ourselves have sadly been wakes. I think the last time we really went out by ourselves was a friend's wedding at the end of August, which was fun. But unfortunately I also got to see her best friend, a former long time friend and former employee, who I once considered very dear to me. She introduced me to her now boyfriend as "my old boss", and she knows I hate that term. Nice. Maybe that's a story for another day.

So if I was going to do this, I wanted to do it right. First, it had to be a Saturday night, because Chelle (pictured left) works Sundays (she is off on Fridays, but Fridays are harder to setup). Second, I got tickets on Stubhub for "Wicked" (more on that in a second). Third, I made reservations at Tony's DiNapoli in Midtown, perhaps the best family style Italian restaurant in New York (Carmine's, where I have been as well, is up there too).

So we made our trip into the city. Once we got into Penn Station, we did the rare thing and decided to get a taxi. Normally, since both of us like to walk, we would have walked from Penn to the Times Square area where Tony's is located. But since we only had 15 minutes before our reservation, I didn't want to chance losing our reservation. Everything pointed to the show being great. First the stairwell by the Duane Reade in Penn Station is painted as one giant advertisement for Wicked. Cool. Second, during our cab ride, our taxi driver had a religious show on the radio. The announcer mentioned a bible passage and used the word "wicked". Nice segueway into the evening.

Tony's is on West 43rd Street near the Heartland Brewery. The place is always crowded with good reason. The food is terrific. We made it by 6:00 pm and waited at the bar only for a short time. We took our drinks and followed the hostess to our table. It was perfectly placed in the corner location of the restaurant, on a sofa. We ordered stuffed mushrooms as the appetizer, caesar salad and then Tony's chicken for the main course.

Tony's chicken is two huge (and I mean huge) breaded chicken fillets cover with their unique sauteed tomatoes. I can't even explain how delicious this is. If we made two mistakes, it was one, we didn't get Tony's Sangria, which is terrific, but neither of us was in the mood to drink a pitcher of sangria. Second, we should have passed on the caesar salad and not eaten all the yummy bread, and saved room for the monster desserts, which we have had before.

So after dinner, we walked to the Gershwin Theatre. Now Times Square on a Saturday night is one of the most hopping places in the world. And since it was a relatively warm Saturday night in January, this was no exception. With Broadway now closed off in this area to pedestrian traffic only, it's actually now even more of a gathering place. David Blaine had an area where he was doing Magic for Haiti and every block, there was someone yelling "Comedy show tonight. Discount tickets available!" New York City basketball may be on a downturn, but Times Square is always at the top of its game.

So we made our way to the Gershwin Theatre, just a beautiful place to see a show. As you will see shortly , the stage set work for Wicked is fantastic. Loved the dragon on top. When you see the photos, you will notice that the shots are taken from very close to the stage. Well, I said I wanted to make the night special. I decided to splurge for the girl I have been with for the last 16 years (we started dating this month in 1994), so I got fifth row from the stage seats.

Now the show "Wicked" is somewhat based on the novel, "Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West", which I haven't read (but eventually I will). The premise is the following - It takes the story of the Wizard of Oz and turns it well, upside down. The wicked witch of the west, Elphaba, is a girl that's actually born out of wedlock. Her green color is due to a green elixir her mom and her mom's lover would drink when they were together. Elphaba is considered an outcast and only gets to go to an elite school to take care of her sister. It his here that Elphaba becomes best friends with Glinda (yes, the good witch) and here she learns she has a special talent for spells. This eventually leads her to the Emerald City and the Wizard, neither of which is what they seem to be.

I thought the show was very good, but it wasn't quite Spamalot (which I saw on opening week on Broadway with the original cast and is my favorite all time Broadway Show). Wicked is very humorous at times and the musical numbers are quite good. And the scene where Elphaba truly becomes the Wicked Witch of the West is a great example of Broadway set magic. Glinda is my favorite character in the show and I can see why Kristin Chenowith was the original Glinda. I really think the character for the show was made specifically for her. If you have ever seen her guest role on Glee, you would agree.

The picture to the left is the giant screen curtain before the show starts. Of course with my skewered sense of humor, I thought of the Emerald City as Richmond, where the CAA tournament is every year. And right now the Richmond Coliseum is not what it seems to be. The rest of the parts of the map that make up Oz, Munchkinland etc were all the CAA member schools. These are the moments where I think I spend too much time on college basketball and the CAA in particular.

So you are all wondering, outside of the Richmond being "The Emerald City" reference, what does this have to do with basketball? Now here's the kicker. For those of you who read this column, I am a Hofstra Men's Basketball season ticket holder. And if you know the Hofstra Men's basketball/CAA schedule, games are played on Saturdays and Hofstra home games, with rare exception, start at 4:00 PM. Since our night had to be a Saturday night, I wanted to make sure I did it when Hofstra was on the road and ideally, the game was not locally or nationally televised.

So when I planned this out shortly before Christmas, one day stood out. January 16. Hofstra was on the road at William and Mary and the game was not locally or nationally televised (don't snicker on that last part of the sentence). If there was any night to do this, last night was the night. I know what you are saying. You planned your special night out around Hofstra basketball. Well...yes, guilty as charged.

It doesn't mean I didn't check up on Hofstra and the Mary. As we were in the Gershwin Theatre before the show started, I checked up on the game on my cell phone. Several times. The Pride and the Tribe were playing a close game going back and forth in the first half. It was 30 all around the time I turned the cell phone off before the show started.

At intermission of the show, I turned my phone back on. I had a feeling of what the score would end up being. And when I pressed six for CAA Scores on my favorites on my phone, my feelings were confirmed. Final - William and Mary 73 Hofstra 66. I waited till we got on the train back home to read the AP recap from my phone. Close game throughout, teams went back and forth with the lead. We got back around 12:15 this morning, so I was too tired to do a post mortem on the game.

It wasn't until this morning that I decided to do the autopsy by reading another of Jeremy Kniffin's always great press release recaps of the game (and by the way Jeremy must be the fastest at putting up recaps and box scores of college basketball games), followed by reading over the play by play in the game.

After reading the play by play, I wanted someone to cue up Same Old Song by the Four Tops (and by the way I own the CD pictured - great CD). And the lyrics, "It's the same old song, but with a different meaning since you've been gone" should be dedicated to Brad Kelleher after that NCAA committee ruling. But it's the fifth game this season, where Hofstra has a five -nine point lead midway through the second half, only to lose the lead and game. Here's the lowdown on those five games.

November 17 vs UConn - The Pride are up 54-45 on the #13 Huskies with 9:10 left after a Cornelius Vines three. But five minutes later UConn takes over the lead for good. Hofstra is still within one, 67-66 with 1:29 left but UConn holds on for a 76-67 win and a golden opportunity for a major RLU is wasted.

December 27 vs. St John's - Hofstra is up 59-54 with 6:58 left after a Charles Jenkins three. But Hofstra scores only one point the rest of the way in a 72-60 loss to the Jonnies.

January 2 vs. William and Mary - The Pride are 35-27 with 13:25 left and never trail in the entire game until 17 seconds remaining in the contest. But Kendrix Brown's three point play and a strange ending to the game give the Mary the win 48-47.

January 4 vs. George Mason - Hofstra is up six, 50-44 with 7:52 left and were still up one 53-52 with 4:30 left. But the Pride have no answer for Ryan Pearson and the Patriots come back for a 67-63 win.

January 16 vs. William and Mary - The Pride are up seven, 55-48 with 9:14 left. But the Mary go on a 20-5 run over the next eight plus minutes and win the game 73-66.

Now when you have five games with similar patterns and similar outcomes, there is usually a reason for the repeat occurrences. And I believe I have the reason for the repeat occurrences, an unhealthy reliance on Charles Jenkins in late game situations.

Case in point, last night's loss to the Mary. At halftime, the Pride were up 38-37. They had balanced scoring with Halil Kanacevic with 10 points, Jenkins had 9 points (on three 3 pointers), Lester had 7 points and Chaz Williams had 6 points. In the second half, Jenkins had 10 points and Williams had 6 points. But Lester only had one point in the second half and Kanacevic only had 2 points.

A closer look shows Jenkins had twelve field goal attempts in the second half which is double the amount of attempts Kanacevic, Lester and Williams had combined (six). Jenkins had four field goals out of those twelve attempts, and all four were in the first twelve minutes of the second half, the last with 8:21 left put Hofstra up 57-51. But Jenkins would miss his last seven field goal attempts, which was nearly half of the field goal attempts the Pride would have in those last eight plus minutes (fifteen, of which they made two).

And that's not a one time occurrence. In that 72-60 loss to St John's, Jenkins went 3 of 11 in the second half and they didn't score a field goal the last nearly seven minutes of the game. Against UConn, in that last nine plus minutes of the game, Jenkins scored three of the four Pride field goal attempts made and had three of the five free throws they made.

You see, you can't win when one player is attempting to do all the scoring late in the game. And as much as I think Jenkins is a terrific player who doesn't shy away from crunch time, he can't do it himself. And it's a combination of factors. One, veteran players like Lester and Greg Washington disappearing during criticial moments of the second half. Two, Kanacevic and Williams are freshmen who by their nature aren't consistent yet. And three, a game plan that doesn't allow for diversity in offense.

The Pride could be 14-5 right now if they had a second scorer down the stretch. But as someone once said "If Ifs, Ands or Buts were candy and nuts, we'd all have a Merry Christmas." The fact of the matter is the Pride, at 2-5 in the CAA, are four games out of a top four spot in the CAA, which results in a first round bye (W&M, ODU, Mason and Northeastern are all 6-1). And the team that's in fifth, VCU (4-3 CAA) has a two game lead on them and the tiebreaker, an 81-68 win this past week.

With the Pride losing seven of their last nine games, things look as gray as they do outside my window right now. But the Pride were in a similar boat last season and an above .500 conference record was still accomplished. For that to happen this season though, the Pride must find that elusive second scorer. It's not going to be Brad Kelleher, but maybe someone else will step up. Hey you never know. Even "Wicked" had a happy ending.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

I Know What I am Doing Today, What About You

Usually my Saturdays in the winter are either spent watching Hofstra play (see Litos for today's CAA in action preview) at home or watching a plethora of college basketball on the telly. This Saturday is a little different. I will be heading up to Iona to catch the first half of the women's game as Iona hosts Siena. The game is part of a double header today (men's game is Iona vs Niagara at 3:30 - which should be a pretty good game).

It is also "The Gaels for Haiti" as Iona will be accepting donations of any kind for the Red Cross in supporting the Haitian relief efforts. If you want to see a really good doubleheader and support a good cause come up to New Rochelle today. After I catch the first half, I am heading back home as I am taking my wife out to the city tonight for dinner at Tony D's Midtown then to see Wicked. Hey, man does not live on college basketball alone...though it can sustain us pretty well.

The question for the rest of you is, what are you going to do today? Well, there are one hundred and forty two games on tap today. Some are more important than others. Of course there are some games that are on national TV that will get most of the attention (Syracuse-West Virginia at noon on ESPN and Illinois-Michigan State at 3:30 on CBS come to mind). But there are two games that might be flying under the radar that I would recommend watching.

1) Dayton (13-3, 2-0 A10) vs. Xavier (11-5, 3-0 A10) 11:00 AM ESPN 2- I will try my best to catch the first half of this game before I head up to Iona. I hate when conferences keep their names which used to denote the number of teams in their league, even though the number of teams in the conference have changed. The Big 10 has eleven teams and even worse, the Atlantic 10 has fourteen teams. Why do they keep their old names? It's because it sounds cooler saying "Atlantic 10" instead of "Atlantic 14". Plus "Atlantic 10" has that Rat Pack Feel like "Ocean's Eleven". "Atlantic 14" sounds like an outpost in the arctic. At least the Big 12 had the good sense of changing their name from Big Eight to Big 12.

You can still be having your breakfast as the Flyers and Musketeers start our daily early. Dayton was ranked nationally to start the season on but two close losses to nationally ranked Villanova and Kansas State (now nationally ranked) at the Puerto Rico Tipoff knocked the Flyers out of the Top 25. Their only other loss was by two points at nationally ranked New Mexico. Don't worry Dayton, you may be out of favor by the Sports Bubble as Mr. Whelliston puts it, but we still love you at the College Hardwood.

All of those three losses are very respectable and Dayton has played very solid ball, with wins over Georgia Tech (also at the Puerto Rico Tip off) and Old Dominion. They are led by the Chrisses - Chris Wright (14 ppg, 56.2 FG percentage, 7.2 rebounds per game ) and Chris Johnson (13 ppg, 7.5 rebounds per game). And the Flyers have ten players who average 12 minutes or more per game. I am hearing a lot of talk lately about how depth doesn't matter. Please. In tough conference play as the season wears on, playing teams that know how you play and their defense reflects it, you need guys off the bench that can contribute.

Xavier is an amazing program, whether you consider them a mid major program or in my case a "wannabe" program (a "wannabe" refers to the three conferences - Mountain West, Conference USA and Atlantic 10 that don't consider themselves mid major but aren't in the money range or respectability range of the Power conferences). The Musketeers have only missed the NCAA tournament once in the past seven seasons. They have averaged nearly 25 wins per season over those past eight seasons with two Elite Eight appearances and one Sweet Sixteen appearance.

The Musketeers are led by Jordan Crawford who averages 19 points per game and Terrell Holloway, who averages 10 points per game and nearly 4 assists per game. And of course what's Love got to do with Xavier, as in Jason Love's 10.7 points and 9.1 rebounds per game (cmon, had to do the Tina Turner reference). The Musketeers have a win over city rival Cincinnati and have jumped out to a 3-0 record in conference as they try to win their fourth A10 regular season title in a row.

The Flyers have an enormous task ahead of them - be the first Flyers to win in Xavier since the 1980-81 season. But if they can complete the task, it would be a huge win for an at large resume.

A few weeks ago, I watched the Creighton - Wichita State game on ESPNU. It was a very convincing win by the Shockers. Now the Bluejays can get their shot at redemption at home, the Qwest Center, again on national TV ( 5:00 PM on ESPN2). I have seen my share of Bluejays home games on TV (and even streaming video) and Bluejays fans are like no other. In the largest venue of the Valley, 17,000 fans rooting for Dana Altman's club will be an imposing task for the Shockers.

Right now, the Valley is a two team race with Northern Iowa ( 15-1, 6-0 MVC) and Wichita State (16-2, 5-1 MVC) seemingly run away from the rest of the pack. However, a win by Creighton (8-9, 3-3 MVC) today and the Bluejays will only be a game back of the Shockers. To do so, Creighton must defend Wichita State better than they did in the first game. Wichita State shot nearly 52 percent from the field in the first half, allowing the Shockers to jump out to a twelve point lead at halftime.

Creighton also must get P'Allen Stinnett going. Stinnett only has one double digit scoring game in his past eight games on only 19 of 56 shooting from the field (nearly 34 percent). Stinnett is only shooting 39.9 percent from the field on the season as opposed to 44.4 percent last season and is averaging nearly 3.5 points per game less than last season (9.1 as opposed to 12.5).

As for Wichita State, the Shockers have been fantastic, with their only two losses coming at the CBE Classic to Pittsburgh and a road loss at Illinois State. Wichita State might be the most balanced team in the Valley, first in scoring offense at 73 points per game and also second in scoring defense, allowing only 59 points per game. The Shockers are also in first in FG percentage, free throw percentage, FG percentage defense, three point FG percentage defense, excuse me while I rest my fingers a second, rebounding margin, assists and steals. Whew.

For Wichita State, Toure' Murray leads the way averaging nearly 13 points per game, 5 rebounds and 3 assists per game. Here's the scary part for the rest of the Valley. Nine players average 11 or more minutes for the Shockers. Only one of them, guard Clevin Hannah is a senior. Wichita State is only going to get better.

So whether you are heading out to watch college basketball, staying into watch college basketball, or going into the city to catch a show, enjoy your weekend.

Friday, January 15, 2010

There's Something About the Marys

Remember the movie "There's Something About Mary" with Ben Stiller, Cameron Diaz and of all people, Brett Favre? Pretty funny movie, especially the bathroom prom scene. Well, I was looking for a lead in about two teams named Mary - William and Mary and St Mary's. And for some reason, that popped into my head. Probably for the bathroom prom scene and.. "WE GOT A BLEEDER!"

Both teams, who are playing extremely well at the moment, were in action Thursday night. William and Mary, first in the CAA, was home to James Madison (cue Boss Hogg "Them Dukes! Them Dukes!"). Meanwhile, St Mary's hosted #14 Gonzaga in Moraga on ESPN2 for first place in the WCC.

Unless you have been under a rock or in a power conference trance, William and Mary (13-3, 5-1 CAA), known affectionately on this site as "The Mary", has been the darling of the media lately for their wins at Wake Forest and Maryland among others. And having seen them in person against Hofstra, they are legit and absolutely fun to watch.

The Tribe came out and gave the 3000 plus fans at Kaplan Arena at Williamsburg all they could ask for from their home team - a quick start. Danny Sumner's layup four and half minutes into the game put the Mary up 7-6, a lead they would maintain the rest of the game. Madison would try to keep it close as Darren White hit a layup to make the score 23-20 with 8:30 left in the first half.

But The Mary would extend the lead over the half, thanks to 59 percent first half shooting, including 6 of 14 from beyond the arc, a staple of the Mary's offense. William and Mary would score the next seven points to go up 30-20 with 6:38 left. Thanks to another run of 10-0, the lead would eventually become sixteen, before the Mary settled for a 46-32 halftime lead.

The Tribe's defensive philosophy was to try to stop one of the members of James Madison's dynamic duo of Denzel Bowles and Julius Wells. They decided to let Bowles get his points, which he did, scoring 12 in the first half. The Mary focused their attention on trying to stop Wells. They were successful. Wells was limited to three points in the first half on 1 of 6 shooting.

In the second half, the Tribe continued to lead but the Dukes started chipping into the lead. And it wasn't just Bowles and Wells. Darren White would hit two three pointers, the second of which would cut the lead to 50-46 with 15:07 remaining in the game. White would have 11 of his points in the second half.

But the Tribe would extend the lead again to double digits, as David Schneider's three put William and Mary up 12, 75-63 with 3:13 left. Madison would make one more run to cut the lead to 78-74 with 57 seconds left, but would get no closer. The Mary would hold on for a 85-78 win.

Quinn McDowell led five Tribe scorers in double figures with 19, while Schneider would add 17 for the Mary. Madison's Bowles 14 second half points gave him 26 on the game along with 13 rebounds. As noted, White had 15 points along with Pierre Curtis for JMU. JMU's Wells though finished with 12 points, five under his season average, on only 3 of 12 shooting.

I woke up yesterday morning at 4:00 am, the second day in a row. I can thank a very cute two year old son who lives for a bottle of milk. Hey, when you're hungry, you're hungry. So when I got home last night from work, I had dinner and I was so tired, I went upstairs for a nap at around 7 pm . Some nap. Nearly three and a half hours later, I woke up. But it was all good. Though I had not planned it that way, I was now wide awake to watch Gonzaga travel to Moraga, to face St Mary's at McKeon Pavillion.

Broadcasting the game is my favorite ESPN broadcasting duo, Terry Gannon and Stephen Bardo. Gannon is one of the rare play by play people I know who played college basketball as he was a member of NC State's national championship team in 1983. Bardo was a very solid player at Illinois and briefly played the NBA. They do a lot of the West Coast games and they admitted how much they love doing the games at places like the McKeon Pavillion.

McKeon Pavillion is basically a gym that holds 3500 people. And you know there is a sellout when you simply read "3500" next to the word attendance in the box score. It's a very loud place to see a game, where the fans are practically on the court. And Gannon while introducing the game, referred to the fans literally right behind him as "the crazy fans". It's the kind of place that when watching on TV you smile as soon as you see it. Then you become depressed because being a Hofstra ticket season holder, you have longed for games at the Mack Arena to be regularly like this (but alas they're not).

For St Mary's, there has always been the big bully up north. The big bully for the entire WCC, Gonzaga, who has won ten straight regular season West Coast Conference championships. The Gaels have strived to get their own identity to show how good a team they have been over the last several seasons. They haven't had a losing season since 2001-2002. In fact they have made the NCAA tournament twice in the past five seasons, losing to Southern Illinois in the first round in 2005 and losing to Texas in the first round in 2008.

That 2007-08 team of Patty Mills, Diamon Simpson and Omar Samhan knocked off several good NCAA tournament teams that season including Drake, Oregon and Gonzaga. Based on their success in 07-08, and with all three of their stars returning, there was much hope for the 2008-09 team. And the team lived up to the hype by starting off 18-1. In game number 20 of last season, the Gaels were beating #25 Gonzaga in Spokane at the half 39-33. But Patty Mills broke his hand only a few minutes prior to the end of the half trying to break his fall on a play. While Mills was out with the injury, St Mary's would lose that game to Gonzaga and then lose four of their next five as well (including a two point loss in the rematch at Moraga).

Mills would come back in the WCC Tournament and help lead the Gaels to the tournament final. But Gonzaga would paste St Mary's in the final 83-58, which probably gave the No Clue At All Tournament Selection Committee ammunition to make St Mary's one of the last teams left out of the tournament. They would end up in the NIT, win two games at home, including a dandy over Stephen Curry and Davidson. But they would lose to San Diego State in the quarterfinal game. A game that they played at San Diego State, despite having beat the Aztecs earlier in the season in a neutral site game.

With the graduation of Simpson and Mills leaving early for the NBA draft, with only Samhan returning, the Gaels were picked to finish third in the preseason WCC poll behind Gonzaga and Portland. But someone forgot to tell St Mary's that this was supposed to be a down year. The Gaels stormed out to a 15-2 record thanks in large part to "Enter the Sandman" Samhan, who is averaging a double double on the year, 21 points and nearly 11 rebounds per game. He has received help in the scoring department by Matthew Dellavedova who averages nearly 14 points and Mickey McConnell who averages nearly 13 points per game.

But again for St Mary's to be taken seriously by the No Clue At All, they needed a win at McKeon last night vs. the bully, the Zags, led by the tandem of senior guard Matt Bouldin and freshman forward Elias Harris, two fantastic players. Bouldin averages nearly 16 points, 4.6 rebounds and 4.4 assists per game. Harris averages over 15 points and nearly 7 rebounds.

The game plan for the Zags in the first half was to make Samhan work for his points. And the plan was successful as Samhan would only have six points on 2 of 9 shooting from the field, often having to force fade away jumpers. But Dellavedova kept the Gaels in the game scoring 15 first half points, shooting 4 of 4 from beyond the arc.

The Zags would never trail in the first half (and eventually the entire game), but the Gaels kept it close. Samhan hit a field goal to cut the Gonzaga lead to 36-33 with 4:40 left. After a Bol Kong miss, the Gaels had a chance to tie the game. Mickey McConnell had an open look three but missed. As Bardo immediately noted, the crowd rose on the shot and then sat down on the miss. McKeon immediately went from frenzy to quiet, like a balloon had deflated.

And Gonzaga took advantage, finishing the half on a 9-0 run. Harris would finish the half with 16 points on 7 of 9 shooting as Gonzaga would shoot 57.6 percent from the field in the first half. Steven Gray had 9 points and Bouldin would add 8 at the half. The Zags held the Gaels to 34 percent shooting despite St Mary's shooting 6 of 13 from beyond the arc. Bardo correctly noted a few times in the first half that the pace favored the Zags and thought that Gaels coach Randy Bennett should switch to a zone.

The Gaels came out in the second half with a simple plan. Get the ball to Samhan. And they excecuted the plan and Samhan executed on the floor. In the first two and a half minutes, Samhan took five shots, hit four and also had a three point play.

The problem was that Bennett didn't listen to Bardo, who practically was begging St Mary's in the second half to switch to the zone, and stayed in a man to man defense. And Harris and Bouldin made the Gaels pay. Harris and Bouldin would combine for 29 second half points, including 16 in the first eleven and half minutes to put Gonzaga up 69-54 with 9:36 left in the game.

But Samhan, Dellavedova and McConnell would rally the Gaels by outscoring the Zags 18-9 over the next five minutes, and Gonzaga's lead would only be six, 78-72 with 4:37 left. But again, St Mary's would have no answer for Harris and Bouldin, who would answer with baskets of their own. The lead would be eight, 82-74 with 3:54 left on a Harris layup. Samhan would lead one last charge for the Gaels, who cut the lead to four 84-80 with 1:03 left on a Samhan layup. But Bouldin would seal the deal with four three throws down the stretch and Gonzaga would hold on for an 89-82 win.

Samhan would have an absolutely terrific second half, scoring 25 of his 31 points in the second half on 11 of 13 shooting. Samhan also had 12 rebounds for his tenth double double on the season. But despite the Gaels shooting nearly 62 percent from the field in the second half, they couldn't stop the Zags, who shot 60 percent in the second half themselves. Harris would also score 31 points and add 13 rebounds, while Bouldin scored 22 points and Stephen Gray had a double double with 14 points and 14 rebounds. The Zags outrebounded the Gaels 45-27 including 17-10 on the offensive glass. That lead to an 18-6 Gonzaga edge on second chance points.

So once again St Mary's fell short in their quest to defeat Gonzaga. It was their fifth straight loss to the Zags. But college basketball is often a game of redemption. The Gaels play at Spokane, February 11, which won't be an easy task. And there's always the WCC Tournament at the Orleans Arena at March. But St Mary's must somehow defeat Gonzaga once and hold serve in the rest of the WCC to have their at large resume seriously looked at by the No Clue At All.

At the end of the night, or should I say, early in the morning, I turned on "The Bracket" on ESPNU. And there was a segment called "Take Your Pick" where Andy Katz and Adrian Branch had to take three teams that are playing really well but not getting a lot of national attention. Katz did take Northern Iowa, but also picked Missouri and BYU. Geez, BYU is ranked, so doesn't that mean they are getting attention?!

Meanwhile, I figured Branch, a star at Maryland would pick all major conference teams. He did pick Virginia. But he also stunningly picked St Mary's and William and Mary as his other two teams. As he told Katz ,"You gotta dig deep!"

See, there is something about the Marys.

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

My Take on the "Empty City"

Once again, Kyle Whelliston has written a terrific article on the Mid Majority site entitled "Empty City". Kyle talks about the glory days of New York City basketball and the now basketball wasteland, for want of a better term, that New York City has become. But he also talks about CCNY and the point shaving scandal, and the resulting fall out. And how the NCAA took the NIT, once the premiere college basketball tournament held at MSG, and ran it competitively into the ground.

The gist of the article is about the downturn of NYC Metro college basketball. St John's, which use to sell out the Garden on a regular basis during the Carnesecca years, hasn't had a 20 game winning season since winning the NIT in 2003. And the last time they made the NCAA tournament was 2002. You can thank Mike Jarvis for the downturn of the Jonnies, who can't even sell out their own Carnesecca Arena any more, let alone fill the Garden. And though there is improvement this year, it seems the giant behemoth, the 16 team Big East, has passed them by and it's highly doubtful they will make the Dance this season.

Then you have teams like Fordham who decided to jump from the Patriot League to the Big East Lite, otherwise known as the Atlantic 10, or really the A14 since there are fourteen teams in the league. Ask Derek Wittenberg how that's gone so far for the Rams. Iona has struggled since Jeff Ruland was rightly shown the door (and even before that). Manhattan hasn't been the same since Bobby Gonzalez left for Seton Hall. Stony Brook hasn't been very good either.

Kyle points out that there hasn't been a NYC metro team that has made the NCAA tournament since Iona made it in 2006. Does Seton Hall in 2006 count? Perhaps. And yes, Hofstra should have made it as well in 2006, but we all know what happened there.

And Kyle is right, there is no true NYC team. He talks about Manhattan actually being in the Bronx, which is something I found out last season when I went there for the Pride vs. the Jaspers. And yes, though the Draddy Gym is a nice place to see a game, you can't park there. Also LIU is in Brooklyn. I know that from seeing my friend Tony Bozzella's Lady Blackbirds play when he was the head coach there for two years.

And it gets worse from there. Think about it, "The Mecca of College Basketball", the Garden, can't even host a NCAA regional. But yet, The Izod Center, home of potentially the worst NBA team ever in the Nets, in the middle of nowhere, in East Rutherford, New Jersey can have a NCAA regional?! East Rutherford over "The City That Never Sleeps?"

Why? Well, it's greed, pure and simple greed. The Izod Center seats 20,029 while the Garden seats 19,673. You say 400 seats don't seem like a difference? What's the cost of an NCAA regional ticket? Say on average 200 bucks? That's $80,000. Plus all the concessions/parking for those 400 people. Ka-Ching! Remember with the NCAA, the No Clue At All, it's all about the mighty dollar.

And all hope for a Final Four in the City died when the proposed domed West Side Stadium was killed by no less than the folks that run MSG, the lovely people at Cablevision. The same people who have also managed to run the Knicks in the ground too.

Though he was the most eloquent on this subject, Kyle is not the first to write about the downturn of the city game. I noted in my article about Cornell winning the Holiday Festival at MSG that there was a great article in the NY Times in December entitled "A Rough Time for the City Game" by Jack Styczynski. The article was about how not only have the metro teams have fallen on hard times, but that NYC is also not the center of basketball talent anymore either.

And it's ironic that about all this talk of the downturn of the City game, there were two reminders of how great it used to be in attendance at the Hofstra-VCU game last night.

The first person in attendance was former Hofstra star guard and NBA player, Speedy Claxton. Claxton was a member of the 1999-2000 America East champs. The Flying Dutchmen, as I call them went to two consecutive NCAA Tournament teams in 99-2000 and 2000-01 (and they went to the NIT in 1998-99). And Hofstra has not gone to the dance since that 2000-01 team. Yes, the Pride have been to three consecutive NITs since with the Stokes/Agudio/Rivera trio. But again as Kyle points out, the NIT became inconsequential after the NCAA expanded to 65 teams.

The other person in attendance was Dick McGuire. Dick is the older brother of legendary coach Al McGuire. But Dick is a legend in his own right. Seven time NBA all star, Hall of Famer, great assist man and most importantly in New York City lore, a star for St John's and the Knicks, who drafted him in the first round of the 1949 NBA draft. McGuire led the Knicks to three NBA finals and his number was retired by the Knicks. McGuire still works for the Knicks scouting games as a Senior Basketball Consultant.

Here's the ironic thing. McGuire was there most likely scouting a player from Virginia, Larry Sanders not the Queens kid on Hofstra, Charles Jenkins. And though Jenkins played somewhat well, Sanders played much better, though much to Claxton's chagrin, Hofstra's lack of defense played a hand in Sanders' scoring proficiency last night.

What was probably even worse for Claxton was watching a team that had started the season with such promise with a 7-3 record fall to it's sixth loss in eight games. This due in large part to the lack of a second scorer, predictability and lack of imagination on offense and for last night, poor effort on the defensive end. In conference play, where the opposing teams know you inside and out, that combination is a killer.

And Kyle may be right one more time. With the struggles of the New York area teams like St John's and especially Hofstra, there may not be a NYC area metro team in the NCAA Tournament for a quite a long time. This probably results in any of the good NYC high school basketball players looking outside of New York as noted in the Times article (how ironic is it that former Hofstra coach Jay Wright poaches NYC players to Philly).

For NYC metro basketball, there is seemingly no light at the end of the tunnel, outside of an oncoming A subway train.

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

The Larry Sanders Show on the U

As you can see from the blog posts, Tieff and I were at the Mack Center tonight for the VCU-Hofstra game televised nationwide on ESPNU. You had unfortunately the perfect storm for Hofstra. The Pride were down two players due to injury - starting point guard Chaz Williams with a sprained ankle and forward David Imes with a knee injury. The Pride were already minus one player due to the NCAA still not having decided Brad Kelleher's eligibility. So the Pride were down to seven players (sorry Matt (not Josh) Grogan fans, the walk-on did not play tonight). And combine that with Larry Sanders just itching to play after having to sit out a game due to a CAA suspension for a thrown elbow, and you had the makings of a potential mismatch on national TV.

So how did it turnout? Well, let's put it this way. If Larry Sanders needed a highlight video to send to potential NBA teams interested in drafting him, he only needed to show a recording of this game. Sanders put on a clinic, scoring a career high 31 points on 11 of 13 shooting from the field and 9-12 from the line as VCU defeated Hofstra 81-68.

In the first five and half minutes, Hofstra came out strong, jumping out to an 11-5 lead. However, there were already warning signs on the horizon for the Pride. During this time, Joey Rodriguez missed several open threes. But over the next several minutes, Rodriguez would hit two open three pointers to put the Rams up 16-13 with 11:30 left, a lead the Rams would never relinquish.

It became very apparent to the fans in attendance that VCU was having its way with the Pride's first ranked CAA FG percentage defense. Whether it was Rodriguez or Ed Nixon hitting threes or Sanders posting up for easy baskets, the high scoring pace certainly favored the Rams.

Hofstra tried hanging in there and with a layup by Greg Washington, the deficit was only six, 27-21 with 8:08 left. VCU would then score 13 points over the final eight minutes, with Rodriguez and Nixon combining for 8 of them. Those eight points by Rodriguez and Nixon were double what Hofstra scored over the final eight minutes. During those final eight minutes of the first half, Hofstra shot 2 of 10 from the field and committed 6 turnovers. Mix in Rodriguez, Sanders and Nixon combining for 30 points as VCU shot 48 percent from the field in the first half and you had a VCU 40-25 halftime lead.

Those hoping for a comeback by the Pride got treated instead to watching Larry Sanders really make his case for a NBA draft pick. Hofstra tried their best to get back in the game, especially Charles Jenkins (17 second half points) and Cornelius Vines (10 second half points) and the Pride would cut the lead to seven, 48-41 with 14:37 left. But the Rams would go back up by double digits on a Sanders jumper 52-41.

Hofstra again would cut the lead to single digits 56-48 and had a chance to cut the lead further but Charles Jenkins airballed a three point attempt. Shortly thereafter, Sanders scored four points on free throws and a jumper and the lead was again double digits, 61-48 with 8:14 left.

The game was basically over after that, thanks to Sanders and his sidekick Rodriguez, who had 21 points for the game. From when the score was 57-48 with 8:54 left in the game till the final score of 81-68, Sanders and Rodriguez would be responsible for scoring the final 24 points scored by the Rams. Sanders and Rodriguez outscored the entire Hofstra team 24-20 the rest of the way.

And Sanders did this with an array of post moves that he didn't have last year. Baby hooks, up and under moves, fall away jumpers. It was downright impressive. In fact, he had an emphatic slam to put VCU up 74-60 with 2:01 left. It was so emphatic that he swatted the ball away after the dunk and got called for a technical (the second technical for VCU in the game as Shaka Smart was given one earlier in the second half).

What was really surprising was that Hofstra, a team that "prides" itself on good defense, did not double team Sanders, nor Kiril Pischalnikov for basically the entire game. Sanders scored at will on Hofstra. And in another surprising occurrence, which had Tieff and I just shaking our heads in disbelief, consistently late in the game Hofstra decided to foul Joey Rodriguez, a 76 percent free throw shooter, when he had the ball instead of Brandon Rozzell, a 62 percent free throw shooter when he had the ball (Rodriguez was 7 of 8 from the line). It was just plain mind numbing.

As for Hofstra on offense, well Charles Jenkins did his best, scoring 17 of his 23 points in the second half. But he really worked for it. as he was only 5 of 13 from the field and 6 of 7 from the line. Cornelius Vines did have 17 points and Miklos Szabo had a nice game with 12 points on 6 of 8 shooting (and he killed our section's Szabo foul pool by not getting his first foul until 6:47 left in the first half - which beats his last home game where he got his first foul in 27 seconds). And Hofstra did shoot better than it's season average on the night - 44 percent as opposed to 40.5 percent.

But the Hofstra offense is often too predictable - let Jenkins drive the lane and either dish or score. However CAA teams know the drill. They saw this with Stokes, then Agudio and now with Jenkins. The problem is Jenkins doesn't have Stokes top of the key floater in the lane, nor Agudio's step back on a dime fadeaway jumper. And this often leads to blocked shots and more importantly turnovers. Jenkins did have seven assists but he also had seven turnovers.

And that leads to the most important stats of the game. Hofstra had 17 turnovers while VCU only had 9. Points off turnovers - VCU 25, Hofstra 9. There's your ball game right there.

VCU evened it's season record at 3-3 and has hope to get over. 500 with a win at 1-3 Georgia State on Saturday. As for Hofstra, the Pride are now 2-4 with a road game vs. first place William and Mary Saturday afternoon. With Williams and Imes out for two weeks and a 2-5 record potentially staring them in the face, a first round bye in the CAA Tournament looks to be more and more out of their grasp.

Finally I want to say Tieff and I got to meet Kyle Whelliston of the Mid Majority tonight who was there covering the game. We got to talk to Kyle for a long time and simply put, he was great to talk to and just a really good guy. Kyle, enjoy the Penn-Temple game tomorrow night and I hope to see you at the CAA Tournament.