I will have my in depth report from the CAA Semis later this evening. I will say this, I can't remember two more compelling and exciting semifinal games in the CAA in the seven years I have been to the CAA Tournament than yesterday's. The ODU-VCU semifinal had the capacity crowd rocking for just about the entire game. And Northeastern's last possession at the end of the game vs. William and Mary was the epitome of a nail biter.
As for today, it seems very ironic that the two CAA teams talked about the most during the season for NCAA at-large bid possibilities, Old Dominion and William & Mary are in the final. You could definitely say they were the CAA's best overall teams as far as conference and non-conference play.
Since I predicted that neither would get to the final in a very competitive CAA Tournament, I will make a prediction now. Old Dominion's strength, rebounding, is William and Mary's weakness. However Tony Shaver will probably make a similar adjustment as he did with Denzel Bowles in the second half of the W&M-JMU game. He will collapse on Lee and Hassell and force the ODU guards to win the game.
However, I just think ODU's overall size advantage inside and their depth will prove to be the difference. The height the ODU guards have will make it very difficult for Schneider and McDowell to get off open shots. It will be close for about 35 minutes, but the Monarchs pull away in the last five minutes to win.
However, considering there have been two overtime games already in the tournament, why not make it a third?
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