The Call to Pay College Football and Basketball Players a Good Excuse to Abolish Title IX

Special to Hoopville

Preliminarily, you need to know who you are reading. I was once upon a time a college basketball assistant, most recently spending a year on Dan Dakich’s staff at Bowling Green. Later, I spent four years as a radio analyst (and Hoopville writer) in Boston, the last two for Northeastern’s Bill Coen. Most of the rest as a litigator, most of those years representing insurance interests. I developed the view that most civil lawsuits are frivolous, that we have too many lawyers in America (by a factor of 10), and that nothing I can think of is more disgusting than middle class Americans with a lawyer’s phone number on speed-dial (don’t much like the concept of speed-dial, but really hate individuals’ rights of recent-vintage to sue). The reader should know I have worked Title IX lawsuits (in fact, on the plaintiffs’ side), so I know from whence I speak.

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Cedric Jackson and Cleveland State Rock Wake Forest

In the odyssey this 2008-09 season has become for the Cleveland State Vikings, all year long senior forward J’Nathan Bullock has been consistently excellent.  He led the team in scoring and rebounding, earned first team all-conference honors in the Horizon League, and in this writer’s opinion he should have been Player of the Year.  The way Bullock has played this year, and particularly now on the biggest stage, don’t be surprised if he follows in the footsteps of Antonio Gates and becomes a star NFL tight end when his days playing for Gary Waters are concluded.

And for the last three months, sophomore guard Norris Cole has been the most improved player in the Horizon League, increasing his scoring (he finished eighth in the league in scoring) and consistently locking up the opposition’s best guard defensively.

But for those of us who’ve watched this roller coaster season, the success and failure of Cleveland State has been inexorably linked to the play of one man: as Cedric Jackson has gone, so have gone the Vikings.  And for the first 80 percent or more of the year, other than hitting a miracle 65-foot shot at the buzzer to beat Syracuse in the Carrier Dome, Jackson just wasn’t quite good enough.  Not good enough to beat Washington, or Kansas State, or West Virginia in non-conference play.  Not good enough to beat Butler in conference play.  In fact, for the first half of the conference season, not good enough to beat any Horizon team on the road except Detroit.

For much of the year, Jackson looked lost out on the floor, couldn’t come close from the perimeter, then embarrassed, stopped shooting altogether.  And defensively, while this wonderfully athletic player still made steals in passing lanes, his constant reaching and digging while defending the ball made him incapable of guarding anyone straight up.

But perhaps as much as any player I’ve ever seen, Jackson is a rhythm player, and yes, an emotional player, a player whose game is based on confidence and whose psyche is incredibly fragile.  At another conference’s tournament I heard another coach say about another player, “he has to feel good about himself to perform well, and he picked a darned good time to feel good about himself.”  The same can be said of Jackson.

Following a loss at Youngstown State on January 23^rd, and more than anything due to a favorable home schedule the second half of the conference season, gently and gradually the Vikings turned around their season, winning seven straight conference games en route to a third place regular season finish, at first almost despite Jackson’s inconsistent play.  Trey Harmon stepped up and won a game for the Vikes, George Tandy did likewise, and freshman Jeremy Montgomery scored 21 to steal a road win at Illinois-Chicago.  Bullock was good every night, and Cole better and better, but where was Jackson?

Then on the final day of the regular season, a 58-56 loss at Butler, Jackson began showing signs of finding himself, of that smile evidencing his elusive confidence.  Jackson scored 11 that day, shot a bit better (4-11), and made two crucial treys in four tries.  And down the stretch of that tough game, Waters positioned Jackson on the wing, using baseline screens to get open to shoot or penetrate.  The Jackson Waters thought he was getting when the New Jersey native transferred from St. John’s was almost back.

Then a terrific Horizon Tournament, culminating in a superb performance in the tournament final, winning the rematch with Butler at Hinkle Fieldhouse.  Tournament MVP, a second-team all-league selection, and conference Defender of the Year (even though his teammates know the lock-down defenders on the Vikings are Cole and injured D’Aundray Brown).  Jackson’s confidence was soaring, and his play was all the way back, heading into the NCAA’s Tournament as the 13^th seed in the Midwest Region.

Friday night’s game against No. 4 Wake Forest in Miami was over almost before it started.  Jackson hit an open trey 15 seconds into the contest, then Norris Cole hit one a minute and 15 seconds later, then Jackson hit another at the two minute mark, and CSU had Wake 9-0.  The Vikings led wire-to-wire, by as many as 17 twice in the first half, and only 15 first half points including a late barrage from the arc by Wake’s James Johnson kept the game from being a first-half blowout.  As it was, the Vikings led 39-30 at the break, turning the ball over just twice in the first half, scored the first two baskets of the second half, and were off to the races, winning easily 84-69.

In the end, Cole had 22 points on 8-18 shooting and four assists, and held ACC second-leading scorer Jeff Teague to just half his average.  Bullock had 21 points on 8-16 shooting and six rebounds.  But it was all Jackson this night, who finished with a line of 19 points on 8-14 shooting, including 3-4 from the arc, seven rebounds, three steals, eight assists and just two turnovers.

Now it’s on to the round of 32 for the Vikings, who play No. 12 Arizona tomorrow, who defeated fifth-seeded Utah.  Now, as good as his body is, Jackson still isn’t the perfect player, or the most consistent player, especially when shooting from the perimeter.  But if Jackson’s confidence continues for two more days, you just might see another stellar performance from the senior guard on Sunday.  And as Jackson goes, so go the Vikings, with one more win right into the Sweet Sixteen.

No. 13 Akron Scares No. 4 Gonzaga in South Region

In last night’s South Region first round game between the No. 4 Gonzaga Bulldogs and the No. 13 Akron Zips, played at the Rose Garden in Portland, the Zips came out playing harder than the Zags at both ends of the floor.  Akron led by as many as 5 three different times in the first half, by three at the intermission, and by a game-high 6 five minutes into the second half, at 49-43.  But the slow-starting Zags finally got moving in the last fifteen minutes, and the Zips tired – mentally and physically – allowing the favored and physically superior Zags to outscore Akron 34-15 over the final fifteen minutes, and defeat the Zips 77-64.

From the underdog’s point of view, for twenty-five minutes the game was a thing of beauty.  When “Humpty” Hitchens made a trey just over five minutes into the second half, giving the Zips that 49-43 lead, Coach Mark Few, his Zags and their fans had every reason to be worried.  At that point in the game, Akron was just a make short of shooting 50 percent at 18-38, and led by virtue of their monstrous 8-13 from the arc (including a banked trey from a forty-five degree angle by Chris McKnight that suggested that destiny was on the side of the Zips).  On the strength of going 3-4 from behind the arc, senior Nate Linhart led all scorers with 13 points, and on the strength of 2-3 from the arc, junior second guard Darryl Roberts had 11, along with 3 assists (Roberts would finish as Akron’s high scorer with 19). Coach Keith Dambrot’s team keeping the pace a moderate one, at that point in the game the Zips had committed just four turnovers.

But over the final 15 minutes, the game was taken over by Zags’ guard Matt Bouldin and forward Josh Heytvelt, Gonzaga pressed and pushed tempo, and dominated the game.  With much of his scoring from the perimeter, Heytvelt finished with 22 points on 7-12 shooting, 14 of those points in the second half.  Bouldin finished with 12 on 3-8 shooting and five assists, with eight of those points and four of those assists in the second half.  And while still not awful, Akron had as many turnovers in the final 15 minutes (four) as it had in the first 25 minutes.

It was like two different games, one for the first 25 minutes and one for the last 15.  In the earlier portion of the game, Akron competed harder, guarded better and perhaps most important, hit its treys.  And while Few had said before the game that “we’re going to have to match the intensity Akron plays with,” Gonzaga simply didn’t.  The Zags looked slow and lethargic, poor defensively and more than a bit passive on the boards; they also committed a number of unforced turnovers.  CBS analyst Dan Bonner saw it early and clearly, pointing out that the Zags were attempting to catch passes with just one hand, when they should have used two.

And when it turned around, there was nothing Keith Dambrot could do to stop it.  To this writer, the game turned around for four reasons.  First, as has been a fairly common occurrence all winter long, fouls began mounting on the Zips in the second half, taking away some of their aggressiveness defensively.  Second, more than fouls, it appeared that fatigue began to set in, both physically and mentally; forty minutes against a bigger, stronger and more athletic team can do that to an outmanned and undersized group, particularly in the rarified atmosphere of tournament play.  Third, the Zips reverted to form, both from the perimeter and on the boards.  No offense intended, but Nate Linhart and Co. simply are not 60 percent shooters from the arc.  And finally, all at once the Zags realized the perilous position they’d placed themselves in, and began competing much harder than they had earlier in the game.

For competing those last 15 minutes, No. 4 Gonzaga moves on in the South Region, facing No. 12 Western Kentucky on Saturday in Portland, who defeated No. 5 Illinois.

For Akron, respectfully with among the smallest and least heralded personnel in the tournament, I think Dambrot got about as much as humanly possible out of his team, and out of each member of the roster.  They gave this edition of the Zags the scare of their collective lives, and perhaps a wakeup call they desperately needed.  The Akron fans returning home from Portland this morning, and those waiting for them back in Akron, should be incredibly proud of this group, and Linhart and his teammates should be holding their heads high, proud of their huge and unexpected accomplishments.

In the MAC, It’s Akron

CLEVELAND, Ohio – In last night’s MAC final, in a game they led continually for the last 34 and a half minutes, one which was basically over at the under-16 second-half media timeout, Akron bested Buffalo by a final score of 65-53.  It capped a run of four wins in five days from the No. 5 seed; counting the season finale last Sunday (a loss a Kent State), that’s five games played in seven days.

They came back from the dead, in the form of a 12-point deficit in the last five minutes against No. 12 Toledo on Tuesday night and down one-point inbounding with 1.5 second on the clock in overtime.  And now they’ve garnered the MAC’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, Akron’s first since a young Bob Huggins patrolled the sideline in 1986.

The Akron kids did it with terrific shooting (55 percent for the game, 57 percent from the arc).  They did it with injured point guard Anthony Hitchens coming off the bench to contribute 10 points in 14 minutes.  They did it with superb rebounding against the MAC’s best rebounding team, competing on the boards to be within a rebound of Buffalo at the half, within seven for the game.  They did it with tenacious man-to-man defense Saturday night and throughout the tournament, on this night particularly by Darryl Roberts on Buffalo’s all-league second guard Rodney Pierce.

Most of all they did it with tremendous heart, courage and mental toughness, in the words of Coach Keith Dambrot, they were “resilient; they had the ability to take punch after punch, and keep coming back.”

And they did it with balance, up and down the roster.  I’ve never been at a tournament final before at which there was so little consensus, so much and broad disagreement, about MVP and all-tournament selections.  And that’s a good thing, one I suspect the Akron players – those selected and those not – are smiling about today.  In addition to players from other teams in the conference, I had second guard Roberts and back-up second guard/substitute point guard Steve McNees on my ballot, and listed McNees as MVP for controlling the ball the last three games, as well as for his clutch three-point shooting.  Others had Roberts as MVP; others had leading scorer Brett McKnight as MVP; still others had his brother and leading rebounder Chris McKnight as MVP.  Some had “Humpty” Hitchens as MVP for his game-saving shots that first night against Toledo, coupled with his effective play in the final on an injured leg.

And wouldn’t you know it, none of those voters got it “right,” as the final vote named senior and team-leader Nate Linhart MVP, with six points and a game-high nine rebounds this night, and every single winning “little play” throughout the tournament.  Linhart was joined on the all-tournament team by teammates McNees and Brett McKnight, Buffalo forward Max Boudreau, and Bowling Green forward Nate Miller.

Given the team balance, given Akron’s inconsistent play the last few weeks of the regular season, given the 5^th seed and the task of winning four game in five days, perhaps the true MVP was Dambrot; at least that’s what the white-clad Akron student section seemed to think as they chanted Dambrot’s name over and over in the final minute.  And he would surely share the honor with the sports psychologist that Linhart mentioned had visited the team earlier this season, and rejoined them for the conference tournament.

Now fifty years old, once released as the coach of Central Michigan, back to high school and then an Akron assistant to Dan Hipsher for a year, Dambrot was characteristically humble.  “I’m fortunate just to be coaching, in some ways I have no right to be coaching.  I’m 50, still love to compete, love to coach, just have my family and coaching, no other hobbies.  And I’ve gotten to coach at my alma mater, in my hometown, at a school where my mom was a professor.”  I’ve gotten to know Dambrot pretty well, all within the last 6 or 7 weeks.  He really is humble, even gentle, and there wasn’t a sound in the room as he spoke.

“In this tournament, there was no clear-cut favorite,” Dambrot said, adding, “I’ve thought all year that all the teams in the MAC were about the same, from best to worst, that there wasn’t much of a difference.  We had a rough year shooting the ball, I thought all year we underachieved shooting the ball.  We’ve taken a bunch of shots in the mouth.  Heck, we were 9-8 early.  Then, after winning seven in a row, we faltered late at Valpo, at Northern Illinois, against BG and at Kent State.  It took our kids a while to get used to me.”

When I asked Dambrot about “point-guard Steve McNees,” Dambrot said that “he was really good in the tournament.  He’s had a tough season.  He needs to feel good about himself to play his best, and he picked just the right time to feel good about himself.  Some players have to be coached differently than others, and I probably did a poor job earlier with McNees.  But you know, there’s not a better guy than McNees, and I’m really happy for him.  I feel good for all our guys.  I have come to realize that it’s not about the coach, it’s about the players.”

About the unexpected (and terrific) play of Humpty Hitchens, he said that “I didn’t know before the game that he’d play.  He hadn’t come to me and told me he was ready.  But he had gone to [Assistant] Coach [Jeff] Boals, and told him he could go.  So we rolled the dice, gave him a few minutes, he played well, so we gave him a few more minutes.  Humpty is really tough; the best thing about him is that he’s not afraid to fail.”

Finally, about the team as a whole: “Somehow, these guys don’t let stuff bother them.  Then, when we shot well coming back against Toledo, I knew we could win the tournament, could beat anybody; also that we could lose to anybody.  We defend well enough to beat anyone, except that first night against Toledo.  If we straightened ourselves out offensively…  Are we as good as previous Akron teams, previous MAC Tournament winners?  Well, before I didn’t think so, but now I don’t know.”

Tonight the Zips will learn their seed and destination, and wherever they’re assigned, they’ll be happy to go.  And if we can believe Brett McKnight, “we’re ready to compete.”  They’ll get to compete on the biggest stage Thursday or Friday.

Akron Fights Off Nate Miller and Bowling Green to Reach MAC Final

CLEVELAND, Ohio – In Bowling Green’s quarterfinal win twenty-four hours earlier, senior “point forward” Nate Miller had played with a chip on his shoulder, dominating Jerome Tillman and the Ohio Bobcats with a 22-point, 10-rebound double-double, making many in the assembled media wonder how’d he come only fourth in Player of the Year balloting (behind Michael Bramos of Miami, Tillman, and even David Kool of Western Michigan).  So it would not be surprising for Miller to dominate Akron.

On the other hand, in its quarterfinal, playing without injured point guard Humpty Hitchens from the 3:30 mark forward, somewhat miraculously Akron had clawed back from an 11-1 deficit, gotten ball-handling from two second guards, and stunned Miami.  The only good news for Akron – at least to this writer – is that during its recent successful run Louis Orr’s BG team had become primarily a 2-3 zone team defensively, and while Akron was awful against that zone in a home loss two weeks ago, at least that was the kind of defense they might be able to play without a true point guard.

In the first half, Akron had its way with Bowling Green, neutralizing Miller with Chris McKnight, Brett McKnight and Jimmy Conyers, in sequence (this writer thought Brett McKnight did the best job), moving the ball and scoring against BG’s zone, and dominating the boards.  So while BG did control the pace in the first half by playing slowly, Akron build a 13-point lead, and took an 11-point advantage into the locker room, 28-17.

In the half, Akron outrebounded BG 25-12 (Chris McKnight’s 10 board almost equaling BG’s total), and outshot the Falcons 42 percent to 20 percent.  Steve McNees handled the ball for 16 minutes with just two turnovers, and Darryl Roberts played 4 of his 18 minutes at point, accumulating five points, four rebounds, three assists and just one turnover.  Brett McKnight led all scorers with seven points, on 2-4 shooting, including 1-1 from the arc.  BG’s Miller had just two points in the half on 1-7 shooting, and no rebounds.

But just when it appeared safe to be an Akron Zip fan (perhaps steal a thought and a smile about tonight’s final), everything changed in the second half – and I do mean everything.  Perhaps not totally unexpected, Miller came out of the locker room like a one-man wrecking crew.  With the first possession of the half, just 11 seconds in, Miller set a screen on the perimeter for Darryl Clements, and for a moment Chris McKnight must have forgotten who he was guarding, as he hedged hard onto Clements and allowed Miller to roll to the goal uncontested.  The rest of Akron team was late helping, and Miller was off.  He hit a trey on BG’s next possession, cutting the Akron lead to 6, and it was a game again.  Then, after Keith Dambrot had called time to stop the bleeding, BG came out of the timeout playing man-to-man defense, which they did for the final 18:30 of the game.

BG’s man-to-man was surprising at that juncture, both to the Akron team and to this reporter.  BG hadn’t played man-to-man in weeks, probably hadn’t practiced it much, and in truth didn’t seem very good at it. That said, it was a way for Orr to get his kids to play more aggressively, and it tested Akron’s ability to play without a point guard.

The Akron players adjusted, and at first were able to stop BG’s run playing against their man defense, with McNees and Roberts handling the ball, and drawing lots of fouls (Roberts in particular). Over the next eight and a half minutes of play the teams battled evenly, 12-12, Miller scoring eight of BG’s 12 on two threes and a two, and Roberts and McNees each scoring five of Akron’s 12.  It was 40-34 Akron, with just over 10 minutes on the clock.

Then BG went on a run that earlier in the season would have won the game, 9-0 over 2 minutes, a run taking the Falcons from down six to up three, at 43-40.  From the 9:48 mark through 11:43, Akron committed three fouls and a turnover, Roberts missing their only shot, from the arc.  For BG, Brian Moten hit a trey, center Otis Polk had an old fashioned three-point play, and Clements hit a trey.

Then, just ten seconds apart the Zips had two timeouts in which to regroup, one that they called followed by a media timeout.  And regroup they did.  Brett McKnight drew a foul from Miller, hit one of two, and followed that up with the biggest shot of the game, a trey at 12:44, giving Akron back a one-point lead at 44-43;  they never relinquished the lead again, finishing the game on their own 23-12 run over the final 7:57.

Perhaps the biggest single play in the game took place 4:12 left in the game.  Miller had just scored at the rim to pull BG to within 47-45, and as Brett McKnight received an entry pass at the foul line, Miller ran up from 6 or 8 feet away to basically grab and foul McKnight, as obvious and unnecessary a foul as you will ever see.  And after grabbing McKnight, Miller continued walking right on over to the BG bench, taking himself out of the game.  Later, Miller told us that he was spent, needed the seconds remaining and then the under-four media timeout to rest, but that the foul was not intentional, but it looked to all the world as if it was.

In the 63 seconds Miller was on the bench (Orr had to call a timeout to stop play with 3:19 left, as he could no longer wait for a whistle and a media timeout), Akron went on a 6-0 mini-run, extending from up 47-45 to up 53-45.  Even when Miller got back in, he could not overcome an eight point lead in the final 3:19.  Miller would finish the game with 27 points, 25 coming in the second half and just three late rebounds.  But somehow, that decision to remove himself with 4:22 on the clock was his undoing.

Without a point guard, it was a monumental show of character, of mental toughness, for Akron to withstand Nate Miller’s onslaught, punch back, and win the game.  Brett McKnight led Akron in scoring with 14 points (on 3-8 and 2-4), Darryl Roberts had 12 (on 4-6), five rebounds and four assists, and Nate Linhart had 11 (on 3-7), 11 rebounds, one great slap at a rebound on the foul lane to a teammate, and just seemed to make every “little play” needed to win.  Nikola Cvetinovic had nine points (on 3-6 shooting), Chris McKnight had five, 14 big rebounds, and spent most of his time guarding Miller, and McNees finished with nine (on 3-4 including two huge treys in three tries) and a superb all-around floor game.

Dambrot spoke with great pride about his team’s toughness, that “no one can question whether or not we can take a punch.”  He complimented Miller at length, bemoaning the fact that he “tried recruiting him twice and missed both times” (once when Miller first attended UNC Wilmington, and then again when he transferred to Bowling Green).  He added that he suspected that if Orr had known in advance that Miller would hit 5 of 8 treys in the game, Orr would have expected to have won the game.

Nate Linhart downplayed the fact that he’s scored the 1,000^th point of his career late in the game, and was obviously sincere when he said that “I just wanna win this tournament.”  When Nate was asked about Akron’s 43-26 margin on the boards, he complimented Akron assistant coach Jeff Boals, saying his “main focus in life is to get us to crash the boards.”

Dambrot thought Roberts was absolutely great at every aspect of the game (scoring, handling, rebounding and defending Darryl Clements), but most of his praise (privately) was for Steve McNees.  “This was the best he’s ever played,” Dambrot said.  “He did everything, controlled the game, wasn’t afraid of anything.”  He concluded, “This team surprised me.  They’re so resilient.  Sometimes they surprise me and play badly, but they have the ability to come back.”

Now heading to the NIT (guaranteed by virtue of his team winning the regular season), Orr was disappointed, particularly at his team’s lack of toughness, that they were so “out-physicaled” on the boards.  “A tournament like this is an endurance challenge, and with Chris Knight not at 100 percent, we didn’t seem to have the toughness that the Akron kids had,” Orr said.

I asked Orr about his change to man-to-man early in the second half, specifically if he’d considered going back to his signature zone when BG got the lead.  He responded, “No, the man-to-man got us the lead, got us to be aggressive.  We weren’t rebounding well in the zone, so I thought, ‘let’s go with it [the man-to-man]‘.”  Perhaps that decision hurt BG, we’ll never know.

So now, these 5^th-seeded point guard-less Akron Zips have one more mountain to climb, and the steepest of all: the big, strong, athletic and tough Buffalo Bulls in the conference Final, tonight at 8.  Without Hitchens on the floor for Dambrot (perhaps even if Humpty were able to play) the Bulls appear the physically more imposing team in this match-up.  But one thing is for sure: Akron will be just as tough as Buffalo mentally, take a punch or two, and keep coming back for more.

Buffalo Pounds Ball State Into Submission

CLEVELAND, Ohio – It was predictable for the team with by far the largest rebounding margin in the league (+5.2), and sometimes what’s predictable happens exactly as predicted.  For much of the evening the Buffalo Bulls doubled the Ball State Cardinals on the boards, with the rebounds evenly distributed up and down the roster.  For illustration, at the under-eight media timeout in the second half, Buffalo led Ball State on the Boards 28-14, with no Buffalo player having more than 4 rebounds.  And oh yes, Buffalo led on the scoreboard 47-38, and for all practical purposes the game was already over.  The final margin on the boards was 36-23, and the final score was 64-52.

To Ball State’s credit, despite being pounded on the boards they managed to stay in the game into the second half, mostly on the strength of 52 percent first-half shooting, led by senior Rob Giles’ 10 first half points on 4-6 and 2-3 from the arc.  But on top of the one-sided rebounding numbers, the shooting reversed in the second half, allowing the Bulls to pull away.  And while Ball State did manage to cut Buffalo’s 14-point lead in half in the final six minutes of the game, before falling back and losing by 12, that “run” wasn’t real, wasn’t the kind of run that ever had a chance of catching the opponent.

It was a workmanlike effort for Buffalo, led throughout by all-league junior second guard Rodney Pierce, with 18 points on 8-14 shooting, and led in the second half by reserve junior power forward Max Boudreau, who scored 15 of his career high 21 after the intermission (he was 8-10 in the game, all from within five feet of the rim).  Calvin Betts, who scored 11 and grabbed 18 rebounds the previous night in the Bulls’ win over Kent State, was quieter this night, scoring just two and pulling down five boards.

For Ball State, senior guard Laron Frazier led the team in scoring for the second night in a row, this night with 15 points, but it took him 14 shots from the field to score them (going 6-14), and most of Frazier’s points were scored long after the issue was decided.  Giles finished with 13 points (on 5-10), and Freshman of the Year big man Jarrod Jones had eight (on 3-8), but his five rebounds weren’t nearly enough.

Coach Reggie Witherspoon talked about his team having played anxiously in Muncie during the regular season, losing both the rebounding battle and the game that night.  “Tonight the guys were up to the challenge,” said Witherspoon.  He enjoyed talking about Boudreau’s improvement this season, even in this tournament, pointing out that before coming to Buffalo, the Montreal native had played much more hockey than basketball.

Witherspoon also talked about how hard it is to get to a conference championship game, with his and his team’s last having come in 2005.  Responding to our question about the powerful and balanced rebounding his team showed, he commented that “we also have perimeter guys capable of rebounding, and that helps us.  But even with that, we have to work at our rebounding.”  He then added what could be his mantra: “you have to work at the things you’re good at.”

Finally, when a reporter pointed out that Buffalo had been picked last in the MAC Eastern Division by many in the media, Witherspoon smiled, pointing out that “no one early gave our kids a chance.”  Well, tomorrow they’ll have a chance to win the MAC tournament against Akron and go onto the NCAA Tournament.  And you can bet they’ll bring that hard-working rebounding into the game with them, and pound and pound and pound.

No Point Guard, No Problem For Akron

CLEVELAND, Ohio – During the course of this season, this writer has seen some memorable college basketball games, and some not-so-memorable.  Any of the three contests between Butler and Cleveland State could have been best.  Northeastern’s game down at VCU and that wonderful Bracketbusters between tournament-bound Morehead State and Kent State also come to mind.  Well, all of those pale in comparison to last night’s titanic struggle between Akron and Miami, a game which came this close to being a Miami 30-point blowout, but which Akron somehow came back and won.  A game for the ages for Keith Dambrot and his team.

First, it took a miracle for the Zips to even to get to last night, playing poorly and finding themselves down a dozen to lowly Toledo with five minutes left two nights earlier.  They miraculously forced overtime, and then inbounded with a second and a half left in overtime and Brett McKnight catching and scoring.  And while such miracles can give rise to strange results in following games (mostly bad, in this writer’s experience), in this miracle win Akron saw its only point guard, Anthony “Humpty” Hitchens go down with an ankle injury.

As we’ve chronicled, early in the year redshirt freshman Ronnie Steward earned the point guard spot, but he went down mid-way through the non-conference schedule.  He came back and practiced a bit in early February, but was so out of shape that that was aborted, in favor of applying for a medical redshirt.  That left true freshmen Hitchens the only remaining point guard, something not affected when the team lifted a redshirt off of freshman shooting guard Brent McClanahan halfway through the season.  Having become “the man,” Hitchens averaged 9 points, 2.5 assists, 1.5 rebounds and close to three turnovers per game this season.  Diminutive at 5-10, and hardly a pure shooter, Hitchens gave the team an innate toughness, a total fearlessness, the inconsistency of a freshman, the heart of a lion, and an ability to create shots and get to the goal, both in transition and in half court.

Now, while Hitchens is (well, was) the only legitimate point guard dressed, Dambrot had to use someone else at that spot, and that someone was sophomore backup second guard Steve McNees.  A good shooter with range, McNees possesses neither the speed and quickness to defend most teams’ point guards (second guard Darryl Roberts performed that task when Humpty was out) nor the ball-handling ability to face pressuring defenders.  Overwhelmingly you’d see him backing his way up the court, or positioned side-saddle toward his defender.  But for 10 or 12 minutes a game, Dambrot used McNees to spell Humpty.

At Akron’s short practice on Tuesday at Cleveland State, while the assistant coaches said Humpty would be ready for the Miami game and Dambrot said “we’ll see,” it was obvious from his walk (and the fact that he was just shooting at a side basket) that Humpty was far from ready for tournament action.  Then last night Humpty started against Miami, and gutted out three and a half limping and ineffective minutes before Dambrot mercifully took him out.

At the time of Hitchens’ departure the score was 7-1 in favor of Miami, and McNees would have to play point for the remaining 36+ minutes.  It got even worse, as little pressure on Miami’s guards allowed them to smoothly get into their offense, and barely 5:19 into the contest, two Michael Bramos free throws gave the RedHawks an 11-1 lead (MAC Player of the Year Bramos had 5 of the 11).

Then innocently enough, at the 5:34 mark, freshman Brett McClanahan made Akron’s first field goal of the game, a trey that brought them to within 11-4.  Then a Brett McKnight jumper a minute later made it 11-6, and suddenly, a “headless” team being blown out was sort of in the game.  A few minutes later, after Bramos and Co. had extended Miami’s lead to 17-6, Roberts (more on him later) hit a trey, to pull Akron to within 17-9.  It’s not a score to write home about, but Akron was – just barely – clinging to life in the game.

But if we’ve learned anything as a group in watching sports, lots of things are contagious:  good things as well as bad things.  Fear, tentative play, poor shooting, fouling and the like are contagious for sure; so are enthusiasm, confidence, and even that nothing-to-lose reckless abandon we see all too rarely in college and professional sport.  And suddenly – maybe Dambrot and his staff saw this all year long, but it was sudden to this writer – in place of apprehensions, concerns and a fear of losing, grew this wonderful devil-make-care I-can-do-this attitude, and at least to me, it grew from nothing.

Before he scored a single point you could see it clearly in show-footed McNees as he battled the ball up the floor and into offensive position.  And thus emboldened, at 9:16 Akron’s newly anointed point guard launched a trey, and it went in to bring the Zips to within 17-12.  The bench stood up, the coaches smiled – for just an instant – and the Akron contingent in Quicken Arena roared with approval.  The Zips weren’t dead, and they were fighting.  This game could be something special.

Before the first half was over, McNees had wowed the crowd with a total of 4 threes in 5 attempts, plus a goal in close after smartly penetrating to the rim with less than 30 seconds remaining, those 14 first-half points already exceeding his previous high for the season.  In the process, McNees led an unfathomable 30-21 run from 11-1 down to the end of the half, leaving the Zips down just one at intermission, 32-31.

Four glaring questions presented themselves at halftime (I suspect in Akron’s locker room as well as at courtside).  First, was McNees’ incredible first half play simply an aberration, or could he sustain it?  Second, having played the last 16 and a half minutes of the first half, could McNees – averaging 20 minutes a game for the season – possibly play the entire second half at point?  Third, if not, could Humpty give them even a minute in the second half?  Fourth, again if not, who would fill in at the point and rest McNees during the second half?  They were great questions for a great game.

The first of those questions was anwered immediately as a Chris McKnight jumper 18 seconds into the second half made clear that the magical run wasn’t over, and gave Akron its first lead of the game at 33-32.  And while Miami’s Tyler Dierkers (who we later heard spent the day on IV fluids with the flu) hit a jumper 13 seconds later to restore Miami’s one-point lead, that lead would be short-lived, and would turn out to be Miami’s last of the evening.  On the ensuing possession, Akron senior and leader Nate Linhart launched and hit a trey, and the magic continued from there.

The remaining questions were answered moments later: with Humpty clearly immobile on Akron’s bench (aside from later when he came out onto the court to cheer and greet his teammates), at the 5:34 mark, with the score tied at 39, starting second guard Roberts returned from a brief rest, replacing McNees, making Roberts the point guard de jure.  Seamlessly assuming his new duties, Roberts twice penetrated Miami’s man-to-man defense, drawing big-man help, and deftly passing to teammates Nikola Cvetinovic and Chris McKnight for easy baskets.  By the time McNees returned at the 7:56 mark, Akron was up 47-41, and the margin would never slip below three the rest of the night.  Miami’s fate was sealed when Linhart hit another trey at with 5:33 left, widening Akron’s lead to 63-50.  In the end, with Bramos and his Miami team utterly demoralized, the Zips coasted to a 73-63 win.

For the game, McNees scored 17 on 6-9 shooting, including 5-7 from the arc, with three assists and most importantly, no turnovers.  His alter ego, Darryl Roberts, finished with 15, on 3-10 shooting, including 3-5 from the arc, adding six rebounds, and also with three assists and no turnovers as well.  Cvetinovic scored 12 on 5-10 shooting, grabbing eight rebounds, and Linhart scored 10 including two crucial treys (shooting 3-10 and 2-5), and also grabbed eight rebounds.

For the losers, Bramos managed 24 points (just 10 after halftime), making only 5-13 from the floor and adding 10-11 form the line.  Point guard Carl Richburg (himself a fill-in for earlier injured Eric Pollitz) finished with 12 points on 2-3 from the arc and 6-7 from the line, and five assists, but Coach Charlie Coles found his play wanting and sat him for long stretches of the second half.

Dambrot told us after the game that “they punched us early, disrespected us, beat the crap out of us.  This team showed the ability to take those blows, to shrug off disappointment, to rally.  Steve [McNees] did the same, as he didn’t have the year he’d have liked to have, but rallied himself tonight.  We have character guys.”

As to using Roberts at the point, he added, “Well, I had no choice.  Plus, Darryl has been in big games for us, conference championship games, NIT games.”  As to holding Bramos down in the second half, he told us that “we’ve done well against him.  Tonight he had his way in the first half.  Conyers and Linhart made him work in the second.”

As to the style of play, Dambrot mused that “we had to play faster, score more, because early on we couldn’t guard them.  Then, we scored off our good rebounding, particularly our 19 offensive boards.”  For the game Akron out-rebounded Miami 40-28.

Coles was gracious, telling the media that “we were beaten by a superior team tonight, coaching too.  Their bigs inside and their smalls outside, then sometimes switching.  We didn’t rebound, gave up 19 offensive boards, five or six in one sequence, which must be some kind of record.  As for us, teams have figured out that we’re not particularly good off the dribble, so they’ve crowded us.  And when they take away our perimeter game and we can’t create off the dribble, we’re not very good offensively.”

On Akron, Coles added, “they were good defensively, switching to zone and back to man defense.  They’re mentally tough, tough enough to win this tournament.”

We’ll see how tough this point guard-less team is Friday night against Bowling Green.  The Falcons used a tight 2-3 zone to beat Akron 50-46 last week at Rhodes Arena, and used that same defense to manhandle Ohio University 74-61 in last night’s earlier semi-final.  Perhaps it’s not a bad match-up to face a zone team now that Akron is without a true point-guard, as McNees, Roberts and McClanahan could be on the floor together for stretches as zone-breakers.

Regardless, someone or some combination is going to have to defend BG star forward Nate Miller.  Miller manhandled Ohio’s Jerome Tillman last night for 22 points (on 9-11) and 10 rebounds, mostly scoring powerfully near the goal.  That job will fall partly on Defender of the Year Linhart, partly on Jimmy Conyers, and partly on both McKnight brothers.  That will leave it to McNees, and his alter ego Roberts, to handle the ball for the Zips.  Should be fun!

Buffalo Too Tough for Kent in Second MAC Quarterfinal

CLEVELAND, Ohio – Stronger on the boards (mostly due to 18 rebounds from 6-3 Calvin Betts, listed as a guard), the Buffalo Bulls pushed the Kent State Golden Flashes around all afternoon long, but could never shake them.  Then, after senior Greg Gamble hit one of two at the line with 22 seconds left in the game, Kent had the ball down by three.  Coach Geno Ford might have said “get a quick two,” but nothing developed quickly for point guard Al Mincy (who twice previously in the final two minutes had taken the ball 94 feet to paydirt).  Then, with under 10 seconds on the clock, Mincy saw an opening and knifed toward the goal.  But with so little time left, Ford no longer wanted a two-point shot, and utilized that awful rule to call timeout from the bench with Mincy about to lay up.  That left seven seconds left, Kent State ball out-of-bounds under the basket, needing a trey to tie.

Mincy, the trigger man, saw Al Fisher in the corner to his right, and tossed a short pass in Fisher’s direction.  The ball never got there, as Buffalo senior Andy Robinson deflected the pass, then as the ball bounced toward the end-line, Robinson alertly lunged for it, and in a “flash” slammed it off of Fisher’s lower body and out-of-bounds.  Buffalo ball with five seconds to go; game over.

All night long Kent had played from behind, trying to win despite a subpar performance from former Player of the Year Fisher.  Al finished with just nine points, on 2-14 shooting, including just 1-3 from the arc.  Credit Buffalo’s perimeter and interior defense, but in truth Fisher had a ton of looks near the basket, and this night the league’s best finisher couldn’t close the deal.

Kent battled and battled.  Its only two post-players, undersized Jullian Sullinger and Chris Singletary, were saddled all night with fouls, both playing just 14 minutes before fouling out.  It should be here noted that while Singletary was ejected just 90 seconds into Sunday’s rivalry game against Akron for throwing a punch at Akron’s Nate Linhart, and suspended for the opening round tournament game against Toledo, he also brings the toughness and fearlessness to the floor that coaches need to coach and win.  Tonight in just those 14 minutes, in what may be the final game of his career, Singletary contributed 13 big points on 5-7 shooting, mostly on post-ups and driving to the rim.

Back to the game, with Buffalo out-rebounding the Flashes, when Buffalo’s Titus Robinson (no relation to Andy) hit a trey at 13:30 of the first half, the Bulls had a ten-point lead at 25-15.  Andy Robinson’s jumper at 15:19 restored that margin at 29-19.  But over the final 4:21 of the half, Kent went on a run that temporarily saved the game, closing out the first half 11-2 to trail by just 1 at intermission, 31-30.

The game see-sawed up and down early in the second half, with Singletary keeping Kent State in the game early in the half.  Five times in the second stanza Kent State led by three, and on three of those five occasions the Flashes had the ball with an opportunity to extend their lead.  They would never do so.

Then, with Sullinger and Singletary mostly on the bench, and the Flashes often playing four guards with either Brandon Parks or Anthony Simpson, the Bulls reasserted themselves defensively and on the boards, extending to a five-point lead at 17:48.  The Flashes didn’t quit, pressing full-court with that four-guard alignment, and committing four fouls to extend the game in the final two minutes.  But try as they might, the Flashes couldn’t get that one big steal that they needed to catch up.  And with Buffalo hitting 6 of its 8 free throws in the last two minutes, they were able to hold on against gritty Kent State.

Statistically, reserve forward Max Boudreau led a balanced Buffalo attack with 13 points on 4-7 shooting, including the finish of a gorgeous pick and roll with Gamble that gave Buffalo that five point lead with just over two minutes to play.  Betts, who was held scoreless when Kent State beat Buffalo at Kent last week, added 11 on 3-8 shooting, and those monstrous 18 boards.  (Pound for pound – or inch for inch – Betts could be the best rebounder I’ve seen this year.)

Singletary’s 13 led Kent State, Evans had 11 (on 4-11 and 2-6 shooting) and Mincy had 10.  Playing off the bench, junior forward Anthony Simpson stemmed the tide on the boards for Kent State, pulling down 12 rebounds – six at the offensive end – and contributing eight points.

Buffalo Coach Reggie Witherspoon talked about Betts’ play, suggesting that hitting his first couple of shots gave the young man confidence, which helped his defense and rebounding as well as his offense.  He also said that as good as Al Fisher is for Kent State, he and his staff had decided to pressure him all over the court, particularly with the ball, hoping he’d get tired before they did.  At least this night, that strategy worked.  Witherspoon then told us that he’d scrimmaged against Fisher when he was a freshman at Siena, and “[after coming to this league,] I’d have been happy if he stated at Siena.”  He then complimented his own freshmen, Mitchell Watt and Titus Robinson, “it’s unusual to be competing for first place in a conference with freshmen on the floor.”

Ford was complimentary of Buffalo, saying that “they’re bigger, stronger, more athletic, and went after every ball.”  He bemoaned the fact that a number of times his team had the ball up three, and thought both Fisher and Anthony Simpson had point-blank looks they couldn’t put that would have extended the Flashes’ lead to five.

Ford agreed that Buffalo made Fisher work hard, that he himself had put the ball in Fisher’s hands an inordinate amount in the second half of Sunday’s win against Akron and in the first round win against Northern Illinois.  Still, he was surprised at Fisher’s inability to finish plays this night, calling his 5-11 guard “the best finisher around the rim in this history of this conference.”  He also talked about the toughness of Chris Singletary, saying that “few kids really want the ball at crunch time, Chris does.  And he wants to guard the opposition’s best player, box out their best rebounder on the weak side.”

Finally, addressing strength of schedule in connection with a question about a possible NIT bid, Ford commented about his difficult non-conference schedule, emulating that traditionally played by Miami.  “In this day and age, if you play 33 games, you can schedule yourself 20 wins.  We made a schedule designed to get us an at-large bid, but weren’t able to win those tough games.”  Kent is 19-14, hoping for a bid somewhere.

Buffalo on the other hand is already preparing for Ball State, which it lost to in Muncie the only time the teams met during the regular season.  That game will be Friday night at 7:30.

Ball State Survives Central Michigan in Overtime in First MAC Quarterfinal

CLEVELAND, Ohio – They finished the regular season tied for the Western Division lead (along with Western Michigan), all three teams 7-9 in conference (and all three well under .500 overall). But Ball State won the tiebreaker, therefore the second seed in the MAC Tournament, and thus a bye two days ago. Central Michigan had to play on Tuesday, eliminating Eastern Michigan 62-49.

This was a game pitting a more athletic guard-oriented team (Ball State) against a more powerful – though slower and less flexible – forward-oriented team (Central). And Central did everything they needed to do to win – almost. Now, they didn’t do it right away, as led by the early scoring of senior guard Laron Frazier (22 points for the game on 8-15 shooting), Ball State went up early, and led twice in the first half by as many as eight, 17-9 after two free throws by Freshman of the Year Jarrod Jones at the 9:00 mark, and then again 23-15 after a trey by senior Rob Giles at 14:40.

While Frazier was handling the scoring load, fellow senior guard Brandon Lampley was putting the defensive clamps on Central’s Robbie Harmon, who’d scored 13 against Eastern, holding him without a field goal for the first 39 minutes of the game. And shockingly, early on Ball State was winning the boards against powerful Central, ahead 13-10 in rebounds at the under-12 media timeout.

But Central hung tough, got to a pace more to their liking (slow, slower, slowest). Ultimately Central got control of the boards too (pace and boards are the formula for Central), leading 18-15 in rebounds at the half (and 39-27 for the game). And Central got off two shots to Ball State’s one in the last minute of the half, and a mini-5-0 run in that last minute pulled the Chippewas within one at the intermission, 29-28.

They got slower still in the second half, with the offense coming from second guard Jordan Bitzer (13 of his 18 after halftime, shooting 6-14 for the game). And they kept pounding the boards with center Marcus Van (8 boards) and power forward Jacolby Hardiman (7) leading the way. But behind Frazier, Jones and Giles, Ball State rebuilt the lead in the second half, going up by six at 48-42 at the 14:48 mark when Frazier hit a jumper, and again at 50-44 when Jones hit from in close on an assist by Lampley at 15:26.

Each time Central fought back, scoring eight of the last 10 points of regulation over the final three and a half minutes. First a jumper by Bitzer, set up by Harmon, at 16:39. Then came Harmon’s only field goal of the game at 17:44, followed by another jumper by Bitzer at 18:23. And after Jarrod Jones gave Ball State a two-point lead with a jumper at 18:48, Hardiman tied the score at 52 and was fouled at 19:21, but missed the ensuing free throw. But Central managed to rebound the miss with :39 left (Bitzer, who else, who ended up with 6 rebounds, in addition to his 18 points), and then their worst possession of the game ended terribly. A basket by Van at the buzzer would be disallowed, as the buzzer was obviously for ticks beyond the expiration of the shot clock. Central had a foul to give, and then Giles missed a desperation trey at the buzzer, forcing overtime.

In overtime, Central got an early lead on the strength of Bitzer’s shooting, and was up 59-56 at the 2:02 mark. But the rest of the game belonged to Ball State, who outscored Central over the final 2:44 by the same margin Central had benefited by in regulation, 8-2. Laron Frazier had four of those final eight points. Finally, when Frazier hit two free throws with just 11 ticks left for a 64-59 lead, there were no more comebacks left for Central, and a meaningless basket by Hardiman in the final seconds made the final score 64-61.

Ball State Coach Billy Taylor was humble in victory, pointing to having to overcome Central’s strength on the boards all night long. He was proudest of his senior guards, Frazier and Lampley, who won the game for him at the offensive and defensive ends, respectively. When a reporter asked Lampley if he could overlook his 2-9 shooting in light of having held Harman to three points, Taylor interjected that “the coach can overlook Lampley’s 2-9.”

Central Michigan Coach Ernie Ziegler acknowledged our question about clock management in the last minute of the first half, taking advantage of a “two for one” and scoring the last five points of the half. “But I wish we’d have been cognizant of time and score in the last minute of the second half, when we ended the most important possession of the game with a shot-clock violation.” Ziegler added that “the Ball State kids are tough-minded, and used that to beat us tonight.”

As to his own team, he was glad we asked about the fine second half play of Jordan Blitzer. “In our league, Bitzer is underappreciated, he’s a really good player, and a really tough player,” Ziegler said.

We’ll have to wait for next season to see more of Bitzer, but we’ll see the Ball State group tomorrow night in a conference semifinal against Buffalo

Cedric Jackson Outduels Shelvin Mack for Horizon Tournament Championship

INDIANAPOLIS – Now that it’s over, it feels all the sweeter when you do it the hard way, playing two extra games, winning the conference championship on the other guys’ floor.

And when a senior, Cedric Jackson, who underperformed all year, lost his confidence and looked like he just wanted his career to end quietly, comes back to find the best parts of his game, and uses those to lead his team to victory, then it is that much sweeter.

Behind Jackson’s MVP performance, 19 points on 7-12 and 4-8 from the arc, eight assists and seven rebounds, Cleveland State defeated Butler tonight at Hinkle Fieldhouse, by a score of 57-54.  In doing so, the Vikings won the Horizon League’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.  With Butler likely to win an at-large bid, that makes the Horizon a two-bid league this year.

It was a nail-biter throughout, two teams playing hard, defending fiercely, just as they did twice before during the regular season.  Somewhat surprisingly, given all of the talent on both sides, the game came down to a shootout between Butler freshman guard Shelvin Mack and Jackson, with Jackson getting the better of Mack by the slimmest of margins.  Mack finished with one fewer point than Jackson, 18, on 5-10 and 2-7 from the arc.  He also pulled down nine rebounds.  Matt Howard added 14 for Butler, on 4-7 shooting.  But it wasn’t quite enough.

Three times in the game Butler led by as many as eight points, 25-17 at 13:23 of the first half, after a Mack trey; 27-19 two minutes later on a Mack free throw, and 39-31, 1:40 into the second half after a Howard dunk.  But each time Cleveland State dug in deeper on defense, at all five positions on the floor, and held the line, then inched back.

Behind the good all-around play of Jackson and the shooting of reserve freshman guard Jeremy Montgomery, who finished with 11 points on 4-6 and 3-4 behind the arc, over the next 11:30 the Vikes outscored Butler 23-9 to go up 54-48 at the 13:10 mark.  In the end, only five points were scored collectively by the two teams in the final 4:55, four by Butler and just one by CSU. All five were on free throws.

With Cleveland State up by two at 56-54 with under 20 seconds remaining, Cole guarding Haywood and Jackson on Mack, Haywood gave to Mack, who penetrated the left baseline under terrific pressure from Jackson.  Largely due to that pressure (and of course the clock ticking down), Mack thought he had a return pass available to Hayward to the right of the key, but threw the pass right to Cole for a turnover.

After the Bulldogs fouled Cole, who made one of two from the line to extend Cleveland State’s lead to 57-54, Butler had the ball with 14 seconds on the clock, down three. Again under severe defensive pressure, the Bulldogs managed to get two treys off, one by Mack and one by Gordon Hayward, neither close.

A comparison I’ve used once before, the way this game ended made it feel like the 2008 Super Bowl, with Clevealnd State playing the role of the Giants, having lost to these “Pats” during the regular year, but having played them tough both times.

An incredibly emotional player, Jackson finally found his rhythm in this tournament, and after he made a shot or two, it seemed like months of self-imposed pressure melted away.

We talked to Coach Gary Waters after the game about Jackson, and the return of his confidence.  Waters corrected me a bit on that, telling us that “Cedric always had confidence, but was too concerned about his own play, rather than about the team.  Earlier in the year he’d look at his stats each night and see only his poor shooting, and not all those other good stats, and he’d feel awful.  I would tell him that ‘you’re my point guard, be my point guard, and your scoring will come.’

“And do you want to know who helped Cedric?  Quincy Douby of the Sacramento Kings, who played for me at Rutgers, came to practice when the Kings were in town, and sat down with Cedric.  He told Cedric, ‘You’re worried about the wrong things.  As a point guard you need to defend, to distribute, and yes, to make your free throws at the end.  Now, if you want to be a good shooter, you need to put the time into that.  Come to the gym to shoot every morning at 7:30.’  Since then, Cedric’s been to the gym to shoot lots of mornings at 7:30.”

Butler coach Brad Stevens, along with Matt Howard and Shelvin Mack, were gracious in defeat.  Stevens said, “Cedric was just fabulous tonight.  In fact Jackson was great the whole tournament.  We were beaten by a really good team tonight.  But I just told my team that the last time a Butler team lost the conference championship, we ended up going all the way to the Sweet Sixteen.”  Stevens also added in response to our question that looking ahead to the NCAA Tournament, he is “really encouraged” about the improved play tonight from Mack [whose shooting has been off for almost a month].

At the end of the night, Waters raised one of his arms and pointed to a ring on one of his fingers.  A Kent ring, he acknowledged.  “I’ve been wearing this ring too long, it’s time to get a Cleveland State ring.”  Well, the Vikings have won an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, and Waters will now get a new tournament ring, one that says Cleveland State on it.

News and Notes

• This game was so intense, so all-consuming, that the assembled media appeared to forget there were eight other teams in the tournament besides Butler and Cleveland State.  The all-tournament team came exclusively from these two, consisting of Howard and Mack from Butler, and Norris Cole and J’Nathan Bullock for CSU, along with MVP Jackson.  While I had a couple of others on my ballot (Ryan Tillema of Wisconsin-Green Bay and Cory Cooperwood of Wright State in lieu of Bullock and Mack), the final was so good that can appreciate why the voters focused exclusively on players from these two teams.
• This marks the first time since the conference instituted a double-bye for the top two seeds that a team that did not get the double-bye won the conference tournament.
• Enjoy the Selection Shows on Sunday, and with any luck, the next time you read this space we’ll be reporting from one the NCAA sub-regional sites (hopefully one not too far from home).

Akron Turns Rebuilding Season into Third Place Tie, 5th Seed in MAC Tourney

The last time this writer wrote about Akron, it was after attending a preseason exhibition game against NAIA D-II Walsh College, a game in which the Zips were outrebounded 37-29, and held on by the skin of their collective teeth to win 83-81.  If the game had gone on just a minute or two longer, it could have become an embarrassing loss for Coach Keith Dambrot’s program.

What a difference four months make.

Now it’s March, the MAC Tournament beginning tomorrow in Cleveland, and with the 5^th seed Akron (now 19-12, 10-6 in the MAC) opens up against No. 12 Toledo at 6 pm at “the Q.”  Along the way, redshirt freshman Ronnie Steward from Columbus won the point guard battle, then became injured and was replaced at that spot by diminutive true freshman Anthony “Humpty” Hitchens from Chillicothe.  Joining Humpty in the starting lineup for much of the year has been 6-8 freshman forward Nikola Cvetinovich from Serbia via Virginia.  And while the original plan was to redshirt freshman shooting guard Brett McClanahan from Nitro, West Virginia this season, halfway through the year, partly as a result of Steward’s injury, along with the McClanahan family the coaching staff removed Brett’s redshirt, allowing him to contribute significantly during the conference season.

It’s no surprise to our readers that in recent years the MAC has been a bit down, with particularly few power forwards and mostly small guards.  The East Division continues to be better than the West; if the seedings were done without regard to division the first 5 MAC seeds would have come from the East Division.  Preseason favorite Kent has the strongest and deepest group of guards in the league, with last year’s Player of the Year Al Fisher, Chris Singletary, Jordan Mincy, Mike McKee and well-traveled newcomer Tyree Evans.  But weakness at the forward spots resulted in Kent earning a disappointing 6^th seed in this year’s tournament.  The best forward in the league is Ohio’s Jerome Tillman, but he’s not really 6-6 as listed, and inconsistent guard play resulted in a disappointing 9^th seed for the Bobcats.

Back to Akron, this year’s team needed to replace graduating point guard Nick Dials, Jeremiah Woods and Cedrick Middleton, returning as forwards finesse rebounder and mid-range scorer Nate Linhart and the McKnight brothers, Chris and Brett.  They would so heavily rely on first two and then three freshmen.  But despite greater successes at Central Michigan and recently here at Akron (NIT appearances two of the last three seasons, sandwiching a regular season East Division crown), this may have been Keith Dambrot’s best coaching job ever.  Fighting through the inconsistency inherent in relying on freshmen (particularly at the point), Dambrot got his group to play aggressive yet largely sound man-to-man defense, to continue their tradition of home court dominance at Rhodes Arena (posting a 10-3 home record), and to produce a season-changing 7-game win streak in late January and early February.

But most of all there was the development of Hitchens.  Never at a loss for confidence, the athletic, skilled but undersized guard started off slowly, most nights posting more turnovers than assists and shooting a poor percentage.  The win at Fairleigh Dickinson was a hopeful exception, with Humpty scoring 12 points on 5-8 shooting (2-3 in treys) in just 15 minutes of play.  Better still at Niagara, 15 points on 5-11, including 3-8, and just two turnovers in 30 minutes.  He was less reliable against Dayton (17 points, but five turnovers), stronger in the North Carolina A&T win, in the VCU loss, and in the St. Francis win.  Humpty was now scoring (especially in transition), but still turning the ball over too much and sometimes reaching too much on defense.

Then the conference season, in which Humpty raised his scoring average to nine points per game, and began closing in on a 1:1 assist to turnover ratio.  He’s hit a bit of a wall of late offensively, shooting poorly in three of Akron’s four games preceding Sunday’s rivalry game at Kent (Akron losses at Valparaiso in the Bracketbusters and to Bowling Green, and last Thursday’s home win over Ohio), but that’s to be expected from all freshmen.  Humpty recovered to play well in a close loss Sunday at Kent, scoring 13 points on 4-11 shooting, and credited with three assists and just one turnover in 25 minutes of play.

Now they have a first round game against No. 12 Toledo to get back in the swing. Humpty didn’t play well in the Zips’ win at Savage Arena, scoring just 2 on 1-5 shooting, and credited with no assists and two turnovers in 19 minutes.  A win against Toledo would be Akron’s 20^th of the year, the fourth straight year Dambrot has won 20 or more (Akron was 19-10 Dambrot’s first season, 2004-05).

If the Zips can prevail against Toledo, No. 4 seed and traditionally powerful Miami awaits in the next round Thursday night at 9:30, the two teams having split a pair of games this year, each winning on its home court.  The RedHawks will be looking to extend Coach Charlie Coles’ final season in a stellar coaching career, but Dambrot just might have his three freshmen ready this week, specifically his exciting freshman point guard.  And if he does, look out Toledo, look out Miami, look out MAC, and look out to the participants in any post-season tournament the Zips play their way into.

Virginia Commonwealth Too Good for George Mason, Wins Colonial

RICHMOND, Va. – Eric Maynor started out passing, but after the first 4 minutes of the first half, he took over the game with his scoring, accounting for 14 of VCU’s 30 first half points in the CAA Final, on 6-9 shooting, 2-3 from the arc.  George Mason’s John Vaughan couldn’t stop him, nor could Mason’s 2-3 zone.  Add to that that center Larry Sanders has now learned to defend without fouling – mainly by staying on the ground until an opponent has left his feet and only then going up to contest – and that poor hands and all, Sanders managed to coral most of the rebounds he touched (12 at the half to go with 6 points on 3-5, and no fouls), and a third scorer in perimeter shooter Bradford Burgess (8 in the half on 3-6, including 2-5 from deep), and this VCU team becomes very, very good.

So as tough and talented as Mason sophomore point guard Cam Long is, as physically tough as are upperclassman forwards Darryl Monroe and Louis Birdsong, and freshmen forwards Michael Morrison and Ryan Pearson are, they were nowhere near enough to stop VCU.  And with tonight’s 71-50 win, suddenly a VCU team is peaking in March, even improving, on its way to the big dance.

The second half was just an afterthought, Maynor resuming to pass and Sanders to rebound.  Held scoreless in the first half, Mason center Darryl Monroe was finished mentally; held to a single point in the first half, Mason forward Louis Birdsong was intimidated near the goal, altered his shots, and couldn’t score.  And while freshman Morrison is tougher, and will be heard from in this league, he was no match for Sanders this night, especially when Sanders’ running mate Kirill Pishchalnikov was in the game.  The game even got a little chippy in the second stanza (because of the big score differential), but the officials were able to step in and settle things down.  VCU’s lead topped out at 23 six minutes into the second half (43-20), and they were never threatened in winning by 21.

Mason senior Dre Smith, broken nose and all, kept his team moderately close, close enough on the scoreboard to avoid embarrassment, scoring 23 points, 18 in the second stanza, on 8-14 shooting, including 5-10 from deep.  Often guarded by Maynor, Mason’s budding star sophomore point guard Cam Long was held in check all night long, finishing with just four on 2-10 shooting.  And John Vaughan was able to score just five, on 2-5 shooting.

In the end, Maynor scored 25 points on 9-20, though most of his misses were long after the issue was decided; he also had eight assists.  Sanders had a monster game inside, scoring the game’s first basket on a baseline jumper and 18 for the game, on 7-12, grabbing 20 rebounds, blocking seven shots, and changing countless more.  Perhaps his most impressive stat, Sanders was whistled for just foul fouls in 34 hectic minutes.

After the game, CAA Commissioner Tom Yeager announced all-tournament selections of Sanders, Long, Smith, ODU’s Gerald Lee and Towson’s Junior Hairston.  This writer voted for Georgia State’s Joe Dukes and Madison’s Pierre Curtis instead of Smith and Hairston, but the choices voted on by the assembled media were just fine.  And I’d imagine the selection of Eric Maynor as tournament MVP was pretty darn near unanimous.

After the game, Coach Anthony Grant focused on Maynor’s great leadership, repeating his frequent view that Maynor has had a huge impact on Sanders’ growth, both as a player and as a person.  While he wouldn’t speak directly toward the difference between last year’s team’s lethargic post-season and this team’s March enthusiasm and improvement (other then “we had a number of first year players last year who needed to learn”), he spoke of his group as “family,” and repeated Maynor’s comment that “we love each other.”  Maynor was unequivocal in his view that this team can succeed in the NCAA Tournament, saying more than once that “we’re not done yet.”

George Mason Coach Jim Larranaga pointed out how Sanders changed the game, rendering his two starting big men terribly ineffective.  He also spoke of Mason’s poor shooting, 30 percent and just 50 percent from the line (7-14), and bemoaned his team’s poor shooting over the last three weeks.  He also expressed discouragement that his team seemed distracted tonight, didn’t listen in the huddle, and then didn’t do what the coaching staff asked out on the floor.  “This is often caused by stress, thinking negatively, being discouraged,” Larranaga said.  “We showed our frustration early in the game.”

Don’t cry for George Mason.  They look like a very good bet to be an NIT team, they’re young and good, seem to have already done much to replace graduating Smith, Monroe and Vaughan, and Mike Morrison will be a brute in the middle when he takes over for Monroe.

As for VCU, they’re the best team to come out of this league since I’ve been around, including Mason of 2006, and unlike last year’s VCU team, they’re improving and playing with energy in March when it matters most.  And they’re obviously having fun, on and off the court.  On the subject of fun, Maynor finished the post-game by telling us how much fun it will be to watch the NCAA selection shows this coming Sunday, knowing that “this year, our name has to be called.”

So while the CAA will almost certainly be just a one-bid league this year, it appears to this writer that whatever their seed, the 2008-09 edition of VCU is more ready to do damage in the tournament than any team that has come out of this league in recent memory, even the Duke-killers of two years ago, and even the Final Four Mason group of three years ago.

Mason Comes Back to End Towson’s Tournament Run

RICHMOND, Va. – With 8:39 left in the second Colonial Athletic Assciation semifinal and down by 4 (43-39), Jim Larranaga’s George Mason Patriots came out of a time-out full-court pressing the upstart Towson team.  The Tigers beat the press easily that possession, and there was senior Rocky Coleman with the ball leading a two-on-one break, lobbing to junior Calvin Lee for the dunk that would have extended Towson’s lead to 6 and brought the house down.  Alas, the pass was in inch too high, sailed off Lee’s outstretched fingertips for a turnover, and instead of nailing the coffin shut on Mason, Towson left the door open.

Led by sophomore point guard Cam Long’s 3-point shooting, from that point on George Mason outscored Towson 17-5 to come away with a hard-fought CAA semifinal win, 56-48.

The undermanned Towson team showed that reckless abandon Pat Kennedy had talked about the previous night, particularly on the defensive end.  While being outrebounded by Darryl Monroe, Louis Birdsong and friends 42-34 in the game, Towson stayed in the game (and led by as many as six with nine minutes remaining) on the strength of 10 interior blocked shots (and that’s just the number the scorer was able to record), four by senior Junior Hairston, three by sophomore Robert Nwankwo, and three by junior JUCO transfer Calvin Lee.  But it was not enough.

First, Nwankwo dominated the first half as much as anyone could with just two points and one rebound, blocking two shots (at least) and changing countless others.  And in the biggest change of momentum imaginable, first Nwankwo dunked off a pass from Coleman with 15 seconds left in the half to tie the game at 26, only to see a trey from six feet behind the arc by Mason’s Dre Smith at the buzzer give Mason a three-point lead at the intermission, 29-26.

No matter the final score, the second half belonged to Towson’s Lee, as the junior grew up on the big stage this night.  In that half alone, showing great confidence and athleticism, Lee had four points, seven rebounds, and a block, and was a force to be reckoned with on the inside.  And from Lee’s point of view, as well as Kennedy’s, one can only think back to that Coleman lob that missed Lee by inches and ask what might have been.

Monroe lead Mason with 15 points on 6-11 shooting and seven rebounds, and his running mate Louis Birdsong had nine boards, six points, and showed the game over by circling out with his dribble after catching a baseball press-breaking pass in the last minute.  Cam Long finished with 14 on 5-11 and 4-7 (nine on three treys in the second half), and added six rebounds and five assists, with one turnover in 33 minutes at the point.

Josh Thornton kept the Tigers in the game from the perimeter with 15 points on 5-12 and 3-10, and freshman point guard Troy Franklin from Mt. Carmel High School in Baltimore had a second straight good game on the ball, and scored 10 on 4-8 shooting.

Larranaga told the media that he thought Towson played “as hard as a team can play.”   Admitting some fatigue showing up in his team’s early shooting and late rebounding, Kennedy was proud of his group, particularly of senior forward Hairston.  Surprisingly, Pat again answered a question this writer had posed last night, when we asked “what took you so long,” talking about having six players on his roster who sat out last year, eight who had never played together, and adding simply that it “took a while.”  Kennedy agreed with tonight’s question, that being whether “Calvin Lee grew up before our eyes,” and thought Lee and Thornton would bring their improved tournament play into next season, when they’ll be joined by solid incoming recruiting class.

So yet another all-Virginia Final is set in the CAA tomorrow night, with VCU and George Mason, the conference’s two signature programs, set to meet tomorrow night at 7 p.m. eastern.  These two teams last met in a final two years ago, when 6^th seeded Mason ran all the way to the final, even led 39 minutes into the game, before that famous steal and basket by then-sophomore Eric Maynor gave VCU the game, the tournament and the automatic bid, en route to a first-round upset of Duke.  Expect tomorrow night’s match to be just as good.

Maynor Wills VCU to Semifinal Win

RICHMOND, Va. – For the second day in a row, Old Dominion couldn’t hit from the perimeter, following up a 2-13 effort from the arc in the Hofstra win with 1-9 today.  But unlike yesterday’s game, this day Gerald Lee couldn’t finish at the goal, then turned his ankle (on the same foot that was injured previously), limiting his effectiveness in the second half.  That left tough-rebounding ODU up by just a point at halftime (28-27), and vulnerable to two-time Player of the Year Eric Maynor in the second half.  And Maynor took over the game in the second half, leading VCU to a comfortable 61-53 win.

But respectfully, this game was not lost by ODU in the second half, when Maynor dominated and Lee was limping and ineffective.  It was lost in the first half, when the Monarchs had all the better of the play, except couldn’t finish their plays.  At half-time, ODU led VCU on the boards 20-12, had taken 4 more shots than VCU, and 2 more free throws.  Bookend sophomore forwards Frank Hassell and Ben Finney had 10 and five points respectively, three and two rebounds.  But as Tim Duncan-like as he was the night before, this day Lee was less aggressive at the rim, and while he was able to get clean close looks in the first half, he pulled back and looked tentative with the ball, making just 1 of his 6 first half shots.  That and his teammates hitting just 1-5 from the arc in that half left the door open, and as usual, Maynor would walk right through that door.

When VCU had pressed in the first half, ODU had been ready, and with only five first half turnovers, the Monarchs were able to do some business offensively behind the press.  Not so in the second half.  While forcing just four additional ODU turnovers, in the second stanza full-court defense caused ODU out of their rhythm, both to take poor shots and to miss their good ones, and ODU shot just 25 percent from the field in the second stanza, 0-4 from the arc.

And Maynor put on an offensive clinic, penetrating, looking to score first, but also distributing, scoring 13 of his 23 points after halftime (on 4-6 shooting, including a big three), and dishing out three of his four assists.  The game was largely over at the under-four media timeout.

In addition to Maynor’s 23, sophomore center Larry Sanders scored 12 (on 5-10 shooting) and his 14 boards ultimately kept VCU within five for the game in that all-important category.  For the losers, with Lee contributing just five (on 1-7) and just four boards, Frank Hassell was strong near the goal with 14 points (on 5-7) and six boards, and sophomore forward Keyon Carter came off the bench to score 12 (on 4-8) and grab three rebounds.

ODU Coach Blaine Taylor took an extra minute or two to compose himself, then after noting that Lee hurt his ankle commented obliquely that “there are inequities in basketball, as guards are much more protected than forwards.  Some teams send big strong players at your talented forwards with instructions to foul as much as they can, and hope the officials don’t call all of them.”  Obviously, Taylor was alluding to VCU’s two-headed defensive monster that shared the assignment of guarding Lee, 6-10 Sanders and 6-8 power forward Kirill Pishchalnikov.

When I asked VCU Coach Anthony Grant about Defender of the Year Sanders’ improved ability to defend without fouling (and therefore stay on the court), Grant agreed, adding that “Larry has learned a lot in two years, from Eric among others, and now knows what he has to do to help us, including how to stay out on the floor.”

Tomorrow, in the CAA Final, VCU will face either in-state rival George Mason, or Pat Kennedy’s upstart Towson Tigers.  The winner gets an automatic bid to the big dance.

Old Dominion’s Gerald Lee Grows to Manhood in Quarterfinal Win, Sets Up All-Virginia CAA Semifinal

RICHMOND, Va. – Some of us used to call Old Dominion junior center Gerald Lee soft, not finishing as strong as he might at the goal, not dominating down the stretch, not winning the biggest of games.  Not anymore.

The player Hofstra Coach Tom Pecora calls the Tim Duncan of our league, got into a CAA Tournament shootout yesterday with Hofstra’s star sophomore guard Charles Jenkins, and by the thinnest of margins, bad foot and all Lee prevailed, giving the Monarchs a 52-51 win over the Pride and a berth in today’s all-Virginia semi-final against Virginia Commonwealth.

It was a thing of beauty to watch.  Lee got the deepest position I’ve ever seen him get, on a host of Hofstra defenders, sealing beautifully to create openings for entry passes, and then finished powerfully at the goal.  He also put the ball down and penetrated from the perimeter, again finishing everything.  When all was said and done, Lee had a game high 30 points, on 13-19 shooting, and 10 rebounds, 5 at the offensive end.

And by one point and the strength of senior Jonathan Adams’ last-second block of a short jumper by Jenkins, ODU had its one-point win.  Jenkins pulled his weight in the shoot-out, finishing with 27, though he had to take 23 shots to get them, making nine.  Jenkins also rebounded, pulling down six.

ODU has become a powerful team, winning the rebounding battle virtually every night, and starting (and finishing with) four powerful players on the floor, along with point guard Darius James.  Super sophomore Ben Finney is listed as a guard, and Adams defends opposing two-guards in man-to-man defense, but along with Lee and powerful sophomore Frank Hassell, they form as formidable rebounding group as you will find in mid-major basketball anywhere in the country.  With Adams adding eight boards this day (along with seven points, on ODU’s only two treys), Lee’s 10 resulted in a 46-34 rebounding edge over Hofstra, and shooting just 37 percent from the field and 14 percent from the arc, ODU needed every carom they could get.

Coach Blaine Taylor beamed about Lee in the post-game, and Lee told the press that he wasn’t conscious of any kind of shootout with Jenkins.  “I just wanted to win the game,” Lee said.

I asked Taylor about the four-forward alignment (even against full-court pressure, protecting the lead), wondering if that wasn’t too much pressure to place on his sophomore guard.  “I trust him,” Taylor said, “and I call him the snake.  Really, he’s the head, and I think of that as the head of a snake.  And I named him after another lefty, the Raiders’ Snake Stabler.  And Darius performed well as our lead [and only] guard, and that’s how I always use him.”

I also asked Taylor about possible concerns about his team’s poor perimeter shooting this game, about seeing more zone defenses down the road.  “We shot 52 percent from the floor our last 9 or 10 games, and I’m not worried about our shooting.  Some good shots didn’t fall tonight, but they will.  We managed to win tonight, without shooting well, so the next time out, I expect we’ll shoot the ball better from the outside.”

Well, given the monster four-forward lineup, if ODU shoots the ball better today against VCU, the Eric Maynor’s Rams – with Defender of the Year Larry Sanders at center – had better be careful.  The Rams are liable to be pushed around in today’s semi-final by Gerald Lee and Co.

No. 11 Towson Upsets No. 3 Northeastern in Colonial SemiFinal

RICHMOND, Va. – You could hear the whispers everywhere, even as far away as Cleveland.  About Coach Pat Kennedy.  He’s in his 29th season as a Division I head coach, his second without prolific scorer Gary Neal.  Iona, Florida State, DePaul and Montana came before Towson, Sam Cassell at FSU long before Neal.  An improved season last year without Neal, with point guard C.C. Williams running the show, but the Tigers couldn’t find a way to win away from home last year.  Superb performances by Josh Thornton and Tony Durant in an upset win over Hofstra to begin last year’s CAA Tourney in Richmond, and then a strong losing effort, especially defensively, against No. 1 seed VCU.  There’s money to be spent on the gym and the program despite virtually no tradition, and precious few butts in the seats at Towson Center.

Kennedy knew he needed to take another step forward this season, his fifth at Towson, to get his team to win some games on the road despite the departure of Williams, the league’s leader is assist to turnover ratio.  So Kennedy rolled the dice with transfers two years ago, 6-6 point guard Brian Morris and forward David Brewster from Richmond, and Jarrel and Jimmy Smith from Colorado State all becoming eligible this year, joining a team already crowded with junior college and D-I transfers.

The roll came up snake eyes.  Towson came into the tournament 5-13 in conference play, 11-21 overall, and 5-13 on games played away from the Towson Center.  So the whispers were – and still are – that a coaching change is coming.

Then the Tigers did what they’d done last year, grabbing an upset win to start the tournament.  This year it was over No. 6 Drexel, and rather than just a win, it was an absolute thrashing.  Led as always by underrated senior forward Junior Hairston, Towson scored 19 of the first 21 points of the game against the Dragons and their shell-shocked coach Bruiser Flint, led by 25 at 39-14 at the half, and cruised to a 73-62 victory.  Hairston finished with 24 on 7-11 shooting, including 2-2 from the arc, and seven rebounds.  But still the whispering continued.

Then in last night’s quarter-final game, the Tigers drew No. 3 and 18-11 Northeastern, who led the CAA for 6 weeks in January and February.  When they played man, Kennedy often had Hairston on first team all-conference performer and 7^th-leading scorer Matt Janning, Hairston, his teammates and an effective zone holding Janning to just 8 points in the game, on 3-13 and 0-4 shooting (and just 2 rebounds).  And even though NU junior center Manny Adako (also third team all-league) had a monster game, scoring 23 of NU’s 54 on 10-14 shooting and grabbing seven boards, even though the work of Adako and point guard Chaisson Allen on the boards (Allen had 10 caroms) resulted in an eight-rebound advantage for the Huskies at 34-26, Kennedy’s Tigers kept the game at a manageable pace, stayed on the lead more often than not, and scored 8 of the last 9 points of the first half to go up 7 (32-25).  Then in the second half, the Tigers came back from a five-point half-time deficit to go up six on two Morris free throws at 19:24 (56-50), and held on to beat the Huskies 58-54.

In the last half-minute of the game, Allen pulled Northeastern within three with a trey at 19:40, Tiger point guard Troy Franklin (13 points on 5-10 and four assists, and walked around Janning and Allen on his last two handles of the game, once for a goal and once to draw a foul) missed the front end of a 1-and-1, and Hairston foolishly fouled NU’s Baptiste Bataille on a trey, giving the junior guard three free-throws to tie the game with 4.8 seconds remaining.  But Bataille missed the first, made the second, purposely missed the third, and when forward Robert Nwankwo rebounded that miss (one of his 6 boards), the game was over.  Nwankwo made two free throws at the other end in the final seconds to complete the scoring.  Still the whispers.

Kennedy has been there before, having been fired twice (from FSU and DePaul).  His chin was up and his attitude positive at the post-game press conference, and nary a word was spoken on the subject.  “We’ve gotten back to the way we were playing early in the season, when we beat Navy and UMBC, and were right there with Villanova at halftime.  We obviously struggled through the middle of the season, but now we’re showing much more continuity on offense, understanding time and score, executing down the stretch of games, even playing with some of that reckless abandon you need to win.  Tonight we controlled tempo, Junior [Hairston] defended Janning well, and I’m starting to see our confidence build.”

While none of us chose to address Kennedy’s job pressure, I did ask why it took so long for his team to gel, and after pointing to early season injuries to David Brewster and Calvin Lee that hurt Towson’s depth, then pointing out the disadvantage of the absence of any winning tradition at Towson, Kennedy stated that “we’re coming together now, admittedly a year later than I would have liked.”

Kennedy gets to coach the Tigers one more day today against George Mason in one CAA semifinal.  And if Towson should continue on its late season run and beat Mason, Kennedy will get one more day to coach, in tomorrow night’s final.  Nothing else is assured.  Here’s to hoping the Tigers continue on their unlikely surge, win the CAA Tournament, and make that decision at Towson as difficult as possible.

Wright State Shoots Early, Defends Late, to Oust Wisconsin-Milwaukee

INDIANAPOLIS – Usually it’s a good thing when a team opens up hitting all its shots, including treys, building a double-digit lead early in the game.  It’s even better for a team that doesn’t usually start fast, even one we might call offensively challenged.

Not so this night.

In tonight’s Horizon League quarter-final game between 4^th seed Wright State and 5^th seed Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Brad Brownell’s Wright State Raiders came out blazing hot, hitting their first five shots (including two treys by center Ronnie Thomas), and 10 of their first 17 (including 6-8 from the arc), to lead 26-14 11:38 into the game.

But along the way, the Raiders forgot what “brung” them this far, never dug in and clamped down defensively, and allowed Milwaukee to then take off on a 25-13 run (and 16-2 to the horn) to end the first half tied at 39.

It didn’t help that WSU’s best player Todd Brown picked up his second foul at the 12:55 mark when he switched onto Tone Boyle at the arc, sat the rest of the half, and went to the locker room scoreless.

It also didn’t help that plodding back-up Milwaukee forward Jason Averkamp was hot inside and out, shot 4-for-4 and 2-for-2, and led all scorers with 10 at the intermission.

But – there’s always a but – Wright State somehow managed to right the ship at halftime, came out guarding like they should have from the outset, and scored 15 of the first 17 points in the second half to lead 54-41.  And this time they continued to guard.

It was a game in which Wright State held Milwaukee’s leading scorer Jim Eayers scoreless, mostly the work of Ronnie Thomas, and in which Milwaukee countered by holding WSU leading scorer Todd Brown to eight, three of which were late-game free-throws most of which were the work of Ricky Franklin.  The Raiders’ signature half-court man-to-man defense controlled the game, and Wright State won easily 80-70, in a game that was over at the under-eight media timeout.

For Wright State, Cory Cooperwood was efficient all night long, scoring 14 on 4-6 shooting (making his only shot from behind the arc), and pulling down 10 huge rebounds.  Ever-improving N’Gai Evans scored 12 points, also on 4-6 and 1-1 shooting, was credited with five assists and only two turnovers, and played a superior floor game.

For the losers, Avery Smith kept his team in the game until half-way through the second half, finishing with 15 points on 6-10 and 1-2, 4 rebounds, five assists and two turnovers.  Reserve Deonte Roberts contributed 15 as well on 7-7 shooting, though most of his scoring was after the issue was decided.

After the game, Brownell was prouder of his team than I’ve seen all year.  When I asked him about holding Eayers scoreless, he talked about having game-planned to rotate on Eayers when he screens and then slips/pops and that collectively his team kept Eayers from ever finding a rhythm in the game.

As to the strong shooting performance (53 percent, and 67 percent from behind the arc on 12-18), Brownell said, “It helps us offensively that our post guys can shoot and that that makes Eayers guard all over the floor.”  He added that he “expects Ronnie [Thomas] to make more shots and he is free to shoot three-pointers.”

Brownell complimented both Thomas and Cooperwood, saying Thomas has “fought through some injuries this season,” and that Cooperwood, “shows more enthusiasm as a player, cares more for his teammates that any of us would imagine.”

While Brownell thought that the defensive focus slipped when his team shot itself to a twelve-point lead midway through the first half, he was really excited about how his team defended the 3-point line in the second half. Milwaukee shot 8-26 from the arc in the game, just 2-13 in the second half.

Finally, Brownell talked about who his second scorer might be after Todd Brown.  After acknowledging Brown’s foul trouble in tonight’s first half, and his overall average game, he was incredibly pleased that his other guys shot well, meaning Cooperwood, Evans, Thomas and even Cooper Land, who scored 13 points on a 4-6 effort from beyond the arc.

Now it’s time for Wright State to play the home team and first seed, Butler, tomorrow night here at Hinkle.  Recognizing that Butler has twice dominated the early going against WSU, Brownell said, “We have to play them well early; they got much too comfortable at our place.”

Well, if the Raiders can manage to shoot as well tomorrow night against Butler’s defense as they did tonight against Milwaukee’s, they just might be in the game to the end with the Bulldogs.

Cole Outduels Mayo as Cleveland State Ousts UIC

INDIANAPOLIS – Tonight’s second Horizon League quarterfinal game between No. 3 Cleveland State and No.7 Illinois-Chicago turned into a shootout between UIC’s all-league senior and conference second leading scorer Josh Mayo, and theViking’s budding star sophomore guard Norris Cole.

Assigned both to guard Mayo and provide the bulk of CSU’s scoring, Cole was up to the task, and behind Cole’s 26 points on 9-16 shooting, 2-5 from the arc and 6-6 from the line, Cleveland State  came back from a late  nine point deficit to defeat UIC 67-64.  Mayo finished with 24, on just 3-9 shooting against Norris, though he made 17-20 free throws.

Cleveland State started strong at both ends, and behind the scoring of Cole and Cedric Jackson, the Vikes led 16-5 at the 7:17 mark.  But guard Robo Kreps led the Flames back with 10 first half points, and UIC trailed by only two  at the intermission, 29-27.

UIC power forward Rob Eppinger managed to score eight in that first half on 3-9 shooting, and held CSU’s first-team all-league power forward J’Nathan Bullock scoreless for the entire half.

When the teams came out for the second stanza, they both went scoreless for the first 2:53.  Then a bucket by Mayo tied the game at 29, and at the first media timeout, CSU led by just one at 32-31.  Then came the move of the game by UIC Coach Jimmy Collins:  UIC came out of that first media timeout playing  2-3 zone, which they stayed in for much of the rest of the game.  In that zone, over the next five minutes the Flames held the Vikings to five points, on just a single field goal by Cole.  Slowing the game down to a pace they could win at, from the 4:59 mark until the 13:58 mark,

UIC outscored Cleveland State 24-14, and took a commanding 9-point lead at 55-46.

Then the real big move of the game, by Cleveland State’s Coach Gary Waters, for the last six minutes of the game Cleveland  State’s moved its defense up to press full-court, first in the man-to- man, then in a 2-1-2 zone trap, and ultimately in a diamond and one trap.

By extending their defense, the Vikings made steals, forced turnovers, scored in transition, and completely took over the game, finishing the game on a 21-9 run, and snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, 67-64.  Over the final 5:46 of the game, Cleveland State’s was led by Cole with seven, and by a suddenly awakened Bullock with eight of his nine.

In the end, after two Josh Mayo free throws pulled UIC within two at 65-63 at 18:59, a Bullock foul sent UIC’s Eppinger to the line with two shots to tie the game.  He hit one, pulling the Flames to 65-64.  Then, UIC fouled the wrong man in Cole, who calmly sank two free throws to extend the lead to three at 67-64 at 19:37.

Still UIC had the ball with a chance to tie, but even with two offensive rebounds providing three opportunities from the arc in the final 23 seconds (none by Mayo), UIC could not tie the game and earn five-extra minutes of playing time.  Cleveland State  snuck out with a win that five minutes earlier seemed most unlikely.

Oh, and by the by, while this hard-fought win was Cleveland State’s 23rd of the year, it was also the Vikes’ 20th D-I win of the year, a sometimes magic-number for various selection committees.

Coach Waters was effusive in his praise for Norris, noting that the sophomore won the game for him at both ends of the floor.  He also said that he is now playing without his best defender D’Aundray Brown, who would guard Ryan Tillema tomorrow night against Green Bay, and that his team was able to win this night despite a subpar performance from Bullock.  Waters didn’t seem concerned that he’ll be zoned again, perhaps for stretches tomorrow night, taking the position that UIC’s zone was effective only because seven-foot center Scott Vandermeer was able to take away the inside half of CSU’s inside-out zone attack (ie, he neutralized Bullock).

Of course, this writer has suggested more than once that no one should play any defense against Cleveland State OTHER THAN a tight sluffing zone, forcing the Vikings to win from the perimeter.  If only Jimmy Collins had done that for forty minutes.

Coach Collins was complimentary of his opponent, and of his own seniors Mayo and Vandermeer, and properly concerned about forward Tori Boyd who injured his head during the first half and was taken to a local hospital.  He called this game “the story of our season,” explaining that his team “played well, took a lead, but then couldn’t hold that lead down the stretch.” He bemoaned his team’s turnovers against pressure and failures to block out on its defensive boards late in the game, and candidly admitted that his team “did not have the energy at the end; you can’t relax against CSU, we needed to match their intensity, and we didn’t.”

Then Coach Collins managed to change the subject, and bring up two issues that were on his mind.  First, in addition to his seniors, he is about to lose long time Associate Head Coach Mark Coomes, who is retiring after “being with me for 40 years.” Second, Collins chastised the local Indianapolis print media for how little press he saw today for the Horizon Tournament, perhaps that will change tomorrow, with Butler playing.

So after the ultimate reprieve, the Vikes move on to tomorrow night’s semi-final round to face No. 2 seed Wisconsin-Green Bay, that’s the Green Bay team which has been off for a week while Cleveland State  played two games.  Someone’s going have to join Cole in scoring (and from the perimeter, no doubt), if CSU is to have a chance to beat Green Bay, and in D’Aundray Brown’s absence, someone else is going to have to guard prolific scorer Tillema.

It also appears that Phoenix swingman, and last year’s defender of the year, Terry Evans will be out injured tomorrow, to some extent neutralizing Brown’s injury.  It should be interesting tomorrow night here at Hinkle.

UIC Falters, then Regroups to Advance in Horizon Tourney

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – The 6-7 game figured to be the best of the four first round games in the Horizon Tournament.  It saw the 15-14 UIC Flames in the seventh spot (7-11 in conference), with early wins at Vanderbilt and Georgia Tech, visiting the improved 11-18 Youngstown State Penguins in the sixth spot (also 7-11 in conference, but with two head-to-head wins over the Flames serving as the tiebreaker).  They met for the right to go to Hinkle in Indy to face the winner of Cleveland State-Detroit (that turned out to be CSU, but not nearly as easily as you might have expected).

With the Penguins doing a superb job defending the Horizon’s second leading scorer Josh Mayo (shockingly, it was Kelvin Bright – with lots of help – who did the job on Mayo most of the night), UIC turned to two unexpected sources of offense in the first half last night, forwards Rob Eppinger and Tori Boyd (averaging 5 and 10 points per game, respectively).  By half-time Eppinger had nine on 4-6 shooting, all within five feet of the goal (he would finish with 20 and 14 monstrous rebounds, 7 offensive), while Boyd also had nine at the half, hitting his first three attempts from the arc (finishing with 15 on 5-9 shooting).  And with these two scoring 18 of UIC’s 35 first-half points (Mayo had just 5 at the intermission, Robo Kreps 6 and Scott Vandermeer 3), the Flames went into the locker room up 10 at 35-25.  They would need every one of those to withstand Vytas Sulskis’ and the Penguins’ second half run.

But before turning to that second half, in this writer’s view, this game was won in the last 7½ minutes of the first half.  That was when Vandermeer committed his second foul at the 12:24 mark, taking a seat for the rest of the half.  At that moment UIC led by 13, at 25-12.  Over the next 7½ minutes, with the league’s best rebounder and shot-blocker on the bench, the Penguins could manage just 12 more points, and could cut the UIC lead by only 3.  That was the point in the game when YSU needed to make hay, and UIC’s backcourt defense, forward rebounding, and ability to control the ball kept YSU from gaining more than those 3.

Interestingly, in Jerry Slocum’s ever-changing lineup, star forward Sulskis played this night off the bench (along with high-scorer Bright).  Sulskis played only 12 minutes in the first half, despite not picking up a single personal foul.  But as the teams broke the huddle for the second half, everyone in the gym knew that in order for YSU to catch the Flames and win the game, Sulskis had to dominate.

And dominate he did, right from the very first possession, when he hit center Jack Liles smartly on a pick and roll, Liles’ first points of the game on a thunderous dunk immediately closing the gap to 8.  As he did in the loss at Cleveland State two weeks ago, Sulskis would utterly dominate the second half, scoring 17 in the stanza on 5-10 shooting, including 2-4 from the arc, dished out two assists, and grabbed four rebounds.  For the game, Sulskis talled 20 points, three assists and six boards.

Early in the half, after UIC had restored its 10-point lead at 37-27, YSU went on a 7-0 run to pull within 3, 4 of which points came on a jumper and two free throws by Sulskis.  Later, after neither team could score for a period of over 2 minutes, YSU went on a 6-0 run on an old-fashioned three-point play by former walk-on forward Zack Rebillot, and a trey from Sulskis, pulling the Pens within 1, 52-51, mid-way through the half.  Later the Pens went on yet a third mini-run, one of 5-0 giving them a four-point lead, 62-58, at the 15:23 mark.  That final run included a shot near the goal by Sulskis, as well as a trey by Kelvin Bright (held to just 7 in the game on 3-6 shooting).

But like Bill Russell told us countless times on television in the 70s, so often a team roars back, roars back, roars back, pulls even, takes a breath and loses, and thus it was with the Penguins last night.  After Bright gave YSU that four-point lead at 15:23, UIC righted the ship, and over the final 4:37 outscored the Penguins 15-6.

With UIC entering the final minute up 1, the Pens continued to defend Mayo well, Sirlester Martin blocking Mayo’s in-close attempt from the left at 19:26 (I thought blocking with his armpit).  After UIC rebounded, team defense forced Mayo to miss again from in front of the rim at 19:30.  The biggest play of the game followed, as Eppinger grabbed the hotly contested rebound of Mayo’s miss, and was able to score inside with a foul, that three-point play at 19:33 extending the UIC lead to four and icing the game.

After the game, I talked with UIC Coach Jimmy Collins about his team’s current five-game winning streak (and 6 of 7), which followed a five-game losing streak from late January into February.  I reminded him how disappointed he seemed with his team after the loss to Wright State in Dayton, how he’d labeled his team’s play “selfish” that night.  Collins responded that instead of playing “like individuals” as they had mid-season, his team has now “finally bought in” to what the coaching staff is asking.  He then kept it general by saying that lots of voices seemed to have the ears of his players mid-season – “too many people, and the only ones with the players’ interests truly at heart are the coaches.”  Still generally, Collins said he’d been able to eliminate or reduce the number of outside influences.

Also, speaking as if these issues are really one, Collins indicated that “we’ve made some changes.”  When I asked what changes, he pointed to “the smaller roster for tonight’s game.”  Certainly the principle change appears to have been the suspension of Chicago freshman forward Jelani Poston (from Harmony Community School in Cincinnati), and Collins acknowledged that some of Poston’s behavior had been disrupting.  Staying general because of the personal nature of the conversation, Collins did allude to Poston’s improved mental health being a goal of his staff, and made clear that Poston will have every opportunity to be part of the program next season.

For now, though, it’s on to Indy to face CSU in a Horizon quarter-final game on Friday, and from the confidence displayed by Collins after last night’s win, it would appear that the way the Flames are playing right now, this Friday could provide the best opportunity they’ve had to defeat the Vikings this year.

Horizon News and Notes

• In other Horizon League first round games, CSU defeated Detroit 56-43, Wright State beat Valpo 68-56, and Wisconsin-Milwaukee bested Loyola 77-68.
• The two quarter-final games in Indianapolis Friday night will pit Wright State against Milwaukee at 6 pm eastern, and Cleveland State against UIC at 8.
• In Saturday’s semi-finals, Butler will face the Wright State-Milwaukee winner at 7, and Wisconsin-Green Bay will face the CSU-UIC winner at 9.
• The conference final will be played next Tuesday night at 9 pm, on the home court of the highest remaining tournament seed.
• If you can’t be in Indianapolis for the rest of the tournament, catch Friday night’s two quarter-final games on the Horizon League Network, Saturday night’s two semifinal games on ESPNU, and the final Tuesday night on ESPN.

Horizon Notebook: Regular Season Ends In Style

What a super weekend in the Horizon, even better than advertised.  This writer got to see five of the teams over this special weekend (one twice), and enjoy two absolutely titillating games.

First on Thursday, this writer was courtside at the ARC in Valparaiso, where after Valpo’s tucked in 1-1-3 zone earned the Crusaders a 19-11 lead half way through the first half, their abandonment of that defense allowed Cleveland State to run by them the rest of the night, led by J’Nathan Bullock and George Tandy.  Bullock’s 25 points (on 9-11) and six rebounds, and Tandy’s 15 (on 6-8) and six boards of his own led CSU to a 71-64 victory, one not nearly as close as the final score indicated.

Then CSU continued to Indy, where Butler awaited needing Saturday’s game for the regular season title.  Eliminated from contention for the second seed double bye by Green Bay’s win over Detroit Thursday night, CSU was competing for the third seed along with Wright State, i.e., to avoid the no. 1 seed in the conference tourney until the final game.  The Vikes ultimately backed into that spot despite WSU’s win, when Valpo held off Youngstown State.  It was a game at Butler’s pace – slow, and mostly in the half court – but as they did in Cleveland in December, the Vikes played more solid and less gambling defense against Butler then they did against most other opponents this year.  Still, they found themselves down 50-40 at the 10:30 mark of the second half.

But a 12-0 CSU run would follow, that included two shocking treys by Cedric Jackson (11 points in the game on 4-11 and 2-4) giving the Vikes a 52-50 lead at 15:15.  They still led by 2 at 56-54 after Jackson curled from the baseline into the lane, received a pass, drew help defense, and found Tandy for a lay up with a pretty bounce pass at 17:56.  However, the final 2:04 was unkind to the Vikings, featuring a costly Jackson turnover, a terrific offensive board and follow basket by Butler’s freshman point guard Ronald Nored, and a disputed non-foul call when Butler’s Matt Howard jumped a screen to pressure Norris Cole’s three-point attempt at 19:57.  Thus, Butler survived CSU by 2 for the second time this season.

But the best game of the weekend (maybe of the year in the conference) was Green Bay against Wright State in Dayton, tipping 5 hours after the issue was decided in Indy (and on this writer’s route home from Indy back to Cleveland).  By the time the game tipped, Green Bay was locked into the second seed, and thus was able to rest injured senior swing man Terry Evans.  Wright State, on the other hand, was playing for third if YSU cooperated in Valpo.

Still, even without Evans, Green Bay was better at every position on the floor, likely including conference co-leading scorer Ryan Tillema, starting for Evans (28 points this night on 10-17 and 5-8, and 9 boards), over ever-improving Todd Brown (19 on 7-15 and an all-important 5-5 from the line).  And in a game played almost as hard as that final regular season NFL game last year between the Giants and the Patriots, Wright State used America’s best fundamental man-to-man defense to come back against Green Bay time and time again.  Then, at the end, after a traditional three-point play by Green Bay’s Troy Cotton (22 points in the game on 9-14 and 3-6, and 3 assists) gave the Phoenix a one point lead at 19:44, diminutive WSU guard N’gai Evans did his best 7-second imitation of UCLA’s Tyus Edney, took the ball end to end and scored under pressure at 19:51, giving the undermanned Raiders a 65-64 win.  After that incredible performance, it hardly mattered that Valpo held off YSU, keeping the Raiders out of the third seed.

Elsewhere this weekend, Illinois-Chicago held off the Ramblers at Loyola Friday night 62-58, a result that guaranteed YSU the sixth seed and a home tourney game despite the Penguins’ two losses in Indiana.  Back on Saturday, improving Valpo’s home win over YSU was by the score of 67-59.  And Detroit played Wisconsin-Milwaukee tough at home before falling to the Panthers, 68-63.

That leads us to the conference tournament, beginning with 4 games on campus sites tomorrow evening.  In the 3-10 game in Cleveland, CSU hosts the Detroit Titans.  In the 4-9 game in Dayton, those WSU Raiders will rely on their superb defense against Valpo.  In the 5-8 game, Loyola travels up the road apace to Milwaukee to face the Panthers.  And in what may be the best match-up in the opening round, in the 6-7 game that this writer will attend, Jimmy Collins’ UIC team with wins at Georgia Tech and Vanderbilt visits Youngstown State, a team that beat the Flames in both regular season meetings.  Then on Friday night at Hinkle, the winner of CSU-Detroit faces the winner of UIC-YSU, and the winner of WSU-Valpo will play the winner of Milwaukee-Loyola.

So on the heels of one great week in the Horizon, tomorrow night we start another!

Horizon News and Notes

• Today the Horizon League announced all-conference and other award winners, as follows. All-League Second Team designees were Todd Brown of Wright State, Rahmon Fletcher of Green Bay, Urule Igbavboa of Valpo, Tone Boyle of Milwaukee, and Cedric Jackson of CSU. While I saw Milwaukee the least of any team this year (just once in person), with the emergence of James Eayrs as the Panthers’ best player the second half of the year, I don’t fully understand Boyle being designated. And having seen as many as 20 Cleveland State games, I don’t consider Cedric Jackson anything like a good defender (the steals stat be damned), and with his poor perimeter shooting and inconsistent temperament, respectfully I don’t understand his selection for the second team.
• The All-League First Team designees are CSU’s J’Nathan Bullock, Green Bay’s Ryan Tillema, UIC’s Josh Mayo, and Matt Howard and Gordon Hayward, both of Butler. Howard was named Player of the Year. As much as this writer enjoyed Butler and Matt Howard this year, given that the Bulldogs had to survive Howard’s all-too-frequent foul trouble, and that Howard had much more help on his team than Bullock had on his, I’d have given the Player of the Year nod to Bullock.
• The All-Newcomer Team includes Butler’s Hayward and Shelvin Mack, Milwaukee’s Boyle and Eayrs, and DeAndre Mays of YSU. Gordon Hayward won Newcomer of the Year in a walk.
• The All-Defensive Team included Green Bay’s Terry Evans (last year’s Defender of the Year), UIC big man Scott Vandermeer, Wright State’s superb defensive guard Will Graham, Butler’s Howard, and Cleveland State’s Jackson, with Jackson winning Defender of the Year.
  Readers of this space know I’d eliminate both Jackson and Evans from Defender of the Year consideration because of their incessant reaching and lunging; and respectfully, in naming Jackson Defender of the Year the Horizon coaches joined last year’s Colonial Athletic Association voters in wrongly equating steals with good defense (so often they indicate quite the opposite). And with a gun to his head, I suspect CSU Coach Gary Waters would admit that Jackson isn’t even his team’s best defender (both D’Aundray Brown and Norris Cole are much better). I’d have made Will Graham defender of the Year after holding Josh Mayo scoreless for most of Wright State’s home win over UIC, and defending without all that silly reaching and lunging, put Norris Cole on the team in lieu of Jackson, and but for D’Aundray Brown having missed nearly 7 weeks with an injury, I’d have chosen him over Evans.
• Finally, Butler’s Brad Stevens was named Coach of the Year.  And oddly, while this writer will be voting for Stevens, among the 10 nominees, as Henry Iba Award Winner (for National Coach of the Year), as super a job as Stevens does, I’d have given the nod in our league to the “other Brad,” WSU’s Brad Brownell.  Tied for third in the league with his best and toughest two players hurt, a skilled but inexperienced (and early on, not tough enough) Todd Brown, defender Will Graham, and a bunch of non-Division I players.  In an impromptu post-game following WSU’s rousing win Saturday night, after the other writers asked questions and Brownell turned to me, I just told him that I thought he’d been doing it with mirrors all year long, wished him luck tomorrow night against Valpo, and told him to “bring those mirrors” along with him Friday night to Indy.