Posts Tagged ‘Big East’

Villanova, Kentucky and Kansas State are contending for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. If the selection committee picked today, the Wildcats that grab a top seed might surprise you.

Look at Connecticut’s roster, or watch them before the game, and they look impressive. They pass the look test, with a lot of length and athleticism. But once the game begins, it’s not long before the feeling changes.

Providence has had to face adversity over the course of this season on several occasions. But the young Friars haven’t faced anything like their loss to South Florida on Saturday night, so the next time out, they will have a brand new test.

South Florida pulled out an improbable win in Providence on Saturday night. It’s not out of the realm of possibilities that it could be just the beginning of an upswing for the Bulls.

The Notebook

 By: Ray Floriani  in: Columns

10 Jan 2010

Some notes on Syracuse using the 2-3 zone defense successfully, Fairleigh Dickinson coming alive in 2010, a doubleheader coming up and St. John’s reversal of fortune in early conference games.

Lost in the story that caught everyone’s attention on Saturday night and even Monday night in Providence is a great development on the court. While the big story is part and parcel of what’s going on, in the long run it’s not as important.

The Cardinals have won five straight, including knocking off No. 1 Pittsburgh. They have now won their past three games in the regular season against ranked opponents – Pittsburgh, Notre Dame and Villanova. In addition, Louisville has won three straight against the No. 1 team in the country. The previous two were over Florida on Dec. 13, 2003 and Kentucky on Dec. 27, 2003.

There’s always a lot said about how much it helps when a team has winning experience, especially if that team goes up against one that lacks such experience. While it doesn’t always manifest itself in such a matchup, when it does it’s almost undeniably clear.

On Thursday evening over the Prudential Center the Seton Hall men battled but came up short in search of their first Big East win of the season. Providence gradually wore down the Pirates, fouling out three players in the process, to earn a hard fought road win.

Today’s task was to evaluate Rhode Island’s Ryan Center and UConn’s Gampel Pavilion. In addition, I was hoping to get enough material to write some kind of game story.

An oft-uttered cliché early in a season is that “it’s not how you start, it’s how you finish.” True though it might be, you can’t neglect how you start, because it can have an impact on how you finish. A bad start can have you exerting a lot of energy to try to rebound from it, then leave you out of gas to try and finish it. A good start can give you a boost and help you play better later on.

A day after handily defeating Marist in the semifinal, St.John’s met their match. Virginia Tech defeated the Red Storm 81-67 before slightly over 2000 at Madison Square Garden . The win gave Virginia Tech a second straight Aeropostale Holiday Festival title. Tech defeated St.John’s is last year’s championship.

It was crushing news to Norm Roberts and his staff last month when informed that their best player, Anthony Mason Jr. would miss the entire season with a foot injury. It only got worse when Justin Burrell sustained a facial fracture after being hit by teammate Sean Evans in practice last Thursday. So with its top two players sidelined, along with freshman Malike Boothe playing with a sprained left thumb, it was no suprise that it would be a struggle vs former Big East memeber-now ACC foe Virginia Tech.

During his high school days, Geoff McDermott was known as rifle-toting Geoff McDermott. Then a quick-strike 6-foot-6 quarterback, McDermott helped lead perennial power New Rochelle to back-to-back state championships. After committing to Providence, where there’s no football team, he kissed all gridiron dreams goodbye. Today, McDermott is still whipping passes.

In Saturday’s 81-76 win by Boston College over Providence, neither team gave a tremendous account of itself. But the team that had the more concerning play was, without doubt, the team on the losing end of the score. Providence’s flaws were all right there on display as a reason why they lost the game, and this hasn’t been an isolated case.

Saturday’s game at The Heights between Providence and host Boston College has a few notable items to it. It’s a matchup of regional rivals and of former conference foes, as the two used to play each other in the Big East all the time. The schools are less than 50 miles apart and are continuing the rivalry despite Boston College’s jump to the ACC back in 2005. It’s also a homecoming of sorts for Providence head coach Keno Davis.

The intracity rivalry between Cincinnati and Xavier had everything one could ask for, including five technical fouls. But in the end, it was Xavier coming away with the victory.

Madison Square Garden has played host to many great events over the years. In the college basketball game it is home to the “final four” of the nation’s oldest post-season tournament, The NIT. Add the Pre-season NIT, Big East Tournament and Coaches vs. Cancer, to name a few and you can see why the Garden is termed the “Mecca” of basketball.

For the Seton Hall women, it was a simple halftime adjustment after the Hall trailed Marshall 33-30 at the half.

This was what a rivalry game is supposed to be. It looked like, felt like, and was a rivalry game all the way through. You could feel it right away, with the sold-out crowd’s energy in the Dunkin’ Donuts Center even before the game started. That included the visiting team’s own student section and cheerleaders.

Easy-Going Gavin rapidly morphed into Gung Ho Gavin last night, an aggressive individual UConn fans have rarely seen during the reserve forward’s stay with the Huskies. The kid from Gilbert, Az., finally got physical, played above the rim, and displayed a sense of urgency, en route to the reserve forward’s career-high 17 points in 16 minutes on 7-of-9 shooting.

Being from the area, Reggie Redding knows what Villanova’s reputation has been over the years. He can also see that a current senior might change that, for this year at least. “They say this is ‘Guard U’. I think it’s turning around this year to ‘Dante U’,” the junior wing said after the Wildcats won the Independence Bracket in the Philly Hoop Group Classic on Saturday night.

It’s easy to see the 111-87 final score and think Providence had a good night against Sacred Heart. That’s certainly true, as the Friars shot nearly 54 percent from the field, including a 13-30 showing from behind the arc, and forced 22 turnovers. But as is usually the case at this time of the year, the end result doesn’t tell the whole story. There were potentially two bigger bright spots on this evening: Marshon Brooks and Sharaud Curry.

It was quite an impressive debut. The Rutgers women cruised to an 86-59 win over Saint Joseph’s on Friday night at the Rutgers Athletic Center. Scarlet Knight mentor C.Vivian Stringer was quick to point out this was a team Rutgers struggled to defeat a year ago.

Big East Conference Notebook
by Zach Smart

Stephenson Considering SJU, Rumors Are Rumors
Basketball is our city’s game. So how come, for the better of a decade, has there been a search warrant out for top-profile players at St. John’s University?
In the heart of a traditional basketball breeding ground, the New York City-based school should shoulder an [...]

Big East Conference Notebook
by Zach Smart

NEW YORK – This is what it all trickled down to. After back-to-back-to-back do-or-die games, non-stop live hoops, constant reliance on live scores, updates, and television highlights, a Land Rover-load of buffalo wings and a Hudson River full of cold beer (which allowed the bulge in my stomach to [...]

Big East Tournament Notes
by Ray Floriani

NEW YORK – The Pitt Panthers love New York. They might even be willing to advertise for the city’s commerce and tourism as they frequently discuss their enjoyment of playing in Madison Square Garden. And those discussions occurred prior to Saturday’s Big East championship over Georgetown.
The seventh-seeded Panthers capped [...]

Big East Conference Notebook
by Zach Smart

STORRS, Conn-Due to a vicious Ohio storm that shattered the state’s snowfall records, the Cincinnati Bearcats/UConn Huskies game originally slated for Saturday afternoon was delayed until Sunday night.
For the Bearcats, which committed a torrent of turnovers in the early going, the confines of the Gampel Pavilion weren’t much more [...]

Big East Conference Notebook
by Pat DiSalvo and Zach Smart

The Big East has been a vicious league so far, with teams from top to bottom beating up on each other. This week Zach Smart takes a look at some of the conference big men who are integral parts of some of the league’s elite teams. [...]

Big East Conference Notebook
by Zach Smart

HARTFORD – Apparently, Jerome Dyson’s 14.3 points per game-as well as his hounding defense, set three-pointers, quick slashes to the bucket and acrobatic, rim-ringing dunks- haven’t been sorely missed by the Connecticut men’s basketball team.
Forget, for a moment, the pre-Superbowl madness that’s leaving the northeast region completely split.
UConn has [...]


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Managing Editor Phil Kasiecki spent Friday (3/20) discussing NCAA first-round action on ESPN 1040 in Tampa. Download the broadcast! (5.7 MB)

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