Impressive, but by no means a record. The NESCAC beats that every year when Amherst plays Colby.

Quote from: frank uible on March 08, 2009, 03:44:42 PM
In my unsophisticated view a number of the good Amherst or Williams teams of the last 7 years would have blown the doors off this year's NESCAC, including this year's versions of Amherst and Williams.

I don't think anyone disagrees.

First of all, nescac1, it's criminally insane to say that Schultz's stats and Pierce's are "basically even." A difference of four points and two boards is a LOT. Four points is the difference between Choice and Aaron Gallant. Two boards separate Schultz and... Alex Gallant. Yeah, I'm cherry-picking, but the numbers are not the same and you know it. Let's be serious here.

As for this head-to-head thing... AZ is right.  Choice has outplayed Pierce, but that doesn't make him a better player.

I've been in the front row for multiple Tufts-Colby games. What I observed this year was that Choice was the more productive player than Pierce, but you can't just look at those two guys in a vacuum -- that's oversimplifying things. It's not a one-on-one game.

Colby devoted everything they had to stopping Pierce. They would put Choice on him, but they would also have a big man like Russell or Planeta helping on him, doing everything they could to limit his looks. That helped Tufts' other forwards get open... and if you look at the box score, it shows. Selby shot 3-for-3, and Beyel was 4-for-7 on 2-point FGs. Colby's game plan was "don't give Pierce anything, and if the other guys hurt you a little bit, it won't be that bad." Give Whitmore some credit -- that worked.

Tufts on the other hand played a straight man, trying to contain not just Choice but Cutrone and Russell and Sherman.  So Pierce was left trying to stop Choice one on one. Choice burned him on one play early on -- second possession of the game, iirc -- and you could tell it pissed Pierce off. He got fired up, and he was determined to stop Choice man-to-man. The next play, Selby helped out on Choice, and Pierce called him off right away, yelling "NO, SWITCH"; next play, Beyel sees Pierce get screened and picks up Choice, and Pierce starts yelling "DAVE DAVE DAVE" until he backs away. Pierce wanted Choice to himself. He wanted him bad.

My point is that for whatever reason (call it questionable coaching decisions, call it Pierce's own ego, call it necessity because Colby has more offensive threats than Tufts, whatever), Tufts didn't devote the same energy to stopping Choice that Colby did to Pierce. So you can't just throw a bunch of shooting stats out there and say "look, player X is better than player Y." It's not even close to that simple. I know Choice shot 10-for-17 against Tufts, but you can't tell me that Pierce in his shoes wouldn't have been even better. I personally think he would have.

All of this being said, don't get me wrong. I absolutely LOVE Choice's game, and he might even be the second-best player in the league. But Pierce is better. (But POY isn't about being a good player, necessarily -- it's about leading a good team, so I'm fine with Rudin winning it and of course I'm not surprised.)

Sorry. I don't usually show off my Tufts homerism like this. I just happen to think Jon Pierce is really good at basketball. Sue me.

Yeah, Schultz over Pierce is a little ridiculous. I know he played for a last-place team, but going on individual performance alone, Pierce is absolutely the very best player in the league. Put him on the first team.

Wilson is a good player and I'm fine with seeing him on the second team. Nothing else was too surprising.

Middlebury Panthers
Pool A selection, NESCAC champion (defeated Amherst in conference title game)
Rank in latest D3hoops poll: No. 9
Record: 8-1 NESCAC, 24-3 overall
Head Coach: Jeff Brown, 153-143 through 12 seasons

Key Wins: 61-58 over Richard Stockton on Nov. 21; 62-46 over RPI on Dec. 30; 67-62 over Williams on Jan. 31; 77-68 over Amherst on March 1 to win NESCAC title.

Losses: 74-63 to Manhattanville on Nov. 22 (without Aaron Smith); 84-71 to St. Lawrence on Nov. 25 (still without Aaron Smith); 71-64 to Amherst on Feb. 14

Notes: 24 wins this season, a program record; NESCAC championship, a program first; hosting NCAAs for the first time, also a program first; No. 1 in the nation in blocks per game; No. 1 in the nation in opponents' lowest field goal percentage; won 17 straight games, also a program record, before losing their regular season game against Amherst; appeared in the NCAA Tournament for the first time last year, but lost in the first round, 56-43, to Rochester; will play their first tournament game this year at home on Saturday after a first-round bye

First-round opponent: Winner of St. Joseph's (Maine) vs. Bridgewater State

Starters:
Ben Rudin: senior co-captain, PG, 6-0, 175, heavy favorite to win NESCAC Player of the Year. (Some kid named Olson's won that the past two years.) Broke the all-time record for points in one NESCAC Tournament with 77. Leads the Panthers in points per game (16.7) and assists per game (4.5). Second in steals (1.4).

Kyle Dudley: senior SG, 6-1, 180. Teammate of Rudin's since elementary school (both are from Scarsdale, N.Y.). Good outside shooter. Team's second-leading scorer (10.1 ppg).

Tim Edwards: junior small forward, 6-4, 185. One of the best defenders in the NESCAC. 5.7 rpg, 2.3 (!!) spg.

Aaron Smith: senior co-captain, power forward, 6-6, 235. Second team All-NESCAC last season. Was injured for a few weeks earlier this year but came back to average 8.3 ppg and a team-high 7.2 rpg. Very skilled player on offense and defense alike.

Andrew Locke: sophomore center, 6-10, 215. Fourth in the nation in blocks (3.4 per game!). Still developing offensively but is a very high-percentage shooter inside (60.1 percent).

Bench:
Ryan Sharry: freshman power forward, 6-7, 215. Good offensive weapon off the bench, great rebounder.
Jamal Davis: sophomore forward, 6-5, 180. Good, physical defender.
Ryan Wholey: sophomore small forward, 6-4, 200.
Ashton Coghlan: sophomore shooting guard, 6-3, 160.
Bill Greven: junior forward, 6-5, 230.

edit: NESCAC awards were released today (Wednesday). Rudin wins POY, Edwards DPOY, Brown COY.

Quote from: BankShotCharlie on February 26, 2009, 09:03:13 PMTufts - Purdue (Gross jerseys yet great SID's and student journalists)

Aww, thanks.

Quote from: nescac1 on February 22, 2009, 05:35:22 PMcompare that group to the extremely strong and deep junior class (Bernier, Choice, Pierce, Beyel, Phillips, Edwards, Schultz, Rubin, Geoghegan, Wheeler, Hauser, Ellis, Kaminer) and I'd say there is a pretty huge drop off.

Don't forget Chris Wilson. Or Tom Selby. Also I kinda like that kid Sherman at Colby. You're right... the juniors are far better.

Or three years behind?

Black bear.

My gut says to take the favorites with all four of those spreads.

Well, he's played 19 games, which is close enough to the 20-23ish range that everyone else has. And plenty of coaches in the league know who he is, even if they haven't seen him play this year. But maybe you have a point.

Conn leads Bowdoin 30-28 at halftime in the one early game. Camels looking good to clinch that 8 seed.

Quote from: frank uible on February 14, 2009, 04:01:56 AMWilliams has beaten Amherst in basketball 112 times. Shalvoy played in only one of those 112.

I guess I deserved that. What I was implying was that they hadn't won with reasonably human shooting since '03, but you already know that...

My guess for all-conference:

Rudin (lock)
Baskauskas (lock)
Pierce (lock -- I know his team flopped, but the numbers are too absurdly good to ignore)
Choice (lock for at least second team)
Snyder (lock for at least second team)

Schultz
Cutrone
Smith (I know he was hurt part of the year, but they tend to honor seniors who've had great careers, and if Midd goes undefeated, two Panthers instead of one would make sense)
Wheeler
Bernier

POY: Rudin
COY: Jeff Brown, Midd
ROY: Porter. I think he'll get a lot of credit/name recognition for being "the guy that filled Stone's shoes." That could easily put him over the top.

Quote from: ephoops on February 13, 2009, 10:33:08 PMI believe Bucket meant to say that it was the first regular season win for the Ephs at Lefrak in over a decade.  You are correct that the Ephs won at Lefrak in '03 and '07 in the NESCAC tournament.

Must be nice to find a way to beat Amherst that doesn't involve Chris Shalvoy going absolutely insane and hitting seven threes, hmm?

Quote from: booyakasha on February 13, 2009, 02:29:03 PMTry telling that to any sox fan watching Papi come through in the clutch '04 and see if they agree

FWIW, I'm as big a Sox fan as any... watched every game of the '04 playoffs, was there for the walk-off against Carmona in '06, have seen countless games he's won in the ninth inning... still not buying it.

Papi, AVG/OBP/SLG, career, overall: .287/.382/.554
Papi, AVG/OBP/SLG, career, close and late: .279/.382/.564

Close call, but overall I'd say he's a *little* worse in the clutch, not better. Point being that they're basically the same, meaning that over the course of your career it evens out. Because being clutch isn't a skill that you "have" and sustain over the long run -- it's just something that happens, randomly, from time to time.

Anyway, this is getting ridiculously off-topic. Not even the right sport anymore. Anyone wanna talk about Middlebury?

Clutch hitting is not a skill. It's a myth.

On an unrelated note, read this. 1,700-word epic about Amherst/Midd written by a friend of mine. Quotes from both coaches, Rudin/Smith, Baskauskas, etc. Good stuff.

http://tuftsdaily.com/inside_the_nescac_middlebury%252C_amherst_fight_for_supremacy-1.1375204