Let me throw out another name - Mark Carson of Rochester Institute of Technology.  Stats:
                                                            Conference rank                         National Rank
Rebounds per game   14.3                              1                                                1
PPG                             19.7                              2                                              50
FGP                             61.4%                           1                                              15
Blocked Shots/g            1.7                              1                                              50

Empire 8 First Team All Conference, Empire 8 Tournament MVP, Chase Tournament First Team All-Star, 3rd Team Academic All American, Twice Rochester Area College Athelete of the week, 3 times Empire 8 Player of the Week               

It has been a roller coaster for the Tigers.  They looked dead after being trounced by Ithaca last weekend.  It is interesting to see how a team responds to adversity.

Kudos to the McAdams brothers - 169 minutes of court time in < 24 hours.  Eighty points between them, along with controlling the tempo in the face of an increasingly desparate Ithaca team (Kudos also to Jeff Bostic, who guarded Corey McAdams very effectively).  Jeff Dehimer - 18/18 from the field for the weekend -can't do much better then that.  I hope the Naz player who missed the foul shots at the end of the RIT game puts it behind him - there were other fouls shots missed in the game - any one of them would have made the difference.

Congrats to RIT for digging dowen and finding they were still strong.  Everyone played great, and the team showed a lot of character

Bombers798etc...

If you had read closely, you would have noticed that what I posted was that Carson was the nation's leading rebounder, not the "best" rebounder.  Of course, there are DI (and likely D2 players) who would have better stats if they were playing D3.

I think any knowlegable basketball person would be embarassed by your attempt to claim steals per game in women's basketball is comparable to rebounds per game in men's basketball.  Without even getting into the differences between the women's and men's game, and the inherent difference between steals and rebounds, just the fact that steals happen less frequently in a game gives that statistic an increased degree of randomness.  However, I congratulate the Ithaca woman who lead the nation.  She should be quite proud of that accomplishment. I suspect she would also say it is ludicrous to try to compare that stat to men's rebounds.  By the way, at the end of the season carson will most likely hold the all-time E8 records for total, offensive and defensive rebounds per season.  If the season ended today he would break each of these records by > 1 rpg. 

I'm sure if he were an Ithaca player you would also be comparing this accomplishment to women's steals, because you claim to loath "homers".

By the way, if the buzzer-beater at RIT was disallowed, the game would have went into OT.  Since you are not a "homer", I'm surprised you are just assuming Ithaca would have won.

Cheers!

I cannot speak to Empire 8 teams of yore.  However I do know the this year's E8 has the NATION'S leading rebounder (Carson) and 2 Academic All-District First Team Members (Bostic and Carson).

If both RIT and Ithaca go 15-1 (i.e. RIT loses to Ithaca in the final game) gobombers is correct.  If both teams go 14-2 it gets more complicated - first tiebreaker is record vs. subsequest finishers in descending order; next tiebreaker is road record vs. conference opponents.  Third tiebreaker is SOS.

From the RIT website - I believe this is the team Gobombers is referring to. Congratulations to both Mark and Jeff

ROCHESTER, NY - Senior center Mark Carson (Voorheesville, NY/Voorheesville) of the RIT men's basketball team was named to the 2008-09 CoSIDA/ESPN The Magazine Academic All-Region first team on Thursday.  Carson is now eligible to earn Academic All-American honors, which will be announced at a later date.

Carson, a packaging science major, has a 3.41 grade-point average.  He leads all of College Basketball (Divisions, I, II and III) with 14.3 rebounds per game.  Carson is averaging 19.4 points per game, while shooting 61.8 percent (131-for-212) from the field.  Carson leads the team with 1.6 blocks per game, while adding 1.5 steals per contest.  He has 16 double-doubles in 19 games, and has at least 10 rebounds in 18 contests.  He is currently 103 points shy of 1,000 for his career and is second all-time in field goal percentage (.598), third in rebounds (699) and seventh in blocks (84) at RIT.

Carson is a main reason the Tigers are off to their best ever start in Empire 8 play (11-0).  RIT is 15-4 overall and 11-0 in 2009.

I have no clue who would host the tourney if the season ended today.  That is too speculative for me.  Good luck against Ithaca Tuesday.

I surprised to see talk of Ithaca hosting the NCAA sweet sixteen "if the season ended today" - when they would not even host the conference tournament if the season ended today.

There is a great race for first going on in the conference between RIT and Ithaca, with each team is exerting increasing pressure on the other to keep winning.

Any cornations are premature.  I'm looking forward to the RIT/Alfred and Ithaca/Fisher games Tuesday.  After losing two this weekend, Fisher should be certainly be focused.

Hey Bombers 798891 - Interesting analysis of the last 3 minutes.  You somehow forgot to mention the 2 defensive and 1 offense rebounds Carson got it that time frame.

I was at the game - Burton is a fabulous player, who brings a completely different set of skills to the game than Carson does - I guess that is the point.

By the way, you are absolutely correct that the RIT team are not a bunch of stiffs.  But I am curious - which Ithaca starters would you replace with RIT starters if you had the chance?

I should have mentioned another freshman for RIT - Marcus Lowe - had eight points and 5 rebounds in 33 minutes.

I think the reason I forgot him is he has been contributing all season, and I don't really think of him as one of the freshman any longer.

RIT snatched victory from the jaws of what would have been a crushing defeat.  After being up by 15 early in the 2nd half (and by 19 in the first half) they found themselves down by 4 points with 24 seconds remaining.  3 point goals by Scott Young and Nate Konrinchak (with 2 fouls shots by Corey McAdam in between) tied the game just before the buzzer.  RIT dominated the overtime - Mark Carson scored the first 7 points, with a foul shot and consecutive "old school" 3 pt plays.

Scott Young had 18 points, and Adam Sweet had 14-15 (not sure) for RIT.  RIT also got quality minutes from freshman Clayton Gray, Dan O'Brien and Brendan Harder.  Dan O'Brien - who is listed at 6'2"- attempted (and unfortuately missed) what would have been a spectacular dunk off a baseline drive.  Not the smartest play, but he has some impressive jumping ability.  Clayton Gray showed a nice touch around the basket. 

The referees were erratic, to put it kindly.

I have point out that while players on Ithaca and Stevens get much attention on this post, the best statistics in the Empire 8 belong to Mark Carson - 1st in rebounding (both offensive and defensive), 1st in blocked shots, 2nd in scoring (by a hair), 3rd in FGP, and 12th in steals.  I don't know why this is - I guess there are so few poster who follow RIT.  Anyway, I find it annoying that Bostic and Burton (both fine players) from Ithaca have both been named Empire 8 player of the week while Carson (with better overall stats) has not been acknowledged.  He plays hard every minute he is in the game, and is a pleasure for any basketball fan who knows the game to watch.

I read the stat sheet in the same way fromafar does.  However, this is a young team and a win is a win.  The freshman are looking for what will work for them at this level, and it might take them a while to figure it out

My hope is that thay gain confidence as the season progresses, get into the tourny, and make some noise then.

Tomorrow's game at U of R will be interesting.

RIT has a young team, there were 4 freshman on the court at times over the weekend.  The freshman look talented, but they are freshman.  They will need to consistently contribute if RIT is going to make the E-8 playoffs.

We shall see.  It may be an exciting team.  Carson looks in great shape, Thomas had no answer for him.  He was in foul trouble the first game.