Quote from: Colby Hoops on February 26, 2020, 09:24:05 AM
I'd put Amherst as the favorites over Colby on Saturday.

Appreciate the analysis or maybe just defensive pessimism but don't sell your White Mules so short (even though I am rooting for the guys in purple and white) - it's been great to see them having a fantastic year to add some variety to the league standings.  Should be a great game, and anything can happen after a long bus ride to Maine.

Looks like some new Amherst roster additions by upperclassmen according to the team IG account: Yaseen (Yaya) Zarroug '22 and Jack Harlan '21.
https://www.ncsasports.org/mens-basketball-recruiting/international/abu-dhabi/american-community-school-of-abu-dhabi/yaseen-zarroug

Harlan looks to have transferred from Columbia University - 6'7", played baseball:
https://gocolumbialions.com/roster.aspx?rp_id=9664
http://athletics.amherst.edu/sports/bsb/2018-19/bios/harlan_jack_o7cw

Quote from: MidDay on October 22, 2019, 10:40:20 AM

Well, it was a bit of a crossroads weekend for some teams and some posters are, unfortunately, probably not quite as excited  at this point in the season as they were earlier.

This is accurate.  Losing to a team for the first time in 27 years in the final minute will do that to a certain group of sports fans.  Kudos to Hamilton for pulling one of the upsets of the decade. 

Quote from: Canvas Hightops on September 29, 2019, 10:48:50 AM
It may be been posted previously but I just noticed that Wesleyan starts the season with Colby, Hamilton, Bates and Bowdoin.
After that, they travel a very bumpy road to the finish.  Yikes.

This is the old Amherst schedule for many years, essentially (pre 9-game schedule would alternate Bates/Hamilton), with Middlebury thrown in.  In most years, other than Middlebury, it gave Amherst a shot to ease themselves into the season and find their groove before ending with what was often a challenging few games against Wesleyan, Tufts, Trinity and Williams.  I always thought this benefited the Amherst team quite a bit and minimized the odds of throwing in an early season loss that might have been more likely to occur if they had to play Trinity/Tufts in Weeks 1-3, but now they do have to play Tufts early (plus Middlebury looks tough this year and has been tough in many other years), so we'll see whether in future years this has a negative effect on Amherst and/or a positive effect on Wesleyan when compared to prior years.  Just need a calendar reminder to check back in on this post in 8 years or so when we have a large enough data set... 

Nice Hoopsville interview with Coach Hixon.  No big inside baseball but some nice anecdotes about the season and a touching one about the team putting together a video for his mother when she missed a game online.  Sounds like there is good chemistry with this group, although Hixon talked about how 2019-20 will need "something added" to compensate for Schneider's graduation.  With the late season run, Hixon has moved up from 25th to 20th on the all-time college men's basketball coaching wins list, and if Amherst can make it to the championship game, he'll be in a tie for 19th.  A lot of ball between here and there, and a lot of big names ahead of him on the list (though many of them are also moving targets), so it'll be hard to have as large of a jump up the list in future seasons.  Wooster's coach went from 19th to 17th on the list this year, but no more wins for them this season. 

Nice Amherst win with a huge second half and almost everyone made it off the bench and into the scoring column. Great to see Sellew is back in action. Like Amh63, maybe Saturday night plans get rescheduled and the game gets streamed during dinner and I blame it on the snow...

If you weren't doing actual math, it's a reasonably close back-of-the-envelope guess.  Best of luck to all NESCAC teams the first weekend.  The postseason is always a fun heat-check to see how good the conference really is that year. 

Quote from: nescac1 on February 28, 2019, 11:14:31 AM
Odds of all four advancing to round of 16 this year are probably something like 20 percent ...

Based on your odds, more like 13.2% if you do the math, but who's counting?   

Quote from: old_hooper on February 23, 2019, 06:03:48 PM
Don't know when the last time Amherst beat Ephs 3 times in a year.

Technically 2013-14 but they played 4 times that year and maybe you trade the first three wins away in exchange for not losing in the Final Four. The last time they beat Williams at least 3 times in a season with no losses was 2012-13 en route to the national championship, and also 2000-2001. AFAIK Amherst hasn't beaten Williams 4 times in a season.

Williams beat Amherst 3 times in both 2002-2003 and 2003-2004 but those too were 4-matchup years with Amherst winning a regular season tilt each January.  The last time Williams swept Amherst was 2009-10 (2 regular season games, no postseason matchup).

Quote from: jayhawk on October 24, 2018, 04:39:15 PM


That Cole-Prowitt story about Amherst and Williams is a bit of an odd story

He was never going to go to Amherst.  Amherst hasn't had a men's basketball player with a hyphenated last name in 25+ years.  I don't have the analogous stats for Williams, but I feel like there were a few, and even if there weren't, CP-S just sounds like the name of a 2 or 3 for the Ephs.  Not a shocker for students of the game.

Quote from: middhoops on December 08, 2016, 02:06:07 PM
Going into LeFrak with a gaudy record and an All American is too often inadequate.  (Grumble, grumble...)
I think Amherst holds on to a very hard fought win.  High scoring, say Amherst by 4.

Well played, middhoops.

Quote from: amh63 on September 05, 2016, 10:35:49 AM
Bottom line here...interesting coaching approaches at Amherst.

Throw in that nearly all of the student newspaper team previews for Amherst have stats about all Academic NESCAC returnees in a slightly awkward way that suggests something short of total editorial independence, and it's clear some sort of treachery is afoot.  Before you know it, they won't even be called the Purple and White anymore. 

Good WR recruit for Amherst class of 2020. http://homenewshere.com/wilmington_town_crier/sports/article_21ffa7c0-a9bd-11e5-b969-d7ebc7b68f79.html

I am hopeful for an Amherst win tomorrow, and while it would be great to see a lopsided score, the reality is that rarely happens in the Amherst-Williams game - at least not in favor of Amherst.  Despite what seems like a ton of Amherst dominance recently, the past 15 games have only been 8-7 Amherst.  Amherst's average margin of victory in those games has been less than 8 points and never more than 13 points.  It's been 30+ years since Amherst has beaten Williams by more than 3 TDs.  Hopefully Coach Mills has everyone in the right mindset to avoid an upset.  Go Jeffs. 

Quote from: nescac1 on October 04, 2014, 03:42:14 PM
For the Kelton countdown folks, today's game may be the last straw

I sure hope not.  Kelton needs a long leash to show what he can do.  It's pretty clear from his two years as a defensive coordinator at a premiere I-AA team like Columbia that he has the talent, and he just needs a few more recruiting classes under his belt.  Be patient Williams fans -- you'll always have women's crew in the meantime.  #AmherstFansForKelton