Trinity down 17-5 early. Couple possessions later it was 17-12. Second unit came in and continued momentum. Not sure there is a better 2nd unit in country. Last 34 minutes of game , catholic out scored 79 to 46. Trinity just defends.
Wesleyan Trinity part III should be fun to watch.
Still wish the would reseed final 4. Trinity vs NYU and Wash U vs Wesleyan. Give each conference a chance to play against each other in finals.
I got 3 out of 4 correct for final 4, tufts urgh!!!!

Neither Wesleyan or Trinity has played a close game yet. I think that changes today for at least one of them, probably both.  Trinity playing great, lots of depth and off the charts defensively. But Catholic can shoot it, will be interesting.

I like NYU and Wash U to get to the final four. The other two games are tossups.

Predictions. It's the sweet 16 so anybody can now beat anybody so no real upsets.

Wesleyan 78 WPI 62. I think Wesleyan wins fairly easy. I think WPI will have issues guarding Wesleyan, especially on the wings. Callahan is a great guard, if he does guard Regan, not sure he can guard him in the paint. Callahan cannot afford to get into foul trouble. I think Wesleyan has the height advantage and advantage in the paint. All that said, if WPI shoots it very well, they will have a shot.

Trinity 70  Western New England 60. I think this game will be much closer, but Trinity will wear them down and pull away some at the end. They played earlier this year. It was a 3 point game at Western New England. Trinity did not shoot the ball that well that day. Don't see that happening again. But Western can play very tough defense.

Should be great atmosphere in both gyms!

Quote from: Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan) on March 10, 2025, 12:38:00 PM

Quote from: WUPHF on March 10, 2025, 12:26:47 PM

Quote from: Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan) on March 09, 2025, 07:58:10 PMUltimately they'll let it go because they're going to stop things to review the time anyway.  Once that decision is made, nothing after the bucket counts, so even if Redlands was on the floor before the whistle, it wouldn't matter in the end.

Do you mind explaining this further?  How do we know the officials were going to stop the game before the whistle? 

It's a game winning shot near the end of the game; isn't standard procedure at this point to make sure the time is right?  It makes total sense that Tufts is trying to get the ball in and score, but I can't imagine any ref letting a tournament game like that without checking.

I don't think it standard unless they think something is wrong. Did Tufts have a time out that they called? If there was no timeout and Redlands players were on the court it's a violation and technical foul. But they are not going to call that unless a Redlands player had impeded something on the court. Did that happen? Was tufts going to score likely not.

As I stated previously, should have never come to that. Foul when they get over half court and have your best player on the court, 4 fouls on him or not. Bad coaching decisions at the end  of the game as well as missed free throw, multiple turn overs and bad fouls. All committed in last 2 minutes. Those were way bigger than the refs missing a call, which they do all the time.

Quote from: SpringSt7 on March 10, 2025, 12:09:07 PMTrinity and Wesleyan are 1 + 2 on their rankings so by that definition it makes sense. 

Gross oversimplification but if they both win 2 home games this weekend, we are guaranteed a NESCAC team playing for the championship and the computer will make them the favorite.

I do also think that Trinity should be the overall favorite at this point in time if only because the bracket really opened up for them this weekend. It would be a big surprise if they didn't head back to the Final Four

Agree, the d3datacast odds for both haven't changed that much since before the first weekend. Wesleyan has actually gone down from a 20.2 to 18.6 to win it all and Trinity has gone up from 28.6 to 32.4.
I believe in D1 now they reseed the final 4, wish they would do same here. Would rather see Wesleyan Trinity III, as the final game. But as you say if they both win 2 games, 1 of them makes the finals!

Kiss of death lol. I think they said the same thing last year about Randolph-Macon Hamden-Sydney. How'd that work out.🤔

My guess is 6 teams have a legit shot to win 4 games. Not in any order but NYU, Emory, Wesleyan, Trinity would be the 4 favorites and then UW and wash U. They rest would be a lot for them to win 4 games

Quote from: rdanie03 on March 09, 2025, 02:28:12 PM

Quote from: D3boarder on March 09, 2025, 01:56:03 PM

Quote from: D3BBALL on March 09, 2025, 01:51:48 PM

Quote from: D3boarder on March 09, 2025, 01:46:31 PMObviously bad sportsmanship from the Redlands side, but I feel like we're blowing it a bit out of proportion here. Just last week Trinity did the exact same thing to the Wesleyan fans and no one on here seemed to think it was a big deal. Losing to a team that acts like that makes the loss sting even more. Want to shut a team like that up? Win the game

I was at the Wesleyan Trinity game, it was nothing more than banter. The Wesleyan students were giving it to the Trinity players the entire game, nothing bad but heckling the entire game. After the game a few Trinity players went over to the student body, and stuck their shirts out. It lasted maybe 10 seconds. Was not a big deal at all.

I don't disagree. Perhaps Redlands was a bit more egregious but my point still stands. If we're completely ok with what Trinity did then we also need to be ok with what Redlands did. Personally, I'm not a fan of it in any scenario. But after a long game of being heckled by the student section you can't blame the players for trying to get a bit of payback.

Sure. But when you start gesturing to your groin and telling the student section to suck it, there needs to be consequences.

Agree, and in the Wesleyan/Trinity game that stuff did not happen.

Quote from: D3boarder on March 09, 2025, 01:46:31 PMObviously bad sportsmanship from the Redlands side, but I feel like we're blowing it a bit out of proportion here. Just last week Trinity did the exact same thing to the Wesleyan fans and no one on here seemed to think it was a big deal. Losing to a team that acts like that makes the loss sting even more. Want to shut a team like that up? Win the game

I was at the Wesleyan Trinity game, it was nothing more than banter. The Wesleyan students were giving it to the Trinity players the entire game, nothing bad but heckling the entire game. After the game a few Trinity players went over to the student body, and stuck their shirts out. It lasted maybe 10 seconds. Was not a big deal at all.

First on the tufts game, terrible decision not to foul the minute Redlands got to have Court. Put them on the line and they have to make the first, miss the second and get the rebound. Should never have let them get a three-point shot up.

Wesleyan and Trinity will not be in the same pod. Guessing both Wesleyan and Trinity are hosting next weekend, along with NYU and who knows in the fourth quad. I believe the locations will be chosen tonight. So that plans can be made.

Quote from: jumbomumbo on March 07, 2025, 07:43:15 PM

Quote from: SpringSt7 on March 07, 2025, 07:33:01 PMTufts gets Redlands tomorrow, who beat St. Joe's Maine 89-79. If you told me before the game that St. Joe's would win the turnover battle by 8 I would've told you they won by double digits but they really struggled to contain Redlands in the halfcourt on top of their run and gun style.

Tufts is the better team and I expect them to win but I didn't think they played awesome against Yeshiva. As a quick aside, I had completely forgotten that they played each other earlier in the year which I thought was a bit of an oversight by the committee. Regardless, they did a great job defensively especially with Medley on Samet who had a respectable game if you only saw the box score but never really got going.

I hate to keep beating this drum but as a Williams guy we do know the Bridgeland style better than those who are in the northeast otherwise so I guess it is of a little use. Tufts (like Williams) is not a super ball handling heavy team but they do have a lot of size. They will have to beat the press by passing over the top of it which they definitely can do, and in fact they have a little more positional size down low than Williams did with Bernstein as a receiver and Gyemesi's vertical leap making him play a little taller than he is.

But either way, Morakis and Kennelly are going to have to be AWESOME to get the ball over halfcourt consistently, which I expect them to do. If Medley and Reilly can be strong with the ball and take their chances in the halfcourt they will be fine. And at least they get more than 24 hours to rest. I like Tufts to win a close one in a fun and hectic game.

Otherwise, Hamilton dropped a tough one to a good Western New England team (is this a bad time to say I didn't like the Hank Morgan POY pick) and Wesleyan is in control early against Delaware Valley. Hamilton as of late has just seemed to be the NESCAC team that draws the brutal draw but I guess that's just the way it goes sometimes.

Morgan played a poor game and went out with a banger of a technical foul to foul out and end his career. The coaches messed up. I understand it is based on regular season, but they still messed up. Regan should have been it.

100% agree

Quote from: SpringSt7 on March 06, 2025, 03:35:12 PM

Quote from: toad22 on March 06, 2025, 02:37:32 PMThe advantage that the voters ( the coaches) have over fans is that have watched hundreds of hours of play of all 11 teams in the league. They have analyzed the play of all the opponent players, and had to formulate game plans against them. They are in a far better position to judge their relative strengths and weaknesses. Though I don't always agree with their decisions, I know that the coaches have seen a lot more than I, or any fan has, and usually get it right. However, everybody gets an opinion.

I think the fallacy that we fall into is thinking that the coaches use all of this information to agonize for hours over getting their all-league teams right instead of just using some combination of stats and how they played against their team

Agree they don't look at every game in conference, the look at stats and their own game.

Quote from: nescac1 on March 06, 2025, 03:05:35 PMI have consistently thought that Morgan would and should win it.  It's an individual award, not a team award.  Of course team success goes into the equation but Hamilton finished a very solid fourth this year, took Wesleyan to double OT in the conference semis, made the NCAA tourney, and the reality is that every opposing team put all of its game-planning into stopping Morgan.  Yet, he still managed to have by a wide margin the best statistical season of any player in the conference.  Regan would be a very deserving POTY as well and he's clearly going to be, at worst, on one of the first three all-American teams, as he had a fantastic year and indeed did it all for Wesleyan.  But he also played next to the best point guard in the conference which gave him a lot more freedom to operate than Morgan ever had. 

And as I've noted before, Morgan had as far as I can recall the most efficient statistical offensive season in conference play history, on a team in which no other player averaged averaged double-digits in points in league play:

26-5-2 on 57/51/89 splits, against only 1.3 TOPG, plus 1.4 spg to boot. That's like Duncan Robinson level efficiency on much higher volume. 

Regan's league stats were stellar, but at 20-4-2 on 54/39/86 splits, there really is no case for him over Morgan other than, his team was better - but again, that cuts both ways, since Morgan had to do a lot more on his own. 

(I wrote this before seeing el_jefe's post but we are exactly the same page here). 

He got the award because he scored the most points, not because he was the best player. Votes are counted before conference play so you can't look at what happened in playoffs. Hamilton was 4th and in the losses to the top 3 m, the games were over with 5 minutes left against tufts it was over with 35 minutes left. Wesleyan game was tied or Hamilton was up a few at half lost by 16. Against Trinity Hamilton was up 8 at half lost by 12. 20 point turn around. Both games at home. Minus 36 in second half and they had a 2nd teamer as well.
They changed last year to 7 players for each team. Maybe now add offensive player of the year as a category. To not at least split the award is wrong.

Quote from: jumbomumbo on March 06, 2025, 02:24:37 PMMorgan was a beast against Wesleyan but Wesleyan won and Regan is my Player of the year. He couldn't have done anything more for that team, and at the end of the day do you want to win or do you want an individual trophy.

 I like winners. Morgan is a winner too, but Regan embodies a "winner" more than anyone in D3. By no means a shot at Hank.

Side note:

HUGE CONGRATS to Hank Morgan's agent. I'm sure he's going to be receiving a massive bonus heading into the overseas recruiting cycle.

In the second half against Wesleyan Regan was the best player, not even close.

Quote from: jumbomumbo on March 06, 2025, 01:59:16 PM

Quote from: NESCACBBALLFAN on March 06, 2025, 01:42:39 PM

Quote from: jumbomumbo on March 06, 2025, 01:00:14 PM

Quote from: NESCACBBALLFAN on March 06, 2025, 12:50:46 PMI have played against Teja Singh and he is a great player. But that is ridiculous to include him on those splits and if I was any other guard in the NESCAC I would feel slighted. You have to feel for Alex Lee - had objectively a superior year.

I know it's been touched on before, but looking at tenure across the board, crazy to think that Tufts, Trinity, and Wesleyan will be largely comprised of the same roster. Would be either frustrating or motivating depending on the mental fortitude of other teams (or players) in the conference. That Trinity - Wesleyan weekend on the road has to be the hardest two game stretch in D3.

Singh is great, but agreed. I have played against all these guys and probably you too. I think Espinosa is a great player but there's an opportunity cost here. No James Morakis on first team is strength blasphemy.

Are you insinuating that Morakis is better than Espinosa?

Sure. I haven't seen a guard in D3 with his size, athleticism, skill. He puts kids in a blender

I agree, I think they are different type players. But Morakis I would pick over Espinosa, close though.

Quote from: NESCACBBALLFAN on March 06, 2025, 12:50:46 PMI have played against Teja Singh and he is a great player. But that is ridiculous to include him on those splits and if I was any other guard in the NESCAC I would feel slighted. You have to feel for Alex Lee - had objectively a superior year.

I know it's been touched on before, but looking at tenure across the board, crazy to think that Tufts, Trinity, and Wesleyan will be largely comprised of the same roster. Would be either frustrating or motivating depending on the mental fortitude of other teams (or players) in the conference. That Trinity - Wesleyan weekend on the road has to be the hardest two game stretch in D3.

Agree and if Regan comes back, even tougher.