MBB: Little East

[lefrakenstein]

The Anchormen, who trailed by as many as 15 points in the second half, went on a 17-5 run to take a 65-64 lead with 3:21 remaining, only to see Amherst (25-3) senior guard Conor Meehan (Meriden, CT) drain a three-pointer on the ensuing possession to help lead the Lord Jeffs to the win.

It was actually freshman guard Aaron Toomey who hit that shot. D3hoops.com... always vigilant in their quest to have at least one mistake in all NESCAC-related articles.

[Pat Coleman]

Lefrakenstein: That's Rhode Island College's release that they posted on our site. We didn't write it -- do you think we have people at every game?

[UMDCorsairKatz]

UMD's Brandon Stephens was selected to East team for the NABC D3 All-star game!

He is already representing the LEC in a big way down in Salem by winning the 3 Point contest last night!

[UMDCorsairKatz]

D3 All star game over and UMD's Brandon Stephens was the East's leading scorer with 14 points. Also added 3 assists and 1 steal.

Stephens had a great showing at the D3 All star weekend, definitely made UMD and the LEC proud!

[UMDCorsairKatz]

UMassD has recruited Jansy Cruz.

Per New England Recruiting Report:
Local Star Resurfacing at UMass Dartmouth

Former Springfield star Jansy Cruz has resurfaced at UMass Darmouth.  Cruz took classes during the spring semester and is expected to join the team on a full time basis for the 2011-2012 season.

An indisputable division I caliber talent, Cruz has all the ability to be one of the top players in the Little East from day one in Dartmouth.  An attacking lead guard who makes plays on both ends of the floor, Cruz is a tremendous addition for the Corsairs.


What other players have been recruited around the LEC?

[7express]

Was able to find 4 of the 8 schedule's:

Boston, Keene & Eastern's schedule are official as they're posted on their respective websites.  Keene has a bunch of teams listed playing on the road twice so they have to fix things there.  Plymouth state's schedule isn't out yet, but changed the year on the 201--11 schedule to look at their schedule.  Only teams I can't find schedules for are RIC, Dartmouth, Southern Maine and West Conn.

there's 1 OOC game I found for Western; they will be playing Connecticut College at home January 31, when I find the schedule, I will post it on here, and note important games.

[olskool]

Should be another exciting year in the ol lec.  Looking for the keene owls to produce some quality games this year.  Get someone new at the helm of the usm team and the league could be strong 1-8.

[7express]

West Conn men's schedule released: http://wcsu.edu/sports/MBasketball/schedule.htm.

They only get 2 non LEC teams at home, so its a lot of driving, but aside from the Richard Stockton (though they sucked last year), Albertus, and WPI games everything else on on the OOC slate seems winable.   I was kind of hoping the Southern Maine games would be swapped for 2 reasons: 1) If that So Maine game on the 10th would've been a road game even though we would have had 4 of our first 5 conference games on the road, we would have had 6 of our final 8 at home.  2) I'm not lookign forward to going up to Maine in January again, mid December seems like a perfect time to do that trip.  Thrilled that we only have 1 game at home during winter break.  Aside from the athletes that have to stay there, I'm the only student that went to home games during break last year, so lets eat up the road games that stretch when we would've had no students anyways, and get a backloaded home stretch where school will be in session, and they may actually show up.   Not happy about playing RIC so late, thats a team I wanted the beginning of the season, because they get better as the season goes on.  Once again we finish with RIC, Keene and Eastern at the end of the year; since those 3 along with West Conn should be the top 4 at seasons end, we'll have a big say about what are placement is at the end of the season.
Can't miss game on the West Conn schedule: Tuesday, November 22 @ Albertus Magnus.  With all due respect to Richard Stockton & WPI, the Albertus/West Conn game last year was an absolute classic; a 103-99 Western victory in which Ray Askew scored a whopping 36 points.   Should be another good game.

[7express]

Other team's schedules:
Eastern: http://www.easternct.edu/athletics/men_basketball/mbb-schedule.htm
Keene state: http://keeneowls.com/sports/mbkb/2011-12/schedule
UMass-Boston: http://www.beaconsathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/sched/masb-m-baskbl-sched.html
Plymouth state: http://athletics.plymouth.edu/sports/mbkb/2011-12/schedule

Still waiting on RIC's, Southern Maine's and UMass-Dartmouth's, when I find those I will post them.

[ECSUalum]

Here are some 2010 LEC stats to refresh everyones memories of top teams/players and use for discussion of upcoming season:
http://www.littleeast.com/sports/mbkb/2010-11/stats/confldrs.htm

ECSU's weakness are all on the offensive end.  If Coach Geitner can work on this and specifically improve FT% and FG% while maintaining the excellent Defensive stats, if could be a very good year for the Warriors.  Garrow, Nedwick and Kohn having good years offensively and defensively, are key to Warrior success in 2011/12.  Hopefully they have picked up an impact freshman player this year for depth.

As 7express stated above, it will be WCSU, ECSU, RIC and Keene that will be duking it out for the LEC prizes

[7express]

Quick change on the West Conn men's schedule: The game against Richard Stockton on November 26 is part of a WCSU tournament and will include Richard Stockton, Johnson & Wales and a team TBA later next month.  The semifinals are Saturday, November 26 at 5 & 7 PM, while the consolation and championship are Sunday, November 27 at 1 & 3 respectively.  Pairings of the 2 semifinals will be announced later in October.  Western has also added a home game against Clark Monday, December 12 scheduled for 6:30 PM.  Both changes are availible on the schedule link I posted earlier.  I will continue to update the schedule if more changes happen throughout the next month and a half.

[7express]

Mass-Dartmouth schedule availible: http://www.corsairathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/sched/masd-m-baskbl-sched.html
Southern Maine schedule availible: http://southernmainehuskies.com/sports/mbkb/2011-12/schedule  Have to question why Southern Maine is going down to Connecticut back to back weeks at the end of the semester.  I highly doubt their spending the week, and a lot of miles to travel back and worth from Gorham to Willimantic and back then from Gorham to Danbury and back a couple days later.  I still wouldn't be surprised to see 1 of those games changed to a home contest by the time November rolls around (hopefully its the Western game).
Only team I don't have a schedule for is RIC, but I kn ow they open with an exhibition game at Rhode Island November 4.

[leelowlang]

LEC

2010-11 Final Standings

1.   Rhode Island College – 21-8, 11-3 LEC
2.   Western Connecticut – 22-6, 11-3 LEC
3.   Eastern Connecticut – 21-10, 10-4 LEC
4.   Keene State – 17-11, 8-6 LEC
5.   Mass.-Dartmouth – 11-15, 7-7 LEC
6.   Plymouth State – 11-14, 5-9 LEC
7.   Southern Maine – 10-15, 2-12 LEC
8.   Mass.-Boston – 8-17, 2-12 LEC

2010-11 Conference Championship
o   Rhode Island College 62, Eastern Connecticut 49

NCAA Performance
o   Rhode Island College 83, Penn St.-Behrend 54 (1st Round)
o   Rhode Island College 71, Oswego State 63 (2nd Round)
o   Amherst 78, Rhode Island College 74 (3rd Round)
o   Western Connecticut 89, Salve Regina 67 (1st Round)
o   Middlebury 79, Western Connecticut 53 (2nd Round)

RETURNING LEADERS
•   Scoring
o   DaQuan Brooks – Western Connecticut – 5'10", Sr., G – 21.8 ppg
o   Nick Nedwick – Eastern Connecticut – 6'1", Sr., G – 17.9 ppg
o   Ryan Martin – Keene State – 5'9", Jr., G – 14.8 ppg
o   Derek D'Amours – Keene State – 6'5", Sr., F/G – 14.8 ppg
o   Mike Akinrola – Rhode Island College – 6'6", Sr., C – 14.4 ppg
•   Rebounding
o   Jamie Kohn – Eastern Connecticut – 6'5", Sr., F – 9.1 rpg
o   Justin Pulver – Mass.-Dartmouth – 6'8", Sr., C – 7.4 rpg
o   Rashad Wright – Keene State – 6'10", Jr., C – 6.5 rpg
•   Assists
o   Michael Mitchell – Mass.-Boston – 5'8", Sr., G – 4.3 apg
o   DaQuan Brooks – Western Connecticut – 5'10", Sr., G – 4.1 apg
o   Ryan Martin – Keene State – 5'9", Jr., G – 3.8 apg
•   Steals
o   Michael Mitchell – Mass.-Boston – 5'8", Sr., G – 2.6 spg
•   Blocks
o   Rashad Wright – Keene State – 6'10", Jr., C – 2.7 bpg
•   FG %
o   Mike Akinrola – Rhode Island College – 6'6", Sr., C - .587
•   3-pt FG %
o   Ryan Martin – Keene State – 5'9", Jr., G - .462
•   3FG Made
o   DaQuan Brooks – Western Connecticut – 5'10", Sr., G – 83
•   FT %
o   Ryan Martin – Keene State – 5'9", Jr., G - .961

[ECSUalum]

Leelow,

Nice summary of 2010. Any predictions for a preseason poll?

[warrior]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who can't wait for the season to begin!  As for predictions - I don't have any of those, but I do have one WISH  - a win vs. RIC!  They are the only team we haven't beaten the past three years despite so many close games.  As for our chances this year, Broderick Sawyer and Bill Roveto will be tough to replace, but everyone else is back and ready to go!  As far as the freshman go, as usual, we have a bunch of guard recruits, but no big men!  I think Chris Robataille is definitely ready to replace Broderick, but who will replace Chris as the back-up?  I'm guessing, when Chris is on the bench, we will be going with a small, but quick front line, counting on our big guards for help on the boards and with defending their bigs.  Like last year, every game should be competitive this year and I'm sure, like last year, the title won't be decided until the last week. Hopefully we'll still be in the mix at that point! Here's to a great year on the court and in the blog!  PS I seem to recall one of the teams having a monster recruiting year, featuring some DI transfers.  Was that Dartmouth?  Keene?  or was that just a bad dream??