MBB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[AO]

AO's Pick'em Roundup

St. Thomas	19-1
Gustavus	15-5
St. John's	13-7
Augsburg	13-7
Bethel	10-10
Carleton	10-10
Hamline	10-10
St. Olaf	9-11
St. Mary's	6-14
Concordia	5-15
Macalester	0-20

I believe Hamline is left at home under this scenario as Bethel would be 2-0 vs Carleton, and Carleton would have a better record against the teams above both squads with 2 wins over the johnnies and 1 against the Gusties.

[Gacman]

GMAN'S Pick'em Roundup

St. Thomas  18-2
Gustavs       16-4
St. John'       13-7   
Carleton      12-8
Augsburg     12-8
Hamline       11-9
St. Olaf        9-11
Bethel          7-13
Concordia    7-13
St. Mary's    5-20
Macalester  0-20

[jquentint]

Jquentint's picks
St. Thomas        18-2
Gustavus       15-5
Saint John's   13-7
Augsburg            12-8
Carleton            11-9
Bethel            10-10
Hamline            10-10
St. Olaf             8-12
Saint Mary's     7-13
Concordia             6-14
Macalester     0-20

[OldUMACFAN]

I have wateched Bethel play twice this year and Rob Lang is a very nice denfeder however he is not nearly physical enough to guard a Brown.  To guard Brown you have to get physical with him and make him get flustered, trust me, I highly doubt Lang will do this.  But like other posters said, Hamline can not look past Concordia as they lost their first meeting.

[hoopmaster]

Pick'em Roundup
1. UST  19-1
2.  GAC 15-5
3.  Augsburg 13-7
4.  SJU 12-8
5.  Hamline 11-9
6.  Carleton 11-9
7.  STO 10-10
8.  8-12
9.  St.Mary's 6-14
10.  Concordia 5-15
11.  Mac 0-20

I look forward to collecting at the Play-off championship .

[huhoops]

UST 18-2
GAC 15-5
HU 14-6
AUG 14-6
SJU 12-8
CAR 11-9
STO 8-12
SMU 8-12
BET 7-13
CON 5-15
MAC 0-20

I did this pretty quickly, so DP, sorry if I made any mistakes. I'm pretty sure it works out though.

[HarryDH]

St. Thomas   18-2
Gustavus    16-4
St. John's    13-7
Augsburg    13-7
Hamline    11-9
Carleton    11-9
Bethel    9-11
St. Olaf     8-12
St. Mary's     6-14
Concordia     6-14
Macalester 0-20

I don't know if this is even possible but I'll go with it

[wabbit]

Knights punish the Oles 76-50 and it wasn't that close! Nice multi-view cameras on the live feed.

[OldUMACFAN]

Hamline beats Concordia by 3, very close game the whole way.  I was impressed by a few of Concordia's players with the exception of Fraase.  Ray had 25 points and Carl had 23 I belive.  big game on Wednesday!

[miacsuperfan]

"pipes were pipes and vipes were vipes, and barely the cobs did beat."  nice effort by a down and out concordia crew.  i'm still not impressed with the vipes.  i must be slow to convert.   
 
dawgs were impressive in st. peter.  olson was on fire, and cassens got it going in the second half.  auggies could be really a tough matchup for a lot of teams; g-grimm appears to have improved from earlier in the season.   flavin is all over the place, and truly does have a revved up 'motor.'     gusties looked good at times, but paulson inability to hit the ocean from the beach really hurt gus.  another pretty quiet night from anderson.  looks like we may have to wait til next year to see what he's got.

[westie]

Auggies very impressive in the 2nd half at Gus Young court.  Auggie guards outplayed the Gusties throughout the game.  Van Sickle got hot in the 1st half after getting some wide open transition looks but simply could not find open shots in the 2nd half.  The Auggie defense was very tough and physical and took advantage of the facts Coombe and Co. were not going to blow the whistle...credit to the Auggies for adjusting to this.

Even knowing the top half of the MIAC is fairly balanced I did not expect the Gusties to struggle this much after the huge win vs. St. Thomas.  Hopefully the Gusties can hold on to the #2 seed in what should be a wild finish to the MIAC season in the next couple weeks.

Coombe is still terrible.

[SUMMIT!!!!!]

UST offically clinches a playoff spot & a top 4 finish. Another solid night from Healy. The Nicolai to 1000 countodwn has begun....he is unoffically at 899

Teh Auggie/GAC game was delayed some 30 mins because the refs were delayed by the snow. BIG win for AUGS...good to see the big 3 (Cassens, Olson & FLavin) score. Cassens moves into 7th palce in Auggies all-time scoring list.

A double-double by Jonkey KOng keeps the Goat on the east end. Oles are fadsing fast but Knights are sizzling. Kalland for COY?

I'll let VOJ gloat about USJ's win over Mac. I'm sure he ha plenty to say on it.

I managed to fight the snow to get over to Hutton Arena. A VERY entertaining game. It looked like HU may have been looking past Cord  but they go the job done.  STRANGE starting lineup for Cord-- no Fraase, no Olson. Then down the stretch, Fraase was sitting again. Olson & Olmscheid kept the Cobbers in the game and threatening to knock off the juggernaut known as Hamline. 

If HU plays like tonight on Weds, BU could do the job. I'm looking forward to seeing Lang on Brown-- Lang is so underrated/underappreciated. 

Coombs was working a HS game I was at last TH....he was awful then too.  Maybe he should try reffing another sport? Like badmiton, maybe (i.e., something not played in the MIAC and nothing I'd watch)

[Willy Wonka]

Hanson's career winning percentage is .700. I wish I had an intern I could ask to break his record down against each MIAC school — I'm betting it's right around .700 for all except maybe St. Thomas.

But I'm guessing his winning percentage when Coombe refs is between .400 and .500. Seriously. When that guy works a Gustie game, he often matters more than the opponent. Tonight it was McPartland and a 2-1 FT advantage for the Auggies. Two years ago he took Wittwer completely out of the MIAC title game. He gave Paulson a completely ridiculous technical two years ago in a loss to Carleton and I bet he's given Hanson 90% of his Ts...which are very rare but come all too often when Coombe is wearing the stripes.

I wasn't at tonight's game so I can't cite any specific, recent examples...but the thing that bugs me most about Coombe is his smirk. It's like he takes enjoyment in making bad calls that turn a game. As a Gustie fan, I feel like I might as well go home if I see him on the floor during warmups. While I can't speak with any degree of certainly, I imagine Hanson feels the same way.

***********************

Now with all that said...

...the Gusties need to look in the mirror and do some major self evaluation. Opponents have shot 50% or better in six of the last seven halves against the Gusties. The last two have both finished above 54%. I don't have to explain to anyone how bad that is. You can shoot 80% on treys, outrebound the other team and have a 2-1 assist-to-turnover ratio...but you're still not gonna win if you can't get stops. They've pissed away leads late in the last two games because they can't do it defensively.

GAC had a letdown after beating UST, which wasn't totally unexpected as they are far from the most talented team in the league. But they've proceeded to drop 4 of 6 since beating the Tommies. Simple put, they relaxed and quit playing with a chip on their shoulder. It's a little different being the hunted instead of the huntee, as the Gusties are finding out in painful fashion.

Hopefully they can figure it out soon or I might have to start using this as my collapse example instead of the 2000-01 Auggies  

[piperinsider]

Auggies very impressive in the 2nd half at Gus Young court.  Auggie guards outplayed the Gusties throughout the game.  Van Sickle got hot in the 1st half after getting some wide open transition looks but simply could not find open shots in the 2nd half.  The Auggie defense was very tough and physical and took advantage of the facts Coombe and Co. were not going to blow the whistle...credit to the Auggies for adjusting to this.

Even knowing the top half of the MIAC is fairly balanced I did not expect the Gusties to struggle this much after the huge win vs. St. Thomas.  Hopefully the Gusties can hold on to the #2 seed in what should be a wild finish to the MIAC season in the next couple weeks.

Coombe is still terrible.

Like you would know anything about reffing?  

Like my dad someone once said, a win by 30 and a win by three count for the same. Let's play! That's three extremely tight games for the Pipers (two against non-playoff teams) in a row. I'd like to see an 8-12 point win at Bethel.

Then again, I'd be fine with this kind of finish - http://www.d3hoops.com/story.php?story=2901

[VOJ]

UST offically clinches a playoff spot & a top 4 finish. Another solid night from Healy. The Nicolai to 1000 countodwn has begun....he is unoffically at 899

Let's crown them...because Denny Green says so

I'll let VOJ gloat about USJ's win over Mac. I'm sure he ha plenty to say on it.

I

Actually the only gloating I would do on this game would be to talk about the improvement of MAC since the Johnnies last saw them in early December...if they could have duplicated their performance of the first half they might have snapped their now 43 game MIAC losing streak...they moved the ball well, took good shots, outrebounded SJU but they played defense more with their hands than their feet as the Js were 15 of 20 at the free throw line in the first half and 24 for 31 for the game

The Freshman for the Scots looked very good, Peters, Jarvis and Bowman are good building blocks...

Johnnies were a little short-handed last night, Aaron Barmore was out because of the flu, Chris Schwartz rolled an ankle.  Burns and Herman each had 17 last night picking up the slack, Johnnies will need to re-focus their effort with the Oles on deck

Nice win for the Auggies last night, it definitely brought the two seed back into play...Willy kind of hinted at it but I will pull the pin on the grenade that this question is:  "are the Gusties in a free fall"?

Cobbers fought valiantly on the road, thought they might get it done...Fear the Knights, other than the Tommies, they might be the hottest team in the conference with 5 straight wins.  Maniac suggested Kalland for COY and right now it would be tough to argue against it based on last year's losses and how they seem to be playing their best basketball coming down the stretch.