MBB: MAC Freedom League

[chairman]

The preseason polls for the Spring have been released. Those teams will all get better, (Baseball and MLAX are first year coaches who will build programs quickly) but with the exception of WLAX this spring could be a little rough across the board.

We are looking forward to the fall.

[chairman]

Missed the game today, but it looks like I might know something about something. I missed on the Championship MVP-- Hunter missed too many free throws, but 72-58 was pretty close.

[lefty2]

Jon. The league is aware of the issue with the rims. (The Commissioner was at the games the other night and I pointed it out to him during the Alvernia women's game.

In the words of the famous philosopher - Mike Brady - "Nobody likes a tattletale, Chair."

[chizwiz]

Mid-range,

I don't make a habit of defending Chair as I feel that he states his case pretty plainly.  I fully agree with chair's statements, especially the several points he made about the game and especially his "novel".   On a side note, that "novel" only took me 15 seconds to read, so give me a break.  You were only calling it such because his persuasive argument was too hard for you to counter.  Mid, I know you don't like to read long paragraphs, so here is your chance to take a nap, smoke, drink, or whatever it is you do to rest your weary mind . . .

Chair is correct about the rim issue.  I would venture to say that M'ville will want to fix them before next season.  About 4-5 years ago, EU's rims were getting like that, and people complained and it was fixed.  Simple solution.  (and Jon, there is a special tool made for measuring basketball rims for just this purpose)  Frankly, college ball isn't YMCA ball, but it sure feels like it at the Kennedy.  While some people can say that EU's gym isn't much better, I would argue that it isn't the capacity, but the other little things that make a difference.  M'ville can fix it's problems so that they are just like everybody else's place if they work on the lighting, the rims, and do a better job of keeping the fans from intimidating and grabbing at the visiting team on the way to the locker room, to name a few.

And I will repeat what I said to the great M'ville fans I got to speak with at the EU/M'ville game this week - You do have a great gym.  I like the atmosphere, the seating, and the whole experience.

It could be a really great place to go lose a game if these small problems are fixed.

[mid-range j]

chairman - props to you on your prediciton last night  - i give credit where credit is due, you were on point with your predicitions for the most part

desales played a great game, no excuses on this side, they shot the lights out and braswell proved to be the difference and the reason why he should be the player of the year, desales is a great program..lapinski was very emotional and into this game, he played with fire and energy and really had a look like "i am not losing a championship game again" - so congrats to desales and i hope they represent our conference in the big dance

the game was close the whole time while there were several lead changes throughout, desales shot the hell out of the ball (they had 21 turnovers so it made there field goal perctange look better) but regardless they shot the ball excpetionally well and had a run in the second half that proved to be the difference..they got out in transition and made some easy layups off mville bad shots and turnovers..

for mville, wesly wicks really played his heart out and its said to see his season and career come to an end..if anyone has had the chance to see him play he is one of the quickest guards in the conference and can get to the rim at will, his on the ball defense gives opposing point guards a real problem and i congratulate him on a great career

i think desales has our vote for trevoy pointer being picked rookie of the year...(i know im going to hear it from the chair on this one) he proved it in the playoffs and he proved it last night..its not just his offense, but his defense is something else..he played big in big games, his team has a better record, he has almost identical numbers to tucker, annd i think the difference is his defense..(its just my opinion so dont get all crazy)

once again congrats to desales as they really earned it, but congrats to mville as well on a great seson where nobody thought this would be the case...

[PBR...]

congrats to all teams...it was a fun season and great to see dvc finally being able to give a game to long time powers in the league. (first dvc tries for a national championship in wrestling this week)

[Coach K]

Congratulations to the DeSales men and women on winning the Freedom Conference. Coach Coval, the rest of the staff, and the players did a great job this season! Good luck in the NCAA tournament!

[larry_u]

Can someone post your NCAA team's profiles in here:

http://www.d3boards.com/index.php?topic=6299.0

[chizwiz]

Congrats to all who made the All-Conference team.  It seemed pretty strong.  Congrats to Coach Coval and Trevoy Pointer in winning COY and ROY, respectively.

Without sounding like sour grapes or raining on Pointer's parade, would somebody please explain to me how Pointer was voted as ROY?  I just did a comparison of the stats between the two players, and Trevoy doesn't match up well.  Is there something I missed?  I'm thinking the MAC coaches maybe ignored the stats and voted based on something else.  I would like people's opinions on what that was.

Player            FG%    3FG%    FT%    PPG    RPG    Steals    Blocks    AST/TO    MPG    Starts
Tyrik Tucker    49.8      40       76      13.5    5.4     16     41          0.41       29.3     26
Trevoy Pointer  45.8   26.2       77.8    12.4    3.1     36   5           0.46       24.9      4

Anybody?

[chairman]

I'm going to chalk it up to midrange's effective campaigning on the board.

Seriously though. I am curious to see if the post-season impacted coach's voting on this. Pointer hit a pair of huge shots against Eastern and by all appearances kept the Valiants in the game for a half with 18 in the first twenty minutes at DeSales.

Chiz, I agree with you, but I think we have seen Tucker quite a bit. My impression is 1) he was unmistakable on Eastern's team, and 2) he possesses a skill set that is unique in the league. His game got better as the year went on, and that is really encouraging for Eastern supporters. I anticipate next year he will check point guards and power forwards on defense, and that added muscle will boost his rebounding numbers up to around eight or nine a game.

Pointer and Tucker were both the second leading scorers on playoff teams. I am not sure you could say Pointer was undeserving-- remember 25% of his season was spent shooting in the dark at the rim of doom-- and he still scored over 12 points per game. The starts number doesn't mean much. Pointer played the big minutes for the Valiants.

It would be interesting to see how the Katz/ Williams factor influenced the voting as well I am sure those two got a couple votes as well.

The way I would look at ROY would be to ask the coaches, if you were picking your team for the next three years based on the performance of the player this year, who would be your first pick. If that is the question, I think every coach in the league takes Tucker. If you ask the question, Which Freshman contributed to the success of his team the most, then I think it is a wash except M'ville had two more wins, and maybe Pointer wins.

Either way, I think the EU v. M'ville rivalry will be pretty interesting for the next four years.

[chizwiz]

That brings a little light to the situation, Chair.

[hoopzwiz]

Tucker had more offensive help, its that simple.
Manhattanille had a good year but its seems to me that Pointer made nearly every big shot for them.

They are going to be a scary team in the next few years.

Hey Chiz, how does a nice score keeper like you get a karma total like that?

[chairman]

Hoopwiz... Chiz is trying to turn over a new leaf-- don't antagonize him.

I am a little surprised to hear you say Tucker had more offensive help. In my way of looking at things, the 'offensive help' couldn't be more similar.

Eastern started two players who combined to average 5.7 points per game-- and it was only that high because Manhattanville let Kaiser go for 20 in the game at Eastern. M'ville starts two guys who average a combined 4.3 points per game.
M'ville gets 15 a game out of Glass and Rodriguez, Eastern gets 15 a game out of Pujols, Wright, and Whipple.

You would have to consider Reels and Wicks (both second teamers averaging about 13 ppg) to be comparable "offensive help" and Laroche and Martin Soaries both averaged exactly 10.7 points per game-- LaRoche scored 289 points in 27 games and Soaries 279 in 26.

In the games I saw them both play, Pointer got his points on spot up shots and lay-ins in transition. Tucker created his own shot off the dribble. Not to diminish the play-calling, but the two big shots he hit against Eastern in the semi-final were on wide open looks on kick out passes. The second one came off a double screen on the baseline.

The 'more offensive help' theory doesn't work.

[mid-range j]

i think we all know that the rookie of the year was between pointer and tucker..offensively and statistically they are nearly identical..yes, tucker started but that doesnt mean anything in the scheme of things because they averaged nearly the same amount of minutes..here is what i have to say (if anyone cares)

tucker is a great player and was probably runner up to pointer because of a few reasons...the number one thing is defense, i dont know how many times you have seen trevoy play this year but his defense is incredible, he shut down some major players, including dejoras, jones, and braswell (first game) this year when he was in the game (lamar glass who is also excepetional on D also had the responsibility of guarding these top players as well so we have to give him some recognition as well), nothing against tuckers defense who is also good and probably has better steals and blocks numbers, but i think the coaches of the conference really saw tp lock down players...

the next reason is strength of schedule, like i said mville didnt play a weak non conference schedule and tp had to put these numbers and great games up against some of the top teams in the country, and thats why his numbers might be slightly below tuckers...

next, tp's playoff performances topped it off, he had 18 points in the first half against desales and some people could say that he single handedly kept mville in the game, he hits big shots, plays with unbelievable poise, especially as a freshman, and had a great season with a better team record than the contenders he was going against..

chairman, i guess my "campaigning" was effective..hah
so like i said pointer was deserving of the award and he won it, the coaches of the conference thought the same thing, so i guess i am right about something...

[chairman]

Mid-range--

Strength of schedule would be a good argument if Tyrik had racked up big numbers against some of the softer teams on the schedule. The argument loses strength when you see that Tucker scored 225 points in league for a 14.1 ppg average and 125 points in 10 non-league games for a 12.5 ppg average.

I would say that Pointer might be a better man to man defender, but Tucker can do a lot of different things in the defenses, and he caught on very quickly to several different defensive schemes.

I think you are right about the two being the top two vote-getters, although we have no way of knowing. I am sure both coaches are looking forward to building around their rookies for the next three years.

This is an interesting question for you though. Which of the two do you think has a better chance of becoming a player of the year in the next three years? I don't begrudge Pointer the award because he had a great freshman year on a winning team, I think you wouldn't have had a complaint if Tucker had received it either.

How's that rim coming?