MBB: Coast 2 Coast Athletic Conference

[bbsquared]

Mary Wash and St Mary's in the championship. Hey D-MAc I noticed York was up to 4th in the region last week, is there still a chance for them to sneak in?

UMW had a win at home and St Mart's won huge at home. Should we judge that the home court will be the deciding factor?

I do like UMW's chances since the game will be a home game.

[bbald eagle]

 

Two CAC Championship Games at Goolrick on Saturday!



Go Eagles!

[Pat Coleman]

York is not completely out of the picture because they will be on the board after the Centennial runner-up gets picked. But it's not looking good.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

Agree with Pat... they are on the board... but I still don't see them getting in. Too many losses in region, especially the lose to Salisbury in the first round. I honestly will be surprised if they make it.

[Pat Coleman]

Game times for Saturday set at 2 p.m. for men, 4:30 p.m. for women.
D3hoopsNet will broadcast audio of both championship games.
http://www.d3hoops.com/audio/

[bbald eagle]

Yippeee!   

[CACsportsnut]

obviously the loss to salisbury hurts york, then salisbury losing the very next game dosen't help either. losing to marymount who has a sub par year hurts badly as well. the losses to hood, wesley once, and being dismantled by messiah aren't helping either. however they have wins over william patterson, elizabethtown, and mary washington twice. what must happen for York to get a bid into the tournament?

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

CACSportsnut... YCP's chances are getting slimmer and slimmer with upsets in conference tournaments. If a few more teams like Wooster lose, the Pool C arena gets more and more full. I honestly don't think YCP has any chance of getting into the tournament. But, if the Spartan fans want to route on some teams to help their chances... route on Wash U, Amherst, Guilford, and others to win. If even one of those lose this weekend - POP for good!

[CACsportsnut]

so if even one of those teams go down then that's it? i can understand that I guess. there regional ranking was 4th before they lost to salisbury, and now that desales is back to winning ways im sure there mback to 5th in the region. such a hard thing to believe, a talented team like york is done, just unbelievable. this may seem like a dumb question and i hope i dont receive any banter for this...but do you think they will get some special consideration being that they have a nation-wide known player in first-team all american chad mcgowan wearing there colors? i mean i thought all year long guilford got some special top 25 voting becuase of the player of the year ben strong...so its just a question, but do you think that will get any edge over teams who dont have nationally recognized players. again i stress...its a smoewhat good question!

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

CACsportsnut - no. The NCAA committees don't sit at the table and say, we need YCP in the tournament because they have Chad McGowan. YCP may be a talented team, but they simply didn't get it done when they needed to. They lost too many games they should have won and they didn't help themselves tripping in the first round when they HAD to win!

Also... I am actually disappointed with McGowan this season. Yes, he has gotten his points and rebounds this season, but I didn't see him put the team on his shoulders when push came to shove. I don't think he was as big a factor as many expected from him. He somewhat disappeared from the the normal chat in the region and nation this year. I have no idea if any of the off-season problems really distracted him, but it seemed to derail the team early and they never got themselves into any type of groove for the rest of the season. Just a bit disappointed.

[bbald eagle]

If a team with a "nation-wide known player in first-team all american" got special attention, maybe it'd be negative attention due to their not accomplishing what they should have.

[ycp]

D-Mac,

WHAT???

Are you kidding me? First, did you even see us play this year? I am really disappointed that someone who has a respected point of view would comment like that when you didn't even see him play this year. He had a great year. He should be the POY of the conference again and should be an All-American again. The only area where he did not perform was at the free throw line. Everything else was better than last year.

Ask Salisbury what their strategy was in the quarterfinals. Throw three guys at Chad whenever he got the ball and he still scored 24. When he was triple teamed he kicked the ball out to the shooters who missed their shots. Not Chad's fault but he certainly did his job. Very rarely did Chad get single coverage all year. That is what you should do to an All-American in the post but he responded to all the things thrown at him all year long, including a number of schools with very classless fans. (Speaking of classless fans, there is an excellent article in this week's Sports Illustrated regarding the boorish fan behavior in college hoops)

The problems with York had nothing to do with Chad or any situation regarding Chad. The problem with the Spartans is that they started the season having to replace their two starting guards and trying to integrate two new starters and two other key newcomers. The Spartans played a tough schedule during the year and had some very good wins and some disappointing losses. Prior to losing to Marymount at the end of the regular season and to Salisbury in the tournament, York won nine straight and 14 of 16. While the bitter taste of the last two games linger, this team was playing well heading down the stretch.

I think everyone forgets this team won 18 games and won their third regular season conference in the last four years. I know everyone wants to focus on the tournament but winning the regular season is the better indicator of who the best team in the conference is over the course of three months. Unfortunately, York has not been good in the tournament the last three years but that does not diminish the 87 wins over the last four years.

D-Mac, what were your expecations of Chad? He led the conference in scoring and rebounding. He was second in the CAC in field goal percentage and also played good defense. He did not foul out this year and blocked 34 shots for the year. Offensively, a post player needs a little help from his shooters. At times he got that, and at times he didn't. Your example of him "carrying" the team doesn't hold any water. If you would have seen the Salisbury game, you would have noticed that when Chad got the ball, he scored or was fouled. We had segments in the game where he didn't get his hands on the ball. Certainly not the fault of Chad but simply a matter of fact in the game. I have a really hard time with your statements that you were disappointed with him. Also, throwing something that happened in the offseason in is total bunk. You should be better than that. Chad wasn't distracted at all. He was great all year.

While I think it is unlikely that the Spartans will get into the tournament, it was still a successful season. Congrats to Chad and Chris for their outstanding four years in the green and white. 

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

ycp - I guess I had higher expectations for Chad than others. Sorry if you don't like that. He is a very good player, don't get me wrong. I have enjoyed seeing him play throughout his career and become a better player every season. I just expected to see him take his game and his team to the next level. This season, I saw a bit of a plateau for him and the team. Sure, he was double (and triple) teamed a lot and he still got his points and rebounds. And while he did have to deal with new guards and a different team, I didn't see him or the team take it to the next level.

Sure, the team did win nine straight, but sometimes it is how you finish that is the guage of how a team did... and the Spartans stumbled... which was too bad. I wanted to see YCP succeed in the conference and eventually the NCAA's, especially after Hood lost Gutekunst and were no longer the same team. But that didn't happen. I am certainly not blaming McGowan, he can't do it all. However, I did expect more. I am allowed to expect more and was a bit disappointed.

By the way, I don't take stats as the be-all and end-all for how good a player is. McGowan might have lead the conference in points and rebounds, but no one, besides Gutekunst, comes to mind as someone who could have completed with McGowan for both those categories. I expected him to lead in those categories. I also expected more of the other tangiables - like taking the team on his shoulders in a game like Salisbury's this week and finding a way to get it done. As for POY this season, I expect McGowan to win it as well, but besides Jughans, I can't think of anyone else in the running.

Also, the CAC is not one of the tougher conferences in the region or the nation. YCP had chances to raise its level of play and dominate... they simply didn't do that. In that nine game winning streak, it started after a bad three-point loss to Wesley and a dismantling by an ok Messiah team. Marymount forced OT against the Spartans before York won. Hood's games was too close for a team YCP should have dominated - especially size wise. And only two of the nine games were wins of over ten points - both to Gallaudet.

By all fairness, I was extremely disappointed in Hood this season - especially when Gutekunst was declared ineligible for the final semester. I was very disappointed in St. Mary's who I thought was going to be a very good team when I saw them play several games earlier this season. Salisbury surprised me with how much they struggled this season. And Marymount once again showed they can't play a consistent season of basketball.

The only surprise for me was Mary Washington. I didn't think they would be in the running for the conference title, but with some of YCP's struggles along with Hood's rough second semester, it allowed the Eagles to rise to the top and they will probably win the title today.

While I appreciate the fact I have a respected point of view, that also means I have a point of view that may not agree with everyone elses. I spend plenty of my life during basketball season getting to games, watching and listening to games online, and keeping track of what is going on nationally. I may not have showed up to YCP this season (I did have plans to do it Thursday!), but I have still followed the team closely in other ways along with plenty of other teams I don't have a chance of getting to. I am sorry if you don't like my opinion... but I stand by it.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

If you would like to listen to the championship game... Pat Coleman is on the call at Goolrick:

Listen here!

And there are Live Stats!

[ycp]

I guess my question would be, why would the expectations for York be so high? I understand that returning an All-American raises one's expectations but I am not sure those are always valid expectations.

This team was not close to the two NCAA tournament teams of 2004-05 and 2005-06. That team played so well together and was much, much deeper than this team. This is not to demean the abilities of this year's squad but I thought to get to 18 wins was a success. Could it have gotten to 20, I think so but I don't see the season as a failure. It is a disappointment to lose when you don't feel like you should have but the fact of the matter is that they were the best team in the CAC in the regular season regardless of the strength of the league.

I agree with your assessment of the CAC. I thought it would be a bit stronger and there are teams that have continued to underachieve. I don't think York was one of those teams but I am also biased in that assessment. We won a number of close games and winning is the idea. We didn't blow people out and I think you are looking at that fact as a weakness. The name of the game is to win. Maybe that should be an argument on why your expectations were not realistic.

I guess my problem with your opinion is that you did not see any of our games this year. It is a necessary evil to go off results and box scores but if you haven't seen us play, how do you evaluate a player's performance as disappointing? I wonder what you think Chad's stats should have been. Should he have averaged 30 and 15 and shot 60% from the floor?

I am really proud of how Chad handled this season. Everyone was gunning for him and he represented himself and his school with class and dignity.

Dave, I don't agree with your opinion but I respect your dedication to DIII basketball. I just think that your are wrong in this situation. I, too, will stand by that