MBB: NEWMAC

[toooldtoplay]

Yes,  It seemed to work for awhile but a very strange substitution pattern.  Tashman and Kates go to the bench at the 11 minute mark and never come back. McCue looks exhausted at the end of the half - I think it is by far the most minutes he has played one stretch in several years. Must be hard to play when you never know what to expect. Seemed to work out in the end this time.

[Hugenerd]

MIT beat up on Wheaton, winning on the road 79-61.  Mitch Kates had 34 points on 11-15 shooting (4-6 from 3) and 5 assists.

WPI also won at home over Springfield.

Babson won at Clark.

WPI first in the conference at 5-0. MIT, Babson, and CGA are all tied next at 3-2.

[mass_d3fan]

Fellow NEWMAC posters

I just got home from a nice evening out with friends after watching WPI & Springfield battle this afternoon.

The Engineers lit up the Pride for 89 points in an 89-74 win.  WPI was led by Kyle Nadeau's hot shooting early as he put up 15 of his 18 points in the first half going 5 for 7 from outside the arc.  After struggling with his shot early on, Matt Carr had a big game with game-highs of 23 points, 8 boards, and 3 blocks to go with 4 assists. Jeff Robinson struggled early but put up 13 in the 2nd half and finished with 17 points and 4 assists.
Jamie Shannon stepped up with 14 points on 5 of 6 shooting. Freshman Ryan Kolb played some very good minutes and chipped in with 5 points.  Joe Wesoloski did not score, but played some great defense during his 17 minutes.

Springfield's Billy Harkins posted a career-high 20 points and a game-high 5 assists.  Matt Cavalieri struggled to get good looks, but got to the line(7 of 10) and put put 17 points to go with 4 rebounds.  Evan Christner played good all around game with 9 points, 6 boards and 2 blocks.  Ryan Coburn gave the Pride 8 points and 5 rebounds.

It was a good performance by the Engineers who were playing in front of the basketball alumni that included their 84-85 Elite 8 team and the 04-05 Sweet Sixteen squad.  The game was close until the final 6 minutes of the first half.  WPI went on a 17-8 run that created a 44-27 lead at the half.

The second took off were the first had ended.  Springfield looked confused and lost their composure a few times as the Engineers upped the lead to 26 (60-34) with just over 10 minutes left.  The Pride chipped away at it and at 5minutes it was a 17 pt game (82-65).  That was when Harrington Auditorium went silent as Carr went to floor grabbing his ankle.  He limped off and when the game resumed, it was the Engineers who looked confused.  Over the next 3 minutes, the only points they would put up were two Jerome Stewart free throws.  The Pride took advantage of the ice cold shooting and turnovers to cut the lead to 11 at 84-73.  Carr re-entered after being worked on by the trainer and helped to shutdown any further comeback by the Pride with two blocks and steal in that final couple of minutes.

As Hugenerd pointed out, Mitchell Kates had the biggest offensive performance of the day in MIT's 79-61 win over Wheaton. Will Tashman posted 14 points and 7 rebounds. No upset of the Engineers this time around.  The Lyons were led by Anthony Coppola (25 pts) and Brendan Degnan (12 pts).

Clark continues to struggle to find offense as no one went for double figures in a 49-41 loss to Babson.  The Beavers got 15 points and 4 boards from Russell Braithwaite, 11 points and 5 rebounds from Kris Noonan and 9 points& 5 rebounds from Matt Florio.
The Cougars got a near double-double from Brian Vayda (9 pts/10 rebs).  Both teams shot well under 40% from the field.


Bad news though -> More Bad Weather is being  predicted-> yet another fun snow storm for the middle of the upcoming week.

[mass_d3fan]

Congatulations to Coast Guard's Jevon James on being named NEWMAC Player of the Week.

http://www.newmacsports.com/sports/mbkb/awards/weekly/2010-2011/mbkbweekly012411

[mass_d3fan]

The NEWMAC continues to have two teams getting on the ballots for the top 25.

WPI moves up to #14 and MIT sits at ORV:#38.

Weather permitting three conference games on the slate tomorrow:

Springfield travels to Clark
WPI hosts Babson
Coast Guard heads north to MIT

Wheaton plays 2 non-conference games.  The Lyons are at Tufts tonight and host Worcester St. on Thursday.

[JustAFan]

MIT lands another big kid for next year:

http://www.newenglandrecruitingreport.com/news/article/1805/Commitment-Catch-Up.php

[jabnike23]

Springfield beats Clark 75-72.  Point Guard Billy Harkins has an awesome game with 17 points, 8 assists, 7 steals, 5 rebounds, and only 1 turnover.

[WPI89]

Looked pretty easy last night for WPI over Babson (after a sluggish start at least).  Glad they got the game in before the heavy snow.  Any details out there?  Mass-D3?

[mass_d3fan]

WPI89

Yes, my wife and I went to the games last night.  We stayed and watched the WPI women's team beat Smith College and go to 14-3 (10-1 in the NEWMAC) on the year.

The Engineers pulled away in the second half for a 67-47 win.  Robinson (off the bench again) had 24 points (21 in the 2nd half), to go with an assist and a steal. Carr had another strong all-around performance with 17 points, 9 boards, 4 blocked shots and 2 steals.  Fernando Perez gave WPI a good lift off the bench with 8 points and 6 rebounds.  Nadeau, Etten & Shannon combined for 10 assists. Robinson, Carr & Perez shot a combined 21 for 29 for the evening.

Babson was led by Alex Rudolph (12 pts), Matt Zoia (10 pts) and Marcus McDermott (7 pts.  Kris Noonan added 6 points and 9 rebounds and Matt Florio contributed 6 points and 4 assists.  Babson was held to 32% from the field.  I was looking forward to see Russell Brathwaite play and see the improvement in his game from last year.  Unfortunately, he got 2 fouls in the first 8 minutes and sat the rest of the half.  He got his 3rd 4 ½ minutes into the second half and was limited to single FG attempt in 15 minutes on the night.

It was indeed another slow start for the Engineers.  They committed 8 turnovers in the first half and sluggish would indeed be a good description for their play.  The Beavers did not play great, but played good enough to stay with WPI.  They had a 22-20 lead with under 5 minutes in the half.  Carr got a couple of inside hoops and freshman David White hit a three to cap a 9-0 run that gave WPI a 29-22 lead with just under 2 minutes to go.  Rudolph drained a jumper and went 1 for 2 at the line to make it 29-25 at the half.

I am guessing that Coach Bartley had some choice words for his team during the break.  Robinson heated up quickly hitting 3 consecutive 3-pointers.  A conventional 3-point play by Carr pushed the lead into double digits for the first time with 15 minutes to go. The lead see-sawed from 13 to 17 until a Matt Florio 3-point play cut it to 12.  Robinson's 5th three of the half immediately pushed it back to 15.  Two layups by Perez and a Carr dunk made it a 23 pt game and the benches emptied after that.

The Engineers are indeed a Jeckle and Hyde team at times.  When they are playing well, they do indeed look like a team worthy of their national ranking.  This pattern of slow starts though could cost them a game if they are not careful.  They need to start to put together games where they get that flow going and maintain it.  Something I have brought up before, I think could help them avoid these lulls they seem to go through on the offensive end.

 Screens... I really believe that they must do much better with this if they intend to make any kind of post-season run.  They had a couple of plays last night, but for a college team, they are terrible at actually running their man to the screen and making that textbook tight cut off the screener as well as looking at the screener afterwards.  This is really stuff you would figure players at this level would do automatically.  Strangely though, the Engineers seem content to cut wide on screens and on many plays the ball handler never even looks in the direction of the player who just set the screen.  I think if they would do better with this on both off & on-ball screens, they could avoid these backfires in their offense.  When they do execute these things correctly, they get a lot of open looks – both at the rim and on the perimeter.  It just a shame they are not better at executing this.  I spent a couple months on business in Utah years ago and got to watch a dozen or so Jazz games from upclose.  John Stockton and Karl Malone shredded NBA teams with the simple beauty of the pick & roll play. Others obviously have had great careers in the game using it as well, but I got to see these two first-hand over a number of games.  It is such a great play, because even when you know they are going to do it, it is still very hard to defend it if it is executing correctly. After watching that, I have always wondered why every team does not make the execution of it a basic staple of their offensive system. We here in New England are now privileged to watch one the NBA's best ever at using the off-ball screen to get open – Ray Allen.  He just keeps going, running his defender into one, two, sometimes 3 screens to create an open look for himself.  I think WPI's perimeter group would get more good looks if they ran those off-ball screens more tightly.   LOL, - ok time for me to step down from the soap box!

MIT and Coast Guard play tonight and then MIT & WPI will battle on Saturday in Cambridge.  Also on Sat., Coast Guard will host Babson and Wheaton travels west to Springfield.

[Hugenerd]

MIT handles CGA at home, 85-66.  Tashman and Kates were dominant tonight. Tashman went for 26 points (10-13 shooting), 11 boards, and 2 steals in 34 minutes, dominating the matchup with last week's NEWMAC POY Jevon James.  Not to be outdone, Kates went for 27 points (9-14 FG, 3-5 from 3), including 6 assists and only 1 turnover.  Jamie Karraker player extremely efficiently, scoring 17 points on 6-8 shooting (5-6 from 3) in 28 minutes.  Billy Bender had 11 points, 9 rebounds, and 5 assists off the bench. Pretty solid contributions all around.

Looks like MIT has figured out how to score again. After averaging just 61 ppg in the first 5 games after officially losing Hollinsgworth for the season (they went 1-4 in those games), they have averaged 75 ppg in the last 4 (all conference wins, including 82 ppg in the last 2).  MIT is now alone in 2nd place in the NEWMAC.

This sets up a 1 vs. 2 matchup as they host WPI on Saturday. A win for MIT would draw MIT within 1 game of WPI in the conference.  A win by WPI would all but guarantee them the regular season crown in the NEWMAC, as they would have a 3 game lead on everyone and own the tiebreaker vs. MIT, with 5 games to play.

[toooldtoplay]

Good effort tonight especially on the defensive side in the second half. Hopefully the coaches can get the defense sorted out and be able to guard penetration and the 3 point line. I liked the rotation tonight with Bender and McCue getting a few of Karrakers minutes. The defense improves noticeably and Karraker stays fresher as evidenced by the solid shooting.  Liked Tashmans last few games and he will be tested against WPI.  Can't see MIT winning this one unless they rebound far better than they have this year. It will take a near perfect game all around or an off night by the "other" engineers.

Congrats to Harkins who appears to really be putting it together as a senior.  His all around play is keeping Springfield in the hunt.

If WPI can run out the string I think they may end up in the top ten.

[Hugenerd]

I dont think it will take a "near perfect game" for MIT to win at home.  They played poorly in the first game, which WPI clearly had something to do with, but they have been playing much better in the last 4 since that matchup.  They just have to do slightly better in 3 areas:

1) Shoot better from 3.  For the season they are shooting 41% from 3, last time they met WPI, they shot 31%.  They took nearly 20 3s in that game, so if they shoot 10% better (their season average), thats 6 points right there (shoot 30% better, like they did tonight, and obviously you have a whole different ball game).  Karraker, specifically, shot nearly 30% below his season average (2-10, he is 47% for the season) in that first contest.  In the four games since WPI, Karraker has shot 17-26, or 65%, from 3.  You have to believe he will do better than the first meeting on Saturday.

2) Rebounds the defensive glass.  WPI had 15 offensive boards in the first meeting, leading to 14 2nd chance points, 11 of which were in the 2nd half.  Guards need to do a better job boxing out as many of those were from WPIs guards, obviously if the MIT bigs can put a body on Carr that helps also.

3) Take care of the ball.  MIT had 21 turnovers in the first meeting, 11 more than WPI.  That led to 29 points off of turnovers for WPI (WPI was +18 in that category). Clearly way too many, and a lot of those appeared to be caused by forcing it into the post.  Look for MIT to mix it up next game and do something different.

You also cant undermine the fact that MIT seems to have figured out how to score again in the last few games.  They will obviously be tested by the WPI defense, but they have played them once now and will be at home, so they should have a better idea of what to expect.

WPI is still clearly the favorite, but I dont think there is as big a difference between the two teams as you make it sound.  It took them a few games to get going after Hollingsworth was ruled out for the season, but I think they are back on track now and hopefully will play to their potential on Saturday.

[WPI89]

Thanks all for the updates........

I do not think WPI is a good as all this and thus - I beleive it sets up perfectly for an MIT win on Saturday - simply the Karma card and Oh yeah - the fact that MIT seems maybe to have figured out it is time to play with the group they have now.

I do believe a win on Saturday would get WPI an at large bid  - unless they completely collapse (which their remaining schedule should prevent).

They could drop 2 conferenc games (again not likely with their remaining schedule) after MIT and still get to 20 before the NEWMAC semis.

A win Sat keeps them rolling in the polls etc.........at that point, even a loss to say MIT in the conference semis would likely be OK.

Just my opinion............

[Hugenerd]

WPI has no bad losses to date (both D3 losses are to top 26 teams on the road). Therefore, I agree that they could lose a couple of games down the stretch and still get strong consideration for an at-large.

[mass_d3fan]

Gentlemen...

I tend to agree somewhat with WPI89.  The Worcester-based Engineers must prove they can play a solid game from tip-off to final buzzer.  The games I have seen this year, they have tended to have slow starts and struggled to find offensive rhythm.  They have had some explosive 2nd halves, but they need to develop a more consistent offensive flow throughout the game.

In the first half of the first game, Robinson went 1 for 9 & while Carr put up 8 pts, he only played 9 minutes due to a couple of fouls.  They need both of them to play 30 minutes and put up the numbers they have been lately.  These two have combined for 40 or more points in each of the four games since the MIT game.  WPI also needs Ben Etten to give them some offense punch as well. He only had 2 pts in the first game.  Perez gave WPI 9pts/6rebs first time around and Nadeau played a good all-around game. They both need to give that kind of performance again.  Shannon & David Brown will have to play some solid D against the MIT guards and handle the ball well.  I think if both avoid foul trouble, Tashman & Carr will pretty much cancel each other out at games end.  A big key will be how WPI's rotation of Carr, Wesoloski, Perez, Galloway & Stewart work on defense against Tashman, Dickinson & Donegan.  Stewart did not play in the first meeting, but has been getting some minutes in the last 3 games.

I also agree with HN that MIT must shoot the three better than they did in Worcester.  WPI has been one of the hardest teams in the country to shoot 3's against.  The NEWMAC stats show they are holding teams to 28% from outside the arc and 38% overall.  MIT is at 35% & 43% respectively.

This game is certainly not a make or break game for WPI, but it is a very good test on the road.  I do think they are the favorite in the game, but not a strong one.  An MIT victory would not surprise me and I do not believe a loss in this one will be looked at as a bad loss for either team.  How the game is won or lost and how each team responds to the outcome as the season winds down is the more important thing to take from this one.  I do feel they will meet a third time at the end of February and there is still a possibility (given recent history of the #1 seed in the NEWMCA tournament) of getting two teams into the NCAAs.

With the NCAA regional rankings coming out next week, I would think a WPI win would make a good case for them being ranked 4th in the Northeast behind the NESCAC big 3.  An MIT win would place them up there in fight for positions just under the top 5 or so.