MBB: NEWMAC

[middhoops]

WPI goes to Tufts and pulls out a win despite good stats from the Jumbos' twin towers.  Another win over a talented NESCAC team.  Congrats.
I've long thought a seasonal match up between the two leagues would be great fun.  One weekend where the NEWMAC and NESCAC play two games against each other? 

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Everybody seems to be beating the NESCAC this year.  I'm really thinking they may be a one bid league.

[WPI89]

Woohoo!  Great win boys. Absolutely love love love that Bartley did not call time out!

[WPI89]

Could not get video.  No box.  No summary.  Just the score of the WPI/FDU-FP game.  Hoping against hope something is wrong with the posted score?

Anyone know what happened?

[WPI89]

Holy Moly - Dave/Pat - gave a guy a near heart attack.  Score was posted in reverse for nearly 2 hours.
Finally got a tweet giving me the game story and that the score was reversed on the site.   

Great way to head into  the NEWMAC boys!  Way to go.

Also congrats to Clark with a quality win in Vegas against Colorado College last night.

Should be a competitive and fun 2 months!

[gordonmann]

Everybody seems to be beating the NESCAC this year.  I'm really thinking they may be a one bid league.

The NESCAC hasn't been a one-big league in a really long time. I don't know the last time that happened.

The NESCAC's elite teams aren't as good as in previous years, to be sure. But the conference's overall winning percentage is .708. If you back out the Little Three rivalry games (Amherst-Wes-Williams) and CBB games, it's even higher. Over half the league has a winning percentage over .700.

Some of those teams are going to come back to earth (Wesleyan, Trinity, Hamilton), especially when conference play starts. But it's too soon to say all of them will. And since the conference still plays a single round robin, teams like Middlebury are headed toward a really high winning percentage. 

On a different note, the NEWMAC posted a higher winning percentage against D3 opponents last year than the NESCAC did, even with the disappointing NCAA tournament performance.

http://www.d3hoops.com/guidebook/2014-15/2014_Non-conference_record_for_D3_opponents.pdf

[amh63]

Pretty quiet on this board!   Several big games tonight...Springfield vs WPI is one and MIT has a game on tap.  I probably will watch the WPI game.

[nescac1]

Hamilton will definitely come back down to earth. Trinity and Wesleyan were both VERY young teams last year, each graduating basically no one of consequence, and both seem to be much improved (although for Wesleyan, at least, next year is the one that will be really interesting).  I would not be surprised if one, or both, made a legitimate run for the NESCAC title, especially given the likely lack of any powerhouse team dominating the league this year. 

NEWMAC seems similarly wide-open -- Babson looks strongest to me, but certainly WPI, and possibly even MIT or Springfield, could certainly make a run at the top spot.  New England is going to be crazy this year, lots of surprising results certain to be forthcoming!

[middhoops]

Looking forward to Springfield's game at WPI this evening, so I came to this board to catch some of the buzz.  And who do I find here?  Amherst and Williams guys.  Oy.....
You folks have one of the top leagues in D3 right now.  Now that you're through beating up on the NESCAC you can start beating each other. 

[WPI89]

Nice to see you guys over here fellas!  Relatively easy for WPI and MIT tonight - setting up thier first matchup on Saturday. Will be fun!

[WPI89]

Prediction:  WPI beats MIT in a close - hard fought game Saturday.

Contingency Prediction:  If MIT beats WPI - we hear from Huge Nerd for the first time in a very long time!!!!!

[amh63]

WPI89.....agreed with both of your posts...and your prediction.

[Hugenerd]

Thought I would write something so you could at least be 1 for 2, WPI89. I actually didn't know MIT was playing WPI today, but had a few minutes to check out the scores since the conference slate is Wed/Sat and was happily surprised.  Started a new job which requires more travel and in the midst of a relocation for that job, so not as much time to follow the Engineers as I used to have.

MIT appears to be playing better with the return of Pre-Season AA Matt Redfield, who missed the entire first semester and the first 10 games of the year.  I hope they can continue to improve as Redfield gets further into game shape and the full squad gets more playing time together.

Hope they can keep it going.

[WPI89]

+1 Nerd. Welcome back.  Missed the game entirely today. Seems like some trouble putting the ball in the hoop. Will read about it tomorrow.

[rlk]

+1 Nerd. Welcome back.  Missed the game entirely today. Seems like some trouble putting the ball in the hoop. Will read about it tomorrow.

It was a hard-fought defensive contest with more than the usual number of shot clock violations.  We didn't shoot especially well either, more due to your D than anything else I think.  There were surprisingly few fouls given the nature of the contest except for tactical ones near the end -- you guys had to foul us 2 or 3 times to even get us into the bonus, and we were trying to foul before the shot near the end to take some time off the clock.  Mastascusa in particular seemed to be everywhere for you guys.  He had a nice steal off Ryan Frankel with about 4 minutes left that he took in for what was called a layup but which really was a soft dunk.  It's a good thing we had Redfield and Acker back to maintain discipline in the paint, or it would have been a very long afternoon for us.

Who's that huge guy of yours that I saw?  He didn't play, but he must have been around 7', and I'm not used to seeing our bigs dwarfed (even if it was just in the layup line).

Also ran into Mitchell Kates.  He's done with grad school and is working for a startup.  He was sitting with what I think are some former WPI players (they were wearing WPI shirts, at any rate).