MBB: NEWMAC

[Hugenerd]

New poll out, MIT #9.  First top ten ever!

[Hugenerd]

Recent release by NCAA.com about Division III basketball:

http://www.ncaa.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/011210aaa.html

[Hugenerd]

I got a chuckle out of the title of the recent release by MIT on Noel Hollingsworth's NEWMAC Player of the Week honors: "Hollingsworth's Scoring Binge Leads to Player of the Week Accolades".

http://www.mitathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/2009-10/releases/HollingsworthPOW_011210

I have never thought of anyone binging on scoring, but I guess the term fits after the Babson game.

Hollingsworth also picked up ECAC player of the week honers.

[toooldtoplay]

Also Noel D3 team of the week. Impressive list of awards so far. Congrats.

Noel Hollingsworth
Hollingsworth had a huge week, averaging 26.5 points, 8.0 rebounds and 2.5 blocks, as MIT improved to 13-1 with wins over Tufts and Babson. The sophomore notched his eighth double-double of the season with 16 points and 13 boards in a 71-59 win over Tufts. He then followed that up with a career-high 37 points, including 20 on 9-for-10 shooting in the second half, as MIT picked up a win against Babson, 72-45. Hollingsworth shot 60.9 percent from the field for the week.

[massballer]

anybody know how many "commits" anderson has.  I hear alot of coaches talking about waiting on kids who got deferred, in addition to the 4 hes already got in. It sounds like he might have 10+ hoping to get in?

[Hugenerd]

anybody know how many "commits" anderson has.  I hear alot of coaches talking about waiting on kids who got deferred, in addition to the 4 hes already got in. It sounds like he might have 10+ hoping to get in?

I really dont think its that many.  I think he is waiting on a few more that are actively being recuited.  Should be about the size of the class he has this year.

[Hugenerd]

MIT handles WPI tonight 76-53, holding WPI to 30 points below their season average.

MIT really came to play tonight and it showed throughout the game.  I was able to attend the game, but I am not going to go into too many specifics of game action because it was really lobsided.  WPI made one last run with a little over 5 minutes to go to cut a 19 point lead to around 12, but that is as close as they got as MIT got some clutch shots from Jimmy Burke and Billy Bender to extend the lead back out into 20+ territory.

So many guys played well tonight.  Mitch Kates is the best point guard you haven't heard of in D3, but dont worry, he is only a freshman, so there will be plenty of time for that.  He completely controlled the tempo of this game for MIT.  His box score doesnt really do his performance justice (11 points, 6 assists, 4 reboubds, 2 steals).  He does so many things that dont show up on paper.  Noel Hollingsworth had his usual solid performance, scoring 16 on 7-10 shooting and adding 10 rebounds for his 9th double-double of the year.  Billy Bender had a huge game, he played really well on D the whole game.  He guarded Jeff Robinson throughout the entire game and held him to 8 points (he was averageing in the 20-21 range).  On top of that, Bender made 3 3s and scored 17 points, adding 7 rebounds and 2 steals.  Jimmy Burke was huge in the second half, picking up 12 points, most of them on 3 3s.  Wil Tashmen also had a solid game, with good defense on Fernando Perez and added 8 points, 5 rebounds, and 2 steals.  Bill Johnson added 9 points for MIT.

The nice part of a blowout is you get see some of the younger guys on the other team.  Fernando Perez (who usually plays alot regardless of the score), was pretty impressive in the post, leading WPI in scoring with 10 points.  He is a strong kid who can score over people despite only being 6'3".  He is a sophomore, so if he can develop his off hand he could be a top league performer in years to come.  There was also another very athletic, young kid on WPI: Jameel Galloway.  You could tell he was excited to be out there and he can jump out of the gym.  He had a pretty nice dunk and he was the one who was the catalyst on WPIs run near the end of the game that cut MITs lead down to 12.  Jamie Shannon, Jeremy Shannon's younger brother (perseason All-American for Emerson) also is a very quick and athletic player. He has the tools to develop into a nice guard for WPI.  I met Jeremy and his parents at the game, so a shout out to them, they seem like very nice people.

Overall a very nice performance for MIT and I hope this solidifies MIT as a top 10 team in the eyes of voters.

There are still a lot of games left though, and it starts with a game at Clark on Saturday.  It wont be easy, they have a solid team this year.  I was worried about the number of road game MIT had in their non-conference schedule before the year started, with such a young team, but now it seems like a huge advantage as they went through it pretty much unscathed.  These guys are used to playing on the road.

Go MIT!

[Hugenerd]

In other conference action, both home teams won. 

Springfield over Wheaton 78-61

Coast Guard over Babson 69-61

Springfield is off to a hot start in the league at 3-0.  Coast Guard has also impressed at 2-1 with their only loss to Springfield.  Neither team has played WPI or MIT yet, though.

I am not sure what is going with Wheaton, they seemed to have a veteran nucleus, but their record is a woeful 5-8 and 1-2 in conference (that one win being over WPI).

[tball]

Three top players for Wheaton did not play.  Coppola, Degnan & Stehle.

[Hugenerd]

Three top players for Wheaton did not play.  Coppola, Degnan & Stehle.

That doesnt sound too good.

[remsleep]

Hugenerd---- I too was at the game tonight and you hit it right on the head with your assessment of Kates...what a great career he has in front of him.  On another note, earlier this season I was critical of MIT on defense because of their general lack of quickness....so far they are proving me entirely wrong....particularly in the past two games against Babson and WPI....more than anything else this is a team that appears to enjoy playing with one another.
I would be very wary of Saturday's game at Clark.  MIT is due for a stinker and the Cougs will be all honked up about this one in Worcester.  Alexander playing great for them at this time....currently it looks to me like Alexander and Kates may be, in reality, the two best players in the conference...with all due respect to the job Noel Hollingsworth is doing.   

It's great that MIT's ranking gets better and better and they certainly deserve the recognition......but I'd rather they were more under the radar....it only matters how they finish.   By the way, so-called  "No.1" Randolph-Macon gets torched tonight.  So it goes.

[toooldtoplay]

Great posts about the young MIT players. Teams have tried different methods of beating them this year and the coaches and team have adjusted very nicely.  I think it starts with Kates who seems to really have a mature feel for the game and adjusts the offense to what the D takes away. Against Babson they played Hollingsworth 1 on 1 in the post and he through the ball inside every possession. Yesterday they doubled the post, trapped the pick and roll and left the weakside shooters open (Johnson and Bender) and Kates made them pay.  Teams seem to be trying to wear him down with full court pressure and that has failed as well. 

Kudos to the shooters who were deadly from outside.  Burke was unconscious as his shots were not open and all deep 3's, 2 with the shot clock winding down.  Right now I think the entire team is a nightmare to prepare for. 

[mass_d3fan]

Hugenerd,

   I had issues remembering my password, so i just created another account, anyway...

Congrats to MIT.  Very impressive performance! I did manage to make the game, sitting at the top of the bleachers so I had something to lean my back against. Damn, it just plain sucks to grow old!  I was invited by a colleague who got his Master's degree at MIT many moons ago.

It was a statement win for MIT as far as putting their foot down on WPI's reign.  After this win, there is no doubt who is the top dog in the NEWMAC is now.

After attending a handful of WPI games this year, I was afraid this game would play out this way.  I believe a serious re-think is needed on Institute Road.  Basketball is ALL about matchups.  It is about recognizing match-ups and exploiting them to your advantage when they are in your favor, and minimizing them when they are not.  Right now, MIT puts a much better, make that bigger & athletic, lineup on the court position-by-position, than WPI.  This equals a big advantage in ...you guessed it... Matchups!

This game was a classic example of one team understanding that fact and the other one not.   WPI kept with it's usual lineups which meant MIT had a huge advantage inside.  You had the feeling they could just take their time and see which match-up they wanted to exploit.  WPI's choice to primarily only play one "big" at time was major problem all night.  They chose to play a lot of 6'2"/6'3" players against MIT's big forwards.  The lobs were there just about anytime MIT wanted them and rebounding mismatches were everywhere.  WPI was leaving men all alone at the 3pt line as they tried to cover up for the fact they could not match-up at the forward positions.  The result was Bender & Burke going a combined 6-9 from outside the arc. Johnson also had some wide open looks, even though he only hit one.  Also, the size mismatch gave WPI fits.  Ben Etten only had 3 FGA, and 2 of those were from 3pt land.  Perez did go 5-7, but only 7 FGAs in 30 minutes showed he struggled to get his usual shots against the greater size of MIT.  It also showed in the rebounding, where Perez had been averaging over 7 boards a game, he only got 4 and Etten was 6.6 a game and was shutout on the glass.

WPI point guards, Nadeau & Shannon, were no match for Kates tonight. While Kates was running his team's offense and distributing the ball, WPI never seemed to really to get a flow going and on many possessions looked to be simply running the old shell drill instead of an offensive set.  (LOL, to this point, read the MIT write-up on the game, they are calling Robinson the point guard because he had 6 assists!)

Bender was the "star" in my book in this game, he completely took Robinson off his game, while having a very good offensive game himself.  Again...MATCHUPS!

As we have discussed in the past, I am firm believer that you need a true center and a power forward combo underneath to be consistently effective inside. (Both offensively AND defensively.)  This is how you open up your 3pt sharp-shooters.  Again, MIT executed this to virtual perfection last night.  I really enjoyed watching them play as a complete team.  When was the last time MIT had the kind of even distribution of FGAs in  a game Vs. WPI.  The game last year at MIT showed exactly why the so-called "one-star" system can get you wins...until the star goes down.  Then the rest of the team has no idea how to make things work.  Coach Anderson deserves a tremendous amount of credit on this.  He moved from the one star system to a complete team in one year.  Not only selling recruits that he would do that, but then making it actually happen while increasing the teams win total and national standing in less than a year.!

On WPI's outlook, I agree with you on Perez, he could be a big time scorer if he develops some right hand skills.  He also must add some kind of mid-range jumper.  I would add their sophomore center, Matt Car, to that group of potentially good young players.  His minutes have been cut back some, but I saw him play earlier this year and he showed the ability to score inside and out.  In the 2nd half, WPI went to him on back-back possessions and he scored over Hollinsworth both times.  He also showed range hitting a 3 earlier in the game.  He defended Noel very well when he was in the game.  I would have enjoyed seeing Galloway & Carr out there at the same time to see what they might have been able to do together.  They need to get both of those players much more involved if they want to compete with MIT & teams with good size.  Galloway's dunk was nice and he runs the floor well.  The kid is ALL arms & legs though, and will need to put on some body mass and develop some good post moves to fulfill his potential.  They also have another 6"6" freshman, Joe Wesoloski, who got in late in the game.  If his game develops, that would them the ability to match up much better with MIT in the future.  I just don't see anyway WPI can defeat MIT without getting at least two real bigs on the court at the same time and make MIT's interior players work harder on defense. (LOL, if you can play 2 PGs at the same time, I would think you could play 2 bigs - In MIT's case...3 BIGS!)

Galloway's dunk was nice.  The kid is ALL arms & legs, and will need to put on some body mass and develop some good post moves to fulfill his potential.  They also have another 6"6" freshman, Joe Wesoloski, who got in late in the game.  If his game develops, that would them the ability to match up much better with MIT in the future.

WPI has its work cut out now. Coast Guard has already beaten Clark on the road and they struggled with Springfield last season, including losing to them in the NEWMAC tourney.  They can't afford to take any games lightly this season as the debacle at Wheaton has already shown.

For now, it would appear that the road to the automatic bid in the conference will go through Cambridge this year!

Again, Congratulations to MIT!

[BBallers]

I agree with everyone's comments.  You take the center away and you leave the guards open and Coach Anderson has given them the green light and related confidence.  Johnson was only 1-5 in 3 pointers, but he needs to keep shooting the open shots because they will drop eventually.  Kates played a lot of minutes dribbling against the press and deserves all the kudos.  Defense is definitely improving and fun to watch.

Now on to Clark.  Big road game.  Hope there is no letdown and they stay aggressive.

[toooldtoplay]

MIT down 8 at the half after being down 14 early. Getting outplayed in every facet of the game.  Kates had 5 points in last minute to cut lead to 8. Noel and Kates with 9 each at the half. Alexander 8, Renshaw 7 and Vayda with 6 leads a balanced Clarke attack.