MBB: NEWMAC

[Hugenerd]

WPI moves to 21-0, with an easy win over CGA today. Hope to see them pick up some #1 votes this week and possibly even move into the #1 overall spot. After what should be a cupcake at home against Wheaton, WPI plays the #2-#4 NEWMAC teams on the road to close out the season. If WPI were to fall at Springfield and MIT, and MIT wins out, I believe they would be tied in all tiebreaker criteria and hosting would go to a coin flip.

MIT was able take care of business at home over Springfield to take a strong hold of the #2 spot in the conference. Leading the way was Will Tashman with an all-around solid game. Hopefully they can keep things rolling and finish out the season with a string of wins. They only have one road game remaining, at Babson, followed by home contests against Clark and WPI (with a non-conference tilt against Wheelock sandwiched in). I'm hoping someone trips up WPI coming into that game so that MIT has a chance to get hosting rights for the conference tourney by winning that game.  As for the rest of the team, I haven't heard anything on the injury front as of late (Hollingsworth, Karraker, or Levene), but the new rotation seems to be working with Burke starting and Pedley coming off the bench. Should be an exciting end to the regular season.

Congrats to WPI for moving up to #2 in the country and to MIT for getting back into the rankings at #23.  Big match for MIT and WPI a week from Wednesday, but first MIT has to get by a pesky Babson team on the road tomorrow.  MIT only won by 5 earlier at home and Babson beat Amherst earlier this year.  Here's hoping multiple NEWMAC teams make the tournament.

Babson recently beat Springfield on the road also...they can be a dangerous team when they are playing well.

[Pat Coleman]

Charles - the more the merrier.  Discussion has very little to do with Springfield or MIT.  Would love to get 2+ NEWMAC teams in the tourney.  Not assuming a NEWMAC championship in the slightest.  But it would sure take a historic type collapse at this point to keep WPI out of the big tournament.  Say they went 2-3 in their last 5 games and then lost the first round of NEWMAC.  Would 22-4 not still get them a bid?

I would think that going 2-3 over the last 5 and losing in the fist round would keep WPI out. I think that with their SOS that 2 or 3 late losses wouldn't be very helpful. However, I always felt that it was good to lose before the tournament. Going undefeated is just too much pressure.

I don't think a 22-4 team stays at home. No chance.

[mass_d3fan]

What a ride!!!  21-0!!!!!

Congratulations to WPI for being ranked #2 in the nation and also garnering 8 votes for #1.

No one saw this kind of season coming and I for one am most happy to be wrong!

I have been away for a time, the last game I was able to get to was MIT game.  It was a great game.  I will offer this up for those MIT fans still holding out for a Hollingsworth return - I do not see it happening and even if it does I can't believe he will very effective at all. That game was Jan. 19th and he was still on crutches and wearing a boot.  I did at time during the game see him get up off the bench without the crutches, but he moving very, very cautiously.  Very hard to think he could get back on the court for any really significant minutes and do the things he needs to do to be more effective than anyone who is now part of that playing rotation.

WPI is playing great defense this year on the perimeter led by freshmen PG Aaron Davis.  They lead the nation in defensive 3pt FG pct (26.6%),  33rd in overall FG pct (39.1%),  20th in scoring defense (59.3 ppg).  Offensively they rank 30th in the country in 3-pt FG pct (39.0%), They are tied for 12th in the country in turnover margin(+5.5 per game).   Davis is a true PG and a in your shorts defender all over the court.  He does not big scorer, he is a big time scorer.  His baskets always seem to come at critical moments in the game.  Joe Wesoloski & Ryan Kolb along with Chad LaBove have done a great job defensively on the interior.  Kolb has had a great season on both ends of the court.  Coppola and Longwell have complimented each other all season. Zach Karalis has given the Engineers another outside threat along with Matt Harrington. I dont think they have a game yet this season where all these young guns have misfired. As I stated earlier, taken as a complete group, they form the best guard group in the northeast.

I think this was the mistake MIT made in the first meeting.  Tashman & Redfield had 17 FGAs versus the team hoisting up 18 3s.  Many of those threes were not good shot selections and Tashman/Redfield seemed to spending most of the shot clock at or above the free throw line setting screens. I honestly thought MIT would pound the ball inside heavily.  Give the WPI interior players credit for making it difficult, but I would think the next meeting may focus more on it.  I am not sure that MIT can win a 3-pt shooting contest against WPI. The Worcester Engineers have 3 of the top 5 3-pt shooters in the conference.   

An area of concern is still rebounding as they are 234th in rebounding margin with a -.6.  So far they have been able to overcome this issue, but it will get magnified as post season play starts.

As far as NCAA tournament hopes go, as long as they do not fall to far in the regional rankings, remember last year! That being said, I do not think they will pick up 4 losses before the tournament selections are made and I would imagine they will host some opening round games as they did in 08-09 and 10-11.

[rlk]

It's amazing just how high the overall talent level is these days.

When I was team manager for MIT in the mid 1980's, our best season was 7-16.  We had one or two guys over 6'5", and one of our starting forwards was 6'0" on a good day.  We lost more games than I'd like to remember by 30-40 points.

Completely different story now.  I'd estimate that today's MIT team is 30-40 points better than back then.  We gave Harvard a real game for 40 minutes (other than their big run midway through the first half), and we're not even tops in our conference.  Harvard has defeated a number of D1 teams by more than the 15 points they beat us by.  They had their starters and top reserves in until the last couple of minutes against us, and they really couldn't handle Mitch Kates.

The rest of the season will be very interesting, with a lot of very big games coming up.

[WPI89]

Yes RLK.  I remember the mid 80's well.  We were basically an ECAC team but the trips to MIT were always fun (and I think wins both times I went).

Wonder if there has ever been a conference with the pre-season number 1 team and maybe the end of the regular season #1 team - and have them be different teams (maybe UAA or whatever conference all the UW-Whatevers play in)?.  LOTS to do before that could happen but fun times for the NEWMAC for sure!

[GoTech73]

Pretty nice win for MIT today at Babson. MIT led wire to wire, jumping out to an 8-0 lead and never looking back. Early in the 2nd half the lead stretched to 26. Babson got within 11 at one point, but no closer down the stretch. Hot 3 point shooting really helped, with the Engineers ultimately hitting 44% from deep. Also, one of Babson's bigs, Wickey, got two very quick fouls early on, and that allowed MIT's frontcourt to do some damage.

Glad to see Tech gaining speed as opposed to slowing down during the home stretch.

[amh63]

WPI89....Congrats to WPI for their top regional rankings!  Will help to get a post season nod.  Watch out, Amherst is barking at your heels for a spot....as well as the rest of the "CAC".  Critical games this weekend will be impacted by the storm coming.....will miss them since I have become a snow bird for awhile

[WPI89]

Yes Amh63 - I believe you could throw WPI and the big 3 from the NESCAC in a basket right now.  MIT is rounding into shape and not far off the big 4 if you ask me either.

I see Amherst has a nice easy weekend as well coming up!  Amazing stuff up here in the Northeast - hope we can get a few to make deep runs!

WPI has to run the gauntlet in the next 6 days (weather permitting) - playing the top 3 in the NEWMAC all on the road - then turn around and have to beat 2 of them (if not Clark) again next week.  Will be a very tough run heading up tot he big dance.

[Hugenerd]

WPI89....Congrats to WPI for their top regional rankings!  Will help to get a post season nod.  Watch out, Amherst is barking at your heels for a spot....as well as the rest of the "CAC".  Critical games this weekend will be impacted by the storm coming.....will miss them since I have become a snow bird for awhile

Since you brought up Amherst on the NEWMAC board, I have to note that Amherst is 0-2 against NEWMAC teams this year (and they have not even played the top two teams in the conference).  The've done a lot better against the rest of D3 (20-0), but they still are winless against the NEWMAC!

[WPI89]

WPI/Springfield moved to Sunday already.  Time TBD

[Hugenerd]

According to the MIT basketball site, both the Saturday game against Clark and the Monday game against Wheelock have been postponed/rescheduled.

http://mitathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/2012-13/schedule

MIT has announced that the Wheelock game will be played the following Sunday, Feb. 17.  There is no date announced for the Clark game, but it may be difficult to get that game in with the remaining games on both teams schedules and the way the schedule for the conference tourney is. 

Remaining game dates for both teams:

MIT 2/13, 2/17
Clark 2/13, 2/16
2/20 #4/#5 play in game

Based on that, the only way it looks like this game can get in is if one of the teams is ok with playing on back-to-back days.  That is, unless, MIT and Wheelock are willing to cancel their game (Wheelock also has games on 2/14, 2/16, and 2/19) and then MIT could play Clark on 2/18, with 2/17 and 2/19 open as rest days for both teams.

Based on this independent announcement, it also appears possible that the game may be cancelled:

http://mitathletics.com/genrel/2012-13/Snow_Feb8

If I were MIT, I would cancel the Wheelock game and try to get the Clark game in.  Wheelock already has 3 games in a 5 day span during that time, and this only adds a 4th, so it doesnt seem like it would be very beneficial for their team to play the game.  Further, the Clark game will be important in finalizing conference seeding, and gives them an opportunity to get another win against a good team.  In addition, playing a one win team at home is only going to hurt your post season chances at this point, as it is going to drop your weighted OWP a lot.  This game alone could drop their OWP 0.025 points, in other words from a ~0.555 to a ~0.530.  Based on all that, if I had to choose one game, I would try to get the Clark game in.  Obviously you've made a commitment, so if you could play both, you do.  But the way the schedule looks its seems tough to get both of them in.

[Hugenerd]

WPI falls at Springfield, which makes the last week of the season a bit more interesting. If MIT can also best them on Wednesday, after getting past Clark on Monday, the two teams would be tied atop the conference (if WPI also wins at Clark next Saturday).  I believe all tiebreakers would also be equal for the two teams, if that scenario played out (having split the head-to-head and both losing at Springfield).

In other related news, Brandeis lost to Case Western today. That counts as an in-region game for Brandeis because it is a conference game, so they now have 6 region losses, with games against WashU and at NYU still to come. I think it is possible for MIT to pass them this week in the regional rankings.

[Hugenerd]

MIT cruised past Clark tonight at home, 69-44.  In a game where Mitch Kates only played 15 minutes due to foul trouble, and never was able to get in a rhythm, Will Tashman was unstoppable.  He arguably had the best night of his career as he went for 26 points (10-14 from the floor, 6-6 from the stripe) and had 20 huge rebounds.  He nearly outrebounded the entire Clark team by himself (Clark had 24 as a team). In doing so, Tashman set the career rebounds mark for MIT, as he now has 974 boards for his career. Tashman is just 26 boards shy of becoming the first MIT 1000 point/1000 rebound player, and will have at least 3 games to get that mark (and hopefully several more than that).

Clark also could not matchup with MITs other starting big, Matt Redfield, who had 13 points (6-8 shooting) and 11 boards.

MIT has now put themselves in great position by setting up essentially a regular-season championship game with WPI on Wednesday.  A win and they are guaranteed a share of the regular-season conference crown (WPI still plays at Clark next Saturday). 

[mass_d3fan]

Well, there is a balance to the universe I guess.  WPI's last loss came just a little over a year ago to Springfield in the NEWMAC Semis.  The record 22 game streak came to a close on Sunday with the exact same score as that game last season, 66-60.  It was also the Pride that ended the '10-'11 squad's 14 game win streak in Springfield.

I took a break from my snow removal tasks to watch the game online.  WPI played their usual good defensive game and created 24 turnovers, but other than Coppola & Mastascusa the offense pretty much vaporized.  They shot 35% from the field,  30% from beyond the arc including 1 for 11 in the 2nd half.  Take Coppola/Mastascusa out of the mix and the rest of the team shot 8 for 38 (21%) and 0 for 10 from 3-pt land. I have been touting them as the best overall guard group, but this was not the case on Sunday.  It was obvious they needed some interior scoring and it wasn't there.  Even though they tied up the Pride in the points in the paint category, virtually all of those points came on drives to the hoop or fast break opportunities, not from a low post game. They also got out-rebounded 39 to 30.  With all that, they still had plenty of chances to pull this one out.

Huge game tomorrow night in Cambridge as they must go into the Cage at MIT and win to clinch the regular season title and host the conference tournament.  Should be a tremendous game.  IF MIT really presses it's obvious interior advantage and does not settle for trying to play shoot out from the 3-pt line, I think they win and make WPI to beat Clark on Saturday to force what HN believes will be a coin toss to decide the #1 seeding.  If  Tashman has a game like he did last night(26 points/20 rebounds), MIT is going to be very hard to beat.

If however WPI's defense plays like it did in the first meeting this season, they have a good shot at sweeping MIT.  Sam Longwell will have to recover from his worst collegiate performance and Zach Karalis also needs to shake off a bad game.  Ryan Kolb will need to play at a very high level to match Tashman.

Enjoy the battle!

[WPI89]

What a world (conference) we now live in that WPI, after winning 22 in a row needs to win tonight in a very hostile gym in Cambridge just to win the regular season NEWMAC!

What a long way we have come.

Plus lets think about how great the next couple of weeks in NE D3 hoops should be.  The 3 NESCAC's going nuts, Springfield, MIT, and WPI vying for I hope at least 2 bids and throw in RIC, Magnus and the rest - holy cow.