MBB: NESCAC

[nescac1]

Frank, if you're not interested, there is a simple solution: skip to the next post . 

Nice post, Panthernation.  Midd deserves to be the highest ranked team from NESCAC, for sure, but that is saying less than in most years with NESCAC playing at a collectively below-par level.  I'm not sure how to really judge them in terms of how they stack up nationally.  As you note, it's hard to tell much from the Panthers' very weak early season schedule -- by my count, their opponents are a combined 27-43 (by comparison, Williams' opponents are 50-45).  The Plattsburgh win looks pretty solid right now, but otherwise, not much basis to judge how good the Panthers really are.  I think when both Williams and Midd play the first NESCAC weekend (Tufts/Bates, solid competition, especially Tufts), there will be more basis to judge. 

Three more notes about Williams: (1) after a VERY cold first few games, Taylor Epley is now the Ephs' leading scorer.  He's averaged over 21 ppg on lights-out shooting over the last six games, and has been especially good in the games he was most needed ... vs. Curry, Springfield, and Luther.  Williams loses the Curry and Luther games without big games from Epley.  His first year I (among other observers) compared his game to Blake Schultz, and he is now starting to reach that potential, as he can really do it all, shoot from deep, drive, and his post game is getting more and more effective.  It seems like when the team most needs a bucket, he is the guy they look to first right now.  He also plays solid D and rebounds a bit.  Right now, he's the Ephs' MVP, even over Mayer and Robertson, who continue to be the other two key cogs / creators on offense. (2) Williams rebounded poorly vs. Luther, gathering only 4 offensive rebounds, while Luther had 13.  The Ephs will have to improve their collective rebounding effort in future closely-contested games ... that allowed Luther to hang around when the Ephs should have put them away late in the second half.  (3) The other big concern for Williams right now continues to be depth.  In the second half they really played only seven guys, with Epley and Nate barely sitting at all, and they are only getting consistent offensive production from six players.  Williams' starting five is really stellar, but they are asking a lot of six to seven guys to carry the load every night, and right now, no reason to think that is going to change any time soon, although there are guys on the roster with the ability to step up.  Williams certainly can't compete with Midd's bench strength right now, however. 

[frank uible]

And forego an opportunity to zing at a soft underbelly? Never!

[jayhawk]

solid rebounding and scoring "big" man to Tufts for next year: Hunter Sabety, on NERR referred to as Hunter Saberty
nice pickup

Long Island Basketball.com
www.longislandbasketball.com/Oceanside's Hunter Sabety was MVP and led Long Island with 21 points. ...... the off-season, but chose academics over hoops and will attend D3 Tufts next fall.

[amh63]

Hope all are having a enjoyable holiday season!
Did not catch any of the Williams game as it is too late for me...so thanks for the wrap up nescac1.
Always good to see how the Midwest teams play...teams that have players exposed to the style via a JV program.
Amherst joins Midd. today in its first game after the break...so to speak.  Will be interesting to see who gets to play in the game.....returning injured players, etc.  Unfortunately, the game is not shown.
So far, Bates,Trinity,, and Conn. have not upheld the conference in their loses yesterday.  Still puzzled by the Trinity team...saw them play a bit against McDaniel, a MD team, and they looked bad, IMO.   Expect more from their coaching staff.
Anyway, good luck to all the CAC teams today.

[Old Guy]

Curious about Frank Uible, quipmeister, I googled him. Turns out he was an Ohio politician who died in 1974. Freaky.

[Old Guy]

It's taken me a few hours to post about the Midd-RPI game, a 105-86 Panther win. I had to go home in take a nap - watching RPI's application of "the System" is exhausting as a spectator too. Relentless pressure: 15 Engineers with significant minutes - none more than 19. Middlebury had the depth and talent to withstand the pressure.

RPI, down by 11 at the half, had us just where they wanted us. With our experience and poise in the backcourt, however, we are not prone to getting caught up in the helter-skelter tempo, though it happened on occasion. You just can't relax.

This was a good win - RPI (5-4) will be heard from (as will Skidmore especially - watch: 6-3 now). I think in the end we will not have to apologize for this early schedule. On the other hand, we miss Sharry, especially on the glass.

Ryan was at the game today, home from Luxembourg. He's having a good time, playing well, doesn't know what the future holds. He spent part of the Christmas holiday in Paris with his girlfriend (the sister of a teammate - god bless the team). Not a bad life.

Of note: James Jensen played a great game last year in the NCAA tourney buzzer-beater loss to Scranton, except for his lamentable 2-10 from the line. He took the loss hard. Today he went 8-8 from the line. Wonder how he spent his summer. He had 18 this afternoon in 22 minutes.

Lynch had 21 (9-12 from the floor, 9 boards), Thompson had 21 too (3-6 from three). Merryman had 14, but was blanked from the arc (0-3). Wolfin had 8 assists in 18 minutes (foul trouble), Kizell had 6 assists and played a strong floor game (no surprise there) with Wolfin's time compromised.

Midd goes to Bates and Tufts this weekend. I'm glad Bates will be on break. Playing in that small gym is easier without les fanatiques. Still, I worry. We're playing in Lewiston for the first time in three years, because of changes in scheduling principles. I spoke to the Bobcat coach this fall, and they are glad indeed not to have to come to Vermont on Friday and Williamstown on Saturday to open NESCAC play. They will not be taken lightly. A win at Tufts would be a very good one. They're tough.

Midd is 39-0 in games against teams not named Williams and Amherst in the past four years. That level of success will be hard indeed to maintain. I'll catch the Bates game in person. I grew up in that wonderful gym. Fingers crossed. Happy New Year all!

[frank uible]

What is it that Mark Twain said about reports of his demise?

[magicman]

I'll do nescac1's job since he must have retired early.

Williams improves to 10-1 as they win Cal Lutheran's tournament by defeating the hosts 71-53 late Sunday night. The Ephs' Taylor Epley was named Tournament MVP as he outdid the 26 he had on Saturday by scoring 34 against Cal-Lu. Epley was 10x14 from the field, 6x8 from downtown and a perfect 8x8 from the line. He had 18 in the first half (6x8 fg, 3x4 3's, 3x3 ft) and 16 in the 2nd period (4x6 fg, 3x4 3's, 5x5 ft). Sean Hoffman with 10 points (2x3 fg, 6x6 ft) was the only other Williams player in double figures. Michael Mayer had 8 points and 3 rebounds, Daniel Wohl had 7 points and 4 rebounds and Nate Robertson filled up the stat sheet with 3 points, 6 assists, 6 rebounds, and 2 steals. James Klemm only had 2 pts, 2 assists, a rebound and a steal but his game from Saturday, along with steady play on Sunday, was good enough to get him named as the 2nd Williams player to the All Tournament team.

Williams opened the game scoring early and often as they jumped out to a 19-5 advantage 6 minutes into the game. Epley had 13 of those 19 points. The Kingsmen managed to cut into that 14 point lead but could never get closer than nine for the rest of the period and the Ephs went into the break with a 32-23 lead.

Cal-Lutheran came out of the break and tried to make a game of it as they opened the half with a 3 pointer to cut the lead to 6. Epley and the Ephs quickly built it back to 11 points at 39-28 but the Kingsmen went on a 10-2 run to get it down to a 3 point 41-38 deficit. It would be as close as they would get. Still up 3 at 43-40 the Ephs would open things up once more with an 11-2 spurt with 9 minutes left to play. They increased the lead to 14 at 61-47 with 6 minutes left and then back to back 3's by Epley made it 67-47 and the game was over. The Kingsmen didn't even attempt the foul parade for the last 4 minutes of the game. Good thing as they probably would only have made the final margin larger.

The Ephs shot 23x50 from the field (46%), 8x21 from beyond the arc (38.1%) and an almost perfect 17x18 from the line (94.4%). Rebounding and turnovers were fairly even, with the Ephs losing the glass battle 35-34 and committing 10 TO's to 12 for the Kingsmen.

Cal-Lutheran had 3 players in double figures with 12, 12, and 11. The Ephs outshot them in all 3 areas as they were only 21x59 from the field (35.6%), 7x25 from 3 point distance (28%) and 4x10 from the stripe (40%).

Luther, the team that Williams beat in OT the day before, won the consolation game as they kept Northland winless by pounding the Jacks, 93-42.

Good effort by Williams to make the long trip out West and come home with 2 wins. Not always an easy thing to do as many times highly ranked teams from the right side of the Mississippi River go west and run into problems against lesser regarded teams in the SCIAC or NWC.       

[madzillagd]

Good win for the Ephs tonight mainly because they were so tired yet still pulled together in the second half to get the win.  The energy level of the bench to come in and play good defense and turn a 6 point lead into a 12-14 lead was huge.  The starters fed off that energy and finished the job to make it a great weekend. 

It truly was a special week for the team and the basketball family as a whole and it deserves mentioning.  At Saturday's game there were close to 100 Eph supporters I'd estimate with 10-15 students from the LA area in attendance. There was a few less tonight, but I'd still estimate the crowd was 75 Ephs fans compared to 50 CLU fans on their home floor in a championship game.  Impressive and it set a great tone of support for the team. 

Going to be a tough transition this week to deal with the jet lag and open NESCAC play on the road with a couple tough games so we'll see how the team pulls together to get the job done. 

[pick and roll]

It's taken me a few hours to post about the Midd-RPI game, a 105-86 Panther win. I had to go home in take a nap - watching RPI's application of "the System" is exhausting as a spectator too. Relentless pressure: 15 Engineers with significant minutes - none more than 19. Middlebury had the depth and talent to withstand the pressure.

Maybe that high octane stuff works if you have the right players and can throw a suffocating press at the other team, but I did not think RPI's press was very good at all - they get some turnovers, however they give up so many easy baskets.  Not sure how you beat the number one team in D III when you are playing the bottom of your bench against their top players for 1/3 of the game. 

[amh63]

Well, Amherst wins big against Medgar Evers in NYC yesterday.  Stats and recap are posted on the Amherst website.  Some observations after looking at the stats and reading the recap.  Amherst played 11 players and 6 players had double figure points.  Only one player was in the game for more than 25 minutes and that was Willy Workman and he did NOT score in double figures.  Willy did set a career high in assist with 10.  Willy seems to be happy not leading the scoring and will rebound, play defense and distribute, etc. to win games.  Aaron Toomey had 7 assist and also seems happy not having to carry the offense....or at least be the the top scorer.  Seems, imho, that opponents have been double teaming Aaron in the early games and it seems that Willy will take up some of the distributing load.  It appears to me that Amherst is getting to the point of having a solid 8 man rotation and working towards being able to go to 10 players....in spite of not having L. Buckner back.  Connor Green led the scoring again and he as well as FY B. Pollack have worked themselves into the rotation.  Tom Killian returned to the starting lineup and Gach is getting more minutes.  Gach is a deep threat and his defensive play improvement is getting him more time on the floor, imo. Kalema is a solid scorer and works well with Toomey on the floor and also can relieve Aaron when needed.  FY Sanderson, the tall slight 6'9"...and growing...center is getting time on the floor.  Coach Hixon likes his quickness.  Sanderson is not shy about taking a 3-point shot when he gets into the game.
Watched a little of the RPI vs. Midd. game and got "sleepy"!  Just kidding....RPI's rotation of three teams during a game has its limits...in seems to me.  The teams are not even in talent and players size.  One RPI team would enter and plays well against Midd.....but the next team of 5 enters and does not play well.  Does the RPI coach spread his most talented players among the three teams?  Still, RPI's talent level is not up with the Panthers.
Seems that next weekend, Williams, Midd. and Amherst will all be on the road. 
Pick and Roll....do not understand your last post.
Old Guy.....your classic education...like Frank U.'s...is raising the level of this Board.  French, Latin...what will be next?   

[frank uible]

Igpay Atinlay.

[pick and roll]

AMH63 - my point is that RPI does not have the talent to effectively run "the system" particularly against a team like Middlebury.

[amh63]

Pick and Roll.....Got it!...thanks.  Was confused in the "format" of your reply in that it was included in the Old Guy ref.  Point well taken.
God bless technology!...the video casts of the games have improved greatly.  The Middlebury game under the NSN system had HD clarity and replay!  The Trinity system is quite good as is the new Cardinals system with replay.  Here's hoping that Amherst will upgrade its system as rumored this semester.  Tried watching some games on my wife's new IPad and have had to adjust to its software, etc.  Hard to teach an old dog new tricks...I guess.
Frank U......your post in pig Latin brought a smile.  Would add Manderin but have only limited vocab and lack the keyboard.  Would only confuse my posts even further.
Seems that conference teams have recovered a bit in terms of wins against non conference teams.  Amherst face Wes. on Friday in the dinner time game.  Last year, Amherst lost on the Cardinal court......this year the away game counts in the standings!

[grabtherim]

AMH63 - my point is that RPI does not have the talent to effectively run "the system" particularly against a team like Middlebury.

I watched the Midd/RPI game.  The "System" at least in the hands of RPI is a joke.  Test tube basketball.  Once you can get past the initial double team on the inbounds pass, which Midd was able to do 90% of the time, baskets become absurdly easy to come by.  What decent recruit is going to commit to RPI knowing they are changing lines hockey game like with no thought to flow or having no go to guys?  Word around the campfire is the RPI players are not happy with it, but obviously have no say in the matter.