MBB: NESCAC

[P'bearfan]

Here are some late impressions from Bowdoin's first two games this past weekend:

-Overall the team played well and is WAY ahead of where they were this time last year.  Sticking with my projection that they may surprise people as conference play rolls around

-So. VT was small but very athletic.  They played aggressive, deny-based defense the entire game which took the P'bears out of their offense a bit.  Still Bowdoin had 3 players in double figures and one more with 9 points so while Jack Simonds is poised to be the main scoring engine he will hopefully get help every night.

-UMass-Darmouth is talented and very well coached.  They shot very well from behind the arc especially early in the first half and late in the 2nd (unfortunately Bowdoin went cold from long range at the same time).  Bowdoin's bigs got into foul trouble and it hurt their overall defense. This was particularly disappointing since several of the calls were questionable at best.  But in the end UMD clearly won the game and Bowdoin needs to tighten up it's D - they especially can't allow too many open 3's.  One promising sign was that Bowdoin had 4 players in double figures.  The P'bears were very effective getting looks inside the arc. 

Looking forward to the UNE game tonight!

GoUBears!!

[magicman]

Middlebury defeats New Paltz 94-62.

Early Tuesday afternoon on the SUNYAC board I predicted the Panthers would win this game by a 91-62 final score. I'm gonna have a few words with Perry Delorenzo when he and his Panthers come to Plattsburgh on Valentines day to take on the Cardinals. His basket with just over a minute remaining was the final points the Panthers put up on the scoreboard. He misses that shot and 1 of his 2 free throws right before that and I have a perfect score. Damn man.

Matt St. Amour led the Panthers with 27 points. Zach Baines and Eric McCord each had 12 markers, while Baines had 6 boards and McCord had 8. Adisa Majors had 11 points and Nick Tarantino led the Vermont team with 9 rebounds.

Dylan Balducci led the Hawks with 12 points and Nick Arthur has 10 points. Arthur had 4 rebounds and tied for the team high with 3 other players.

Middlebury improves to 3-0 and will be back in action on Sunday 11-27 as they host Endicott at 2:00 PM

New Paltz 0-4 will return to the hardwood on Tuesday Nov 29th when they travel to Springfield for a 7:00 PM  matchup.

[magicman]

Tufts backers are happy because the Jumbos just got stronger as Vincent Pace returns to action tonight for TUfts. He tops  all scorers at halftime with 11 points as they lead MIT 37-29 at the half.     

[magicman]

Tufts opens up a 15 point lead over MIT 59-44, with 8:22 left to play. The Jumbos' Vincent Pace is the leading scorer with 15 points .

[nescac1]

Pace back already and clearly playing well?  That bodes well for the Jumbos.

Easy win for the Ephs over an overmatched MCLA team that gave up about five inches per man. 

For Williams, a few guys stood out.  FY center Matt Karpowicz had a massive size advantage, but looked really good out there, putting up 10-9-2 plus 2 blocks in only 13 minutes of play.  He looks like someone who will make substantial contributions as he gets comfortable as he is a massive guy with some nice interior skills.  James Heskett had 15 points, including three triples, in only 13 minutes.  He has skills that few guys his size do in D3, and the Ephs need to find ways to get him involved in the offense against more strenuous competition.  Kyle Scadlock led the Ephs with a double-double, 17-10.  Those three guys, plus Kempton and Soto, are going to form a REALLY imposing front court as upperclassmen.  For now, all are still learning and will make mistakes along with flashes of huge potential.

Bobby Casey also had an excellent overall game after struggling a bit in the opening weekend of play.

The easy part of the Ephs' schedule is over and things start to get tougher starting with this weekend.  Williams looks mostly good on defense, and is doing a MUCH better job than last season of working the ball inside, but will need to do a better job converting from distance and from the foul line than they've shown the first three games if they want to keep winning against better competition. 

[jumpshot]

Key to Ephs improvement tonight was "playing freely", fewer turnovers, and good teamwork within the offensive scheme. Defense still needs to get better, especially individual footwork, consistent hard work, and team format. Rebounding and size a plus this year, along with some depth. Greenman an experienced, stabilizing asset. Swagger and confidence will be essential against better upcoming opponents.

[Old Guy]

Middlebury defeats New Paltz 94-62.

Early Tuesday afternoon on the SUNYAC board I predicted the Panthers would win this game by a 91-62 final score. I'm gonna have a few words with Perry Delorenzo when he and his Panthers come to Plattsburgh on Valentines day to take on the Cardinals. His basket with just over a minute remaining was the final points the Panthers put up on the scoreboard. He misses that shot and 1 of his 2 free throws right before that and I have a perfect score. Damn man.

Matt St. Amour led the Panthers with 27 points. Zach Baines and Eric McCord each had 12 markers, while Baines had 6 boards and McCord had 8. Adisa Majors had 11 points and Nick Tarantino led the Vermont team with 9 rebounds.

Dylan Balducci led the Hawks with 12 points and Nick Arthur has 10 points. Arthur had 4 rebounds and tied for the team high with 3 other players.

Middlebury improves to 3-0 and will be back in action on Sunday 11-27 as they host Endicott at 2:00 PM

New Paltz 0-4 will return to the hardwood on Tuesday Nov 29th when they travel to Springfield for a 7:00 PM  matchup.

Nice summary, Magic-man, thanks. Midd romps at home looking awfully good (albeit against not a great team). They look like they're picking up just where they left off, and why not - just about everyone's back. St. Amour was 6-10  from three, some  from the parking lot. Also went hard to the hoop. Fun to watch.

Jake Brown doesn't get his due. I asked on this Board if there was a better point guard in NESCAC - and the response was PG is not a strong position in the league right now. Brown is the motor. He works so hard on the defensive end - picks up the opposition point guard at 3/4 court and just makes him work and work, terrific defender. What a backcourt + Daly, the glue.  Nine assists tonight for Brown. Midd may have difficulty with big frontcourts. Midd-Wms could be a great game of contrasting strengths.

Nick Tarantino had nine boards in 13 minutes - way over the rim. He's had tough luck with illness and injury his first two years - and now he is competing for minutes with frosh Folger, but he's really maximizing his time on the floor.

Endicott next, then RPI, Johnson, SoVT, and then Skidmore on Dec 10. Let it snow - it' hoop season!

[nescac1]

Impressive 10-0 night for NESCAC ... albeit against weak competition, save for the Tufts and Conn College games.  NESCAC stands at an amazing 28-5 in out-of-conference play so far.  Very, very strong start for the league, especially considering NESCAC teams sometimes struggle early due to the late practice start.  By comparison, at the same point of the season last year, against many of the same opponents, NESCAC teams had already picked up 12 losses!  It's very early, but the Maine trio of Bates, Colby and Bowdoin all look a bit stronger than anticipated.  Hamilton, Conn, Williams and Midd all appear improved from where they were at this point last year, as well, and Amherst and Tufts are so far playing to their pre-season billings.  Trinity is the only team that has been a letdown so far, but the Bantams did replace four senior multiple-year starters, so no surprise that there is at least an adjustment period. 

The competition gets much tougher over the next week however, as NESCAC teams start to play vs.  lot of the top teams in the region (Babson x2, Endicott, WPI, Eastern Conn, Keene State) plus a tough out-of-region opponent (Oswego state).   

[JustAFan]

It was great to see Vinny Pace back on the court for Tufts last night against what appeared to be one of the weaker MIT teams in several years. He was a steadying force on offense, made some great passes and was able to put the ball on the floor surprisingly well given his knee, but he struggled to hit his outside shot in the second half, which I attribute to conditioning and not yet being able to elevate the way he needs to on his jumper.

I'm not yet convinced that Tufts is a top 20 team. The Jumbos really struggled on defense last night, especially on the perimeter, they need to develop a second strong big man to help out Palleschi and they not yet getting the leadership they need at the point guard position from Tarik Smith, who is a score first player who too often last night tried to do too much on his own rather than run the offense and trust the offense to get a good shot.  But Tufts is doing a great job of pushing tempo and so far has not had a problem scoring a lot of points on the road. We will know a good deal more about the Jumbos over the next 2 weeks as they fact WPI, Brandeis and potentially Babson. Like many teams this early in the season, the parts may be there but there is a lot of work to be done to knit them into the team the polls suggest.

[nescac1]

Really impressive win for the Ephs, coming back from down 5 at the half to end up winning by 11.  If Williams plays as well as they did in the second half going forward, they will win a lot of games. 

For the Ephs, Aronowitz played, once again, like an all-American.  Really could not be stopped whenever he got the ball going towards the rim, and totally shut down the Eastern Conn star on the other end in the second half after he torched the Ephs early in the game.  Finished with 28-4-3, plus 3 steals, and only 1 to, 12-18 from the field.  Very, very impressive.

The story for the Ephs besides Aronowitz was the starting backcourt, as Teal and Casey each had by far their best games of the young season.  In fact, I think that was the best I've seen Teal play when he wasn't serving as mainly a standstill shooter and torching opponents from very deep -- he showed the whole package tonight, driving, dishing, mid-range jumpers, tough finishes.  He finished with 19-3-2 on a very efficient 8-12.  Casey also played fantastic ball on both ends, hitting his 3's but just as importantly completing some beautiful passes for easy finishes by teammates.  He finished with 18-4-5, including 4-7 from 3, and only 1 turnover, and he was really in complete control of the game from the PG position. 

The rest of the Ephs were quiet but credit to Kyle Scadlock for keeping human jumping jack Hugh Lindo off the glass ... Lindo finished with 7 points and 8 boards, both well below his averages, and critically only two offensive rebounds.  He also picked up four fouls and four turnovers trying to deal with Scadlock.  Scadlock tossed in 11 points for good measure, although he did have a few turnovers going towards the basket that he'll eventually clean up. 

The only area where the Ephs really fell short in was free throw shooting -- they made only 4-10, including I think missing three front-end of one-and-ones.  But the offense was otherwise incredibly efficient and patient, with tremendous ball movement. Rarely any bad, late-in-the-shotclock attempts.  On defense, the Ephs struggled in transition against Eastern Conn's speed in the first half, but in the second did a much better job getting back on D.  Eastern Conn scored a lot before the defense was fully set, but was able to do very, very little vs. the Ephs' half-court defense, other than Brown's scorching hot start to the game. 

[Bucket]

I'm guessing that Eastern Conn is sick of playing NESCAC teams—now 0-3 with Amherst left to play.

[7express]

I'm guessing that Eastern Conn is sick of playing NESCAC teams—now 0-3 with Amherst left to play.

I think ALL LEC teams are getting tired of playing NESCAC teams, LOL.

[amh63]

Jumped around watching CAC teams.  Correction, looked at the stats for the ECSU vs Williams game since it costed money to watch.  The Warriors need some additional scorers outside and help with the interior defense inside, IMO.
Watched Tufts play Emerson in Medford.  Nice starting five.  They are not deep and the front court is a bit thin.  Freshman Racy seems to be getting playing time and is listed as a center at 6'7", 215 pounds.  Runs the floor well.  The jumbos seems to want to run the floor on offense and play man to man on defense.  Pace will rebound and seems to want to be more of a point forward than a scorer for his team.  Conn and Wes are hard to evaluate for me at this early date.
Will try to get a look at Bowdoin and any other CAC team playing today.  The Bowdoin vs Babson game will be a key one.

[middhoops]

"Will try to get a look at Bowdoin and any other CAC team playing today.  The Bowdoin vs Babson game will be a key one."

Bowdoin is up against a national championship quality team today.  On the road.
A Polar Bear win would be epic. 
We need magicman or the LEC crew to put a point spread on this one.

Hamilton hosts Oswego, Colby is at Clarkson and Middlebury hopes to beat a visiting Endicott team that won their game last year. 

Three Midd guards fouled out against Endicott last year.  All Region guard Kamahl Walker will face a stouter Middlebury defense this season.  One hopes.

[P'bearfan]

Prior to the holiday break Bowdoin took an early lead against UNE and answered the question of what would happen if Jack Simonds had a slow start.  Simonds only scored 4 points in the first half and other P'bears stepped up - especially Liam Farley who hit 3 trey's and finished the first half with 11 points.  In the 2nd half, Simonds regained form and finished with 19 points.  Hugh O'Neill had a monster game on the glass grabbing 16 rebounds.  The game also saw a number of different rotations as Jack Bors returned to action which is a good sign for Bowdoin.

Bowdoin faces a much tougher test today at Babson.  To win, Bowdoin will need to tighten up it's defense - e.g. they let UNE get back in the game in the 2nd half - and hit on all cylinders offensively - and a little luck wouldn't hurt.

GoUBears!!