MBB: NESCAC

[Conts Fan]

I'm not shocked Hamilton won this weekend - I could've seen almost any team in the tournament winning - but I am pretty surprised that they kind of rolled to the championship after the Bates game. The NESCAC was so evenly spread this season. Hopefully at least one or two teams can make a nice run in the NCAAs.

[Hamilton4]

Coach Stockwell definitely out coached the other coaches these last two weekends with huge in game adjustments (losing at halftime to both Conn and Colby) to secure the chip!! Hamilton is very fortunate to have Coach Stockwell leading their program!!

[SpringSt7]

My dark horse? The Hamilton Continentals. They went 4-6 in league last year and 12-13 overall but return 8 of their top 10 scorers led by Eric Anderson who I think has been my breakout candidate for about 4 years. Additionally, 6 of their 10 league games are at home and that is always a brutal place to road trip to for a Saturday game. I don't know quite what their ceiling is but I expect them to be much improved this season.

Me neither.

[SpringSt7]

I believe this drops either today or tomorrow, but one last go at all-league:

POY: Sobel
COY: Stockwell
ROY: Poulton
DPOY: Sobel

1st: Sobel, Johnson, Karren, Spivy, Thoerner
2nd: King, Rood, Singh, Murray, Callahan-Gold

All Rookie: Poulton, Vetter, Flaks, A. Lee, Hansen

All Defense: Sobel, Spivy, Johnson, Scherrer, Tyson

Last few are total guesses. Just wanted to get something out there.

[names jaismith]

I said it way earlier:  Stockwell did the best coaching job all year long in a league that has many fine coaches.  Tourney proved it, as aside from a real close one with Conn that could have gone either way, his group was dominant in two wins vs very good teams. Those all league picks look about right to me!

[nescac1]

Brackets are out!  Williams certainly got as brutal a draw as you could expect for a team that was certainly in the conversation for a home pod. 

They play Pomona-Pitzer at St. Joe's.  Pomona is a very expeirenced team which returns all but one player from the squad that lost a close game in the second round of last year's tourney to eventual national runner-up Elmhurst.  They've been in and out of the tail end of the top 25.  Pomona matches Williams man-for-man in terms of height, two of the longest teams in the country, certainly.  I assume they aren't an incredibly quick bunch because if they were, with that size, they'd be in D1!  Brendan Mora is their star but beyond that, I don't know a ton about them or their style of play. 

St. Joe's, everyone knows St. Joe's.  Losing to Albertus may be a blessing in disguise for them as it takes the pressure off the undefeated season.  They are deep, very talented, defend the heck out of the ball, shoot the 3 very well, and are ridiculously experienced, loaded with fifth year players who have played huge roles since day one on campus.  And of course, with Glenn Miller at the helm, very well-coached.  The tough part for them is that they've been easily beating up on mostly very inferior competition for nearly the last two months -- will that prove a challenge to adjust to starting in round two of the tourney vs. a tough opponent either way (their round one opponent certainly won't cause any problems)?  As for Williams, will we see the Williams team who looked like a national contender in late season games vs. Trinity, Wesleyan and Conn, or the Williams team who couldn't get out of its own way against Colby (and earlier in the year against Tufts and Midd)?  We will find out on Friday!  Weirdly, Williams seems to be playing its best ball of late on the road, just hope that continues! 

I will say that the Midd opening round pod is very interesting.  Midd and Rochester are the best two teams in the pod, but in terms of momentum, Nichols and Worcester State are two of the hottest teams in the country (beating up on mostly bad competition) while Midd and Rochester both stumbled massively down the stretch after tremendous starts to the season.  Midd, Rochester and Worcester State are all very big but not particularly quick teams, while Nichols is maybe the tiniest team in the tourney and plays lightning fast with basically a six-man rotation.  Nichols has a lot of talent on the perimeter and seems to be playing much better after changing up its rotation from early in the season.  Midd has already played Rochester and Nichols so either way, if they win round one, it's a guaranteed re-match. 

[names jaismith]

Its long past time for the NCAA to move on from how Pool C bids are allotted.  Every school does indeed deserve a path to post season through being conference champion.  Fair enough.  Pool C should be chosen by a system of statistical measures, like Massey.  It's not perfect but it's better than what we have now. However saying its time for the NCAA to change in no way means they'll have the common sense to do so.  By the way, I'm not advocating for any particular team to make post season.  I just want to see the best tournament possible.

[nescac1]

The Pool C criteria are definitely far from perfect; but so is Massey.  I do think some combo of Massey and the D3hoops top 25 rankings would, if split 50-50 with the current rating system, lead to a better outcome. 

This year, the team that has the biggest complaint is Guilford (11 in Massey and 13 in the D3hoops top 25).  If you swapped them (and perhaps one other very strong team like Lacrosse, which is 13th in Massey) out with Rochester and/or Utica (34 and 85 in Massey, both unranked in the top 25), I think the field (though not necessarily the bracketing itself) would be hard to find fault with.  Overall through, if you look at the top 25, Massey, or whatever other ranking system you want, the tournament field turned out OK with, again, Guilford being the one big outlier as a team that really deserved to be in (and I think they deserved to be in over Emory, as well, from their own region). 

[Hamilton4]

Great point I believe Guilford beat Emory H2H at Emory if Im not mistaken.

[Pat Coleman]

The Pool C criteria are definitely far from perfect; but so is Massey.  I do think some combo of Massey and the D3hoops top 25 rankings would, if split 50-50 with the current rating system, lead to a better outcome. 

This year, the team that has the biggest complaint is Guilford (11 in Massey and 13 in the D3hoops top 25).  If you swapped them (and perhaps one other very strong team like Lacrosse, which is 13th in Massey) out with Rochester and/or Utica (34 and 85 in Massey, both unranked in the top 25), I think the field (though not necessarily the bracketing itself) would be hard to find fault with.  Overall through, if you look at the top 25, Massey, or whatever other ranking system you want, the tournament field turned out OK with, again, Guilford being the one big outlier as a team that really deserved to be in (and I think they deserved to be in over Emory, as well, from their own region).

If it were to be a computer ranking, it should be one that is fine-tuned to work for D3, not for D1.

[maineman]

Figures lie and liars figure!  This first round match up with Worcester State statistically looks plenty challenging for the Panthers.  Both teams beat Westfield, Worcester twice, both lost to Wesleyan and the Panthers defeated Williams while the Lancers dropped the game to the Ephs.  Advantage Midd....not so fast.  We've lost to the MASCAC champ at home, Bridgewater State in the past.......painfully.  Remember 2009?

The Lancers are on a 14-0 win streak while the Panthers have lost 3 of the last 4, albeit against superior talent.  Worcester State averages more point per game 77/72, but gives up more than Midd 68/63.  Shooting stats compare like this: Lancers 43%/22%/64% FGs/3pt/FT while Midd is 41%/32%/71%.  Hopefully, the Panthers can be efficient from the charity stripe and 30%+ from 3pt and exploit this advantage.  They also need to get to the foul line more often, which could be problematic since both teams average 15 PFs a game. 

The player that concerns me is 6' 5" C/FB Bjorn.  He averages 10 pts and 10 rebounds per game and just had a 6pt, 17 reb effort in the MASCAC championship game.  His performance and that of his teammate 6'8" C Rubenskas will be critical to the outcome of the game.  The possible Achilles of these two gentlemen, similar to Alex Sobel will be "foul trouble."  Bjorn and Rubenskas fouled out 5 and 3 time respectively, this season.  I would put Brennan on  Bjorn and hope that David can not only outrebound him, but frustrate him into ill advised fouls.  With Sobel likely on Rubenskas, if the converse happens and Alex's minutes are limited due to fouls, the Panthers will be in trouble. 

I am counting on Stevens, Flaks and Goldman, etc. to be successful shooting outside the paint to open up lanes for Sobel, Stevens and Brennan around the rim.  is 35% from 3pt range too much to ask?

We'll find out on Friday afternoon  Both teams are pretty even with respect to the number of turnovers, steals and blocks so there is no clearcut advantage there.  Let the games begin.

[ItsATuftSituation]

Looking at the tournament, should be an exciting weekend for all of the NESCAC teams.

Since I'm the resident Tufts poster (been MIA the last week), wanted to weigh in on what I saw at Williams against Hamilton as I was there. Hamilton played better, plain and simple. Jumbos had some decent looks most of the game, and nothing was falling in the second half as the Conts pulled away. I think this could be good for Tufts, as it could be a good reset going into the NCAA Tournament.

Looking at this regional at Keene State, Widener can score it for sure as they have four players in double figures on the season. After watching some of their games on archived webstreams, looks like the Dunn player can go inside/outside and they have some other guards that get hot from time to time. As with any team this time of the year, if you make shots you've got a shot. They have a really nice win at home against Swarthmore, and played Stockton pretty tough.

We'll see what happens. Keene State is really good as well. How about that Williams-Pomona match-up, that's gotta be one of the most intriguing games of the entire opening weekend right now. Should be fun to watch.

[Hamilton4]

Assuming that all 4 NESCAC schools win their first round games. The likely second round opponents look extremely competitive:

#37 Hamilton vs #11 Johns Hopkins
#14 Williams vs #4 St. Joseph
#16 Middlebury vs Rochester
#32 Tufts vs #5 Keene St

On paper it appears that Middlebury received the best draw, theoretically they should be favored to advance to the Sweet 16. As for the other 3 NESCAC schools it will require defeating top 11 schools on their home floors which isn't out of the question for any of these 3 schools.

Williams has been Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde throughout the season, they will really need to bring their A game against St. Joseph but if the great version of Williams decides to show up I think they can control the game start to finish.   

Tufts is similar to Williams, will the Tufts that lost to Bates show up or will the Tufts that beat Williams and Middlebury show up? If its the latter than Keene St better get a good nights rest cause Tufts is a very physical team when they choose to be.

Hamilton is the champion of the NESCAC and 9-1 in their last 10 games. It really seems like their peaking at the right time. JHU has won 13 of their last 14 but I question the quality of competition in their Centennial Conf vs the level of play in the NESCAC. For that reason I'm expecting the Continentals to continue their excellent play into the Sweet 16.

My prediction is that both Middlebury and Hamilton survive the weekend. But would not be surprised in the least to see Williams and Tufts join them. I'm rooting for all 4 NESCAC schools in every game throughout the tourney!!

[nescac31hoops]

JHU has won 13 of their last 14 but I question the quality of competition in their Centennial Conf vs the level of play in the NESCAC. For that reason I'm expecting the Continentals to continue their excellent play into the Sweet 16.

Although the Centennial may be a top-heavy league, the top of that league is one of the strongest in the country. Swarthmore is one of the best teams we have seen in division 3 in a while and beating them is something that is extremely impressive. Although they did lose in the championship to Swat, it was a great game that could have easily gone either way. I am excited for that game but can't really vision Hamilton beating a team that has played Swat so well.

Good luck to all the Nescac teams this weekend, hopefully all four make it to the next round!

[SpringSt7]

My prediction is that both Middlebury and Hamilton survive the weekend. But would not be surprised in the least to see Williams and Tufts join them. I'm rooting for all 4 NESCAC schools in every game throughout the tourney!!

I will be rooting for everyone during the first weekend for conference reputation purposes and then, respectfully, I hope everyone else loses by 30 or more in the Sweet 16.