MBB: NESCAC

[ac08]

yes, that was crotty. must be nice.

[GnacAlum55]

http://www.bates.edu/x177023.xml

Interesting hire for the Bobcats.....

[frank uible]

Very young - very little experience.

[LordJeff07]

I think Furbush will do a great job at Bates. As far as experience, he played at Bates and was an assistant at Bates before heading to Springfield College. Don't forget he was a Reilly guy. Maybe the youth movement will serve Bates well.

Can someone explain to me how Sal Abdo has 4 years of eligibility? He played in two games (and dropped about 20 in each) How many games do you have to play in to lose eligibility?

Looks like it will be an interesting year in the NE region

[Pat Coleman]

If you're not injured, you only have to practice once after the season opener and you use a year of eligibility.

If you have a season-ending injury and have played one-third of the scheduled regular-season games or less, then you can get a medical hardship year, informally referred to as a medical redshirt.

[nescac1]

That is a pretty bold hire for Bates, 25 is young to be a coach when some of his players will be nearly that age and will still know him from when he was a senior and they were recruits ... but he inherits a good situation with lots of young talent including returning ROY Brian Ellis leading an experienced frontcourt. 

Where do you see that Abdo played?  I thought he never played at all?  So that is two coaching vacancies down, and only Williams left -- any word at all on who is under consideration?

[speedy]

. . .

Can someone explain to me how Sal Abdo has 4 years of eligibility? He played in two games (and dropped about 20 in each) How many games do you have to play in to lose eligibility?
. . .

I think that that may be a mistake - If you go to the official UNH site, it is actually a player by the name of Alvin Abreu who scored the points that were credited on another website to Sal Abdo for those 2 games  . . . There's no listing of Abdo on the official UNH website for the 2007-08 season.

[LordJeff07]

Thanks for the explanations.
This is where I got my info from: http://www.bbstate.com/players/59157

[fpc85]

Especially impressive is the D-I transfer Trinity is bringing in.   Every time Trinity looks to be down, they seem to bring in a huge impact player (Tabb, Rhoten, etc.) and this year seems like no exception ... Trinity will probably start at least 2 and as many as three frosh ...

If they stay healthy, it could finally be MIT's year to make the dance, with the top player by far in the region (Bartolotta) and an NBA-huge front-line (6'10, 6'8, 6'8).   Considering that MIT offers virtually no admissions concessions and certainly scares lot of players away with its reputation for academid intensity, impressive how much talent they have managed to assemble.

As for Brandeis, with Delucca returning and the topnotch recruit, they should hardly skip a beat despite the enormous losses suffered to graduation.  Thanks for some great recruiting classes, the top New England contenders appear to once again include usual suspects Brandeis, RIC [overwhelming regional pre-season favorite as no one graduated], Trinity, Amherst, with MIT, Midd, Williams, Wheaton (all of whom return veteran squads and seem to have solid recruits, but not quite in the class of the incoming guys at Trinity/Amherst/Brandeis) all having enough talent to surprise a few people.

I will take the Jeffs..still loaded..unproven but still loaded.

[Marty Peretz]

Barring a string of disastrous injuries, there's not a doubt in my mind that Brandeis is the northeast representative in Salem next year. Amherst will be good by the end of the season, but they will not be enough to overcome what figures to be a terrific Judges squad.

[fpc85]

i think the NE is wide open...although the judges would appear to be the favorites on paper....too many teams are really bunched together. in the past, the judges haven't shown the ability to handle being a frontrunner. they will be the team everyone will be pumped up to play. i am not sure they will deal with it well enough to get to salem.

[walzy31]

This year's Bates/Wesleyan game would be a good one to catch. It would be better even better if it were at Bates and not Wes.

Most important side not about Coach Furbush: He is the runaway favorite to be the 2009 All NESCAC All Crazy Team Coach of the Year.

[walzy31]

Barring a string of disastrous injuries, there's not a doubt in my mind that Brandeis is the northeast representative in Salem next year. Amherst will be good by the end of the season, but they will not be enough to overcome what figures to be a terrific Judges squad.

On paper 'Deis is tough and they will be a top 3 team in New England wire to wire.
Amherst & Trinity will finish atop the NESCAC and be the other two top teams in the region (unless you want to count MASCAC teams...).

[nescac1]

I don't know, I think RIC has to be at least right there if not the pre-season favorite assuming they don't lose any guys unexpectedly (which they sometimes seem to do) because they had great results last year with a very young but deep and talented team, and lost NO ONE to graduation.  Plus rest of their conference looks down with Umass dartmouth and Keene both looking weaker. 

Brandeis does return Deluca but that is more than offset by the loss of the starting back-court plus a few other solid contributors from a strong senior class. 'Deis has a lot of talent but maybe not as much depth as some other teams, and they too have a lot of question marks. 

Amherst has a lot of question marks, I mean they only return two really proven players in Baskauskas and Wheeler, have no experienced big guys except Holsey who is not going to score much, and have to repalce the best point guard in the nation who made things easy for the rest of the team.  Unless the incoming frosh big guy are really, really, really good, hard to imagine they will be as good as Walters / Hopkins et. al. were as experienced seniors, and Meehan while good is not in Olson's category.  And even last year, late season Amherst looked a little vulnerable losing to Bowdoin at home, getting a favorable draw which really helped in the tourney but then getting slaughtered in the title game.   Middlebury on the other hand returns a very experienced and balanced core with the best point guard and one of the best 2-3 big guys in the league, which is a pretty great start, they are right there with Amherst as pre-season Nescac favorite.  Williams could surprise with a lot of talent returning especially up front, depending of course on who emerges at point and how the new coach works out.  Trinity is a huge question mark with tons of talent but tons of very young players who have to mesh quickly.  I think any of those four, or maybe even Colby, could come out on top of NESCAC next year -- Bowdoin I think loses too much and will come back down to earth a little.  NESCAC is definitely weaker than last season, but even so I think Amherst will not march through as easily as they have in recent years. 

Don't look past Wheaton and MIT in NEWMAC as well, both of those teams could be in the mix.

[Marty Peretz]

Stating that Brandeis is losing their starting backcourt is technically correct, but it omits a hugely key piece of information: Andre Roberson, the team's "back-up" point guard last season is, in my humble opinion, a much better basketball player than Kwame Graves-Fulgraham, last year's starter. Despite starting just one game and playing 5+ fewer minutes a night than Graves, Roberson averaged 2+ more points as a back-up (9.7 vs. 7.5). In much of UAA and NCAA play, Roberson had clearly taken control of the offense. Not a knock on Kwame, who himself had a solid senior campaign. Just a contextualization of the 'Deis lost its starting back court' point. Coppens is no doubt a huge loss, but between a healthy DeLuca, Hollins, Roberson, an apparently terrific recruiting class, and the team's terrific schedule, I have a hard time seeing anyone else as a favorite in that region. Meehan is also an excellent coach.