MBB: NESCAC

[walzy31]

Yup, good memories. Going to move on from 6-7 years ago though and hopefully get back to the Final Four this year!

[walzy31]

ANNOUNCEMENT

Cool news coming in from Amherst about their home web-casting this season. Spencer Noon (a two-year member of the men's basketball team and pretty decent soccer player...) will be calling most of the live play-by-play commentary throughout the season. Part of the new approach is to make it more interactive with their viewers (that's us). Spencer and whomever he will be broadcasting the game with will be taking Twitter comments and questions live throughout the season. I'm sure he'll remind viewers while on air, but direct your tweets to @LordJeffCast

A neat idea to make games more interactive for those of us who can't make it to every game in person.

[walzy31]

Tuesday 11/27/12 Lines

Amherst Vs. Lasell
Amherst -27.5
O/U: 168.5

Amherst and the under

Lasell and the Under. Down 0.1 units. Thanks for the action.

[walzy31]

Tuesday 11/27/12 Lines

Amherst Vs. Lasell
Amherst -27.5
O/U: 168.5

I love these, even though I'm terrible
Lasell and over.  They don't play much defense and they can score (regarding Lasell).

Lasell and the Under. Down 0.1 units. Thanks for the action.

[walzy31]

Tuesday 11/27/12 Lines

Amherst Vs. Lasell
Amherst -27.5
O/U: 168.5

Amherst 84 Vs. Lasell 69
Amherst -27.5 (Lasell Cover +12.5)
O/U: 168.5 (Under +15.5)

Toomey (27) and Green (13 & 7) looked sharp.

[jumpshot]

Anyone know why Sha Sha Brown did not play tonight for Wesleyan?

[Old Guy]

Midd over SoVT 96-60. It wasn't that close. First home game: fun to see some of the new guys. SoVT is small so Lynch (21) and Roberts (18) had their way (18-21 from the floor). Midd shot 55% from the field and 65% from three (11-17). Williams plays this team twice?

[nescac1]

Ephs rout a clearly outmatched RPI team, 105-60.  The game was notable mainly because it allowed Taylor Epley and James Klemm to get into a good rhythm, with Epley pouring in 26 points and adding 7 boards in only 19 minutes, and Klemm nailing 4-5 three pointers, and 5-6 overall.  Mike Mayer added another double-double, 12-13, despite an off shooting night, and back up big guys Hoffmann and Kilcullen combined for 23 points in only 26 minutes.  Frosh Luke Thoreson, who had been injured, saw the first action of his career.  A good chance for the Ephs to go deep into the roster and hopefully get everyone in rhythm heading into a big match-up with Stevens, which is undefeated, and already knocked off one top-25 squad.

I see that Allen Williamson played only nine minutes for Amherst, did he get injured?  Seems like, based on early returns, that Connor Green will be, as predicted, a leading contender for NESCAC ROY, along with Haldanya from Tufts. 

Tufts gave MIT a pretty good run for its money, but a huge game for Mitchell Kates sealed the deal for the Engineers.

Speaking of Kates, I wonder if there has ever been a better group of point guards in one region in one year than New England features this year ... Toomey and Kates are both first-team all-American talents, and then you have Nate Robertson, Sha Brown (who did not play for Wesleyan tonight, hopefully he is not injured), Gabriel Moton (the B.C. transfer who is starring for Brandeis), Kizell/Wolfin at Middlebury, Alex Berthiaume at Springfield, and Ryan Martin at Keene (Berthiaume and Martin, like Moton, are transfers from scholarship level programs).  Just an incredibly impressive group of point guards in New England, and with Kates, Robertson, Brown, Wolfin, Martin, and Berthiaume all seniors, it will be a LONG time, if ever, before we get to see this level of point guard play across the region.

[Old Guy]

Interesting game at Bowdoin as the Polar Bears routed Southern Maine (3-1 coming into the game), 82-45. Andrew Madlinger had 28 points - he's a junior: I don't remember him. Keegan Pieri, a 6'6" soph, had 18. Don't remember him either. Bowdoin won the second half 48-19. Swords (7'0") played 17 minutes, had 2 points and 9 boards. That's about the time he's been getting in other games too. It would be good to get a Polar Bear report.

I don't know if Bates is mid-pack or not. They're very small and thin - Bogdanovich (6'6") is big and strong, but the rest of their starting five are guards (6'1", 6'1", 6'1", and 5'9"), good players though. Eight players saw action tonight in a loss to St. Joseph's.

[amh63]

Amherst beats Lasell at home as predicted by Walzy but the score and amount were lower than the projections.  It was an interesting experience tonight for me.  The video feed was not available for the first half.....so I watched the Live Stats.  Amherst could not hit a basket for the longest time and went down 8-0 to LASELL.  After a timeout and a talking to, I believe, by Hixon to his starters, Amherst outscores Lasell  by 18-3 or something like that.
Lasell is a quick, but short and has two players that can really shoot and score.  Amherst easily out rebounds Lasell and shoots 50% from the floor and 100% from the foul line but Lasell hits more 3-point shots and shoots well overall.
Allen Williamson had a bad start and was replaced by Conner Green.  There was a period that had Workman. Toomey and Kaasilla on the bench with Kalema at PG and Pollack and Green on the floor with Killian.  Interesting lineup combinations by Amherst throughout the game.  Workman and Green both had great dunks after a missed shot.  Amherst got a good working margin after Toomey started to hit his outside shots and this allowed Coach Hixon to work his combination of players....at least the first 10 players.  Aaron went 11-11 from the foul line as Amherst only shot 13-13  from the line.  Good defense by Amherst was seen at times....still needs work, IMHO.  Overall, Amherst's team is still a work in progress but I really believe it can become a very good and DEEP team this year.  There is depth at ALL the positions.  I know...I have named only 4 players above....can not remember the 5th player as I was watching the stats and not reading the names of the players fast enough.....told you all that I had a interesting experience.  Good announcers and the video feed was clear when it came on.

[pick and roll]

Nescac1 - Colby has a nice rookie - Westman.  He might get more PT than some of the other first years.

[quicksilver]

Interesting game at Bowdoin as the Polar Bears routed Southern Maine (3-1 coming into the game), 82-45. Andrew Madlinger had 28 points - he's a junior: I don't remember him. Keegan Pieri, a 6'6" soph, had 18. Don't remember him either. Bowdoin won the second half 48-19. Swords (7'0") played 17 minutes, had 2 points and 9 boards. That's about the time he's been getting in other games too. It would be good to get a Polar Bear report.

I don't know if Bates is mid-pack or not. They're very small and thin - Bogdanovich (6'6") is big and strong, but the rest of their starting five are guards (6'1", 6'1", 6'1", and 5'9"), good players though. Eight players saw action tonight in a loss to St. Joseph's.

Either Bowdoin is going to surprise or Bates is going to have a difficult year since the Bobcats lost to the same USM team in Lewiston a few days ago.

[7express]

USM's 3 wins have come against Maine-Maritime (2 wins last year), Maine-Presque Isle (3 wins last year and they still don't play a full D-3 schedule, iirc) and Bates.  The only 2 good team's they've played (St. Joseph's-Maine and Bowdoin) they lost, so the jury is still out on them too.

[quicksilver]

USM's 3 wins have come against Maine-Maritime (2 wins last year), Maine-Presque Isle (3 wins last year and they still don't play a full D-3 schedule, iirc) and Bates.  The only 2 good team's they've played (St. Joseph's-Maine and Bowdoin) they lost, so the jury is still out on them too.

USM hung in against Bowdoin for the first half but was just blown out in the second half. It's hard to figure out how USM beat Bates (on the Bates' home court where the Bobcats usually have an advantage).

[lumbercat]

We will get some answers on Bowdoin and Bates when they meet next week.
Comparing scores can be misleading but Bowdoins domination of USM implies that Bates may be overmatched.
Bates lost to St Joes last night who also beat Bowdoin by 20.
Interesting to see how the rivals match up next week.