MBB: NESCAC

[JustAFan]

I agree 100% with your game analysis, nescac1. Williams needs to find a third scorer behind Heskett and Casey to replace Scadlock, it's leading scorer, and that's going to take time and will require someone stepping up. It also may take some re-tooling of the offense. Fortunately Teal has  shown glimpses of regaining his shooting touch recently (3-6 on 3's last night) but Greenman is still searching, and if one of them does not step up as a consistent third offensive threat Coach App may have to find ways to put more emphasis on the inside game, which means more time and touches for Karpowicz and Soto. Karp tends to get into foul trouble on the defensive side due to his over-exuberance, and until he can play a bit smarter on that end it may tie Coach App's hands in terms of building more of the offense around him.  The good news is the emergence of Bobby Casey as a consistent rather than streaky scorer, both from the outside as well as going to the hoop, and the growing assertiveness and aggressiveness of Heskett on the offensive end, especially his emerging confidence in his ability to drive to the basket and not always settle for the 3 pointer.

The Ephs also need to get to the line more often than they have (in addition to hitting their free throws when they get there!).  Last night they only went to the line 9 times and in their prior game vs. Springfield they only went to the line 10 times.  The lack of an inside game from their bigs contributes to this since Kempton gets most of the minutes (deservedly so given his defensive contributions) but I think the loss of Scadlock and his ability to put the ball on the floor and get to the hoop and draw fouls is the biggest contributor. Even though he has not played in the Ephs last 3 1/2 games, Scadlock still he leads the team in free throw attempts by almost 50%, with 47 total attempts vs. Heskett's 32.  Casey is next with 26 and Karp, despite limited minutes, is next with 18. Greenman and Teal are the only others with substantial attempts, and both need to do more.  Williams has demonstrated the ability to get to the line (28 times in their opener against a good Salem St. team, 28 vs. MCLA, 23 vs. Wesleyan, 28 vs. Westfield St., 35 vs. Fitchburg St.), they just need to re-emphasize its importance as they adapt and re-build their offense following the loss of Scadlock. I anticipate that this will continue to be a work in process for the next month or so. Coach App commented in the post game story that he thought the team settled too much for either the quick shot or the three last night and I expect we'll see some improvement today.

[amh63]

Amherst plays today in Florida!   Will see how they play a big team of upper division players.....after a long break and travel
Did watch the Amherst WBB team in Las Vegas and the announcers seem to dwell much to much on the "18 day break" by Amherst.....not aware of NESCAC academic needs, me thinks  
Many ranked teams on the men's side were "upset" based on the early rankings in recent games.  Supports MY thoughts on early rankings to a degree.
Did drop in on-line on the Midd game in Lexington and watched the early part of the Williams game.  Too late for me to watch the ending of an expected Williams win.
Nothing more to add wrt the Midd game where Daly appeared to be in foul trouble.  Question I have is when Daly is out of the game for whatever reasons, is there someone else to keep the "team motor" running at it's winning pace/ways?
Looking at the Box stats of the Williams game....two stats stood out for me.  One is the Williams' foul shooting.  Nescac1 has pointed it out but comparing it to the opponent's foul shooting...my first thoughts was the game was lost on the foul line.  I know it is NOT that simple...especially on the road,etc, etc.   The other stat I notice is the rebounds.  Williams, the overall taller team lost the rebound battle.  Interesting!

[Colby Hoops]

Hanna ROY?!  NESCAC1, you are routinely one of my favorite people to read on this board and your knowledge of this great league is matched by very few...but stop with this! Are you related to Hanna? I almost fell off of my couch when I read you put him at #1. I would put Hutcherson, Farrell, James, and Robinson above him easily. First off, all of those guys are better right now than Hanna and would all be putting up better numbers if they were on Colby. Second, there needs to be some account for that perhaps his numbers, similar to Draffan's, are good numbers on a bad team that are using them an insane amount for a freshman. I think Tucker, Kornaker, and Walker are better too. Nothing against Hanna, he is definitely a talent and a top 10 freshman in the league (and debatably top 5), but no way should win this award or be leading the conversation, imo.

I think you're a little low on Hanna, but I agree with your point to some degree. There are certainly several freshmen with more upside/talent who might be putting up big numbers on a team that has few upperclassmen like Colby. Hanna may well win Freshman of the Year, but that doesn't mean he's the best player over four years. Still, while Hanna doesn't jump off the page as an athlete, but he is going to be a VERY good player. Feels the game so well and can really shoot it. I think Hutcherson and James have a chance to be really special -- have not seen many of the other freshman yet.

Colby had another nice win over Endicott last night with big games from Hanna, Jefferson and Weiner. I think they'll be in the mix with Trinity, Bowdoin, Bates for the final spot in NESCAC tourney, and would slot them ahead of Conn for now. Hard to project with such a young team, most who have not played much or at all in league games. All will be figured out soon enough with league play right around the corner.

[toad22]

Looking at the Box stats of the Williams game....two stats stood out for me.  One is the Williams' foul shooting.  Nescac1 has pointed it out but comparing it to the opponent's foul shooting...my first thoughts was the game was lost on the foul line.  I know it is NOT that simple...especially on the road,etc, etc.   The other stat I notice is the rebounds.  Williams, the overall taller team lost the rebound battle.  Interesting!

I completely agree with the comment about Williams' foul shooting. Now that Scadlock is gone, they don't get to the line a lot, and the shooting has been mediocre at best. The rebounding stat from the Hamline game is deceptive. Williams' defensive rebounding stat is so low because Hamline shot the ball so well in the second half (67%!). There were very few defensive rebounds for Williams to collect. In this case, the Eph defense seems more to blame than the rebounding.

[toad22]

I agree 100% with your game analysis, nescac1. Williams needs to find a third scorer behind Heskett and Casey to replace Scadlock, it's leading scorer, and that's going to take time and will require someone stepping up. It also may take some re-tooling of the offense. Fortunately Teal has  shown glimpses of regaining his shooting touch recently (3-6 on 3's last night) but Greenman is still searching, and if one of them does not step up as a consistent third offensive threat Coach App may have to find ways to put more emphasis on the inside game, which means more time and touches for Karpowicz and Soto. Karp tends to get into foul trouble on the defensive side due to his over-exuberance, and until he can play a bit smarter on that end it may tie Coach App's hands in terms of building more of the offense around him.  The good news is the emergence of Bobby Casey as a consistent rather than streaky scorer, both from the outside as well as going to the hoop, and the growing assertiveness and aggressiveness of Heskett on the offensive end, especially his emerging confidence in his ability to drive to the basket and not always settle for the 3 pointer.

I am very hopeful that Cole Teal is now back to his normally very good outside shooting. In the first 7 Eph games this year, Teal shot only 5-35 (14%) from 3. In the last three games, he is 6-13 (46%). Probably too small a sample size to be confident, but since he shot 39% (145-372) in his first three years at Williams, I'm inclined to believe that he is just returning to form. Teal is now starting at the forward spot, formerly occupied by Kyle Scadlock. Bob Casey has assumed Teal's guard position. If Teal can start scoring in double digits again, as he has done in the prior two years (actually 9.7 and 10.5 ppg), a substantial part of Kyle Scadlock's points will be replaced.

[jumpshot]

Hey, I don't care how many points you think you're capable of scoring when shooting well ---if your team doesn't play defense (no open threes, not leaving your feet with simple head fakes), and rebound with passion, is slow and prone to unforced turnovers, and poor at free throws, you will see the kind of disappointing results experienced by the EPHS currently on the West Coast.

Where are the hard-nosed competitors who played with pace, grit, and determination of the recent past?

This year's team has defaulted a lot of swagger and will have an uphill battle to earn it back ....Average opponents start the game knowing this team may be soft and too pretty....

[Cards Fan]

Wesleyan has NOT played well so far. Started the game up 7-0, then proceeded to let up an 18-4 run. Up 2 at the half, but if they don't pick it up, they could join the loss train that is the NESCAC this weekend.

[Old Guy]

Midd drops its first game, 90-87 in OT, to York (10-0) in a highly competitive game between two good teams. I will leave the analysis to Bucket after he catches his breath, as he was there. Hard to beat a good team if you turn the ball over 27 times, to state the obvious.

York beat a good team with 25 turnovers, so it's really not stating the obvious.

Indeed, York did it, but it was hard to do, right? 

[nescac1]

Nice bounce-back road win for the Ephs last night.  Early in the game, Williams looked bad, again playing sluggish defense, giving up too many open looks, and having trouble dealing effectively with Cal Lutheran's plan to collapse on everything inside.  Only James Heksett kept Williams within striking range as the Ephs went down by 13 points in the first half.  From that point forward, however, Williams played much better on both ends, controlling most of the game to eventually pull away late, outscoring Cal Lutheran by 17 in the second half, despite some very tough foul calls going against them.  The Ephs aggressive defense led to a lot of steals and easy points in transition, which was huge in pulling away.

Heskett as noted was spectacular all game, with 29 points, 3 boards, 2 assists, 2 steal, several beautiful finishes inside and tremendous 5-10 shooting from deep.  He has been getting better each game since Scadlock's injury and now looks very comfortable and confident in his new role as the go-to guy.  It would be good to see him coral a few more boards at his size, but that is a minor quibble -- he is playing like a first team all-NESCAC guy and the Ephs will need that to continue to be competitive going forward.  The other key player last night was Matt Karpowicz.  In a season high 19 minutes (and I very much hope that is not his season high for much longer, he should be in the 20-25 minute range consistently, I hope, going forward), he went 6-6 (several on very high degree of difficulty finishes on the move) to push his season shooting percentage back over 80 percent.  He also added 4 boards and 2 nice assists, passing well out of the interior.  He gave a HUGE spark during the big run to get back into the game.  He's still figuring out a lot of things, including when to be aggressive looking for his shot even with multiple guys in the paint and when to pass, but clearly he's one of the Ephs' two best weapons on offense while also doing solid job on the boards.  Teams are really keying on him in the half-court so Williams needs to find creative ways to get him the rock in good scoring position. 

Also making solid contributions for the Ephs last night were Marcos Soto, who has been shooting the ball beautifully of late, and Cole Teal, who had a solid all-around game with 12-4-5, finishing well both inside and from 3, as Toad noted he looks more like himself after the rough start to the year. 

Huge game with Wesleyan coming up for Williams and obviously they will be the underdog going into that one after losing to the Cards at home, with Scadlock.  Williams still has plenty of areas to work in the coming weeks.  The defensive awareness and footwork wasn't where it needed to be this weekend and they will need to be at their very best on that end vs. a quicker Wesleyan team.  Bobby Casey and Mike Greenman are shooting a combined .50 percent from the line -- they are both way too good as shooters to be mired in that range and I imagine it must be a mental thing at this point, but considering that they are the Ephs' two primary ball-handlers late in games that clearly is an area that could benefit from improvement (especially since poor foul shooting is what is keeping Williams from being undefeated). 

Williams also needs better rebounding from the 4 and 5 positions, for sure, 11 combined boards from the four guys playing up front, all over 6'8, isn't enough.  They miss Kyle a LOT in that department and the big guys need to go after the ball really aggressively on both ends of the court.  Some more easy points off second-chance opportunities would hugely benefit Williams, in particular.  No one currently playing averages more than one offensive rebound per game, part of that is that Williams doesn't emphasize that instead making sure to get back and avoid giving up points in transition, but even still, they can certainly do better.  Henry Feinberg is the only guy who really looks physical and aggressive going after offensive boards but the rest of his offensive game is still evolving, limiting his minutes. 

[amh63]

Holiday games after a long break and often long travel brings surprises.  Indeed, there were some wrt Nescac teams on the men's and women's side.  The games played are to evaluate the team playing against unfamiliar opponents in unfamiliar arenas...all to prepare for CAC games.
Amherst's lost to SEU in Lakeland Fl. proved to be just that.  It was considered an exhibition game for the Heats in Flame arena.  Southeastern Un. is presently ranked 7th in the NAIA2 polls and has a 12-2 record.  Do not know if the record includes the win over Amherst and an earlier lost to a D1 match.  In any case, the Heat has a number of D1 transfers and tall players.  The players starting the game were generally shorter than the Amherst starters.  However, the Heat players, especially the two high scorers were just a step quicker, especially to the ball and played an all around physical game.
Amherst often found its inside game was met by blocks by shorter leapers.
Amherst got behind early but came back to take the lead in the first half.  In general, Amherst trailed by 6-10 points with limited inside points and poor outside shooting.  Yes, Amherst made only 5 of 10 foul shots, a continuous problem.  The margin at the end of the game...the largest margin does need some explaining.   SEU does use a press but was generally beaten by Amherst.  With less than 2-3 min left in the game and behind by less than 10 points, Amherst went into a full court press, and when the Heat slowed their game down, Amherst would foul to get the ball back in the last few minutes.  The Heat players made their foul shots and Amherst's long 3-point attempts missed.
In fact, except for Tom Mobley going 4-8 from the 3-pt. range, the rest of the Amherst players were 1-16!   Amherst shot poorly all around and was out rebounded too!  It was a learning lesson game.  It was a physical game and the refs let the Home team play its style both offensively and defensively.  HC Hixon countered a bit with more physical and quicker subs at times and put in Mobley in when others could not hit their outside shots.
My take of the game...no excuses for the loss to the better team on its home floor.  Remember a silimilar Florida trip game...a lost...to a higher level team.  That team with Toomey would later go on to win a National Title.  Recall the HC of the Miami area team praising the play of several Amherst star players.

[amh63]

Best to all and a Happy And Safe New Year!  Keep warm too!
Watched an Amherst WBB game yesterday and dropped in on several CAC games.
First I need to correct an error posted earlier.  In 2013-14 Amherst lost to Nova Southeastern in Florida in OT.  The Winning HC of the D2 level team praised several Amherst players, in particular Conner Green who shot the lights out in the game.  Amherst did go to Salem that year again....after winning the Nat.Title in 2012-2013.  Amherst got trounced by Williams in the semi final, led by a FY by the name of Duncan Robinson!
Anyway, Amherst, like in the 2013-2014 season, will return from Florida to play ECSU on Jan.2.  ECSU is always a tough opponent...even in LeFrak.
Missed the Wesleyan vs, Springfield game yesterday!  Any poster here catch the game?

[Vandy74]

Best to all and a Happy And Safe New Year!  Keep warm too!
Watched an Amherst WBB game yesterday and dropped in on several CAC games.
First I need to correct an error posted earlier.  In 2013-14 Amherst lost to Nova Southeastern in Florida in OT.  The Winning HC of the D2 level team praised several Amherst players, in particular Conner Green who shot the lights out in the game.  Amherst did go to Salem that year again....after winning the Nat.Title in 2012-2013.  Amherst got trounced by Williams in the semi final, led by a FY by the name of Duncan Robinson!
Anyway, Amherst, like in the 2013-2014 season, will return from Florida to play ECSU on Jan.2.  ECSU is always a tough opponent...even in LeFrak.
Missed the Wesleyan vs, Springfield game yesterday!  Any poster here catch the game?

amh63.....I watched the Wesleyan-Springfield game but lack the familiarity with either team's personnel to go into specifics.  It was a game of two halves although in terms of statistics Wesleyan's production was quite consistent.  After looking just short of anemic in the opening half, Springfield came out en fuego following the intermission shooting 53.6% from the field.  The game changing difference, however, was their 10-17 shooting from behind the arc.  By contrast, Wesleyan shot 3-15 over the course of the entire game.  It was difficult to determine whether Cardinal frustration or fatigue was the bigger factor as things were winding down.  Springfield's play gave good reason for both.  I'm certain another poster can analyze the game in greater detail.

Best New Year's wishes to you and your family, my friend.  This time of year in New England, warmth is a relative concept.

[Old Guy]

Big week: first NESCAC weekend. All the projecting and postulating is moot. Just ten games. One game each against your ten NESCAC rivals. Intense.

Fun game tomorrow night at Middlebury with Swarthmore coming to town, two top 20 teams who I strongly suspect have never played one another before — both teams team with just one tight loss against the same opponent, York of PA. School's not in session; otherwise, I think there might have been a big crowd. As it is, lots of townsfolk will turn out. Strange start-time: 6:00 pm (not a doubleheader either). I worry many people will arrive in the second half, anticipating a normal 7:00 tip-off.  Personal dimension: the grandson of one of my hoop teammates and good high school friend in Maine is a first year at Swarthmore and hit 9 threes in his debut in the Garnet's opener this year, 6'3" Conor Harkins. Nine! Must be a school record. We better pick him up. They look like a team with nice balance.

I'm thinking that the enthusiasm for Wesleyan so far may be a bit inflated. Their win over Williams is certainly a good one, perhaps too the 80-61 win vs Nichols (8-1 with a win over Trinity).  Take away Williams and Nichols, Wesleyan's other eight games have been against teams that are collectively 34-52. Others might be better than I at evaluating the strength of Nichols schedule to date. Wes's one loss is to Springfield (6-5) and they're a good club, but had lost to Trinity (by 18), Williams (17) and Amherst (4) before defeating the Cards.With revenge-minded Williams on Friday and Midd on Saturday, we'll know soon enough how accurate their position as the speculative favorite for the NESCAC tourney top spot is.

Let the game's begin!

[Cards Fan]

Best to all and a Happy And Safe New Year!  Keep warm too!
Watched an Amherst WBB game yesterday and dropped in on several CAC games.
First I need to correct an error posted earlier.  In 2013-14 Amherst lost to Nova Southeastern in Florida in OT.  The Winning HC of the D2 level team praised several Amherst players, in particular Conner Green who shot the lights out in the game.  Amherst did go to Salem that year again....after winning the Nat.Title in 2012-2013.  Amherst got trounced by Williams in the semi final, led by a FY by the name of Duncan Robinson!
Anyway, Amherst, like in the 2013-2014 season, will return from Florida to play ECSU on Jan.2.  ECSU is always a tough opponent...even in LeFrak.
Missed the Wesleyan vs, Springfield game yesterday!  Any poster here catch the game?

Yes. And it's not what you think.

While losing to Springfield may seem bad, Wesleyan did NOT play bad. Their defense was actually very good. Every single shot was contested heavily, but my goodness, in the second half Springfield couldn't miss. I may be biased here, but they stopped missing entirely as it came down the stretch. They may have made 8 threes in a row.

The offense was slightly off, but I really didn't think it was poor play. Sometimes, a team just plays better than you, and you have to live with it.

[Greek Tragedy]

Big week: first NESCAC weekend. All the projecting and postulating is moot. Just ten games. One game each against your ten NESCAC rivals. Intense.

Fun game tomorrow night at Middlebury with Swarthmore coming to town, two top 20 teams who I strongly suspect have never played one another before — both teams team with just one tight loss against the same opponent, York of PA. School's not in session; otherwise, I think there might have been a big crowd. As it is, lots of townsfolk will turn out. Strange start-time: 6:00 pm (not a doubleheader either). I worry many people will arrive in the second half, anticipating a normal 7:00 tip-off.  Personal dimension: the grandson of one of my hoop teammates and good high school friend in Maine is a first year at Swarthmore and hit 9 threes in his debut in the Garnet's opener this year, 6'3" Conor Harkins. Nine! Must be a school record. We better pick him up. They look like a team with nice balance.

I'm thinking that the enthusiasm for Wesleyan so far may be a bit inflated. Their win over Williams is certainly a good one, perhaps too the 80-61 win vs Nichols (8-1 with a win over Trinity).  Take away Williams and Nichols, Wesleyan's other eight games have been against teams that are collectively 34-52. Others might be better than I at evaluating the strength of Nichols schedule to date. Wes's one loss is to Springfield (6-5) and they're a good club, but had lost to Trinity (by 18), Williams (17) and Amherst (4) before defeating the Cards.With revenge-minded Williams on Friday and Midd on Saturday, we'll know soon enough how accurate their position as the speculative favorite for the NESCAC tourney top spot is.

Let the game's begin!

So basically you're taking away their "good wins" so you can discount Wesleyan?