MBB: Centennial Conference

[SpringSt7]

You could argue that Keene is a better job than Hopkins if you really wanted to. They had plenty of success before Cain and I would venture to say they will have plenty of success after him. Maybe not routine trips to the second weekend, but they will continue to make NCAA tournament appearances.

Loeffler was one of the best coaches in D3 and he took Hopkins to as many Sweet 16s as Cain did with Keene St - 2 each.

[Stretch4]

Pre-Season coaches poll released and as expected it is Swarthmore and Hopkins, and then everybody else. https://centennial.org/news/2023/11/2/mens-basketball-preseason-poll.aspx

Swat lost a great deal of scoring, experience and intangibles from last year, and on paper Hopkins has the deeper and overall more talented roster than Swat, but Kosmalski's track record is hard to ignore.  Nice to see that both teams have set themselves up with really challenging non-conference schedules, and it will be interesting to see if the coaching change at Hopkins has any impact in their level of play to start the season.

Gettysburg has a very talented and deep team returning. If they can do a better job this season with the consistency of their shooting and taking care of the ball, look for them to potentially challenge the top two. Muhlenberg, F&M and Ursinus also are talented teams, but clearly do not have the depth to challenge the front runners. As has been the case in recent years, Dickinson, Haverford, McDaniel and Washington College do not appear to have enough depth on their rosters to truly challenge.

Some individual performers to keep an eye on: Rubino from Muhlenberg who with Gaines gone may become one of the top scorers in the country; Schaller and Stafford from Gettysburg who form a really dynamic backcourt who do a bit of everything; Hanson and Paquette from Swat who will be asked to take big steps forward this year in much more prominent roles; Wall from Ursinus who will have everything run through him for the Bears; D1 grad transfer Ogbu from Dickinson who will have an opportunity to have a major impact in his one season in Carlisle; Parra from F&M who seems to get overshadowed by Caprise and Thybulle but is honestly every bit the player as them.

Looking forward to another great season in the Centennial Conference.

[D.B. Cooper]

The pre-season starts.

F&M gets a tough 1st game with Neumann who are coming off consecutive 21-win seasons. Plus, they have an All-American inside player (Vaughns) that will be hard to contain, while possibly keeping Parra on the bench with foul trouble. They have overcome situations like this occasionally with strong 3-point play in past, but we will see tonight if they can stay in the game or not. It will be interesting to see if any of freshman can play & whether Dylan Cormac is recovered and able to pick up like he started a promising rookie season last year before being injured.

[D.B. Cooper]

Halftime at Mayser Gym.

Stunning me F&M leads 53-29. Balanced scoring, making reasonable 3 pointers and watch out if this continues especially odd 7 for 7 from charity stripe. I assume Neumann will scrap and make a game of it. We'll just have to watch.

[Greek Tragedy]

The pre-season regular season starts.

F&M gets a tough 1st game with Neumann who are coming off consecutive 21-win seasons. Plus, they have an All-American inside player (Vaughns) that will be hard to contain, while possibly keeping Parra on the bench with foul trouble. They have overcome situations like this occasionally with strong 3-point play in past, but we will see tonight if they can stay in the game or not. It will be interesting to see if any of freshman can play & whether Dylan Cormac is recovered and able to pick up like he started a promising rookie season last year before being injured.

Fixed it for you.

[Stretch4]

Great win by F&M last night on the road at Gettysburg. Diplomats simply executed better down the stretch of the game, while Gettysburg had some really questionable shot selection in the last five minutes of the game. Grauslys has really stepped up this season and the balanced attack behind him makes F&M tough to defend. Interesting that Seidman seems to be playing the role of facilitator this season, and Parra (who has continued to be a load to handle in the paint) can't seem to play more than about 15 minutes a night. F&M fans should be very optimistic based on that performance last night.

For Gettysburg fans they have to be disappointed coming off a great win at Hopkins. Looks like many of the same challenges that plagued the Bullets periodically the last two seasons continue to pop up at inopportune times. In the last 6-7 minutes you saw about 6 turnovers, 5 very questionable shot selections and a few defensive lapses. Three years in with the core group on this team and I would expect those things to be cleaned up a bit. A very talented roster, so they need to move forward and focus on playing a full 40 minutes.

For what its worth, Swat and Hopkins simply don't look like Swat and Hopkins yet. Credit to Swat for still finding a way to win almost every night, but they definitely have a challenge with lack of depth at this point. Hopkins clearly still trying to figure it out as they are just not the same defensively at this point. I suspect they will start to piece it together.

[McBuckets]

Excellent post Stretch.  F/M outplayed the Bullets on both ends and did an effective job rebounding at key moments.  Bullets definitely had several questionable possessions in the second half.  To your point, that had been a thing of the past but certainly evident in what was an early season test.  Having said that, Dips are exceeding expectations at the moment and it will be interesting to see them play Hopkins in a few days.

On another topic, I see Robino only played a few minutes for the Mules last night.  Anyone know what happened?

[Stretch4]

For the non-Swat and non-Hopkins fans, the 2024 playoffs had to be a disappointment. I really thought we would see something other than the usual. Gettysburg had everything break right for them down the stretch of the season to allow them to finish in first and grab home court advantage. Sadly, they could not take advantage of it. I guess I have to give credit to Swat who really turned things around, and ultimately became the best team in the conference, including beating the 1 and 2 seeds on the road. Don't see Hopkins or Gettysburg getting an at large, so Centennial will end up with only one team in the field of 64. Hard to imagine Swat making a deep run this year, but with DeAngelo and Caprise leading the charge, you never know.

[Gabriel]

It's my understanding that the CC will be splitinto two divisions next year (2024-25).  I believe one division (let's call it the North) will include Swarthmore, Muhlenberg, Ursinus, Haverford and Wahington College.  The other division (let's call it South) will be comprised of JHU, F&M, Dickinson, Gettysburg & McDaniel.  Teams in each division will play each other twice (home and away) and teams in the other division once (alternating home and away).  This means each team will replace five conference games with non conference games. Do I have this right?

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Definitely going to divisions (which I believe you have correct).  I'm pretty sure they're calling them East and West, but that's not really important.

I haven't heard for sure on the rotation.  I didn't think they were going to drop all the way down to 13 league games.  I thought it was going to be offset a bit - playing some cross division teams twice a year and others once.  I could be wrong about that, but 13 seems like a low number to me.

[Stretch4]

Centennial Conference Honors for 2023-2024: Stafford grabs Player of Year, Thybulle Defensive Player of Year, and Fagbemi rookie of year. First team seems right to me with Stafford, DeAngelo, Caprise, Wall and Windley. Great to see Ogbu from Dickinson and Contee from McDaniel recognized on second team as they both had excellent seasons for their teams. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised to see Stafford take player of year over DeAngelo. Easy pick would have been DeAngelo, but quite honestly I think Stafford was more valuable to his team, and DeAngelo did not have quite the same season as last year (but boy did he turn it on late and in the playoffs). Fagbemi was a no-brainer as he was certainly a top five freshman nationally.
Mystery to me continues to be Thybulle - 3 straight defensive player of year awards. I know Hopkins has been tremendously successful during his time there, but for four years I feel he has been underwhelming. This was certainly his best defensive year, so maybe he earned DPOY this year. But he somehow picked up a national reputation as some type of elite level player, and I just never really saw it. No where near the player that Caprise is, yet he seems to be considered on that level. Congrats to all (including Thybulle). 

[Gabriel]

Ryan, 13 conference games would be right, 8 (4x2)  in division and 5 in the other division

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Ryan, 13 conference games would be right, 8 (4x2)  in division and 5 in the other division

Yeah, but I mean I'm not sure that's what they're doing.  A few conferences do unbalanced schedules - only playing some teams twice each year to reach an optimal number.  I'm not sure in the CC is doing that or not.

[r.w. mcnickels]

What's old is new again! The Centennial had East/West divisions from 1994-2003, and 13 conference games, before going to a double round-robin format.

[Pat Coleman]

I'm going to consolidate this under the Centennial Conference conversation.