MBB: Centennial Conference

[gordonmann]

Mr. Mxyztplk (great handle, by the way):

I think Ursinus-Albright or maybe even Ursinus-Widener would be a better gauge of Centennial-vs-MAC playoff contenders.  We'll see how well Leb Val fares following the graduation of their All-Amercian, JD Beyers.

[D.B. Cooper]

Gordon, it does look like those would be great match-ups. Neither has lost a game yet. Both have one nice win. Widener @ Lyco & Albright putting on a frenetic comeback to hold off the talented Lincoln "Road Warriers" @ home. LVC, Juniata, E-town & Messiah are likely vying for the remaining spots. Does not look like Ursinus has any serious challengers in the Centennial (Maybe JHU). BY mid-January things should be more clear.
Ursinus has only two remaining out of conference challenges in York (PA) & Trinity (CT), but they are games that could be quite interesting.

[Coach C]

RW McN -

Got to agree with you.  This is not a top tier team.  Plus when you figure F&M's traditional struggles on the road against top conference competitors, you can look to possible losses at GBurg, JHU and Ursinus.

Congratulations to GRob on putting together a consistently winning program for a long time.

C

[beantown]

McDaniel looks ok so far- any thoughts on the Terror.  It sounds like Flynn is a good job

[D.B. Cooper]

Haverford 66-Muhl 63. In a borderline upset, perhaps a factor was Stewert fouling out in a game that went down to the wire.
In a bit of a stunner to me F&M 73-Gburg 61 at Hen Bream where Bullets are usually tough. Dips open up big lead and withstand apparent 3 point second half barrage & several runs by game home team. Bullets recently played an excellent game @ # 6 York and only lost a close contest by nine. I didn't think this would be an F&M game to win based on lackluster efforts in last two games.
If GRob can get this team to NCAAs it might be his best coaching job to date. Admittedly G-burg doesn't have the best inside game in the CC, but if they can compete with York on the road they must be decent. Tough contest in the backyard brawl in Annville on Thursday. It should be my first trip to Duthmen's new gym if nothing goes wrong for me.

[Reserved Seat]

If Robinson can get the effort under the boards, F&M should be able to hang with most teams.  Consistent work in the back court will be a key.

[fritzdis]

Well, F&M still hasn't played a good 40 minutes, but their first 8 minutes tonight were awfully impressive, as they started the game with a 23-3 run.  Outerbridge bombed some REALLY deep 3s, while Teschke and Hines both hit some nice mid-range jumpers.  After F&M's intitial outburst, Gburg responded with a 10-point run of their own, but Logan had a great behind-the-back assist to Fogg on a fast break to end that particular Gburg rally.  If Smith hadn't been so cold (4-11, 0-3 3s, 1-4 FT), F&M might have been able to put the game away earlier.  Nonetheless, it was nice to see they could withstand Gburg's rallies.

[Amish Allstar]

You can never doubt Grob and the Dips.  Hopefully, they will continue to grow as a team bc they seem to have lot of depth and GRob seems to be able to put a lot of interchangable lineups on the floor.

I think once this kid Yost is comfortable in the system he will be force especially down low and on the boards.  The one game i saw he seemed to have a nice mid range.

Long season but a nice win where the crowd is usually pretty tough.

[swish]

I disagree with a few comments made about F&M. First of all, they did play a full 40 minutes last night. I'm not sure what people expect. Are they supposed to continue playing the whole game like they did the first 10-15 minutes. If they had, the score would have been 64- 18. They played in one of the toughest away venues in the CC and never gave up the lead and won by 12.
This is a VERY young team. At one point last night they had five players on the court at the same time of which NONE had significant playing time until this year. I believe it was three sophmores and two juniors.
Lastly, go ahead and give Grob credit - he's a great coach. But you might want to look at the heart of some of these players. They are 4-1 losing in overtime to a very good Trinity team. Like GRob says - he doesn't dribble, rebound or shoot the ball. The credit for this win goes to the players. They fought the whole way for this one and THEY are the reason F&M won last night.
I don't know if this team of all underclassmen (except for one senior) will make it to the NCAA' tournement but like I said before the season started - come CC tournement time I guarantee you the last team Ursinus will want to meet in the finals is F&M

[fritzdis]

Swish, when I said they hadn't played a good 40 minutes yet, I didn't at all mean they didn't play hard for the whole game.  The problem is, they still had 16 turnovers, they were still outrebounded, and they were only 18 of 30 from the free throw line.  They won because they played hard, particularly on defense, and made their shots.  That's great, and they can win a lot of games that way, but until they take better care of the ball and really get after it on the glass, I just don't see how they can beat a team with the size that Ursinus has.  After watching F&M last night I know they can hang with anyone else in the conference, but Ursinus presents such a match-up problem that I just don't see it yet.

[diplomaniac1]

Fritzdis, Swish, et. al. -

I agree that the Ursinus front line may cause match-up problems. However, my impression is that they are significantly slower than F&M.

Really, I am more worried about their all-american guard.  :(I am not sure who on the Dips can stay with him and limit his offensive production and assists to the big men!

Thoughts anyone? Feel free to respond. Regards to all. GO Dips!

Eric

[fritzdis]

diplomaniac,

I haven't actually seen Ursinus play this season, so maybe I'm giving their front line too much credit, but I was impressed by what I saw of them last year.  Sure, they're slower than Teschke (not sure about Hines, since he's not the swiftest big man I've ever seen), but they seemed to position themselves well to make up for it (remember this is just from what I saw last year).  Even if they don't score a lot, I think their rebounding will give F&M headaches.

[cc_fan]

Ursinus beat Washington last night 82 - 73.  Shattuck continues to play well.  He had 18 points, 10 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 blocks , and a steal.  McGarvey added 13 points and 14 assists.

[swish]

Eric,

The guards from Ursinus (especially McGarvey) are outstanding. But we have good guards as well. My opinion is that F&M would have to play an almost flawless game to beat Ursinus. But it can be done.
Interestingly enough , the score of the Washington-Ursinus game last night was tied 44-44 at the half. I think that says something about both teams.

[swish]

Final-

F&M 69 - Lebanon Valley 55