MBB: Centennial Conference

[r.w. mcnickels]

12/3 picks:

Gettysburg
Johns Hopkins
Muhlenberg
McDaniel
Ursinus

Dickinson and Haverford should give their respective hosts a scare.  Hopkins will defend the home court against F&M after nearly knocking off St. Mary's over the weekend.  I'm not sure what to make of the Dips, who have looked very good so far.  Just too hesitant to pick them until we see how they play against a good conference team on the road, which will happen Wednesday.

[Reserved Seat]

Pick-ems for 12/03/08

F & M(need to start conference play with a win)
Muhlenberg
McDaniel
Ursinus(shouldn't lose two in a row)
Gettysburg(should be a great game)

[old ends]

Diplomaniac1:

Got to watch us old timers.... Thanks for catching it and it has been corrected...
You can check with the others I have miscalculated a few in the past.. But always corrected

[old ends]

I think with Gettysburg & Ursinus being top teams to beat this year it may cause us to overlook some of the other teams.

Dickinson has their big man back,Leszcynski, who already is leading in rebounds and teammate Dolan in 7th spot. F & M is getting a team attack going with 7 members in double figures against Lebanon Valley. They have McNally 5th in points and 4th in rebound in the conference and Milligan the assist leader so far. The above are on per game ave.  Also remember F & M beat Lebanon Valley who Beat Ursinus.

Hilton( Ursinus) Capkin( Gettysburg) and Noonan( Ursinus) lead in scoring and 3 pt's made.

Going to be a good one this year...

[Reserved Seat]

Diplomaniac1:

Got to watch us old timers.... Thanks for catching it and it has been corrected...
You can check with the others I have miscalculated a few in the past.. But always corrected

Old Ends
Thanks for your efforts in maintaining the pick-ems.  You do a great timely job.  All miscalculations are corrected as soon as you are informed of the discrepancy.
I'll be in Baltimore for the Hopkins' game on Wednesday.

[old ends]

Speaking of Matt Hilton, Ursinus. Congrats for being the Conference pllayer of the week.

The rest of the stats and stuff can be viewed here:
http://www.centennial.org/basketball/2009/MBK_1201.pdf

enjoy

[r.w. mcnickels]

Eric, I think you asked what happened to Chris Sullivan a while ago.  By now you may already know, but I found out that he transferred to Wittenberg to play closer to home.  Here is Witt's roster.  It looks like Sullivan has started all three games for the Tigers so far.

I thought he was a great shooter but not the best at running the point, where he was playing at F&M.  Of course, he was thrown into a starting role as a freshman, no easy thing.  Best of luck to him.

[old ends]

article from the conference on tonights matchups.
http://centennialconference.blogspot.com/2008/12/opening-night.html

enjoy

[r.w. mcnickels]

At the half in Baltimore:

F&M 37, Hopkins 32

McNally with 15 points for the Dips.  Hopkins shooting 60% from the field, but 12 turnovers.

[D.B. Cooper]

Never am I so glad as to lose a pick-em game

F&M 79 - JHU 66 (in Baltimore)

Are the youthful Dips for real or is JHU a second division team in the savage Cenntennial Conference? I eagerly await the result of the other exciting tilts.

[r.w. mcnickels]

Muhlenberg is laying it on Haverford 55-26 midway through the second half. 

Gettysburg leads Dickinson at the half, 38-26.

An impressive win for F&M on the road.   They host the Mules on Saturday in what should be a good one.

[Reserved Seat]

F&M looked ragged, but they moved the ball well.  McNally continued his strong play under the basket.  Milligan and Brooks can both penetrate with the ball.  F&M's rotation of 7 players is working well.  Despite some foul trouble, the offense showed no let up with Tolliver and Selig playing.  Tolliver and Selig will be the strength for F&M when it comes to bench play.  They both can sub for several players without affecting the flow of the game.

[r.w. mcnickels]

Gettysburg cracked the top 10 this week:

http://www.d3hoops.com/top25/

According to the Gettysburg website, this is the highest the Bullets have ever climbed in the D3hoops.com poll.  I think this makes the Bullets the third Centennial program to earn a top 10 ranking in the poll's history, along with F&M and Ursinus.

[D.B. Cooper]

Any thoughts on who the top freshman in the CC are? With all the upperclassmen experience most teams have their aren't that many impact openings. Last year McNally (FM) had a great rookie year but was overshadowed by Powers (GB) who was explosive & dominant on a team that made a sweet-16 run.

This year I am favorably impressed with Milligan (FM) he looks like the best Dip point guard since Duran Searles, but is a different type of player. Early on his scoring, defense, rebounding & assist to turnover ratio are impressive. Plus he's led his squad to an unbeaten start that few if any would have predicted. The only apparent weakness shown so far is he does not seem to be comfortable shooting 3-pointers, if he ever develops this aspect he could be a 1st team CC player.
The only other frosh making a splash that I found is Liddic (Muhl), but most of his damage was against the shell-shocked Fords in the cavernous Muledome. I know the Sho'man play some rookies but can not imagine they are of the quality of the others I mentioned.

What does everyone think?  Did I miss some frosh high-riser that's the next Andrew Powers?

[r.w. mcnickels]

D.B. -

I am also impressed with Milligan.  He might be the guard F&M has lacked.  However, this is from someone who thought Logan Outerbridge and Bryan Teschke would develop into All-CC players, so my opinion might not be worth anything!

Kevin Breslin of WC might be a player to watch - I just noticed his name on the stats and found out he's the brother of All-CCer Joey Breslin.

Cavernous is a great word for the Muledome.  Another one I've heard: "dungeon."  It's a tough place to play.