MBB: Great Northeast Athletic Conference

[GnacBballFan]

good point Pat, however its invalid bc Oliver was double T'd the game prior to Medgar Evers, a game they ended up winning. He served his one game suspension the next game, medlar evers, and they lost on a buzzer beater. year before that, Oliver served the same one game suspension. They played rivier and lost, in what was the last game of the yr. well first round of gnat tourney, they play rivier again, the very next game in the first round. this time with oliver. and win by 30 plus. The point is the team is a different with him coaching. but you obv see it your way. i just wish that if you get oliver in an interview, like yrs prior, you guys actually have the guts to confront him with these concerns you bring up on this board. bc just like you critiquing olives coaching, i can critique your journalism. so hopefully you or dave has the guts to do that, unlike years prior. I'm sure he'd be glad to answer

[GnacBballFan]

sorry for the typos, stupid iPhone

[GnacBballFan]

had forgotten my log in info, but I'm back! lets go falcons!!!

[D3HoopJunkie]

GNACBballFan.....welcome back and way to come back in a big way.

I however have to apologize to Pat because I totally forgot about Oliver recieving the Double T in the game prior but I do remeber it now. For some reason I had thought it was at the very beginning of this game with Medgar Evers.

Regardless of this I still think my points are valid

[Pat Coleman]

The eye test is far more important then anything you see on paper and again I know it's not the voters fault necessarily but it's just a shame that that's what it comes down to.

But if the eye test is more important than anything, how many teams do you have to eye test in order to vote? And then, what good is your eye test if you see a team play a crappy team? There can't be more than a couple games per year one can accurately "eye test" Albertus against.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

I saw Albertus play against Stockton this year.  I think Albertus is as talented, if not moreso, than any other team in d3.  The problem is, there are a lot of very talented teams - when they face each other, often discipline and teamwork win more often than talent.  My experience with Albertus is that they play more loose and freely than most teams.  I imagine that's a good way to get good players to come to Albertus in the first place, but it can backfire on you against good teams.

I look at Albertus and I see a team that could beat anyone on any night, even if the other team is playing their best game.  I just have trouble believing in their consistency because of the style of play.  One guy on a different page on one night could mean the difference in the tournament.

I haven't seen much of them as the season has moved along.  I hear the chemistry has improved, but there's really just no way to know for sure until they play better opponents.  It's why Dave won't put them above 12 - it's why, I imagine, a number of voters are reluctant to move them up as quickly.

With Albertus you could get a 40 out of them or a 100 depending on a lot of factors - I suspect many voters are more comfortable voting for a team that will give you 80-90 every night.

That's the result of my eye test, anyway.

[Ferraro13]

Fair assessment to me hoops!!!

Dave ranks Albertus 11th in his poll, and says that's their ceiling, won't rank them any higher hahahahahahaha. That makes a lot of sense. I needed a good laugh, thanks Dave!

[Pat Coleman]

Fair assessment to me hoops!!!

Dave ranks Albertus 11th in his poll, and says that's their ceiling, won't rank them any higher hahahahahahaha. That makes a lot of sense. I needed a good laugh, thanks Dave!

Based on who they played I can see why he would think that. I notice teams hop over Albertus Magnus on a weekly basis in the Top 25 so there must me many more voters who think the same way.

You may say "we can only play who's on our schedule" but the same is true for voters: We can only rank you based on who you played.

Even into last year's tournament, Albertus was ranked 13th, beat No. 14 on a neutral floor by two and then beat No. 15 in a close game on 15's floor. I think the poll held up pretty well there.

So far Albertus probably has a slightly better resume than it did last year -- only loss is to a ranked team (Central Connecticut game not a factor), no bad loss as of yet. They don't have a win over a ranked team like the Purchase win in January last year but they don't have the bad loss either.

An enigma until the NCAA Tournament.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Fair assessment to me hoops!!!

Dave ranks Albertus 11th in his poll, and says that's their ceiling, won't rank them any higher hahahahahahaha. That makes a lot of sense. I needed a good laugh, thanks Dave!

Based on who they played I can see why he would think that. I notice teams hop over Albertus Magnus on a weekly basis in the Top 25 so there must me many more voters who think the same way.

You may say "we can only play who's on our schedule" but the same is true for voters: We can only rank you based on who you played.

Even into last year's tournament, Albertus was ranked 13th, beat No. 14 on a neutral floor by two and then beat No. 15 in a close game on 15's floor. I think the poll held up pretty well there.

So far Albertus probably has a slightly better resume than it did last year -- only loss is to a ranked team (Central Connecticut game not a factor), no bad loss as of yet. They don't have a win over a ranked team like the Purchase win in January last year but they don't have the bad loss either.

An enigma until the NCAA Tournament.

I don't even think they're an enigma.  I'm sold on the capabilities.  I'm just completely unsure what team will show up on a given night.

[GnacBballFan]

Pat, they beat the 15th ranked team by 8 on their home court. Close game, i suppose, but Albertus was in control pretty much the entire game. Anyhow, I have no problem with them being ranked 11th. What I have a problem with is that Dave says thats their ceiling. So he has a pre determined spot for them, even though he has said on multiple occasions this top 25 is wacky. So why is their no shot to have albertus higher? Seems like narrow minded thinking to me is all. Also, maybe albertus was ranked good where they were last yr as you stated, but i remember a little debate with dave where he had them like 7 in new england, and clearly he was way off there. As they proved that in the tourney. Last thing, I remember the trinity's and west conns having NOOOOO problem playing albertus when i was a student from 04-08. Then Oliver came around and all the sudden those schools don't want to play?? this is a guy who has scheduled Central and Yale twice, one game in which they led with less then a minute.

[GnacBballFan]

Mind you I know west conn ended the drought, but there was a few yrs they didn't play, and i have a funny feeling it was bc albertus turned the tides on them. Albertus had 3 wins my fresh soph yr there, and begged guys from the baseball team, i was one, to play on the team just to look like they had bench players. insert Oliver and this program has done a 720, they were literally the bad news bears of d3 prior to oliver, look it up. Wopuld make for a freaking disney movie almost

[pjunito]

Great discussions here. Most Albertus fans are very excited about this team for many reasons; mostly because it is a veteran group of guys who have now played two years together. The new addition, Sledge, provides real leadership on the court. He has been able to control the tempo and emotion of the team over the last few weeks. Albertus plays in a very weak conference and didn't have significant out of conference wins. SOS really hurts. However, I think this team is more talented than last year group and more experienced. I don't know if this means that they will go further in the tournament, however, they could surprise a lot of people.

I don't really care about the top 25; however, most voters haven't seen all 300 plus teams play. Therefore, it is mostly a vote of numbers. So, Albertus being ranked number 7 is highly impressive considering their SOS is really weak and they don't have any wins vs a top 35 team and only one against a top 50 team. This tells me that most voters think Albertus is a very talented team. Why else would they be top 10 with such poor "numbers"?

Most Albertus supporters know where the team struggles. I want to see them clean that stuff up before the conference tournaments begin.

Go Falcons! Dunk Haven!!!!

[lildave678]

While I am absolutely a Falcons fan, I tend to be more on the conservative when it comes to the rankings/top 25/etc. Not that I don't believe in the team, but I can see where everyone comes from.

I think what Dave (and many others) are trying to say, and he can correct me if I'm wrong, is that he's not saying the Falcons can ONLY be the 11th or 12th best team in the country in the physical sense. Especially with this years madness I think he'd say that we have as good a shot as any to win the thing. He's simply saying, based on who we play that in his mind there's no reason to move them up. Why should wins against Norwich, the Riv, and Suffolk move us up? Again, I THINK no one is denying the talent - but from someone who doesn't see them every game like we do, wins against the GNAC do nothing for us. Anyone in the top 50 should beat the GNAC teams any given day. I think to some of us it's coming off as harsh because he's been critical of us in the past, both rankings wise and with his thoughts on Coach Oliver. Whereas, I tend to side with him more than others at least in terms of the top 25.

But I'll agree with PJ's statement that who gives a hoot about the top 25. We (Falcons fans) think this is our best shot since we've become relevant. Guess what, we're at the highest national ranking we've ever been so it IS being noticed, contrary to what people seem to think is happening.


As for the game, a scary game that in the past might have turned into one of those ugly losses Dave just spoke about. Lasell was on fire from 3, hitting 16 of 29 and hung around until the very end. The Falcons got down in the 2nd half but stayed composed, played their game, and ended up winning the game more comfortably than I thought they would. Vic was a monster with 28 and 14. Seemed like everytime we NEEDED a basket they got the ball down low to him, something we've NEVER done in the past. Good to see us finish a game strong without Tavon having a game to his standards. He only scored 9 points and was 0-3 from deep. Surprise of the game was absolutely Lex Perez. Love seeing the NVL get some burn on my Falcons. From what I saw at Crosby he can absolutely be the shooter Wiggins was and he showed it in this game. 4 for 5 from 3 and ending with 14 points. Second most minutes off the bench behind Walker. Hopefully this game gives him the confidence moving forward to be a big contributor off the bench.

Any word on Jennings? I coulda sworn I saw him out there but I was only checking every so often with the lo-def on my phone so they all look the same lol

[lildave678]

Also, Anna Maria with a surprise loss to Norwich. JWU back in sole possession of 2nd place.

[Saint-Paul]

The GNAC games are starting to get crazy this time of year.  The teams with sub 0.500 records that have nothing to lose are playing free and easy, making shots that they couldn't make in November, December, and January.      Lasell 4 - 8, makes 16 threes shooting 55% behind the arc and almost upsets Albertus.  Norwich, 4 - 9 , shoots 57% from the field and upsets Anna Maria by 4 points ( and just when I was jumping on the Amcats bandwagon too ) .  Mt Ida  2 - 9, makes 19 of 21 free throws, and is beating Emmanuel for three fourths of the game until a late surge by the Saints bench saves them from an upset.  Only JWU and St Joe held made it look easy against the sub 0.500 teams.  It looks like the next two weeks are going to be fun.  The top teams AMC, JWU, AM, and ST Joe fighting to maintain their positions and the sub 0.500 teams fighting to stay out of the basement.