MBB: State University of New York Athletic Conference

[Bengalsrule]

I TOLD YOU SO!!!!

Joining the BENGALS at BUFFALO Wild Wings (seems appropriate). Team says "thanks" for the shout out Magicman!!!!

[magicman]

I TOLD YOU SO!!!!

Joining the BENGALS at BUFFALO Wild Wings (seems appropriate). Team says "thanks" for the shout out Magicman!!!!

I expected that "I told you so" to be bigger, bolded, and orange!!! Easy on those wild wings you'll be paying the price come Saturday morning.

PS. What in hell were all those double technicals  about? Not even the radio announcers could figure them out. 

[Bengalsrule]

Double tech were bs. The refs were D1 and D2 refs.  1 ref in particular appearred to want to show he was in charge whenever the opportunity presented itself. Called double techs on Carthages Senior and a Buff State freshman who basically bumped each other after a foul.

Later Justin Mitchell was fouled by Kastel  They had a brief word and bang double tech. Same ref. He also took time to  chastise Chris Thompson and Jordan Glover when felt that they overeacted to a call.  And, yes it was the same ref! Dont get wrong. It was a physical game by 2 teams who have been in the same hotel since Weds.

Two techs were called in the first game also.  And overtime win  by N Central.

Ps  Wild Wings was a blast!!!!

[Bengalsrule]

Now that i have had a good nights rest...let me tell a few things about last night!  Critical move was around the 13 min mark of the 2nd halfand Carthage in the midst of a 16-0 run, coach Ansari took all 5 starters out AT ONCE and put in 5 freshman. Many say that they have never seen him do that ever  High school or  college.

That crew of freshman led by Johnny Belton, went toe to toe and gave no quarter. Freshman Jovohn Owens ans Carthages leading scorer, Marlon Senior, even got into abrief shoiving match ( which resulted in techs on both and sending Seniir to the bench). When i say they gave no quarter i mean these freshman, Lovell Smith, Reyzhon Jordan,Jonathon Belton and Jovohn Owens did not back down an inch. Coach let me go at it for at least 4-5 minutes.

By then the starters got the message and by 1 account Carthage did not acore a fg in the last 10:25 of the game. No play by play but on the CCIW boards a postet postedthat stat! Hell I beleieve that he is right!!!!

Startwrs gradually returned and the rst is history

[ECSUalum]

I TOLD YOU SO!!!!

Joining the BENGALS at BUFFALO Wild Wings (seems appropriate). Team says "thanks" for the shout out Magicman!!!!

I expected that "I told you so" to be bigger, bolded, and orange!!! Easy on those wild wings you'll be paying the price come Saturday morning.

PS. What in hell were all those double technicals  about? Not even the radio announcers could figure them out.

GOOD LUCK TO THE BENGALS VS NORTH CENTRAL COLLEGE TODAY!!!  GO BENGALS!!!

[Bengalsrule]

Good looking out ECSU. You know it's funny. I have been hanging out with the BENGAL coaches and for the past 2 mornings and we have had breakfast wtih E. Conns coaches. Last year we wrere both in a similar tourney in Miami and they all got to know each other. This morning the E Conn coach suggessted that we get NCC to turn it over "30 times". Gonna try our best!

Class act those East Conn coaches...and fans!

Good luck to E Conn vs Carthage in 23 mins. Heading over to see that game in a few. EAST COAST is representing!!!!

Go WARRIORS!!!!!

[magicman]

Now that i have had a good nights rest...let me tell a few things about last night!  Critical move was around the 13 min mark of the 2nd halfand Carthage in the midst of a 16-0 run, coach Ansari took all 5 starters out AT ONCE and put in 5 freshman. Many say that they have never seen him do that ever  High school or  college.

That crew of freshman led by Johnny Belton, went toe to toe and gave no quarter. Freshman Jovohn Owens ans Carthages leading scorer, Marlon Senior, even got into abrief shoiving match ( which resulted in techs on both and sending Seniir to the bench). When i say they gave no quarter i mean these freshman, Lovell Smith, Reyzhon Jordan,Jonathon Belton and Jovohn Owens did not back down an inch. Coach let me go at it for at least 4-5 minutes.

By then the starters got the message and by 1 account Carthage did not acore a fg in the last 10:25 of the game. No play by play but on the CCIW boards a postet postedthat stat! Hell I beleieve that he is right!!!!

Startwrs gradually returned and the rst is history

I remember that mass substitution and I had the Buff State roster up on my computer at the time. I quickly looked at the subs names and observed they were all Freshman. I thought, Coach Ansari is not happy with what  the regulars are doing and he's making a statement with this move. I also considered the fact that as well as humbling the starters for a brief stretch, it was giving them some valuable rest that hopefully would come in handy when they did get back into the game. It all worked out for the best.

On a side note I wonder if wild wings were the only thing you were ingesting last night. There was a poster on this board that mentioned that same thing about the lack of a field goal in the final 10:25.   

[magicman]

Just one game on tap today in the SUNYAC but it's a big one.

North Central vs Buffalo State    at Orlando, Florida     4:00 PM

The Bengals are sky high after their come from behind win over Carthage College last evening. Tonight they have to face another CCIW opponent. North Central won a tight game over Eastern Connecticut yesterday on a disputed foul call with 2 seconds left in regulation. The Cardinals came away with a 70-69 win and hope to sweep their East Coast foes this afternoon. Last weekend the Cardinals went to Virginia and won 2 games against ODAC teams so this would be especially sweet to do it again and go back to Illinois with a 4-0 record over the East Teams. The Oddsmakers have made the Cardinals a slight 3 point favorite over the Bengals, which is the same margin that Carthage was favored over Buffalo State yesterday. Yesterday I picked Carthage to win and the Bengals came away with the victory. I'm not gonna mess with that mojo so once again I'm picking Buffalo State to come out on the short end of a 76-72 score. Several weeks ago when the Bengals hosted their home tournament and played 2 schools from the Ohio Athletic Conference I picked them to beat Ohio Northern and John Carroll. The Bengals lost both games. I figured I needed to do something to turn that around. It worked yesterday and I hope it works today. Go Bengals

PS   Carthage leading Eastern Connecticut 60-58 with 05 seconds left but Carthage is going to the line to shoot fouls. So it looks like Eastern will lose their 2nd game. Buffalo State needs to win to salvage a split by the Eastern teams. Oh yeah and to claim bragiing rights plus the tournament championship. Go Bengals       

[magicman]

Buffalo State Leads North Central at the break  36-29

Bengals have been in control of this game since the early going. I'm not happy that they let the big lead get cut in half though.

The Cardinals were down by as many as 16 points in this game with 7 minutes left in the half but fought back to get it down to 5 points, on 2 trips to the free throw line by Brandon Williams, who made 1 of 2 each time.

It appears that a technical foul was called on the team against North Central, with 40 seconds to go and then another one was called with 36 seconds to play. Buffalo State's Jordan Glover made all 4 free throws to open up a 9 point lead at 36-27. Williams hit a layup for North Central just before the buzzer to make it the 7 point margin at halftime.

Landon Gamble leads the Cardinals with 12 points and 4 rebounds. In looking at the box score that live stats has provided it has notated that Kevin Honn has a technical foul, so that would account for one of the 3 T's. 

Rod Epps is the high man for the Bengals with 11 points. Jordan Glover with all those free throws has 8 points and Justin Mitchell has 7.
Brad Doyley has 5 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 steals. Bengals press not quite as effective as it was yesterday against the Redmen but still caused the Cardinals to vcommit 10 turnovers in the 1st half. bengals have 5 TO's.

I smell another barnburner coming up.

[magicman]

Here comes that barnburner I got a sniff of as Buffalo State leads North Central 75-70 with 1:13 left to play.

After the teams  missed shots and turnovers the Bengals  Chris Thompson is fouled and makes 1 of 2 and the lead is now 76-70 with 1:13 to play.

North Central commits another turnover and fouls the Bengals Justin Mitchell, who makes them both to make it 78-70.

The teams once again exchange TO's and then the Cardinals miss a 3 point attempt and foul Rod Epps, who extends the lead to 80-70 with 33 ticks left. This game is over and Buffalo State will claim the Holiday Championship. The foul parade is called off and North Central gets a basket with 10 seconds left to make the final score 80-72

Great weekend for the Bengals and the SUNYAC as the Boys from the Queen City did the conference proud.

I'll have more to say a bit later on. Big ice storm here in the North Country and I have to get home while I still can.

[ECSUalum]

Congrats to the Buffalo St Bengals for their tournament championship this weekend!!!  Hopefully Buffalo St  gets some D3Hoops top 25 love next week

[Bengalsrule]

Thank you very much ECSU alum

[7express]

Double tech were bs. The refs were D1 and D2 refs.  1 ref in particular appearred to want to show he was in charge whenever the opportunity presented itself. Called double techs on Carthages Senior and a Buff State freshman who basically bumped each other after a foul.

Later Justin Mitchell was fouled by Kastel  They had a brief word and bang double tech. Same ref. He also took time to  chastise Chris Thompson and Jordan Glover when felt that they overeacted to a call.  And, yes it was the same ref! Dont get wrong. It was a physical game by 2 teams who have been in the same hotel since Weds.

Two techs were called in the first game also.  And overtime win  by N Central.

Ps  Wild Wings was a blast!!!!

That's my favorite spot to go watch games.  I absolutely love BWW's.

[magicman]

Buffalo State 80    North Central 72

Hard to imagine the Bengals Florida trip concluding with a better ending. Two quality wins over teams from a top rated conference.  Brings back memories of their DC trip from 2 seasons ago when they won 2 games that went right down to the wire also. And of course there were the 2 wins last year in Miami over the holidays. That DC holiday tournament was preceded by one in 2010 at Worcester State where the Bengals picked up another pair of victories.  Lets list them here for a recap.

December 11th 2010 98-92 over Elms College at the Worcester State Tournament Elms was 4-2 at gametime

December 12th 2010 79-76 over Colby-Sawyer for the Championship of the Worcester Tournament  Chargers were 4-4 at gametime

December 31st 2011 80-77 over Wesleyan University at the Catholic University Holiday Tournament Wesleyan was 9-1 at gametime

January 1st 2012      82-81 over host Catholic to win the Championship of their tournament. Catholic was 11-0 at gametime

December 21st 2012   89-85 over Eastern Connecticut at the Miami Holiday Tournament  6-2 at gametime

December 22nd 2012  83-67 over Coe to finish the Tournament unbeaten  5-3 at gametime

December 20th 2013  67-65 over Carthage in the Orlando Holiday Classic  Carthage was 6-3 with wins over #4 and #9 of the Top 25

December 21st 2013  80-72 over North Central to win the Orlando Holiday Classic  The Cardinals were 7-2 at gametime

Tonight's win makes it 8 straight holiday victories over quality teams from all parts of the country. None of these teams had a losing record and in fact nearly all of them had very good records at the time of the contest. Several of them were undefeated or nationally ranked. Certainly a nice run of holiday tournaments for Buffalo State.  Also an awful lot of Cardinals in that group. (Wesleyan, Catholic, and North Central) The only Cardinals that really and truly matter however, the Plattsburgh variety, will prove to be much tougher birds to bring down.    

In todays game the Bengals were led by Rod Epps with 22 points. Rod was almost perfect shooting the rock, as he was 8x9 from the field and 5x5 from the line. His only miss was a 3 point attempt as he was 1x2 from long range.

Justin Mitchell had 18 points (6x9 fg, 1x1 3's, 5x6 ft), 5 rebounds and 2 blocks. Chris Thompson had a double double with 13 points (4x10 fg, 0x1 3's, 5x6 ft) and a game high 11 rebounds. He also led the team with 3 steals. Jordan Glover added 10 points, 2 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals. Brad Doyley only scored 2 points but had a career best 12 assists and was 2nd on the team with 7 rebounds.

Chris Boyd came off the bench and only saw 8 minutes of action but hit 2 huge 3 pointers in those 8 minutes. His first triple came with 6:26 left in the game and brought the Bengals back from their first deficit since early in the game when they were down 6-4. Buffalo State had just allowed the Cardinals to come all the way back from that 16 point 2nd half deficit. Finally gaining a 3 point advantage at 66-63, the largest lead North Central would enjoy, Boyd made sure it was short lived, as he buried his 3 pointer on the Bengals next possession, 22 seconds later. That shot shifted the momentum back to the Bengals  The 2nd bomb that Chris would deliver came several minutes later with the Bengals up 72-70. His triple made it 75-70 with 2:16 to play and was the basket that sucked the life out of North Central. After the Cardinals missed on their next possession they were forced to foul and the Bengals hit 5 of 6 from the line to put this game away.

Buffalo State outshot the Cardinals in every category. The Bengals were 25x51 from the field (49%), 5x12 from long distance (41.7%), and 25x38 (65.8%) from the line. They were outrebounded by North Central 42 to 31. Buff State had 14 turnovers while NCC had 18.

North Central was led by their preseason 1st team All American Landon Gamble who scored 18 points (7x12 fg, 4x5 ft)and had 4 rebounds. Tyler Sutton came off the bench and also had 18 points (7x14 fg, 2x8 3's, 2x3 ft). Vince Kmiec had 16 points (5x16 fg, 3x10 3's, 3x4 ft ) and led the Cardinals with 8 rebounds. Brandon Williams had 8 points, 6 assists, 4 rebounds and 3 steals. Cardinals shot 28x64 from the field (43.8%), 5x21 from beyond the arc (23,8%) and 11x20 from the stripe (55%).

North Central falls to 7-3 and will return to action when they host North Park on January 4th to open CCIW conference play.

Buffalo State improves to 6-3 and will be idle until Friday, January 10th when they travel to Cortland State to resume SUNYAC play at 8:00 PM.

One last thought about the Buffalo State weekend. If North Central's Landon Gamble is a 1st team All American, then what is the  Bengals' Justin Mitchell? 1st Team All World? Gamble's weekend stat's: 16 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 12x23 from the field (52.1%) 8x13 from the line (61.5%), fouled out of both games (which I told a Buff State coach would happen). Mitchell's weekend stats: 21 ppg, 8.5 rpg, 17x28 from the field (60.7%),  7x8 from the line (87.5%)  didn't foul out of either contest. Too bad Justin was just on the D3hoops Team of the Week cause he certainly merits consideration for another.

The Bengals weekend may have lifted the SUNYAC up several places in the Massey Ratings. I know yesterday's Buffalo State win moved the Bengals up around 20 spots as they were #114 and they are now #90.

The ice storm here in the North Country is getting pretty bad. Freezing rain all day long and it's still going on. The forecast is calling for continued freezing rain all night long and well into Sunday. Tree branches are heavily coated with branches bending and breaking. Power outages occurring with frequency and I hope this isn't a repeat of the great Northeast ice storm we had in 1998. My poor dog can't even stand up to take a whizz as the snow is coated so heavily with ice that all he does is slide when he tries to lift his leg. Gonna have to train him to use the john I guess.                  

[Titan Q]

Congrats to the Buffalo St Bengals for their tournament championship this weekend!!!  Hopefully Buffalo St  gets some D3Hoops top 25 love next week

Definitely good wins by Buffalo State over NCC and Carthage.  As I posted on the CCIW board though...

Keep in mind though, Bengals, that Carthage and North Central are probably projected to be the 4th and 5th teams (in no particular order) in the 2014 CCIW race -- Illinois Wesleyan, Augustana, and Wheaton seem to be the contenders for the top 3 spots heading into league play.  I think Elmhurst could even finish higher than one of these teams.  If one of these CCIW teams finishes 6th it won't be a huge surprise.

Buffalo State was 13-11 last year, 8-10 in the SUYNAC.  They came to Orlando with losses to Ohio Northern, John Carroll, and Hobart.  I think the "OK" tag by bopol was pretty fair for your Bengals...just as its fair for both Carthage and NCC. 


I don't think either of these wins is enough to get Buffalo State (with losses to Ohio Northern, John Carroll, and Hobart) Top 25 votes.