WBB: Little East

[7express]

USM beats Western 69-56.
Courtney Cochran did not play for USM and wasn't even with the team (neither dressed in uniform or in street clothes).  Something to keep an eye on later in the year. 

[7express]

Rest of Saturday results:

Dartmouth 76-62 over Plymouth.
Colleen Moriarty lead 3 Corsairs in double figures.  Once again Colleen O'Hara for Plymouth was a DNP, has to be an injury at this point.  A Dartmouth win over West Conn next weekend would tie them for 4th in the standings, guess we weren't as comfortable as I first thought.

Keene clobbers Boston 75-33.
Kirsten Morrison got held to 6 points and 9 boards in 33 minutes of action.  15 players for Keene played 5+ minutes.

USM 69-56.
As stated earlier, USM finished the final 9:33 on a 27-8 run.  And granted it didn't matter in the end, and made the final margin 13 instead of 11, but you would think a senior would be smart enough to realise to dribble the ball out when the opponent is letting her do that, then to do stat padding.  USM hosts Colby on Tuesday, their gonna have big problems if Cochran is out for that game as well.

RIC keeps rolling 83-52 over Eastern.
What was a close game at halftime (33-29), RIC ended it by outscoring the Warriors 50-23 in the 2nd stanza.  Cynthia Gaudet lead them with 19, Rachel Riley had 16 and 7, while Danyelle Rodriguez lead the Warriors with 17.

Since were approaching February from here on out after every conference day, I'm going to post the updated standings, and how the conference tournament would shape out if the season ended today.

1) RIC 17-2 (9-0)
2) USM 15-4 (7-2)
2) Keene 13-5 (7-2)
4) Western 13-6 (5-4)
5) Dartmouth 12-7 (4-5)
6) Eastern 6-13 (2-7)
6) Boston 5-14 (2-7)
8) Plymouth 2-15 (0-9)
Eastern, Boston & Plymouth are all eliminated from claiming the #1 seed, Dartmouth is 1 loss OR  1 RIC win from being eliminated for that 1 seed as well.  Boston won the first head to head meeting against Eastern this year (rematch is Feb 18- final day of the season), so Boston has the 6th and final spot.  Likewise, USM won the only head to head meeting against Keene (rematch is next Saturday), so they get the 2 seed and final bye while Keene gets #3.
RIC would host the semi's and get to a bye to them, and USM would join RIC in the semi's.  Keene would host Boston and Western would host Dartmouth in the first round on Tuesday to open the tournament.

No LEC games on Tuesday, so we get OOC games on Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday of this week, before LEC action picks up again Saturday.
Tuesday schedule (will have predictions Monday):
Colby @ USM
Lesley @ Plymouth
Tufts @ RIC
Eastern @ Bowdoin (good luck).

[7express]

Tuesday predictions:

Colby 56 @ USM 59.
Colby is receiving votes, you would think USM would go into that ORV category if they win this; that would give them wins over Bowdoin (was ranked at the time, not even receiving votes now though), Colby (bounced around between the top 25 & ORV all year) and Babson this year (top 20 all season).  It sounds like Courtney Cochran will be back, so I'll take the Huskies by a field goal.

Lesley 32 @ Plymouth 58.
The 2 teams are on a combined 25 game losing streak (Plymouth on a 9 game losing streak, Lesley on a 16 game losing streak), and bring a combined 2-31 record into Foley gymnasium.  Lesley has been held to 40 points or less in 13 of their 16 games this season, while Plymouth has scored 40+ in 16 of 17, that's the difference in this pillow fight.

Tufts 56 @ RIC 62.
Best game of the day.  It's too bad the West Conn men have a game because I really want to see this game.  Tufts has good defewnsive pressure but 2 things which I think will decide the game 1) They have no height and 2) they can have periods in the game where they struggle to score.  The height disadvantage for the Jumbo's will be the main reason I think they lose this game, but really could go either way.

Eastern 45 @ Bowdoin 83.
Yah, good luck Eastern!  Bowdoin coming off a big win over NESCAC and state rival Colby, so their could be an emotional letdown for the Polar Bears.

Massey ratings:
Tufts 55-51 (62%)
USM 64-62 (55%)
Bowdoin 71-51 (97%)
Plymouth 72-28 (100%).  Wow, Lesley must be really bad if Plymouth has a 100% to win.

[Maine 1]

A couple of thoughts here-first on Tufts--they actually have a very good freshman post player--who battled Colby's bigs evenly a few weeks ago (Colby has a 6-3 and 6-1 front line)--so don't be surprised if she doesn't get more playing time.

Colby versus USM should be interesting.  I would not be surprised either way on that one

[7express]

Tuesday results:

USM 73-67 over Colby.
Haley Jordan lead 3 Huskies in double figures with 23 points.  That gives USM wins over Colby, Bowdoin & Babson this year all teams that were either ranked or in the ORV category at the time.  Hopefully this gives USM some votes in next week's poll.
Plymouth 63-27 over Lesley.
Plymouth held Lesley to 4-23 shooting in the 2nd half.  Kellie Walsh lead the Panthers with 13 points
RIC over Tufts 62-41.
Their really rolling, Tufts was 17-3 on the season, losing 2 of their first 3 games in November when they had to replace the school's all-time leading scorer in Colleen Hart, and then lost by 1 to Bowdoin in the final seconds.  RIC held Tufts to 23.2% shooting.  Rachel Riley and Cynthia Gaudet each poured in 15 and Riley missed a double double by 1 rebound.  That's now 16 straight W's for RIC.
Bowdoin 65-45.
Eastern is going the opposite way as this was their 7th straight loss.  Kristina Forsman scored 11 of Eastern's 20 field goals and attempted 24 of their 55 field goals.  She lead them with 23, noone else scored more than 7.  Jill Henrikson lead the Polar Bears with 25.
When you take into account the 5 men's games on Tuesday, the LEC finished 5-3 against the NESCAC with 1 game remaining this week.  Not sure of the overall record of the league is the whole season.

Wednesday schedule :
Mount Ida @ Mass-Dartmouth.  I'll have a prediction in my next post

[7express]

Wednesday schedule:

Mount Ida 62 @ Dartmouth 67.
Mount Ida is 10-9 on the year and 4-4 in the GNAC.  They are 1-1 against the LEC this year; losing to Keene state and beating Boston.   Dartmouth is 2-0 against the GNAC beating Johnson & Wales by a combined 22.5.

[7express]

Wednesday result:

Dartmouth 70-55.
Colleen Moriarty lead the Corsairs with 17 who now assured of no worse than a .500 season this year.  The Corsairs forced 23 Mount Ida turnovers, and they converted those turnovers into 22 points

Thursday schedule (predictions in next post):
Johsnon state @ Plymouth state
Western @ Bridgewater state

[7express]

Thursday predictions:

Johnson state 54 @ Plymouth 62.
The teams are a combined 7-30.  Take out Johnson state's 2 wins against USCAA teams and their only win against a D-3 team is Green Mountain state who they swept (0-14 in any other D-3 games this year).  Last year's 82-48 win over the Badgers gave Plymouth their only win in their 16 losses in 17 game stretch to end the season.

Western Connecticut 65 @ Bridgewater 67.
The 2 teams have the same exact record (each 13-6).  Bridgewater has won 8 of 9 since the calendar turned to 2012 to run out to a 2 game lead in the MASCAC with 4 conference games remaining.  Looking at the NCAA milage counter https://web1.ncaa.org/TES/exec/miles (what the NCAA uses to calculate miles between schools) between Bridgewater and UMass-Dartmouth (where we play Saturday) is only 32 miles, while Western to Bridgewater is 174 miles and Western to Dartmouth is 172 miles.  I know it's a Friday and there's probably some girls that have class, and I know were talking about D-3 here, but it seems incredibly pointless to travel all the way back to Danbury at 10:00 PM on a Thursday night (it's at least a 2:45 trip), only to come right back up here on Friday night/Saturday morning.   Hell, the only reason I'm actually going to be coming back is I'm going to see Skidmore play @ Vassar Friday night; if that game was a different weekend, or was on Saturday instead of Friday, I'd stay up there Thursday and Friday, and probably go into Boston to visit my cousin who goes to BU.

[7express]

Thursday results:

Plymouth 66-49 over Johnson state.
Kellie Walsh was a surprising non-starter for the Panthers (she's started every game to date for them this year); she had 2 points on 1-7 shooting in 24 minutes off the bench.
Bridgewater over Western 72-67.
Luckily this didn't count in the LEC standings because this was not a very well played game by Western.   We were up by 2 at halftime, largely in part because Bridgewater had a 10 minute stretch in the 1st half where they made 1 field goal.  We were down 9 with 1:38 to go, and back to back 3's from Taylor Nkonoki and Caroline Brasa, and a jumper by Stephanie Slosnki got us to within 68-65 with 47 seconds left.  After 4 straight missed Bridgewater free throws, we got the ball back with a chance to tie, but a Caroline Brasa turnover (our 29th and final of the game ) gave it back to the Bears, they converted both free throws, and that was the game.  We probably had our best game from the line; 11-12 from the charity stripe when were at or near the bottom in that department in the conference.  Even though we shot 50% from 3, and had a chance to force OT, you don't deserve to win when you turn the ball over 29 times.  Fought back well the final 98 seconds to give us a chance to tie hopefully we can use that these next 4 games.  This was our final OOC game of the season, and everything else from here on out counts now.  Can't afford anymore games like this. 

Saturday schedule (have predictions tomorrow):
RIC @ Boston
Plymouth @ Eastern
USM @ Keene
Western @ Dartmouth.
USM/Keene best game, Boston/RIC worst game, Eastern/Plymouth most important game.  My superlative's for Saturday.

[7express]

Also, Saturday could give us our first home opponent in the opening round of the LEC tournament: RIC (who has already clinched a spot in the 6 team field) can finish no worse then the 4 seed with a win over Boston AND a Western loss to Dartmouth.

[MVP]

Is there any doubt remaining as to whether the referees are in the bag at USM home games?  Yet another blatant example was on 1/31/12. USM had 33 free-throw attempts, Colby had 15 free-throw attempts. USM 's Jordan was 13-16 at the line... once again she had more free-throw attempts than the whole Colby team. This has happened time and time again. Look at the boxscores throughout the season This is not a coincidence. They should be forced to play any post season games at a neutral court, otherwise be disqualified.
Since 12/30, the New Years Tournament, hosted by USM at Gorham...they have hosted 9 home games, 11/22 there is no posted boxscore. that I can find....but out of the remaining 8 home games;
Opponents have had 103 free-throw attempts, USM has had 214 free-throw attempts.

In response to 7express,  "That gives USM wins over Colby, Bowdoin & Babson this year all teams that were either ranked or in the ORV category at the time". " Hopefully this gives USM some votes in next week's poll."
In those three (opponent ranked) wins, all three games were home at Gorham, opponents had 33 FTA, USM had 76 FTA   

Their only 4 losses all season were away games!!! We'll see how they perform in late February away from home ice advantage.

[7express]

They only have 2 road games left the rest of the season: Keene state Saturday then Dartmouth the final day of the season the 18th.  The other 3 (Boston the 7th, RIC the 11th and Plymouth the 14th) are all at home.  We'll see if RIC is able to beat them up there.  USM could possibly lose to Keene (I hope not, but they only beat them by 7 in Gorham in January), but can't see them losing @ Dartmouth, and should be able to beat Boston & Plymouth without a problem.

[7express]

Sat predictions:

RIC 64 @ Boston 42.
Last meeting was a 23 point RIC win.  Kirtsen Morrison lead the Beacons with 14 points, no one else had more than 6.  They'll need more scoring, but probably not going to matter much.

Plymouth 47 @ Eastern 50.
Must win for Plymouth.  They sit 2 back of both Boston & Eastern, and a loss would put them 3 back of Eastern for the 6th spot.  A loss would also give Eastern the 2-0 season series and first tiebreaker.  A win would put them right back in the mix at only a game back, and would only have to win 1 of these games: @ USM, vs. Keene, @ Western instead of all 3 if they were to lose.

USM 57 @ Keene 52.
A Keene win and we can officially drop West Conn out of the top 2.  We'd still be 2 back of USM regardless (with the tie breaker) and a Keene win over USM would give them that tiebreaker over us, so they'd really be 3 up on us with 4 to play.  Keene only lost by 7 in Gorham, their question is will they be able to score consistantly enough, because their undersized against USM.

Western 62 @ Dartmouth 58.
Probably gonna end up being the 4/5 matchup when it's all said and done, only question is where it takes place.  Dartmouth more then likely wins the first matchup if they don't come out of halftime shooting 4-20 to start.  Dartmouth win, not only are they tied in the standings, Dartmouth assures themselves of a winning season.

[MVP]

Southern Maine loses at Keene. Shouldn't be a  shock or a surprise. Southern Maine did not have the benefit of the home town referee calls in this one . All five losses for USM this season have been on the road, where they didn't have the referees in the bag. Good luck to Umass/Boston , RIC and Plymouth playing in Gorham, the officiating makes it almost impossible for opponents to get out of there with a win.

[7express]

Boston & Plymouth could have the refs in the bag for them and it wouldn't matter.  Those 2 would need more than the refs on their side to beat USM.

I get it, your mad that Babson lost up there (I didn't watch the game nor watch it on live stats, so I can't comment on the officiating), but give it a rest already!  It's already been known and I've mentioned it on here, that ALL teams in Maine (Colby, Bowdoin, USM...all the power teams) get the home town discount when it comes to officiating.  It's been proven, and will continue to happen.  As I said RIC is more than capable of beating them since their the only team in the conference that actually matches up with them.  At least this USM loss means aside from a major choke from RIC, USM WILL NOT be hosting the semifinals, and right now Keene has a better chance to host it then USM does, especially since they'll have to beat RIC later on which'll mean winning that tiebreaker should it come to that.