Dribblings 2/9/2005 (Suspension Edition)

Big South: Winthrop 72, High Point 55 (story) - The Winthrop Gauntlet, as mentioned yesterday, is a four-game, six-day stretch; they'll take any break they can get. Last night, they took advantage of the indefinite suspension of HP's star forward (and defending Big South Player Of The Year) Danny Gathings, and used a big second half to throttle the Panthers in front of their own fans. The Eagles have now won nine straight, and are halfway through the Gauntlet - tomorrow they get a roadie at second-place Liberty, which sits two games back. Do you think they'll be tournament-ready after this? Yep.

Shootaround!

Ivy: Pennsylvania (12-7, 5-0 Ivy) came back from 18 down with 13 minutes remaining and won in overtime, 70-62; insodoing, they killed archrival Princeton's (10-8, 1-4 Ivy) season dead. It was, simply put, the greatest game the Palestra has seen so far this century, and there will be more on this later.

Northeast: Monmouth (11-9, 10-1 NEC) picked up the half-game they'd been missing by skewering Quinnipiac 91-81 at the friendly confines of their Boylan Gym. The game served as a showcase of the inside-outside attack they hope to ride back into the Tournament: rangy Blake Hamilton penetrated at will for 29, and Floridian jumping bean Tyler Azzarelli struck long-range for 25. They lead the conference by a full game as Fairleigh Dickinson sat idly by.

Ohio Valley: Southeast Missouri (11-10, 6-4 OVC) is hot. SEMO has come out of nowhere to win six straight, and deposit themselves right into the thick of the O'Valley race. Oversized guard Dainmon Gonner had 23 and 10 as they victimized Eastern Illinois 88-79.

Game! Of! The! Night!

Every time you turn around, there's a hot game in the Mid-American Conference. Ball State (12-7, 7-4 MAC) is first in the Mid-American West (they currently have the tiebreaker over fellow 7-4 Bowling Green), and you can't swing a cat around The Mid-Majority these days without hitting a paragraph fawning all over Miami (Oh.)'s (14-5, 9-2 MAC) recent East dominance and their six-game winning streak. The Cardinals are coming off a bad loss to Marshall, but it was their first home drop of the season - they're nails at Worthen Arena, in front of The Nest. Tonight is White Out III, so don't wear red or your David Letterman double-breasted skinny-suit. Tip is at 7:00 Eastern, and you can listen along at home.

Oh yeah, there's that going on tonight too. You're excused, but just this once.

In other MAC news, Ohio is pumping themselves up for their Saturday "Battle Of The Bricks" versus Miami by rerunning articles from the Bobcats' 1985 NCAA run in their student newspaper (that is, when they're not talking smack). A bunch of OU no-names spoiling a star-powered Red~~skin~~Hawk attack. Hmmmm. Know your history, former MMBOW Danny Horace?

During Monday night's SWAC game between Jackson State and Southern, JSU guard Charlie White laid out the Jaguars' Chris Alexander late in the first half. White will soon learn how long he'll be suspended for. This was no regular NBA-style grope-and-smack, this was a real The Punch kind of punch. "It was like Ali-Frazier," an eyewitness e-mailed me yesterday. "Dude went down."

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