February 21, 2005 8:40 am ET by Kyle Whelliston |
America East: Northeastern 63, Boston University 48 (story) - It's a dog-eat-dog world, and nowhere is that more true than in this conference. The Terriers of BU (19-6, 13-3 AE) stifled junior sharpshooter and former MMBOW Jose Juan Barea (2-for-17, 10 pts) on Senior Day, and held on to a lead for nearly 30 minutes. But at the 12-minute mark of the second half, the Huskies of NU (17-8, 13-3 AE) began unraveling a scorching 30-7 run that overtook and enveloped their hosts. The two teams are now tied for second in the league, two games behind Vermont.
Vermont, as mentioned yesterday, lost to the Nevada Wolfpack (on TV!) this weekend. They'd probably be well-served to make it to the tourney title game if they want to feel safe on Selection Sunday. If this happens, and one of these two Dogpacks nips them in that final to earn the automatic Dance ticket, we might actually, really, truly see a two-bid America East.
Shootaround!
Let's look at the conferences that are less about Bracket Busting and more about tourney-seed jostling.
Atlantic Sun: Only the top eight make it to the conference tournament - nine of the 11 teams have records of .500 or better, thanks to 0-18 Campbell. Gardner-Webb (15-10, 12-6 ASun) leads at the moment, but they've gone 4-4 over their last eight including a 80-61 drop at Lipscomb on Saturday. Wide open.
Big Sky: Portland State (18-7, 10-2 BSky), the presumptive Dancers from this league, lost 83-62 in a Bracket Buster to the Sun Belt's Middle Tennessee State in a game where former MMBOW Seamus Boxley had 18 points and 10 rebounds. The Vikings have a Thursday tuneup against second-place Montana State heading into the tourney.
Big South: Winthrop (21-5, 13-1 BSC) is firmly in command; their thirteenth straight victory was a 74-66 home W over High Point, and reigning MMBOW Torrell Martin had 14 points.
Colonial: Old Dominion (24-4, 14-2 CAA) rebounded from their drop to George Mason last week by beating William & Mary by 16, 82-66; that's six points for William, and ten for Mary. With two games to go, the Monarchs have all but wrapped up the one-seed.
Horizon: Wisconsin-Milwaukee (19-5, 13-2 HL) clinched the top seed last week, and they've won five in a row - that includes their 87-81 win during their short Hawaiian vacation over the weekend.
Ivy: Pennsylvania (15-8, 8-1 Ivy) finally lost one - they fell hard at Yale on Saturday, 78-60. Believe it or not, but the only credible threat to the Quakers now are those Bulldogs, who are 5-3 and winners of four straight. This was also only the fifth weekend in Ivy League history in which Yale swept Penn and Princeton.
Metro Atlantic: Niagara sits atop the stack at 12-4, Rider is one behind at 11-5 - they'll meet this coming Saturday (the first meeting was a 102-97 non-OT thriller won by NU), and the one-seed may be on the line there. The Purple Eagles lost their Buster to the Akron Zips of the MAC, 74-68.
Mid-Continent: Oral Roberts (20-5, 11-2 MidCon) are clicking on all cylinders now heading into their final showdown with Missouri-Kansas City; they've won five straight and beat a good Missouri Valley team in Southwest Missouri State at their place, 86-76. Pretty impressive, considering the Bears had won seven of their last eight.
Mid-Eastern: Coppin State holds a slight lead at 11-4; longtime leaders Delaware State have been joined by Hampton and Norfolk State at 10-4. The Hampton Pirates are the hot team right now, having won three straight.
Northeast: On Friday, the Monmouth Hawks (13-12, 12-4 NEC) were walking on air, enjoying the finest of what the NEC has to offer, and they had two home games scheduled for the weekend. But a steal by Fairleigh Dickinson's Chad Timberlake with 23 seconds left changed the mood in MU-land - it iced a 62-58 Knights win and moved FDU to within a half-game of the Hawks at 11-3. Yesterday, Monmouth dropped another one at home, this time it was to 7-8 Wagner. The Seahawks came from behind to win 60-53, hitting their free throws down the stretch; Blake Hamilton's gym-leading 21 points weren't enough to close the gap.
Ohio Valley: Tennessee Tech (15-10, 10-4 OVC) had been missing from the top of the table for a couple of weeks, but they're back. On Saturday, they avenged the loss to Samford that had dropped them out of the top spot, winning 70-62 at home.
Patriot: Holy Cross (20-5, 11-1 PL) is proving all tha' haters wrong - they've rattled off 12 in a row, their only league loss being the season-opener at Bucknell (18-8, 9-3 PL, 2nd place). On Wednesday night, the Crusaders will have the chance to avenge that drop and wrap up the Patriot League regular-season title.
Southern: Behind West division champs Davidson (16-7, 14-0 SoCon), this conference tournament will be wide open. Possible foreshadowing doom: the entirety of the tourney will be held next week on East-leading Chattanooga's home floor.
Southland: Southeastern Louisiana (19-7, 11-2 SLC) looks strong heading into the tourney - if defense wins championships, their average of 54 points allowed per game should do the trick. That tenacious D was on display on Saturday as they defeated Stephen F. Austin 52-41.
Southwestern Athletic: Alabama A&M still leads at 10-3 with four teams on their collective tail. On Saturday, the Bulldogs beat the most recognizable SWAC name to most casual hoop fans, Alcorn State, by a score of 77-63. The Braves are in last place at 4-10, so some folks might want to update their SWACtionaries.
Sun Belt: Western Kentucky and Arkansas-Little Rock (both 8-4) fight it out atop the Belt's East division; Louisiana-Lafayette (11-2) and Denver (10-3) scrap out West. All four teams likely have a tourney run in 'em, Denver and Little Rock hold the one-seed tiebreakers due to season sweeps.
Well, Red State Basketball Goodwill Tour 2005 is over. I've travelled over 2,600 miles in a week, going to some great hoops and meeting some great folks. Never did get those car problems fixed, but I made it back to Philadelphia in one piece. There will be a set of travelogues posted sometime in the near future (safely linked and tucked away off the main page), but first I need some time to make sense of this.
He was a man who dearly loved the Tournament and understood its rhythms. On a grander scale, he helped remove the inherent pretentiousness in first-person journaling, and showed us that incomplete and incoherent sentences were okay sometimes... if they got the point across. He will remain a hero to any writer who jumps in a car and hits the highway to try and capture the American Dream in words - and for someone who still thinks that Dream can be found at a small-college basketball game, it will feel different knowing he's not out there anymore. I'll miss him.
Hunter S. Thompson 1939-2005
Vermont, as mentioned yesterday, lost to the Nevada Wolfpack (on TV!) this weekend. They'd probably be well-served to make it to the tourney title game if they want to feel safe on Selection Sunday. If this happens, and one of these two Dogpacks nips them in that final to earn the automatic Dance ticket, we might actually, really, truly see a two-bid America East.
Shootaround!
Let's look at the conferences that are less about Bracket Busting and more about tourney-seed jostling.
Atlantic Sun: Only the top eight make it to the conference tournament - nine of the 11 teams have records of .500 or better, thanks to 0-18 Campbell. Gardner-Webb (15-10, 12-6 ASun) leads at the moment, but they've gone 4-4 over their last eight including a 80-61 drop at Lipscomb on Saturday. Wide open.
Big Sky: Portland State (18-7, 10-2 BSky), the presumptive Dancers from this league, lost 83-62 in a Bracket Buster to the Sun Belt's Middle Tennessee State in a game where former MMBOW Seamus Boxley had 18 points and 10 rebounds. The Vikings have a Thursday tuneup against second-place Montana State heading into the tourney.
Big South: Winthrop (21-5, 13-1 BSC) is firmly in command; their thirteenth straight victory was a 74-66 home W over High Point, and reigning MMBOW Torrell Martin had 14 points.
Colonial: Old Dominion (24-4, 14-2 CAA) rebounded from their drop to George Mason last week by beating William & Mary by 16, 82-66; that's six points for William, and ten for Mary. With two games to go, the Monarchs have all but wrapped up the one-seed.
Horizon: Wisconsin-Milwaukee (19-5, 13-2 HL) clinched the top seed last week, and they've won five in a row - that includes their 87-81 win during their short Hawaiian vacation over the weekend.
Ivy: Pennsylvania (15-8, 8-1 Ivy) finally lost one - they fell hard at Yale on Saturday, 78-60. Believe it or not, but the only credible threat to the Quakers now are those Bulldogs, who are 5-3 and winners of four straight. This was also only the fifth weekend in Ivy League history in which Yale swept Penn and Princeton.
Metro Atlantic: Niagara sits atop the stack at 12-4, Rider is one behind at 11-5 - they'll meet this coming Saturday (the first meeting was a 102-97 non-OT thriller won by NU), and the one-seed may be on the line there. The Purple Eagles lost their Buster to the Akron Zips of the MAC, 74-68.
Mid-Continent: Oral Roberts (20-5, 11-2 MidCon) are clicking on all cylinders now heading into their final showdown with Missouri-Kansas City; they've won five straight and beat a good Missouri Valley team in Southwest Missouri State at their place, 86-76. Pretty impressive, considering the Bears had won seven of their last eight.
Mid-Eastern: Coppin State holds a slight lead at 11-4; longtime leaders Delaware State have been joined by Hampton and Norfolk State at 10-4. The Hampton Pirates are the hot team right now, having won three straight.
Northeast: On Friday, the Monmouth Hawks (13-12, 12-4 NEC) were walking on air, enjoying the finest of what the NEC has to offer, and they had two home games scheduled for the weekend. But a steal by Fairleigh Dickinson's Chad Timberlake with 23 seconds left changed the mood in MU-land - it iced a 62-58 Knights win and moved FDU to within a half-game of the Hawks at 11-3. Yesterday, Monmouth dropped another one at home, this time it was to 7-8 Wagner. The Seahawks came from behind to win 60-53, hitting their free throws down the stretch; Blake Hamilton's gym-leading 21 points weren't enough to close the gap.
Ohio Valley: Tennessee Tech (15-10, 10-4 OVC) had been missing from the top of the table for a couple of weeks, but they're back. On Saturday, they avenged the loss to Samford that had dropped them out of the top spot, winning 70-62 at home.
Patriot: Holy Cross (20-5, 11-1 PL) is proving all tha' haters wrong - they've rattled off 12 in a row, their only league loss being the season-opener at Bucknell (18-8, 9-3 PL, 2nd place). On Wednesday night, the Crusaders will have the chance to avenge that drop and wrap up the Patriot League regular-season title.
Southern: Behind West division champs Davidson (16-7, 14-0 SoCon), this conference tournament will be wide open. Possible foreshadowing doom: the entirety of the tourney will be held next week on East-leading Chattanooga's home floor.
Southland: Southeastern Louisiana (19-7, 11-2 SLC) looks strong heading into the tourney - if defense wins championships, their average of 54 points allowed per game should do the trick. That tenacious D was on display on Saturday as they defeated Stephen F. Austin 52-41.
Southwestern Athletic: Alabama A&M still leads at 10-3 with four teams on their collective tail. On Saturday, the Bulldogs beat the most recognizable SWAC name to most casual hoop fans, Alcorn State, by a score of 77-63. The Braves are in last place at 4-10, so some folks might want to update their SWACtionaries.
Sun Belt: Western Kentucky and Arkansas-Little Rock (both 8-4) fight it out atop the Belt's East division; Louisiana-Lafayette (11-2) and Denver (10-3) scrap out West. All four teams likely have a tourney run in 'em, Denver and Little Rock hold the one-seed tiebreakers due to season sweeps.
Well, Red State Basketball Goodwill Tour 2005 is over. I've travelled over 2,600 miles in a week, going to some great hoops and meeting some great folks. Never did get those car problems fixed, but I made it back to Philadelphia in one piece. There will be a set of travelogues posted sometime in the near future (safely linked and tucked away off the main page), but first I need some time to make sense of this.
He was a man who dearly loved the Tournament and understood its rhythms. On a grander scale, he helped remove the inherent pretentiousness in first-person journaling, and showed us that incomplete and incoherent sentences were okay sometimes... if they got the point across. He will remain a hero to any writer who jumps in a car and hits the highway to try and capture the American Dream in words - and for someone who still thinks that Dream can be found at a small-college basketball game, it will feel different knowing he's not out there anymore. I'll miss him.
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