Dribblings 2/24/2005 (What Went Wrong? Edition)

Mid-American: Akron 55, Miami (Oh.) 49 (OT) (story) - Six-four RedHawk guard Chet Mason had the game of his life, with 23 points and 15 rebounds... but as the sportswriters like to say, it was not enough. Despite sending the game to overtime on a last-second three by William Hatcher, Miami (17-1, 11-4 MAC) fell to Akron's total team effort and could only score two points in the extra session. The 'Hawks cling to a one-game lead in the Eastern division, and have lost two of their last four.

This is the most dangerous time of year for mid-majors with at-large aspirations - one loss, no matter to whom, can blotch your resumé and start you thinking about NIT home games. Of course, Miami isn't the only one with this concern - Akron (17-7, 10-5 MAC) has been mentioned in this discussion for a couple weeks now, and their win streak is now at four. It's unlikely that three MAC East teams (10-6 Buffalo being the other) will be allowed into the Dance, but next Saturday's (that's March 5th) Zip-Bull matchup in Buffalo looks mighty important.

Shootaround!

Missouri Valley: Southern Illinois (23-6, 13-3 MVC) showed the Valley who's boss last night - they beat Northern Iowa 76-69 at home in last night's G!O!T!N!. The win, powered by 6'3" defensive wiz Stetson Hairston's 17 points, was their sixth straight; the Salukis maintain their one-game lead over Wichita State (19-6, 12-4 MVC). The Shockers kept their wobbly at-large standing on track with a 72-61 win over Southwest Missouri State; SMS did not convert its field goal of the game until there were seven minutes to go in the first half.

Colonial: Hofstra made things interesting; they scored their 19th win of the season by beating league-leading Old Dominion (24-5, 14-3 CAA, 1 seed) 66-63 at their Long Island home, despite the double-doubling efforts of Monarch Alex Loughton (16 and 13). Insodoing, the Pride also cemented the CAA as another one-bid league, as the Selection Committee is usually looking for any excuse they can to exclude regular-season champ mids who don't take care of business in their tourneys. They also seem to like giving folks something to discuss on Office Pool Monday.

Horizon: Here's a fun fact: Loyola (Ill.) is the first D1 conference affiliate to finish their 2004-05 regular season. With a 67-63 road win over Cleveland State, the Ramblers finished 8-8 in the HL, and 11-16 overall.

Northeast: Fairleigh Dickinson made up the half-game on Monmouth they'd been missing - after last night's 63-58 home win against Central Connecticut State, both teams are 12-4. More on this game later.

Patriot: Holy Cross (21-5, 12-1 PL) wrapped up the one-seed and the regular season championship in front of their home fans, with a convincing 69-54 revenge win over Bucknell. The Crusaders will host a four-game "mini tournament" of the 1-8 and 4-5 seed games and the resulting semifinal matchup. The Bison, by virtue of having locked up second place, will host the 2-7 and 3-6 games.

Game! Of! The! Night!

Perhaps after this evening, the cloudy Atlantic Sun picture will clear up. Gardner-Webb (15-10, 12-6 ASun) hosts Central Florida (18-8, 11-7 ASun) for the top spot in the league; while the Runnin' Bulldogs From Boiling Springs have led most of the way, defending champions UCF (19-8, 11-7 ASun) have put together a late run to get back in the mix. The Golden Knights have won six of their last seven, and have rebounded from a three-game losing streak, and it's mostly thanks to 6'6" sophomore forward Josh Peppers (13.5 ppg). The two teams have met once already - that was a 67-55 Webb win in Orlando, all the way back on December 2. 7:00 Eastern time; there's no webcast, but you can pay a lot of money to get the game streamed to your phone.

Game! Of! The! Night! (Sentimental)

When Long Island and Robert Morris tip off tonight at 7:00 Eastern, and it will be the final game at Brooklyn's erstwhile Paramount Theater. The Northeast Conference pays tribute.

As time ticks away on the regular season, most talk focuses on teams that are gaining at-large worthiness, salting away league tourney one-seeds, or fighting for those last few wins to sneak into an eight-team conference field. Some, if they can't find enough stories there to fill out a newspaper, will write about the awful teams, the Campbells and the Savannah States. But before the madness of March consumes us, I'd like to stop and take a moment to acknowledge some lost seasons, teams that came into 2004-05 with high hopes but found themselves hard-luck, fighting a losing battle against encroaching mediocrity.

Rhode Island (3-20, 2-11 A10) It was clear early on that something wasn't right with Murphy's Rams. After a regularly-scheduled ten-point win over Brown to start the year, early-season backcourt injuries were recovered from and then reaggravated. In a weak A-10, they're one of the weakest - their year includes twin nine-game losing streaks, and only a two-point win over St. Bonaventure kept them from an eleven-game skid.

Delaware (10-18, 7-10 CAA) - Senior Philly-boy point guard Mike Slattery was supposed to be the focus this year, but the burden was too great. Imported talent Harding Nana (Virginia Tech transfer forward) and Andrew Washington (juco guard) did not step up with increased production to replace that of all-time UD leading three-point shooter Mike Ames, and the Blue Hens suffered through a tough CAA schedule. Their season would feature losing streaks of six and five, and the low point was a December 29th non-conference loss at home to America East bottom-trawler Maryland-Baltimore County, 66-56.

Montana (11-13, 5-6 BSky) - They had been picked to finish at or near the top of their conference because of the inside-outside attack of senior PF Kamarr Davis and junior SG Kevin Criswell. After defending champion Eastern Washington's slow start and a decent 6-7 non-conference period (which included a quality win over a good Cal State Northridge team), Missoulans had reason to hope that there would be life after Grizzly football. But Montana fell into a pattern of alternating pairs of wins and losses, one which pulled them down into the muck of middleville as Portland State ran away with the conference. They were also breaking in a new Coach K, UMT legend and former NBA player Larry Krystkowiak.

Princeton (12-10, 3-6 Ivy) - A 9-4 non-conference record that included dominating wins over both Holy Cross and Bucknell - as well as a tight loss to Duke - seemed to be enough momentum to justify preseason predictions that the Tigers would dominate the Ancient Eight. But a loss to Brown on Ivy opening night exposed their outside shooting deficiencies, and teams began scoring just enough points against that vaunted defense to pull out wins. Their season was sunk by a four-game losing streak that included drops to Dartmouth and Harvard, and they don't have a conference tournament with which to redeem themselves.

To follow up on yesterday's thugball story involving Temple, Owls coach John Chaney has suspended himself one game for sending a goon on the floor against St. Joseph's on Tuesday. And this, my friends, is what makes Philadelphia Big Five basketball great. Accountability.

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