• Season 9 SuperTicker presented by BLAPP
#TMM9
Having recently completed its 9th season, The Mid-Majority is a community chronicle of the smaller Division I college basketball conferences. Last year, the theme was Team. Six groups of five (plus a fantasy mid-major player) were engaged in friendly Amazing Race-style competition, criss-crossing Hoops Nation to provide awesome college basketball content. Season X (2013-14) will be our final one.

Recent Game Recaps

Epilogue, The Ninth: Only Love Can Break Your Heart

Memories

So We Meet Again

Rte. 139 - End of the Line

Hanging On

A Championship in Pictures

This Time of Year

Dotson Leads Ducks to the Sweet Sixteen

Grizzlies Overwhelmed by Orangemen

Empire

Challenge 11: Final Four Memories

By George, UConn is Dead

Butler and Us

Donning the Black and Gold

Challenge 10: Tourney Memories

The Madness of the Horizon League

The Rare Ivy League Conference Tournament

MAC Madness

Anything Can Happen in the MAAC

Challenge 9: Shock The Neighborhood

A Youthful Surprise

From Worst to First

Peers and Seers

Tag: Cornell Big Red
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S9 February 16, 2013 "Lord save us all from a hope tree that has lost the faculty of putting out blossoms." - Mark TwainNEW HAVEN, Conn. - The tough or impossible thing, depending on your perspective, about trying to project where a Mid-majority basketball team is going to finish the season, is often exposure.Granted...
S8 February 29, 2012 Game #8-642: Cornell Big Red at Yale BulldogsFebruary 25, 2012 7:00 pmJohn J. Lee AmphitheaterBBState Stats/Recap “Injustice, if it is on a large enough scale, is stronger, freer, and more masterly than justice.” -Thrasymachus (Plato’s Republic) Part of the fun for me this season with the Mid-Maj...
S8 February 21, 2012 Game #8-601: Cornell Big Red at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 17, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapOn my own personal sportz-related crimes-against-English scale, on which the offenses range from "just trite" to "utterly senseless and inane," the one I heard most about Penn coming into Frid...
S8 January 23, 2012 Game #8-441: Cornell Big Red at Columbia LionsJanuary 21, 2012 7:00 pmLevien GymBBState Stats/RecapI debated just going back to Grand Central Station and home after the conclusion of the St. Francis game. It was just about 7 p.m., and I really had no idea how long it would take or how lost I would g...
S8 January 2, 2012 Game #8-325: Cornell Big Red at Bucknell BisonDecember 31, 2011 2:00 pmSojka PavillionBBState Stats/RecapSometime during TMM12, I will look back on this New Year’s Eve affair as the game where it all went off the rails for me. The one where I got hooked on insanity. Until now, I had only recapped Ak...
S8 December 29, 2011 Game #8-303: Cornell Big Red at Stony Brook SeawolvesDecember 28, 2011 7:00 pmUSB Sports ComplexBBState Stats/RecapIf red is your favorite color, then last night's Cornell vs. Stony Brook contest was the game for you. You had the Big Red taking on the Seawolves, whose motto on their tickets is "Get ...
S8 December 23, 2011 Game #8-286: Cornell Big Red at Penn State Nittany LionsDecember 21, 2011 7:30 pmBryce Jordan CenterBBState Stats/RecapAfter my trip to Marshall and seeing an exciting game come down to a missed layup at the buzzer, I was excited to have a day off to spend at home. Instead, I took a slow drive back ...
S8 November 12, 2011 Game #8-003: Cornell Big Red at Saint Bonaventure BonniesNovember 11, 2011 7:00 pmReilly CenterBBState Stats/Recap Not even a four hour drive from Toronto through sleet and snow can dampen the excitement of opening night in an NCAA basketball arena. My buddy Jack and I enter the Reilly Centre, past ...
S7 March 2, 2011 KINGSTON, R.I. -- The stars are beginning to flicker and burn out in the elimination games. For others, it's far from over. Here, one final look at the remaining league regular season races as we move towards getting all the rest of the Other 25 conferences in the gate and ready for bracket time. ...
S7 February 27, 2011 Cornell Big Red at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 26, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap Kid Reporter Night at The Palestra! Suit separates, the taste of tweets, Corky Calhoun, Keeping It Klassy with the Sigma Kappa tug-of-war team, and Cornell hijacks the Power of Booba. @midmajority Gam...
S7 February 26, 2011 Saint Bonaventure Bonnies at Saint Joseph's HawksFebruary 26, 2011 4:00 pmHagan ArenaBBState Stats/Recap Phil Martelli: don't call him Coach? Hard times on City Line, Hawk funerals, welding Saint Bonaventure back together after a decade of adversity, buff mascots, and THE BELLYFILLERS. @midmajori...
S7 February 26, 2011 Columbia Lions at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 25, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap 30fps Palestra home shopping, #omgivydunx, the Good Drinks, Ben & Ed & William, golden pants, and Bally's greatest TV moment. Ever. @midmajority Game Tweets18:35 RT @SethHunt105: @midmajority Ooooo an en...
S7 February 24, 2011 CLEVELAND -- Once upon a time, there was this really thick book, and it had a bunch of stuff about college basketball in it. No, not the book you're thinking of, I'm talking about One Beautiful Season. I wrote that, last summer! A few thousand people went ahead and bought it (perhaps you?), and it...
S7 February 23, 2011 CHICAGO -- Every single one of the conference games going on tonight, and tomorrow, and Friday and Saturday too, were scheduled months in advance by a league office (or, in some cases, years ago). Some were circled rivalry games worth driving a day for, others were just-anothers. In early March, t...
S7 February 16, 2011 HUNTINGTON, W.Va. -- March really is here before we know it, because there's half a week missing out of February. This month wasn't designed that way -- and nothing was adjusted for our benefit or anything -- but it's still disorienting and disruptive to look at a calendar and realize that in two ...
S7 February 14, 2011 Yale Bulldogs at Harvard CrimsonFebruary 11, 2011 7:00 pmLavietes PavilionBBState Stats/Recap "Ten Thousand Men of Harvard": the original Ivy League smac-rap. @midmajority Game Tweets18:14 #FF @findthelastman. Take *that*, Christmas Creep!18:17 RT @LoyolanSports: @midmajority Happy birthday to the...
S7 February 8, 2011 ??????, ?.?. -- The game of Last Man continues into its second full day in the secret bunker. Follow along with as I slowly descend into madness. No, David, I have not heard about Pittsburgh, P. A., and don't tell me! Conference ShootaroundConference USA: Fact: the ex-Metro won 68 percent of its...
S7 February 7, 2011 American Eagles at Lehigh Mountain HawksFebruary 6, 2011 2:00 pmStabler ArenaBBState Stats/Recap In which we prepare to bunker down for Last Man. @midmajority Game Tweets13:55 Game No. 7-049: American at Lehigh. You are here. http://img.ly/2WtR13:57 Nothing makes for a better pregame show than......
S7 February 7, 2011 Harvard Crimson at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 5, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap The last real Palestra soft pretzel, and double overtime. @midmajority Game Tweets18:12 RT @gashaheen: Be a NCAA Bkb Comm member - Step 1: make YOUR list of no-brainer teams "in" + a list of those whic...
S7 February 6, 2011 Dartmouth Big Green at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 4, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap On a February Friday night in Philadelphia, there's no other place to be. @midmajority Game Tweets18:58 Game No. 7-046: Dartmouth at Penn. (Corrected.) Helloooo! http://img.ly/2VEk19:03 Penn huddlz...
S7 February 2, 2011 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- Despite the efforts of "Operation In Our Sites," the government's poorly-planned and badly-named offensive to try and shut down the #pixelvision feed aggregation sites (a topic broached on Stardate 15), National Pixelvision Day II is saved. Remember, that's tomorrow evening, so ...
S7 January 30, 2011 Cornell Big Red at Harvard CrimsonJanuary 29, 2011 6:00 pmLavietes PavilionBBState Stats/Recap I believe. @midmajority Game Tweets17:32 We are so early to this Cornell-Harvard game that we can pay a visit to the World's Classiest Dunkin Donuts. http://img.ly/2Tjx17:33 Airball's Revenge. RT @midm...
S7 January 30, 2011 Georgia State Panthers at Northeastern HuskiesJanuary 29, 2011 1:00 pmMatthews ArenaBBState Stats/Recap Northeastern has always been frustrating. Back at Drexel, the team always helped make the America East hell for the Dragons. It's got to be frustrating to be a sports fan there, too. The school i...
S7 January 30, 2011 Columbia Lions at Harvard CrimsonJanuary 28, 2011 7:00 pmLavietes PavilionBBState Stats/Recap Thirty years ago, sixteen and one were just a pair of numbers, even to basketball fans. In the early 1980s, "Sixteen" had no real hoops significance outside the state of Kentucky, because the NCAA Tournam...
S7 December 30, 2010 CHICAGO -- I was very young during the Blizzard of 1978. It was not my first memory of snow, but it was the first time in my life that snow had transformed the world around me into a network of tunnels, mazes and forts. I took the opportunity to ask my father what it all meant. "Why is snow white, ...
S7 December 22, 2010 Saint Joseph`s Hawks at Boston University TerriersDecember 21, 2010 7:00 pmCase GymBBState Stats/Recap TMM Throwback Night at the Golden Greek. @midmajority Game Tweets 18:22 Boston. Basketball town. http://img.ly/2Fqg18:56 Game 7-031: Saint Joseph's at Boston University. Welcome to TMM THROWBA...
S7 December 9, 2010 CINCINNATI -- Recently, at a game, I sat next to a "national columnist" as I tapped away at my keyboard, scribbling notes in a notebook, wearing my suit with sneakers, accompanied by my stuffed basketball companion. Afterwards, as I was packing up, he extended his hand tentatively. "Kyle, right?" he...
S7 December 2, 2010 Columbia Lions at Bucknell BisonDecember 1, 2010 7:00 pmSojka PavillionBBState Stats/Recap It's amazing to think that back in Season 2, there was serious talk about Bucknell being "the next Gonzaga," another academics-first school that would use the NCAA Tournament to transcend mid-majordom foreve...
S7 November 19, 2010 Austin Peay Governors at Lipscomb BisonsNovember 18, 2010 8:15 pmAllen ArenaBBState Stats/Recap During the conference season, Fridays are the ones out of the seven with the fewest games. Usually, there are Ivy League games, a couple Patriot tilts, and whatever ESPNU has convinced the Horizon or M...
S6 March 27, 2010 HOUSTON -- Bally and I won't be there in Salt Lake City today. We're still in Texas, in the expansive and quiet Reliant Stadium media room. There are so many moving logistical chutes and ladders with something like this, and there simply wasn't enough time to change course. I can't tell you how mu...
S6 March 25, 2010 The now-famous "TMM 5" have basked in basketball glory for three days now. Tonight three of them will face another rigorous test each, at higher stakes, under hotter lights. Nervous times. And Butler, Xavier and Cornell have the same disadvantage going in as they had in the first two tests: financia...
S6 March 24, 2010 HOUSTON -- We're heading into the second weekend. Are there any people left still playing that office pool bracket stuff anymore? I think everybody's entries are busted, because I haven't heard people talking about it for days. But for our nine brave As-You-Goers, their brackets are totally, 100 per...
S6 March 23, 2010 The passage of time is what usually grants college basketball its mystique and aura; witness memory fades and history takes over. Players become larger than life, coaches change into infallible titans of the mind, and single contests transcend the game itself. The words, and the numbers, never fit...
S6 March 21, 2010 Now, we would have preferrrred that the NCAA powers-that-is would have spread the first round upsets more equitably between Thursday and Friday. That would have made for an emotional rollercoaster of far simpler convexity, no? But it shook down like this, and we had six dogs, cats and dudes in the f...
S6 March 20, 2010 PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- In the big picture, the really big picture, it doesn't mean much at all. It's a basketball show. This is entertainment for rich people, a diversion for any remaining members of the American middle class with disposable time. The performers are judged on whether their effort ple...
S6 March 9, 2010 Mid-Majority protocol dictates that we take a look back at some of the teams that outpaced modest expectations to put together solid seasons, despite not taking it to the big stage of the Big Dance. It's a leading indicator of sorts, a distant warning to current champions that there will be teams to...
S6 March 6, 2010 NOTE: The Hoops National will only cover regular-season games for the remainder of the week. Big Games Ivy League: Cornell 95, at Brown 76 CORN - 26-4 (12-1) [RPI: 46, State: 50] BRWN - 11-19 (5-8) [RPI: 250, State: 281] Star of the Game: Jon Jaques 20 Pts (7-9 FG), 7 Reb Men's Hoops Claims Thir...
S6 March 3, 2010 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- It's 2010, and the future is now. We have androids and robots that do our bidding, we use magic phones, and all the kids are having droid sex on "virtual AOL." Everything either flies, glows, or has a touch screen. But there's one machine from the old-school that has not been ou...
S6 February 27, 2010 Big Games Ivy League: at Cornell 50, Princeton 47 CORN - 24-4 (10-1) [RPI: 48, State: 52] PRIN - 16-8 (7-3) [RPI: 161, State: 120] Star of the Game: Jeff Foote 19 Pts (6-7 FG, 7-8 FT) Men's Basketball Tops Princeton, 50-47 - Cornell fought off a feisty Princeton team to claim its fourth stra...
S6 February 20, 2010 Big Games BracketBusters: at Northern Iowa 71, Old Dominion 62 UNI - 24-3 (14-2) [RPI: 21, State: 12] ODU - 21-8 (13-3) [RPI: 41, State: 48] Star of the Game: Ali Farokhmanesh 23 Pts (6-10 FG, 6-6 FT) Farokhmanesh's 23-Point Second Half Pushes #24 UNI Past Old Dominion, 71-62 - CEDAR FALLS, I...
S6 February 13, 2010 Big Games Metro Atlantic: at Niagara 87, Siena 74 NIAG - 14-13 (7-8) [RPI: 172, State: 184] SIE - 21-5 (14-1) [RPI: 33, State: 50] Star of the Game: Kashief Edwards 20 Pts (9-14 FG, 2-2 FT), 6 Reb, 3 Stl Niagara Halts Siena, Nation's Longest Win Streak - NIAGARA UNIV., N.Y.-The Purple Eagles h...
S6 February 11, 2010 Big Games Atlantic 14: Richmond 69, at Rhode Island 67 RICH - 19-6 (8-2) [RPI: 31, State: 39] URI - 19-4 (7-3) [RPI: 14, State: 25] Star of the Game: David Gonzalvez 19 Pts (7-12 FG, 2-3 FT), 2 Stl Surging Spiders Grind Out Road Win At Rhody, Move Into A-14 First-Place Tie - KINSTON, R.I. - Dav...
S6 February 8, 2010 Big Games Atlantic 14: at Richmond 71, Temple 54 RICH - 18-6 (7-2) [RPI: 31, State: 41] TU - 19-5 (7-2) [RPI: 17, State: 35] Star of the Game: Kevin Anderson 29 Pts (11-17 FG, 5-5 FT) Richmond Topples Temple, 71-54 (via Richmond) Atlantic 14: at Dayton 90, Xavier 65 UD - 16-6 (5-3) [RPI: 33, S...
S6 February 4, 2010 The State of College Basketball is a ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 344 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the Final Four ...
S6 February 1, 2010 TMM Shortattentionspantheater! Siena (19-4, 12-0) has won 13 in a row now, and Butler (18-4, 11-0 Horizon) has a 10-game streak! And they could play each other in the Busters, yeah! (Don't forget, matchups are announced tonight!) Northern Iowa (19-2, 10-1 MVC) remains two games clear in the Valle...
S5 March 21, 2009 MINNEAPOLIS -- Just so we're clear, we don't care about your brackets. We know you want to talk about who you "have," about how three of your eight website entries are totally and thoroughly busted, and how you'll never win that $84.50 in the office pool now. We don't want to hear about how you...
S5 March 20, 2009 MINNEAPOLIS -- There's no day more exciting and more highly anticipated than First Round Thursday, and there's no 12 hours quite as difficult to get through. As soon as the games begin, the NCAA Tournament teaches a hard lesson about the perfection that's necessary to compete against enemies with mo...
S5 March 16, 2009 Aside from reality show winners and one-hit wonders, nothing is forgotten quite as quickly as Championship Fortnight when the NCAA Tournament brackets are released. Some of the teams we've been following all season are destined for great and lasting glory, which will be fulfilled and certified once ...
S5 March 12, 2009 KATY, Tex. -- Quick programming note: we've run into some technical difficulties here in Texas, so that marathon chat we promised has to be postponed. Next week seems a better fit anyway, since there will be an actual 65-team bracket to talk about. We'll do a regular chat tomorrow from Cleveland at ...
S5 March 11, 2009 HOT SPRINGS, Ark. -- With our third-to-last GMHN of Season 5, we have a very special treat for you, yes we do. The image you see over and over during Championship Fortnight is students running all willy-nilly onto the floor after their beloved teams win mid-major titles. So it's only fitting that w...
S5 March 7, 2009 Bullet Points Cornell became the first school to punch its ticket to the NCAA Tournament. For the second straight year, the Big Red claimed the Ivy League title, beating Penn 83-59. The upsets began in earnest on Friday. Ohio Valley No. 4 Morehead State took out No. 1 Tennessee-Martin. CAA No....
S5 February 18, 2009 SAN LUIS OBISPO, Cal. -- Morning really is a relative concept, isn't it? It's always morning somewhere, or 5 p.m., or the night time (a/k/a "the right time"). And it just might be Morning in America all over again, depending on what economic time zone you're in. I write this to you as the a.m. hours...
S5 February 13, 2009 Thursday, 1:05 PM -- I don't know what made me think this, but I went to the Hyatt Regency first and looked for anything that said "Mock Selection." There was an NCAA Life Skills conference on the second and third floor, so I asked somebody at the ballroom reception where it was. "Who are you, and ...
S5 February 10, 2009 NATCHITOCHES, La. -- Tomorrow I'll drive the four hours back up to Little Rock, jump on a jetliner and return to the hub-and-spoke center of Hoops Nation, the city of Indianapolis. On Thursday at 1:30 p.m., I'll walk into the Hyatt Regency with 19 other journalists and engage in the third annual NC...
S5 February 3, 2009 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- BracketBusters pairings are out, and we're temporarily reunited with our own bed and desktop computer, so it's a good time for a game reset. Who am I? Why am I here? Seventy-five percent of what The Mid-Majority is about during the regular season is analysis. There are check-ins o...
S5 January 22, 2009 EMMITSBURG, Md. -- They call them the blues because of blue notes, those tones hidden in between the in-between places there on the pristine straight streets of the music scale. Each one of us has had the blues at one time or another, stuck in the gutter, the ditch, the rut, been down soooo loonnngg...
S5 November 14, 2008 PEORIA, Ill. -- Remember back when you were a kid, it was a hot summer day out in your backyard... you had your 1980's NBA-style short-shorts on with no shirt, just hanging out in the grass your daddy just mowed fresh that morning. Not a care in the world. Then you got really thirsty, and you were t...
S4 March 21, 2008 BIRMINGHAM -- On mornings like this, after days like that, I'm envious of people who can simply move on with their brackets and think about the next round's matchups. For those of us who cover the mid-major schools, we'll be reliving this day over and over again for the next year. The true underdo...
S4 March 19, 2008 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 March 19, 2008 We had quite a few mail inquiries and chat questions yesterday about the chat that was published in my weekly blog for the Worldwide Leader. For those of you who are ESPN OutSiders, I listed the top five largest financial disparities in both overall athletic expenses and men's basketball budgets. Pe...
S4 March 13, 2008 ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- I don't know if I'm ripping the cover off some secret clandestine something, or exposing some horrible underbelly of The Business here. But one of the best things about Championship Fortnight is the media gifts. Yes, many conferences bestow presents upon us ink- and pixel-sta...
S4 March 12, 2008 ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- As we promised earlier this week, we're going to take one last look at some seasons that may not have resulted in a Dance card or a lot of national headlines, but were breakthroughs or returns to form. Here, then, are eight teams that few saw coming... in alphabetical order. ...
S4 March 5, 2008 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 March 3, 2008 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- The calendar does not deceive you, it's been March for two-plus days now and we haven't seen one conference tournament game. We'll take care of that tomorrow (the Big South, OVC and Horizon get underway), but this in-between day gives us a chance to catch our collective breath and...
S4 February 29, 2008 LAWRENCEVILLE, N.J. -- Last night was a great evening for regular-season champions, all of which have now clinched at least a spot in the National Invitation Tournament. In addition to five crownings last night, Belmont took a share of the Atlantic Sun title with an 11-point win over Campbell. We ha...
S4 February 26, 2008 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 February 26, 2008 DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- We're all just getting over the thrills of BracketBuster weekend, but there's plenty to get to as the regular season winds down to its electrifying conclusion. Just 19 days until Selection Sunday... Saint Mary's. In last night's G!O!T!N!, the Gaels proved that yes, they can ...
S4 February 25, 2008 FORT MYERS, Fla. -- Sometimes I just have to pinch myself (even though dreams can be complicated enough that I wouldn't wake up if I did). Three years ago, I was just another computer programmer with a college basketball blog, and the next thing I know I'm talking over BracketBusters highlights wit...
S4 February 19, 2008 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 February 18, 2008 TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Plenty of folks have the day off for the holiday today, but we have a patriotic duty to provide you with a Supersized Boubacar that takes into account all the action from the weekend that was. We'll get to that in a second, but I wanted to share with you my most recent fantastic...
S4 February 12, 2008 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 February 12, 2008   Princeton at Pennsylvania (Ivy League) The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA 7:05 PM EST Even the great rivalries have their down years, and it's usually because one or the other team involved is down. Even the most diehard Penn fan will admit that the P&P games have been somewhat lackluster...
S4 February 11, 2008 HAMDEN, Conn. -- We have been, and we stand, accused. Accused! Of having too much fun around here, of shifting the focus off basketball and running too many contests, pictures of pretty girls, cartoons and snapshots of pet basketballs. So we're going to put on our super-serious faces, talk in our su...
S4 February 4, 2008 There's more than one Bally, and that's because we occasionally hold contests here and give away real-life versions of the cartoon buddy who goes everywhere with me on my travels. Like, for instance, our Hunan: Return Of The Phoenix movie treatment contest, which might be extended an extra day bec...
S4 February 4, 2008 MEADVILLE, Pa. -- It's a lot of effort trying to live a life free of American-style football, the lengths you have to go to in order to pretend it doesn't exist. It's come to this, it really has, and I can't believe it myself. But I made it through the night, Hoops Nation. I'm shacked out in a litt...
S4 February 2, 2008 NEW BRITAIN, Conn. -- If you've been reading along, you know how we feel about American-style football, which has its big over-bloated title game this weekend. The sport has come to define American maleness and took over the true title of "America's pastime" long ago -- not actually strapping the pa...
S4 January 28, 2008 HOUSTON -- I was thinking over the weekend, while I wasn't at any games, about all the games I go to. A total of 57 games so far this year, headed for yet another 100-game season. Having done 100 twice now, it's tough to find triple-digit motivation anymore. Need to turn it into some kind of contest...
S4 January 16, 2008 ASHEVILLE, N.C. -- I'm really all atwitter today. I've been to 52 games so far this year, but none has been as eagerly anticipated as tonight's. For the finale of my weeklong tour of the Carolinas, I'm going to see UNC Asheville square off against High Point for first-place bragging rights in the Bi...
S4 January 7, 2008 INDIANAPOLIS -- Making the transition from nonconference to conference season is always a little rough. Not that we're getting dragged into something we don't want to be dragged into -- they just require such different mindsets. For two months, it's all rah-rah beat the power conferences, and then i...
S4 December 16, 2007 You usually meet the best people by accident, and often in the strangest places. I made the acquaintance of John Kuchar in a PayPal complaint box -- he had subscribed to Basketball State last month but some stray binaries kept his account from being activated. Once that was ironed out, he told me ab...
S4 December 4, 2007 The State of College Basketball is a brand-new ratings system that uses a lot of good basketball sense, per-game team performance ratings and degradation of older results to rank the teams from No. 1 to 341 (here's the long-winded version). In its overall form, it retroactively picked three of the F...
S4 November 27, 2007   Binghamton (America East) at Cornell (Ivy League) Newman Arena - Ithaca, NY 7:00 PM EST It's a November Tuesday night, which means lots of guarantee games and prefab power-conference challenge matchups. But up in the occasionally snowy wilds of upstate New York, we have an intriguing battl...
S3 February 12, 2007 BALTIMORE -- OK, OK, OK, OK. I've read your e-mails, I've received your calls and media inquiries. The big question of the weekend is not what happened in the huge mid-major games these past few days, but what are we to do about this? And this? Let's get the easy punchline out of the way first: Ther...
S3 January 15, 2007 LORMAN, Miss. -- BracketBusters season starts in just under two weeks, and that's why we here at the Mid-Majority have put together this little map, so you can start scouting out the home teams (orange) and away teams (grey) and dream about matchups leading into the pairing announcement on Jan. 28. ...
S2 January 13, 2006 Non-conference is officially over: the Ancient Eight are in the house! Tonight marks the annual Friday kickoff for Hoops Nation's brainiest, zaniest, no-postseason-tourney-iest league. Every game counts in the 14-Game Tournament®, and tonight's Palestra tip-off counts more than some other...
S1 February 25, 2005 Atlantic Sun: Central Florida 58, Gardner-Webb 55 (story) - G-Webb (15-11, 12-7 ASun), who finished ninth and out of the conference tournament last year, could have clinched the regular-season title and the tourney one-seed right there on their home floor. The Runnin' Bulldogs From Boiling Springs c...
S1 February 14, 2005 So it turns out that Hot Sh*t Saturday was a great success. Six games, all good. Thrillers, comebacks, overtime, great shooting, great defense... HSS had something for everyone. Let's review: Big West: Pacific 64, Utah State 63 (story) - With 31 seconds left, homestanding Utah State was leading 61-...
S1 February 11, 2005 Game 054: at Pennsylvania 70, Princeton 62 (OT) Tuesday, February 8, 2005 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA It begins simply enough: a messenger delivers a long white tube from floor level, he bounds up the short and wide stairs. The folks in the upper left corner know exactly what to do with it - t...
S1 February 2, 2005 Game 047: at Pennsylvania 83, Brown 60 Saturday, January 29, 2005 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA When stripped to its essence, the object of our game is to score more points than the opposition. When the contest is over, the point totals of the two competing teams are compared, then the officials ...
S1 January 24, 2005 Patriot: Army 63, Navy 43 (story) - I've been talking so much about the Academies lately, might as well share the biggest upset of the day. Having observed the wide gulf of talent between Army (3-14, 1-4 PL) and Navy (3-15, 0-5 PL) within the past week, I'm in slackjawed disbelief at a result that s...
S1 January 16, 2005 Game 033: at Bucknell 63, Army 46 Sojka Pavilion - Lewisburg, PA Saturday, January 15, 2005 Last month, Spc. Thomas Wilson of the 278th Regimental Combat Team surprised U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld with a tough question during an event that was supposed to be a pep rally. "Why do we sold...
S1 January 8, 2005 West Coast: Loyola Marymount 68, San Francisco 65 (story) - It does indeed rain in Southern California - man, it pours. While the water came down outside Hank's House, two up-and-coming WCC teams played soggy ball in the first conference tilt for both. Both teams traded baskets and shot poorly, and ...
S1 December 13, 2004 Game 015: at Drexel 66, Quinnipiac 59 Saturday, December 11, 2004 Daskalakis Athletic Center - Philadelphia, PA Long before Hollywood gave actor/writer/director Richard Linklater large sums of money to remake The Bad News Bears, before he crafted the feel-good blockbuster School Of Rock, he made a ...
S1 December 7, 2004 Northwestern State 85, Tulane 72 (story) - Northwestern (Louisiana) State is the answer to a trivia question - who won the first NCAA Tournament 65-vs.-64 play-in game? (against Winthrop, 2001). They also beat Kentucky 16 years ago. Not known for their long-range accuracy, the Southland Conference's...
S1 November 29, 2004 Like a young, wet foal bravely attempting to put his legs under him for the first time, the Mid-Majority Baller Of The Week Award made some happy progress this week towards its very first frolic in the meadow. Yes, this week saw the first vote that originated from the TMM-reading public. It was for ...
S1 November 9, 2004 One Sunday afternoon in early February, I found myself sitting in a cold, half-empty gymnasium in Lawrenceville, New Jersey. I was watching Rider and Loyola - two of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference's perennial doormats - fall all over each other. It was halftime, and the two squads had barely...
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