• 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: Pennsylvania Quakers
Sorted by date
S9 March 8, 2013 I'm probably only as dedicated a Penn fan as I am because of Route 301.The option of driving that stretch of road to Wilmington instead of I-95 is one of the things that has contributed most to my willingness to continually make the 2-hour drive back and forth to Philadelphia for Penn games (especi...
S9 February 12, 2013 "Make happy those who are near, and those who are far will come." - Chinese Proverb PHILADELPHIA - I could sit here and talk to you about Penn basketball and their remarkable second half against Brown Saturday night at the Palestra, outscoring the Bears by 25 points in the final 22 minutes on the w...
S9 January 21, 2013 There's a website that came to my attention a few months ago called "Philly Love Notes," that collects essays and stories, with photos, of things that Philadelphians love about their city. It's the kind of website I love - using the internet to connect people to their surroundings and each other. I...
S9 January 21, 2013 PHILADELPHIA - "Everyone is disappointing the more you know someone."I watched Synecdoche, New York after I read that prologue from Kyle. As the quote would probably lead to you believe if you didn't know better, it was pretty depressing, which is likely the reason it tanked at the box office. No o...
S9 January 15, 2013 What new can be said about an arena so mystical, it is called a cathedral; so important it inspired a book and documentary; and so influential it is emulated hundreds of miles away?This was the challenge facing me in recapping my first game at the Palestra, and the answer is: nothing, or at least n...
S9 January 13, 2013 "Too hyped to do school work so I will keep reading the nonsense on Sudanese diaspora list serve."Not your usual college-athlete-Twitter-feed fare."In my opinion - in the end - the university will have benefited more from having him than he will from having attended Penn."Not your usual coach-speak...
S9 January 6, 2013 Growing up in Indiana, it was an annual ritual to try to identify, whether by reading magazines or newspapers or by listening to some wise old sage, The Next Great One. The Next Great One referred to the state's next great high school basketball star. While the talents of relative giants and freak...
S9 January 6, 2013 It's a little strange to plan a basketball trip for a game that you don't even know will happen, but such is the lot of the pilgrim, I guess.When it was announced last March that Butler and Penn would play a #ghostbracket game in the Palestra (which gave rise to one of my favorite 800GP essays), I ...
S9 November 29, 2012 Game #9-107: Binghamton Bearcats at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 28, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap One of these things, as they say, is not like the others.The Penn Quakers huddled up late in the second half of last night's game against the Binghamton Bearcats, a team they were expect...
S9 November 20, 2012 Since this game happened, I've been trying to figure out the best way to convey how much fun it was to be in the Palestra on Saturday afternoon watching Penn and Drexel battle it out for bragging rights over ... a few blocks in West Philadelphia (as you may know, the two universities essentially sh...
S9 November 11, 2012 Game #9-011: Maryland-Baltimore County Retrievers at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 9, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap Friday was a pretty big day for the phrase "all in," if a phrase can have a big day.As I was speeding away from Washington, D.C. to make the 7pm tip at the Palestra, Beltw...
S8 March 30, 2012 Game #8-800: Pennsylvania Quakers at Harvard CrimsonFebruary 25, 2012 7:00 pmLavietes PavilionBBState Stats/Recap "May I, composed like themOf Eros and of dust,Beleaguered by the sameNegation and despairShow an affirming flame." -September 1st, 1939, W.H. AudenI don't know Zack Rosen, the man. I ...
S8 March 30, 2012 Game #8-799: Pennsylvania Quakers at Villanova WildcatsDecember 3, 2011 7:00 pmPavilionBBState Stats/RecapPhiladelphia is a basketball city. Yes, I know there’s the E-A-G-L-E-S EAGLES and the Flyers. Then there’s the Phillies and the Union and finally the 76ers. The other sports may dominate the hea...
S8 March 23, 2012 Game #8-784: Butler Bulldogs at Pennsylvania QuakersMarch 19, 2012 9:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapDear Editor:Diet books are always hot. There are ones by doctors and chefs, amateurs and professionals, savants and charlatans. But there is no diet book yet that allows you to lose weight by wat...
S8 March 22, 2012 Game #8-784: Butler Bulldogs at Pennsylvania QuakersMarch 19, 2012 9:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapEverything comes and goesMarked by lovers and styles of clothesThings that you once held highAnd told yourself were trueLost or changing as the days come down to you. -Joni MitchellI've thought a...
S8 March 16, 2012 Game #8-764: Quinnipiac Bobcats at Pennsylvania QuakersMarch 14, 2012 8:30 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapAbout a week and a half ago, I walked out of the Palestra for what I assumed would be the last time this season. Penn had just defeated Yale to stay in the hunt for the Ivy League title, and t...
S8 March 6, 2012 Game #8-707: Yale Bulldogs at Pennsylvania QuakersMarch 3, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapLet's get this out of the way right up front: personally, I think the Ivy League has got it right in how it selects its NCAA tournament representative. To me, the goal should be to send the team to ...
S8 March 6, 2012 Game #8-706: Brown Bears at Pennsylvania QuakersMarch 2, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapBy the time I had a chance to write about the game that took place on Friday night, Brown coach Jesse Agel had already lost his job.Brown certainly came into the Palestra looking overmatched. They wer...
S8 February 21, 2012 Game #8-603: Columbia Lions at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 18, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapAt this time of year, the factoid closest to the front of most people's minds about the Ivy League is the lack of a conference tournament. (Indeed, I wrote about this yesterday.) This state of ...
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 February 11, 2012 Game #8-547: Harvard Crimson at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 10, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapImagine a drill sergeant yelling at you in your face. Then imagine that you are in a tiny room, and the noise reverberates and crashes. Then multiply that by 8,000.That was what the Palestra w...
S8 February 11, 2012 Game #8-547: Harvard Crimson at Pennsylvania QuakersFebruary 10, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapI live nine miles from Philadelphia, in South Jersey, but I don't go there much anymore. For eighteen years, my parents and I crossed the bridge weekly as we attended a large Presbyterian chur...
S8 January 31, 2012 Game #8-490: Princeton Tigers at Pennsylvania QuakersJanuary 30, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapThe 800 GP guidelines say no smac, which in the case of this game will require great restraint on the part of your correspondent. (The lawyer in me is tempted to muse on the nature of guidelin...
S8 January 24, 2012 Game #8-447: Saint Joseph`s Hawks at Pennsylvania QuakersJanuary 21, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapI think that the way I can best describe my Saturday at the Palestra is to say this: Seeing Maryland and Temple in the morning was my first time seeing a game at the Palestra. Seeing Penn ...
S8 January 23, 2012 Game #8-447: Saint Joseph`s Hawks at Pennsylvania QuakersJanuary 21, 2012 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap"This is our house." It's a common cheer in college basketball - I've heard it, or at least versions of it, in arenas all over the place. When the "house" in question is the Palestra, thou...
S8 January 15, 2012 Game #8-394: Pennsylvania Quakers at Columbia LionsJanuary 13, 2012 7:00 pmLevien GymBBState Stats/RecapFor those who have not been to a Columbia Basketball game, the experience is slightly maddening. Levien Gymnasium is a high school gym, which in itself, is not the problem. Rather, it is tuck...
S8 December 2, 2011 Game #8-094: Wagner Seahawks at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 22, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapWhen Wagner visited Penn, it was a rainy Tuesday night; getting from Annapolis to Philadelphia after work for a 7 p.m. tip-off on these types of nights can be a dicey proposition. We...
S8 November 26, 2011 Game #8-126: Pittsburgh Panthers at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 25, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapThis was the game everyone came to see. And as the Arena started to fill up, my buddy Travis was afraid that the real ticketholder of the seats we were in (I held a ticket for this section...
S8 November 23, 2011 Game #8-094: Wagner Seahawks at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 22, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap“There are no second acts in American lives” -- F. Scott FitzgeraldF. Scott Fitzgerald wrote these words shortly before his death in 1940 and Americans have spent the past 70 years proving h...
S8 November 21, 2011 Game #8-084: Robert Morris Colonials at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 19, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapOkay, let’s get this out of the way: the Palestra is magical, historic, a fantastic place to watch basketball, etc. You do not need me to tell you this, because you are a fan of TMM an...
S8 November 16, 2011 Game #8-034: Temple Owls at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 14, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/Recap "Who are we playing tonight anyway?" My friend asked me as we made the short drive from Temple's campus in North Philadelphia to the Palestra."Penn.""Oh, so it's not a real game then?"The respons...
S8 November 16, 2011 Game #8-034: Temple Owls at Pennsylvania QuakersNovember 14, 2011 7:00 pmThe PalestraBBState Stats/RecapIn the essay E Unibas Pluram, David Foster Wallace (whom you may know from his non-fiction work like Consider the Lobster or his NY Times magazine article on Roger Federer) analyzes the relationsh...
S8 November 13, 2011 Game #8-016: Pennsylvania Quakers at Maryland-Baltimore County RetrieversNovember 11, 2011 7:30 pmUMBC FieldhouseBBState Stats/RecapAbout six weeks ago, I watched some real, live basketball in the Palestra for the first time since that school in New Jersey knocked off the Quakers to force a rare I...
S6 April 2, 2010 INDIANAPOLIS -- Here at the Crowne Plaza Indianapolis Airport, there's magic in the air. Mid-Majority headquarters, usually empty on account of the airport moving away two years ago, has turned into a bonafide basketball mecca. The median height has shot up past the 6-foot mark, and the number of ...
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 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 1, 2010 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- This was going to be the day. Conditions could not have been more perfect. The Bryant Bulldogs, 0-21 on the season, had the struggling Monmouth Hawks right where they wanted them -- on the ropes. The newest member of the Northeast Conference sprung out to a 15-5 lead on the four...
S6 January 29, 2010 PHILADELPHIA -- They say the difference between home and the road is that when you're at your own place, you clean up. That the difference between a guest and a friend is that a friend will help with the dishes. So when I slept over at the Palestra on Wednesday night, a place I consider to be the ...
S6 January 28, 2010 PHILADELPHIA -- The Palestra, the concrete and steel Cathedral of College Basketball, opened in 1927 at 215 South 33rd Street, near the edge of the campus of the University of Pennsylvania. Since then, it's hosted 52 NCAA Tournament games, hundreds of Big 5 and Ivy League tilts, and thousands of c...
S6 January 11, 2010 PHILADELPHIA -- On June 6, 2001, the Philadelphia 76ers beat the Los Angeles Lakers 107-101 in overtime. It was Game 1 of the NBA Finals, and the Allen Iverson-led Sixers catapulted to a quick series lead. It was a promising harbinger of a championship, since the game was out west, on the road. Ph...
S6 December 29, 2009 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- One more drinker's holiday, and the calendar will flip. Many Americans are spending this week in silent fear of what's on the other side: a return to the bleak routine of five-day workweeks, the gray skies of short days, and January bills from December's illusions of prosperity. O...
S4 February 19, 2008 DELAND, Fla. -- Last night on press row at Florida A&M in Tallahassee, my inbox full of nasty notes from Penn fans (more about that later on), I was reminded once again about the key differences between Ivy League and MEAC basketball. And there are differences, even though both conferences would...
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   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 January 24, 2008 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- I never meant this to be Philosophy Week, and I apologize for all the thoughtful treatises on insignificance I've spilled recently. I'm going to blame it on jet lag, and leave it at that. I've made a key decision, and I post it here for you now primarily to point to it later once...
S4 January 15, 2008   La Salle (Atlantic 10) at Pennsylvania (Ivy) The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA 7:00 PM EST When there's no games featuring conference frontrunners or prospective NCAA teams that are facing soul-baring tests, we here at G!O!T!N! studios usually revert to the game we'll be attending. Since we'...
S4 December 5, 2007 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- First of all this morning, a big hello-and-thank-you to the 213 members of the Upset Club. We got you one (a result, surely, of all the Northern Illinois love from yesterday) or two last night, but those e-mail boxes should be lighting up soon with lots more Upset Alerts. Maybe ev...
S4 November 16, 2007 Because no website has ever thought of anything like this before -- to my knowledge, at least -- TMM will be running an interview series at the end of each week throughout the college basketball season. I know, I know, this has been done before, in other places. But we'll be chatting with coaches, p...
S4 November 2, 2007 There's an annual event -- if that's a phrase suitable and grey enough to describe something that doesn't cut it as a tradition -- here in our household. Every year around this time, the satellite television company beams in a solid week of unlimited American professional basketball in a free previe...
S3 March 28, 2007 PAWTUCKET, R.I., Mar. 28 -- All animate organisms, from the globbiest amoeba to the most intricate human machine, share one thing in common: life. Life is what keeps you going, it's the light before the beginning of the tunnel. The meaning of life is simply this: it means so much that nobody can sur...
S3 March 19, 2007 In light of this great WaPo article about relative quality of hotels in the NCAA tournament's first weekend, might as well bring out the dist-o-meter again. How far from home did the committee send teams? (Distances are from campus to city center) (East 11) George Washington -- 2372 mi. to Sacramen...
S3 March 14, 2007 So what are the real upsets? When it comes to college sports, it's all about the Benjamins. Here, then, are the first round matchups with the participating schools' 2005-06 athletic budgets. "Differences" are based on the high seed's budget. As always, expense data from the Office of Postsecondary E...
S3 March 12, 2007 Bullet Points http://schools.basketballstate.com/TAMCC class=optn>Texas A&M-Corpus Christi won the Southland final, and Championship Fortnight has come to a close. It's Tournament Time! The Last Bracket All brackets on the Bracket City page have been replaced with the completed versions. ...
S3 March 11, 2007 Bullet Points Albany, Long Beach State, Miami (Oh.), Florida A&M, Jackson State and New Mexico State, welcome to the dance. All won their respective conference tournament championships, and are all super-great. LBSU is the only double-champion from Saturday, following up a regular-season title w...
S3 March 10, 2007 Bullet Points Holy Cross is back in the NCAA Tournament after beating Bucknell in the third consecutive Bison-Crusader title game. It's not a rivalry unless both teams get to win. Nevada was sent out of the WAC tourney with a freaky foul moment against Utah State. In other No. 4-over-1 action, Toled...
S3 March 9, 2007 Bullet Points Most action played according to seed yesterday, but there were a few upsets: Morgan State over South Carolina State in the MEAC's 4-5 game, and both low seeds won in the SWAC, including No. 6 Arkansas-Pine Bluff. Yeah, there were a couple of pretty surprising upsets too. Lamar knocked ...
S3 March 8, 2007 Bullet Points Central Connecticut State from the NEC is going dancing, and so is Weber State of the Big Sky. Both are double champions of their respective leagues, and both just plain rock. No autobids tonight. Deep breath... No surprises in the MAC quarters, or the SWAC and MEAC early rounds, but ...
S3 March 7, 2007 Bullet Points Wright State are double-champions of the Horizon League, having beaten a Butler team that's been all up in the national grill this season. Do you take the Raiders seriously yet? Oral Roberts, repeat double champions of the mighty mighty Mid-Con, and North Texas has claimed the champion...
S3 March 6, 2007 Bullet Points Three championships were settled yesterday. All hail Virginia Commonwealth, double champions of the grand old Colonial, who held off a pesky George Mason team. And congratulations to Niagara, which beat Siena to claim the MAAC tournament championship. Oh yeah, andUnnamed Major Program ...
S3 March 5, 2007 Bullet Points In Sunday's only championship game, Creighton beat Southern Illinois to win the Missouri Valley autobid. Cinderella 2: Electric Boogaloo... George Mason upset Old Dominion in the CAA semis out of the No. 6 seed. Siena upset Marist in a No.5-over-1 job in the Metro Atlantic semis, and S...
S3 March 3, 2007 Bullet Points In the first real shocker of Championship Fortnight, Appalachian State was upset by College of Charleston in the SoCon semifinals. Four leagues crown champions today on the ESPN family of networks. The Big South, Ohio Valley, SoCon and Atlantic Sun seasons will conclude with autobids b...
S3 February 26, 2007 BOZEMAN, Mont. -- That's right, waah-waah. This is the final Daily Paragraph, the last K-Dub's Krazy Fact of the Day of the season. That's because (not-so-Top Five) Tuesday, February 27 is the honorary first day of March. It's tourney time! The Horizon League, Ohio Valley and Big South kick off thei...
S3 February 14, 2007 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- I've been talking to folks around the country these past few days, and have had a really hard time convincing them that the Northeast is where it's at. It's not all Friends and the Hamptons and day trips to Times Square... you pay for all that glamour with high gas prices, frost h...
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 February 6, 2007 LOS ANGELES -- I'm not going to get all weird on you and tell you that covering basketball is tantamount to some kind of athletic event, but boy-oh-boy can it take a physical toll. Last night, I ventured out to Gersten Pavilion (a/k/a "Hank's House") to take some notes on theUnnamed Program From t...
S3 February 5, 2007 LOS ANGELES -- There are three important national holidays on the official calendar of Hoops Nation™. First and foremost in importance, of course, is Selection Sunday in March -- the day that the entire college basketball year leads up to. A second is coming up in a couple weeks: that glorious...
S3 January 30, 2007 PAWTUCKET, R.I. -- Before we begin our supersized DP, I just want to share with you something I wrote yesterday. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (fourth edition, 2004, published by Houghton Mifflin) defines the word "champion" as "One that wins first place or first prize in...
S3 January 25, 2007 BOONE, N.C. -- As of press time, 63 of the available 100 entries in Bally's BracketBusters Racket, the only contest in the world that lets you choose all 51 BB matchups, have been snapped up (the limit is in place 'cause I'll be hand-validating the entries, but call it a "soft cap"). Remember: the d...
S3 January 22, 2007 CULLOWHEE, N.C. -- Lots to get to today, just like every Monday. And if you haven't signed up to play Bally's BracketBusters Racket yet, you have a lot more to get to than I do. Roll the HTML! The Big Games! at Virginia Commonwealth 80, Old Dominion 75 (Colonial) (box) -- The VCU Rams are the only...
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. ...
S3 December 20, 2006 MARTIN, Tenn. -- First of all today, I want to welcome the newest member of the Mid-Majority family, the "vs. Others" page. Every team now has one -- even yours! -- and it's got all sort of cool stuff on it like records and results against current conference opponents, as well as records against oth...
S2 April 9, 2006 INDIANAPOLIS, Apr. 2 -- There are huge signs all over town -- on airport walls, strung over streetlights, over the main gate to the RCA Dome. They all read, "The Road Ends Here." There's also a giant logo on the side of the 45,000-seat venue, a green and gold star with zag-zigging trailers that has...
S2 February 25, 2006 There are two types of people in this world: Ibby and anti-Ibby. When you're Ibby, you conduct your business with a calm dignity and dart-sharp exactitude. Why, being Ibby might make you the most efficient scorer in Division I basketball if you measure the highest effective FG% (64%) for ppg (19.1)....
S2 January 26, 2006 After a rough December against tougher opposition, Penn is ramping up at the right time: January. Last night at the cozy Philly Palestra, the Quakers overcame an old Big 5 nemesis and A-14 foe in LaSalle. Four Penn men scored in double figures to give coach Fran Dunphy his 10th win of the season and...
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...
S2 November 26, 2005 Time to make amends. Last week, in front of thousands of people, I said that Drexel didn't have a chance against the likes of Duke. If they play that same type of steady, grinding, athletic (if unspectacular) team-ball for the rest of the year, they could certainly make things miserable for all the ...
S1 March 16, 2005 Fairleigh Dickinson Seed: 16 1st Round Opponent: Illinois Record: 20-12 (16-5 Northeast Conference) Big Nonconference Wins: December 9 at eventual MAAC two-seed Rider (76-74) 100 Games Project Appearances: #65 Key Players: Big Gordon Klaiber and little Tamien Trent are the inside-outside mechanism ...
S1 March 14, 2005 In the heat of the postseason, it's easy for people to quickly sweep their preseason conference picks under the rug. What? Huh? I picked Princeton? Look over there, a birdie! But not this one; I face my failures head-on. For your amusement, here are my picks from late December. Note that I had an e...
S1 March 13, 2005 Bullet Points Six more teams are in: Vermont (America East), Ohio (MAC), UTEP (WAC), Delaware State (MEAC), George Washington (A-10), and Utah State (Big West). Championship Week concludes today with a pair of games: the SWAC and Southland finals. It's Selection Sunday, the holiest day of the colle...
S1 March 12, 2005 Bullet Points Congratulations to Bucknell, orange-clad kings of the Patriot League. Eight-seed Boise State continued to rip through the WAC bracket, knocking off Fresno State one day after dispatching 1 Nevada. Today marks the grand crescendo of the mid-major season. With finals in the America East...
S1 March 11, 2005 Bullet Points Western Athletic regular season champions Nevada dropped a shock decision to Boise State, clearing the way for a two-bid WAC. There won't likely be many other two-bid mid-major leagues except for, say, the Missouri Valley... apparently the new RPI isn't all it's cracked up to be. I'...
S1 March 10, 2005 Bullet Points Two more Dance tickets were printed and punched last night: Fairleigh-Dickinson out of the NEC, and Montana from the Big Sky. Defending champion Florida A&M was ousted from the MEAC tournament. After a last-second bracket reshuffling due to three forfeited games, the SWAC gets it ...
S1 March 9, 2005 Bullet Points Oakland of the Mid-Continent Conference pulled the low-seed surprise of the year, taking down 1 seed Oral Roberts in the league's title game by a 61-60 score. Two other proud conference champions, and two overjoyed satellite campuses: Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Louisiana-Lafayette. The P...
S1 March 8, 2005 Bullet Points Four champions are crowned: Creighton (MVC), Niagara (MAAC), Old Dominion (CAA) and UMPFN (WCC). Three more tonight: the Sun Belt, Mid-Continent, and the Horizon league matchup of Detroit and Wisconsin-Milwaukee. The run of the Oakland Golden Grizzlies of the Mid-Con continued, they'...
S1 March 7, 2005 Bullet Points No finals yesterday, four tonight. The Missouri Valley, as expected since the beginning of the season, was no cookie-cutter cakewalk for top seeds. Both 1 Southern Illinois and 2 Wichita State went down, but the Salukis remain bulletproof on Selection Sunday. Two defending conference ...
S1 March 6, 2005 Bullet Points Four Dance tickets were punched: Winthrop, Eastern Kentucky, Central Florida and Chattanooga. Despite the two-digit numbers that the Selection Committee will hand them one week from today, all are champions. One-seeds fell like mighty trees. Arkansas-Little Rock, the E1 in the Sun Bel...
S1 March 5, 2005 Bullet Points Two one-seeds went down: Tennessee Tech lost in the OVC semifinals, and Davidson was eliminated in the Southern Conference semis. Four automatic bids will be handed out today, as the ESPN networks begin a schedule of court-stormings every two hours or so. We have the Big South's matc...
S1 March 4, 2005 Bracket Wrap Southern: The favorites prevailed, but all their SoCon South division-mates have been wiped out. (recaps) (S1) Davidson 67, (N4) Elon 53 (N2) North Carolina-Greensboro 73, (S3) Georgia Southern 71 (N1) Chattanooga 77, (N5) East Tennessee State 70 (N3) Appalachian State 63, (S2) Charle...
S1 March 3, 2005 Mid-American: Miami (Oh.) 70, Kent State 45 (story) - Total domination. The RedHawks (18-8, 12-5 MAC) sent a message to the rest of the league, and to the Selection Committee as well, saying that they'd sure like to be invited to that Dance thingy if there's room on the list. But they didn't ask nic...
S1 March 2, 2005 Bracket Wrap Big South: The way is now even clearer for the dominant one-seed in this league; after the campus-seed quarterfinals, the BSC bracket is blown apart. (7) Charleston Southern 66, (2) Liberty 60 (story) (6) High Point 98, (3) North Carolina-Asheville 93 (OT) (story) (4) Birmingham-Sout...
S1 March 2, 2005 Game 067: at Harvard 82, Yale 66 Friday, February 26, 2005 Lavietes Pavilion - Cambridge, MA If each basketball team's season is like a single lifetime, then Ivy League hoops must be a lot like life. There are good days and bad days, zero second chances and absolutely no do-overs. And if you were ...
S1 February 27, 2005 Ivy: Pennsylvania 80, Columbia 72 (story) - Congratulations to the Quakers! The first ticket to the NCAA Tournament was punched last night as Penn (17-8, 10-1) clinched the Ivy League regular-season title. They stormed to a win on the Lions' home court, bolstered by 68% second-half shooting and a ...
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 23, 2005 Mid-Continent: Missouri-Kansas City 77, Oral Roberts 70 (story) - In front of a roaring partisan paid attendance of 7,132, UMKC (15-9, 11-2 MidCon) held off the visitors in what the Kansas City Star pegged as "the most important game in its 18-year Division I era." After a seesaw opening to the seco...
S1 February 21, 2005 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 n...
S1 February 16, 2005 Game 060: at Chattanooga 82, North Carolina-Greensboro 68 Monday, February 14, 2005 McKenzie Arena - Chattanooga, TN No news here, but this red state-blue state thing isn't a new divide by any means. Back in the 1860's, an invisible Mason-Dixon line separated America's two primary philosophical nat...
S1 February 16, 2005 Game 061: at Austin Peay 73, Jacksonville State 65 Tuesday, February 15, 2005 Dunn Center - Clarksville, TN When halftime comes, the "Gov" mascot strides onto the floor accompanied by his attendants, a phalanx of black-dressed cheerleaders. The red-coated, top-hatted old gent with a monocle, a cha...
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 14, 2005 Game 059: Wagner 62, at St. Francis (NY) 61 Saturday, February 12, 2005 Pope Center - Brooklyn, NY The Northeast Conference doesn't try to be something that it's not, and that's refreshing. Their mission statement strives for "athletic achievement, academic integrity and development, community out...
S1 February 13, 2005 Game 056: at Pennsylvania 73, Columbia 66 Friday, February 11, 2005 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA Every game counts, but the sad flipside of the Ivy League season is that it is cruel and short: only fourteen games over six weeks. Each team gets three weekends at home, two midweek contests against...
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 9, 2005 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 Ga...
S1 February 8, 2005 Missouri Valley: Southern Illinois 58, Drake 57 (story) - Faraway, so close. Sure, SIU's RPI is great, but they're really struggling right now. At Drake, they had to be bailed out by bigman Josh Warren's last-minute jumper - they shot 40% and only made two free throws all evening. The Bulldogs' seas...
S1 February 7, 2005 When the final gun sounded at the Super Bowl yesterday, the city of Philadelphia was again spared the property-damaging bonfire a quarter-century in the making. While the majority of American sports fans will be spending the day mourning and mothballing their screen-printed replica jerseys, a few of...
S1 February 5, 2005 Game 051: Pennsylvania 70, at Harvard 57 Friday, February 4, 2005 Lavietes Pavilion - Cambridge, MA Two weeks after the Blizzard of 2005, much of the ancient city of Boston was still buried under three feet of frozen white. The temperatures had been too frigid for significant melting to occur, and ...
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 31, 2005 Mid-American: Miami (Oh.) 74, Akron 63 (story) - It was a bonus Shakedown Saturday game that happened to fall on Sunday. The RedHawks of Miami were up by 20 and had the game well in hand going into the final five minutes, but the zippy Zips zipped off an 18-1 run to cut the lead to four. In a rare g...
S1 January 29, 2005 Game 044: Brown 57, at Princeton 52 Friday, January 28, 2005 Jadwin Gym - Princeton, NJ All well-earned due respect to the National Invitation Tournament, but you won't find a more boisterous bracket than the septuple-elimination slate in the Ancient Eight! "Ace" Whelliston here, follower of the ...
S1 January 26, 2005 Game 041: Pennsylvania 67, St. Joseph's 59 Tuesday, January 26, 2005 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA Let me tell you, those 27-game road trips are the worst. It seems like I've been traveling forever, hopping from arena to arena on my silly little quest to see a hundred college basketball games bef...
S1 January 14, 2005 There is no question that that this is a deeply divided nation, this America. The election last November showed a country split between Republicans and Democrats, retro and metro, blue states and red. And across those thin black battle lines flew the arrows of misunderstanding, hate and prejudice. J...
S1 January 13, 2005 Game 031: at Lehigh 63, Lafayette 57 Wednesday, January 12, 2005 Stabler Arena - Bethlehem, PA February 14th, 2004 broke cold and clear in the slumbering burg of Easton, Pennsylvania, but the love in the Kirby Sports Center was powerful enough to warm the whole town. Lafayette's basketball team sat...
S1 January 12, 2005 Southland: Southeastern Louisiana 56, Sam Houston State 54 (story) - We sold this yesterday as big O versus big D, and the defense won. (I've also heard that it wins championships, but the evidence is inconclusive.) Southeastern kept the Bearkats' normally streaky offense in check, and backup guard ...
S1 December 29, 2004 Game 021: at Drexel 76, Monmouth 47 Tuesday, December 28, 2004 Daskalakis Athletic Center - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Like so many great things, it all started at the University of Oregon. Hall Of Fame coach Howard "Hobby" Hobson led the Ducks back in the Forties, and he also served on the NCAA ru...
S1 December 28, 2004 Game 020: at Villanova 81, Middle Tennessee State 62 Monday, December 27, 2004 The Pavilion - Villanova, Pennsylvania CHAPTER 1 1 There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was blameless and upright and turned away from all evil. 2 There were born to him seven sons and thre...
S1 December 24, 2004 Big West: Idaho 69, Utah State 62 (story) - Because the students were away, this game was moved from the 7,000-seat Cowan Spectrum to Idaho's old, dusty Memorial Gym (seating: 1,300). Utah State (7-3, 0-1 BWC) outshot Idaho 52%-44%, but the undersized Vandals (2-8, 1-0 BWC) outrebounded the visitor...
S1 December 19, 2004 The West Coast Conference and Missouri Valley have a lot in common these days: both are inspiring mid-major geeks almost to the point of bad poetry, both have decent records against power leagues (MVC: 3-7, WCC: 8-10), and both can say that every team but one has a winning non-conference record so f...
S1 December 18, 2004 Winthrop 70, East Carolina 55 (story) - With embarrassing losses to D2 teams and potential school-poaching by the Atlantic Sun, it hasn't been the Big South's day, their week, their month, or even their year. But Winthrop has been a big bright spot, running out to a 7-2 record that includes two wins...
S1 December 6, 2004 Metro Atlantic: Loyola (Md.) 97, Niagara 89 (story) - Bottom beat top in the MAAC. Shane James, a member of the Canadian junior national team, went 9-for-9 to lead Loyola, who outshot the Purple Eagles 55%-39% and scored 37 of their points on 58 free throws. Despite the fact that Niagara's bruising ...
S1 December 5, 2004 Game 011: Pennsylvania 78, LaSalle 67 Saturday, December 4, 2004 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA Carlos Castaneda's primary life mantra, "fly past the eagle and be free," probably wouldn't go over too well in Philadelphia, a town stuck in a perpetual heartbreak cycle with its football team. But h...
S1 December 3, 2004 Indiana State 62, Birmingham Southern 55 (story) - The prohibitive favorites in the Big South - and champions of the recent Marist Classic - went to Indiana and got beat by the worst team in the Valley. The Sycamores (or the "Trees" if you're cool) did the Panthers in with stingy perimeter defense, ...
S1 December 2, 2004 Game 010: at Pennsylvania 65, Bucknell 52 Wednesday, December 1, 2004 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA As anyone who goes to one of its affiliated schools (or anyone who's read The Last Amateurs) can tell you, the Patriot League was created primarily to give Ivy League schools some early-season foot...
S1 November 30, 2004 Georgia State 85, Louisiana-Lafayette 78 (story) - A good Atlantic Sun club beat a bigger and stronger Ragin' Cajun team - one picked by many to storm through the Sun Belt Conference this year - by making their free throws down the stretch. It was the front end of a rare non-conference home-and-home...
S1 November 17, 2004 Game 002: Pennsylvania 74, Quinnipiac 60 Tuesday, November 16, 2004 The Palestra - Philadelphia, PA A couple of weeks ago, the Official Wife Of The Mid-Majority and I were out a-walking hand-in-hand across the campus of the University of Pennsylvania. We paused to admire the blocky brick facade of ...
S1 November 15, 2004 This site has been open for business no more than six days, and it is already being lit up like a Thanksgiving turkey. Most gratifying, however, are the wonderful things that others are saying about The Mid-Majority elsewhere in the b-ball blogosphere. I am touched and slightly overcome by the kind ...
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