Well, I thought the game I was at tonight was pretty good. Then I got text messages from my brother at the UW-Stout/Augustana game with score updates on a game that went down to the wire as Augustana dropped 10 three-pointers on the Blue Devils in the second half. Then I got a phone call from Gordon Mann as I was driving back from Randolph-Macon and he ran down the rest of the key scores.
Those were good games, too. Let me tell you about Fisk/Randolph-Macon, however. I’m accustomed to seeing Randolph-Macon’s backcourt cause trouble for its opponents with in-your-face defense and by stepping into passing lanes and picking the ball off. But tonight it was Fisk’s speed on defense that got the job done. Chris Adams had five steals to go with his 15 points as Randolph-Macon turned the ball over 23 times, including four consecutive possessions that allowed Fisk to battle back from a five-point deficit, its largest of the night.
“The last 10 minutes of the game we found our way,” Fisk coach Larry Glover said after the game. “In the second half I think we kind of forced the tempo defensively that turned the momentum in our favor. I don’t think they recovered.”
Glover also said one of his team’s goals after watching the video of the second Randolph-Macon/Lincoln game was to shut down either Adam Krovic or Justin Wansley. Wansley got his points (19, plus 11 rebounds) but Krovic was held to one shot, a missed three-pointer.
At any rate, I can see Fisk doing some damage, especially since they won tonight despite shooting 4-for-21 from three-point range. They came in shooting 40.6% from downtown, so they must have their moments. A heads-up to Mississippi College and Maryville, coming up in the next two weeks.
Good win for Baldwin-Wallace, obviously. The Randolph-Macon tournament and Wooster’s tournament were a couple of the ones I had in mind in writing a Daily Dose post in September regarding how to select pairings for your tournament. Both host schools took a chance and picked the second-best team as their first-round opponent, and I’ll be honest, I like the decision. Shows guts. In both cases, it means the hosts got a regional game they might not have gotten otherwise. And if you’re Wooster, you’re going to have to beat Baldwin-Wallace at some point to win the tournament, whether it was tonight or tomorrow.
Some good non-regional games tonight as well, between UW-Platteville and Mary Hardin-Baylor and between Manchester and Trinity (Texas). And don’t overlook Caltech/Rivier — Caltech lost 55-54, as close as it gets for them in attempting to beat a Division III foe for the first time in years. Illinois Wesleyan/Puget Sound comes out about as expected.
Millikin’s women still appear to be struggling, only beating Tufts by four. UW-La Crosse’s win against Chapman is important because even though Chapman is a little down, they are still usually a playoff contender. By the way, apparently we need to take a closer look at Oglethorpe, which appears to be 9-1 (no report on Wednesday night’s game with Chapman but looks like a win) with its only loss to Division I Davidson. This weekend’s games were its first road tests (other than Davidson, which can’t be considered a test if there’s no chance of passing).
Maybe someone can chime in on W&J’s women, who appeared to struggle this weekend with a pair of UMAC teams. Bad sign. They were up by 20 tonight at one point but yesterday had to rally from an eight-point halftime deficit to beat Minnesota-Morris.
UW-Platteville defeated Mary Hardin-Baylor 55-52. UW-P’s release is posted here.
http://d3hoops.com/releases.php?release=43469
The ASC-West is likely to be UMHB, McMurry and Howard Payne. I am glad to see the ASC getting some good inter-region games. (I also hope the NCAA approves the “holiday” legislation to qualify these as in-region.) IMHO, UW-P defeats Concordia-Austin on Saturday. We are having great weather in Texas this week, so I hope the UW-P coach brought his golf clubs. 🙂
As for Fisk, they have a chance to make some noise. Adding wins over Mississippi College, the favorite in the ASC-East, and Maryville TN, their fellow GSAC foe, will greatly boost their chances at a Pool B bid.
I hope the Selection Committee looks closely at the Fisk-Mississippi College game. Mississippi College could win the 8-team ASC-East and still lose in the Conference Tourney, which is being hosted by the ASC-West winner this year. That should be a great in-region match-up. MissColl should be ready for the Fisk athleticism. Several ASC teams try that style of play.
Thanks to Pat for getting to the R-MC Fisk game!
I listened to the second half of the R-MC/Fisk game. Fisk sounds like the real deal. Nine of their fifteen players are seniors, three are juniors, one sophomore and one freshman. Only one of the latter three got any minutes, and only 2 minutes at that. So they are an experienced team that should be taken seriously after last night. And hats off to Pat Coleman for great photos of the game. How do you get the D3HOOPS logo in the background of every photo? Will you include Fisk in your Top 25 vote next week?
From a Mid-Atlantic perspective, tonight’s game between No. 10 York (Pa.) and Ursinus is an interesting one.
Nick Shattuck seems to be emerging as the scoring threat to complement All-American guard Mike McGarvey. The Spartans have won 20 straight at Wolf Gym, but this is a key stretch for the Bears. York tonight, Trinity (Conn.) on Tuesday and then conference play resumes with F&M.
Albright is struggling. Last night’s 77-73 loss to Rockford in Phoenix is the Lions’ third in four games. I’m not sure any of the MAC men’s teams — Commonwealth or Freedom — are in the Top 40. Sigh.
The Cactus Jam Classic has a softer field this year than in the past, but I’ll be curious to see if Ramapo can hang with Biola, who stomped mediocre Elmira (2-7) and Linfield (2-8).
Mark Simon pointed out these stats from the UW-Stevens Point/Baruch women’s game:
Rebounds: UWSP 53 BC 25
Turnovers: UWSP 31 BC 10
I will vote for Fisk next week, presuming they win tonight.
The Fisk roster in the game program listed five seniors, three of whom started.
The logo is superimposed automatically on those photos to prevent someone from downloading and printing them themselves. 🙂
I’ll be at that York/Ursinus game this evening.
I was going by the roster on the Fisk website for my count of players and class years.
http://www.fisk.edu/index.asp?cat=46&parent=679&pid=821
Will look forward to your report and photos of the York/Ursinus game. You do get around.
Pat, down here in sunny and warm FL with W&J. They were two ugly wins. First night was a combination of Christmas layoff rust and quite simply, poor play! THey don’t have a place for teams to practice while down here and we had no info on UMM b/c no one would send film or give scouting report. Against Presentation were up 20 with about ten to go when coach started subbing pretty freely. Do need to start playing better but not sure it’s a bad sign. UW-SP struggled against an Oswego team that’s not as good as last year, beating them in OT
Thanks, robooh. I won’t have a photo gallery — gym was too dark to shoot very well in, but I’ll have use for photos from York at some point, I’m sure.
From the short-lived bandwagon department…
SUNY-Farmingdale 69 Fisk 51
Pat was wise to make that conditional statement above – “I will vote for Fisk next week, presuming they win tonight.”
Oopsy!
Well, I think we’ve all seen teams come out … flat, let’s say … after a big emotional win.
Thx for mentioning Oglethorpe Women. We just returned from LA where we played Chapman and Occidental. The score against Chapman was 70-59 and was the day before Chapman lost to Wisc.-LaCrosse by 1 on the last shot. We beat Occidental 81-60 the next day. We start 4 freshmen and 1 junior. We’ll see what happens this week when we play 3 SCAC conference games.
Again, thx for mentioning us.