Its been an interesting week in mid major college basketball. But before I start on that, I just want to make a quick comment on Rhode Island. They may not be a mid major, but damn they are an impressive team. The Rams are 10-1 with resume building wins over Providence, 77-60 and at Syracuse 91-89. The Rams only loss was a four point loss at BC, nothing to be ashamed of. The Rams are led by senior forward Will Daniels and junior guard Jimmy Baron. But they are not a 2 man team. The Rams have five other players who score between 7 and 9.7 points a game, which means teams have a difficult time keying on one player. Along with Xavier and an underrated Dayton team, the Rams look to be an elite A-10 team and the Atlantic 10 may very well get three teams into the NCAA tournament this year.
CAA
George Mason has struggled in the past week, losing to East Carolina in the BB&T Classic, then a tough win over a pretty good Hampton team, then a discouraging road loss at a pretty solid Kent State team. Those three games showed a possible Achilles heel in the Patriots team – free throw shooting. In the three point loss to the Pirates, the Patriots shot an unseemly 13 of 25 from the free throw line, including Louis Birdsong’s 2 for 6 and Will Thomas 2 of 9 from the charity stripe. In their three point win over Hampton, George Mason only shot 6 of 10 from the line. In their 18 point loss against Kent State, the Patriots shot a meager 9 of 19 from the free throw line. Now, the Patriots lost by 18 points to Kent State, 73-55, but the game was close in the second half at 38-35 before the Golden Flashes (how great is that nickname by the way!) went on a 25-8 run. As I pointed out in a previous blog posting when Mason lost to Villanova, during Nova’s decisive run in the second half, the Patriots missed the front end of three one and one free throw attempts. During that 25-8 second half run by the Golden Flashes. the Patriots missed 4 of 6 free throws. It seems like a drop in the buckets, but its often free throws that keeps teams in games during cold spells from the field.
VCU had an excellent week with an impressive win over Maryland at the BB&T classic 85-76, then followed that up with a solid 14 point win over William and Mary in their CAA opener, then ended the week with a 20 point beat down over Richmond in the battle of the James River schools. In the win over the Terrapins, Jamal Shuler (30) and Eric Maynor (25) combined for 55 points as the Rams shot 24 of 31 from the free throw line. Maynor and Shuler combined for 36 points as the Rams shot 50 percent from the field to down the Tribe. In the win over the Spiders, the Rams held the Spiders to 29 percent from the field as Shuler and Maynor combined for 41 points.
UNCW had an up and down week. The Seahawks started their week with a tough well earned three point overtime win at Hofstra over the Pride, 87-83 in their CAA opener. The Seahawks then lost by seven at Missouri State, 73-66. In the win over the pride, the starting lineup of Vladimir Kuljanin, Todd Hendley, TJ Carter, Daniel Fountain and Charles Tomko combined for 77 of the team’s 87 points. They outrebounded Hofstra 42-34 and shot 17 of 19 from the free throw line. In their seven point loss to the Bears, UNCW only had 10 free throw attempts (and only made 6), and had 21 turnovers.
Hofstra had a tough week losing two games by a total of six points. In the aforementioned four point overtime loss to the Seahawks, despite shooting 47.8 percent from the field, the Pride shot 12 of 22 from the free throw line, again showing Hofstra’s propensity for weak free throw shooting. However, the Pride showed potential second and third scoring options in Nathaniel Lester and Charles Jenkins who combined for 33 points to go along with Antoine Agudio’s 34 points. In their two point loss to Fordham 73-71, the Pride shot much better from the charity stripe, going 17 of 18 from the line, as well as shooting 50 percent from the field. However the Pride had 27 turnovers and if it wasn’t for Antoine Agudio’s 30 of his career high 36 points in the second half, the game would not have been that close and only Charles Jenkins was the other Pride player in double figures with 10 points.
Drexel has been struggling from the field in its last games. Ok, struggling is an understatement. In their last three games, all losses, Drexel has not scored more than 48 points. Furthermore Drexel is showing an alarming tendency of not being able to find another scorer other than Frank Elegar. Elegar has been the only Dragon to be in double figures in scoring the last two games. Drexel has also shown a propensity like George Mason and Hofstra to struggle from the free throw line. In their 24 point loss to Creighton, Drexel only shot 7 of 15 from the free throw line. In their 12 point loss at Toledo, the Dragons only shot 7 of 12 from the line. It may be a long season if Drexel both struggles from the field and the line and must get other scoring options like Tremayne Hawthorne and Gerald Colds into the mix.
Horizon
Butler looked simply dominant in the second half of their 65-46 win over Ohio State, outscoring the Buckeyes 45-16. Matt Howard came off the bench to score 23 points for the Bulldogs. The Bulldogs forced 23 Buckeye turnovers. The Bulldogs then defeated 53-46 as Howard scored 20 points, this time as a starter. However, the Bulldogs could not win three in a week, as the Bulldogs lost to arch rival Wright State 47-46 in a Horizon league game.
In that 47-46 win, the Raiders gave the Bulldogs their first loss of the season, as Brad Brownell’s team held the Bulldogs to 32 percent from the field. The Raiders held Bulldogs scorers AJ Graves and Matt Howard to a combined 11 points as Graves and Howard shot 4 of 16 from the field. Scottie Wilson and Todd Brown each had 10 points for the Raiders as the Raiders won their third consecutive game against Butler going back to last season, which included the Horizon Championship game.
However, Wright State may not be the toughest competition for Butler in the Horizon League. Valparaiso may be the team to beat as the Crusaders have started off to a 8-1 start (only loss was 87-78 at nationally ranked Vanderbilt). Included in that 8-1 start is a 2-0 conference start which includes a 71-66 win at Wright State. In their 81-68 win at Detroit yesterday, the Crusaders shot 66 percent from the field (30 of 45) including 10-20 from the three point arc. Shawn Huff, Jarryd Loyd and Urule Igbavboa combine an average of 35 points a game.
Its very possible that the Horizon league will get two teams again this year if Butler should lose the Horizon championship as it did last year to Wright State. Butler already has the marquee wins over Texas Tech and Ohio State, resume material for an at large bid from the NCAA tournament committee.
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