So everyone in the PL is having this kind of season, right? RIGHT!?

Goooooood afternoon AU basketball fans. And buenos tardes to Frank Borden if he's reading this from Mexico, who knows. So it strikes me that while many of you are digging graves for our (as-of-lately-not-so) mighty AU Eagles, you may not know about how the rest of our Patriot League friends and foes (but mostly foes) are faring in their out-of-conference schedules. Well, I figured I'd look that up and provide it in one nice, neat tidy package for you. This will catch you up on the games played to date, and every Monday I will update you on the past week's games. Get it? Got it? Good.

Off we go!

Two 0-7 Powerhouses Collide on Tuesday...WILL YOU BE THERE?

I just found out that Howard is also 0-7. Tuesday night will be a battle of futility. Please cross your fingers and pray to your respective deities that we pull out a win. After this the toughest part of our season commences.

Josh will have the preview sometime tomorrow, but I know you all get antsy when we don't post for a day. Or maybe I just think you get antsy.

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

When you lose to a team you flat-out should've beaten, I can search for GOOD but can find plenty of BAD and UGLY

Ugh. Good evening AUHoops.com fans! Thanks to all of you who came out and participated in our liveblog today. For those of you haven't heard. We lost. Again. For the seventh time in a row. Unlike the past couple of losses, this is a game we should've won, and, well, we didn't. Let me give a disclaimer here, I'm going to write up this Good, Bad, and Ugly based on the box score, the recaps I read, and the comments in the liveblog. If I don't get it entirely correct, I apologize in advance, but I think I'll probably do a pretty good job. (Good enough for government work, as they say). Here's the recap and box score.

Anyway, let's get on with it, painful as it may be.

AU vs. UMES Liveblog!

It's our second liveblog! Free and no account needed, so come join us!

These Hawks Could Be Doves

I hope everyone enjoyed a happy, restful Thanksgiving! For a day our collective thoughts turned from Eagles to Turkeys, and we reflected on the things in our lives we are grateful for. For example, Mike Bersch's hot 3-point shooting, time spent with family and friends, Riley Grafft's first career double-double (matching the number of double-doubles we had the entirety of last season), and possibly even the sport of football (coming from Connecticut, this writer often forgets there are sports other than college basketball).

Of course, our 0-6 record probably wasn't high on too many people's lists yesterday. The last time our record was this abysmal was...December 2005, when many of last season's star players were mere freshmen themselves. Derrick Mercer was already a consistent start (and eventually PL Rookie of the Year), but Garrison Carr was two seasons away from coming off the bench. Jordan Nichols and Brian Gilmore looked on as George Mason pounded us 75-35 in the BB&T Classic (in which I would argue the Eagles should still compete) to bring us to that fateful 0-6. Ah, maybe this season isn't quite so bad, then.

When you come back from a 14-1 deficit to make a game of it but still lose, you could say there's elements of GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

Goooooood evening AUHoops.com followers, fans, and general hangers-on. Hope you all had a good night and a safe day of traveling for Thanksgiving tomorrow. Me? Oh, no, my traveling is not completed. Josh and I were both in Bender Arena tonight. Why? Because we're slaves to the blogosphere, that's why. I hope you appreciate the personal sacrifices we make for you. Meh, actually, it's okay if you don't, I'm going to go to the games and report on them anyway.

So, tonight. I predicted 84-70. Per usual, I showed that I am not good at things. The final score was Manhattan (Jaspers, what in the Great Wall of Lumpkins is a jasper? Is it like Casper the friendly ghost's mid-major basketball team cousin?) 69, AU 62. I was actually pretty pleased with our performance overall. What's that you say? You mean if I'm so pleased then why don't I shut up and just write a "Good" column instead of a "Good, Bad, and Ugly" column? Because this isn't rec soccer, there are winners and losers (even though tonight we're all losers, losers of six straight actually). You don't just get a trophy that says, "Good job." You get (maybe, if you're lucky) a designation as Good, Bad, or Ugly from a blogger with less skill in his whole body than Lumpkins has in his left knee.

So join me on this magical trip to Good, Bad, and Ugly land. It'll be an extra-long edition because I'm feeling generous! Yippee!

The Quick and Dirty Preview

Sorry if you've been checking in like crazy, this day just got away from us here at the Hoops Blog.

Here's the preview:

Manhattan just beat FAU who beat us pretty handily. This will be another one of those "If we can keep it to within 10 points and lose, it'll be a moral victory." Mm. High expectations. Prediction: Manhattan 84, AU 70.

I'll be livetweeting, and there will be a full recap later.

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

Let's Talk Turkey: SPECULATION TUESDAY

Get it? Talk turkey? Thanksgiving is coming up? Oh God I need some more material. In any event, here we are, everyone, 0-5. Fear, not, however! There is an end in sight to this losing streak. Without too much introductory nonsense (you don't really come here for that, do you?) Here are my items for Speculation Tuesday:

When you surpass 5,000 hits but the team you cover goes 0-5, it's GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

Goooooood evening AU Hoops fans. We are 0-5. Zero wins, five losses. Boy oh boy. We knew it was going to be a rebuilding year, but I don't think anyone thought it would be quite like this. The recap to the game is here, and the box score is here. In any event, there is definitely some good, bad, and ugly tonight. It's hard to keep being creative to these introductions. It's also hard to keep losing, and I do feel bad for the team. Still, away we go

Deer Huntin' In DC

So today I took an especially long drink from the endless well of optimism we keep fresh on tap here at AU Basketball Central. Tonight in Bender we face the Fairfield University Stags of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC), to whom we have ungracefully fallen the last two years. What chance then, you ask, do we have today? Yikes, I'm afraid to tell you. To be honest, folks, I'll likely be cheering us on to another moral victory tonight. Here's the quick and dirty of it.

FU (get the laughs out now):

• To repeat, Fairfield somehow pulled the rug out from under us for the past two seasons (where I might remind you we then went to put on a mighty good show in the NCAAs). If they can do that then, well, I bet they can do it now too. We're 2-1 all-time against them in Bender (4-1 in DC since we go way back with the Stags), and 8-6 overall. At least after tonight we'll still be ahead all-time.
• They've got the youth. Freshman Guard Derek Needham has already been named the MAAC Rookie of the Week, and he's averaging 16 points per game. He's backed up by Anthony Johnson, a 6-8 senior who's averaging a double-double with 11.7 points and 11.3 rebounds per game.
  
• They summarily handed Fordham and Central Connecticut State solid losses so far this season. Sure, they got handily wiped by UMD (remember '07!), but they're ranked #25 right now. We're not exactly top-25 at the moment, so let's not expect to do the same.
• Low Point: Fairfield has shot less than 30% from the floor for the past two games. Of course, they still one one of those and the other was against #25 Maryland. Of course, we are currently averaging the highest scoring defense in the Patriot League, so who knows...
  

The Mighty AU Eagles (Where There's A Fight They'll See It Through):

• Stephen Lumpkins has upped his career-high in points with every game this season. He scored 23 against Florida Atlantic, let's hope he can do it again. He's also averaging 9 rebounds per game, so if he can pull off a double-double tonight he's going to be averaging some really freaking solid numbers. Too bad Fairfield's already got a guy (his height, too) already doing that.
• Riley Grafft is also averaging somewhere between 9 and 12 points per game. I say this because the latest AU press release says 9 (and so does my math), but Fairfield's says 12. If that's what they want, let's give it to them, eh Riley?
• Danny Munoz has started every game so far, and is the only freshman to be doing so. To my knowledge the only two freshmen under the Jones Regime to ever start every game their freshman year were Andre Ingram and Derrick Mercer. You're in good company, Danny!
• We are scoring well off the bench (Bersch, Jolivette, and McCormack are all averaging 7-8 points apiece), and (let's just forget FAU ever happened) from the line as well. These were our two weakest points last year, so it's good to see some bright spots. We're also repeating last year's trick with our high scoring defense (just not the high scoring to go with it).
• Low Point: Uh, I'm going to have to go with passing here. If we can get into enough of a rhythm where the ball can successfully go between our players, and not straight into a turnover, well, I'd just have to pick something else as a low point. It was looking better every game until FAU. Let's just hope that was an aberration and it continues to improve.
• High Point: Had to sneak this one in here. One thing we are not afraid to do is get physical, and at least once a game someone (say, Blake Jolivette) is diving face-first into the hardwood after the ball, and most of the time coming up with it over someone almost twice their size. Always impressive. No one can say we're not scrappy.
• Starting Lineup - projected to be Lumpkins, Grafft, Luptak, Munoz, and...Hendra. Last time we had heard that Wilson was going be starting for at least one game over Hendra, but that didn't quite pan out. Our apologies for the mistake, but we think we've got it right this time. We never mind a surprise out of Coach Jones, though!
• Let's hope Coach is feeling a bit better this game. He had to step out a few times against FAU, but luckily Assistant Coach Donohue stepped in and looked like he ran the place. He's going to make a really great head coach someday somewhere (fingers crossed that place is AU for some time to come yet).

Alright, that's all I've got today. Let me know if I glossed over anything you find important, since I know we have some pretty damn smart readers out there who are sure to pick up on something I missed. I'll see you all in Bender tonight at 7:30! Let's go Stag Huntin'!

Go Eagles,
Josh

EDITOR'S NOTE: The gun in the image above is an airsoft gun, not a real gun, since we here at AU Basketball Central don't like that real-life violence stuff. Plus, guns are illegal in DC. Oh, and Eagles don't have opposable thumbs.

When you play 10 really good minutes and 30 minutes full of putrescence, there's some GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

Well goooooooood afternoon AUHoops fans. If you were at the game today, I imagine you're probably trying to forget what you saw. But, like a deranged psychiatrist, I'm going to dredge up all those painful memories, make you confront them, and give you no closure about it! How do you like them apples?

The long story short is that we lost this game 81-69. We were down 16 at half, down 23 at one point in the second half, and we managed to claw back to within four. Ultimately though, the wheels came off and we're now sitting at 0-4 for the season.

Let me be honest, if I had had to write this entry at halftime, it would have looked like this:
GOOD - Matt Wilson, BAD - Mike Jarvis's career trajectory, UGLY - everything else about AU. Luckily, I didn't have to write it at halftime. Unluckily, I had to watch the second half.

Third Time's The Charm

It's preview time again here at AU Basketball Central, as our Eagles fly onto the hardwood of Bender Arena yet again tomorrow (Saturday) at noon. For those of you who stopped by last time to check out Bill's Mt. St. Mary's preview, I apologize for the Sylvester Stallone joke. I clearly would not condone such a reference in one of my own previews, unless it involved some sort of incredible Rocky/Rambo hybrid meant to symbolize Stephen Lumpkins' intimidating game-face. But I digress...

So here we are, three games into a five game homestand. The first two didn't go quite as planned, but there's a spring of endless optimism here at AU Basketball Central, and we drink from it every night just to stay sane. So as they say, third time's the charm! Let's see what we're up against tomorrow after the jump.

The....Florida Atlantic University Owls! Owls, you say? Owls?! Unless our mascot suddenly becomes the field mouse, I don't see these owls having any sort of real advantage tomorrow. Plus, owls are pretty far down on the "badass bird" scale, so we win there too. Could this mean we'll record our first win of the season? Why, I believe it could!

When a freshman birthday boy plays his heart out but the team still loses, there's a little bit of GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

Gooooood evening AU fans. Josh wanted me to title this entry, "Again." I really thought about titling it "Again!?" But ultimately, you got what you're seeing. Fresh from Bender Arena, another evening, another loss. This is one, quite frankly, that I thought we would drop. This is what I wrote on August 10:

"Nov. 18 (Wed) - 7:30p - Mt. St. Mary's (@AU) - As mentioned above, the Mount really kicked in our teeth last year in our only home loss. The Eagles will really have to dig in deep if they want to reverse their fortunes this year, especially since Mt. St. Mary's returns its top four scorers from a year ago. Not looking forward to this game, folks. I'll bring the peroxide because there's a good chance our guys are going to get beat up."

Woo, I'm not awful at predicting things. We lost the game 73-62, and my prediction before the game on Twitter was that if we could keep it to under 10 points in a loss it'd be a moral win. I'll take 11 points, though, because I'm not good at math. In any event, plenty to talk about tonight, so let's get to the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY...

Wait, Josh, so to do a preview I just tell them what I think will happen?

I tell you, these blog titles just keep getting cleverer and clevererer. Anyway, stepping into unfamiliar territory as I do a preview here. Josh has been doing these (as you no doubt know since you're an avid reader). So normally there's a clever graphic or something, but I'm not good at that. So instead, here's an image of the movie poster for the 1993 film Cliffhanger starring Sylvester Stallone (courtesy of fotos.org).


Why a movie poster of Cliffhanger? Join us after the jump to find out!

Will Jeff Jones tone down the profanity? Should the Blue Crew be the Red Crew? Is it Speculation Tuesday? Only one question can be answered YES

Why do I speculate on Tuesdays? It could be because I first had the idea to do a weekly post full of speculations on a Tuesday, or it could be because our site traffic needs a boost on Tuesday. But why hasn't there been a Speculation Tuesday entry since the first one like three weeks ago? It could be because I'm forgetful or easily distracted by shiny objects. Or it could be because the blue paint I use on myself isn't quite as non-toxic as it says it is on the label.

In any event, I'll be trying to make this a more regular feature on the site. Have things you want me to speculate about? Send them to auhoopsblog@gmail.com! I'll do my best to provide you some kind of answer, but of course it would just be pure speculation. Just like the rest of these...

Last Night's Coverage and Some Thoughts from a Great Dane/Eagle Hybrid

First some links because I imagine some of you go elsewhere for the recaps and all that of the games

Washington Post's recap
AUEagles.com recap
AUEagles.com box score

Now, onto some other things. Occasional contributor and constant Blue Crew member BPW also has connections to Albany. (I would say SUNY-Albany, but I don't want to rile him up too much). Last night he was on the wrong side of Bender Arena (the Albany side), but I asked him to write up some thoughts about the game from an opponent's perspective. Read on and find out exactly how powerful the Blue Crew acting as a 6th man can be.

When I'm Particularly Annoyed About a Loss, It Is GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

No time for niceties tonight. Here's the long and the short of it: we blew the game in the second half again. For those of you who weren't there or haven't heard, we lost to the Albany Great Danes tonight 51-50. Just like at St. Francis, the wheels came off the whole operation in the second half, and we blew a halftime lead. At this point I've got to think that conditioning is playing a part in this; we're just gassed by about the 10 minute mark in the second half. Some of that is that we've got a young team with players whose bodies don't have the benefit of 2-3 years with collegiate trainers and training regimens.

Before I get into this, nice to see play out of Mike Bersch tonight. The good news is, he got his first collegiate bucket. The bad news is, he went 0-3 from behind the arc.

Ugh what a bitter loss. Still incredulous that we lost this game. Still, there were some highlights, which brings me to...

SIT, HEEL, STAY... Eagles Home Opener An Exercise In Dog Training

Opening Note: I'd just like to state that in no way do I support actual cruelty to dogs. That would be the PHILADELPHIA Eagles, ever since they hired Michael Vick. Alright, alright, that was just a joke, since I'm sure some of our readers are loyal Philly fans as well. Of course it's the AMERICAN Eagles that matter tomorrow night!

The AU Eagles' season opener at St. Francis (PA) on Friday was not our finest hour - blowing an 11-point halftime lead is never the way one wants to start their season. It's all part of the learning curve for these young Eagles, though, and I am confident we will rebound on Monday when we face down the University at Albany Great Danes on the hallowed hardwood of Bender Arena.

The first of a five-game homestretch that will keep the Blue Crew quite busy for the next two weeks, our home opener is sure to excite. Word has gone out that mini replica 2009 Patriot League Champion banners will be distributed again, and up to 2,500 dorm rooms on campus will get a whole lot sexier. So there will be goodies, but what's going to happen on the court?

When you have an 11 point lead at half time and then blow it, you could say it's GOOD, BAD, and UGLY

Gooood morning and happy weekend to all of you out there in the Eagles blogosphere! Don't know about the rest of you, but this week was particularly long and agonizing. The thing that made it all better though was that incredible win at St. Francis last night! Up at 11 at half time? Psht, I'm not watching the rest of this blowout, I've got other things to do!

Wait, what?

What do you mean awful second half? What do you mean "lost by four"? Are you kidding me?

Ugh. Well. At least it's Saturday.

I'm kidding by the way, of course I was sitting riveted to the hideous video feed from St. Francis and the pretty okay radio feed from the local radio station. In fact, we even ran our first liveblog last night (you can replay it below if you're so inclined). I'd like to thank everyone who came out for that last night, it was a pretty good time, and we will keep doing it for the away games.

Here's the requisite info from last night: Box Score Recap

In any event, it's time for today's edition of the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY!

AU vs. St. Francis Liveblog!

Here we go! Free and no account needed, bear with me, this will be an experiment for us all!

First official game of the season, let the WINS start flowing!

Tonight is the official beginning of our season, Eagles fans! At 7:00 PM we take on the Red Flash of St. Francis University (PA), at their home court of DeGol Arena in Loretto, PA. This is the real deal, folks, this is what actually matters. Those last two games - those were just practice. Somehow this week I've been bestowed with an inordinate amount of things to do, so this is going to be a quick preview at the moment.

Here's what's going down:

• We can totally win this. History is on our side. The last 5 games we've taken on the Red Flash, we walked away with a win, with last year's 67-46 beatdown in Bender particularly memorable.
  
• We don't have to worry too much about youth, it's pretty even. They have seven true freshmen. We have seven true freshmen. They graduated 5 of 6 starters. We graduated 5 of 6 starters (if you count that Hendra started a few games near the end of last season).
• Our starting lineup tonight is projected to be Hendra, Luptak, Grafft, Lumpkins, and Munoz. It looks like Coach Jones took some pointers from the exhibitions, and he's playing up the big frontcourt presence of Lumpins and Grafft. It helps that St. Francis' team is relatively short, with their tallest at just 6-8. Munoz is starting to really prove himself as well, and not just from the free-throw line (where he completely iced the game for us on Sunday).
• If our level of improvement between the pre-season and now is of the same caliber as between the two exhibition games, they don't stand a chance.

There it is, the quick and dirty preview! Look for much more later on tonight, plus we'll be liveblogging the game starting at 7:30 (NOTE: I'm still at work, but I'll try to get one going as close to 7p as possible, it'll be my first time running one, so bear with me.. - Bill). It doesn't get much better than tha-- wait, it does! St. Francis is being so kind as to STREAM THE ENTIRE GAME FOR FREE. Just click that link and watch us make the Red Flash the Red Splat on the hardwood!

See you soon and GO EAGLES!
Josh

This is Madness! THIS IS...THE RECAP!

Last night AU celebrated its storied basketball teams with the second annual American Madness pep rally. What we're all wondering now is, of course, "Was it any better than the first?" Well, as the Burger King commercial so wisely states, "that's more of an...opinion." This blogger's opinion, if it means anything, is that it was a step forward, if not a particularly big one.

For those of you who weren't able to make it to Bender Arena yesterday evening, whether it was because of work, great distance, or just the freezing rain keeping you indoors, it's OK - we've got you covered. The teams first danced their way to the court to the familiar tune of "The Final Countdown" (masterfully played by Bender's unsung [pun intended] heroes, the Screaming Eagles Pep Band) and clumsily missed a few baskets on purpose so that some students could win some fun prizes in good conscience. Sophomore Guard Joe Hill would have none of that, of course, proudly announcing he would beat three cocky Blue Crew members in a 3-pointer shooting contest by five. Amazingly, he won 8-3. Well done, Joe! Let's show St. Francis that same attitude on Friday!

The coaches then made their obligatory heartfelt speeches. Coach Jones echoed many of his sentiments from Patriot League Media Day (if you haven't read Bill's interview with Jones yet, check it out here), offering this succinct piece of insight which I think sums up this year quite well,

"We are not the Patriot League defending champions. That was last year's team. We have our own identity, and we're still searching for what it is."

Well said, coach, well said. The faithful Blue Crew responded with some pretty serious applause, which gives me hope that this year's growing pains will be seen as just that and nothing more sinister. On that note, attendance was pretty decent considering the cold, rainy weather that likely had many hunkering down in the dorms for the night. Not fantastic, mind you, but alright for the circumstances. If you weren't there, one awesome thing you did miss was the freshmen men's dance number with the dance team/cheerleaders. It lasted about three minutes, and all I know is that even if Blake Jolivette doesn't make a single basket this entire season, at least he can GET DOWN (Blake, if you're reading this, don't worry, I know you will score many, many points this season). Check out Hannah Rubin's great video, or my endearingly low-quality cell phone version below:

That's all for tonight, AU Hoops Fans, check back later for an exclusive AU Basketball Central preview of our season opener at St. Francis (PA).

GO EAGLES,
Josh

Quick Check-In

Sorry we've been AWOL this week, just very, very busy! Josh is going to get a recap up from AMERICAN MADNESS last night!

In the meantime, check out this FANTASTIC video of the freshmen from last night. I won't spoil it for you, but it is a MUST SEE. (Courtesy of Hannah Rubin, thanks very much for capturing this fantastic moment!)

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=1169997973715&ref=nf

I'll get a St. Francis preview/belated Speculation Tuesday up tonight!

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

Ancillary Materials Are Tasty. Especially When They Include AMERICAN MADNESS

Just a short entry tonight to share some quick tidbits with you.

Yesterday's recap from AUEagles.com (including video highlights!)

Box Score from yesterday's win against Catholic

On Wednesday, Athletics will host for the second consecutive year AMERICAN MADNESS. This is AU's version of Midnight Madness, and it was a pretty good time last year. I'll be there painted, the least you can all do is show up in a Blue Crew shirt. Here's the FB link: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/event.php?eid=175042553758&index=1

See you all there! Tomorrow is Speculation Tuesday, check back in for some burning questions!

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

Playing a cross-town school in another athletic division often brings out the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY

Goooooood evening American University basketball fans! Well, no matter what happens this season, one thing that's positive is that we will NOT go winless! The Eagles defeated the Catholic Cardinals (harf harf) 70-64 in Bender Arena today in a game that eased many of this blogger's worries and fears. Without further dalliance, let's get to today's edition of the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY!

THE GOOD

There's a lot that can go in this section as this game was a vast improvement over Tuesday's loss to Randolph Macon. Pretty much every area of the Eagles' game was better today, and it showed as they picked up the W. Some of the good:

- Four players with double-digit scoring: Lumpkins (21 points, career high), Munoz (15, career high), McCormack (12, career high), and Hendra (11). Steve Luptak just missed this cut with 8 points (also a career high).

- Two players with their first double-doubles: Lumpkins (21 points and 10 rebounds) and McCormack (12 points and 10 rebounds).

- Only 13 turnovers, 12 less than against Randolph-Macon. Overall we did a much better job of protecting the ball, and the dribbling was markedly improved.

- Lumpkins had a game that deserves a special shout-out here. To go along with his 21 points and 10 rebounds, he kicked in 4 assists, 3 blocks, and 2 steals and only committed one turnover. Now, Lumpkins only went 3-10 from the field, but he made up for it because he went 15-19 from the free throw line. If Lumpkins had only scored free throws, he would've still been tied for game high points. Marvelous performance from him. It's clear the team is relying on him, and he has really accepted the responsibility these past two games. He's also making it look good, near the end of the first half Lumpkins dished it to McCormack who put it in for two with a sweet reverse lay-in that fired up the crowd including President Neil Kerwin, who stood up and cheered for the play like he was an undergrad.

- Simon McCormack also deserves a pat on the back here. For a guy who got VERY minimal play time last year, he has looked fantastic so far this year. Great hustle, not giving up on plays, fighting for loose balls. +1 to you, sir. I think Jeff Jones has got quite a decision to make as four of the guards (Luptak, McCormack, Jolivette, and Munoz) all looked pretty good today.

- Free throw shooting. MUCH improved over last year. 32-38 as a team, including 8 in the last 32 seconds from Munoz to ice the game. We weren't bad, per se, from the line last season, but we weren't good by any stretch. Obviously we've put in some work on them during the off-season, and we ended up getting about half our points from the line tonight. Seems like that work paid off.

THE BAD

Unfortunately this wouldn't be much of a Good, Bad, and Ugly column without putting some things I thought were bad and could be improved upon. I hate to do it, but sometimes it's got to be done.

- I was a little disappointed by Riley Grafft's performance today. Here's the line: 17 minutes, 2 rebounds, 1 turnover. No points on 0-1 shooting, and the one shot was from three. Not a quality performance. I'm not sure if this is his fault or not, but Riley was out on the perimeter quite a lot, and I have no idea why. The team was trying to use him as some kind of a swing man, and it just didn't work. He should have been in the paint where he could've used his height to some advantage today against a short CUA team. Riley's got good hands for a big man, but using him on the perimeter as a swing man is not a good use of his talents.

- Daniel Fisher is someone else who could have had a better game. He was only in for seven minutes, but for most of those minutes he looked extremely uncomfortable in the paint. Calling for the ball when he was well guarded, not handling the ball well when they got it in to him. He did get to the line and sunk one of two. Just an off game, maybe, and I hope he'll recover and have a great one against St. Francis.

THE UGLY

- The passing today was very ugly. Especially in transition, but I'll get to that in a minute. These lazy bounce passes are not getting it done, and they were the cause of a lot of the turnovers this afternoon. The team needs to communicate better, think its passes through more completely, and most importantly, execute those passes. Too many passes were easily picked off today because we tried to force them. There were some pretty nice dishes, too, but not enough to keep this aspect of the game off the ugly list.

- The transition game was miserable. No points in transition today. Not one. And it isn't like we didn't have opportunities. The one bone I have to pick with Danny Munoz is that he has had some trouble running the point in transition in these two games. There have been some sloppy passes, not just by Danny, but he's done it the most. The transition game just needs some work, we're not getting back quick enough to take advantage of 2 on 1 or 3 on 2 situations. We're not making the right passes, and we're not converting.


Overall, you can see that from the comparative sizes of these sections this was a pretty good game. Vast improvement over Tuesday, and I think that we can at least be competitive for some of these opening regular season games. We saw some definite chemistry today that we didn't see on Tuesday. It also looks like we've got a plethora of candidates to run the point, and, whether he likes it or not, Jeff Jones may have to run point guard by committee. After these games, Luptak, McCormack, and Munoz have all proven they deserve the playing time they've been getting. Jolivette has been a little behind those three in terms of outputs, but he's still been playing pretty well.

While I was pretty perturbed after Tuesday, I feel much better after today. So, as always,

PRO DEO ET PATRIA AND GO EAGLES!

They're messin' with the wrong Bird...

Well, Eagles fans, it happened. The Randolph-Macon Yellow Jackets got the best of our young team. There’s nothing left to do than trudge on to the…next exhibition game! That’s right, the college basketball gods have graced us with a second glorified practice to get in shape before the regular season starts! We certainly need it, since the only thing uglier than the College of the Holy Cross is our ball handling last Tuesday. I can only imagine what Coach Jones might have been saying (read: shouting emphatically with lots of cussing) in the locker room to our guys post-game. It certainly couldn’t have been pretty.

Our opposition this Sunday will be the Catholic University of America Cardinals. Yes, that same school down on the other end of the Red Line. They are members of the Division 3 Landmark Conference, and indeed they will be flapping their little red wings across town to Bender Arena…and limping back out again after. We have a bone to pick with Division 3, and fortunately this time our competition is a little less nationally ranked. This isn’t to say CUA isn’t a decent D3 team, they did win the D3 national championship about eight years ago.

That was almost a decade ago, though, and this year’s Cardinal squad isn’t quite so deadly. Beyond sophomore Jason Banzhaf, who was named by D3hoops.com (apparently Division 3’s only real basketball authority) as a D3 All-American and All-Region player, there shouldn’t be too much to worry about come Sunday. See the lovely graphic above for reference. Unfortunately I have little data on how the Cardinals fared last season, as CUA hasn’t deigned to post last season’s schedule up on their website yet. 2007-08 was a decent year for them, but that just won’t be good enough. It takes a truly top-notch D3 team to take down our Eagles, and that’s what R-MC was (and I need not remind you the game was CLOSE). Catholic just doesn’t have that. Alright, on to the (pseudo-)analysis…

Here’s what we need to do:

• Tighten up the ball handling. Seriously, this cannot be emphasized enough. We can’t drop the ball, completely turn our backs to hoop while an opponent’s driving right under it, or take bonehead three-point attempts with thirty seconds left in the second half when it’s all tied up.

• Be confident. We can’t be afraid to take shots. We’re going to have a serious height advantage between Lumpkins and Grafft (who are looking to be a lovely frontcourt duo, I might add). I swear there was a guy on RM-C’s team that made Derrick Mercer look gigantic. D3 players just don’t have the height.

• DE-FENSE DE-FENSE DE-FENSE. This wasn’t really a problem last Tuesday. In fact, it might have been the only thing we really had going for us. We set up a good screen and generally made it difficult for them to shoot…while we were actually by the net. Let’s limit turnovers and play on our terms. If we can do this we can keep their scoring low.
  

• Be there. This one’s entirely on the fans – I know this is still the pre-season, but it’s really the team’s last chance to truly figure out what works before the real challenges begin. There’s some true promise in this team, and this is your opportunity to see it shine early on. Please come out, and please cheer LOUD. Catholic might actually be able to muster up a few folks to come down due to their proximity, and for the love of whatever deity you choose I do not want to see more red than BLUE in those stands. Of course if you’re reading this, you’re probably unscrewing the cap to your bottle of blue paint already, so I’m likely just preaching to the choir here (Catholic joke, get it?).

Finally, a correction from my last entry, a neat factoid, and some thanks:

• As one astute commenter pointed out, I failed to mention Frank Borden as I briefly waxed nostalgic about last year’s superhero squad. Frank was a consistent starter and an absolutely indispensible member of the team. His defense of the net was crucial to our success, and we’re going to have a great post about what he’s up to these days coming very soon. Hint: he’s still playing basketball, and his Spanish is probably a lot better than it was last year. Here’s a great screenshot of the love ESPN.com had for Frank for about 15 minutes right after last year’s tournament game against Villanova. Sadly, once ESPN realized 'Nova actually won they replaced this picture with a more prominent image of a Wildcat player. Lame, ESPN, really lame…

• I feel a bit bad for Vlad. When R-MC downed George Mason in an exhibition last year, he was on that team. He’s now seen them take down his Division 1 team two years in a row. Poor guy. He did look rather dapper during last week’s game, though. Can’t wait until he’s in a lovely BLUE uniform instead.

• Recently Bill took the opportunity to thank you, our readers, for helping us to reach a milestone of 92 unique visitors in one day. This past week, however, we’ve averaged 100 visitors a day and set a new record with ONE HUNDRED EIGHTY EIGHT unique readers this past Wednesday! AU Basketball Central was loaded over 300 times as well. We celebrated by purchasing our own domain name, so welcome to the constantly improving auhoops.com!

I will see you all this Sunday, November 8^th, at 4:30 PM in Bender Arena! Be LOUD, be BLUE, GO EAGLES!

Pro deo et patria,
Josh

New Domain!

We've migrated to www.auhoops.com! This is very exciting for us. If you continue to go to au-hoops.blogspot.com, you'll be redirected to our new URL, auhoops.com. We think this is a much more memorable name, so help us out by telling all your friends about the switch! If you have any problems connecting to the new domain, let me know at auhoopsblog@gmail.com

I can already see we have some problems with the Twitter feed on the page; that'll get remedied, I think. It works on www.auhoops.com, but not on the blogspot URL. If you get really confused and need our Twitter, check out twitter.com/auhoops

Okay, enough changes for tonight.

Thanks for all the hits the past two days by the way, we've shattered our records for page loads, unique visitors, and returning visitors each of the last three days. This is great, and it let's us know you like what we're up to. That in turn lets the team know they've got a legit fanbase!

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

AU 2009 Google Calendar + Something I Can Totally See Jeff Jones Doing

Hi everyone! Just a quick entry for tonight.

First, I've created a Google Calendar for the games this year. If you use GMail, you can add it to your calendar by searching for "American U. Men's Basketball 2009-10 schedule". I think the Google calendar search feature is a little dicey, so if you want the calendar and can't find it through the search function, you can e-mail me at AUHoopsBlog@gmail.com, and I'll be happy to share it with you! It's a great way to keep track of when the games are, and I used it a lot last year. Figured I'd share the wealth.

Now, from Yahoo! Sports's The Dagger Sports Blog, comes this video from the HERM'S PERM sports blog. It involves former USC Men's Basketball Head Coach Tim Floyd breaking up a catfight in the casino. For some reason, I can totally imagine Jeff Jones doing this. Am I alone in that?



Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

When your freshmen play as well as your juniors, it often brings out the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY

Helllooooo AU Hoops blogosphere! Well, last night was the night we were all waiting for, the beginning of the 2009-10 AU basketball season. It was a doozy of a game, and in case you weren't following the LiveTweeting, we lost. At the buzzer. 49-47. If you want a recap of the game, you can go see our friends at Athletics as it's pointless for us to write a redundant recap. Similarly, the box score is here. I think (read: hope) you readers come here for our charming analysis and obscure references, and so I'm going to offer you the former in this edition of the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY.

THE GOOD

- The defense was solid last night. At one point in the first half we held Randolph-Macon scoreless for 13:44. We forced 18 turnovers. Had 10 steals. The benefit of having all these guards? Quick hands. We picked Randolph-Macon's pockets often times before they even realized what happened.

- The freshmen. Danny Munoz and Blake Jolivette (20 minutes each) both had pretty solid games. Daniel Fisher had a few more growing pains in his 17 minutes, but he still picked up three rebounds.

- Stephen Lumpkins. Looked dominant last night. 18 points and 6 rebounds in 28 minutes. Could see he was getting fired up after a couple of tough put-backs. He looks like a guy who has done a lot of maturing in the off-season, which is good, because we're going to put the team on his back this year.

- Simon McCormack. As far as I'm concerned he made the best case out of any of the guards for being the starting PG last night. He only got half the time that Blake and Danny did, but he looked more polished than either. Not giving up on plays, hustling like crazy, distributing (and taking care of) the ball. I think Jeff Jones would be remiss not to give him more play time on Sunday against Catholic.

- We got to see 10 players last night, nine of them for 10 minutes or more. Jeff Jones is using pre-season the right way, to try different combinations to see what works and what doesn't. The fact that a lot of it didn't last night brings us to...

THE BAD

- This section really could begin and end with two words: ball handling. 25 turnovers (eight of them from Nick Hendra, who also had a more than respectable 12 points and 7 rebounds, but 8 TOs negates that a little bit, as do the 6 TOs that Lumpkins gave away). We gave up 14 steals. The dribbling was sloppy. The passing was sloppy (we've got to stick with chest passes, these tortoise-esque bounce passes aren't going to cut it). The rebounding was sloppy. Just really ugly overall.

- We played this poorly against a Division 3 school that, to be frank, didn't look particularly good last night either. The overall quality of play was atrocious. It looked like Keystone Kops out there for most of the game. We've got to get our act together or any D1 school is going to make mincemeat of us.

- The 3 point shooting. 1-9 total. The 1, to be fair, was a beauty from Steve Luptak, from about 8 ft behind NBA range with 3 on the shot clock, but the rest of it was horrendous, which leads me to...

THE UGLY

The way we lost. Getting the ball back with 31.4 seconds left. I'm not sure what the set play was intended to do, but I know what ended up happening was Hendra tossing up an ugly three pointer, we fumbled the rebound, and Randolph-Macon's Eric Pugh streaked up the floor to put in the layup as time expired. Like I mentioned, we were 1-9 from 3, and our shot, for the win, was an unbalanced three pointer that Garrison Carr would've had trouble with?



Listen, I could be harder on this team. There's plenty more Bad and Ugly to write. Let me be fair though, this is the first pre-season game, and quite frankly, this writer expected us to lose this game. RMC is a very experienced and good team, D3 or no D3. The fact that the Eagles never got into a rhythm last night is because JJ was constantly cycling players in and out to see who could do what. When we have a firmer line-up down, the chemistry will come. There's a lot of bright spots from last night. The freshmen looked reliable. Riley and Lumpkins showed glimpses of a lot of promise as an inside duo. The defense was very good. There's a lot of room for improvement though, too. I hope you'll be there with me on Sunday as we watch the season continue to unfold against Catholic.

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!

Break Out The RAID, Let’s Squash Some Yellow Jackets

That time is almost upon us, Eagles fans – less than twenty four hours until the AU men’s basketball team takes to the court for the first time since our heartbreaking loss to the Villanova Wildkittens this past March. This is a particularly exciting time as so much has changed over the past few months.

This time last year we knew what to expect going into the first game of the season, and we handed St. Francis (PA) a lovely 67-46 beating while we watched our first Patriot League championship banner raised to the rafters. We knew Garrison Carr was going to nail the three time and time again, and we knew that Derrick Mercer was going to drive the ball around opposing players more than twice his size (and make it look easy, too). We knew that Brian “Jesus” Gilmore was going to make the clutch plays just as we needed them, and that Jordan Nichols would block even the best of shots with his inhumanly long arms.

Alas, those players – and indeed our entire starting lineup – have graduated. They’ve moved on, each one with a valuable AU degree and a bright future. This leaves our team, however, young and malleable. We’ve heard all the reports from Patriot League Media Day (and if you haven’t read them yet check out Bill’s recap here and here). We know the vast (VAST) majority of the team has never seen significant play before at the college level. We know Vlad “The Impaler” Moldoveanu will be on the sidelines until December. We also know that this means that our team has near limitless potential – and our hapless opponents certainly won’t know what to expect.

This leads us back to the moment ahead of us, at 7:30 PM tomorrow evening. This year we aren’t opening against a Division 1 opponent, but we’ve been graced with the good fortune of having not one, but two Division 3 matchups to test our mettle before the real W’s and L’s start being recorded. Yet just because these are exhibition games doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take them seriously. Rather the faithful Blue Crew – students, alumni, faculty, friends, neighbors, and fans alike – should be there in full force. We need to show this young team that we will be with them from the beginning, and show Randolph-Macon and Catholic what happens when they come into OUR arena.

Of course, this is all just fanboyish rambling. You already know this. This isn’t why you’re here. You want to know what might go down tomorrow night. Well, if you’ve read this far you certainly care, so throw on your Red and Blue and hold onto your seats, folks – this might not be pretty…

Here’s the truth: we might not come out of tomorrow night’s game with that W. It’s a bit of a catch-22 – if we win, well, of course, they’re D3. If we lose, then our team really has some work to do.

Here’s the facts:

• D3hoops.com has tagged Randolph-Macon as the #19 D3 team in the country.
• They've killed before...this time last year Randolph-Macon opened up with an exhibition against neighboring George Mason – and walked away with a 73-72 win
• The Yellow Jackets went 20-6 overall and 14-2 in their conference last year, and return 12 letterwinners and 3 starters
• To reiterate, roughly 3 of our players eligible to play tomorrow have had more than 10 minutes of court time in an NCAA game
  

Now, before you break out the lanterns and pitch forks and come after me for predicting we’re going to be solidly trounced by a D3 team, take quick breath and reconsider. I’m not saying we’re going to lose, or even that we’re likely to – fact is we do have the better team no matter how you slice it. The other glaring fact is that our team just hasn’t had the time to gel yet, and might make mistakes that just won’t happen later on in the season.

It might be close, though, and if we don’t walk away with the W it will be a good wake up call for our players. Luckily it doesn’t count toward our regular season one bit, and it’s important that even if we’re on the receiving end of a hornet’s sting that we aren’t discouraged…we have an entire season ahead of us, and our team will certainly get better.

So come out tomorrow if you can, and most importantly be BLUE and be LOUD! Let’s cheer our team on to an early victory, and even if we lose, just buck up and look ahead (trust me, Catholic is likely to be a breath of fresh air with that lovely winning smell). Plus, AUEagles.com has pointed out that we'll be seeing some "new look Eagles", whatever they mean by that (maybe new uniforms?). If you can’t make it to Bender Arena tomorrow, then make sure to check out AU Basketball Central (this very blog) for the best recap you’ll find out there.

See you tomorrow at 7:30 in Bender! If UPS is speedy I'll be striking fear into some Yellow Jackets' hearts with this badass Eagle mask I got here for $10:

Go Eagles!
Josh

Media Day Report Part Two - Jeff Jones Telling It Like It Is

So I was a little bit of a fanboy when I first met Jeff Jones. After stammering my name, the name of the blog, and why I was bothering him, there was kind of an awkward pause before I asked, "So, do you want to maybe, uh, sit down and answer some questions?" Luckily for you, Coach is very forgiving of young pseudo-journalists and was more than generous with his time. What follows here are excerpts from what we talked about.

I started by asking Coach what the starting line-up would be if the Randolph-Macon game was today (last Thursday). His response: "I honestly don't know." JJ indicated that at this point there are three starters more or less locked in: Nick Hendra, Stephen Lumpkins, and, surprisingly, Riley Grafft. For the other two spots, there are "young guys battling for spots."

Right now for the point guard competition, JJ says that, "It's not who's the best player. It's who is the oil, who makes things run more smoothly. There's some good competition going on right now. Things have a lot of moving parts for our team right now with young guys learning and trying to figure college basketball out, much less how they're going to fit in [to a lineup]. I would encourage people not to be too concerned with the starting lineup for the Randolph-Macon game."

Well, Coach, sorry, but here in the blogosphere, we ARE concerned about those kinds of things. Even though we understand that the line-up will change, we still want to know who is emerging out of these pre-season practices looking the most promising.

On Vlad the Impaler: "...different players fit into different styles in different ways. Vlad loved GMU. He didn't leave there because he was unhappy with the coaches. He liked the players; he liked the coaches, but that wasn't the right fit for him basketball wise. His skillset fits what we're trying to do, and, quite honestly, we're trying to build around him and give him a lot of responsibility and have other people feed him...Vlad is an accomplished post-up player, not through bulk, but by being smart, being able to use both hands, and being crafty. He's also probably our best perimeter shooter. In the same way we made Garrison Carr the focus of our offense [last year], and then, depending on what the defense did, we created opportunities for other guys built off of that, we're trying to create those same opportunities around Vlad, Nick Hendra, and Stephen Lumpkins...As coaches we have to handle Vlad becoming eligible [midway through the season], it's not a decision I could make right now, it's not a decision I have to make right now."

On the perimeter game this year: "We're not capable of being the same kind of perimeter shooting team that we were a year ago. We don't have Garrison, no one does. Having a guy like [Brian] Gilmore, like Bryce [Simon], we just can't do that this year. We have shooters, but not the same kind."

On the biggest surprise so far this season: "Riley Grafft's performance thus far has maybe been the most pleasant surprise...People will say “wow” that's a big jump [when they see him on the court]...Riley's confidence, hopefully Riley's confidence, is very high. Another thing is Daniel Fisher, he's...a guy that we thought by his junior year might be able to help. He's proven at the very least he's going to be able to get in games as a back-up, I'm not going overboard, but it's something that we didn't expect."

I asked if in two years the Munoz-Jolivette-Snodgrass trio might end up being like the Mercer-Carr-Gilmore trifecta from last year: These three are "different than Carr, Mercer, and Gilmore. [Munoz and Jolivette] are more traditional point guards than Garrison Carr. Snodgrass is more of a wing player than Gilmore. It's important to note that when that class [class of 2009] were freshmen, we went through some rough times...[But] they didn't get crushed, they fought through it, they got better, they got more determined. When those guys were juniors, we were picked sixth [in the preseason Patriot League coaches' poll]. We had lost 90% of our scoring, a lot of our statistics...[but] the hope is the new guys can step in and help...[However,] last time we lost 6-7 players, we filled with juniors, not freshmen, and I don't think our freshmen are ready to step in to that degree...[We're going to have to,] I want to use the term patch together, but I'm not saying that like the Redskins offensive line, it's not a natural fit based on where we played a year ago...We'll be evolving."

On Riley Grafft: "Last year there was no thought that he'd be a guy who could contribute this year. We knew he had athleticism. He's 6'11”, so he's got length. He runs the court very well, but I think the biggest thing, well when we saw him in the recruiting process, he's got some skill that most other guys his height don't have...what he's shown us is to be able to show us some of those skills that we knew about a long time ago [during recruiting]...It's a confidence thing."

On the battle for point guard: "The thought coming in was that one of either Blake [Jolivette] or Danny [Munoz] would come in, and the other would back him up. At this point, Simon McCormack has made it a little bit more complicated, and he's head and shoulders better than where he was a year ago. There hasn't been a knockout" in terms of one point guard emerging as far and away the best. "Practices have been good, we've been doing some scrimmaging. Saturday we will do some scrimmaging situations that probably will determine who starts against Randolph-Macon. After Randolph-Macon, we'll have to take a look after that. Two of those three will get a really long hard look in the Randolph-Macon game." From there, the coaching staff will try to make some decisions to see who will start at point guard. JJ also noted that instead of platooning point guards and playing 2-3 equally, he would "rather have one guy earn the job and the other back him up. So that it's clear to everybody, he's our PG because I think that instills confidence." He also indicated that whoever is the starting point guard will play 25-27 minutes and his back-up will play 13-15 minutes.

I asked JJ if he thought Nick Hendra was ready to stand up and take leadership of the team because in the past he has sometimes opted to make the flashy play instead of the smart play.
JJ: "Frank [Borden, last year] played defense and didn't screw up. That's why he played in front of Hendra...If you look, Nick was in at the end of the games; he was playing more minutes. The maturity, the decisions were still an issue [last year]. He needs to make a bigger step from last year to this year because we're going to have to rely on him. [Last year] I could just yank him [if he made mistakes], we don't have that luxury this year...We had a practice where Nick was aggressive, made some great plays, then made some bonehead plays, and we didn't yank him because we need him to learn that we need the really good plays, but there's a line there, and you can't cross that line...From the time he got to AU until now he's made a lot of progress, but there's more progress [to be made]. In high school, you get volume, you get 30 shots a game. In college, you need to be efficient. It's an important lesson that he's going to need to learn even better...You look at Greg Sprink [from Navy] a couple of years ago. [We're saying to Hendra,] 'We're going to give you chances to do things with the ball, you need to make sure that you make good decisions. If you don't get an opportunity we're coming back to you.'"

On leadership on the team: "We don't believe in captains, we don't nominate captains. Assigning them a title, I can remember as a player at UVA and as a coach, that there were so many times that the team got it wrong because they're either the senior or the popular guy, so I was like, we're not doing that. Leaders lead, our leaders are going to lead, why do I need to put a letter on someone? Brian Gilmore was a vocal leader, Derrick Mercer was the guy everybody looked to, Garrison led by example, those guys were so competitive...They were so competitive, but they led in very different ways, but in very effective ways, but not any one of them was any more of a leader, it was just different ways. Luptak and Matt Wilson are really taking it to heart. Nick is trying to assert himself a little more. Lumpkins is trying to assert himself with his work ethic. Even Vlad, Vlad feels like he needs to be a leader on this team, he hasn't been around that long, he hasn't played in any games, and the guys look to him like 'okay, you're our best player', at Mason he was just another guy."

That's all I've got. Re-posting some of this, it makes me realize there's a LOT of good stuff in here. I want to thank Jeff Jones, though I doubt he reads this, for his candor. One other quote from JJ I want to add is on team motivation: "I made my career out of being pissed off at the other team." That actually made me laugh during the interview.

I'll cut this short now because I think this has already run pretty long, but I want to say I'm pretty surprised about the positive (and rave) reviews on Riley Grafft and Daniel Fisher. Those two, combined with Lumpkins and Vlad when he's available, have the opportunity to give the Eagles an inside game that I thought wasn't going to be possible. That's encouraging.

I think Josh is going to post a preview of Randolph-Macon tomorrow, so look forward to that. I will see you all, I hope, in Bender Arena at 7:30p on Tuesday!

THE SEASON IS UPON US!

PRO DEO ET PATRIA AND GO EAGLES!