Some Thoughts on the Non-Conference Schedule - Part 1

Eagles fans, today is a beautiful day. To my delusional and basketball-starved mind, today is the first day of AU basketball season. Why? Because that road map to a third consecutive Patriot League title and NCAA Tournament berth was released today: the 2009-10 season schedule. I'm going to take some time and offer some preliminary thoughts and stats on just the non-conference portion of the schedule (in-depth analysis of the Patriot League will follow...when I get a chance to do some more research). Before I look at a game-by-game basis, I have some general thoughts on the non-conference schedule:

- It's ambitious. It's possible Jeff Jones didn't get the memo that he lost all five senior starters to graduation last year. And you know what? I'm okay with that. We've got a real young team coming in (ten out of twelve players are freshmen or sophomores). So what did Coach Jones do? He went out and scheduled not one, but two Big East teams (Georgetown and DePaul), an SEC team that won back-to-back national championships in 2006 and 2007 (Florida), and a Big 10 team that managed to pull off ten wins in what was arguably the best conference last year (Penn State). That's a signal to this team that Coach Jones fully expects them to be able to compete. He's getting out and getting them great experience early so that our young team will be fully tested by the time conference play opens up. Is it possible our Eagles will have PTSD by the end of non-conference play? Entirely possible. But it'll also be a confidence booster when the team gets to Patriot League play and see that Colgate and Lafayette are nothing like the major conference powerhouses they'll already have played.

- It's home game heavy. Continuing on the trend of things I'm a-okay with, the schedule this year has five more home games this season than last. Granted two of these games are exhibition games against Randolph-Macon and Catholic, but to this blue-chested fan, a chance to stand in section 115 for a few hours is a chance to stand in section 115 for a few hours. This is a move that should help the team (playing at home rarely hurts, after all). Bender Arena has become one of the best (if not the best) home court advantages in the Patriot League in recent years (13-1 last season, 24-5 over the past two season), and the Blue Crew should help keep the Eagles in the game in what will be a number of close non-conference games (Howard, UMBC, Mt. St. Mary's, Fairfield)

- It's going to be a hell of a November. Forget about easing into the season, we'll be hitting the ground running and instantly moving into a sprint. From November 16 to November 28 (12 days) we've got 6 games. For you SISers out there, that averages out to a game every other day. And these aren't gimmes by any stretch of the imagination. Mt. St. Mary's stole our lunch and ate it in front of us last year last November, handing us our only home loss, and Fairfield eked out an eight point victory on their home court. Luckily, interspersed in these games are some definitely winnable match-ups for the Eagles, which leads me to the fourth general point...

- It's important to keep in mind that this year is not last year. Does this year's team have definite talent? Yes (and in an upcoming entry, I'll detail all of it). With more size than past years' teams and a sophomore class that had a whole year to jell together, it is entirely possible we're going to have some surprises early on; we haven't seen a lot out of most of the sophomores (except for Lumpkins, who will have a lot on his shoulders this year). But as of right now, we can't assume that there's a Garrison Carr-esque player who is going to come out right away and be able to nail five threes in two minutes and erase deficits or mental mistakes. Still, there are some definitely winnable games for us, and without further adieu, let's get into it.

Nov. 3 (Tue) - 7:30p - Randolph-Macon (@AU) - Division III Randolph-Macon finished the 2008 season with a 20-6 mark and 14-2 in the Old Dominion Athletic Conference. While it's hard to call R-M a D3 powerhouse (mostly because the existence of such is really oxymoronic), AU would be foolish to look past this team for its D3 status. The Yellow Jackets are coming in with a similarly young team, sporting only two seniors and two juniors. Not a bad pick-up for the schedule, and much better than the leading-lambs-to-slaughter type drubbing we opened up with last year against Oklahoma.


Nov. 8 (Sun) - 4:30p - Catholic (@AU) - Our neighbors on the Red Line finished 8-6 in the D3 Landmark Conference last year and 18-10 overall. Another young team, the Cardinals only have two seniors and a junior, and I have to give the edge to AU here because of the caliber of teams that Hendra, Luptak, and the sophomores got a glimpse at last year.

Nov. 13 (Fri) - 7:00p - St. Francis (Pa.) (AWAY) - Last year, the Eagles got their first home win of the year against St. Francis (PA) in a 67-46 rout in Bender Arena. The Red Flash, who struggled mightily last season, finished 6-23 (3-15) and 11th in the Northeast Conference. The Eagles shouldn't expect to walk all over the Red Flash again this year, because those same juniors and seniors will no doubt remember the 28 point performance Garrison put up against them last year.

Nov. 16 (Mon) - 7:30p - Albany (N.Y.) (@AU) - The Eagles match up against the Great Danes for their regular season home opener. Albany, who went 15-16 (6-10) and finished 7th in the America East should be an even match-up. The Great Danes return Will Harris, one of their top scorers from a year ago, and it'll be up to Lumpkins to try to contain him in the post.

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.

Nov. 21 (Sat) - 12:00p - Fla. Atlantic (@AU) - Luckily, the Eagles should be able to rebound (in multiple senses) against the Florida Atlantic Owls. After a miserable campaign last season that saw FAU go 6-26 (2-16) and 6th in the Sun Belt East, the Owls might not prove much better this year after only returning one of their top four scorers in Shavar Richardson (11.8 ppg). Still, Mike Jarvis is a coach certainly to be respected, and he might have some tricks up his sleeve for this bird-on-bird battle.

Nov. 23 (Mon) - 7:30p - Fairfield (@AU) - The Fairfield Stags pulled off a victory in Connecticut last year thanks to ice cold three-point shooting in the second half from the Eagles (2-12). After graduating one of their top two scorers, this should be a fairly even match-up between two fairly young teams. It remains to be seen if the Stags will have another scorer step up this season, but this is definitely a game I'll look forward to watching.

Nov. 25 (Wed) - 7:30p - Manhattan (@AU) - The Jaspers (by the way, what the hell is a Jasper?) finished 16-14 (9-9 MAAC), but fell to AU 60-48 on their home court. The Eagles will look to make it two in a row against Manhattan. The Jaspers(??) lost two of their top three scorers to graduation, but they have a young crop of juniors who no doubt will try to step up and take advantage some of that increased playing time.

Nov. 28 (Sat) - 2:00p - Maryland Eastern Shore (AWAY) - Hopefully the team will get to stop at Kent Narrows to get some crab while they're out here. MD - Eastern Shore finished 7-23 (3-13) and placed 11th in a weak Mid-Eastern Conference. Unless something goes horribly wrong here, the Eagles should look forward to some she-crab victory soup after this match-up.

At this point, it's getting late, and this is already a huge entry, so I'm going to call it a night for...tonight and finish up tomorrow. That's when the meat of the non-conference schedule is, and you can bet I'll devote a lot of time to the Florida, Penn State, Georgetown, and DePaul match-ups. For tonight, I hope this hasn't run too long for all of you. Let me know if you have questions, comments, or feedback!

Until tomorrow...

Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!