Here we begin the rough portion of our non-conference schedule, Eagles fans. The homestand is over, our record is...ugly, and our upcoming opponents are no longer fellow mid-major programs but members of the power conferences. What to do? Here, more than any other time in the season, I advocate the "moral victory." Not a single person in the world - not Jeff Jones, not the players, not even this writer - believe we are going to best the Georgetown Hoyas tomorrow afternoon. We have to take what we can get.So why do we bother? Well, Georgetown is surely paying our athletic department a hefty sum to come to the Verizon Center and add an easy win to their record. It's not all about the money, though. It's great experience for our players (getting killed by the Hoyas is not the same as getting killed by FAU), it's certainly media exposure we wouldn't get otherwise, and it's always worth it for the chance at an upset. Speaking of which, anyone remember December 22nd, 2007? I sure as hell do.
I'm not trying to make excuses here. It's not going to feel particularly good if the Hoyas make Eagle meat of us tomorrow. I predict a score of 74-36, and this is fine because I'd consider anything within 40 points that "moral victory." Trust me, I've drank all I can from the eternal well of optimism we keep here on tap at AU Basketball Central. So why so gloomy? The Hoyas are ranked 14/16, folks. Last year when they were ranked lower (18) they trounced us by a good margin of 30. As has been stated multiple times on this blog before, this is not last year. They're better, we're rebuilding. The Hoyas had some Patriot League warm up already this season when they gave Lafayette the ugly end of a 97-64 game. Mt. St. Mary's, who ran all over our team, just got their Mountaineer butts handed to them 83-62. Even their youth is hot - Freshman Hollis Thompson was just named the Big East Rookie of the Week (and this is no easy feat in such a conference). Is any further analysis needed? Okay, maybe just a little.
This is not to say I won't be supportive of the team tomorrow. I encourage all AU fans to converge upon the Verizon Center, covered in Blue, to cheer on the Eagles and show the Hoyas how loyal a fan base we are even in the face of certain defeat. That is what being an AU fan is about. It's not impossible to beat Georgetown. We've done it before (more on this in a moment) and I am 100% confident we will do it again in the future. Just not this season.
Despite the disparity in basketball skill, aka spending (Georgetown likely spends more money on their basketball team than AU's endowment), AU and Georgetown have met many times before. This will be the 51st overall meeting, with the Hoyas holding a 40-10 advantage (according to AU), and a 42-8 advantage (according to Georgetown). No matter which one is true, the Eagles have certainly toppled the mighty Hoyas before. In 1973 all-American Kermit Washington scored 40 points on John Thompson The First's team. In 1984 AU beat the defending national champions, and AU coach Ed Tapscott later went on to coach the NBA's Washington Wizards for slightly less than a season. In fact, Georgetown only has a six-game winning streak against us (of course, this is more likely due to the fact they didn't play us for a decade than anything else).
I'm all for rivalries. I think they're great. So do athletic departments, and both Georgetown and AU's press releases refer to this as a "cross-town rivalry." I just have a hard time wrapping my mind around that word in this context, though. Is it really a rivalry if every time one of the teams wins it's a newspaper headline-worthy upset? I don't think so.
Now I feel I need to share something that's bugged me a little for the past few days. All basketball disparity aside, I think AU-Georgetown is way more legitimate a rivalry than the "Battle of the Orange Line", which debuted this year after GW deigned to play George Mason after refusing to play them for ELEVEN YEARS. GW came up with the slogan, bought beatgeorgemason.com (I am not joking), and made all sorts of pretty videos building up the game. Not to get too off-topic here (it's DC college basketball, it counts), but I think you need to play a team more than once a decade to make up a whole rivalry. For purposes of making this blogger feel better, Mason's all-time record against GW is about 41-9. Look familiar? Maybe being 40-10 against Georgetown isn't so bad.
But back to the teams that matter. Another rivalry of note tonight is the Battle of the Assistant Coaches (see, GW, I can make up rivalries too!). Over the summer assistant coaches Robert Burke of Georgetown and Mike Brennan of AU LITERALLY SWITCHED TEAMS. Now Robert Burke of AU and Mike Brennan of Georgetown will be facing off again, but on opposite sides of the court from where they sat only a year ago. Absurd, isn't it? One of the few things I think we have going for us is that Burke might be able to let our players in on a little Georgetown strategy. This will be interesting to see.
Our projected starters for tomorrow include the usual suspects of Nick Hendra, Stephen Lumpkins and Riley Grafft. It looks like Blake Jolivette will be getting the nod again over Danny Munoz, and Simon McCormack will be rewarded for his stellar performance against Howard with his second career start. Our issues will likely be everything we've kvetched about before, but amplified. If Jolivette drops the ball, there will be no second chance at it. If Lumpkins fouls out, we have no chance to rebound. If we pass sloppily, the ball will be stolen. Georgetown has some of the best players in the country right now and they will capitalize on these mistakes before we even realize we've made them.There is little room for error tomorrow, and I believe we can rise to the challenge and at best make a game out of it. Luckily Burke spent five years with the Hoyas and likely knows John Thompson III's coaching inside and out (he spent time under Thompson at Princeton as well). This will likely be our only real advantage.
Does it get better after this? Only marginally. We next move on to tangle with DePaul, Penn State, and Florida. Our only other opponents before conference play starts are UMBC, Columbia, and Brown. Vlad will get his first start in an AU uniform in less than two weeks against DePaul, and while I still don't have that one down in our favor, it will certainly be a boost. But let's cross that bridge after we're finished with our "cross-town rival."
That's all for today folks. I'll see you tomorrow at the Verizon Center. As always, be there, be LOUD, be BLUE, be AU!
GO EAGLES,
Josh
Great entry. I do want to make one point re: The Battle of the Orange Line though...Yes it was fabricated this year, but at some point all traditions are fabricated. They don't have a men's equivalent of Phil Bender, so that's what this may grow into. I was there, and the atmosphere was electric. I can't knock GW for trying to start a tradition the right way, especially given that we just solicited suggestions for new traditions at AU this week. At some point we'll be fabricating just the same. People in glass Bender Arenas, I guess...
ReplyDeleteUnder 40 will be very nice of them. They'll be sure to be able to give their freshmen some nice minutes.
Bill, you make some very good points. I was more critical, however, of the fact that GW is suddenly pulling this out of their hat after spending 11 years with the position that playing Mason wasn't worth their time.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the actual marketing materials, though, I give them big props. It was very well done. I won't lie, I'm a little jealous when I look at beatgeorgemason.com. As has been said before, our athletic department could certainly learn a thing or two from GW's.
On that note, Phil Bender did evolve a little more organically. The reason that Phil Bender was chosen against Holy Cross and not a closer opponent like Navy is that the first two years we were in the Patriot League, Holy Cross kept us out of the tournament. Recently, we repaid them the favor two years in a row. That's a really great rivalry. I just wish that Holy Cross was a little closer so that it could be more of a home and away thing - 300 something miles is a hell of a distance. I agree though, everything has to be at least a little fabricated at some point.
So, who's up for www.beatholycross.com? There's nothing like the internet to bridge a geographic divide and really bring a rivalry together...