This year's Cable Car Classic, at first glance, had all the excitement of taking your dog to the senior prom. Considering the four teams involved this year (Santa Clara, Fordham, Delaware, AU) posted a combined 31-88 record last year, I figured AU's revamped and reloaded lineup would make this a pretty easy invitational win for the Eagles. Well. It's not going to be the cakewalk I thought. This year, all four teams are over .500, including Fordham, which went a truly hideous 2-26 last year.
The Santa Clara Broncos will open up against the Delaware Fightin' Blue Hens (you can't make this stuff up) on Wednesday, and AU will take the court against the Fordham Billygoats upon the first game's conclusion. The next day, the two non-winners (let's keep it Little League here, folks) will play a consolation game, and AU and whoever wins the Delaware and Santa Clara game will play in the championship. (See how I did that? With the presumption of an AU victory? Slick, huh? I've been taking some writing classes.) For more info on the Cable Car Classic, click here.
Joking aside, this match-up with Fordham is going to be a tough one. This is a team that pulled off an upset of a pretty good St. John's team and also beat Lehigh on their home court. (The former achievement certainly trumps the latter, but if Lehigh is a team in our comparison basket, it doesn't bode well for us). With four players in double figures, the Billygoats can get production from almost any of their starters. They're averaging a tremendous 40 boards a game and have an 8 rebound margin on their opponents. They also average 4.5 blocks per game. The frontcourt here, anchored by Chris Gaston (who averages a double-double with ~16 points, 12 boards, and almost 2 blocks a game), is beastly. Lump will have his work cut out for him again against this big man, who has really turned it on in his past 3 games and put up over 20 in each. The backcourt, led by redshirt senior Brenton Butler, has a lot of experience as well. This will be a really physical matchup for our guards. We'll need some of Luptak's vaunted defense to try to limit Butler's effectiveness. Troy will also need to come out on the perimeter and try and get in the passing lanes with his long arms.
Vlad will really be the key here. Gaston is tremendous down low, but he and Lump will battle all night. Will Vlad be able to get around the smaller, quicker defender that will assuredly be on him? There won't really be anyone else in the paint that Fordham can spare to take Vlad, so if he can get his inside game going, that will be a big boon for the Eagles. Will his shot selection be smart? Will he take over the game in the way we know he can? Hard to say. We'll have to wait and see.
For the second game, neither Santa Clara nor UDel will be a cupcake. I think I'd rather see us have to play the Blue Hens. Jawan Carter is a potential CAA Player of the Year candidate, but the rest of the team is comprised of roleplayers. I like our odds if we can put Troy on Carter and make someone else on the team step up. I like those odds much better than I do those of us handling the inside-outside duo of Kevin Foster and Marc Trasolini, but we'll cross that bridge when and if we get to it.
We won't be liveblogging this game as it goes on at 11:15p on Wednesday night and we all have bedtimes. We'll keep you updated with a recap though!
What are your thoughts on our prospects for the Cable Car Classic? Leave it in the comments!
Pro deo et patria and GO EAGLES!
One big edge for AU has to be Fordham's three-day trip to the West Coast. With all flights out of NYC cancelled, the best they could do was try to take a bus to Pittsburgh and then fly west. However the roads were so bad on Sunday it took eight hours just to get to Princeton. They stayed over and then had another eight hours on a bus yesterday, finally reaching Pittsburgh late afternoon. They were supposed to fly out of Pittsburgh early today, for the 5.5 hour flight to the Coast. Hard to believe they'll be in good shape to compete with AU after that sort of travel - and limited practice.
ReplyDeleteMaybe I'm the only one that noticed this and looked for an excuse to use the transitive property, but.....
ReplyDeleteAU loses to Pitt 46-61 (15 points)
#4 UCONN loses to Pitt 63-78 (15 points)
AU = UCONN?????
This tournament will be a very interesting test for AU. So far AU has had to play fellow minnows or step up to the big leagues, with little in-between. Here are three teams that should be about eye-level with us, so it will be a strong challenge. We are more likely to go 0-2 than 2-0 in this one.
ReplyDeleteTransitive Property:
ReplyDeleteColumbia over AU by two.
Longwood over Columbia by 19,
Conclusion?
Really looking forward to seeing how AU does in these games. As Steve said, these are all teams that are right around we are in terms of talent, record, expectations, etc. I will be very disappointed if we don't win at least one game, because if we're going to win the PL we'll have to beat teams at our level.
ReplyDeleteParticularly interested in how Hinkle, Danny and Lump play. I think we know how Vlad and Troy and Luptak and Nick are going to play game in and game out; the X factors are going to be key to our ability to win three games in March.
I've been wwatching the Santa Clara vs. Delaware game on the internet: Snata Clara website has it for free. But with about 3:15 left in the first half, the whole thing went kablooey and now I only get a camera feed that doesn't follow the action, and half the screen is black. Arrrgh.
ReplyDeleteThe Santa Clara schedule now has the AU/Fordham game (!) on it, so it may be possible to see this game live if they iron out their technical difficulties.
When I first started watching the SC/Delaware game, they were having buffering problems very often, but that situation was corrected after a while.
I saw the rest of the SC/Delaware game. Delaware won by one. Santa Clara was extremely cold shooting. Only 25% in the second half. Delaware looks like they have some nice athletes. They were more successful inside than SC. Looks like AU might start at 11:37pm EST if they leave 30 minutes between games.
ReplyDeleteThe AU/ Fordham game costs $8. I can see them warming up!
ReplyDeleteWow, AU dismantles Fordham by 16. Hendra, Lumpkins, and Vlad too much for them. AU went up by 14 early, and Fordham was lucky to be trailing by only 7 at the half. The second half was easy for AU.
ReplyDeleteLots of hard work by AU pays off.
The webstreaming came off without a glitch. Tomorrow's game should be available as well. No audio with the video, but live stats.
If Nick plays like this the rest of the year, I take back every bad thing I've said about him for two years. He was sensational--22 points, 7 boards, 6 assists in 34 minutes. He played like a SENIOR tonight. Took big shots, defended, made smart, easy scoring passes to Lump and Vlad instead of idiotic no-look drop passes. That is what he is capable of and that is why it's been so frustrating watching him. If he would take a leadership role on this team we would be darn near unbeatable in the PL and have a fighting chance in the NCAAs.
ReplyDeleteWe were balanced tonight. Didn't have to depend on Vlad to throw in threes or Lump to score 20-25. Lump had 18. Vlad had 16. The most amazing stat of all? Luptak and Danny played 40 minutes at the point. Zero turnovers. Bottle this game up and hope we can produce it in March.
Hendra had the kind of game we all hoped for last year. I liked the way he took the ball into the paint. No reckless abandon. Also Lumpkins positioned himself well. Hendra glided into the paint and handed the ball off. Excellent, simple execution.
ReplyDeleteThis was an almost perfect game for AU at this time. Our only deficiency is that we need to work on our ball movement when Vlad or Lump go out of the game. Our movement bogs down, and we lose our sharpness. It's not any one player's fault, the whole team suffers.
And don't forget about Hendra's block! You don't usually see a player get stuffed like that on the perimeter.
ReplyDelete