Patriot League Preview : January 14
As will be the case almost every week, two of the games tonight are almost certainties: Army and Navy are going to lose.
Rough sailing for Crews (one of many stupid headlines you may see in the local press for Army)
Army is traveling to Pennsylvania to take on Lafayette. Army comes off an impressive 32 point effort against Holy Cross, getting beaten like they were Fordham. Someone at the Army message board brings up an interesting point: Army may be the first team in history to finish dead last in D-I football (no wins last year) AND in D-I hoops (one win so far this year). I just hope they give Jim Crews at least one more year to try to make something out of the program. Anyway, Lafayette will win by 20, in a laugher (puns are not funny).
AU-Navy : Battle of the Patriotic School Names
The other service academy game is AU at Navy, which your faithful PL blogger is ditching work to attend. Navy has a nasty habit of
scaring the shit out of the Eagles in Annapolis. Last year, AU won on a controversial charging call against the USNA with 13 seconds left and AU up only 1 (the exact situation happened this year when AU drove up to U St. to play Howard). Navy really doesn't look at have much in this game, but as evidenced by David Hooper's ridiculous performance last year, someone could step up and give AU trouble. But for optimism's sake, I'll say AU wins by 12.
HC-Colgate: Who will stop Howard Blue?
Holy Cross faces its first real league challenge tonight as it takes on Colgate at home. CU comes off a tough, high scoring loss to Lafayette in PA. They just couldn't get over the hump all game, and ended up losing by 11. My understanding is that the game was much closer than the score indicates. The two matchups here are Linebaugh-Meade (they ought to defend one another) and Blue-Whoever HC is playing in the post. If HC can hold Blue to under 14 and they can Linebaugh from doing whatever he likes, then they will win. If Blue gets tough and plays strong (I mean literally strong, i.e. the HC guys are going to bang him around and he's going to have to hit back), then Colgate will be in good shape. We'll say HC by 3, in what is the most important and interesting game of the day.
Bucknell-Lehigh: Battle of the middleweights
Bucknell by 5. I already talked about them in the below post, and I think they're a team that can beat anyone in the league if they play up to their potential. I have little or no insight on Lehigh, which is painfully obvious if you've read anything I've written earlier. They have someone named Ra, like the Egyptian god. I have plans to make fun of him for this on Sunday. That's all I can tell you about Lehigh.
See some of you in Annapolis tonight. I'll be out there early for food and drink beforehand to celebrate a friend's birthday. If you see a short man yelling angrily from the AU section, don't worry, it's his birthday so he's uppity, and he doesn't really mean that about your mother.