Friday, February 18, 2005
SUPER SATURDAY SHOWDOWN SPECTACULAR
Four games this Saturday, three of which are going to be interesting, and one of which Army is playing in.
League leading Holy Cross has to make the dismal trip to Hamilton to play Colgate in front of dozens of people. Coach Ralph Willard suggests that the lack of fan support for Colgate actually helps them-- and he makes a good point, since the Raiders are 5-1 in league play in Hamilton. I guess they can get used to playing for no one but themselves, while other teams have to adjust to crowds more suited for JV high school girls games.
This game is certainly winnable for 'gate but I can't see them getting around HC's excellent defense. Unless someone for CU goes unconcious and hits something like 6-7 from 3PT range, this should be a 10 point HC victory.
In the middle of the pack, Navy travels to Lehigh and AU goes to Lafayette. Both games are similar, in that you have a top tier team trying to stay that way against a team that really can't do much to improve their seeding at this point.
Navy, despite only 3 conference wins, is a pretty dangerous squad. At this point, you might have to give the Coach of the Year award to Billy Lange for doing so much with so little. If they can win here at Lehigh or next week at AU, it would certainly cinch that designation for me.
Lafayette continues to struggle, as will any squad whose best player can only play on one half of the court. If the Patriot League played Iowas Girls' Rules, Sean Knitter would be an MVP contender. As is, he's one of the bigger defensive liabilities in the league. Nonetheless, the Leopards are traditionally a good home team, and when they can play at their tempo, they are not bad.
Lehigh and AU are two teams whose schedules are so similar it's scary. Check it out:
Lehigh PL losses:
At Colgate, 54-61
At Bucknell, 63-65
Holy Cross, 56-58
at Holy Cross, 53-73
AU PL losses:
At Colgate 57-67
At Bucknell 52-65
Holy Cross, 67-76 (OT)
at Holy Cross, 56-80
Lehigh, 53-56
The one thing seperating the two squads is a ridiculous beyond NBA three by Joe Knight that won the game for LU at the Splaver Center in January.
Both teams have "must win" (what an annoying cliche) situations on their hands here-- they can't drop contests to teams that are 3-8 in league play this late in the season, or they're looking at a pretty tough assignment for the league tournament.
Speaking of which, the PL tournament starts in two weeks. Get pumped to go...somewhere. Unless you're an Army fan (have fun in Worchester, Cadets!), you really don't know where your school's tournament games are going to be, making planning for anything like that completely unreasonable. And you probably won't know until a week beforehand. Pretty weak.
ARMY PREDICTION
Today's language is Greek! ο στρατός θα χάσει @ 11:36 AM
Four games this Saturday, three of which are going to be interesting, and one of which Army is playing in.
League leading Holy Cross has to make the dismal trip to Hamilton to play Colgate in front of dozens of people. Coach Ralph Willard suggests that the lack of fan support for Colgate actually helps them-- and he makes a good point, since the Raiders are 5-1 in league play in Hamilton. I guess they can get used to playing for no one but themselves, while other teams have to adjust to crowds more suited for JV high school girls games.
This game is certainly winnable for 'gate but I can't see them getting around HC's excellent defense. Unless someone for CU goes unconcious and hits something like 6-7 from 3PT range, this should be a 10 point HC victory.
In the middle of the pack, Navy travels to Lehigh and AU goes to Lafayette. Both games are similar, in that you have a top tier team trying to stay that way against a team that really can't do much to improve their seeding at this point.
Navy, despite only 3 conference wins, is a pretty dangerous squad. At this point, you might have to give the Coach of the Year award to Billy Lange for doing so much with so little. If they can win here at Lehigh or next week at AU, it would certainly cinch that designation for me.
Lafayette continues to struggle, as will any squad whose best player can only play on one half of the court. If the Patriot League played Iowas Girls' Rules, Sean Knitter would be an MVP contender. As is, he's one of the bigger defensive liabilities in the league. Nonetheless, the Leopards are traditionally a good home team, and when they can play at their tempo, they are not bad.
Lehigh and AU are two teams whose schedules are so similar it's scary. Check it out:
Lehigh PL losses:
At Colgate, 54-61
At Bucknell, 63-65
Holy Cross, 56-58
at Holy Cross, 53-73
AU PL losses:
At Colgate 57-67
At Bucknell 52-65
Holy Cross, 67-76 (OT)
at Holy Cross, 56-80
Lehigh, 53-56
The one thing seperating the two squads is a ridiculous beyond NBA three by Joe Knight that won the game for LU at the Splaver Center in January.
Both teams have "must win" (what an annoying cliche) situations on their hands here-- they can't drop contests to teams that are 3-8 in league play this late in the season, or they're looking at a pretty tough assignment for the league tournament.
Speaking of which, the PL tournament starts in two weeks. Get pumped to go...somewhere. Unless you're an Army fan (have fun in Worchester, Cadets!), you really don't know where your school's tournament games are going to be, making planning for anything like that completely unreasonable. And you probably won't know until a week beforehand. Pretty weak.
ARMY PREDICTION
Today's language is Greek! ο στρατός θα χάσει @ 11:36 AM
