A tradition that needs to stop

Posted on March 10, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

This season, The Citadel’s basketball team successfully broke a long cycle of losing, and did so in spectacular fashion, with an unprecedented number of league victories, the longest winning streak in over 80 years, and a record-tying 20 victories.  The team broke long road losing streaks at Appalachian State, Davidson, and the College of Charleston.  It got over the hump in every conceivable way except one.  Oh, but that one…

The conference tournament bugaboo struck again.

Samford became the 21st different team to beat The Citadel in the SoCon tourney (I think it’s safe to assume that’s a record), a little more than a month after The Citadel beat the Birmingham bulldogs by 25 points in a game at Samford.  It was, to say the least, a frustrating performance.  The Citadel’s defense was atrocious, as Samford scored 76 points on only 55 possessions.  The Citadel also got outrebounded by Samford, which is both terrible and amazing, given that Samford is one of the nation’s worst rebounding teams.  It was just a miserable night.

I don’t know why, no matter how good or bad the Bulldogs are in any season (and they’ve usually been bad), The Citadel comes up all thumbs every single time when the SoCon tournament gets underway.  You would think that in all those years that on occasion even one of the Bulldogs’ lesser teams would have done something to win a couple of games, even if it were just by accident.  Nope.  The Citadel is now 10-56 in the Southern Conference tournament.

Ed Conroy did a lot of things right this season, but I suspect he’s going to take a hard look at the performance of the team on Saturday night and try to figure out how to change the mindset of the squad entering tourney play.  The team has to play with purpose while remaining loose, something that never seems to happen, regardless of the year.

I don’t know if The Citadel has finished playing basketball this season.  It is possible that the Bulldogs will be invited to a post-season event, as college basketball appears to be going the way of college football, and eventually all 343 Division I teams will get to play in a post-season tournament.   Well, maybe not NJIT.  We’ll see what develops on that front.

If it does turn out to be the end of the season, I feel badly for the players that it ended so rudely, particularly the two seniors.  However, Demetrius Nelson and Jon Brick will depart knowing that in their senior year, they played on a basketball team at The Citadel that won 20 games.  That makes them members of a very, very small club.  Also, if the Bulldogs are able to maintain the positive momentum built up during this season, and parlay it into even more success, Nelson and Brick will know that they were major contributors to the building of that foundation. 

—

I’ve been asked by friends about two recent articles concerning The Citadel, a long and evocative piece in ESPN The Magazine (and ESPN.com) by the talented Wright Thompson, and a shorter feature in The New York Times, the latter of which could have used some editing.  However, as I have pointed out to people who have brought it up, the truth is that other than Ed Conroy, the basketball team didn’t get much publicity from either article, as both were about Pat Conroy.  The two pieces combined were over 5700 words in length, but despite all that verbiage no member of the current edition of the Bulldog basketball team was mentioned, not even once.

I was disappointed in that, because I’ve heard the Pat Conroy tale before.  While I mean no disrespect, I felt the focus should be on the current players and what they had accomplished, not just Nelson and Brick, but Zach Urbanus, Bryan Streeter, and Austin Dahn.  I wanted to read more about the terror of Beverly Hills, Cosmo Morabbi.  I was hoping someone would come up with a nickname for John Brown (besides just “JB”).

Instead, the national media turned to Pat Conroy as the story.  It’s always about Pat.

(Actually, contained within the Pat-and-Ed storyline was something that I thought was potentially much more interesting, the relationship between Ed and Don “The Great Santini” Conroy.  However, that angle would only have tangentially involved Pat Conroy, and the elder Conroy is dead, so it was just used as a way for the preferred narrative to connect Pat and Ed.  Oh well.)

Perhaps it’s just as well none of the players were mentioned, at least in the Times article.  Since that story referred to General Grinalds as the former commandant of the school, it’s possible that Urbanus would have been described as a 6’10” post player…

—

Finally, you have to hand it to the Southern Conference brass.  After taking the guaranteed money from Chattanooga to move the tournament to UTC’s home court, the conference leadership got exactly what it deserved.  The Mocs had the fifth-best record in the SoCon this season, but despite 20 conference games the league continued with its two-division format.  With the four best teams all in the South division, this enabled UT-Chattanooga (playing in the North division) to garner a bye in the first round while two other teams with better records had to play on Friday night. 

Then everything fell into place for the Mocs.  Not only did they survive a one-point victory over Elon in the quarterfinals (you think the home court was probably worth a few points there?), they only had to beat one of the four teams that finished ahead of UTC in the standings — and that was the third-place team, which had to play an extra game just to get to the final.

There is a good chance (better than 50%, at least) that Chattanooga becomes the first SoCon school to land in the dreaded play-in game, just one year after Davidson reached the Elite Eight.  That will do wonders for the league’s image.  However, it should have come as no surprise to anyone that Chattanooga won the tournament on its home court, since that’s exactly what happened in 2005, the last time the tournament was held at McKenzie Arena.

When the tournament was awarded to Chattanooga, SoCon commissioner John Iamarino noted that the arena would provide plenty of seating.  That’s great, except much of it wasn’t used, as even in the final, with its home team playing and a bid to the NCAA tournament on the line, the official attendance was only 5,042 (and who knows what the actual attendance was).   

It’s not surprising that a lot of the fans from other schools in the league didn’t show up, since Chattanooga isn’t a geographically ideal location to have the tournament (unless you root for UTC or Samford).  It doesn’t say much for the promotion of the event, though, when even the home team can’t put people in the stands.

Naturally, the tournament will return to Chattanooga next season…

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19 could lead to 20, and 20 means a lot

Posted on February 27, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

The Citadel 75, Furman 54.  This would be called “taking care of business”, except that it took the Bulldogs a half to get appropriately businesslike…

In the first half, The Citadel shot 11-34 from the field, including 0-7 from three-point land.  Clearly the eight-day layoff had left the Bulldogs’ shooters rusty, at least from the outside (and maybe from the inside too — John Brown missed not one but two dunk attempts).  The Citadel’s play was a touch sloppy, and there were several missed rebounding opportunities.  The only Bulldog seemingly unaffected by the malaise was Demetrius Nelson.  Luckily for The Citadel, he was more than up to the task of carrying the team.  Nelson scored 17 points in the half, including the last 11 for the Bulldogs, and The Citadel sneaked away with a three-point halftime lead.

The second half was a tour de force, as almost everything you would want to see as a Bulldog fan came to pass.  Nelson continued dominating in the post, Brown resumed his get-every-loose-ball-in-Charleston-County routine (and made all three of his dunk attempts), Zach Urbanus started making threes, Austin Dahn grabbed some tough rebounds and did a good job passing the ball (including a great assist to Brown out of the post), Cameron Wells drove, dished, and finished, Cosmo Morabbi knocked down a corner three on yet another well-conceived inbounds play, and Bryan Streeter contributed solid post defense, boarded with abandon and even made a free throw (now he needs to show Brown how it’s done).

The Bulldogs shot 75% from the field in the second half, including 4-7 from beyond the arc.  The defense was outstanding throughout the game, as Furman never got comfortable on offense (the Paladins had only 3 assists on 19 made baskets and were victimized by 11 Bulldog steals).  Nelson finished with 28 points on only 12 field goal attempts.  He also had 8 rebounds, a pair of assists, two steals, and did not commit a turnover.  After the game he leaped over a tall building in a single bound.  Brown had a career-high 16 points to go along with his usual disruptive ways.

With the win, the Bulldogs swept the Paladins in the regular season for the first time since 2001, and the margin of victory on Thursday was the biggest for The Citadel in a game against Furman since the 1939 team beat the Paladins 56-34 (incidentally, that game was part of a six-game winning streak for the Bulldogs against Furman, the longest winning streak The Citadel has ever had against the Paladins).  The Bulldogs also broke a five-game losing streak to Furman at McAlister Field House.

The victory also established a new standard for biggest turnaround for a Bulldog team from one season to the next (in terms of wins), as The Citadel has now gone from 6 wins last season to at least 19 victories this year.  The previous record was 12, as the 1978-79 team won 20 games following an 8-win campaign in 1977-78.  The Bulldogs continue to add to the school record for conference victories, the school record for consecutive conference victories, and the conference record for turnaround in league play (by wins).

A crowd of 4,219 enjoyed the action, with a vocal contingent of cadets leading the way (I particularly liked the giant cutouts of the heads of Nelson and Jonathan Brick).  Attendance will presumably be even better for the Saturday night game against Wofford.  The last time the home finale had this much meaning was…well, I’m not sure there has been a home finale with as much on the line:

  • A win would tie the school record for victories in a season (20).  The aforementioned 1978-79 squad is the only Bulldog team to win 20 games in a season.  As it happens, the ’79 team will be honored on Saturday, as it’s the 30th anniversary of that season.  That strikes me as poetic (well, it’s poetic if the Bulldogs win the game).
  • A win would also clinch no worse than a tie for second in the SoCon South Division, and as The Citadel swept the College of Charleston this season, the Bulldogs would be guaranteed a bye in the Southern Conference tournament.  That’s obviously critical to The Citadel’s chances of winning the SoCon tourney.  Three wins in three days will be very difficult.  Four wins in four days would be almost impossible.

Let’s examine that second-place possibility for a moment.  Obviously everyone is concentrating on the bye, and that’s understandable, but in a historic context it’s the placement that deserves notice.  Second place may not mean that much to some schools, but for The Citadel, it’s a big deal.  Why, you ask?  (I’m assuming you asked — if you didn’t, just go with the flow.)

This is The Citadel’s 73rd season as a member of the Southern Conference.  As you might have heard or read, The Citadel has never finished first in the league’s regular season standings.  It has never had the conference’s best record.  What you may not have heard or read is that The Citadel has also never finished second.

That’s right.  In its first 58 years of SoCon membership, The Citadel never finished higher than third.  For the past 14 years, league standings have been broken into two divisions, and it’s true that twice the Bulldogs have tied for second place in the South Division.  However, on neither of those occasions did The Citadel tie for second in overall record in the league.  In 1998 the Bulldogs were 6-8 in the SoCon South, tying for second in a five-team division with Wofford.  The Citadel tied for the 5th-best record in the conference that season.  In 2001, The Citadel was in a three-way tie for second in the division, which was good enough to tie for the 4th-best record in the league.

For the record, The Citadel has only enjoyed 15 seasons in its history (before this season) when it finished the year in the upper half of the conference (that includes the 1989 team that tied for 4th in an eight-team league).  There have also been 15 seasons in which the Bulldogs finished last in the conference (overall, regardless of divisional or non-divisional format), 10 campaigns when the Bulldogs finished next-to-last, and 11 seasons in which the Bulldogs wound up third-from-last in the conference.  In exactly half of the 72 Southern Conference campaigns prior to this season, The Citadel finished in the bottom three in the league.

Getting the bye is the immediate concern for The Citadel, because of what it means in terms of the SoCon tournament.  (I’ll save the stats on the Bulldogs’ tourney history for another post; there is only so much “misery history” I can write, as The Citadel’s record in the tourney is actually worse than its SoCon regular season record.)  The chance to finish second, though, is something that would have lasting meaning.  No team in the North Division can match The Citadel’s league win total, so it’s down to The Citadel and the College of Charleston for second overall.  (The Citadel also still has a mathematical chance of tying Davidson for first, but that is very unlikely to happen.)

It’s not going to be easy on Saturday (not that it should be), because Wofford will be a very tough out.  The Terriers fought back from a 15-point halftime deficit at the College of Charleston on Thursday night, and the Cougars barely survived the onslaught, hanging on for an 86-84 victory.

Of course, Wofford is also the last team to beat The Citadel, having won 66-63 in Spartanburg in January.  In that game, the Bulldogs trailed by 16 points late in the first half before making a furious comeback, taking the lead with nine minutes to play.  However, the Terriers regained the lead and held on for the victory.  This game came during a stretch of contests where The Citadel would struggle in the first half before pouring it on in the second.  The Citadel has mostly avoided first-half pitfalls since the game against Wofford, and needs to continue playing well from the opening tip if it is to win its twelth straight.

The Bulldogs also need to do a better job defending the erratic but dangerous Junior Salters (four for six behind the arc in the first game) and must somehow control Noah Dahlman, an all-conference candidate who scored 36 points last night for the Terriers against the CofC.  Dahlman has scored at least 18 points in nine of Wofford’s last ten games.  He scored 17 points against The Citadel in Spartanburg (on just nine FG attempts).  Corey Godzinski will also be a factor on Saturday after missing the first meeting between the two teams with a broken hand.  He’s 6’8″ and can shoot from outside (he made three 3-pointers against the College).

The game against Wofford isn’t a must-win for the Bulldogs in terms of getting the bye.  The backup plan would be the regular season tail-ender, a game in Statesboro on Monday night against a decimated Georgia Southern squad.  However, given the spotlight that will be on the Saturday night contest, and with all the pomp and circumstance associated with it (Senior Night, the ’79 team being honored, etc.), there will be considerable pressure on the Bulldog players to keep all the streaks going and to treat the home fans to a game to remember.

It will be interesting to see how the team performs.  In a way, it’s a warmup for what The Citadel will encounter at the Southern Conference tournament.  It’s one more challenge for Ed Conroy and company.  With the way this year is going, you wouldn’t want to bet against them.

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Valentine’s Day present: nine straight wins

Posted on February 15, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

Now that’s a Valentine’s Day to remember:  The Citadel 72, College of Charleston 58, in the Bulldogs’ first game ever at Carolina First Arena (with 5,168 spectators in attendance).

I have to admit that I wasn’t so sure about The Citadel’s chances of winning this game, despite the solid victory at McAlister three weeks ago.  I felt the Bulldogs were perhaps due for a bad game, and that the College was on a roll after its comeback victory at Davidson and subsequent thumping of Western Carolina.

After watching the first half, though, I realized that my fears  were misguided.  The Citadel had committed nine turnovers in only twenty-seven possessions, meaning that the Bulldogs had turned the ball over every third time down the court (a terrible percentage, to say the least).  Normally that would be a recipe for disaster, but instead The Citadel only trailed by one point (29-28).

The Bulldogs were shooting the ball well, and when not committing turnovers were doing a good job running their offense, using the shotclock, making the Cougars work on defense  (which some of the CofC players did not appear to enjoy), and controlling the pace of play.  The Citadel had handled the College’s press with relative ease (which had also happened in the first meeting), and I figured that as long as the Bulldogs took care of the basketball in their normal fashion in the second half, they would be in good shape.  That is exactly what happened.  The Citadel turned over the ball over on its first possession of the second half, but then committed only two more turnovers the rest of the game.

Then there was the rebounding.

The Citadel outrebounded the CofC 13-8 in the first half, which was a marked departure from the first contest between the two teams, when for the game the Cougars had 38 rebounds to the Bulldogs’ 25.  The reason The Citadel didn’t just win on Saturday, but won going away, was that the Bulldogs completely dominated the glass in the second half, essentially reversing the board differential from the first game, and finished +17 (38 rebounds to the CofC’s 21).  The most impressive statistic in the game, to me, was that the Bulldogs got more offensive rebounds (13) than the College got defensive boards (12).

That had to have frustrated Bobby Cremins and the CofC fans, especially since the Cougars started three frontcourt players in the 6’7″-6’8″ range and brought another 6’8″ forward off the bench, and none of those guys were stringbeans, either.  Meanwhile, The Citadel countered with a starting lineup featuring one 6’8″ post player (Demetrius Nelson) and a bunch of guards, including John Brown, who is 6’4″ but essentially fills the power forward role for the Bulldogs — and it was Brown who proved to be the primary nemesis for the Cougars’ big men, gathering 12 rebounds (5 offensive), scoring 14 points on 7-10 shooting (I think every made basket was a layup), and generally being a nuisance on the defensive end of the floor.   Interestingly, Brown had the same rebounding totals (12/5 offensive) in the first matchup.

In this game, though, he had help on the boards from Nelson (7/3 offensive) and, somewhat surprisingly, Zach Urbanus (who had the same 7/3 ratio).

I would like to riff a little about an aspect of Ed Conroy’s coaching that I have gradually come to appreciate.  The Citadel runs a very disciplined offense, one that usually involves working the clock and controlling the pace of play.  The Bulldogs are generally at their best when the number of possessions in a game hovers around 60 or so.  Whenever I am watching, and things start to get a bit frenetic, or someone takes a shot with 25 seconds or more remaining on the shotclock, I’m inclined to start mumbling things like, “Slow it down!  Slow it down!  You’re playing too fast!  Work the clock!”  You get the idea.  I’m particularly prone to think this way late in games when The Citadel has a lead.

The key is, though, that while a Bulldog will occasionally force a shot, it doesn’t really happen too often — and more importantly, the players maintain a sense of aggressiveness.  There is a distinction to be made between a disciplined offense and a conservative offense.  It doesn’t do you any good to run the shotclock down to 5 on each possession if you regularly wind up hoisting a 30-foot jumper.

So while I may have wished that Cosmo Morabbi had not attempted a contested three-pointer with the Bulldogs up 14 and just over 4 minutes to play, and with 26 seconds still remaining on the shotclock, I can understand that the freedom he has in being “allowed” to attempt that shot is critical.  Maybe that time he made a mistake, but by being aggressive and not timid, he also was in a position to make two other three-pointers during the game, including the shot that signalled the game was The Citadel’s to lose, a three-pointer at the 10:20 mark that stretched the Bulldogs’ lead to nine — and a shot taken with 25 seconds still remaining on the shotclock.

That’s good coaching.

There has been some discussion about yesterday’s victory by The Citadel being “historic”, with references to “The Citadel’s first two-game series sweep since the 1932-33 season” in this column by Gene Sapakoff in The Post and Courier, as well as Jeff Hartsell’s game story (“an event that comes around every 76 years or so”).  This angle pops up in other press reports, too.

Now, with all due respect to the above chroniclers, I think the whole “first sweep since the 1930s” thing is overblown and a bit misleading. Before Saturday, the Bulldogs had not swept the Cougars in a two-game set since 1933, but following the 1937 season (a year during which the schools met three times, with The Citadel winning the latter two matchups), The Citadel and the College of Charleston did not play again until 1956.  After that one game, the series again went into hibernation, and did not resume until 1977. In addition, The Citadel and the CofC only began playing twice per year again in 1997 (except for a two-game set in 1983, which was split).  The truth is there was a 60-year period in the series during which The Citadel (or the College of Charleston, for that matter) had only one opportunity for a “sweep”.

Also, of course, technically The Citadel has not “swept” the College of Charleston this season — yet.  The two schools could meet for a third time in the Southern Conference tournament, although as things currently stand that potential matchup could only happen if both teams advanced to the championship game.  With yesterday’s win, the chances of The Citadel getting to the final improved slightly, because the Bulldogs are now in position to get a first-round bye (as a top-2 finisher in the South Division).

That would be critical, particular for The Citadel.  It would be much easier to win three straight games than have to win four games in four days in Chattanooga (no team has ever gone the “four in four” route to win the SoCon tourney).  Also, given The Citadel’s putrid history in the Southern Conference tournament, having to play one fewer game to actually win the thing would surely come as a relief.  Three tournament wins would be more victories than The Citadel has had in the last 22 tournaments combined.

To guarantee getting that bye, The Citadel has to win at least three of its remaining four games.  The win over the Cougars gave the Bulldogs a little cushion, as the game at Davidson on Wednesday is not a must-win for bye hopes.  However, there is still work to do.  The Citadel also has home games remaining against Furman, a team the Bulldogs had to go to overtime to beat in Greenville (and the Paladins appear to be improving), and Wofford, which beat The Citadel in Spartanburg — the last time the Bulldogs lost a game.  The Citadel finishes the season at Georgia Southern, which has been decimated by injuries and suspensions.  It’s still a road game, though.

The Citadel would get an additional mulligan (or more) if the College of Charleston is unable to win out.  The College has three straight road games up next on its schedule; a slip-up by the Cougars at any of those games would greatly help the Bulldogs’ cause.

As I write this the status of Stephen Curry for Wednesday’s game is uncertain, as Davidson’s all-everything player injured his ankle on Saturday night against Furman.  Even without him, though, the Wildcats would be a formidable opponent, particularly at Belk Arena.  Obviously Davidson is a much better team with him.

While awaiting updates on Curry, it’s worth taking stock in what the Bulldogs have accomplished already.  17 victories clinches a winning season for the first time in seven seasons.  The Citadel has only won more games than that in a season twice in its history (18 in 1985 and 20 in 1979).  The 12 conference victories is a school record, although past teams didn’t have a 20-game league schedule.  Still, no Bulldog squad has ever finished a season with a .750 winning percentage in conference play, which the current group is on pace to do.  The Citadel continues to add to its record for consecutive conference wins.

It’s been a great run so far, but there is still (hopefully) more fun on the horizon.

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Searching the sky for locusts

Posted on February 6, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

Last year around this time, The Citadel lost a game at Appalachian State, 75-71 in overtime.  With the loss the Bulldogs dropped to 0-13 in the Southern Conference (5-17 overall, with just one of those victories coming against a Division I team).  It was the 17th consecutive loss to Appalachian State, a school that The Citadel had not defeated in basketball since 1996 (and had not beaten in Boone since 1993).

What a difference a year makes.

On Thursday night, The Citadel defeated the Mountaineers in Boone 74-72, ending that long losing skid to Appy, and moved to 9-4 in the SoCon.  With the College of Charleston losing to Western Carolina, The Citadel currently sits in second place in the South Division.  If the season ended today (my understanding is it won’t), the Bulldogs would have a bye for the first round of the conference tournament.

There is also the small matter of last night’s win being the sixth straight conference victory for The Citadel, notable because, almost unbelievably (unless you follow Bulldog basketball), it’s the first time that the school has ever won six consecutive games in league play.  Ever.  In case you were wondering, The Citadel has been playing basketball in the Southern Conference since the 1936-37 season.

It almost didn’t happen this year, either.  The Bulldogs led 61-59 when Ed Conroy called a 30-second timeout with 5:49 left in the game.  The Citadel scored at least one point on each of its next seven possessions (including a big three-pointer by Zach Urbanus), yet with 43 seconds left the Bulldogs found themselves leading by only that same two-point margin.  With 14 seconds left, The Citadel turned it over (on what looked like a bad call, but Mountaineer fans could make a good argument that a similar call had gone The Citadel’s way three minutes earlier).  Appalachian State had a chance to tie or win the game, but good defense led to an off-balance three that never had a chance.

It was a fairly well-played game, particularly offensively.   The difference was Appalachian State’s three-point shooting, not as much the poor percentage, but the fact the Mountaineers attempted 17 shots beyond the arc when they were converting two-point attempts at a 60% clip, and also getting it done from the foul line (16-18).  I know the three-point shooting is part of their game, but when you’re having success inside and not shooting well from distance, jacking up threes just strikes me as not the way to go (although Appy did get its fair share of offensive rebounds from the missed three-pointers).

The Citadel only attempted ten three-pointers, making four of them.  I think all ten came within the “natural” flow of the offense — in other words, none of them were forced.  The Citadel did a good job of keeping things relatively simple offensively, feeding the ball to Demetrius Nelson on  a regular basis.  In the second half, Cameron Wells began creating shots for himself and taking advantage of driving opportunities.  Cosmo Morabbi added a three and also had the distinction of being identified twice by the App State radio announcer as Jonathan Brick, which I thought was amusing, although not as funny as when the announcer got Brick confused with Bryan Streeter.  (In all fairness, the announcer wasn’t bad at all; he just had a tough time with Brick for some reason.)

On Saturday, The Citadel travels to Cullowhee to take on Western Carolina, the team it beat to start this six-game streak, in what was arguably the Bulldogs’ best performance of the season (other than the free throw shooting).  It will take another good effort to complete a sweep, particularly since the Catamounts are undefeated at home.  WCU is currently tied atop the SoCon North with UT-Chattanooga, both at 7-5 in the league.

Speaking of conference standings, I’m glad that The Citadel (at least for the moment) has pushed ahead of the CofC into the #2 spot in the SoCon South.  On Saturday night the College plays at Davidson in a game televised by ESPN2, with none other than Dick Vitale as the analyst.  My guess is that he will talk about Stephen Curry for 60% of the game, Bobby Cremins for 30% of the time, and Duke when not talking about Curry or Cremins, but I am hoping that since the game features not the current first- and second-place teams in the division, but the first- and third-place teams, that he might briefly mention the team actually sitting in second place at the moment.  I’m fairly confident he has never mentioned The Citadel during a broadcast, unless it was calling us a cupcake on somebody’s schedule.

—

Brief non-basketball note:  The Citadel and VMI are going to resume their series in football, beginning in 2011.  I’m still annoyed the teams will go three seasons between meetings in the first place.  At least The Coveted Silver Shako remains in Charleston, where it belongs.

Speaking of non-basketball notes and VMI, congrats to the Bulldog wrestlers for beating their counterparts from Lexington.  I don’t claim to follow wrestling too much (despite having once announced a wrestling match — Jim Ross would have been impressed), but 21-9 is a good solid whuppin’.

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I could get used to rooting for a winning hoops team

Posted on January 25, 2009 by Sandlapper Spike

The Citadel 72, College of Charleston 63.  Whoa.

Even better, it was broadcast to a regional audience by SportSouth, with the legendary Whit Watson on play-by-play (plus shiny-domed analyst Nate Ross — I remember when Nate actually had some hair).  The Citadel doesn’t play too many televised basketball games (this was the last of three such appearances this season, not counting any potential SoCon tourney games).  Playing well and actually winning a TV game — well, that’s even more unusual.

First, the atmosphere.  From my vantage point in front of my TV (and by the way, it’s time for SportSouth to go all-HD all the time; I want to see my team play in crystal-clear high definition when it’s on the tube), the crowd seemed reasonably energetic, but a little cautious.  The corps looked okay, but I think it needed to be a bit more raucous.  (I do want a “McAlister Maniacs” t-shirt, though.  They didn’t have those back in the Dark Ages when I was in school.)  5107 is about the number of people I expected at the game.

In the game story in The Post and Courier, you’re going to read a lot of good things said about John Brown.  If you watched the game on TV, you listened to Nate Ross extol Brown’s virtues throughout the broadcast.  All of the accolades are completely justified.

Now, Brown does not appear to have any go-to offensive moves other than layups and dunks.  He’s only 6’4″.  He desperately needs a nickname.  However, he demonstrates that it’s possible for a player to have a huge effect on a game without being a scorer or what the late, great Al McGuire called an “aircraft carrier”.

Brown may not be that tall (although he has long arms), and he may not be that polished an offensive player, but he is an instinctive rebounder and defender, and an all-around hustler extraordinaire.  He finished with nine points (layups, dunks, a free throw), three steals (and numerous deflections), and twelve rebounds, with a lot of his boardwork coming during the critical stretch in the first half  when The Citadel built its lead (a 12-0 run).  I guess you could say it was a Rodmanesque performance, but that’s a description that doesn’t really work at The Citadel (and it’s hard to imagine Brown with dyed hair or wearing a dress).

Brown wasn’t the only Bulldog to have a good game.  Cosmo Morabbi continued his good run at three-point marksmanship.  Zach Urbanus had another solid day distributing the ball and making open shots from beyond the arc.  Five different Bulldogs made three-pointers, including two that I thought were bigger than “normal” made threes — Cameron Wells’ shot to tie the game at 10 when The Citadel was struggling to put the ball in the basket (despite getting good looks), and Austin Dahn’s second-half three under pressure from his defender and the shot clock, which effectively stopped a would-be College of Charleston rally.

Basically, it was a well-played game for The Citadel from about every vantage point.  When you shoot 8-15 from three and commit only eight turnovers against a pressing team, you’re probably going to have a good night.  The Bulldogs kept the possession total where they wanted it (63) and did a very good job of defending, leading to the Cougars’ poor shooting night (preventing transition baskets by avoiding turnovers and forced shots on the offensive end contributed to the College of Charleston’s offensive woes).

The negatives?  Free throw shooting (only 12-19; in particular, Bryan Streeter is struggling right now from the charity stripe) and (to a lesser extent) rebounding, for despite Brown’s prowess on the glass (which included five offensive boards), The Citadel was decisively outrebounded, although part of that is reflected by the CofC having more opportunities at offensive boards because it missed so many shots.  (It also reflects a fine effort in a losing cause by the Cougars’ Jermaine Johnson.)

I’m glad to see Demetrius Nelson finally get a win against the Cougars.  His coach can relate to waiting until his last season to beat the College of Charleston…

Speaking of Ed Conroy, the team looked well-prepared for the Cougar press.  The Citadel again had success with inbounds plays under the basket (this time Brown actually made the dunk).  I thought Conroy did a good job calling timeouts when appropriate.  I also noticed that for this game he shortened his rotation.  In past games he hasn’t hesitated to play eleven or twelve guys in a game (that’s not counting the standard clear-the-bench routine at the end of blowouts; fourteen players actually saw action against Western Carolina).  I think this game’s eight-man rotation tells you all you need to know about who he thinks is ready for big games against good, athletic teams.  Some of the underclassmen who didn’t play yesterday are going to be major contributors down the road, but aren’t quite ready yet for these types of games.

Against the College of Charleston, Conroy played three guys at two frontcourt spots (Nelson, Streeter, and Brown), rotating them accordingly, and played five guys in a three-guard setup, with Urbanus and Wells playing most of the game, and Morabbi and Dahn essentially splitting time at the other spot.  Jonathan Brick got a few minutes as well, long enough to sink a why-are-you-shooting-oh-that’s-why three-pointer.

The players don’t have much time to celebrate, though.  Monday night, the Bulldogs will play at Samford.  This is Samford’s first season in the SoCon, and the Birmingham Bulldogs have been very competitive, perhaps more competitive than expected.  Jimmy Tillette’s squad is, like The Citadel, 5-4 in the league, and has won four straight games.  Samford runs a “Princeton-style” offense and as such averages less than 60 possessions per game, which worries me a little, because the only time this season the Bulldogs faced an opponent that played an offensive style that was demonstrably “slower” than that of The Citadel was against Iowa.  In that game, the Bulldogs seemed to force the action too much and paid for it.  Samford spreads the wealth (no player averages more than 12.4 points per game, nor does any player average 30 minutes per game of playing time) and is a fairly good shooting team.  Samford has improved its turnover rate in conference play (the difference in turnovers in and out of conference is marked).

Defensively, Samford  employs a matchup zone.  This brings up the Birmingham Bulldogs’ greatest weakness, namely that they are a poor rebounding team without much in the way of a post presence.  The Citadel needs to be patient on offense, work to establish an inside game, and then hit open three-pointers.  Of course, you could say that about a lot of games.  The Citadel needs to emphasize (even more than usual) crashing the boards in this game.

On defense The Citadel must watch for backdoor cuts, of course, and be prepared to play defense for 35 seconds at a time.  How well is Samford’s offense working right now?  In three of its last four games Samford has recorded at least 17 assists, especially impressive when you consider that in those four games Samford averaged less than 25 made field goals per game.

We’ll see which team maintains its momentum on Monday night.

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No hoops until next year for The Citadel

Posted on December 22, 2008 by Sandlapper Spike

Of course, next year isn’t that far off.  The Citadel’s next game is another non-conference battle, at home against Bethune-Cookman on January 3.

The Citadel lost to Michigan State by 14, and lost to South Carolina by 14.  However, the Bulldogs played a much better game against the Spartans than they did against the Gamecocks.  South Carolina managed to increase the tempo to a faster pace than The Citadel would have liked (although not quite as fast as the Gamecocks would have preferred).  The Citadel could not take advantage of the helter-skelter play to knock down more open three-point shots.  To win the game the Bulldogs had to make several more threes than USC, and a 7-6 made 3FG advantage was never going to be enough.  It didn’t help that South Carolina was unexpectedly good at shooting free throws (28-33).

The officiating favored the Gamecocks’ defensive style, which is basically a version of the “five guys press and foul, the refs can’t call ’em all” system famously run by Rick Pitino at Kentucky, only Pitino had multiple future NBA players with which to work.  The Citadel never seemed able to adjust to this (even after USC sleepwalked through the game’s opening five minutes).  I would have liked to have seen some of the Bulldogs get more aggressive (I did appreciate Cosmo Morabbi’s approach in this respect).  A poster on The  Citadel’s message board made what I thought was a good point; the Bulldogs needed to set some backcourt picks to “punish” the Gamecocks as they continued to harass the man bringing the ball up the court.

Still, it wasn’t a terrible effort by the Bulldogs, as opposed to the laughable “atmosphere” at Colonial Life Arena.  I wass amused to read that the reported attendance was 9493 (it was less than that by at least a third).  There wasn’t anything original about the Gamecocks’ pregame, from the intros (which featured a player introduced as a starter who actually didn’t start) to the band playing “Sweet Caroline” (this ongoing sports tribute to Neil Diamond must stop).  USC also cranks up Zombie Nation like every other school in North America.  It’s just so…tired.

There was nothing imaginative or innovative about any of it, the crowd was dead…that reminds me.  I honestly am not sure how many of the people at the game were rooting for either of the two schools, because I can’t believe that as much as 40% (or more) of the “crowd” was there for The Citadel, but that’s what it looked like with all the people who showed up wearing blue collared shirts.  Surely some of them were just Gamecock fans, but if you’re a Gamecock fan, shouldn’t you be wearing garnet and/or black?  It was really hard to get a read on the fan ratio because of this (along with all the empty seats).

I took a picture of the scoreboard when The Citadel first took the lead, just for posterity.  I took it quickly, just in case South Carolina scored before I could snap it (as it turned out, I need not have worried).  Here it is:

0032

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10 reasons why The Citadel will beat Michigan State

Posted on December 16, 2008 by Sandlapper Spike

1.  The Citadel threw the UC Davis game just to make the Spartans overconfident.

I mean, let’s get serious here.  Do you really think the Bulldogs were trying to play defense in the first half?  UC Davis shot 78% from the field.  Most teams couldn’t do that if the other team didn’t show up.  UC Davis had an eFG of 69% for the game.  Clearly, The Citadel was just setting a trap for Michigan State.  Having the Spartans win their last game by 58 points (over Alcorn State) was just an added bonus.

2.  Drew Neitzel isn’t playing in this game.

Neitzel did play in the only meeting between the two schools, which came two years ago during the 10th of Neitzel’s 11 seasons in East Lansing.  Michigan State edged The Citadel 73-41 in a game marred by biased officiating, courtesy of Big 10-friendly refs.  There is no other logical way to explain how the Spartans won that game.

3.  The Citadel gives up fewer points per game than Michigan State and commits fewer turnovers per game as well.

These are true facts.  You can look them up.  The Citadel averages 61.1 possessions per game, the 15th-slowest pace in the country, but I don’t think that is particularly relevant.  Neither is the fact that Michigan State ranks in the top 40 nationally in possessions per game (at 74.9).

4.  The Citadel’s school colors are similar to those of North Carolina.

Speaking of the Tar Heels, you can’t tell me that the Spartans won’t be traumatized when a team wearing light blue and white saunters onto the court at the Breslin Center (even if the contest against the Heels was at Ford Field).  Did you watch that game?  Mercy.  You can bet that the players at Rhode Island and Columbia are upset they can’t get a shot at MSU.

You know, if you squint Demetrius Nelson looks a little like Ed Davis…

5.  Idong Ibok could start at center for the Spartans.

Ibok is a native of Lagos, Nigeria.  He’s 6’11”, 260.  According to MSU’s game notes, Ibok (a redshirt senior who has already graduated; he made the Academic All-Big 10 team last season) has started 17 games in his career.  So far this season, he has played in six games (one start) and scored two points.

That kind of starting history/stat line bears an eerie similarity to that of Augustine “Gus” Olalere, who played for The Citadel in the early 1990s and who was also from Lagos, Nigeria.  So, it looks like The Citadel was about 17 years ahead of Michigan State on the recruiting trail.  Advantage:  Bulldogs.

(Don’t forget about Love Ishie, too.)

6.  The Citadel has never lost a game that was televised by the Big Ten Network.  The Citadel has also never lost a game broadcast nationally in high-definition.  I’m quite sure Dave Revsine will mention these two facts repeatedly during the game.

Incidentally, Steve Smith (former Spartan) is going to be the analyst for this game, which reminds me that we have a serious Steve Smith problem in our country.  Not only is there the ex-Spartan hoopster Steve Smith, soon to be impressed with the greatness that is basketball at The Citadel, but on Sunday night the NFL game will feature not one but two teams with wide receivers named Steve Smith.

Then you have the Steve Smith who used to play for the Raiders and Penn State, and the Steve Smith who coached third base for the Phillies this past season (since canned), and the Steve Smith who played basketball for La Salle and for about an hour in the NBA, and a host of other sports-related Steve and Steven Smiths (not to mention ESPN screamer Stephen A. Smith and ASU fixer Stevin Smith).  Basically, we have too many Steve Smiths.  I call for a moratorium on naming your kid Steven or Stephen if your last name is Smith, especially if you are athletic and there is a risk he could inherit your genes.

7.  The Citadel is a better free-throw shooting team.

The Bulldogs are shooting a solid 72% from the line thus far, while the Spartans are a mediocre 65% from the charity stripe.  In a close game, advantage Bulldogs!

8.  Michigan State has a lot of guys afraid to shoot the ball.

You can tell this is the case just by looking at the assist statistics.  MSU ranks 7th nationally with 19 assists per game, a sign that players would rather have their teammates shoot than take the initiative themselves.  Against Alcorn State, the Spartans had a school-record 35 assists, evidence of a timid squad.

Conversely, The Citadel averages less than 10 assists per game, which is in the bottom 40 nationally.  Obviously the Bulldogs have a lot of aggressive players who aren’t afraid to take big shots.  As Bill Raftery would say, Onions!

9.  The Spartans don’t seem to have a lot of personality.

According to MSU’s game notes, senior guard Travis Walton “loves candy”.  The other factoid listed about Walton is that he’s the team’s strongest player, but c’mon.  He’s a senior, and the best tidbit they can come up with is that he “loves candy”?  Weak.  You can’t win unless your players have more personality, like Bulldog freshman guard Cosmo Morabbi.

10.  This has been a tough year for the State of Michigan.

Let’s face it.  If there is going to be a year in which The Citadel beats Michigan State in hoops, this is the one.  Talk about bad karma…

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Bulldog hoopsters unable to maintain lead over mighty Big 10 opponent

Posted on November 21, 2008 by Sandlapper Spike

The lead was 4-2.  Iowa eventually survived, 70-48.

For The Citadel, the first six possessions went like this:
1) Inside to Demetrius Nelson, he scores
2) Inside to Nelson, he scores again
3) Attempt to transition for an easy hoop leads to challenged layup, no good
4) Ignored the inside, rushed a 3, no good
5) Ignored the inside, one-on-one move leading to long jumper, no good
6) Inside to Nelson, Iowa brings help this time, he kicks it out for an open 3, Daniel Eykyn makes it

Then there was a media timeout.  When action resumed, Nelson had been substituted.

When you are playing a team like Iowa, there aren’t going to be a lot of possessions (the Bulldogs had 54 in this game).  You’ve got to make them count.  If something is working early, like Nelson getting good looks because he’s being played one-on-one by a guy about his size, keep doing it.  Instead The Citadel started rushing things. 

Iowa would pass the ball around, running ball screen after ball screen, waiting for a defender to screw up (which happened way too often).  Then one of the Hawkeyes would take (and 52% of the time, make) an open 3.  It was quite frustrating to watch.  Even more frustrating, though, would be The Citadel’s response, which was seemingly to try to speed the game up by taking quick shots on the offensive end, especially three-pointers, missing most of the outside jumpers (4-17 from 3).  The Citadel’s rushed play also led to 13 turnovers, which doesn’t sound bad, but remember, there were only 54 possessions.  That means that almost one-fourth of every Bulldog possession ended in a turnover.  That’s not a good ratio.

The Citadel also tried to speed the game up by pressing Iowa, but that didn’t work, partly because the Bulldogs aren’t really a pressing team.  Iowa only committed one turnover in the entire first half (five for the game). 

A victory probably wasn’t meant to be for The Citadel, anyway, considering Iowa was fairly sharp and never seemed sluggish, and also given how well Hawkeye guard Anthony Tucker shot the ball (the second three Tucker made was actually very well defended, but Tucker made it anyway). 

Still, the final result is disappointing.  While Iowa is a major conference team, it’s not expected to challenge for the Big 10 title, and perhaps more importantly, the game didn’t feature multiple athletic mismatches like you might expect against a BCS opponent.  In other words, it shouldn’t have been a 22-point loss (which is a bad loss, especially given the pace of play).  The Citadel did manage to get within five points with less than 13 minutes left in the second half, but then Iowa made another run and the Bulldogs seemed to lose their bearings.

Cameron Wells had a good game, finishing with 21 points on 13 shots.  Austin Dahn seemed to pick up a foul every five seconds he was in the game – it just wasn’t his night.  Nelson finished with eight shot attempts (and only one FT attempt) in 28 minutes.  Cosmo Morabbi grabbed six rebounds, not bad at all for a guard, and had three assists.  He was 0-5 from the field, though, missing three three-point shots, at least two of which seemed to not come in the natural flow of the offense.

Of course, there arguably wasn’t a natural flow to the offense.  The Citadel only had five assists in this game on nineteen made field goals, and that despite only picking up two offensive rebounds, so it’s not like the Bulldogs converted a bunch of tap-ins.

Next up, Cincinnati Christian, as part of the Cancun Challenge, with McAlister Field House the site, as opposed to a Mexican beach…

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Room for improvement

Posted on November 15, 2008 by Sandlapper Spike

The Citadel basketball 2007-08, statistics and rankings/ratings of note:

RPI:  334 (fifth consecutive season finishing with an RPI of 296 or lower)
Conference wins:  1
Division I wins:  2
Points allowed per possession:  1.145 (last in Division I)
Points scored via the FT line per possession:  0.098 (last in Division I)
Opponents effective FG%:  51.3% (last in Division I)

Uh, ouch.  Other things The Citadel didn’t do particular well included shooting from inside the arc (41.0%, which was in the bottom 10 nationally), defending opponents shooting from inside the arc (57.5%, bottom 3 nationally), defending opponents shooting from beyond the arc (40.0%, bottom 12 nationally), rebounding (25.3 per game, bottom 10 nationally), and blocking shots (1.2 per game, bottom 3 nationally).

You get the idea.  Defending the post was not a strength.  The problems in the paint were exacerbated when Demetrius Nelson was lost for the season early in the campaign, which meant that the post players were exclusively freshmen, who were generally overmatched and overwhelmed by the opposition (especially physically).  This had a carryover effect to the terrible 3-point defense numbers, because the perimeter guys had to constantly help on the inside, leaving outside shooters open on a regular basis.

As a result, The Citadel was the worst defensive team in the country.

The lack of inside play also meant that the Bulldogs got very few easy baskets from in close, and had a decided lack of free throw opportunities.  This resulted in The Citadel being one of the nation’s least efficient offensive teams as well.  The shame of this was that it hid a couple of things that the team actually did fairly well, like taking care of the basketball (18.7% turnover rate, top 60 nationally) and shooting threes (38.2%, top 50 nationally).

The Citadel had one player, Phillip Pandak, who had 101 field goal attempts but only  4 (!) free throw attempts.  I doubt that there was another player in the country who took over 100 shots but only made two free throws.  Pandak’s line was an extreme example, but it was a teamwide problem, and one The Citadel needs to address.  The Citadel made only 238 free throws last season; its opponents converted 366.

The Citadel’s possessions per game rate of 65.5 was on the low side, and the team’s pace of play slowed down as the season progressed, which I think was a good thing.  I would expect more of the same this year.

On to this season.  In both the one exhibition game and the regular season opener (against non-Division I Grace Bible College), Ed Conroy played a lot of guys (12 in each game), so it’s hard to tell what his regular rotation is going to look like.  Obviously he’s going to rely on Cameron Wells, Demetrius Nelson, Zach Urbanus, and Austin Dahn.  The other players are all going to have a chance to make a positive impression (like Daniel Eykyn did against GBC).  The most interesting name (literally and figuratively) among the newcomers is Cosmo Morabbi, who got 19 minutes against Grace Bible College.  In the exhibition game the Bulldogs seemed to make a concerted effort to get the ball inside, with only 19% of its field goal attempts from beyond the arc, but against Grace The Citadel reverted to last season’s bombs-away philosophy, with 49% of its shots from outside (last year 44% of the Bulldogs’ FGAs were from 3-land).

The defense against Grace was not good, as Conroy noted in The Post and Courier‘s game article.  It was disturbing to see a non-Division I team like GBC, playing its first game ever against a Division I opponent, shoot better than 50% from the field.  The Citadel did outrebound the Tigers, but the Bulldogs won’t play a team with as little size as Grace for the rest of the season.  I also noticed the pace was a little faster than The Citadel may have liked (69 possessions), but that’s probably a one-game blip.

The Citadel goes on the road on Sunday to play its second regular season game, and Virginia Commonwealth will be a formidable opponent.  VCU played in the NIT last season and the NCAA tourney two years ago, when it upset Duke in the first round.  The Rams were an outstanding defensive team last season, leading the CAA in defensive FG%, steals, and blocked shots.  VCU led the nation in 3FG% defense; in one three-game stretch Rams opponents missed 28 consecutive three-point attempts.

Eight of VCU’s top nine players from last year return, including outstanding guard Eric Maynor (who two years ago bedeviled the aforementioned Blue Devils).  VCU, which will be playing its season opener, is favored to repeat as regular-season champions of the CAA.  The game is part of the Cancun Challenge, which has a format I am still trying to understand.  The bottom line is that The Citadel will play one game in Richmond, one game in Charleston, and two games in Mexico, all against pre-determined opposition.

I’m not expecting a win over Virginia Commonwealth.  I’m just looking for signs of development and improvement.  It may be tough to demonstrate that such advances have been made, however, against a team like VCU.

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