The Atlantic 10 Thread

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

At this point isn't Depaul no more than a lateral move for Gregory?

That's kind of what I think. Yeah DePaul is in a stronger conference but their program hasn't been any good since the Rod Strickland and Dallas Comegys days of the late 80's. Besides, Jerry Wainwright left Richmond of the A-10 to coach DePaul and look where that got him. With the recruiting class BG has coming in, I think he'd be nuts to take that job now.

Changing gears, I jumped on XavierHoops.com last night and I saw this thread started by Chris Mack with this post:

100% Coach Mack, Asking for the LOUDEST game ever in the history of the Cintas Center. You say NO students. I say NO excuse. We need our fans to be a TRUE 6th man this Sunday at 1pm. Our team needs you early. Our team needs you loud. If you're just going to come to the game to watch, give your tickets up. Heck, you can WATCH from home. I want our arena rocking!! Calling all PARTICIPANTS. This isn't a marketing ploy. This is your head coach, sitting at his home computer asking for the best fans in the country to come alive for 40 game minutes on Sunday LIKE NEVER BEFORE.

A-10 teams dis-like coming to our incredible arena. They need to FEAR it. I know the 5 guys on the floor and our bench will play very hard for you on Sunday. We need the 10,250in blue seats to be one big, living, breathing, loud and raucous 6th man. I want EVERYTHING you have. I want a curfew of midnight for all ticket holders. You're going to need your rest. Sunday will be the most fun you've ever had at a Xavier game. On our end we are working with marketing to make sure the pre-game intros, music, etc are ON it this Sunday.

My staff asked, "How will the fans know it's really you posting on the boards?" I told em that I'll confirm it on twitter. So if you're not a follower, no big deal but that's where skeptics can go. No marketing gimmick here. Wear blue. Stand. Be loud. Get it done. I realize not all Xavier fans come to message boards. That's okay. Copy and paste this and email your X friends. I'm giving the same message to Shannon Russell at my 2:40pm press conference tomorrow. I want to win. Our players want to win. Help be the reason we win! Let's get it!!!!!

Apparently him doing this has spread around the country since head coaches usually don't comment on messageboards. It was really cool that he posted though. I joined up last year and the folks that have been there longer than I have gotten a real kick out of him stopping by to post. Big game Sunday against the Spiders.

[kodiak]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

I'll be shocked if Richmond wins at Cintas. If i was off on Monday I would have seriously considered making the drive to Cincy.

As for today's games, Rhodys demise continues, falling
to the Bonnies. They are trying to play themselves out of a bid.

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

As for today's games, Rhodys demise continues, falling
to the Bonnies. They are trying to play themselves out of a bid.

Wow. I had forgotten to check the scores today until you said something. That loss is a surprise. The other 4 losses they had in their last 10 games were at least to those competing with them for the top 4 seeds in the A-10 tourney. The Reilly Center is no cakewalk to win a game but Rhody should have beaten the Bonnies. That's easily their worst loss of the season. Hopefully they are still in but I don't know. Winning their last two games will help. They'd finish 22-7 (10-6) which is pretty good this year since the A-10 is strong.

[OSUFan_88]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

So effing predictable.

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

An Charlotte falls to GW 75-70. Well, unless someone besides Xavier, Temple, or Richmond wins the A-10 Tournament, the conference is only getting 3 teams into the Dance. Just watch.

[CM1847]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

An Charlotte falls to GW 75-70. Well, unless someone besides Xavier, Temple, or Richmond wins the A-10 Tournament, the conference is only getting 3 teams into the Dance. Just watch.

URI, Charlotte and Dayton are all doing their best to blow it down the stretch. If one of them finishes strong AND makes the A10 finals then there might be 4 at-large bigs, but for now it looks like 3 in and 3 of the first 5-10 teams out will be from the A10.

Nobody to blame but themselves this year, it isn't like the bottom half of the league is strong, these 3 teams are just losing to bad teams. It is a surefire way of getting to the NIT...

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

URI, Charlotte and Dayton are all doing their best to blow it down the stretch. If one of them finishes strong AND makes the A10 finals then there might be 4 at-large bigs, but for now it looks like 3 in and 3 of the first 5-10 teams out will be from the A10.

Nobody to blame but themselves this year, it isn't like the bottom half of the league is strong, these 3 teams are just losing to bad teams. It is a surefire way of getting to the NIT...

I hope you're right. It was great seeing brackets with 4, 5, or 6 teams in. All three of those teams were controlling their own destiny. Losses to good teams wouldn't have hurt so much. Like you said, losing to the bad teams is what is killing them.

[kodiak]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Helluva a game X fans. Free throw differential was the difference. Well that and Holloway stepped up huge. No shame in losing at Cintas, especially in double ot

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Helluva a game X fans. Free throw differential was the difference. Well that and Holloway stepped up huge. No shame in losing at Cintas, especially in double ot

I'm honestly not convinced that Xavier is a better team than Richmond. Both teams played hard but the Spiders seemed to play a tad harder. Plus, they were more fundamentally sound (i.e. setting picks, etc.). I about pulled my hair out at the end of regulation when X gave Crawford the ball and basically stood back and watched. Where the heck are the screens? That's great that he can create his own shot but why make it harder? Set some screens or pass the ball down low to J-Love and draw contact. I'm glad X won but I didn't feel good about it at the end. Richmond is a great basketball team.

I've said this far too often this season, much more than any season in the past, but the officiating once again was horrible. I'm really rather sick of it.

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

...I've said this far too often this season, much more than any season in the past, but the officiating once again was horrible. I'm really rather sick of it.

I recorded the game so I could watch it at some point. The officiating wasn't as bad as it seemed in-person. They made some bad calls but some that I thought were ridiculous while at the game they actually got right while watching the replay. Used slow-mo a lot but they made the right calls more often than not. I'm wondering if I had done this with every game I thought was poorly officiated that I might discover the same thing.

[CM1847]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Charlotte is officially done after a blowout loss at URI(if they weren't already done going in...). They have talent, but absolutely no heart, once somebody punches them they lay down, they had quite a few 20+ point losses despite being talented enough to get some quality wins. Frustrating season, but at least it was a positive step after last year's disaster.

URI lives to fight another day, a win @ UMass and a couple of wins in the A10 tournament might sneak them into the tournament.

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Charlotte is officially done after a blowout loss at URI(if they weren't already done going in...). They have talent, but absolutely no heart, once somebody punches them they lay down, they had quite a few 20+ point losses despite being talented enough to get some quality wins. Frustrating season, but at least it was a positive step after last year's disaster.

URI lives to fight another day, a win @ UMass and a couple of wins in the A10 tournament might sneak them into the tournament.

Tough season for the Niners. I imagine it was frustrating as a fan. Hopefully they can build upon it and stay in it towards the end next season. I agree on Rhody. I think they can be that 4th A-10 team but they need to win a few more games.

Other games tonight
P2K's The Joe - 80, GW - 71
St. Bona - 92, Duquesne - 80 (This seriously must have been a scrimmage)
La Salle - 89, UMass - 78
Xavier - 82, Fordham -56

X was in total cruise control, for the most part, in their game. It was actually close in the 1st half but they cranked things up a notch the rest of the way. I'm just glad no one got hurt in the game.

A bizarre incident happened in the game. The refs called timeout, went over to Jared Grasso, Fordham's coach, and was asking who the guy with the rainbow wig sitting behind the basket was. He didn't know. The refs threw the guy out. And Rainbow Head, as he will forever be known, of course made a scene by calling each of the refs bums, kissing the security guy on the cheek, and high-fiving all twenty fans sitting in the end-zone at Rose Hill Gym.

EDIT: Rainbow Head was actually Fordham star freshman, Chris Gaston's, uncle.

[SlimKibbles]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Temple beats SLU 57-51. Well, unless by some miracle GW beats Temple on Saturday at the Liacouras Center in Philly or St. Bona beats Xavier at Cintas, Temple and X are going to share the regular season championship with Temple getting the #1 seed in the A10 tournament.

[kodiak]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

Temple beats SLU 57-51. Well, unless by some miracle GW beats Temple on Saturday at the Liacouras Center iin Philly or St. Bona beats Xavier at Cintas, Temple and X are going to share the regular season championship with Temple getting the #1 seed in the A10 tournament.

Yeah and the SLU loss also assures Richmond of an opening round bye no matter the outcome between Dayton and then Sat at Charlotte, and a SLU win this weekend gives them the other bye. Also, tomorrow night's game with Dayton is on CBSCollege network at 7PM Eastern

[boomhauertjs]

Re: The Atlantic 10 Thread

A win at Richmond and Dayton can get themselves back in the NCAA conversation. Of course, they can't win on the road at St. Joe's, so I doubt they will at Richmond.