By Mark Simon
D3hoops.com
Franklin and Marshall men’s coach Glenn Robinson and Wilkes men’s coach Jerry Rickrode have more than 50 years combined of head coaching experience, each with long, extraordinary runs of success and traditions as Pennsylvania powers. Their teams have hit some bumps over the last season and a half and they’re presently working through that, trying to get their programs back to an elite level.
Photo by Pat Coleman, D3sports.com Wilkes had plenty to celebrate in 1998 but hasn't had much since. |
Robinson’s Diplomats are 7-5, 2-3 in the Centennial Conference and winners of four straight games (including Robinson’s 1,000th contest as head coach) as they try to rebound from their 8-17, 7-10 mark in 2007. Rickrode’s Colonels are 5-5, and winners of three of four, including a road win at preseason league favorite King’s to start their MAC Freedom League season.
Rebuilding is an unfamiliar position for these two programs and both coaches readily admit that it has taken some getting used to doing. F&M claims the second-best record in Division III over the last 25 years, so the lack of victories the last few seasons, including last year in which the team lost six games by three points or fewer, has been a bit unusual. There was a little bit of a carryover into this season.
“I was not nearly as patient as I needed to be,” Robinson said, referring to earlier this season, when the team was often finishing games with four freshmen on the floor, and at one point dropped three straight. “I expected our guys to react as if they had played two to three years together. I saw glimpses (of that kind of reaction) in practice, but they couldn’t sustain it. So I’ve tried to be a lot more patient.”
With Wilkes, Rickrode’s issues were more of a tactical nature. Early in the season, the Colonels were getting pummeled, losing at William Paterson by 30, and at home to Widener by 20. The flex offense they were running was just too predictable.
“I think we misevaluated what our talent could do and not do, and I’ll take the hit for that,” said Rickrode, admitting a rare error from a record that has produced a 296-112 mark at Wilkes. “So we revamped over the winter break. We’re using a spacing and motion offense that we used with our team that got to the Final Four in 1997-98. It seems to be working well.”
Wilkes has gotten its two best wins of the season, over Tufts and King’s, since returning from break, albeit sandwiched around a one-point loss to Misericordia. The four freshmen and three sophomores who gained experience during last season’s struggles, are making that work pay off. The two key components are a pair of 6-5 forwards, Tom Kresge (last year’s MAC-F rookie of the year), and Steve Kline. Kresge is the scorer, averaging 14.8 points, who brings lots of energy, and can score with jump shots, or by posting up. He’s thrived in the new offense, averaging 17.3 points in four games since break, with Kline as the “trigger-man.” Kline ranks second on the team in both scoring (11.1 points) and assists (26).
“He and Tommy are more mobile big guys, interchangeable in some ways,” Rickrode said. “This is a team where the whole is greater than the individual pieces.”
Robinson would like for that description to fit his squad as well, though the makeup is a little bit different. The Diplomats just got back their two leading scorers, 6-7 senior forward Derek Hines and 6-3 junior guard Clay Scovill (a Penn State transfer) back from missing two games due to the combination of injury and a suspension for violation of team rules. They rely on their rebounding (margin of plus-8.9 thus far, with five forwards of 6-6 or bigger)) and ball movement (credited with 16.9 assists per game)
“We’re a young team, but a talented team, and I think we’re starting to come on,” Robinson said.
The feeling is that F&M should get a few breaks this season that it didn’t get last year, when Robinson estimated the team lost nine games decided within the last 30 seconds.
“When things go bad, it’s like Murphy’s Law,” Robinson said. “We would miss free throws, we couldn’t get defensive stops, and there were calls that went against us.”
That has started to turn around and Robinson has been quite pleased by the play of freshmen James McNally, Mike Baker, and point guard Chris Sullivan, all of whom seem to be shaping up as impact players.
With the recent success, there’s an optimism to the way they’re talking now that they might not have had a few weeks ago. These veteran coaches know winners when they see them. They hope that they’re right about the direction their programs are headed.
“I think we’re going to challenge everyone we play,” Robinson said. “I think there are seven teams in our league that could win it. We need to prove we can go out on the road and win.”
“Maybe we’ve turned the corner,” Rickrode said, noting that the MAC Freedom, like the Centennial, is gettable for several contenders. “Hopefully we’ll play well when we need to.”
WHO'S BACK? Players who could make big impacts as second-semester lineup additions for the 2007-2008 Division III season.
Sherod Harris, Brockport State. Cantrel Parrish (starter), Seth Johnson, Dan Rubertone, Dave Maldonado. Harris is a preseason All-American who had one semester of eligibility remaining. He's scored 22.8 points per game in four games since his return, while Parrish has 7.0 points and 4.0 rebounds.
Meg Coffin, Bates. The Bobcats are getting just what they needed. Coffin, through her first six games back from torn ACL that left her with one semester eligibility, is averaging 14.8 points and 8.0 rebounds Bates enters Friday with five straight wins.
Nate Anderson, Keene State. Anderson returned, after leaving the team for a semester for personal reasons, in time to play in a split at Montclair State’s holiday tournament. The Owls have struggled since, though they snapped a three-game losing streak by winning at Springfield. The hope is to get Anderson back to being the 12-point, seven-rebound factor he was a season ago, though he’s not to that point yet.
WHO'S NEW? It's tough to step into a new program at midseason, but these players are among those making the attempt.
Rhett Bonner, Guilford. Bonner transferred from new Division I Presbyterian and has averaged 3.3 points as a backup guard in his first three games for the 7-2 Quakers.
Pat Devaney, New Jersey City. Expectations are high for the 6-1 Devaney, who was ranked among the nation’s 100 best high school players -- in 2003. Devaney transferred in from Hudson Valley Community College, where he was a Dean’s List student, but has gotten off to a slow start in making the move to Division III He played 13 minutes in his first three games, with no points, but could emerge as a key contributor in a wide-open NJAC race.
Megan Sullivan, Staten Island. A junior transfer from Division I Wagner, Sullivan made a big impact in her first Division III game, scoring the winning basket with 14.2 seconds left in a win against Susquehanna, and is averaging seven points and five rebounds through five games. Staten Island is 9-5, 4-0 in the CUNYAC and got Sullivan in shape just in time for next week’s showdown with Baruch.
Todd Ward, Oglethorpe. A 6-5 forward, Ward had six points, six rebounds and three rebounds in Oglethorpe’s win over DePauw, which snapped the Tigers 20-game home win streak.
BACK HOME, BACK IN FORM: In the prime of his career, one of the greatest basketball players in the modern era decided to step away from the game and get involved with other projects. Following the murder of his father, James, Michael Jordan took his talents to the baseball diamond and the Birmingham Barons.
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This section
by Matthew Florjancic, D3hoops.com |
While his intentions were good, they remained better than his batting average in the minor leagues. Jordan then decided it was time to get back to business as usual on the court.
Though his departure from the game was less involved, Pitt-Bradford senior guard Jess Whelan took two years off from the game he loved. Being a Bradford native, Whelan chose to play for his hometown team after his high school graduation. However, after appearing in just nine games as a sophomore, Whelan headed to the “Steel City” and enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh’s main campus.
“I was playing basketball and was either 19 or 20,” he said of the transfer. “I wanted to just get out of town for a while and see how I liked living somewhere else. I moved down to Pittsburgh and I moved down there with my two cousins.
“I had a good time down there, but after a while, I just found out it wasn’t the best situation for me,” Whelan continued. “I transferred back and watched some of the games at Pitt-Bradford. I just felt that I really missed the game and really loved the game and wanted to come back and play.”
The love for the game brought him back to Bradford, but it was not as simple as transferring back and walking onto the court. Once he returned to campus, Whelan had to earn the opportunity to play and also work to redevelop a trust with the coaching staff headed by Andy Moore.
“That’s one thing I had to do,” Whelan said of winning his supporters back. “I had to talk to the head coach even more about playing again. Fortunately, he let me play again. It was just great to get back on the court.
“I think the hardest thing for me was just getting back in shape,” he added. “I didn’t really do anything down at Pittsburgh. I just got back into shape and started shooting the ball again. After about a month or two, I was back at it.”
Since coming back, Whelan has been a difference maker for the Panthers, who finished the 2006-07 season with a 14-13 overall record and 10-8 against conference foes. The senior is leading the team in scoring with 17.3 points per game. He has converted 31 of 65 field goal attempts (44.7 percent) and is 15-for-37 (40.5 percent) from beyond the three-point arc. At the free-throw line, Whelan is hitting on 87.1 percent of his shots.
Whelan believes his self-confidence with shooting the basketball comes from his experiences during his freshman and sophomore seasons in Bradford.
“As a freshman, I was kind of hesitant to shoot the ball or try to make a big shot,” he said. “Now since I’m older, I feel like I have the confidence in me to step up when my teammates need me and make a big shot or make a big steal and get a win for the team.
“I’m like the old guy on the team, so it’s kind of different in that regard,” Whelan added. “This year’s team, we’re not very big. We have no height at all, but we’re pretty scrappy on defense and are a good hustling team.”
His team and coach have restored confidence in Whelan. Earlier this year when the Panthers traveled to Medaille, Whelan hit a shot to seal the 67-64 victory. The athletic training major enjoyed the pressure more than anything else he has been able to accomplish at Pitt-Bradford.
“I made the game-winning shot with like two seconds left,” he said. “I was making everything that night. When it left my hand, I pretty much knew it was going in. It was one of those games.
“I came up from a screen on the wing,” he added. “The guy was right on me, but I still shot it and it went in. I pulled up and it was a fade-away three. It was a good feeling.”
Not only did he hit the game-winning basket, Whelan paced the Panthers with a game-high 32 points on 10-of-16 shooting. During the contest, Whelan connected on seven three-pointers.
Pitt-Bradford is 7-4 overall and 3-1 in Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference action. They are tied atop the conference with Penn State-Altoona and Pitt-Greensburg with seven weeks remaining in the regular season. In the next two weeks, the Panthers face Hilbert, Frostburg State, Lake Erie and Pitt-Greensburg.
The defending champion, Lake Erie, started the season strong with a non-conference victory against Wooster. All four of the upcoming games are at home, which means for the Panthers to make a run at the AMCC crown, they must protect their court and pick up some key road victories.
“That was definitely one of our goals coming into the season,” Whelan said of a conference championship. “We were picked to finish fifth or sixth in the AMCC. We’re tied for first right now. We’re just going to keep playing hard and see what happens. If it does happen, that’d be great.
“Lake Erie and Penn State-Behrend, we always seem to go to those places and not play a good game,” he added. “It’s important for us to have a good first half and play hard all the way through the game.”
WORTH WATCHING: Saturday is a big day, even before you take the Chase Tournament championship game into account. D3hoops.com's Gordon Mann will be in Rochester and will broadcast and blog live from the event, which features the best the Rochester area has to offer.
Consider it "Show Me Saturday," a day where someone has to show us something in order to be considered a contender in 2008.
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FINAL FOUR: Quick thoughts on news and notes from around Division III. 1. The Wheaton (Mass.) men’s basketball team came back from the Cactus Jam with quite a story to tell about their trip. It took the Lyons 33 hours to get to Phoenix, due to various flight delays (including one in which their crew timed out for spending too much time in-air), and cancellations (some due to a United Airlines strike in Chicago). Oh yes, Wheaton also returned with two wins. The Lyons may be the only team to ever go 2-0 in an eight-team tournament and finish fourth. Wheaton was put in the losers bracket because it arrived a day too late for its first game, and currently holds a 9-2 mark after losing its NEWMAC opener on Wednesday. 2. Oglethorpe’s women’s basketball team came up with a clever way to pay for a trip to Italy next year. They held a fundraiser, in which players were sponsored to make up to 1,000 free throws. All 16 players completed the task within three hours. Hopefully our new Oglethorpe bloggers will share the story of what that experience was like. 3. Some schools have pep bands. Edgewood may be the only one with a garage band, one that includes an electric guitar. The group, known now as “The Edge Band” is garnering a reputation for the entertainment it brings to the school’s games.“We’re a group of about six guys, professional musicians from Madison,” said band leader Patrick Coughlin, who when he isn’t performing at Division III games, runs a drumline for Green Bay Packers games at Lambeau Field. “If I’m at a game, I don’t want to hear canned music. I wanna hear live music. So we try to play fun, pop songs that the fans can sing along with. There may not be a lot of nuance, but it gets the crowd going.” The Edge Band has also become popular with Edgewood’s opponents. Often, when they arrive at the gym, the first question for the home folks is "Is the band playing tonight?" "Sometimes we even see those players sing along,” Coughlin said with a laugh. 4. There’s been a lot of talk on our CUNYAC message boards on the transfer of star Staten Island center Sean Weismuller to Brooklyn College during the semester break. While some leagues have rules about midseason transfers within league, the CUNYAC is among the leagues that do not. These leagues may want to consider adopting such a rule, requiring a midsemester transfer within league to sit out the rest of the year. Allowing midseason transfers within a league is dicey. It allows for a scenario in which a good team can “load up” at semester break at the expense of other squads within the league by accepting transfers from the best players within the league. We’re not saying that’s what happened here, but the chance for something dubious to happen exists. That would seem to violate the spirit of what Division III is about. |
Men
No. 4 Williams at No. 3 Amherst
That's just what this rivalry needs, is a pair of Top Five rankings in front of the names to add just a little more spice. Williams has the better record, 12-0 through Thursday, but Williams' schedule to date leaves something to be desired, with the Ephs' best opponent so far being either Keene State (6-4) or Ursinus (9-2).
For reference, Massey ranks Williams 29th and Amherst 20th, but neither takes into account the way the teams finished last season -- one on a roll and the other holding Walnut and Bronze. The Ephs pulled off an even less likely win last year in the NESCAC tournament championship, however, reminding one and all that nobody can ever be counted out in this rivalry.
No. 16 Capital at Ohio Northern
It's hard not to like Ohio Northern, but it's also hard to think of the Polar Bears without remembering last season. The team was 11-1 heading into the first meeting with Capital in 2006-07 but crashed and burned down the stretch, going 8-6. The Crusaders haven't exactly blow teams out of the water either, with the Wilmington win the best on the schedule to date, but they come into this matchup with a little more cred.
Randolph-Macon at No. 11 Guilford
The Quakers appear to be back on track since the first of the year, with three wins against teams .500 or better. Despite seven wins in a row, it's Randolph-Macon we're waiting to see something from. The win at Roanoke on Dec. 2 was something to write home about, but beating Guilford would be a different story. Then again, they'd have to go back-to-back and win at Emory and Henry the next day.
UW-Platteville at No. 14 UW-Stevens Point
There's almost never a clear favorite in a WIAC men's basketball game and this game falls right in line. Some numbers would suggest UW-Platteville has to show us something in this game, though the standings suggest otherwise. Platteville is 10-3 overall and 4-1 in the league, but has to go on the road again, after going on the road Wednesday to beat UW-Oshkosh.
Women
No. 15 Southern Maine at No. 25 Eastern Connecticut
It's like it's 2003 all over again, when these two teams were the be-all and the end-all in the Little East and the Northeast Region. But the 2002 national title game is long past for Eastern Connecticut, which only recently climbed back into the Top 25. Southern Maine is more vulnerable this year than any year in recent history, but since Bates and Bowdoin are also having down years, it's hardly been noticeable. Eastern Connecticut's most impressive win was in November, however, against Emmanuel (6-4). It may take a while for the Warriors to adjust to the level of play.
Washington and Jefferson at No. 7 Thomas More
Thomas More certainly appears to be head and shoulders above the rest of the Presidents Athletic Conference, with five wins by the margin of 11, 38, 20, 56 and 15. Washington and Jefferson hasn't had a crack at the Saints yet, and may well be the team with the best shot at keeping the Saints from running the table. The PrAC has an automatic bid on the line this season for the first time.
Millikin at No. 10 Illinois Wesleyan
Anyone remember the high hopes for the Big Blue when the season opened? Those disappeared somewhere about the time UW-Whitewater was taking a 41-22 less than 17 minutes into the season. All is not lost but it's a crucial early stretch for Millikin, which started the CCIW 0-1 and has Wheaton following the Illinois Wesleyan game.
No. 2 UW-Whitewater at UW-Eau Claire
Before the season started we got an e-mail from an Eau Claire fan swearing up, down and sideways that we were missing the boat on the Blugolds. A 6-3 non-conference record didn't inspire, though Eau Claire is 4-0 in the league. Whitewater has a win at Chicago, which Eau Claire lost to at home.
