A look at early season tournaments

Since the 2010-11 season is over it’s time to start focusing on two of college basketball’s offseason past times, recruiting and scheduling. Both are harder at the mid-major level, but there are some loopholes. For instance, often multi-team events and early season exempt tournaments offer a chance to score a big victory. A few New York City teams already are scheduled to get that chance, but what about a few others that might still be looking.

Well thanks to Chris Dobbertean over at Blogging the Bracket you don’t have to wait. He’s compiled all the early season events into one handy little page.

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Two players honored with kPOY conference awards

Stats guru Ken Pomeroy started his own statistical award in an attempt to sort out all the noise surrounding the national Player of the Year debate. His new award is the kPOY and it was given to Jared Sullinger this morning. Two New York City players were honored as well. Iona’s Michael Glover won the conference kPOY award in the MAAC and Long Island’s Jamal Olasewere captured the NEC version.

I was a little surprised that Hofstra’s Charles Jenkins was unable to capture the award in the CAA. My guess is that the Pride’s lower standings in the team rankings hurt Jenkins enough that his advantage in Offensive Rating (123.5 vs. 114.0) and Usage Rate (28.4% vs. 23.7%) were offset by the fact that George Mason finished 28th and Hofstra finished 135th.

Iona robbed in final Mid-Major Top 25 and the sad state of Fordham basketball

The final Mid-Major Top 25 poll from CollegeInsider.com is out and there appears to be one team missing. Despite reaching the finals of the CIT, Iona isn’t in the Top 25. (They’re actually 26th, four points behind Wofford.)

Santa Clara, the team that won the CIT on the Gaels’ home court, is ranked 22nd. Butler was an obvious choice for the #1 spot in the poll and VCU, after the Rams’ Final Four run, deserved to be #2, but beyond that it probably was pretty difficult for the selectors to rank the teams. Wichita State, which won the NIT, got boosted all the way up to #5, but St. Mary’s, which lost in the first round of the NIT to Kent State, only fell to #11.

This seems to be a case of poll momentum keeping teams from cracking the list. Congratulations to Long Island. The Blackbirds finished 17th in the poll. Also, Hofstra was in the others receiving votes category, but the CAA showed it’s strength with three teams in the Top 5. The three CAA teams in the poll also tied the West Coast Conference (which along with Santa Clara and St. Mary’s had #7 Gonzaga) for the most teams in the poll.

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Hofstra’s Jenkins named Chip Hilton Award finalist

Congratulations to Hofstra’s Charles Jenkins. He, along with Jimmer Fredette of BYU, Andy Polka of Loyola (Ill.) and Robo Kreps of UIC, has been named a finalist for the Chip Hilton Award. It’s given to a senior that shows outstanding character, leadership and talent on the court. Jenkins certainly demonstrated that for four years at Hofstra where he averaged 19.6 points per game and scored more than 2,500 total.

Jenkins has been named to almost every All-America and All-Star team that you can find thanks to his prolific scoring and desire to win. Using 28.4% of your team’s possessions (97th in the nation), while scoring 1.235 points per possession (23rd) and playing 92.3% (9th) of your team’s minutes is just crazy.

Hofstra didn’t reach the NCAA Tournament while Jenkins was there, but it rose from #200 into the 130’s in Ken Pomeroy each of the past two seasons and qualified for the postseason in the CollegeInsider.com Tournament and the CBI. His career will be one that Pride fans look back upon fondly.