Category: Iona

Tempo-free MAAC: Does anyone want to challenge Iona?

There’s a very clear cut No. 1 team in the MAAC this season. Iona has taken all comers and delivered convincing win after convincing win. It’s good enough that the Gaels are currently projected as a 12 seed in ESPN’s latest bracketology (playing Vanderbilt!). The big question now is if any team is going to challenge the Gaels. We’ll find out this week as more of the top teams have games against each other starting on Thursday with Iona vs. Manhattan and Fairfield vs. Loyola (Md.). Let’s look at what the per possessions stats tell us about those four teams.

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NY Power Poll: Starting the New Year right

A new year means a new power poll. What it doesn’t mean though is new rankings. The top four have stayed exactly the same since last time, even though both Seton Hall and Iona suffered losses during that period. Of course SHU followed it up by beating Connecticut and the Gaels absolutely crushed Siena at MSG. So it’s justified. There was some movement further down the poll, where one team has started to make its move upwards.

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Iona’s Sean Armand puts on a show at the Garden

Sean Armand might want to play all of Iona’s games at Madison Square Garden after the show he put on at MSG on Tuesday night against Siena in the Gaels’ 95-59 victory. But it didn’t come without a little bit of extra preparation.

Armand scored a career-high 32 points and hit a school and MAAC record 10 threes as Iona ran all over the Saints in its return to MAAC action. One game after the team shot 6-18 from three during a disappointing 83-75 loss at Hofstra, Armand came back and hit that many threes during the first half for the Gaels.

The Iona sophomore came in early and did some extra shooting before the game to get ready for the big lights of MSG. It paid off.

“I came in a little extra early to get shots up and routine stuff,” Armand said. “Tonight I hit more than usual and I’m happy about it. … My friends and my family are here and at Madison Square Garden there’s no better place to do that.”

With Armand providing the offensive firepower, Iona had no problem showing the 9,528 in attendance for the double-header along with Louisville’s 73-58 victory over St. John’s why it is considered the favorite this season in the MAAC. Even after Loyola (Md.) and Manhattan lost on Monday, the Gaels showed up focused and ready ready to dominate.

Unlike the game against Hofstra where Dwan McMillan, turnovers and poor shooting help thwart Iona’s high-octane attack, the Gaels were able to consistently get out on the break against the Saints. Scott Machado finished with nine points, nine assists and nine rebounds for Iona and his running mate the backcourt, Momo Jones, went for 14 points and seven assists.

“I hate losing and I hate losing the way we lost,” said Iona head coach Tim Cluess about the Hofstra game. “I can understand it if we competed and they beat us great. Now they played very well, but we didn’t compete for half a game. We made uncharacteristic mistakes and we got selfish. So tonight to see that passing and the effort back were the two most important things.”

The Gaels have another high-profile conference game on Friday when they take on Niagara at home on ESPNU at 9 p.m. Niagara dominated the first half against Loyola (Md.) on Monday on the way to a surprising 66-61 victory on the road at Reitz Arena.

Iona controlled the first half against Siena on Tuesday. The Gaels started out on fire and built up a big lead thanks to impressive three-point shooting. The hot hand was passed from Jones to Jermel Jenkins to Armand during the first 20 minutes. Jones and Jenkins each hit three in the first 20 minutes and scored in double-figures before halftime. Armand led the team with 20 points in the first 20 minutes and led Iona to a 57-31 lead at the break.

O.D. Anosike grabbed 10 rebounds for the Saints in the first half. He also scored six points, but picked up three fouls while battling with Mike Glover and the surprisingly active Randy Dezouvre in the first half.

For the game Anosike, who called Siena the “Cadillac program” of the MAAC earlier in the week finished with a double-double of 12 points and 13 rebounds. Evan Hymes led the Saints with 22 points.

Notes: Kyle Smyth started the game for Iona, but Armand started the second half after his scoring outburst in the first… Hymes is one of the fastest players I’ve ever seen in person… Iona is now 9-2 in MAAC regular season games at neutral sites… The Gaels are now 51-46 (52.6%) all-time against Siena… Glover scored 10 points for Iona, his second lowest total of the season… Jermel Jenkins came off the bench to score 16 points for the Gaels.

New York Mid-Major Non-Conference Teams

Nobody is in action today as we get ready for conference play, so it’s time to look back once more and name the All-New York Mid-Major Non-Conference teams. There are a lot of talented players to pick from in the New York City area. If I left your favorite player off one of the teams below let me know in the comments. I don’t like expanding beyond two teams, even though it’s possible, because at some point you just start including everyone and I wanted to avoid that situation.

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The end of 2011

The end of a year is often a time for reflection. Ironically, in college hoops it is actually just the middle. There’s still at least half the season left to play in 2012 and it’s setting up to be mighty exciting.

I had no idea what would happen when I started this site in April of 2011. I knew that I loved college basketball and the conferences back near my childhood home in New Jersey. I knew I was excited to come back and experience something new and different in New York City.

I didn’t know that it was going to be quite like this. After over 26,000 page views (most in the past two months as things really got going), mentions on sites like CBS’ Eye on College Basketball, SI’s Power Rankings, Beyond the Arc, Ballin’ Is A Habit, and ESPN’s College Basketball Nation, I’m happy to call this my home on the Internet. I’ve gotten the chance to try out some new things — like the Assist Tracker, conference sims and similarity scores — and there are more on the way.

I’m also continuing some old things. NIT Bracketology will continue to be a staple for the site moving forward. The New York Power Poll will post every other week – and thanks to all the voters! There will be recaps of games throughout the area. I got to 25 games during the first two months of the season and I plan on attending many more as it continues.

To all the fans in the MAAC, CAA, NEC, A-10, Ivy League and beyond that have embraced me, sent their message boards to the site and looked to Big Apple Buckets for analysis and game coverage – thank you.

Let me know what you want to see more of as the season progresses. As New York City basketball experiences a renewal that hopefully continues into 2012 with teams like Iona, Manhattan, Long Island, Wagner and Stony Brook all with legitimate chances to play in the postseason let’s make this journey a special one.

Here’s to a happy New Year and a great 2012.

Assist Tracker: Dec. 29

Keegan Bell (G, Chattanooga) — Bell got to play against Longwood last night and he took advantage of the situation going off for 16 assists, 10 points and nine rebounds in the 85-50 win. Eight of Bell’s assists were for threes and the Mocs only made nine. He also assisted on five layups and three dunks. The player distribution was pretty even five of Omar Wattad’s six baskets came off assists from Bell. Wattad was Chattanooga’s leading scorer with 18 points.

Matthew Dellavedova (G, St. Mary’s) — The west coast Gaels welcomed BYU into the WCC with a convincing 98-82 win in which Delledova played magnificently. He had 18 points, 12 assists and six rebounds in the win. Stephen Holt, who scored 21 points, was the greatest beneficiary on the night. He got four assists from Dellavedova. Half of Dellavedova’s assists went for layups as St. Mary’s just dissected the Cougars’ defense.

Neil Watson (G, Southern Miss) — Southern Miss is 12-2 after trouncing Alcorn State 80-49 last night. In that game Watson had 10 assists off the bench. None of those 10 assists were on a shot near the basket. He recorded assists on four threes and six jumpers. You don’t see that very often. Credit his teammates Jonathan Mills (19 points, 7-13), Darnell Dodson (16 points, 6-12) and LaShay Page (10 points, 3-11 — all makes off Watson assists) for knocking down the shots.

Scott Machado (G, Iona) — Yes, Machado ended up with 10 assists last night, but he also had five first half turnovers and really struggled with foul trouble. Half of those assists went to Mike Glover. Those five resulted in two dunks, two layups and a jumper. Momo Jones got three of the others. Three of Machado’s 10 assists were on jumpers as Hofstra’s defense forced him to pass out instead of in for most of the game.

Dwan McMillan (G, Hofstra) — Part of the reason for that was the pesky play of McMillan. He had nine assists in the game. Just one of the eight assists were for a basket around the rim (a layup by Mike Moore). There were five jumpers and three threes in the mix as well. Moore (24 points) and Nathaniel Lester (21 points) each knocked down three shots off passes from McMillan.

Kendall Marshall (G, North Carolina) — Marshall had eight points – on a perfect shooting night – and eight assists in 22 minutes as North Carolina rocked Elon 100-62. His eight assists included three dunks, two layups, two threes and a jumper. John Henson got two of the dunks. Harrison Barnes had the third.

Trey Burke (G, Michigan) — Freshman Burke had 13 points and seven assists – though the play-by-play says eight – and held Tim Frazier to four assist and five turnovers in Michigan’s 71-53 win over Penn State. (Note: Frazier did have 20 points.) Playing in John Beilein’s offense it’s not surprise that five of Burke’s assists in the play-by-play went for threes.

Kenneth Ortiz (G, Wagner) — The Seahawks have eight wins over non-conference opponents, the most in school history after a 72-61 victory over Air Force. It was Wagner’s most efficient offensive game of the season and Ortiz had 10 points and seven assists. Unfortunately there’s no play-by-play on ESPN for the game, so I can’t break them down. But I thought his performance should be noted here.

5 Thoughts from Hofstra’s 83-75 win over Iona

Iona rolled into the Mack Sports Complex at Hofstra with a 10-2 record and hopes of receiving an at-large berth to the NCAA tournament. The Gaels had been road warriors, winning six of their last seven, all away from home. But it was Hofstra, still searching for the right formula after the graduation of Charles Jenkins that pulled out that raced out to a 15-point halftime lead and pulled out a convincing 83-75 victory on Thursday night. Here’s five thoughts from that game, including some post game quotes.

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MAAC Projection: Iona hasn’t won yet

Much like I did for the Big East, I ran 10,000 simulations for the MAAC (and a bunch of other conferences coming up in this series this week). The MAAC is a slightly different animal because it played conference games already this season. Four teams: Iona, Fairfield, Loyola (Md.) and Manhattan are ahead of schedule at 2-0. Four teams: Siena, Rider, Niagara and Canisius are behind at 0-2. (Marist and St. Peter’s are stuck in the middle, we’ll see why that’s important in a second.) All of this means that the simulations have to take this into account. It’d be really tough for one of those four bottom teams to take the league title away from one of the top four teams, but as you’ll see, it happened twice.

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Interesting reading

Two things you should check out: Dan Hanner at Real GM taking a look at teams that play a lot of freshmen and ones that don’t. Fordham is a good example of the former and Iona one of the best examples of the latter. Iona has one freshman on the roster, Josh Gomez. He’s played in six games and 10 minutes total. The other post to check out is Cracked Sidewalks’ update of Value Add. The list of the Top 100 includes Scott Machado of Iona (#36) and Tyler Murray of Wagner (#65). I’d expect to see Iona’s Mike Glover in the Top 100 soon as well.