Last night Iona dominated William & Mary in a wire-to-wire 83-65 win. The Gaels shot 32-62 (51.6%) from the field and had 21 assists in the game. (Ironically, they shot 16-31 in both halves.) I looked into Scott Machado’s assists in last night’s edition of the Assist Tracker. But I’m reposting that paragraph here because I want to look at him and his teammate Lamont “Momo” Jones side by side.
Category: Iona
Assist Tracker: Dec. 21
Saah Nimley (G, Charleston Southern) — The 5’8″ freshman from Atlanta, GA had an excellent game on Wednesday against Stetson. He dished out 12 assists in an 83-79 victory. Just one of those were a jumper too. Nimley also had 23 points. Before the game against Stetson scoring had been more of his role, so it’ll be interesting to see if he appears on this list again.
Brad Tinsley (G, Vanderbilt) — Tinsley had 10 assists as the Commodores beat Lafayette 89-58. Lance Goulbourne benefitted the most from his passes, with five baskets off Tinsley assists. John Jenkins also had four. Seven of Tinsley’s assists went for threes as Vanderbilt shot 15-30 from beyond the arc in the win.
Scott Machado (G, Iona) — Machado had a rare double-double with 10 rebounds and 10 assists in the Gaels’ 83-65 win over William & Mary. He missed a triple-double by two points. Three of his five turnovers came before he even recorded an assist, but once he got his first with 9:09 remaining in the first half it was off to the races. Machado’s first six assists were threes and the total was well distributed amongst all the players on the team. Interestingly enough, backcourt teammate Momo Jones had three baskets from Machado, the most of any Iona player.
Kendall Marshall (G, North Carolina) — Marshall thoroughly outplayed Myck Kabongo in North Carolina’s 82-63 victory over Texas. Marshall had nine assists in 36 minutes – the most of any Tar Heel. Consistent with what we’ve seen before three of his assists came on jump shots. There were also two dunks (by Tyler Zeller and P.J. Hairston). On Wednesday night it was Reggie Bullock who benefitted most from Marshall’s passes converting three of them into baskets.
Jordan Theodore (G, Seton Hall) — Eight assists and just two turnovers from Theodore helped Seton Hall go to Dayton and get a key victory, 69-64, over the Flyers. While Herb Pope was on the receiving end of Theodore’s first three assists, foul trouble limited him to 29 minutes. Thus Theodore passed to other people, including Patrick Auda. Both of Auda’s threes came off assists from Theodore.
Isaiah Canaan (G, Murray State) — The guy for Murray State, Canaan struggled a little bit shooting just 1-4 from the field, but he went 8-9 from the free throw for 10 points and also dished out seven assists in Murray State’s 78-54 win over Tennessee-Martin. All three of Canaan’s assists to Ed Daniel were for dunks.
Tim Frazier (G, Penn State) — The fascinating life of Frazier continued in Penn State’s 74-67 slip past Cornell. Five of Frazier’s six assists went for threes. The only one that wasn’t was a layup by Jermaine Marshall. Frazier also led the Nittany Lions with 17 points and 11 rebounds.
Halil Kanacevic (F, Saint Joseph’s) and Royce White (F, Iowa State) — Both of these forwards had eight assists in their teams’ victories. So I thought it would be appropriate to look at them together. Here’s a breakdown of assists by type and then by the position of the player they passed to:
Kanacevic:
1 jumper
2 threes
5 dunks
1 swing
1 guard
6 forwards (5 to C.J. Aiken)
White:
1 jumper
1 dunk
2 layups
4 threes
2 forward
5 guard (3 to Scott Christopherson)
1 center
You can’t really have two more different games passing the ball than these two guys did. I think it really displays the differences in their games and how the offenses of their two teams are structured.
NYC Power Poll – Happy Holidays
The New York City Power Poll is getting a shakeup this week. By the narrowest of margins we have a new #1 team. It’s crazy to think that a loss at Marshall is enough to knock a team from the top spot, but that’s what we’ve come to. Soon things will get really interesting. Teams will head into conference play and it’ll be almost impossible to judge teams head-to-head anymore. (Well, minus the conference foes in the poll.) If this poll is any indication there are four conferences in particular that you should watch: the Big East, the Ivy League, the MAAC and the NEC. Those teams feature prominently at the top here.
Iona’s non-conference opponents are helping the Gaels
There are two blemishes on Iona’s record right now. The first was in the Gaels’ opening game of the season on a last-second shot by the brilliant Robbie Hummel, which gave Purdue a 91-90 win. The second though was a little more worrisome. Iona fell 82-63 to Marshall in Huntington, W.V. after getting pounded on the boards. At the time that loss looked like it might seriously hinder any chance the Gaels had at an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, but as the season gone on it has begun to look better and better.
Continue reading “Iona’s non-conference opponents are helping the Gaels”
Three Bob Cousy Nominees and Notes
Three local guys have been nominated for the Bob Cousy Award. Brian Barbour of Columbia, Bryan Dougher of Stony Brook and Scott Machado of Iona are all on the list. Of course Barbour and Dougher only play point guard because their teams require it in a pinch. Both are really playmakers in the truest sense. Even though the Cousy guys get to pick 60 names to start they always seem to miss someone. This year the four big whiffs seem to Phil Pressey of Missouri, Jordan Theodore of Seton Hall, Vincent Council of Providence and Nate Wolters of South Dakota State. (At least they remembered Jordan Taylor this season!)
Also in the news is the fact that St. Francis (NY) plays its first home game of the season in Brooklyn against Albany tonight. The Terriers played nine true road games (and are 3-6) before returning home. Even though he wasn’t playing at home Ben Mockford hit seven threes against Howard to earn NEC Player of the Week honors.
Hofstra’s Mike Moore was named the CAA Co-Player of the Week along with Drexel’s Samme Givens. Iona’s Mike Glover was named the MAAC Player of the Week.
Finally, if you love point guards you should check out my Assist Tracker. It’s going to be updated nightly with stats and insights into the guys with the most assist each night. (Even one big guy each evening.) Because I don’t want to clutter up the home page with those updates you’ll have to go to Assists page to find it though, so make sure to bookmark it.
Early season grades for area teams
Since its exam break it seems like a good time to hand out some grades for each of the area teams. These grades are based on preseason expectations and there is absolutely no grade inflation here. Most teams are going to be in the C range and you’ll notice that I’ve liberally handed out a bunch of D’s as well. If you think your school deserved a better one feel free to argue in the comments. They’re listed from best to worst and I’ve also included a special one grade at the end.
Iona runs Richmond ragged
Iona got a solid victory over Richmond this afternoon 88-79 at the Robins Center. This certainly wasn’t a guaranteed win and there are a number of positives for the Gaels to take from it. One of the best is that Iona really imposed its pace on the Spiders. This was an approximately 75-possession game. That’s fast, much faster than Richmond wanted to play.
What to watch for: Iona vs. Richmond
Iona and Richmond are playing an odd 3 p.m. ET start game on Wednesday at the Robins Center in Richmond, VA. Because of the odd start time, and the long road trip, the Gaels are probably going to need to create some of their own energy. Luckily, this isn’t likely to turn into a game like the one against Marshall on Sunday.
Dribble Handoffs: Mid-December Edition
College basketball is almost a third of the way done for some teams. That’s sad, and a little scary, but it also means that there is tons of news available. Here are some recent highlights local teams.
Strength of schedule matters early in the season too
I like Eric Angevine’s writing. I think that the Storming the Floor account is one of the most entertaining college basketball follows on Twitter. But I just can’t get behind a Mid-Major Power Ranking (ESPN Insider $$) that tries to tell me that Tulane, even at 11-1, is the best team in the nation. Especially when it uses a contorted form of efficiency margin.
Continue reading “Strength of schedule matters early in the season too”