Last Week in the Ivy League: After losing several close games Saturday, the Ancient Eight are a combined 11-24 in D-I action. Though Nate Hickman had lots of heroics, Columbia got 88-83’d again. Harvard is reeling, Penn and Columbia took bad losses, and even Yale went winless. Continue reading “Ivy League Weekly Roundup: Non-Conference Struggles”
Jim Engles clearly didn’t want to leave NJIT after a remarkable eight-year run in Newark that began with a 1-30 season and ended with back-to-back 20-win campaigns as well as a conference (Atlantic Sun) to finally call home. Continue reading “Columbia Slowly Building Under New Leadership”
If you’ve been in a deep, dark cave for the last few months without a television or Wi-Fi connection, why didn’t you invite us?
In all seriousness, Tuesday night marks one of the most important and polarizing Election Days in America’s recent history, and it is also the first Presidential election most college students can vote in, three days before most of the basketball players among them begin the 2016-17 season.
Continue reading “Election Provides Awkward But Teachable Moment For Coaches”
Last Week in the Ivy League: Scrimmage season: Yale trounced a Big Ten team (just don’t ask which one). Penn got a transitive victory over Drexel. League play is two months away, but Princeton is already going after Columbia.
Continue reading “Ivy League Weekly Roundup: Preseason Rankings”
Dan Hanner and Luke Winn published their 1-351 rankings of every team in college basketball on Tuesday afternoon. There were some obvious picks, like Duke at No. 1, and some perplexing rankings. Continue reading “Three Thoughts About SI’s Rankings”
After Jim Engles left for Columbia, NJIT decided to invest in continuity. The Highlanders looked at a number of candidates, but eventually gave the job to Engles’ lieutenant Brian Kennedy. Continue reading “Brian Kennedy Ready To Move NJIT Forward”
Unless you’re at one of about 20 top schools in the country hiring a head coach is similar to recruiting. You go find the best one you can and hope they’re a good fit. Continue reading “Grading The Head Coaching Moves”
Jim Engles was the obvious choice to replace Kyle Smith as Columbia’s head coach. The 47-year-old Staten Island native has experience in light blue, having spent five years as a Lions assistant in the mid-2000s. And he has experience as a New York metro area head coach, having led NJIT from the midst of a 51-game D-I losing streak when he took over to a pair of 20-win seasons when he left. Continue reading “Jim Engles Takes Over Columbia At Critical Juncture”
After beating NJIT somewhat handily 80-65 Sunday night in the semifinals of the CIT, Columbia coach Kyle Smith talked about how great the Ivy League has been.
“The league’s good. I was really happy for Yale,” Smith said. “I feel like sometimes it’s like ‘if a tree falls in the forest’ thing because that’s how I feel about the Ivy League. I’ve been screaming at the top of my lungs that there’s really good teams and that helps prove that. Princeton got a horrible seeding in the NIT, should not have been on the road, and they almost advanced as it was.”
Continue reading “Columbia Rolls Into CIT Finals Carrying Ivy League Flag”
NEWARK, N.J. – On perhaps the worst night in a couple of seasons – and make no mistake, it was a brutal 82-67 defeat his team suffered at the hands of 10-21 Stetson at the Fleischer Center in the Atlantic Sun quarterfinals – NJIT coach Jim Engles was able to make a reality check.
He was extremely disappointed, sure, but the “never forget where you came from” thing means something to Engles, and it was only a few seasons ago, they were storming the same court after beating Bryant in 2009. Why? Why not? It was their first win in two seasons. And it would be the only one Engles would get in his first season in Newark. The Highlanders that season were perhaps the worst offensive team in recent Division I history, with 0.749 points per possession and a 38.5 eFG% (24.8% from three-point range).
Continue reading “Brutal Atlantic Sun Loss For NJIT, But Perspective Needed”
NYC Buckets Archive 