Iona could win Puerto Rico Tip-Off this fall

The field for the Puerto Rico Tip-Off has officially been set and it includes five teams that played in either the NCAA Tournament or NIT last season. Iona isn’t one of them, but the Gaels will still have a good shot at taking home the tournament title on November 20.

Many of the other teams in the tournament have to replace key pieces. Purdue will be without both E’Twaun Moore and JaJuan Johnson next season and those two players used over 50% of Purdue’s possessions last season. Colorado’s Alec Burks, who used a whopping 32.2% of the Buffaloes’ possessions last season when he was on the court, looks to be headed to the NBA.

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Charles Jenkins wins another award

Congrats to Hofstra’s Charles Jenkins. He picked up another today with the announcement of the Haggerty Award, which goes to the player of the year in the New York metropolitan area. (Which means it includes the major conference guys as well.)

It was Jenkins’ third straight season winning the award. I guess he’ll have to give it up to someone else next season. (Since he’s graduating at all.)

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Iona falls to Santa Clara in CIT Championship

Iona lost tonight to Santa Clara and if you saw the Broncos celebrating on the court afterwards you know that this title meant something to them. Both teams played hard, but it was the battle-tested Santa Clara squad that pulled out the 76-69 victory to take the title. The margin might seem small, but this was a pretty convincing victory as Santa Clara was able to go inside and dominate the paint.

It wasn’t that the Broncos shot better, because they didn’t. It was they got more shots up. Santa Clara had 18 offensive rebounds on 39 missed shots, which works out to an offensive rebounding percentage of 43.6%. Iona came into the game allowing teams to grab 29.5% of their misses, while Santa Clara came in pulling down 35.8% of their misses. Neither of those percentages suggested this would happen.

But it did and the Broncos, even after committing six more turnovers, ended up with three extra shots – approximately the difference in the game. Take a look at the Four Factors below.

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Two Iona players named Lou Henson All-Americans

Mike Glover and Scott Machado of Iona were both named to the 2011 Lou Henson All-America teams today. The team is composed entirely of Mid-Major players as defined by CollegeInsider.com, the people running the CollegeInsider.com Tournament in which the Gaels are currently doing so well. Most of the players on the team are juniors and seniors, but one sophomore, Ohio’s D.J. Cooper, made the team as well.

Glover has averaged 17.9 points per game and 10.1 rebounds per game this season. Machado is averaging 13.4 points per game and 7.5 assists per game. Glover’s effective field goal percentage ranks 38th in the nation this season at 60.8% and Machado’s assists rate is 39.2, 11th in the nation. Iona continues play in the CIT on Saturday afternoon at East Tennessee State. The Pirates’ Mike Smith, who averages 17.3 points per game and 6.9 rebounds per game, was also named to the team.