UNCW, Delaware will tell the tale for Dutchmen

For those of you who thought you'd see snow in Wilmington before a preview of tonight's game...you were right!

Before we get to a quick preview of tonight’s game against UNC Wilmington, let me apologize again for the sporadic nature of this week’s posts. It’s been a crazy few days between the snow, a surprise work assignment and a few other unpredictable happenings. Hopefully the zaniness begins subsiding as we rev up for the final couple weeks of the conference season.

Tip-off in snowy (!!!) Wilmington is just 40 minutes away as I type this, so let me just say that this is one time when a coach is right in declaring that the most important game of the season is the next one. A loss in either of the next two games against the scuffling duo of UNCW and Delaware could undo all the progress the Dutchmen have made over the last two weeks.

A team that harbors hope of surprising people in Richmond in March must continue the maturation process by beating the Seahawks and Blue Hens. And this is a tricky couple of games—back-to-back roadies separated by a plane ride home. How the Dutchmen fare tonight and Tuesday will say as much about them—maybe even more—than the win over Drexel Wednesday.

“All you can think about is one game at a time here,” Tom Pecora said late Wednesday. “We need to get some separation—the term we use is ‘climb to glory.’ We put that on the board a few weeks ago and always [list] the standings in conference. Things are going to tighten up a bit and we’ve got to be playing well going into the tournament. I think, the way our schedule plays out, if we can continue to win, we can become a consistent team, which we haven’t been all year. That’s why we’re .500.”

UNC Wilmington is coming off its first win under interim coach Brooks Lee and the Seahawks will surely be revved up for the Dutchmen after suffering that 39-point loss in Benny Moss’ final game Jan. 27. The Dutchmen will need Charles Jenkins to remain as aggressive as he was Wednesday and, as Litos noted yesterday, for Chaz to outduel Chad in what sounds like an intramural matchup between frat boys. Another quality performance from two of the Dutchmen’s three big men would be a, well, big help, too.

Expect a typical Dutchmen-Seahawks nail-biter but for the Dutchmen to eke this one out in the final minute. Either way, follow along on Twitter with me as well as UNC Wilmington beat writer Brian Mull at @BGMull and stop back for a recap Monday. No, really, Monday.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Hofstra-UNC Wilmington: More exciting than a monster truck rally!

Hofstra and UNC Wilmington...going to overtime in Hempstead WEDNESDAY WEDNESDAY WEDNESDAY!!!!

If you’re the bizarro world version of me and need to find a babysitter in order to go to the Arena tonight to watch the Flying Dutchmen take on UNC Wilmington (that is the most extreme of inside jokes, by the way), I suggest you lock the hard-working teenager in for four hours. The Dutchmen and the Seahawks have gone to overtime in Hempstead three times in the last four seasons, including a three-overtime classic in 2006. And the one year in which the two teams didn’t need overtime at Hofstra (2007), they needed two extra sessions in Wilmington.

Even if the game only goes 40 minutes, chances are it’ll be a nail-biter: The last seven games between the two schools at Hofstra have been decided by seven points or less, and that seven-pointer was last year’s overtime duel. The school should employ that old monster truck rally saying in trying to lure people to the Arena tonight: “You’ll pay for the entire seat—BUT YOU’LL ONLY NEED THE EDGE!!!!”

(Also, I enjoy watching the Seahawks and will miss them once Hofstra bolts the CAA, so this doesn’t bother me, but can anyone explain to me how Hofstra and UNC Wilmington—separated by roughly 3,000 miles—have played each other twice a year every year since the CAA expanded to 12 teams and went to the unbalanced schedule? Why do the Virginia-based schools take turns playing Hofstra just once a year while Hofstra plays an annual home-and-home with its second-most remote rival?)

This is the first game of the spring semester, so hopefully there are a few more people occupying entire seats, though the Dutchmen’s recent skid has me fearing most of the campus has forgotten the school even plays Division I basketball. Tonight also marks the beginning of the second half of the conference schedule, during which the Dutchmen will play six games against teams that were 3-6 or worse in the first half. So theoretically, at least, there will be plenty of opportunity for the Dutchmen to make an upward move, or at least solidify the seventh seed in the conference tournament.

But it’s hard to assume anything given how resoundingly the Dutchmen lost to Drexel Saturday—especially against a UNC Wilmington squad that once seemed to be on the edge of falling apart but which has since lost by two to ACC leader Virginia last Monday and snapped its own five-game losing streak by edging James Madison Saturday.

On the other hand—if not now, when? The Dutchmen finally get to be home for a week and are finally at something resembling full health. The Seahawks are not: Their star guard, Chad Tomko, continues to battle a nagging foot injury. And at some point soon the Dutchmen have to enjoy a game in which their layups fall in instead of rolling out.

Tom Pecora said yesterday he’s not giving up on his veterans, but I would be surprised if Nathaniel Lester is in the starting lineup tonight and I still think Yves Jules and David Imes—who will likely be back for the Delaware game Saturday—will end up getting a ton of minutes down the stretch at the expense of Lester, Cornelius Vines and/or Greg Washington.

Check out the UNCW perspective from Wilmington Star News beat writer Brian Mull (that’s right, kiddies, some teams in the CAA are covered, home AND away, by the local newspaper!), who, like me, has gotten into a car accident while on the road this season. And also check out his interview with some goofy ass Hofstra blogger. Seriously, thanks to Brian for the opportunity and for calling this blog “excellent.” Someone’s angling for a Colony Diner burger tonight!

Either way, don’t expect the Dutchmen to cover the 6 ½-point spread (for entertainment purposes only, as Mull says!), but they better win, because I’ve already got my victory Tweet lined up (John Sterling would approve). See you there. I’ll be the guy making dated taunts about Brett Blizzard.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Bits and Bytes: Senior Day

It's Senior Day. Make sure to show up to support those who wear the Blue...umm, on the road, at least.

If everything that has to go right today and tonight for the Flying Dutchmen goes right and the Dutchmen are residing in fourth place in the CAA by 10 p.m., it won’t really matter that the first-round bye was clinched while the players were scattered around campus for the evening and three or four thousands fans were nowhere near Hofstra Arena.

But still: Clinching a bye in such a fashion would feel a little anticlimactic—especially for a program that needs all the momentum it can generate with a mostly uninterested public.

Can you imagine the scene at the Arena this afternoon if the Dutchmen were in position to clinch a bye with a win on Senior Day over the last-place team in the conference? It would have been the most charged regular season atmosphere since the game against George Mason three years ago. Some of the students who are rooting for the Dutchmen with a renewed sense of urgency might have even spilled on the court if the Dutchmen won, which would be a reaction as cool as it would be inappropriate.

But, of course, there is no bye to be won against UNC-Wilmington. The two games that will determine the Dutchmen’s fate—if they beat the Seahawks; a loss guarantees the six seed for the Dutchmen—don’t tip off until 6 p.m. (Old Dominion at Northeastern) and 7 p.m. (Drexel at William & Mary).

That means the drama will be in watching the scoreboard to see if ODU and William & Mary can pull off the upsets—the former would be far less surprising than the latter—and catapult the Dutchmen to fourth. And let’s face it: It takes an especially sadistic, devoted person to sit at home on a Saturday night and hit refresh on the CAA scoreboard.

There won’t be much drama—at least hanging on the outcome of the game—at the Arena. Along those lines, I’ll bet you the loss Wednesday came at the cost of at least 500 walk-ups—and maybe closer to 1,000. Long Islanders love to jump on the bandwagon. Now? Not so much.

All that said, as neat as it would be to see the Dutchmen clinch a bye at home, I tend to agree with the posters on the CAA Zone: Even with the necessary caveats about playing on Friday—every team that’s won the CAA since the conference first expanded in 2001-02 has done so with the benefit of a first-round bye—falling to six might be better than jumping to fourth.

A first-round game against the 11 seed (probably William & Mary) should be winnable. And creating some momentum heading into the quarterfinals would be valuable for a Dutchmen team prone to self-destructive slow starts.

If the Dutchmen finish fourth, the fifth seed—Drexel or Old Dominion—will be a particularly dangerous one. The Dragons didn’t trail for a second in two wins against the Dutchmen this season while the Monarchs’ only loss in the last nine games was at Hofstra Feb. 10.

My guess is Drexel beats William & Mary, which guarantees the Dutchmen the six seed no matter how they fare earlier in the afternoon. Either way, if you’re a Dutchmen fan (and you probably are, if you’re here), root for Old Dominion to beat Northeastern in Boston and for George Mason (grrr) to beat Towson. That drops Northeastern to the three seed, and all you can ask for in this tournament is a true neutral site game in the quarterfinals against an opponent you’ve beaten once this season.

Of course, trying to predict this stuff is foolish, and the fact that so much has to go the Dutchmen’s way probably means it will. In which case, I’ll be here Monday telling you how awesome it was that the Dutchmen managed to finish fourth and how it’s a sign that they’re a charmed team heading into the tournament.

For all the Hofstra seeding permutations, check out the WRHU blog. And for the rest of the seeding permutations in the CAA, check out Litos, who is probably cackling in a straitjacket after crunching numbers and tiebreaker possibilities all week.

***

If you’re going to the game today, make sure to get there good and early—like by 3:40, which is when Senior Day festivities start. Hey, that’s what happens when you’ve got six seniors.

I’ve always been a sucker for Senior Day. I’m a nostalgic fool to start with, always wondering where the time has gone and possessing a selective memory when it comes to the good ol’ days while pessimistically wondering about the future, so to see players who have matured from wide-eyed newcomers to grizzled veterans in what feels like a blink of an eye makes me a bit melancholy.

Seeing a montage of the seniors to the tune of Tina Turner’s “The Best” always makes the hairs on my arm stand at attention. And the poignancy of honoring players who are almost surely in the sunset of their competitive days should resonate with anyone who has ever been on a team at any level (even someone like me, who sucked at track). So get there early and give Mike Davis-Saab, Dane Johnson, Greg Johnson, Zygis Sestakos, Darren Townes and Arminas Urbutis the reception they deserve.

***

The sheer quantity of seniors makes for some delicate lineup decisions for Tom Pecora. Six seniors not only means you can expect to see Charles Jenkins come off the bench for the first (and almost surely last) time in his career but that one of the honorees won’t get to start. Who draws the short straw?

Co-captain Davis-Saab will get a start to acknowledge his leadership and selflessness. Sestakos and Urbutis might be playing in front of family for the first time at Hofstra, so they’re in.

Greg Johnson has started the most of any senior this year, which would seemingly make him a candidate to take one for the team. But a lineup without him and Jenkins leaves the Dutchmen with no one resembling a point guard for a few minutes. So assume he’s in there, which leaves Townes and Dane Johnson battling for the last spot.

There’s no obvious tiebreaker here: Both are from New York, so presumably neither has a family member coming a great distance to see their son/brother/etc. Both are JUCO transfers, so there’s no rewarding a four-year member of the program with one final home start. The decision might be easier if Townes is still sick, but all things being equal, he’s provided more—of the tangible and intangible variety—over the last month than Johnson, who has proven more effective recently in short spurts.

Lingering injuries to Urbutis and Greg Johnson could also play a role in Pecora’s decision-making, but I’m going with the Davis-Saab/Sestakos/Urbutis/G. Johnson/Townes lineup. Though I reserve the right to change my mind and not tell anyone about it until just after 4 p.m.

***

And hey: Make sure to stay in your seat at halftime, when Rich Laurel’s no. 21 is retired, though I have no idea if Laurel, who coaches in Belgium, will be in attendance for the festivities.

Check out this thread at the CAA Zone for some very cool recollections of Laurel, who was a lethal scorer on the Dutchmen’s back-to-back NCAA Tournament teams in 1976 and 1977. And check out the awesome, resplendently ‘70s picture of Laurel from a story about him at the Hofstra athletics site. Man. I wish I was a teenager in the ‘70s. What I wouldn’t have done to wear a headband, knee-high socks and waist-high shorts, all while strutting to the Bee Gees. Oh wait. Substitute “Poison” for “Bee Gees” and that’s me at the Y 20 years ago. Never mind.

***

I interrupt this blog to offer my apologies for the sporadic posting this week. It’s been an exhausting few weeks at DDHQ and it was tougher than I anticipated to post with an out-of-state trip in the middle of the week. The batteries are recharged and the hope is to reward your patience by being all over the tournament—past and present—next week. And, fingers crossed, through the weekend and into the next week.

***

All that and no prediction/preview yet. Only three of the Dutchmen’s eight home CAA games have been determined by more than five points, and none have been determined by more than 10 points. But I think the Dutchmen win comfortably today, even against an opponent they edged at the buzzer in Wilmington exactly a month ago. Senior Day should provide a boost, the Dutchmen should be doubly hungry after the lopsided loss to Georgia State and their height advantage will be too much for the scrappy but undersized Seahawks to overcome.

Jenkins reaches double digits in assists on his 20th birthday (c’mon, Lions Den, serenade the guy), Sestakos remains red-hot from outside and leads the seniors in scoring and David Vallins steals the show with his first career points in the final minute. Whatever happens, see you there. I’ll be the guy yelling for Norman Richardson’s no. 21 to be retired along with Laurel’s.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com. And join the Defiantly Dutch group at Facebook today!

Tom Pecora is glad you have to go back to school today

Tom Pecora's Triple Lindy: Getting the start of the spring semester pushed up a few weeks.

The spring semester starts today at Hofstra, so won’t you join me in pouring an overpriced can of Dutch Treats Coke on the sidewalk in memory of the good ol’ days, when classes began the day after the Super Bowl instead of the day after Media Day.

Of all the perks that came with attending Hofstra, few topped the concept of being able to attend a Super Bowl party with absolutely zero worries about the homework I wasn’t going to do once I got back to my dorm room.

True story: Sully Ray and I met at a Super Bowl XXVIII party (it was the one where the Bills lost) hosted in Wantagh by Loyal Reader Rob. Alas, I was still in my shy and unsure of myself at Hofstra stage and Sully Ray was still in his mute phase (he hasn’t always been a cocky, ruthless, T-shirt stealing bastard…I think Corporate America ruined him), so we didn’t say a word to each other until the following September, when he joined the newspaper.

For Super Bowl XXIX (it was the one where the 49ers won), my future wife and I watched the game in my dorm room with my future best man and my wife’s future bridesmaid. (The coupling of the future best man and future bridesmaid, alas, was doomed and they did not get married. To each other, anyway)

For Super Bowl XXX (it was the one where future Netherlands resident Neil O’Donnell forgot that he wasn’t supposed to throw the ball to the guys with the stars on their helmets), I hung out on my floor at Vander Poel with a bunch of neighbors several years younger than me and began to realize I was feeling a lot like the guy who stuck around the party a little too long...and feeling not at all like David Wooderson.

Where was I? Oh yeah. Blame the NFL, which just has to start the season after Labor Day and just has to have two weeks of sound and fury signifying absolutely nothing at all in between the conference championships and Super Bowl, which in turn means it just has to play the Super Bowl in February, for Hofstra no longer starting the spring semester after the Super Bowl. Too bad. You kids today with your wireless campus and multiple chain restaurants on campus and your presidential debate have no idea how good we had it. Ha ha.

Anyway, I know one person who would be perfectly content if classes began right after the final weekend of the NFL regular season. And Tom Pecora, who has wanted this day to arrive for weeks, is sitting in a Wilmington hotel room this morning, marveling at the irony of having to play a game more than 600 miles south of Hofstra the day classes finally begin.

I loved the extended Intersession break, but I can’t blame Pecora for loathing it and believing it makes it all but impossible to create any momentum with the student body. The Flying Dutchmen played just three home games—none against CAA opponents—prior to Intersession and have only five home games left. Not a whole lot of time to get and keep involved the notoriously apathetic students.

“I’ll tell you what, man, it kills us, it really does,” Pecora said earlier this month. “When you think about it, the number of home games we have with students here—it’s a great place to be a professor. I’m the only one without a tan when we come back to classes.”

There won’t be a chance to get a tan this week, even if Pecora and the Dutchmen have been near the beach the last couple days, but a win over UNC-Wilmington—described quite accurately by Litos as the closest thing the CAA has to a Homecoming opponent—would help lure more students to the Saturday showdown against VCU.

(I will take this opportunity to channel my inner Dr. Elliott Reed and mention that Northeastern forced everyone to pay attention by beating VCU last night. Only caught the last few minutes on the VCU site, but what a marvelous game and what a great advertisement for the quality of play in the CAA. Northeastern’s win is both good news and bad news for the Dutchmen. Good since they are the only team to beat my first-place Huskies, bad since the Rams will be ornery Saturday. I now return you to my regularly scheduled blog)

This is as much of a must-win as William & Mary was a week ago. The Seahawks, who have lost six conference games by at least 20 points, are the perfect tonic for any ailing offense and as misplaced in the defensive-minded CAA as Amy Winehouse in a R.A.D. campaign. The undersized Seahawks—one player stands taller than 6-foot-6; the Dutchmen can field an entire lineup that tall—are forced to press most of the time and have allowed a Division I-worst 88.1 points per game.

The Flying Dutchmen, who haven’t exceeded 69 points in their last 10 games and haven’t scored 70 points in a win since the CAA opener against Towson a mere 14 games ago, should get to 70 by accident. Expect Charles Jenkins to put together his most complete game since classes were last in session and for Cornelius Vines to approach 20 points as well, but the pick to click is Nathaniel Lester, who sparked Saturday’s comeback when he moved to small forward and is versatile enough to beat the Seahawks in multiple ways.

I think you can check out a webcast here, though it looks like you have to buy the monthly subscription to see this game, a la James Madison. (Tune in later this week, maybe even tomorrow, as I wonder why just about everyone in the CAA offers webcasts except Hofstra). No matter how I watch or listen to the game, I’ll do my best not to get nostalgic and fall into that nasty old first-day-of-class habit of dropping a class.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com. And join the Defiantly Dutch group at Facebook today!