The bids are not always bigger in the other conferences

Sometimes, the attractive neighbors have deep, dark secrets best hidden.

I’ve always thought Newsday’s Steve Marcus gets a bad rap on the CAA Zone message boards, where his work is often mocked and scorned. I don’t know if it’s a kneejerk reaction to the Big Bad Mainstream Media or just a matter of a columnist continually pushing the wrong (or right) buttons. I do know that the belief that he’s got it out for Hofstra—or that he directs Newsday’s college coverage away from Hofstra—because he’s a Stony Brook grad is hilarious. Yeah, Newsday’s all over the Seawolves.

I have empathy for anyone who is shuffling desk chairs on the Titanic, especially someone like Marcus, who has been at Newsday for more than three decades and is on a beat that the newspaper barely even pretends to acknowledge anymore. Perhaps I’m remembering what I want to remember, but I remember weekly columns from Marcus during my college days. I didn’t always agree with the guy either, and my out-of-control ego believed he and the rest of the Newsday college staff based its Hofstra coverage on trying to beat The Chronicle, but those columns were good stuff.

That said, Marcus does tend to harp on the same issues. In the mid’90s, he was not shy in stating that nobody would care about Hofstra’s football team unless it made the leap to I-A—or failing that, at least played a I-AA schedule filled with the type of local rivals that made for full houses at Hofstra Stadium during the Division III days. This decade, he’s been steadfast in his belief that Hofstra made a mistake in thinking of its football team first in leaving the America East for the CAA following the 2000-01 season and that reaching the NCAA Tournament out of the CAA will be difficult in men’s hoops.

Marcus said as much again last week and, for at least the second time in 23 months, opined that Hofstra should try to move its athletic teams to the Atlantic-10. (Newsday’s archives are brutal, but I found, via the ProQuest archives at my library a March 7, 2007 column titled “At Hofstra, football throws hoops for a loss”)

Look, there’s no doubt that the move to the CAA was James Shuart’s going-away present to his beloved football program and that the current administration views scholarship football as a bad contract it can’t unload. With zero ties to the glory days of Hofstra football, the powers that be would love nothing more than to find a way to save $1.9 million in full rides (give or take a few six packs of soda at Dutch Treats) and either join the MAAC (oh wait a minute…) or turn football into a club sport.

But even if Hofstra could bolt to the A-10 in other sports without affecting its membership in CAA football—and only six of the 12 CAA football schools are full-time CAA members—there’s no guarantee that the highest-profile team on campus would benefit from what Marcus calls “…the logical move” to the A-10. And I’m awfully skeptical that the A-10 would be the upgrade—in terms of local and national perception—that Marcus believes.

Marcus writes A-10 “…opponents would pack the house, something Hofstra has not had with regularity since its last NCAA appearance.” There’s no arguing the recent leanness of crowds at the Arena (this Tuesday marks the two-year anniversary of not only the Dutchmen’s last home sellout but also the last time they drew at least 4,000 people), nor that Hofstra bolting for the A-10 and leaving behind storied rivals Delaware, Drexel and Towson would upset about three people: Me, the wife and Sully Ray.

But the common criticism of playing in the CAA—that the lack of history between Hofstra and the southern-based core of the conference makes it difficult for fans to get excited about conference play—would also apply in the A-10, which is neither entirely based along the Atlantic coast nor numbers only 10 teams.

Sure, there’s a natural local rivalry with Fordham and it’d be neat to rejoin a conference that features a trio of really old school ECC rivals in Temple, St. Joseph’s and LaSalle. But those are the only four schools the Dutchmen have faced more than five times. Do you think fans will breathlessly await games against UMass, Rhode Island, St. Louis, Duquesne, George Washington, St. Bonaventure, Dayton, Xavier, Richmond and Charlotte? Not so much.

When the Dutchmen moved to the CAA in 2000-01, it did so having never played five of its new rivals (and Old Dominion once) but with 184 games under its belt against Delaware, Drexel and Towson.

In addition, if you think the CAA’s unbalanced schedule is unfriendly to the fan, imagine the hand-wringing that goes on over in the A-10, which has two more teams than the CAA yet whose conference season is two games shorter. An A-10 team plays only three of its 13 league foes twice. In the CAA, a team plays seven of its 11 opponents twice.

Marcus also writes that Hofstra cannot assume it’ll receive regular bids as a member of the A-10 but that the conference “…has a much richer history of multiple bids.”

Historically, sure. The CAA has received multiple bids to the NCAA Tournament three times since it expanded to 64 teams. The A-10 has done so 12 times since 1993 alone. Massachusetts and St. Joseph’s spent the majority of the season as the nation’s top ranked team in 1995-96 and 2003-04, respectively. The CAA holds a 1-0 lead in Final Four appearances since 2000, but the A-10 holds a 4-1 lead in Elite Eight appearance since 2004 and has sent seven schools to the Tournament in that span compared to four for the CAA.

But in many ways, the events of even five seasons ago are ancient history. The continuing and hastening divide between the haves (the BCS conferences) and the have-nots (everyone else) means the CAA and the A-10 are in the same position and not only fighting for the same ever-dwindling number of at-large bids but also a respectable seeding for the winner of its automatic bid.

George Mason’s Final Four appearance only made the Selection Committee even more determined to keep Billy Packer happy by keeping Cinderella at home. In 2005, nine of the 34 at-large bids were awarded to non-BCS schools. That number dwindled to eight in 2006 and six apiece in 2007 and 2008.

The A-10 and the CAA have received the same number of at-large bids three times in the last four years: None in 2005 and one apiece in 2006 and 2007 (the A-10 received two at-large bids last year)

Don’t expect the A-10 to crash the Big Dance this year, either. With six teams ranked among Ken Pomeroy’s top 100—twice as many as the CAA—the A-10 is having an impressive season. Yet SI.com, CBSSports.com and Rivals.com each have just two A-10 teams in their most recent tournament projections. and the latter two sites both have Dayton listed among the last four teams into the tournament (in all fairness, both pieces were posted before Dayton knocked off no. 14 Xavier last night) and none of the three labels an A-10 team as among its last four out or still under consideration

Most notably, the CAA champion’s seeding has been the same as or better than the A-10’s in each of the last four years. Old Dominion and George Washington were each 12 seeds in 2005, VCU and George Washington were each 11 seeds in 2007 and George Mason and Temple were each 12 seeds last year. In 2006, UNC-Wilmington was a nine seed while Xavier was a 14 seed.

If this sounds oddly familiar, it should. Eight years ago, similar figures had Marcus expressing uncertainty over the move from the America East to the CAA. Hofstra was a 13 seed in 2001 while CAA champion George Mason was a 14 seed.

Wrote Marcus Mar. 14, 2001: “The schools think the CAA will produce an at-large bid along with the automatic qualifier. But that is highly speculative.”

So, too, is the idea now that the Dutchmen would be better off in the A-10.

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

Are we there yet? No. Are we there yet? No. Are we there yet? No.

Keep it up and I'll turn this car around and take you right back to the beginning of football season!

The road to 143-0 began Tuesday as Northeastern knocked off IUPUI (I’ll take colleges that sound like they were founded by Beavis and Butthead for $100, Alex) in the opening round of the Coaches vs. Classic tournament in Michigan. (If the tourney sponsor wants me to mention its name, it can send me a check)

It’s very cool that a CAA school has tipped off, and Michael Litos does a great job of summarizing the giddiness that accompanies opening day. Mike and I will have to agree to disagree again, though, about the banality of baseball, since I only capitalize Opening Day when it refers to baseball and I’ll certainly be one of those guys counting down the days to pitchers and catchers come February. Or now: Ninety-four days and counting.

All that said, though, seeing Northeastern open the season three days before the Flying Dutchmen play Clemson is a lot like going to a friend’s house Christmas Eve and watching he and his family rip open their presents. It’s nice to see everyone so euphoric and you’re happy for your friend, but it’s also strangely frustrating because you’ve still got to wait to open your presents.

Well, we’ve only got to wait two more days…and most of a third, but who’s counting? To pass the time, check out the typically exhaustive and informative game notes put together by Hofstra men’s basketball contact Jeremy Kniffin. And make sure to check back here tomorrow and Friday as I’m trying to lineup some pretty cool and exclusive content.

Some other bits and bytes:

—Promising transfer Miklos Szabo will miss the first two games of the season as punishment for playing one game for a professional team in his native Hungary. Litos reminds us this is no big deal and that it happens a lot, but still, I can’t help but think of the protracted and eventually fruitless appeals process for Greg Washington two years ago nor resist the urge to riff off the classic Jerry Tarkanian line about the NCAA’s selective sense of justice: “The NCAA is so mad at Kentucky, it suspended a transfer from Hofstra for two games.”

—Hofstra issued a press release Tuesday revealing the 2009 inductees into its Hall of Fame. Twelve athletes and one team will be enshrined Feb. 6. Four of the individuals are from the Defiantly Dutch era: Softball pitcher Erin Phillips, three-sport star Diane Hobin and lacrosse player Stephanie Clarke as well as Harry Royle, who was a lacrosse and football player as a student in the ‘60s and the men’s lacrosse coach from 1971-1985 before he became an assistant athletic director and, eventually, the athletic director from 1997-2004. Congrats to Phillips, Hobin, Clarke, Royle and the rest of the honorees.

—Newsday produced a 12-page college basketball preview Sunday. Counting the cover feature on star-crossed UConn guard A.J. Price (an Amityville native who was joined by Antoine Agudio on Newsday’s all-Long Island team in 2003), there was more content on local teams and players than on the national scene, which is nice to see. Of course, that should be the case now that Newsday’s staff is threadbare and the paper’s national beats a shadow of their former selves, but, to borrow a phrase from my friend the Icepick, I digress.

Here’s a hybrid feature/preview centered around the emergence of Charles Jenkins as well as a thumbnail look at the Flying Dutchmen.

—The website Collegeinsider.com has released its preseason mid-major top 25. VCU (sixth) and Old Dominion (15th) represent the CAA while George Mason and Northeastern were among those receiving votes. As an aside: I remember when that site was known mostly for determining the best-dressed coach in college basketball (and inevitably concluding it was Jay Wright, good times!). Now it’s got a bunch of big-time coaches penning pieces for the site. Very cool to see an independent thrive.

—USA Today has a capsule look at the CAA and predicts two NCAA bids for the conference.

—Lastly, you never know what will elicit feedback. I never thought I’d hear from anyone about my riff last week on The Hardy Boys and the prolific work of “Franklin W. Dixon,” but James Keeline, who is writing a biography of Hardy Boys creator Edward Stratemeyer, wrote to tell me he’s never heard of the information I passed along that the “W” in the pseudonym stands for “win.” Given the impressive amount of time James has spent researching Stratemeyer, I’m going to assume I read an urban legend 25 years ago—or that the memory of what I’ve read has grown fuzzy with time—and humbly retract my statement. I highly recommend James’ site if you grew up reading The Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com.

It's never too early to obsess over polls (UPDATED)

That's two classic '90s NBC sitcoms in two days. Next week: A picture from Boston Common!

If you’re like me, Matt Christopher books weren’t the only things you devoured as a kid. You also consumed every baseball and football preview magazine you could find. The baseball guides provided a hint of summer during the bleak winter. And the football guides made it easy to pine for fall even in the middle of a heat wave.

I’d carry those things with me everywhere I went. There was always more information to be gleaned, something else to learn, an appetite that needed further whetting.

The Internet and the age of instant information has considerably thinned the field of preview magazines (and forced some long-standing titles to merge in order to survive) and largely rendered the content outdated by the time it hits the shelves. But my interest in preview magazines has been renewed by this blog and the glimmer of hope college basketball provides in the midst of a rebuilding football season.

Well, to a degree anyway: Those magazines are pricey, so I just jot down the CAA predictions on a piece of paper. Yes. I am ashamed. But at least I never bring the magazines into the bookstore bathroom. Let’s move on.

Along those lines—and because obsessing over poll results seems to be the in thing to do these days—I’ve decided to keep a running tally of the CAA predictions from every possible source. I’ve read five previews thus far and I’ll update these as new predictions roll in. I figure it’ll serve two purposes: Pass the time while giving us a good idea of the consensus heading into the season as well as providing us something to look back on come March.

One note about the polling: Instead of awarding 12 points to the first-place team and one to the last-place team, I will pay homage to my days as a mediocre cross-country runner by awarding each team the number of points correspondent with its finish in the predictions. So low is good and high is bad.

Without further ado:

1.) VCU (5) 5
2.) Northeastern 17
3.) Old Dominion 18
4.) George Mason 20
5.) Delaware 25
6.) Georgia State 33
7.) Hofstra 37
8.) James Madison 39
9.) William & Mary 46
9.) UNC-Wilmington 46
11.) Towson 50
12.) Drexel 54

First-place votes in parenthesis
Polls compiled thus far: CAA, Blue Ribbon, Sporting News, Lindy’s, Athlon

Some trends:
—Hofstra is ranked anywhere from sixth (Athlon) to ninth (Sporting News). The Flying Dutchmen also collected two seventh-place votes (CAA and Lindy’s) and an eighth-place vote from Blue Ribbon, though Michael Litos has said he thinks he underestimated Hofstra and adds, in this blog post, that the Dutchmen could finish anywhere from fourth to ninth. Clearly, he’s a smart man and wants nothing to do with the Fake Seth Meyers treatment.

—Northeastern and Old Dominion are each ranked in the top three in all but one poll. Northeastern is ranked sixth by Sporting News—no The anymore, apparently—while ODU is ranked eighth by Lindy’s.

—George Mason is ranked second or fourth in four of five polls (and sixth by Lindy’s).

—Aside from VCU, only one school has been selected in the same spot Delaware. David Henderson has no idea why he just did a spit-take.

—The team with the most fluidity is Georgia State, which is ranked second (Lindy’s), sixth (CAA and Blue Ribbon), seventh (Athlon) and 12th (Sporting News).

—James Madison is ranked eighth or ninth by everyone except Lindy’s (fourth).

—William & Mary and Towson are ranked in the bottom half in all five polls. UNC Wilmington is tied for ninth overall thanks to a fourth-place vote from Sporting News. Everyone else has the Seahawks eighth or lower.

—And Drexel is to the CAA what I was to the cross-country team at Torrington High. The Dragons are ranked in the bottom quarter by everyone—one vote apiece for ninth, 10th and 11th and two for 12th—and are the only squad to receive multiple last-place votes.

In other news: Loyal reader Brian, the Mason beat writer for the News & Messenger in Virginia—fortunately for him, I am among the one-half of one percent of the population that realizes that just because you cover a team doesn’t mean you root for it—covered Media Day Wednesday and reports that, like usual, Tom Pecora can work a room as well as those two guys who occupied the Arena nine days ago:

“I did have a chance to sit down with Pecora for a few minutes for a story unrelated to this season. And I must say, for a paper that he has absolutely no use for, he’s been awfully kind to me. ‘Let me know if you need anything,’ he said. So I will not speak badly of the man.”

Two thoughts there:

1.) Smart move.

2.) And it looks like the Potomac News has more use for Pecora than Newsday, which doesn’t seem to have staffed Media Day. There was no Hofstra basketball story in the paper either Thursday or Friday. Doesn’t mean the paper didn’t have someone down there to collect information and quotes for future usage, but it doesn’t look good, either.

Newsday did, though, have two stories on the football team this week. I’ll link those with some brief football commentary before the game tomorrow.

EDIT: And here are the links about the spate of injuries suffered by the Flying Dutchmen as well as the overflowing confidence enjoyed by new starting QB Steve Probst. Sorry but it’s been a crazy week with deadline work. Back to a regular Monday through Friday posting next week.

As for today: The inexperienced Hofstra offense and the lousy conditions—it’s windy as I type this and the skies are supposed to open sooner than later—suggests a defensive tussle today. But Probst seemed to run the offense like a pro when he replaced Cory Christopher last week and Delaware has scored two touchdowns in the last three weeks. So let’s say Hofstra hangs on the fringe of the CAA North for another week with a 24-14 win.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com.