Three for Three (SU-SJU, UMD-Duke, IM)

Light blogging today, because yesterday was a Hoops Day here in Chateau Steelypips. A goog hoops day, too, with victories in all three games that mattered: Syracuse edged St. John's, Maryland beat the hated Dukies, and the intramural team I'm playing on won a tough game last night to more or less lock up first place in our division.

Of course, in addition to preventing me from scheduling weighty blog posts, these games conflicted with each other-- the Syracuse game was shown on tape delay (the live game was only on pay-per-view) in a slot that overlapped with the Maryland game, and I had to leave the Maryland game with eight minutes to go in order to go play the IM game (playing takes precedence over watching, always). As a result, the only one I could give in-depth commentary on is the IM game, and that won't mean anything to anybody reading this...

Scattered thoughts on the major-college games are below:

I saw very little of the Syracuse game, which they won by two. Given the way the announcers were talking when I picked it up, I expected to find that St. John's had had a big lead in the first half, but it was actually pretty close throughout. I have no idea why Syracuse struggles with St. John's, who appeared fairly overmatched, but given that they lost to the Red Storm in the Garden a couple of weeks ago, I suppose I should take what I can get.

The big story of the game isthat Demetris Nichols went off for 37 points, including 7-13 from three-point range, and some of those were pretty ridiculous. The Good Andy Rautins also made an appearance, going 4-5 from three (this is in contrast to the Bad Andy Rautins, who is prone to turning in 0-6 games). Paul Harris, who looked very promising early in the season, continues to be a non-factor in league play (a turnover, two fouls, and two rebounds in ten minutes), which is a little mysterious.

Syracuse was also helped out in the late going by some boneheaded play from St. John's, attempting rushed three-pointers when they were down three with plenty of time to play. Between the nearly infinite number of timeouts that coaches get these days, and the pernicious influence of the three-point shot, the end-game play in college hoops is just awful to watch these days.

The Maryland game was more one-sided. The Terps jumped out to a big first-half lead, and then the teams traded long scoreless stretches for the rest of the game, with Maryland hanging on to win by twelve. Regarding the big lead, Gary Williams had it about right at the half: "We were making some shots that... well, it was nice to have them go in, but twelve [the halftime lead] is more realistic than twenty for how we're playing." They got hot early, and rode the enthusiasm of the crowd for a while, and then it was pretty much even.

The announcers tried to paint it as a really intense battle, but the fact is that this was a game betwen two teams that really aren't that good, and it was reflected in the play, with lots of turnovers, bad shots, and long scoring droughts. Yeah, Duke was ranked 16th coming in, but that's more a matter of reputation and inertia than anything else-- they started the season highly ranked, and it takes forever for an overrated team to fall out of the top ten. This game was their fourth straight loss, and their ranking will take a big hit this week.

Maryland played well, with a level of intensity that they really ought to display more often, but it would be a mistake to take this as a real reflection of the team's ability. Greg Paulus was out of his depth against the press for most of the first half (the box score shows only seven turnovers, which I thought he had by the ten-minute mark. They must've pinned some of them on other people...), and the Terps racked up a lot of easy baskets. In the half-court game, things were a little more even-- Josh McRoberts isn't a great center, but he's at least as good as any of the Terps' big men, and Duke managed to completely stifle Mike Jones (which, to be honest, isn't that hard).

I suspect that if I rooted for another ACC team, I would very quickly come to loathe Greivis Vasquez, who scored eighteen points and celebrated them with more chest-thumping than a "dance like a monkey" contest. It's good to have somebody with that kind of energy on your team, but I suspect that he'd really piss me off if he played for somebody else.

The win takes Maryland to 4-6 in the ACC, tied for eigth place with Georgia Tech, who solidly beat UConn yesterday. They've got a long way to go if they're going to get into the NCAA tournament-- they have games remaining at Clemson and Duke, and home against Florida State and North Carolina (Tyler Hansbrough and Brandan Wright ought to go for fifty each against the Maryland front line). They haven't really beaten anybody all that good (Duke and Illinois are probably their best wins), but they only have one really bad loss (to Miami at home), so they're a long shot at best.

Of course, that won't stop Jeremy Gold and his commenters from getting all fired up. Actually, their wild mood swings have been the highlight of the season thus far...

Anyway, that's where things stand, basketball-wise. I may do a post later on looking back at my pre-season predictions (I don't think I've done all that well...), but then again, maybe not, since nobody reads the basketball posts anyway...