Posts under ‘MAC Nightcap’

To anyone that had the misfortune of being at Rose Arena tonight for Central Michigan playing host to Ball State. I didn’t see the game, but the final box yields me to conclude that the Chippewas’ 53-38 win set basketball back about 3000 years. The ancient Mayan ballgame had to have more artistry [...]

Four MAC teams took the floor on Wednesday night and three finished the night with wins. For a league — currently rated 24th by Ken Pomeroy — that needs to start racking up OOC dubbyas, this is, well, only kind of good news.

Of Wednesday’s wins, only one, Western Michigan defending their turf in a [...]

With the release of the 2009-10 University of Buffalo basketball schedule, one of the best kept secrets in college basketball is no longer a secret. Judging by the lack of non-league home games — the Bulls have a mere four on their 28-game schedule, one of which is a visit to Alumni Arena [...]

Please, someone, put the MAC West out of it’s misery. The six teams that did their level best (or is it worst) to drag the entire league out of Mid-Majordom and into Low-Majordom — Ken Pomeroy ranks the MAC 18th overall, percentage points above the Southland — went at it tonight. While the [...]

To be honest, I think it was Sunday, when teams from the MAC West won all three intra-division scraps, that things started getting really weird in the MAC nation. That trend continued tonight, but in a vastly different way, as several of the games seemed to have involved time travel, with the squads involved [...]

Before I get going, let me say that I love the guys at MAC Report Online (and I’m not just saying that because frequent NFABJ contributor O-Zoner is doing their power rankings). They are the go-to source for MAC football and hoops. It
s that simple.
However, they’ve must’ve had a big bowl [...]

Every now and then during the college hoops season there will be a score that crawls across across the bottom of the telly and grabs your attention the way a preggers MIA rocking Paper Planes in your work cube would. Ever since MAC squads started playing intra-division matches, the only reason MAC scores have [...]

Another night and another pair of crushing routs for the MAC West sides in cross-division play.
Miami (6-2, 13-7) dismantled Ball State (5-3, 10-10), the West’s best team, 59-41, in a game that I thought would be a lot closer. Instead, it seems that the Cardinals couldn’t handle Michael Bramos — few teams in the [...]

Embarrassing for the MAC West.
Another day of cross-division showdowns and another goose egg for teams from the MAC West. And two of tonight’s three games — Akron’s 78-41 dismantling of Eastern Michigan and Kent State’s 81-53 throttling of Toledo — were downright ugly. Given that Central Michigan shot 38% from the [...]

The Big Picture: 62-60 victory over Big 12 doormats Colorado came courtesy of a Calvin Betts jumper from the foul line with five-tenths of a second left. It was the Bulls second straight dubbya on a last second shot, coming on the heels of Andy Robinson’s jumper with one second left in overtime [...]

With St. Nick making his rounds, it’s time to think of what those of us in the MAC Nation should hope he leaves under our favorite team’s tree.
Akron (6-4): Rapid growth from frosh point Anthony “Humpty” Hitchens, one of three Zips averaging at least 11 points per game, and who, by turning [...]

Based on today’s losses, the MAC could find itself sitting 16th or 17th one the rankings are updated. That isn’t the stuff multiple Big Dance bids are made of.

In fact, at this point in the season, we can look at the field of 65, and, with almost absolute certainty, say that only the MAC tournament champion will be repping the conference in that field.

It’s not that every team is scheduling like Charlie Coles and, predictably, losing to teams they should lose to. MAC teams are losing games they can and should probably win.

One thing that seems certain at this point in the 2008-09 NCAA basketball season, with November behind us, is that the MAC is going to be a one-bid league again. It’s not that MAC sides have been absolutely terrible during the first few weeks of the season, although Western Michigan (2-5) and Toledo (1-5) [...]

In fact, I quit watching this game because the refereeing was so blatantly one-sided, and so disruptive, as to destroy any semblance of flow and rhythm this game might have otherwise had, that is was unwatchable.

Sadly, this is the case more often than not during the non-league part of the season. When a mid-major visits a BCS league squad, the refs usually are culled from the cadre of officials who work games in said BCS conference. Believe me, that was not a MAC, Ohio Valley, Big Ten, Atlantic 10, or Horizon League crew working the Akron-Pitt game. It was a straight-up Big East crew that probably does about 12 Pitt games a season. And it showed

All that being said, it’s just one game. While I respect Weber State and the Big Sky, this is a game the Redhawks were supposed to win, and win handily for that matter. (On a related note, Weber State easily covered the 13.5 points so we are in the moolah tonight and are now 1-1 on POTD this season.) Instead, Hayes, Michael Bramos and Co. eked out a close one. Not a bad way to start the season, but not a game that’s going to give MAC coaches nightmares like the sort coaches in the SoCon must be having about Stephen Curry right now.

UNLV spanks Kent State 71-58
Nothing good, that’s certain.
The main problems with the MAC that leave our squads unprepared for Big Dance play are the abyss in quality that are the bottom four or so teams in the league and the lack of atmosphere at gyms throughout the league, no matter where a team [...]

The Golden Flashes missed 3-of-4 freebies during the final minute and a half of the game giving Keith Mandelbrot’s Akron squad a chance to get back in it if they made shots, which they somehow did despite the fact that they spent the previous 38 minutes misfiring from all angles and all places. Since Kent State was up by so much, merely missing free throws wouldn’t be enough to allow Akron back into the game. In order for that to happen, Kent State would need to make other mistakes like flinging inbounds passes out of play or directly into the hands of a waiting Akron player. All of which they did.

And a Kent State rout in a blasé game that was a letdown became a final second nail-biter.

I don’t what is about being ESPN2 but something about appearing on the deuce seems to bring out the worst in MAC teams. Tonight’s 50-39 win by Kent State (24-6, 11-4) over Miami (14-14, 8-7), which notched us another win in Pick of The Day by the way, might’ve been the least watchable college hoops game televised on any channel this season. At one point during the second half, the two teams had combined for 29 turnovers and only 20 buckets. The final tally for the Golden Flashes was 19 TOs to 17 baskets while it was 15 TOs to 16 baskets for the Redhawks, a total of 34 turnovers to 33 baskets.

t’s also too bad because they missed their Huskies giving the MAC West-leading Broncos all they could handle in a rugged affair that WMU (17-10, 10-3) pulled out 56-49. While the Huskies (6-18, 3-9) put forth a dogged and determined effort tonight, it seems pretty clear that this team just doesn’t have the talent to treat a campus and community in need of uplift to a surprise end of the season run.

People will just have to settle for the Huskies hoopsters helping restore the peace and some semblance of normalcy to the NIU campus. Something tells me that’ll more than do right now.

Prior to the game, Kent State coach Jim Christian passed out shirts to his squad that read “Trust the System.” The Kent State system of physical, in your face D and precise O that showcases the Golden Flashes big-time players was like clockwork tonight, as the Golden Flashes smothered St. Mary’s shooters while Al Fisher made big shot after big shot. Incredibly enough, the win over the Gaels was their first-ever regular season win over a ranked opponent.

Christian may want his players to trust the system but whoever it is that Kent State draws in the Big Dance would be better off fearing the system.

Games like this expose the lack of depth in the MAC right now. There are three teams — WMU, Akron (19-7, 9-4),and Kent State (22-5, 11-2) — that are much better than everyone else in the league, followed by two teams — Ohio (17-9, 8-5) and Miami (13-12, 7-6) — that can win on any given night. The rest of the teams in the MAC, including EMU, gritty Ball State (5-19, 4-8), and somewhat surprising Bowling Green (11-14, 6-7), have fatal flaws that can see them end up on the wrong side of a rout when facing the best five or so sides in the league.

And that’s as unlikely to change in a few weeks time as is Mike Huckabee to officiate Larry Craig’s gay nuptials.

More so than any team I’ve seen this season, Billy Taylor’s squad plays like their scholarships are on the line every second of every game. I don’t know that any team competes as hard as Peyton Stovall, Anthony Newell & Company do. Ball State doesn’t back down and they compete for the full 40 minutes.

my UB Bulls (0-5, 6-11) might just be the worst team in the MAC. The Bulls are winless in league play for a simple reason: they don’t know how to win games.

Against the Bobcats, the Bulls had several chances to cut into Ohio’s second-half lead or even overtake them but came up empty each and every time. I don’t know what it is — inexperience and a lack of talent certainly come to mind — but the 2007-08 UB Bulls have a seemingly innate knack for making the wrong play at the wrong time.

But then again, how was I to know that Giordan Watson and Central Michigan were going to put an epic display of offensive impotence, which they did for almost all of the 72-52 WMU win. So ghastly were the Chippewas on O in that first half that

What can we say about the MAC West other than that it’s made less sense than a Matthew Barney flick — yeah, that’s right, I called the Cremaster Cycle a flick — since league play started? Perhaps, this hump day’s results have helped things to make at least some semblance of sense.
Pre-season West faves [...]