Continue reading »]]> After reading Rhett’s post lamenting the irritating nature of the BYU fans at the Mountain West tournament I was instantly sympathetic to his plight. However after some reflection I feel that it must be pointed out that all college basketball phenomena are at some level annoying to the hard-core fan. BYU fans are a bit goofier than most and carry their LDS persecution complex with them into athletics, however ignorance of the sport that they are infatuated with is not unique to the faithful in Provo.

Larger fan bases always have a fair amount of bandwagon fans who come along for the ride when times are good. This is amplified considerably when things are arguably as good as they have ever been. In the case of BYU this isn’t a team just making a run at a conference title, this is a team with the POY, top line seed credentials and national exposure unseen since Jim McMahon was playing QB for the football team in the mid 80′s. BYU basketball is a cultural event in LDS circles in the region and beyond. It is a genuine phenomenon. UNLV, New Mexico, Colorado State, etc… are simply basketball programs having seasons that will attract basketball fans of the school. There is no bandwagon effect and thus no bandwagon fans to become annoyed with.

At Ole Miss there are a few thousand hardcore fans that comprise the season ticket base. These fans are basically knowledgeable and restrained. During a mid week game in February against Auburn when there were less than 3,000 people in the stands, the crowd was respectful and uninspired. A few weeks earlier when Kentucky was in town with 3,000 fans of their own, the Ole Miss faithful were nowhere near respectful. They were boisterous, obnoxious, and overly vocal with the referees. The rarely full student section started the “bull shit,” chant over a pretty obvious traveling call and there were audible boos after nearly every unfriendly whistle.  After the win over Kentucky an editorial in the Daily Mississippian was dedicated to how much fun that game was compared to most others and musing that if fans showed up with that kind of energy every game the basketball team would be more successful.

Unless you have a basketball program with a 50+ year bandwagon like UCLA, Kentucky, North Carolina, or Kansas you are going to get free riders that come out only for the big time games when a program is successful to comprise the bulk of a following. When you have a basketball program experiencing a phenomenal once in a generation type run such as Georgetown in the early 80’s or UNLV in the early 90’s you are going to get non basketball fans and people unaffiliated with the University who identify culturally with what they think the program represents. This is healthy for the sport and helps us to look back with a greater appreciation for how special an era of college basketball was. After all crossover success in any genre is a metric of success.

In the case of the 2010-11 BYU Cougars you have a community, a fan base, and a faith all of which are a bit different than what most of us are used to becoming enthralled with the fortunes of a college basketball program. This is I’m sure annoying to be around if you don’t have any particular affinity for BYU. It is however ultimately better for the sport when there are people out there caring about it. Those goofy Mormon families at the Thomas & Mack are equivalent to the inner city kids wearing Georgetown vinyl jackets in 1982, or Gucci Row at the T&M during Tark’s era. They are a fleeting group of uber bandwagoners who are experiencing something memorable.  Deep down we all want our program to experience something like that.

Rhett’s post is exceptionally titled. The BYU fans that he was talking about don’t deserve Jimmer Fredette. We the hardcore fans of X program deserve this kind of thing to happen for us! Until it does all we can do is wait and hate and realize that when and if our time finally does come we are going to have a whole bunch of new friends in the building with us along for the ride. And trust me as a former season ticket holder at Eastern Michigan where you can watch a game with literally a few hundred of your closest friends and hardcore hoops fans, there is something electric about a full and rocking arena. Even if it is full of johnny come latelys and rocking with the noise of the confused.

Continue reading »]]> Have you ever walked across a beer soaked campus back to your car on a fall saturday after witnessing your team drop an early or mid season game that all but ended the best case scenarios that were talked about for the excruciating long off season and glanced over at the basketball arena and felt better? It just sits there empty, silent, and looking small when compared to the massive football stadium. College basketball offers a new hope for hardcore fans.

This time of year with college football behind us and the conference play heating up there is still hope on most campuses for a March run. Even if your team is scuffling along (MICHIGAN STATE!!!) you can’t abandon all hope just yet. This is the perfect time of year for casual fans to invest in their teams because the best days are ahead of us. Big time conference games, mid week in the winter can make the work week much more tolerable. I welcome all hardcore football fans to the college basketball season on this the day after the BCS championship and hope that the second season gives all of us something that we didn’t get from our football teams.

Continue reading »]]> So the NCAA shut down our hate down with their long reach. That doesn’t mean that we aren’t going to still hate on jerks it will just have to be more insidious to make it past the long reach of the evil cabal in Indianapolis.

What I’m thinking about right now though is that we have games finally tipping off tonight all over the country. I’ve got my eye on East Lansing for Michigan State and Eastern Michigan although strangely I’ll be in Oxford, Mississippi watching Ole Miss square off with Arkansas State. A real border war to be sure. Being outside of my college hoops comfort zone for the first time ever is an interesting experience. Hopefully watching Ole Miss and Memphis games will give me at least some level of enjoyment because I am really going to miss watching MAC and Big Ten games during the bleak Michigan winters. Oh well that is part of the trade off when relocating.

Here is what I am rooting for this year:

1. Michigan State to put it all together and get Izzo his 2nd national championship. Hang every banner possible and silence all the chirpers who think Michigan State is a notch below the blue bloods and on the same level with Purdue and Wisconsin. Time to just lay waste to everyone!

2. Ole Miss to make the tournament finally. It won’t take much to have the best era of hoops ever at the school. Here is hoping I am around to witness it. Win 23 games and be the 11 seed its not that unreasonable of an expectation.

3. The further decline of North Carolina and UCLA. Over indulged fan bases with rosters full of blue chip talent falling apart and finishing way down in their conferences put a smile on my face. I especially like it when their secondary rivals pass them up. Watching North Carolina lose to Sid Lowe and the NC State Wolfpack and Howland loss to Cal is a sweet sweet thing.

4. Memphis to emerge as the gangsters paradise of the Deep South and start making tournament runs again. Good facility, passionate fans, complete disregard for rules and convention, and close proximity to me make this a must. Pastner is like Al Pacino in the first Godfather. I can’t wait for him to become a full fledged gangster and run this thing proper. I’m going to buy a Memphis jersey that has a dollar sign instead of a number and sit in the front row while they murder Tulsa by 45 points.

5. Kentucky to start being the focus of NCAA investigators. Can we at least make it uncomfortable for Kentucky’s rampant cheating? Can we at least get somebody in Indy to rustle a few papers before they play a big game and make the old blue coats nervous? The NY Times piece on Bledsoe has wetted my appetite and it looks like Turkish millionare Enes Kanter being ruled permanently ineligible gives me reason to hope this could be a trend. The fact that Tennessee and Florida have become the good guys in the SEC shows just how far out of balance things have gotten since Cal rolled in to town.

6. The shit show that is Michigan basketball to fall completely apart and be historically bad. Their roster is complete garbage and they should start losing games by big numbers again soon. I’d like to see the Gayze Rage half empty while Illinois is beating them by 45 points after the first media time out in the 2nd half. I don’t expect a return to the glory days of Brian Elerbe but at least an homage to the Avery Queen era would be nice.

7. Duke to lose a home game in the midst of a week long ESPN slurp fest. Nothing will be as obnoxious as watching Duke on ESPN this season. I just hope that they lose one to Virginia or Maryland in a game where ESPN used it as a vehicle to promote another more high profile Duke game, and filled pre game and halftime with stupid puff pieces of Kyle Singler riding a fucking unicycle and dorks camping out for tickets.

Thats all I need out of my college hoops season this year.

Continue reading »]]> What can you say about this guy. Pit stained shirts, Eddie Munster haircut, roster full of semi literate douchebags and program that is built for deep NIT runs. Billy is as dirty as Pitino and would like to be as dirty as Cal but he has no idea how to pull that off. I know I know he won back to back titles and nobody is lucky enough to do that. He isn’t lucky he’s a cheesy dirt ball who maximized his success and rode a special team all the way to the NBA where he craped himself and came running back to Gainsville after a quick 48 hours. I’m guessing Billy got his start by bringing chicks to Pitino and then driving them to the abortion clinic. That was enough to get him the Marshall job and hook him up with fellow sophisticant white chocolate Jason Williams. After that combo was unleashed on the college hoops world a star was born.

Billy is loved in certain circles because he is “charming.” In reality he is a snake oil salesman a dirty gangster and an opportunist. He is one of those guys who will never get what he deserves but will also never be seen as the elite coach he fashions himself to be. As we have seen the last few years without elite seasoned talent Billy is an NIT coach. A Noah, and Horford come around once in a coaches career and after that we see how good they really are. So far Billy is garbage.

Rhett do something with this guy

Continue reading »]]> July 8^th 2010 will go down as one of the strangest days in the history of basketball. It was a day when the self-fashioned king of the sport abdicated his metaphorical throne to go and play a supporting role to a legitimate superstar in Dwayne Wade, and also team up with the biggest tagalong in the NBA Chris Bosh. A sort of disgusting display of narcissism from a spoiled, pre packaged, unintelligent goof ball who likes to throw powder in the air, wear bow ties, and use big words out of context was broadcast live on ESPN for a purpose not known to anyone.  Why in the world was this done? Who likes that kind of thing? And how does this make basketball better? The answers I think are: because LeBron James is surrounded by amateurs who are about as intelligent and savvy as he is, people who lack imagination and love hype, and it doesn’t.

The Miami Heat and when I say the Miami Heat I mean three all star players with no supporting cast, no proven coach, no real fans, and no humility are bad for the NBA.  As of yesterday basketball is once again irrelevant in Toronto and Cleveland except when the Lakers or Heat come to town. Which means there are two more bad teams coming to an NBA city near you. Two more teams that nobody wants to see play. In a league where 22 of 30 teams lost money last season that is a problem. Leagues where more than 2/3 of fan bases know their favorite team can’t win a championship before the season starts have a problem. What you end up with are half empty buildings everywhere but a handful of places, and dreadful ratings for all but a handful of teams.

The concentration of so much talent on one team also robs fans of a chance to watch those players compete against one another. What if Magic and Bird had made the calculation that instead of wasting all of their time and effort trying to be the best and defeat the other they could have simply teamed up and won every year? Would the NBA be a better league? Would they be looked upon as bigger winners? We will never know because both men were competitors and are probably disgusted with what the league has become. The essence of sports is competition. This current arrangement in Miami is not good for competitive balance, and shows a fear of competing on a level playing field. James looks like a coward and the NBA looks like it should never have marketed such a player to such heights.

The perception of NBA players as immature, and selfish was reinforced by the face of the league staging a one-hour infomercial on ESPN to pat himself on the back and rip the heart out of his hometown. He proved himself to be everything his doubters ever thought he was and because of where he went and the role he will play he can never repair the damage he has done to the league and his own precious image. The NBA is in trouble.

]]> http://www.tourneytrip.com/2010/07/09/lebron-james-hurt-the-sport/feed/ 0 http://www.tourneytrip.com/2010/02/15/the-nature-of-being-a-true-fan/ http://www.tourneytrip.com/2010/02/15/the-nature-of-being-a-true-fan/#comments Mon, 15 Feb 2010 21:05:47 +0000 Sam http://www.tourneytrip.com/?p=720

Continue reading »]]> There is a certain code to live by that makes being a sports fan a meaningful experience. It can be a difficult code to follow in hard times because it involves making an emotional attachment to a program, and linking your fortunes with theirs. It is because of that attachment and because there is the potential to suffer with your team that makes the enjoyment of winning so much more intense when you are lucky enough to experience it. You have to suffer with something to truly be a fan of it. You have to be tested, and you have to remain loyal when the temptation of being one of the throngs who regardless of geography or alma mater flock to the most successful blue blood program  or worse to Kobe or Lebron. If you are ever to earn the right to celebrate a teams accomplishments with pride then you must experience more than just a championship run. You have to be there on cold February days when conference road games take their toll. You might have to sit through an NIT or even CBI game, you have to watch players leave the court in March in tears knowing that they gave you 4 great seasons and you will never get to watch them again. You have to experience all of the highs and the lows to earn a meaningful affiliation.

It occurred to me yesterday when I was sitting in the Convocation Center watching my two mid major alma maters battle it out in a game that would determine 3rd place in the MAC West that this game had more meaning to me than the previous weeks Duke/North Carolina game could have had to most of the chattering, blue clad masses in the Dean Smith Center or watching on ESPN, because I am vested. I spent three years of my life in Kalamazoo and watched the Broncos 10+ times a season since the day I set foot on that campus, I’ve spent the last 4 years in Ypsilanti going to every EMU home game I can. The highlights of rooting for middle of the road to bad mid major teams are not plentiful, but they are far more memorable than any Final Four could be for the team I might have arbitrarily chosen to root for.

This might strike some as a bitter rant. I certainly don’t mean for it to. I root for Eastern Michigan, Western Michigan, Georgetown and Michigan State. I have degrees from Eastern and Western, and followed Michigan State since an early age. I do not mean to imply that you must attend a school to root for the basketball team. I think it should be your first loyalty and I absolutely resent the notion that you should cast aside your personal affiliation just because the athletic program isn’t as high a profile as the larger state school. I do recognize that some people make an attachment early in life and it stays with them regardless of where they went to school. I absolutely get that and for the most part can respect it. The so called fans that I can’t abide by are the guys that root for the top team, top player, or top tradition and want to revel in that success. These are the parasites that latch on to the biggest thing they can find to try and share in their success.

Classic example is this clown who sat near us at last years championship game:

This guy was the most vocal person in our section. He was more animated in his support of the North Carolina Tarheel’s than Tyler Hansborough’s parents (I know this because as the game got more and more out of hand I kept an eye on both just to have something to take my mind off things). He didn’t even care enough about the team to ever buy a t-shirt. He did care enough to put on his best Carolina Blue Rocawear jacket and matching Carolina Blue Old English D hat, and try to taunt Spartan fans in our section. He liked to declare things over and jump out of his seat for dunks. I liked to yell “Go Rocawear” every time he did, because I have zero respect for guys like this. If he had an equally unaffiliated friend who was wearing green and white Fubu and had a green and white yankee hat it would be different. But this tool was trying to banter with real fans who were watching their team play for the highest stakes out there. It was completely inappropriate, and no matter how much he tried to pretend to celebrate afterwords it was clearly unauthentic and meaningless. He was out there watching a TV show, I was watching a team/program that I had been following since I was in 3rd grade, other people were watching a team/program that represented the school where they spent years of their lives, a place where they had chosen a career path, met a spouse, etc… it just wasn’t balanced.

My philosophy is simple and fair. There is nothing wrong with liking a team. You can like a team without being a true fan. I like Georgetown. I root for Georgetown, watch them when I can, know who their players and coaches are, and read about them. I like their tradition, I like that they win at an elite level without taking dirty BCS football money, and I just plain enjoy watching them play. I am a true fan of Western Michigan. This is because I can’t walk away when the program is down, or when we have a tough loss. If Georgetown starts a long slide it won’t bother me that much, I’ll just root for Seton Hall or something. If Western Michigan starts/continues to slide I’ll get pissed, want the coach fired, call Ball State cheaters, want to build a new arena, drink more, etc… I can’t walk away from “my team”. If you don’t have a team you can’t just pick one up overnight . You have to earn the right to call a team yours through time and energy expelled watching, hoping, and sometimes being disappointed. Until such time as you become a true fan of a team you should be respectful of true fans and never try to equate your loss affiliations with their real passions. If some tool at BW3s who grew up in the same town as I did, went to community college, grew up rooting for the Fab-5 and then Michigan State when Izzo became dominate, and has never lived outside of Metro Detroit, sits next to me to watch Kentucky play WMU in the tournament this March (I can dream), he better not pump his fist and try to talk shit to me if Kentucky is beating up on Western Michigan just because he really likes Wall, and Bledsoe. He doesn’t matter, his thoughts don’t matter, and his happiness is just a meaningless front, because to him, sports don’t matter. I’d rather watch a game with some crusty old Kentucky fan from the hill country who has a picture of Adolph Rupp in his rec room if he is a true fan of his team. Because at least that guy gets it.

Continue reading »]]> The MAC West looks like its going to CMU. The Chips have a 3 game lead as WMU and NIU have faded during cross divisional play. Eastern Michigan will probably have a sub .500 conference record as they continue to drop winnable home games, and I am quickly becoming frustrated with the prospects of the conference to crown a champion capable of winning an NCAA tournament game.

Michigan State played a terrible game and was thoroughly out classed by Wisconsin. Kalin Lucas rolls his ankle and might be out for the seasons most pivotal stretch (@Illinois, and Purdue). If they don’t win the Big Ten regular season after starting 9-0 then they should make Paul Davis an honorary captain during the Big Ten tournament, and probably shouldn’t be expecting a deep run in March. The notion that everything will be all right in March is an over estimate in East Lansing. State really hasn’t been playing good basketball for the last month, and I don’t believe Tom Izzo can just have them flip a switch. I really hope they don’t fade down the stretch because this is a likable collection of players, but after the debacle in Madison I have my concerns.

Rhett assures me that Lon Kruger will step up today and stop the Mormons from running away with the Mountain West. Let’s see if Jimmer can carry his sprite drinking, polygamist practicing, Orrin Hatch voting, door to door bothering, 25 year olds to victory in a hostile and sin filled environment.

I need wins by UNLV, Western Michigan, Eastern Michigan, and Michigan State today to feel good about the direction of this season. I’ll take 3-1 but anything less than that and my worries will continue. I’ll be at the Convo in a few hours cheering on EMU against Ohio U. Hope its worth it.

Continue reading »]]> #1 John Calipari

College basketball needs a great renegade to come along every so often to scare the shit out the blue bloods and cause a stir. John Thompson did that in the 80′s leading a Jesuit school with no football program or tradition to speak of, with a roster of scary good and fearless black players in a new conference to the very height of the national scene. In the later part of that decade and into the early 90′s Jerry Tarkanian took UNLV out of obscurity and into the national spotlight with Frank Sinatra and Bill Cosby sitting court side some nights. It was fun, it was unique, it was limited. During the 00′s John Calapari started a semi renegade empire in Memphis utilizing the most dangerous new tool available to him, the one and done. Cal used his connections to seedy middle men to get a steady flow of hot shot high school stars that never intended to stay long in the college game. His Memphis teams won big, beat big programs, and had NCAA tournament success. Cal built something at Memphis from the ground up that threatened the bigger, more established and likely just as dirty programs that he was routinely beating. He had become a hated and feared man by the big AQ program fans.

You knew that once Patrick Ewing left Georgetown that Hoya Paranoia would fade. You knew that the NCAA would eventually catch up to Tark and end his empire in the dessert, and we all knew that eventually somebody would drop a dime on one of Memphis’ one and dones. What nobody expected was that before Calapari could meet his apocalyptic downfall in Memphis he would jump ship and lead the bluest of blue blood programs who cheat more on accident than he ever did on purpose. Now instead of being a rouge anomaly at neat program in a non AQ conference, Calipari is a giant hypocritical horse’s ass at the biggest, brashest, fuck headyest program in all the world. His act slickster act was more palatable before he became the front man at college basketballs winningest program. It is the equivalent of John Dillinger becoming President of the United States. If you are going to be an outlaw be an outlaw, if you are going to run one of college basketballs blue blood programs you have to be an insufferable, phony, christian huckster like Bill Self, Roy Williams, or Ben Howland. Calipari blurred the lines and instead of being a martyr for gangster when the law came to Memphis he cashed out and took his once fresh act to a place where it is not by any means cute.

The Lowlights:

• His introductory press conference and midnight madness address to Kentucky fans are the most obnoxious moments in the history of spoken word.
• Sometime this year he will lock John Wall in an embrace and pretend he coached him
• There is much more to come. Stay tuned if you can stand it.

Continue reading »]]> #2 Alex Legion

Alex Legion managed to shoot way up this list with his most recent antics, and since he announced his 5th change of heart in where he will continue his amateur career this decade he makes it all the way up to #2 for embodying the entitlement and profound selfishness that represent his type of player. Alex Legion is basically a sixth man at best now  but don’t tell that to Momma Legion. This Mother of the Year has called into talk radio shows to trash coaches that her son was playing for, taken him out of schools, and basically shopped him around as if he were a used car. For his part Legion has been whinny, soft, and underwhelming at every stop. His refusal to accept coaching and play a role less than star on any team he has played for has stunted his growth as a player. He was at one time a very sought after recruit but has now fallen all the way to a sideshow in the Sun Belt conference because of his own bad choices.

The Lowlights:

• A native of Inkster, MI Legion spurned the Inkster public schools to play at the elite private school Birmingham Country Day for his first three years of high school. Before his senior year Legion’s mother moved him to the seedy basketball factory Oakhill Academy so that he would recieve the proper exposure and not have to “settle,” for the University of Michigan where he had verbally committed prior to his senior season but withdrew that commitment before leaving Country Day. It should be noted that Alex never started for Oakhill.
• Alex gave another verbal commitment and signed a letter of intent to UofM as his senior year was winding down only to once again pull back, this time after Michigan and coach Tommy Amaker parted ways.
• Legion finally committed to the University of Kentucky after his mother claimed on a Detroit sports talk radio program that she had repeated direct conversations with God and Jesus about her son and knew that he was destined for great things but that Michigan was not in his plan. Among her other claims were that this was not a one time conversation but that she was in fact a “prophet of God,” and said that God had told her that Alex would come back to Michigan to play in the Final Four in 2009.
• Despite his mother’s crazy prophecy mumbo jumbo Alex decided to transfer from Kentucky after half of his freshman season when he determined that Billy Gillespie was being mean to him and treating him “like a freshman.” Annette Legion claimed that Gillespie was a drunk and a fornicator who had his way with some of the players girlfriends. This claim was never substantiated.
• After playing the second semester at Illinois in 2009 (and not making the final four) and most of the first semester this year (33 games total) Legion decided to transfer from Illinois to play for Isiah Thomas at FIU. There is no word on if god told him or his mother to make this move.
• Alex Legion has played for 3 different high schools and left 3 different college programs. He and/or his mother has publicly trashed 1 high school and 2 college coaches, and they will still be a part of college hoops (unfortunately) for a least another year.

Continue reading »]]>

The Buffalo Bulls look like the early favorites in the MAC East

Mid American Conference basketball is fighting to stay relevant on its own campuses, in its own region, and in the greater college basketball world with scarce resources and a fast diminishing profile. The presence of FBS football has caused all of the 12 all sport member institutions to place an emphasis on fielding viable D1 football programs which is a very expensive undertaking. As a result of this conference wide emphasis on prioritizing football MAC basketball has slipped considerably over the last decade while conferences that were once considered peers have excelled. Fans of the CAA, WAC, MVC, or Horizon would be insulted if they were considered peers of the now lowly MAC.

In 1999 Miami reached the Sweet 16 behind the efforts of future NBA player Wally Szczerbiak, in 2002 Kent State made it to the elite 8 with players like Trevor Huffman and Antonio Gates, the MAC was arguably the class of the mid majors during its peak in the 90′s. In 1995, 1998, and 1999 the MAC had multiple NCAA bids. During that decade the conference had a very respectable 9 NCAA tournament wins. Guys were leaving the MAC and having decent careers in the NBA. Guys like Grant Long, Gary Trent, Wally Szczerbiak, and Bonzi Wells.

After Indiana ended Kent State’s magical run in 2002, Central Michigan came along with a NCAA tournament win in 2003 lead by another future pro Chris Kamen. Since then however the MAC has not had a player taken in the NBA draft, won an NCAA tournament game or even sniffed a 2nd bid. The MAC is now a one bid league with a falling seed line, dwindling fan support, and no resources available to commit to the problem. In 2007 a 26 win Akron team that won the MAC regular season title, and only failed to win the tournament title after Miami hit a 30 ft bank shot as time expired in the championship game failed to even get a bid to the NIT.

I mention the downturn in MAC basketball for two reasons: 1.) It shows that this is a real underdog league 2.) To illustrate that this is a common problem that is being suffered through by every MAC program. There us no powerhouse basketball school in the MAC who can carry the conference. In fact this conference has more parody than any in college basketball. While Kent State and Akron have had the most recent success, neither has the resources to put any distance between themselves and the field and both have to start from scratch every season to fight their way through the pack and try to emerge as the MAC’s lone NCAA representative. This is the most wide open race in college hoops this year, and because of the tough spot that these schools are in one of the most worthwhile and I am going to try to keep everyone in touch with what is going on as best I can.

To start with every team has played 3 games, and all we know so far is that: Toledo is really terrible, playing on one’s home court is the biggest determining factor in being successful in the MAC, non conference play was a meaningless indicator, and everybody still has a chance to be dancing in March (except Toledo). The way the MAC operates is pretty slick. There are two divisions East and West with 6 teams in each. Each team plays the other 5 teams in their division, then plays 6 cross divisional games before finishing the season playing the 5 inter divisional teams again. Last year the East was so much stronger than the West that no team from the West had a record better than 2-4 against the East, and three teams failed to beat a team from the East at all. This year there looks to be more parity between the two but that really won’t be determined for another two weeks when the teams start facing one another.

So far Northern Illinois has jumped out on top of the West with a 3-0 record despite having only won 4 games in the non conference. Western Michigan and Central Michigan are right behind at 2-1. NIU has the only non Toledo road win of any team in the West winning at Ball State. That so far is the difference in division. It looks like a race between those 3 teams although Eastern Michigan now has legitimate low post monster Justin Dobbins back from injury and should improve gradually as the season progresses as long as they stay healthy. I had the opportunity to watch Dobbins first game back against Toledo last week where he went off with 18 and 4 against the Rockets. They were a different team than the one I saw in Kalamazoo four days earlier when they only managed to score 47 against the Broncos.

Over in the East Buffalo has jumped out to a 3-0 start with wins over BG, Miami, and Akron. Last years champ Akron is right behind at 2-1 along with a 5-11 overall Miami club that always seems to improve as the year goes on under the coaching of possible vampire Charlie Coles. Kent State at 1-2 and Ohio at 0-3 are in the cellar right now but both could bounce back and be right back near the top once they start plowing through the weaker West. The east race is usually more fickle and harder to handicap this early in the year.

So thats where we are right now. I’m going to try and get out to the Eastern Michigan/Ball State game this weekend and regularly post about the MAC race as the year goes on.

The games of the week that promise to have the biggest impact on the standings are:

East

Kent State @ Buffalo 1/20

If the Bulls are able to win and get a 3 game cushion between themselves and perineal contender Kent State then they are in the drivers seat for at least the next month. If Kent State is able to win then they can muddy the waters and turn the East into a week by week struggle for supremacy.

West

Northern Illinois @ Central Michigan 1/23

After dispatching of Toledo mid week NIU is likely to roll into Mt. Pleasent at 4-0 in conference. If CMU wants to contend for the division then they are going to have take care of business at home. Otherwise NIU stands poised to sweep through their first round of games with the West.