Wolff needs to order 200 laps up the Rocky steps

I really have no idea what to say about the Saint Joseph's game. And not because it was completely disgusting - there were obviously some good things about it. After all, we were leading at half-time. It's just the absurdity of it all.

This was the first game of the year I did not watch or listen to (I was flying at the time), but rest assured I called and texted the High Roller for updates from inside the Hudson News kiosk, at the gate, and even on the tarmac. First came word that things were close in the halftime, then that we had pulled ahead at the half. This was joyous news. Then, just before take-off, I heard that St. Joe's had taken a small lead after half-time. No problem, I thought, we seem to be playing well enough to keep it close. So imagine my shock when I land to hear that we had scored 13 points in the second half on two baskets and 26 turnovers overall, of which 11 were Corey Lowe's.

So yes, we lost the game 55-39. But who the hell knows where a performance like that puts us for our next game against a Saint from the A-10 (this time, the Bonaventure variety)? Will the first-half team that stifled the hawks show up in Olean, NY? Or will the second-half team of 2 made field goals show up?

By the way, for a perspective from the other side, check out the blog The Hawk Will Never Die, which contains the link where I found out who actually drafted Jameer Nelson.

Terriers head to the land of cheese steaks

Let's turn the clock back to the year 2003, when the Terriers and the Saint Joseph's Hawks last met. It is the last time I can remember any ranked team coming to play at BU, as St. Joe's was #13 at the time on their way to that magical undefeated regular season (the season, however, did not end so magically for the Hawks, with early exits from the A-10 and NCAA tournaments).

Although we lost that match-up by 15 points, we all enjoyed heckling the St. Joseph's mascot, who looked about ready to commit suicide since he is not allowed to stop flapping his wings, and future Naismith and Wooden Award winner Jameer Nelson, which led to this exchange with my friend Nick:

Me: Nelson, you're a second-rounder and you know it!
Nick: Yeah, have fun playing for the Raptors!

Well, Jameer ended up playing for the Orlando Magic, which is almost as bad. But in that game, it was future Boston Celtic Delonte West who killed us, dropping 20 on the Terriers.

This year's Hawks are certainly not the same as the 2003/04 version, but they're pretty good. However, they are just coming off of a loss to lowly Penn State, who earlier lost to the even lowlier Stony Brook, our America East colleague. St. Joe's is the first of 4 games in a row against Atlantic 10 opponents, a stretch in which I would be thrilled to come away with 2 victories.

So that being said, I don't expect a win from our young Terriers tonight, but I wouldn't put it out of the question. If Corey Lowe and Tyler Morris continue stepping up for BU, and Omari continues his solid play, we could surprise the Hawks.

Rumble in the Bronx

That's right, just like the movie. Only the voices weren't poorly dubbed and there wasn't some weirdo named Angelo who stole diamonds from a bunch of tough guys in suits. Still, the Bronx hosted a tight battle between BU and Manhattan College.

BU was victorious, thanks mainly to Corey Lowe, though it was a team effort that prevailed. Omari, Tyler Morris, Brian Macon, and even Ibe featured in the supporting cast. But with 28 points, Lowe stole the show. With his performance Saturday night, he made a strong bid for rookie of the year, in my book.

It was a great game to watch, too bad more people couldn't have been there for it. Although it's not like I don't understand why. To be honest, I feared for my life until we made it out of the Bronx. And our celebration in the Big Apple? Dynamite. We had no place to stay and had little knowledge of the Island of Manhattan, but if you have the chance, you have to make an adventure out it.

And sleeping in a parking garage at a rest stop on the way home brought back good memories of last years tournament.

Remember to listen in to tomorrow's game against St. Joe's. It should be another fine test for our young team.

I suppose we should do an injury report

The Terriers saw the welcome return of Brian Macon this past Saturday at Manhattan. I firmly believe that BU's poor offense the prior two games was at least partially due to his absence. Brian may look like he's pushing 40 compared to the rest of BU's baby-faced roster, but he ran around on that injured groin like a spry 24-year-old.

We got our first look at Lithuanian sensation Valdas Sirutis (another freshman, of course), who came back from injury. Too soon to tell if he will be the next Arvydas Sabonis, as Valdas was used sparingly in his first game, but he was certainly helpful in spelling the other big men when Ibe, Omari and Scott Brittain turned into foul magnets.

There was one distressing sight at the game in Manhattan: that of Carlos Strong in The Boot. After his hot start, he had a couple games in which the bottom of the net was pretty elusive for Carlos. Word is that Carlos twisted his ankle during practice a few days ago, and they're not sure how soon he'll be back - hopefully within a few days.

Matt Wolff was the other Terrier in the sweatsuit on Saturday (not shirt and tie, interestingly). His status is still the same: a target return of before Christmas, which would be a nice holiday gift for his dad.

Worth every penny

In 1626, Dutch settler Peter Minuit purchased the island of Manhattan from its native inhabitants for $24 worth of beads and trinkets. Last night, for a grand total of about $86, the High Roller and I witnessed the dismantling of the college of Manhattan and then traveled to the actual island of Manhattan to celebrate that dismantling at the hands of our Terriers. In this case, the beads we received came in the form of the free tickets we were given by the lovely ladies in the Manhattan admission booth since we arrived so close to half time, and the trinkets we got were the tall-boys of PBR at Doc Holliday's in Manhattan's East Village.

Now that I think about it, this analogy makes less and less sense (were we the Indians or the Dutch?). Either way, last night's win was exciting and refreshing, especially after the debacle against NU.

Corey Lowe blew up for 28 points, and tied the school record for number of three-pointers in game with 7 (originally set by Matt Turner). Tyler Morris had another solid 15-point effort (he has never scored in single-digits during his young college career).

Add all that to the fact that we did not get mugged during our trip, we were able to find a parking spot relatively easily in Manhattan, and we got to hang out in a bar where they let a dog walk around on top of the bar - it was a great night in the Big Apple.

Bronx College?

Why do they call it Manhattan when it is so obviously located in the Bronx? I actually had a friend who matriculated in Manhattan College, thinking he would be attending school in the center of the "world's greatest city." He ended up transferring to NYU after a year.



Anyway, as the High Roller mentioned, we'll be heading down to the BRONX to watch some low-major basketball tonight. The Jaspers have been schizophrenic this season. The opened the season with a loss to D-1 newbie and independent New Jersey Institute of Technology -- however, Jersey Tech also had an early-season victory over Rider, who promptly rode right over us. Then after that embarrassment, Manhattan went ahead and beat Hofstra, AKA everybody's pre-season pick to be "this year's George Mason."

Let's hope we see the team that lost to Jersey Tech, not the one that beat Hofstra. I'm also hoping we see the BU team that handled Harvard and hung with GW, not the one that shat the bed against Northeastern. That means Omari starting over Ibe and Carlos Strong putting the ball through the hoop again.

We'll post about the game tomorrow, pending survival of the road trip.

ROAD TRIP

So it's Saturday, two days after Thanksgiving, one day after our annual Turkey Bowl. I've recovered from my food coma, now every part of my body aches from playing football. What's the cure? How bout a road trip!?

Tonight, BU travels down to New York to take on Manhattan College, and we'll be right behind them. After Tuesday's shalacking by Northeastern, I doubt any of the Terriers had a good Thanksgiving break. If I know Dennis Wolff, and I think I do, he had them working hard every day this week, with the possible exception of Thursday. Let's hope Wolffie has some ideas up his sleeve, because this road trip is going to be a little more costly than my $50, ten minute drive across town to see a game that made me want to kill myself.

That said, if we win, there may be a crazy drunken celebration in the Big Apple tonight. If we lose, there may be an angry drunken bender in the Big Apple. It's really up to the team what happens, but I think we all know what the end result will be.


My Prediction- BU 67 - Manhattan 59

At least the women's team won

I can't argue much with the profanity-laced tirade that the High Roller posted last night after the Northeastern game. No, I didn't pay 10 bucks to watch the game or get tagged with a parking ticket, but I did pay 10 bucks to take a cab back to work to watch the game after I found my internet not working at home. And yes, wherever that cabbie is right now, if you're reading this, I want my money back.

There isn't much to say about the game itself. We got pasted by our rivals and it's embarrassing. They jumped out to a big lead and pretty much kept that lead for the whole game. Every time it looked like we were on a mini-run and would bring it a bit closer with a Big O lay-up, we'd bring it back down the floor and commit a turnover. And then one of their lucky-ass guards would sink an impossible three-pointer.

I feel like we're so close to competitiveness. Eliminating a few turnovers here, dumping it in a few more times to the reliable Big O there... those types of things make a huge difference. Until that happens, the Terriers are going to hear more frustrated profanity from their fans.

Not Worth The Money

I feel like I was robbed tonight. Robbed of ten bucks. For ten bucks, I expected to see a good game of college basketball. Instead, I saw BU get manhandled like a CGS freshman girl at a BU "frat" party. Was it worth the money? Hell no. It also wasn't worth the money to get into tonight's game. Buddah-bing!

Seriously though, I don't like paying to see a game peppered with rookie mistakes. It's just no fun at all to watch, but I guess I'll have to deal with it on a regular basis as the season goes on.

I also don't like paying to see our team fail to create enough shots on the perimeter for us to keep up with a little shit-head that seemed to make every three he takes.

I don't like paying to see a BU defense that when the ball gets inside, they either give up the easy bucket or foul the hell out their opponent.

I don't like paying to watch Ibe suck at basketball. Bench his ass and start Big O.

I don't like paying to see Tyler Morris get called twice (!) for carrying the ball while dribbling. Everyone does it and no one is every called for it, so what's the effing deal?*

I don't like paying to see my team get convincingly out-muscled. Not sure what I can do about that one except give them the cream and the clear and tell them it's not steroids.

And I don't like paying to see the team that I've followed for 5 years get completely dominated and return to my car to find a fucking parking ticket.

Good grief, what a shitty night.



*Ironic upate: I'm watching the Kentucky-UCLA game right now and the commentators just said that this rule is something that the refs are trying to clamp down on this year. Still, no calls the other way with this rule, so what is the effing deal??

An Old Rivalry Returns

That's right, we're making the very short journey back to Northeastern tonight to take on the Huskies. This game might mean more if anyone on our team ever experienced the BU-NU rivalry, but I'm not sure if any of the players even know it exists.

Still, I encourage all you fans to make the trek over to Matthews Arena (I think) to catch this game which should be tight throughout. When we play an away game in the same city that our school is, there's no excuse for not going. I already tried, but Tall-boy berated me for saying that I probably wouldn't make it. So I'll be there, and hopefully you will too. We need this win.

My prediction: BU 60 - NU 50

See you at 7:00.

[Update 3:25 pm by Tall-boy] One quick note: looks like this one will be broadcast live on the internet! Thanks NU!

A diehard Husky speaks

Tonight, we play our rivals from the dirty side of the city, the Huskies of Northeastern, for the first time since they bolted the America East for the green pastures of the CAA. Of course, this meeting comes the year after the Huskies lost their two best players and their coach and the Terriers lost, oh, about 90% of their scoring from last year. For this special occasion, I've invited one of NU basketball's most devoted fans, known to us as King Husky, to tell their side of the story and talk about tonight's match-up.


BU Hoops: This past off-season brought massive changes to both the Huskies and the Terriers, none of which were "planned." Which team do you think was hurt more by the defections, and which will be better off in the long run?

King Husky: Northeastern's changes were more "planned" than the Terriers', and the perception is that Everhart left for "bigger and better" things - if one wants to call Duquesne bigger and better. It's no secret Everhart had one foot out the door the past couple of seasons (he almost took two major conference top assistants jobs in previous off seasons). You can always plan for a coaching change - and for practical reasons, Shawn James wasn't staying at NU past this season anyway. What hurt NU the most, and in a manner similar to BU is that Everhart took many of his recruits who verballed to NU with him to DU (Robert Mitchell and Stuard Baldonado to name two). However, replacing a coach is almost commonplace these days.

BU's defections are more a reflection of Wolffie - 8 kids in 2 seasons? Come on, Junior Colleges have less turnover the past two years than BU.

BU Hoops: Some have suggested that the upward mobility over on Huntington Ave (moving up to the Colonial) has caused a bit of conference-envy here on Commonwealth Ave. What's the best thing that's come because of your conference move, and can you see any downsides that have resulted?

King Husky: The best thing that came from the conference move is visibility. Because of the success of GMU, ODU and Hofstra in the off season it's given NU street cred. We can say "we beat ODU and Hofstra last year, and ODU was in the NIT Final Four" and "we blew a game to GMU we led with a minute to go when JJB missed 2 free throws". It's helped with recruiting. We can tell kids we play a great out of conference schedule, and our in conference schedule is great. It's not UMBC and Binghamton, that's for sure.

It's the association with the Colonial that's the biggest benefit. Also, the CAA is a much better run organization than the AE. The AE is highly reactive, and insular and has suffered from a lack of vision for years. That's why Delaware, Drexel, Towson and Hofstra left. While Pat Nero will do a better job than Chris Monasch, that's like saying Wolffie did a better job than Bob Brown at BU - when the bar is ridiculously low, it's not hard to show improvement.

The CAA will have over 100 games on TV this season - men's and women's. That just can't be done with the AE because of the TV markets.

The downside - the travel is tough - I did a road trip with NU last year where we played Georgia State on a Thursday and had to fly to Raleigh on Friday, bus to Wilmington and play UNCW on Saturday. There are a bunch of weird road trips like that. And, travel ain't cheap.

BU Hoops: Why should this year's Northeastern Huskies scare Dennis Wolff when preparing for tonight's game?

King Husky: Fear the unknown. I don't know if either team could scare anyone but UMass-Boston this season, to be honest. This could be the weakest game in the NU-BU rivalry since the early 1990s. Generally both teams have been good, or one team has been clearly better. This year it's not the case.

And NU's fans have been known to be incredibly hostile towards the Wolff man. If we can't beat y'all on the court, we'll at least have fun taunting Wolffie and Matt. Remember, Wolffie ducked Northeastern last year when NU had its best team in years and BU was down - NU fans have NOT forgotten that BU dropped Northeastern from the schedule last year. He better bring his earplugs.

BU Hoops: In five years, which will be the better team, Northeastern or BU?

King Husky: I guarantee the following - in five years NU will have a better football and baseball team, and BU will have won at least 6 Beanpots in those five years - but I assume you're talking hoops.

I'm putting on the homer hat here and say that NU will be the better team - BU may go to an NCAA in that time, but that's a function of the poor excuse for a conference you play in than anything. Bill Coen's an up and coming coach who is a great recruiter. Dennis Wolff's approaching the "tenured faculty" stage of his career where he's milking that crazy deal he suckered Strickler into.

BU Hoops: If Dennis Wolff and Bill Coen fought in a cage match, who would win?

King Husky: Here's how I see it playing out.

For nostalgia purposes, Wolffie's corner man would be Mike Jarvis, and Coen's would be Karl Fogel - in case you don't know or remember, Jarvis and Fogel duked it out at an NU-BU game about 20 years ago - the video of that is a classic. Wolffie would start kicking the snot out of Coen at first - Bill's an analytical guy and would try to think things through first. Then, in a scene reminiscent of only the WWE, Jarvis and Fogel start going at it on the side of the ring, and when things get real ugly and Jarvis is getting his head bashed into the turnbuckle by Fogel, out of the lockerroom comes Jim Calhoun and Rick Pitino, accompanied by Billy Collins and Marcus Barnes - pretty soon it's an 8 man Battle Royale in the center of the ring at Agganis.

The judge (Mark Blaudschun) declares it a rout for Wolffie, after all Blaudschun is the Wolff Man's love child.

BU Hoops: Of course, we need a prediction for the game tonight (homer predictions encouraged).

King Husky: BU 43 NU 39

BU wins the war, NU wins the battle of the words.

This isn't working

For the last couple of days, I've been going over in my mind what went wrong on Saturday, why we lost to a team that we should have beaten. It seemed evident that we have players with the skills to get the job done. Inexperience of course plays a part in our loss, but overall, this trend of losing winnable games goes back a few years at least. So what does that say? Perhaps it's not the players, but the coach that's to blame.

Everyone knows that Coach Wolff is one of the most conservative coaches in our conference. It's no secret. And I can't say for sure, but I feel that this is the reason we've lost in the first round of the playoffs the last three years. Wolff's game plan of relying on our defense to win doesn't seem to work in the big games. When a team plays as if they have nothing to lose, they usually come out on top of teams that play a careful game.

Having a strong defense is great, but without more points than the other team, defense is only going to get you so far. We have the tools to get it done. Tyler Morris runs the offense like he isn't a sophomore. Corey Lowe and Sherrod Smith can slice up a defense with the best of them. That's a piece of the puzzle that's been missing for years. We have some pretty sharp shooters in Marques Johnston, Carlos Strong, and Scott Brittain (I'm sorry I bad-mouthed him in my last post). Big O played a pretty good second half, we just need Ibe to get his shit together.

In Saturday's first half, our offense was running smoothly. It seems as though Wolff encouraged them to push the ball and not be afraid to shoot. Once we got a decent lead, though, it then seemed like Wolff wanted to switch to conservative mode, focusing on our defense. That's when our 9 point lead disappeared in a matter of minutes. It happened because we used 35 seconds on each possession and then failed to get off the shot we wanted. It appeared that there was extra pressure on our players to make the shot after killing 35 seconds, and that no one wanted the ball. It looked like they were playing "hot potato" in the closing seconds of the first half and we failed to get a shot off. It happened again in the second half. That should never happen.

Wolff needs to let Morris run the offense and encourage the outside men to shoot if they're open, and not rest on his laurels when he has a 10 point lead. I've always believed that the team that takes more risks will win, and Wolff certainly doesn't like to take risks, especially in the big game. So if our team improves every game this season, and then loses to a team like UMBC in the first round of the tournament, I'll lobby for a new coach. I've always loved Wolff for as long as I've been following BU basketball, and he's put together some winning teams in '02 and '03, but what has he done for us lately?

Butts in the seats

Some figures from the first two BU home games.

Attendance for Game 1 vs. GW: 4778
Attendance for Game 2 vs. Rider: 531

Now, I know that George Washington is the marquee opponent on our home schedule this year, and that most people don't know Rider is a college. And maybe Friday night is a better time to see a game that Saturday afternoon when most students are still sleeping off their hangovers. But those factors hardly should account for a drop of almost 90%.

And I am aware that students were enticed to come to the GW game by the prospect of picking up tickets for BU-BC hockey. That's a good way to get hard-core hockey fans to come to one game, but the problem is that these kids aren't basketball fans - it's obvious they didn't come back for a second helping of Strong, Lowe and Co. But the idea was good enough to work once - normally this is only done for Beanpot tickets, and it was smart to extend it to a regular season BC game. So here's my idea: why not use this promotion every time there is a home basketball game before a home hockey game? There are enough hard-core hockey fans who care enough about where they sit to increase basketball attendance by 500-1000 every game, and that can create a bigger buzz. It would cost the Athletic Department nearly nothing - maybe 20 bucks to have a ticket salesperson or two around after the basketball game to sell the tickets. If the Athletic Department is serious about growing the fan base for men's basketball, and if it believes that the hockey following is the best tool to do that, then it should exercise that tool to its fullest extent.

I would love to get to the point where BU students don't come out to games because of a high-profile opponent or just to get hockey tickets. I want to see them come out to watch the BU basketball team. Until we get there, the Athletic Department is going to have to continue to be creative.

Rough Rider

OK, so we've regressed a bit. Our lovable bunch of Terrier pups fell victim to their inexperience on Saturday against Rider. The game was competitive and back-and-forth almost the whole time... until the last few minutes, when we went cold and Rider opened up a lead.

A big key to our loss, in my opinion, was the absence of back-up point guard Brian Macon. Yeah you heard me right: Brian Macon. It's true that we here at BU Hoops::doggy-style have been down on Mr. Macon at times. But it was obvious during Saturday's game that some players (specifically Carlos Strong, who had a measly 2 points) would have benefited from having a "pass-first" PG out on the floor. Unfortunately, Brian sustained a groin injury, and hopefully he'll be back sooner rather than later.

Corey Lowe and Omari played pretty well, and Scott Brittain finally showed a little bit of his talent with 9 points and a bunch of boards in 35 minutes.

Rider hard, Rider good

This past week, the Rider Broncs of Lawrenceville, NJ lost to a second-year D-I program, and it wasn't even close. That would be the Highlanders of New Jersey Institute of Technology, a team so new that I couldn't even figure out what their record was last year.

So we should have no trouble with the Broncs today at 1 pm when we meet at the Roof, right? Problem is, we lost to these same guys last year, it wasn't close either. The only guy who had a decent game last year (Brendan Sullivan) left the team after last season after run-ins with Wolff and some teammates.

We need this game to go above .500 for the first time since the '04-'05 season!

America Least Or America Beast?

Don't look now, but our traditionally doormat conference has been turning a few heads early in the season. We know about our young Terriers holding their own against a tough G-Dub team that was ranked in the top 10 last year. But some of our fellow A-Easters have found even more success:

First, it was Hartford nearly taking out the #8 ranked Georgetown Hoyas (um, what's a hoya?) down here at the Verizon Center in DC. Natalia, a U-Ha alumna friend of mine down here who witnessed the action in person, described it as "the most exciting game I've ever seen!!!" You can bet the G-town fans weren't nearly as fired up about it.

Then, Albany defeated mid-major superpower Bucknell at home. Bucknell has won games in the NCAA tourney the past two years and is perennially looked to as a possible upset pick. Could the Danes take their place this year??

Finally, the coup de grace, the University of VerMont defeated BC (sucks!) in an absolute blowout. The final margin was 14, and it wasn't any closer during the game. This game presented a bit of a dilemma for me, because I've had a healthy hatred of Vermont ever since they took out BU on our home floor in the AE championship game a few years back. But if any school's teams are more hated on the BU campus, it's BC (sucks!). So in this case, I think an embarrassing defeat at the hands of the lowly AE is a satisfying outcome.

BU defeats Harvard, takes their lunch money

I like this team.

I enjoy watching/listening to them play ball. They're young, so they come with the requisite amount of mistakes, but they have tons of energy, they're not afraid to attack on offense, and they can shoot pretty damn well. That, my friends, makes for exciting basketball.

The three-headed freshman monster of Lowe/Morris/Strong contributed 49 points to tonight's 78-74 win over the smart kids. Morris is a true leader out there. Lowe is still coming back from pre-season injury but still looks good. And Strong continues to be fearless on offense while adding some sparks on defense.

Best stats of the night:

-7.... our turnover differential for the game.

93.... our free throw percentage.

Congrats on Win #1 fellas!

The Stansbury of the East

Every year that I can remember, have taken on Hahhhhhhhvahd in men's basketball. And all the times I can remember, we have beaten them (my memory may not be perfect though). And that includes the drubbing 3 years ago where we doubled the Crimsons up, 86-42. It also includes last year's game, which turned out to be our first win after 5 losses to start the season.

Our annual game is the only time of year (besides when we meet in hockey) that I can turn to friends like Molly and Josh T and say, "HA! YOU MAY BE INFINITELY MORE INTELLIGENT AND WIND UP MAKING 8 TIMES MY SALARY, BUT WHO'S THE REAL DEAL WHEN IT COMES TO LOW-MAJOR COLLEGE BASKETBALL?? THAT'S RIGHT, BIATCH! BOO-YAH!" And then Molly and Josh T will usually respond by playing logic games with my head, and somehow convincing me that Harvard is actually a better team than BU despite losing to them every year. I have no idea how they do this.

Listen to tonight's game on the radio if you can't make it across the River Charles to see it in person. But beware: there is also a men's hockey game at Vermont tonight, and in the past that has caused havoc with the radio schedule.

Strong support

I'm willing to bet that Carlos Strong is already the most famous Carlos to ever come out of the state of Maine. He added to that growing legacy this week by dropping 19 on GW on his way to earning the first America East Rookie of the Week of 2006-07, sharing the award with UM's Junior Bernal (who may or may not be the most famous Junior in the state of Maine right now).

Still taking nominations for nicknames for Carlos Strong. I am hereby rejecting the High Roller's suggestion of HeadSTRONG, only because it reminds me of the awful song by that horrible band Trapt. Go ahead, take a listen - they're pretty cringe-worthy.

One alumnus gets it

In case you've been living under the BU bridge, players have been running away from the BU men's hoops team in a manner reminiscent of freshmen fleeing an Ashford St house party that just got busted by the cops. Somebody sent a letter to the editor of the Freep that pretty much sums up my feelings on the situation. I hope the author and the Free Press will forgive me for reprinting it here.

A red flag should shoot up in any athletic department when a basketball team, which generally has about a dozen players, suffers a mass exodus of five players that would be returning to the fold under normal circumstances ("Coblyn speaks, release official," Nov. 3, p. 12).

It is especially troubling when the fifth player quits just prior to the start of a new season, as Ben Coblyn did, and is quoted as saying, "All I know is that I'm not happy here and I don't want to stay here."

Boston University men's basketball coach Dennis Wolff is quoted in the same article saying, "When I scrutinize every situation and look at them individually, I think that there were clearly reasons why it wasn't working in every situation. In analyzing it, I don't know how me or my staff could have handled any of these situations any differently."

So what Wolff is in effect saying is that he considers all of these players -- players that he and his staff recruited to come to BU -- to be lost causes because he couldn't come up with a better way of dealing with them. That, in it of itself, is most disappointing.

The America East Conference is one of the lower rated NCAA Division I leagues. BU, with all of its built-in institutional advantages, should be able to dominate this conference. That is not presently happening.

It would seem that there would be a good opportunity to move to a stronger league in the near future -- perhaps the Atlantic 10 Conference -- given BU's academic standing, prime location and the potential of playing games in a top-class facility like Agganis Arena. That could represent a tremendous step forward for the university's men's basketball program on both a local and a national stage.

But that scenario is unlikely to happen if BU is not able to retain its recruited players. Whatever the reasons are that these players have left, it has left a public stain on a program that has the potential to be so much better.

He hits two good points. First, the fact that Wolff lost five different guys for five different reasons, and in retrospect would not handle any of them differently. What does that tell us about the chances of Wolff convincing the next unhappy guy to stay in town?

Second, the fact that this is a very important period in the BU basketball program. No matter how coy or how obvious the athletic department would like to be, this is a school shopping itself to higher level leagues. Along with our shiny new arena, the program needs to offer sustained success and continuity. We're not going to enjoy either of those if players continue to leave (especially in a basketball-first league like the A-10).

The new crop of freshmen are a source of optimism for our program, but only if they're here in the long run. And for that to be the case, Wolff needs to figure out how to handle the guys he recruits once they arrive on Comm Ave.

Separated at birth?

I'm still trying to figure out if there's a way BU can save a scholarship by passing these guys off as one another.

So far ba- off to a bad start

Well it's been a long off-season, but our prayers have been answered. They haven't? Oh, you prayed for a great start to our season. I actually prayed for a guy wearing the Rhett costume who can do the worm.

Friday's game showed us so very much about this upcoming season, and posed a lot of questions as well. We lost, yes, but we played hard. It was great to see all those fresh faces on the court, but it was even better to see all the faces in the crowd. Opening night brought in thousands of fans, though I think there was some kind of hockey ticket give-away. Still...

To avoid writing out a full on report of the game, I'll simply state a myriad of observations. So without further ado...

-Tyler Morris earned some respect tonight with his leadership and good play. Then he lost some of it when he travelled when inbounding the ball.

-I don't understand why we schedule such a difficult game for our home opener every year. The Greek was packed Friday night, but a win would have had kids returning for more.

-#31 needs a new jersey number. From the last row of the Greek, I kept thinking KG was on the court. Then reality set in, and I became depressed.

-Speaking of #31, the kid needs to refine his decision making process. He doinks two free throws that weren't even close, gets the ball on the next possesion and puts up a three that had no chance. Isn't he supposed to be an inside man?

-Who needs Hassan the Assassin when you can be head-STRONG??

-Friday, before the game, I did something I've never done before. I waited in line for 20 minutes just to get tickets to a BU basketball game. That's a good thing though.

-My take on the game is that we lost because we were unable to put together a real run before GW squashed it with a three-pointer.

-It took me until half-time to remember Matt Wolff was still on the team. Is he ever going to be in uniform?

-Thank God that asshole didn't win musical chairs during half-time. That would have worsened my Friday night.

-And thank God the George Washington mascot didn't show up. Don't get me started on that jackass.

-Looks like the word "turnover" is going to be heard a lot this season, and it's not because Brian Macon eats an apple turnover before and after every game.

-It seems as though the dance team got much hotter as a group since last year, which doesn't make sense since Dance Team Girl graduated.

-Omari really play hard, and for a long time, but for his size he needs a bigger presence DL. Sounds familiar. Haven't we been through this before?

-It seems like this group of kids already play pretty well together. Once they get some more time on the court, we'll have a pretty competitive team.

It will no doubt be an interesting season. At first glance, one wouldn't think that our young BU team (why does it seem like every year our team is a young team? Oh, that's right, most players don't get along with Wolff) will make much noise this year. And I say this every year, but I really think that this is a team that can break our first round curse.

(For those of you wondering about the second half of the tourney experience, the Terriers lost, Tall-boy and I got wasted in downtown Binghamton, and we crashed at some random dude named Phil's house. Thanks Phil, wherever you are.)

Terriers maintain respectability against G-Dub

Going into this game, I had no idea what to expect from a team that had lost KG, Shaun Wynn-credible, Hassan the Assassin and Coblyn the Goblin. I mean, this team is in serious need of some new nicknames. Not to mention a scoring punch.

Then I found out that neither Omari nor Brian Macon (our two senior captains) would not be starting. The starting line-up consisted of 4 freshmen and a soph. I'm not kidding.

But you know what? They played hard, they moved the ball pretty well, and they put the ball through the hoop once in a while. Yes there were freshman mistakes leading to turnovers and bad shot selections. But they were not afraid to shoot and score, which I think is something we've been missing. And while they ended up with a 13-point loss (not a bad showing), they were down by 4 with 6 minutes remaining. And they came back from at least a 17-point deficit at one point.

Carlos Strong started shooting the lights out from downtown. The other frosh (Sherrod Smith, Tyler Morris, Corey Lowe and Scott Brittain) all showed that we have some serious talent on this team. I thought that Ibe played horribly, and I have no idea why he started. I think Omari should have filled that role, as he played pretty well. He's obviously our best post player, and that part of our offense was a black hole tonight.

All in all, the game made me kind of excited about this year's Terriers. It will be fun to watch these guys grow together this year, and who knows, maybe win a game or two.

I got robbed

If you scroll down the page a few inches, you'll notice my prediction for the game score, which was GW 70 - BU 58. And then a few hours later, BU lost to GW by the score of 70-57. And the amazing thing is that BU's Sherrod Smith had a meaningless free throw attempt with 30 seconds left in the game to complete a 3-point play and match my game prediction exactly. So what happened, you ask? Sherrod sinks the free throw - nothing but net.

But someone committed a LANE VIOLATION, and the game ended 70-57. I just want everyone to know how damn close I came to predicting the score exactly right.

Colonials come to town

Tonight, the Terriers take on A-10 powerhouse The George Washington University, who went 26-1 last year and spent the end of the year in the Top 10. One of those 26 wins was over our beloved Terriers in DC, which was fantastic for me since I got a group of alumni together to watch it here in DC, complete with pre-game happy our at the Froggy Bottom. Even the High Roller came down to party it up in our nation's capitol.

We lost that one by only 13, but I can't say I foresee a better result this time around. GW has lost some of their superstars, like Mike Hall, Danilo Pinnock, and of course, Pops. But we've lost virtually all of our scoring as well.

My hope is that we keep it close enough in our first game to entice those BU freshman fans to come back for another game. Hopefully it'll be a big-time atmosphere at the Greek, and who knows, maybe these young Terriers will keep it close like our first game last year.

Personally I'm pumped that this game will be on TV locally, so if you're in DC or Boston check it out on CN8.

My humble prediction: GW 70 BU 58

The 2006-07 Season: Building block of our 08-09 championship?

Ah, college basketball season. 2006/07 brings the Terriers a new platter of fresh-faced freshmen, new defections from the team, sophomores who have barely played, and senior leadership in the form of two guys who have played a combined 2.5 years here. The ENTIRE TERRIERS ROSTER contains 5 and a half years of playing experience at BU. That is ridiculous.

Recipe for disaster? Time will tell. The America East conference is at its weakest point since 3 teams left for the Colonial (although many teams are improving). The other AE coaches seem to have a bit more optimism, choosing the Terriers to finish 5th in the league in the pre-season poll. And get this: some coach in the league actually picked BU to finish FIRST. The winner of that dubious distinction goes to Albany's Will Brown, who was not allowed to vote for his own team to finish first. This puts Coach Brown's judgment in question and makes me wonder how he was able to lead the Great Danes to the NCAA tournament last year. This makes a little more sense, however, when you notice that the 42 points the Terriers picked up in that poll put them only 7 behind second-place Maine - this puts the judgment of the rest of the AE coaches into question as well, making Will Brown's job a little easier.

But Coach Wolff has also expressed hope, as evidenced in this Boston Herald article from this week. He even talked about loosening the leash on his young players when it comes to creating offense, saying:

"We are going to be a three-guard team and with so many young guys, we are going to play simpler offensively. We’ll try to put them in position to play more naturally and not so controlled."

That alone should be cause for optimism among Terrier fans.