Packed to the Gills: The Northeastern Review

Let's get this out of the way.  We lost to one of our main rivals, in overtime.  It sucked.  Moving on...

This needs to be said: I've never seen the Roof packed like that in my life - and I've been to two America East Championship games there.  Every seat was filled, and people kept streaming in.  Kids were filling every aisle, stuffing every corner of the gym and basically hanging off the rafters.  I'm not sure how many standing room tickets were sold, but I'm damn glad the fire marshal didn't show up tonight.  Terriers, PLEASE keep this up!

The BU student section was phenomenal, the best I've ever seen it.  It was huge, it was loud, and it was on its feet the whole game.  Northeastern brought a nice little contingent as well, which made for a REALLY fun college basketball atmosphere.  Chants back and forth, screaming no matter who was scoring or had momentum.  I must admit I questioned the NU students' decision to remove all their shirts during the overtime period, considering their various physiques (flabby/manboobs or scrawny nicole ritchie types)... but hey they won the game so maybe that was the right play.

As for the basketball itself, BU showed some flashes but we have a ways to go before we're a really good team. Lots of dumb mistakes tonight - holding onto the ball after a rebound, free-throws, inbounding???  It was pretty obviously the first game of the season, because things looked rusty.

But I saw good things too.  DJ Irving and Darryl Partin showed the type of scoring versatility that we'll need from them this year.  I thought Pat Hazel was very solid, on offense and defense, when he wasn't picking up fouls.  Mattt Griffin came up with some huge 3-pointers in the last couple minutes.  The freshmen Chionuma and Kennedy showed glimpses of why they're so highly touted in the few minutes of action they got. 

And that comeback from 11 points down with 3 or 4 minutes to go??  Very gutsy.  That alley-oop tip-in to Hazel with 1.1 seconds left was INCHES from ending that game.

I like this team.  They'll get better and make some noise this year, count on it.

Will the Chambers plan work?

Coach Pat Chambers came to BU and saw a deficit of enthusiasm. And judging by the way he's handled his first few months, he's making it priority #1 to change that.

The apathetic aura surrounding BU basketball is a long-known and often-lamented fact around campus. Sure there are die-hards. But there are also box scores that show no hope of getting attendance figures out of the triple-digits. And national blogs writing about how the published figure was 276, but the in-person count was merely 147.

I don't plan on doing this all season long, but contrast the efforts of our former coach with our new one. I am one who thought Dennis Wolff was a good coach, but his outreach efforts to the student fan base consisted of a 3 minute speech at Midnight Madness. Then get out of the way and let the sports marketing department struggle to push the boulder up the mountain.

Chambers has a plan. A plan that will require a lot of time and effort, but and one he has already begun to embrace. And it's one that says get out of the way sports marketing department, I'll handle this one.

1. He started a blog. And it's not like the "The BU Blog" on the Athletic Dept website, which despite the fact that it's got good info and shows they're trying, still sounds press release-y. No, Coach's blog is obviously written by him. His "Chambers Vision" videos are awesomely hand-filmed by himself. The whole thing gives BU fans who are hungry for more to read about the team (and yeah, there's a couple of us like that). Frankly, that's why we started this blog. Does that make our blog obsolete? Don't answer that.

Go read Coach Chambers' blog: http://coachpatchambers.blogspot.com/

2. He's twittering. Like you, I thought twitter was retarded. Then Coach Chambers came on there and started spilling nuggets about recruits coming on campus and all the other good stuff I want to know about, and it forced me to check it out. And then I grudgingly admitted that there was some other cool stuff on there, so I signed up. Gratuitous pimp: Follow me here if you're so inclined - it's not all BU hoops stuff, but some of it will be - and once the season starts, look out.

Oh, and go read Coach Chambers' twittering: http://twitter.com/Coach_Chambers

3. He's going out and meeting regular students. People just like you and me! He's just going up to people and talking to them. He's going to talk to student groups and wander around the dorms. And, in a very smart move, he's trying to snag them during orientation, before they can be poisoned by the hockey-industrial complex. Does anyone remember the BU Soccer Tailgate on the first day of school last year? They just herded all the freshmen to that thing and ended up with 5,000 fans, which is just amazing.

4. He's sending PLAYERS out to meet regular students. This is something I thought they should do forever. A lot of the fans who come to the games are there because they're friends with some players and they want to support them. I started coming to some games during my sophomore year, but I didn't become a die-hard until I worked with some of the players over the summer. After that, it was cool to see guys I was friends with out there on the court.

The players need to be ambassadors for the program. I understand that they are just college kids, and they are probably a little shy to just go up to random people all the time, especially if you are freakishly tall. I would probably have a tough time with that too. But it would go so far to walk around the lunchroom at Myles or Warren and show everyone that they're students just like them. I imagine it's a lot harder for someone to blow off the basketball game if the day before Tyler Morris asked you point blank if you'd come watch him.

5. He wants to play all our home games at The Greek. Coach thinks it helps build a big-time atmosphere around the program (and probably would help attract better recruits). It's definitely a topic of contention, and has been discussed at length here and elsewhere. Are those in favor of home games at The Roof swayed at all by Coach's plans? Do you want to see evidence that his plan is working first, and then move games to Agganis? It's kind of a chicken-and-egg scenario. I am on record as being pro-Agganis though.

So that's Coach's plan as I understand it. I'm optimistic.

Here's one piece of advice I'd offer: when targeting students in the dining halls and dorms to recruit to games, go after girls. Don't just forget about them because we think of guys as more traditional basketball fans. Make them the priority. Since stereotypes are such a good time-saver, remember that girls are more willing to try new things, they make personal connections better, they are unfailingly loyal to friends, they find basketball players hot, and wherever girls go -- guys will follow.

There's no place like home

There was yet another Freep column today about which building BU should play basketball inside of. The Hot Dog has established in the past that he is strictly in favor of Case Gym as the home for BU basketball. The guy who wrote yesterday's article, known to Freep.com readers only as "MEYER," is in favor of playing our home games at Harry Agganis Arena. I thought I'd weigh in.

First, the Hot Dog's case for Case stems mostly from the performance of the current and recent teams, in terms of winning percentage and shooting percentage. The reality is, those things are going to correct themselves back to the mean in time. There is no Agganis Curse, as Coach Wolff rightfully insists and I'm sure the HD knows this. But Hot Dog makes good points about practice time and comfort level on the Agganis floor that are valid - but I think those are things that will improve on their own over time as well. The Terriers won their fifth game at The Greek this year, and looked more comfortable than I have ever seen them play there in their win over Albany. They play the last game of the season there against Hartford, and I'm predicting the comfort level will continue to improve with each game.

I disagree with MEYER's original complaint that BU's "big deal" of a Bracketbuster game should have been played at Agganis; it would have been a big deal if it were a real Bracketbuster on TV, but it wasn't... and if we had gotten a TV game, I believe it would have been held at The Greek. But he/she makes good points about many teams having separate practice facilities, about The Roof being the smallest AE facility BY FAR, and about impressing recruits with our nice new arena.

Look, we are not filling up either gym. Attendance at Case is probably hovering somewhere around the 500 mark. While it's only marginally better at Agganis, it looks bad no matter where we play. Might as well give the fans a thrill by being lonely in a big-time arena.

And about the fans. Many fans are attached to The Roof, including me. They say it sounds louder in there because every is closer to the action. But they said the same thing when the hockey team moved from Walter Brown Arena to Agganis. And they were right to an extent, but I don't think anybody is complaining about it any more.

The bottom line is that if we have an A+ facility on campus, we should use it. Playing there more often should alleviate the comfort concerns of the players, and playing some lesser opponents there should get that winning percentage back on the right track. As far as attendance is concerned, it sucks right now no matter where we play. The only thing that can fix that is winning. And that has little to do with where we play the games.

Win against St. Peter's, Lose against The Quest

It wasn't the blowout we were all hoping for, but last Saturday BU at least came away with a win against St. Peter's. Despite the final score, BU was clearly the better team all day long and was firmly in control. Two droughts, near the end of each half, allowed the score to get a little closer than it should have. But even a 5-point margin was a vacation compared to the full-on, Dennis-Wolff-vein-popping Cardiac specials provided by the first two overtime games.

BU has a winning record for the first time since the very beginning of last season when we were 1-0.

Johnny Holland went off for a "quiet" 26 (well, it seemed quiet to me, except for his thunderous alley-oop slam from Mr. Corey Lowe) in only 24 minutes. Someone remind me why he only got 24 minutes. This effort, combined with the one against Bucknell where he took over in OT, was enough for him to snatch the Co-Player of the Week award, his first of what I assume will be several this year. Corey had another good game, but again missed some key FTs down the stretch. Jake O'Brien had tough shooting night, which I guess we have to expect once in a while - but boy does he love to shoot when he gets the ball, whever he gets it. But Wolff doesn't mind, as he said after the game, "If he’s looking at the basket and his feet are set, I’ll be mad if he doesn’t shoot."

Finally, Scott Brittain returned to the active roster. He wasn't the unquestioned difference-maker right away - with 2 points in 11 mins - but that is our fault for expecting too much. It's obvious Wolff is easing him back into the rotation, totally understandable because you can't be too cautious with head injuries. Take your time Scott, and we know you're gonna come up huge for us down the road.

As for The Quest for 901, that went sadly unfulfilled. A paltry 600 settled into the Roof for its opener, well short of the half-enrollment of St. Peter's I was hoping for. We'll have to settle for one-third of their total enrollment. Maybe the Dec. 10 matchup against Yale in Case Gym will bring more luck, although I suspect they have an enrollment a bit larger than St. Peter's.