|
Very Little Certain in The A-10!!
By
Andy Mac Williams,
3/4/2008
Here's all we know for sure re the A-10 and March Madness. Xavier is regular season conference champ and thus the number one seed in Atlantic City. The Muskies play the 8-9 winner a week from Thursday March 13th at Noon in Boardwalk Hall. X has done more than enough work (25-4, 6 RPI, 8th in AP, 11th in Coaches' Poll, 11 straight wins) to be certain of an NCAA bid, but the seeding is anybody's guess with a range from 2 to 5.
Also, we are sure St. Bonnies is not making the trip to AC. They're locked into 14th (2-12). Spots 2 through 13 in the standings are a complete fire drill.
And who knows how many NCAA bids will accrue to the A-10?? It could be just one if XU wins the tournament and gains the automatic berth. If X is upset,who knows? Obviously, at least two teams go (X plus the tourney champ), but there could be more at-larges because a bunch of teams are on the hated bubble.
With the exceptions of Xavier and SBU, A-10 teams have beaten each other up. Home court has not meant much. Take out the Muskies' 7-0 record at Cintas and conference teams are just slightly above .500 on their own floors (48-43). Nobody's been that hot lately except for XU (11 straight wins).
La Salle has won 5 of 6 but one of the wins was out of conference against winless New Jersey Tech and the Explorers lost over the weekend at home to Rhode Island. That snapped a 5 game losing streak for URI. How Rhody could drop 5 straight is a bit of a puzzle considering their depth and size and experience. Must be the defense or lack thereof. They allowed 84PPG over the bad stretch.
UMass has won 4 in a row and would wind up with 10 wins by beating LaSalle at home and GW in Washington. Temple is currently all alone in second at 9-5. The Owls finish up at home against Duquesne and at LaSalle. TU has won 3 of 4. Duquesne has hit the skids with 4 losses in a row despite their nice mix of size and quickness. They swooned mightily late last season also.
3 A-10 Tournament first round byes are up for grabs. Temple seemingly has the inside track for one of those and maybe the second seed behind XU. LaSalle, Richmond, UMass and Saint Joseph's are all 8-6. So it's basically 5 teams for 3 byes.
At the bottom Dayton and Duquesne are 6-8 and Fordham and GW are 5-9. One of those 4 teams will finish 13th and not make Atlantic City. Currently, Saint Louis and Rhode Island are tied for 8th and 9th but there's no guarantee they will remain there.
Xavier's in the cat bird's seat seemingly, but the Drew Lavender injury situation is a trifle unsettling. XU is much easier to press without Drew. When Lavender is healthy and reasonably mobile, most teams don't even try full court pressure except out of utter desperation. He is a one man press breaking machine. Ohio State and Tennessee prospered by pressing and maybe Temple back in January, but that's about it in my memory.
Against all but the very best teams, the press goes away as a viable weapon if Lavender can dart and dangle normally. Even when he's partially hobbled. Lavender runs the half court offense smoothly. Spacing is better as is ball movement especially against a zone. His shooting has suffered though. He leaves himself as the last option possibly not comfortable pushing off on three point tries and hesitant to drive into traffic to take that leaning scooping lay-up he makes so often.
Sean Miller apparently has decided to practice Drew more this week with the goal of playing him more minutes at Saint Joe's Thursday and home against Richmond Saturday.
A deep NCAA run will be very difficult for Xavier without Lavender near 100% but don't hit the panic button we've got time. We've learned something with Drew hurting: Stanley Burrell and Dante Jackson are a formidable guard pair defensively.
|
|
