One Trophy Left: Stock Report 2/27

Stock Report 2/27

Congratulations to Amherst who won their 8^th NESCAC Championship with a 62-56 victory over Hamilton on Sunday. The Mammoths earned the conference’s automatic berth into the NCAA Tournament, while Hamilton, Williams, and Middlebury snagged at-large bids as well. Getting four teams into the tournament is basically common practice for the NESCAC, so it’ll be exciting to see if anyone can do some real damage this year. Each of the remaining teams have looked terrific this season and they are all capable of competing with anyone. We’ll just have to wait and see who is left standing in a few weeks.

Stock up

Chance for a run by a NESCAC team

The selection committee was relatively nice to the NESCAC this year, putting the four teams that earned bids in regions that are very winnable. According to the D3 Massey Ratings (the only available computer-generated rankings for Division III basketball), the highest ranked team in the Williamstown regional is Plattsburgh State at 58 and the highest ranked team in the Clinton regional is Keene State at 49. For these two teams in particular there really isn’t a reason that they shouldn’t find themselves in the Sweet 16. Things are a little bit tougher for Amherst and Middlebury who each have one very strong team in their region, but I still think that things bode well for the conference as a whole. By the time the Sweet 16 rolls around we could have some serious chaos – a possible matchup between Amherst and Middlebury looms as well as the chance for Williams to be matched up with Pomona-Pitzer or another school from out west. The good thing is that March is all about chaos so we’re in for quite an exciting month of hoops.

Duo of Grant Robinson and Fru Che

Nobody is hotter right now than the Amherst Mammoths, winners of 9 out of their last 10 including their last 3 in a row to win the NESCAC Championship. They’ve got one of the deepest lineups in the league, but they certainly wouldn’t be here without their star power. Grant Robinson ’21 and Fru Che ’21 have been the team’s leading scorers all season, but they really upped their play when it mattered. In the conference tournament these two accounted for 60% of the team’s offense (116 of 194 total points), guiding the team to three victories. They’re only sophomores, but they’ve played well beyond their years as the season has progressed. It’ll be interesting to see how well they handle the spotlight playing in their first NCAA Tournament game against Rosemont on Friday.

Stock down

Whoever picks the regional sites

I’m not one to throw myself into the fire for Amherst, but how in the world are they not hosting a regional? When I saw that they weren’t hosting I was surprised, but I assumed that it meant the NESCAC didn’t have a team hosting a regional this year. Once I found out that Hamilton and Williams were hosting, I was truly shocked. Hamilton had a great year I understand having them host a regional, but how did Williams get to host over Amherst? The Mammoths won the conference championship and are currently ranked 7^th in the nation going into the tournament. I personally think that the NESCAC champion should automatically host a regional, but this case seems overwhelming. They say that sometimes more things are taken into account such as region, but Amherst and Williams are only about 90 minutes apart so I don’t see how that could be enough of a factor. In the end none of this really matters that much because each team has to win the same number of games, but I do think it was a very strange move by the committee.

Note: Had I done a pretty basic amount of research before writing this, I would have found that because the Amherst women’s basketball team is hosting a regional, the men cannot also host. In odd numbered years the women have priority for the first rounds, but the Amherst men’s team is in line to host the following two rounds this year should they get there.

POY clarity

Now that the NESCAC season has come to a close the league will hand out awards to the top performers during the season. As of right now it seems that picking a Player of the Year is going to be a very difficult job for the committee because there are seemingly three guys that are all equally as deserving. I have laid out the stat lines (only for conference play) for each player to prove just how tight the race is between the top three contenders:

Kena Gilmour – 19.8PPG, 5.6REB/G, 2.7AST/G, 48% FG, 39% 3PT, 91% FT)

Bobby Casey – 19.6PPG, 5.4REB/G, 4.6AST/G, 45% FG, 36% 3PT, 80% FT)

Grant Robinson – 17.8PPG, 5.5REB/G, 3.5AST/G, 51.3% FG, 41.4% 3PT, 87% FT)

There are a few different ways the committee can go to pick a winner. Last year by picking James Heskett over Jack Daly they showed that they valued winning the conference championship over (slightly) better overall statistics. This would lead me to believe that Robinson would take home the hardware, but I also don’t necessarily believe that will be the case. It’ll be interesting to see what the league puts an emphasis on this year through who they give the award to.