UVM 64, Albany 76

2/20/04
RACC
17-9, AE 12-2
AMERICA EAST REGULAR SEASON CHAMPIONS!!!!!
(Feels good to type that.)

Congratulations to the team, coaching staff and fans, especially those who witnessed some of the leaner years. This program really has come a long way in a short time. Hopefully good times are here to stay.

Of course, there's still work to do.

Lines for the Seniors:
Lucious-- 3-10, 5-6 FTs, 11 pts, 4 rebounds, 3 steals
Levi-- 2-6, 3-4 FTs, 7 points, 2 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 steal
Zo-- 2-2, 2-2 FTs, 4 points, 6 rebounds, 1 steal
Jerrad-- 1-1, 2 points

Two of the biggest highlights in tonight's game came from the seniors, as well. The place went wild when Jerrad scored, and coming out of a TO, Levi threw a bullet to a darting Connelly early in the first for one of his 5 assists one the evening. Even Zo drained his 2 free throws on the night, and Lu had a few early baskets and steals to help us get out to an early lead. Lucious and Lillis each had 3 steals, combining for 6 of the team's 11 steals on the evening.

Albany cruised to a big lead, scoring 28 points in the first 10:30 of the game. The team's early defensive pressure was excellent, resulting in a couple of steals, somewhat resembling the UMBC game. Unlike the UMBC game, those steals led to points.

However, the Danes only managed 8 points over the last 9:30 minutes of the first half, allowing the Catamounts to claw their way back into the game-- hideous pun intended. Although UAlbany was able to maintain a decent lead during this drought, and despite taking an 8-point lead into the half, the game really felt much closer than the score indicated.

Quick note about Vermont-- Trimboli and Kilmes are both very good players. Tonight, however, we gave Trimboli all he could handle as he had 6 turnovers in the game,and despite a solid 13 points from Klimes, we were able to shut him out on the boards. That being said, UVM is young and Lonegran has done a very nice job so far. Lonegran again tried to clog up the middle with his big players. The difference tonight was that we found the holes in their zone and hit our shots tonight. You may recall that the first time Albany and Vermont met this year, the team shot 35% from the floor. Transpose those numbers and that's what we shot tonight.

Below is Albany's field-goal percentage over their last 6 games:
v. Stoner Brook 56.9
v. Boston University 52.4
v. Hartford 46.8
v. Maine 50.9
v. VCU 44.4
v. UVM 53.1
Our FG % over our last 5 games v. AE opponents is 52%.

The Wilson bros. teamed up for 39 of UAlbany's 76 points. Brent was on fire from the field tonight, hitting 8-10 shots and winding up with 18. Brent seemed visibly frustrated with the officiating at times-- good to see he didn't let it affect his game.

Jamar had 21 points on 5-10 shooting from the field and 9-11 from the charity stripe. At one point in the second half Jamar looked like he was about to take the game over, hitting a 3, a little jumper, and just missing another trey on three consecutive possessions.

Connelly has seen some early action in both the UVM and Maine games and has made an immediate impact in both games. In this game, Brian had 4 quick points and a rebound, and finished with 6 points in just nine minutes of work. Good job, Brian.

Coach Brown's comments on Big Board Sports were pretty good. He said something about "usually not paying attention to the fans"-- possibly an indirect reference to what has been written, both good and bad, in the TU over the last 2 weeks-- but he agreed with the "One More Home Game" chant.

There's no bigger credit to coach Brown if what I read on the AE message board was indeed correct with the seniors deferring to the regular season starters on Senior Night because they wanted to win. In the beginning of the season coach Brown stated that this team could be very good if everyone accepted their role. Today we have our first AE championship!

Despite my feelings regarding the University's handling of the event, I will save it for another time. We're here to celebrate, albeit briefly. I will add this--
Time Warner distributed disgraceful #1 fingers covered in all-in-one advertisements. Since the all-in-one package is a complete rip-off, I ripped the finger up in protest.

One more thing about TW-- please don't videotape people with signs when a game is being played. If you want to videotape idiotic fans such as ourselves waving signs, please wait until one of the 50 timeouts during the game. Some people care more about a game than face-time.

Loved to see the 5 students rush the court. Per the guidelines established by Pat Forde on espn.com(see:"Middle-Class Principle"), a conference championship is grounds for storming. Of course, those who stormed have been some of the team's biggest fans and have earned the right to storm regardless of what espn has to say about it.

Here's to a lot more storming in 2 and a half weeks!