Will Brown mentioned on CNNSI.com

As mentioned first by a poster on the BPF message board, this is pretty cool. Also, as pointed out, the list has been edited to include Salukis' head coach, Chris Lowery, at number 3. Everyone else has been bumped down one, so now coach Brown is #11. A pretty glaring omission, considering SIU's success.

Youth Movement In Full Swing It's icons such as Bobby Knight, Mike Krzyzewski and Lute Olsen that define the game, but youth is taking over the sidelines. While Florida's Billy Donovan, 41, has become the poster child for the youth infusion, he's an old man compared to IPFW's Dane Fife, who at 26 is the youngest coach in Division I. The MTV generation is making its presence felt in the coaching ranks, so here's a rundown of the top 10 coaches under 40:

1) Thad Matta, 39, Ohio State. The seventh-year coach (above), who was also the head man at Butler and Xavier, is 156-50 and has made it to the NCAA tournament in five of his six seasons (Ohio State was ineligible for the postseason in 2004-05), including an Elite Eight run with Xavier in 2004. He also gets major props for a ridiculous recruiting class that includes Greg Oden.

2) Mark Fox, 37, Nevada. He continues to be one of the hottest names in the game. Fox turned down the Nebraska job last summer and received a raise and extension from Nevada. In his third season with the Wolf Pack, Fox is 59-14 with a pair of NCAA tournament appearances under his belt and is widely considered one of the game's brightest minds.

3) Scott Sutton, 35, Oral Roberts. Often compared to Kansas coach Bill Self, who brought Sutton on as an assistant at ORU, Sutton has won 102 games since the start of the 2001-02 season and is coming off a the Golden Eagles' first NCAA appearance since 1984. It's just a matter of time before he joins his brother, Sean in the major-conference coaching ranks.

4) Jeff Capel, 31, Oklahoma. The former Duke standout has emerged as a rising star, landing the Oklahoma job after a four-year stint at Virginia Commonwealth, during which he went 79-41. He stresses unity and hardwork (sound's a little Krzyzewski-esque) and should be in Norman for the long haul.

5) Mick Cronin, 35, Cincinnati. Regarded as one of the nation's up-and-coming coaches and a top-notch recruiter, he enters his first year in the Queen City after leading Murray State to two NCAA tournament appearances in three seasons. He compiled a 69-24 mark with the Racers and his 28 first-year wins were the fifth-most in NCAA history for a rookie coach.

6) Sean Miller, 38, Xavier. Matta's former right-hand man at Xavier is 45-25 in his third season -- and has a resume that not many can touch. Besides being the first associate head coach in Xavier history under Matta, he was also Herb Sendek's lead assistant at NC State. Don't be surprised if he ends up at a top-tier program soon.

7) Sean Sutton, 38, Oklahoma State. Here's what we know: Sutton is undefeated as Oklahoma State's coach (11-0), he learned from one of the greatest coaches of all-time, his father Eddie, participating in more than 500 games as an Oklahoma State player and a coach in 14 years. The verdict is still out on Sean, but he looks well-schooled to be an elite coach.

8) Dave Calloway, 38, Monmouth. Calloway's official Web site calls him one of the best young coaches on the East Coast. He is, and he's earned it. In his ninth season in West Long Branch, N.J., he won his 100th game last January and led the Hawks on their third trip to the Big Dance in six seasons, during which Monmouth has piled up 112 victories.

9) John Pelphrey, 36, South Alabama. He went 36-48 in his first three seasons, never going above .500, but last year he turned a 10-win team into 24-victory squad which received an NCAA bid. That earned Pelphrey overtures from Ole Miss and Nebraska. He played under Rick Pitino at Kentucky and was once the hot assistant du jour under Donovan in Florida.

10) Will Brown, 35, Albany. In his sixth season with the Great Danes, Brown is 53-83, but he's coming off a 20-11 campaign that included the America East Conference regular season and tourney titles and the school's first NCAA berth. Before coming to Albany, he spent three years at Sullivan County CC (N.Y.), going 90-10. He also has a sweet Web site.

America East Results So Far

I have a little spare time on my hands, so here's a compilation of how AE teams have fared in OOC play thus far. Will try to update this after all AE games.

Tops in AE right now is Vermont at 114. Albany's RPI is 231. Out of 32 conferences, the AE's RPI is 24th (stats courtesy of realtimerpi.com).

Albany (3-4):
11/11 Bucknell W 55-49
11/17 Delaware W 87-67
11/21 at Sacred Heart L 90-71
11/26 at No. 18 Connecticut L 86-55
12/2 at Siena L 76-75
12/6 Virginia Commonwealth L 75-57
12/9 Brown W 62-52

Binghamton (3-4):
11/11 at Long Island L 73-59
11/16 at Niagara W 74-66
11/20 Mount St. Mary's W 66-59
11/25 Cornell W 57-56
11/27 at Colgate L 78-70
12/2 Rider L 79-65
12/6 Akron L 90-55

Boston University (3-5):
11/10 George Washington L 70-57
11/14 at Harvard W 78-74
11/18 Rider L 66-60
11/21 at Northeastern L 73-54
11/25 at Manhattan W 74-65
11/27 at St. Joseph's L 55-39
12/2 at St. Bonaventure W 74-46
12/6 Massachusetts L 56-54

Hartford (4-4):
11/11 at #8 G'town L 69-59
11/13 at Towson L 78-64
11/18 at Army L 62-53
11/25 Dartmouth W 60-50
11/28 at Cornell W 63-61
11/30 LIU-Brook W 64-49
12/06 at Penn State L 56-55
12/09 at Monmouth W 76-75

Maine (4-5):
11/11 at Harvard L 75-71
11/13 at Detroit L 57-50
11/14 Idaho St L 66-57
11/18 at St Fr NY W 79-60
11/22 STJoesVT W 97-69
11/26 R Morris L 55-43
11/29 at Mt St Marys W 68-65
12/01 at NJ Tech W 68-58
12/09 at Providence L 94-79

UMBC (4-5):
11/11 at St Peter's L 67-56
11/14 Loyola MD L 69-56
11/18 at Hampton W 56-49
11/21 Lafayette W 86-51
11/25 at Michigan L 66-54
11/27 at Morgan St W 86-72
12/01 at St John's L 78-57
12/03 L Beach St L 57-53
12/07 at La Salle W 78-67

New Hampshire (1-7):
11/10 at #15 BC L 86-47
11/13 Franklin Pierce Coll L 70-69
11/18 C Conn L 73-66
11/21 at R Morris L 77-64
11/26 at Quinnipiac W 64-59
11/29 Harvard L 83-81
12/02 at LIU-Brook L 70-62
12/06 at Rutgers L 55-48

Stony Brook (3-5)
11/10 at Colgate W 65-59
11/13 at Cornell L 76-72
11/17 at Penn State W 59-51
11/19 Navy L 87-76
11/25 at Columbia W 54-41
11/28 UMES L 64-58
11/30 Villanova L 72-44
12/05 Hofstra L 73-57

Vermont (5-4):
11/07 at New Orleans W 82-65
11/08 at Maryland L 81-63
11/13 at #14 BC W 77-63
11/18 Drexel L 59-46
11/21 at Mich St L 66-46
11/25 at Wagner W 77-69
12/01 at Towson L 67-54
12/03 at Delaware W 57-55
12/10 Iona W 63-50

Brown 52, Albany 62

SEFCU Arena
Albany, NY
11/9/06
3-4

Brown uniforms and those bright red shoes-- coolest uniforms in college baskteball. Straight outta' Hoosiers.

Sure, Brown is 3-7, but they held Michigan St. to 45 points, beat Providence, and lost by 4 to a Rhode Island team that beat Utah on Saturday. Games against teams that slow the pace of the game down are never easy-- ask Georgetown. Brown is a pesky and well-coached team that employs some offshoot of the Princeton offense. Unfortunately, for their sake, Brown had a hard time catching the basketball and finishing their layups off of their backdoor cuts. If they could, this game would have been a lot more interesting-- and this game was plenty interesting, if not soemwhat frustrating. The game surely wasn't pretty. However, I commend the team for not getting frustrated and for not letting the game slip away.

Brown got the score within 5 with just under 10 minutes left and lingered until just about the very end. With about 4 minutes remaining Albany up by 10, the game got a bit out of control. In the next 1:30, both teams combined for 5 turnovers with no points being scored in that time. Once this chaotic sequence ended, with Brown breaking the drought with a free throw, Albany still clung to a 9-point lead and the game was all but over.

A few items of note:
Reid Anderson saw 15 minutes and looked pretty comfortable out there. He had a few open shots that didn't fall, but he finished with 4 points, 6 rebounds and showed good huslte on the floor today. Nice job

After shooting no better than 36% a game from 3-point land in any of their last 3 losses, Albany shot 10-22 from 3-point land today, good for 45 percent. Brent led the way, shooting 4-6 from downtown.

If memory serves me correctly, jason had a breakout game of sorts against Brown in Providence, last year. Today, Jason stays out of the foul trouble alluded to in the last post, plays the full 40 minutes, and shoots 7-13 from the field, good for 17 points. However, Jason committed a foul on a 3-point shot that allowed Brown to cut UA's lead to 6 early in the second half-- before Albany got their lead back to 15. Lillis picked up his second personal with just under 10 minutes in the 1st half andf finished the game with seeing just 22 minutes of action.

The team got another solid effort from Connelly, going 4-5 from the line, good for 8 points to go along with 5 rebounds in 26 minutes. Brian is shooting 16-26, or .615%, from the floor.

VCU 75, Albany 57

12/6/06
SEFCU Arena
Albany, NY
Record 2-4

I know the semester is wrapping up, but the attendance tonight was slight-- just over 2K. Don't blame the students-- those sections were nearly full. Its a tough time of the year, I understand, but this was an opportunity to watch a good basketball team visit Albany, and I, for one, was certainly- well, not disappointed--but definitely a bit surprised by the low turnout.

Weird night, weird game. I arrived at the arena early enough to watch VCU during their warmups and I didn't like what I saw, which was, frankly, a team that hit all of their shots during practice. During warmups, three guys would huck up shots at the same time and all three shots would drop. I was nervous.

Then the game began, and the Danes looked terrific early as they broke VCU's press with relative ease. Brian handled the ball a bit more tonight, but everyone did a nice job at the onset of breaking the press and finding the open man for easy layups.

When we play wiffle ball, we start each at-bat with 2 strikes. In the same fashion, it seems like Jason and Brian start each game with two fouls. As the team tries to find itself, especially against good teams such as VCU, those two need to find ways to stay on the floor and out of foul trouble. 24 or 25 minutes from those two against a team like VCU just isn't enough. With Brent ailing a bit right now and without Jason in the game, we don't have much in terms of another scoring option outside of Jamar. Without Jason and even Brian on the floor, teams are able to focus squarely on Jamar.

With respect to tonight's game, in losing Jason and Brian to early foul trouble, we also lost two capable ballhandlers who were used effectively to help break VCU's press.

As coach Brown said in one of the papers, the team plays poor defense when they play poor offense. Despite forcing 2 more turnovers than Albany tonight(12-10), VCU managed to outscore Albany 12-6 in the points-off-turnovers category.

Even before VCU made their run, one thing was apparent, and that was Albany's inability to rebound the basketball in this game. The most glaring statistic from tonight's game was not necessarily that UA was outrebounded 39-26 by a smaller team, but that VCU destroyed us on the offensive glass, 18-8. Ouch.

The most important thing right now is for the team not to get down and for the fans not to get restless. Has the team played well in their last 4 losses? Of course, not. However, this team is work in progress right now-- a work in progress that has played against some very good basketball teams. Soon enough things will improve and these early-season losses, as bad and as ugly as they are, will only be looked back upon as growing pains. This team has proven talent and excellent coaching. We'll be fine.

I would be remiss not to add that VCU is a very good basketball team and I, for one, am squarely on their bandwagon. I loved Capel as a coach and Grant seems to be a great hire. A lot of frineds of mine pull for the Spiders-- well I am going with the other team from Richmond. Though predicted in the preseason to finish something like 6th in a tough CAA, I would not be surprised to see VCU challenge for their conference championship.

VCU Preview

All right, just like against UConn in the NCAA tournament, we played a very good game against a talented VCU team as part of last year's ESPN Bracketbuster series.

Everything else stops right there. These are two very different teams that are playing each other tonight. VCU lost thier coach, Jeff Capel, to Oklahoma, and their best player, Nick George, to graduation. However, as we are seeing, their program has done an excellent job in hiring one of Billy Donovan's assistants, Anthony Grant, who has his team playing very well early in the season. Eric Maynor has filled in superbly for George, leading the team in scoring and assists, averaging 15.1 and 5.3, respectively.

VCU also starts two other guards, B.A. Walker and Jesse Pellot-Rosa, both of whom average over 14 points a game. What's more, all three players shoot over 40 percent from beyond the arc and the trio accounts for 41 of VCU's 46 three-pointers on the year.

Despite their ability to hit the 3, a friend who lives in Richmond, is a UR graduate, and follows both UR and VCU basketball tells me:

"They are now a full court pressing, up-tempo team since Anthony Grant took them over this year. They like to run, it is a completely different style than last year. If you can beat their press and make them play half court basketball they are very beatable.

They have about 5 good players but no outstanding players. Watch out for Eric Maynor and BA Walker, both guards.

Their claims to fame this year is that they beat Houston and started the Elon game on a 22 to 0 run."

For the record, VCU also lost to Xavier by 3, a team many predict to win the A10 this year.

Beating their press might be easier said than done, as VCU's defense has a total of 67 steals on the year-- an average of 9.6 per game-- many of which are probably a result of that press. VCU also has a turnover margin of +8 per game, so they appear to also do a nice job taking care of the basketball.

I feel a bit like Joe Morgan typing this, but Albany is really going to need Siggers to stay out of the foul trouble that he got himself into against Sacred Heart and Siena.

After ~12,000 attended the Albany-Siena game last Friday, I'm curious to see how both schools draw tonight. Crowds have been good this year and we'll need another one tonight.

Albany 75, Siena 76

December 2, 2006
Pepsi Arena
Double-OT
Record: 2-3
Attendance: 11,271

I'm not going to get too worked up over a game, but this loss stings a bit. Losing to Siena two years in a row is a bitter pill to swallow.

Just before the game, I spoke with a friend who was trying to find a line on the game. He couldn't find one, but I suggested that if there was one it would be something like Siena -1.

Give Siena all the credit in the world. The Saints played a very good basketball game and showed a lot of resiliency in the OT periods when UA had a chance to close the door on them.

I wondered how Siena would shoot from outside and I wondered about how their youngsters would respond. Well, goes to show you what I know, as Siena's kids, in particular, Edwin Ubiles & Kenny Hasbrouck, were outstanding. Siena also shot much better from beyond the arc in tonight's game than they have in their previous 5.

Siena shot 10-28 from 3-point land, and it seemed like all of their 3's were clutch and were made at critical moments. None moreso than the 3's made by Moore and Kenny Hasbrouck with Siena down in the OT periods with UA clinging to 6-point lead in overtime and a 4-point lead in double OT.

In sharp contrast, Albany shot 4-20. Ouch. And Jason Siggers had all of them! Albany went basically 39 minutes without making a 3-point shot, when Jason drained his first trey-- which were also his first points of the evening--with 1:04 left in regulation. Jason went bananas in overtime, sort of like he did in the opening minutes of the second half of the Delaware game, scoring UA's first 8 points in OT. Its a lot of fun to watch when Siggers goes on one of those bursts when he appears to be everywhere and do everything.

Down the stretch, Albany also shot poorly from the charity stripe. Lillis misses 4 free throws and Jamar misses two. If recollection serves me, I think those misses might have been short. Probably nerves.

Connelly and Gifford continue to impress with their effiecient play. Combined, the two shot 8-11 from the floor (Gifford, 4-5, Connelly, 4-6). Brian Lillis also had a nice evening, shooting 5-8 from the floor. Brian is a good shooter and it would be good to see him assert himself offensively a bit more, especially on open looks, instead of looking to pass.

Sometimes I think its a bit easy to forget about how good Jamar really is. Everyone expects a lot from him, and tonight he played all 50 minutes of the game. Jamar is going to get the bulk of attention from opponents, yet he still finds a way to get to the line and get points that way. We saw this tonight and against UConn, as well.

Albany also did a much better handling the ball tonight, considering the 2 OT periods. Albany committed 12 turnovers to Siena's 14.

The Pepsi Arena is a brutally bad place to watch a basketball game. I was pretty psyched to learn I was sitting in section 130. I moved upstairs at halftime where I could actually see better than I coulod sitting on the floor.

Siena Preview

Saturday, 7pm
Knickerbocker Arena/Pepsi Arena/Times Union Center
Albany

My prediction, as part of the Times Union contest:
Albany 79, Siena 69
Jamar scores 26. Haddix scores 15.

Re: the idea of the two teams playing twice a year, as suggested in Friday's Times Union.
I don't like it. Personally, I would rather play another OOC school than play Siena twice. This year's OOC schedule is a very good one, and there's no reason to believe that UA cannot continue to schedule games against other quality opponents.

I do not mind the the game is always held at the Pepsi, either. Per Siena's website, however, the team averaged 6,500 a game in their heyday. In recent years, that attendance has slipped a bit. Albany is a program on the rise and the team's improvement has helped spark attendance figures for this game in recent years. The university should be justly compensated.

Thanks largely in part to Albany's recent success, more than 10,000 seats have already been sold for this highly anticipated matchup between Albany and Siena, as the two schools battle it out for the TIAA-CREF Albany Cup. I mean, of course there has to be a corporate sponsor. In football, Union and RPI play for the Dutchman Shoes Trophy. Siena and Albany play for the TIAA-CREF Albany Cup. If its any consolation, at least TIAA-CREF provides "financial services for the greater good."

As a point of reference, 8,641 fans attended last year's meeting between the two schools.

I have yet to see Siena play this year, but I still follow the team. A few things just from reading the paper and looking at the boxscores:

1. Siena has a tough time rebounding
Through 5 games:
v. Stanfraud, outrebounded 44-22
v. Holy Cross, outrebounded 43-22
outrebounded Dartmouth, 36-28
outrebounded New Jersey Institute of Technology, 39-33
outrebounded Hofstra 37-26

2. Siena does not shoot the "3" well. Same 5 games:
'Fraud: 5-14
HC: 3-8
Dartmouth: 3-12
NJIT: 3-18
Hofstra: 2-11

Hopefully these are weaknesses that UAlbany will be able to exploit. Michael Haddix is a fine player and has returned strongly from two bad injuries. However, listed at 6'6", Haddix is not particularly big. Maybe UA will collapse on him in the post and force Siena to try and hit a few shots from the perimeter. Siena will have to hit their perimeter shots to keep Albany honest on the defensive end. Despite Haddix's proven ability, Siena also gets significant contributions in the frontcourt from 6'7" freshman, Edwin Ubiles (G/F, 9.4 points, 3.2 rebounds), 6'5" freshman, Alex Franklin, (11.2, 5.8), and 6'7" senior, David Ryan (8.4 points, 4.2 rebounds).

Siena also features a host of young guards, and a big key for Siena is seeing how will they respond to the atmosphere of a near-sellout this evening. Last year as a freshman, Kenny Hasbrouck had 14 points on 6-12 shooting in 39 minutes. However will the aforementioned Ubiles, Will Franklin and Ronald Moore, all freshmen and each averaging over 20 minutes of action a game, all remain as composed? Either way, I like our chances with Jamar, Siggers, Lillis-- and maybe some defensive help from Ross-- to disrupt their youngsters.

Siena does a good job of forcing turnovers and getting steals. Albany has allowed 53 points off of turnovers in their last two games. To win this game, Albany is going to have to do a much better job of protecting the basketball against Siena than they have done in their last two losses.

Albany 71, Sacred Heart 90

November 21, 2006
William H. Pitt Center
Fairfield, CT
Record: 2-1

If a tree falls and no one hears it does it make a sound? What if your basketball team gets smoked and no on sees it? Unfortunately, the same does not apply for our Danes tonight, as Sacred Heart rolled tonight in front of a whopping 516 spectators at the William Pitt Center on the Sacred Heart campus. Fans with 7 bucks and a compatible PC were able to watch the game through the SH website. I have a Mac, so I didn't even have the chance to plunk down the scratch to watch-- just listened to Tobben's call. Good call, as per usual, but man, did that place sound dead.

Even without Jason's scoring as he got into early foul trouble, we still put up 71 points. However, scoring was not the issue tonight-- defense and turnovers were. In the first half, Sacred Heart had 15 points off of 9 turnovers (I think), compared to 3 points off of 3 turnovers for UAlbany.

In the BPF chat room (plug), everyone, myself included, commented that Sacred Heart just couldn't keep shooting as well as they did in the first half. Oops. Its only three games into the season, but this is the first time this season UA did not put the defensive clampdown on an opponent in the second half. Sacred Heart shot 44.4% from 3-point land in the first half, 44.4% from 3-point land in the second half, and a whopping 67% from the floor in the second half, as well.

Though it seemed like SHU did most of their damage in the first half with the three-point shot, the Pioneers also had their way with us inside as well, outscoring the Danes 34-20 in the paint for the game, despite the fact that UA outrebounded Sacred Heart, 36-25.

No one on Sacred Heart had a monster game-- they just had a bunch of players with solid games and 6 guys who scored double-digts.

This is how it sounded on the radio-- anyone who saw the game might think otherwise.

Some positives:
Brent had his first big game of the year. He shot well, blocked a shot, took a charge or two, and finished the night with 29 points. It seems like when Brent gets in the mix early as he did tonight, he's gonna' have a big game.

Connelly continues to contribute nicely. Against SHU, Brian shot 3 of 4 from the floor for 6 points.

Jamar and Lillis both had nice games, scoring-wise, but together they combined for 9 turnovers-- almost twice as many as Sacred Heart's entire team.

In the TU, coach Brown referred to the Sacred Heart game as a bit of a trap, and he was right about that.

I'm going to take the glass is half-full approach here and chalk this one up to looking ahead to Pukon and being lulled to sleep by an empty gym-- not that this is any excuse.

Hopefully Brett Gifford, sick with the flu, will be ready for UConn. We're sure going to need him against Hasheem Thabeet and his 23 blocks on the year.