Men’s Hoops Downs William & Mary, Ties for Third in CAA

Senior Days

So this weekend brought senior days at the Convo for both the men’s and women’s teams. And while on the women’s side a senior class that’s been one of the best in school history pulled out a heart-stopping victory, their regular season isn’t even over and we’ve got a feeling there are at least a few more games left in their season to discuss the brilliance of Gwathmey, Perez, Mickens, and Jones (and technically P. Hall, though thankfully for JMU Nation she’ll get another shot next year) so we’re going to focus on the men’s game. Note that the women have an extra week before their CAA Tourney.

The men snapped a five-game losing streak to the rival Griffins, generally played a steady game from start to finish, earned their way back out of pillow-fight Friday at the CAA tourney and into a share of third place with a solid “meets expectations” record of 21-10, 11-7 on the year. And they did it all with a noticeably hobbling (even in street clothes) Shakir Brown out of the lineup and Ron Curry in foul trouble for the entire first half. How?

0-10

That’s what the featherless Tribe shot from 3 in the second-half. And that’s just one part of the 33% shooting overall they were held to by the Dukes’ consistently strong defensive efforts. Ron Thompson, who’s not our favorite CAA color analyst generally, did a good job of noting just that on the telecast and it certainly bodes well for next weekend in Baltimore. The Dukes, maybe better than any team in the conference, have been able to weather cold stretches because of their CAA-leading defense and that certainly seems like something that could help a team win three straight.

The Road Ahead

Towson, JMU, and W&M all finished tied for 3rd with the tiebreaker giving the three seed to the Tigers, the four to the Dukes and the five to the Tribe. Which coincidentally means the Dukes will play this very same Tribe team in the quarterfinals at 2:30 p.m. next Saturday at Royal Ghetto Arena. Congrats to Hofstra, who closed strong to catch UNCW at the top of the league. Although we might rather have drawn Towson than W&M in the quarters, the good news with Hofstra getting the top seed is that the Dukes will definitely avoid UNCW – who has been a nightmare matchup for the Dukes this year – on their side of the bracket. That’s not to say a W&M/Hofstra/UNCW road would be anything other than brutal, but it’s a small silver lining.

Ron Curry

With four more points, Mr. Curry will pass Dukes’ great Darren McLinton for fourth all-time in scoring at JMU. When you look back to the trio of freshman that played in the NCAA tourney a few years back, it’s hard to believe Curry is the one on such a precipice and that he’ll surely have his number hanging from the rafters in the new arena a few years hence. And we cannot possibly be more proud of, and thankful for, a student-athlete we’ve had the privilege to watch during our time doing this silly little project. Curry has weathered every storm, grown into one of the conference’s finest players and leaders, and most importantly, unquestionably improved his game every one of his four years. The three-point assassin, big-shot making, floor general and defensive pain in the ass we get to watch hopefully about six more games is light-years better than the backup guard shakily playing a few minutes in the Indiana loss. Thank you Ron Curry for everything!