Thanks Ladies!!!
There is an avalanche of exciting news all over the JMU sports landscape right now. Bridgeforth Stadium is looking incredible, the baseball team is on fire to start the season and receiving votes in the national polls, softball poleaxed Georgetown today, of course it’s tournament week for Men’s hoops, and national #9 Women’s Lacrosse took out Virginia Tech today, but really tonight was all about one team and four impressive young women.
Bravo!
Senior night for Women’s Basketball marked the last game in the ‘Burg for the storied quartet of Dawn Evans, Jalissa Taylor, Lauren Jimenez, and Courtney Hamner. You can read about the eyepopping stats for this group over at JMU Sports, but it’s no stretch at all to say this senior class rivals almost any group in JMU Athletics history of any gender in any sport for what they meant to the program, not to mention sheer brilliance on the court. This group finally took down ODU last year and brough the CAA title back to the Convo for the first time in decades, not to mention putting in an appearance in the Big Dance and looking that direction again! And it’s not like any one of this group is an afterthought or just a crowd favorite like you often see on Senior Night. Taylor has turned into the most consistent rebounder and all-around player on the squad, the Dukes are at their best when Jimenez is healthy and getting consistent touches, Hamner is a sharpshooter of the highest order, and Ms. Evans is, simply, a legend.
Oh yeah, they also played a game tonight. And not just any game, but a “sort of” important one in which they were battling fellow CAA powerhouse UNCW for the regular season title. And these four did not disappoint! The Dukes locked up the #1 seed in next week’s tournament in Upper Marlboro (Show Place Arena for you DC area Dukes) by coming from behind in thrilling fashion to beat the Seahawks 79-77. And guess which Dukes shone brightest this evening? Yes that’s rhetorical. Jimenez set her new career high with a game-high 31 points and Dawn Evans broke the all-time CAA scoring mark with 2583 points, surpassing Drexel’s Gabriela Marginean’s 2581. Needless to say, the Dukes need every one of those points tonight. Not a bad way to wrap up a career in Harrisonburg. Now let’s hope they’ve got two more runs in each of the impending tournaments in ’em. Take a bow ladies and please accept thanks from a couple guys who didn’t know a thing about WBB when this project started and now are sincerely going to miss all four of you!
First off, since you do this out of the kindness of your heart and no pay, I say… Thanks.
Now
TD’s posts are becoming more and more dominated by these “glad they are doing well, but we don’t really care about sports”.
The lack of comments should be keying you in to the fact that people on blogs just like in the real world just DGAS… (You’re creative, I am sure you can figure it out.)
Rob.. can we please maybe get a CAA tourney preview. You know its kinda a big deal and its starting tomorrow night… .
I will be the one in the Coliseum wearing Purple 8:30 on Friday … Be There
Rob.. can we please maybe get a CAA tourney preview. You know its kinda a big deal and its starting tomorrow night… .
I will be the one in the Coliseum wearing Purple 8:30 on Friday … Be There
Alright, we’re glad you like the blog and appreciate you reading and commenting. The following points aren’t directed at you, but more of an attempt to provide info to anyone who cares.
First off, comments and page views are not related, so the lack of comments about any one particular post doesn’t really concern us.
Second of all, the main focus of this blog always has been, and always will be men’s hoops and football. Occasionally we like to mix it up and post about other sports though. The fact that the CAA women’s career scoring record was broken by a Duke was noteworthy so we wrote about. The fact that the player was Dawn Evans, a woman whose struggle with kidney disease has been something we’ve covered in the past, made it especially cool in our minds.
I just wanted folks to understand where we coming from and address some of the issues Landeta had. We really appreciate everyone reading and are open to the feedback. Just know that we understand that we can’t please everyone and we’re not really trying to. We’d drive ourselves crazy if we did.
Well, if the school were a bigger school in terms of following by the National (and heck even local media) then I think it might not be as big a deal but I really appreciate having this blog as a way to keep up with JMU sports and have interesting discussions that only JMU fans can appreciate. I know I can always go to JMUsports.com but its not quite the same. Granted I too follow mostly just the football and men’s bball, but I can say that I follow many of our sports, especially since I am proud to say that was at JMU when the women’s field hockey team won the first EVER National Championship for any sport in JMU’s history. Thanks again to Rob and Todd for keeping this thing going. Now lets move on to MARCH MADNESS!! Go DUKES!
For the record, Landeta is one of our oldest friends. That said, he’s also the big fat clown who used to care about JMU before he married into a UVa father-in-law that allowed him to skip Dukes football games under the guise of “it’s only an hour to Charlottesville”, trot out ill-fitting preppy pink pony plaid pants, and start acting like he grew up a lifetime CCV member from River Road when in reality he grew up in what he once called “a pretty rough neighborhood.” (Also known as The Estates on the mean streets of the Robinson high district but that’s another story and I think I just choked on my own bile remembering that particular claim). Sorry Deta, but to paraphrase Eminem, “No such thing as halfway crooks!” This is a guy who roots for the Yankees, Tarheels, and Phil Micktittleson despite a lack of peronal connection to any of them – well except for the sweet lefty swing and the need for a brozierre like Phil – and acts like he’s an OG for each of those cliched squads.
And the coup de grace, this friggin’ guy owns a red Richmond Ticks sweater vest and tries to justify support of this with “I’m settling in Richmond, it’s a good networking opportunity and I get good tickets when JMU’s in town.” Seriously, guy couldn’t even stay in-conference and throw some love VCU’s way – says “Siegel Center/Broad St. area’s ‘just not my style'”.
Finally, I’m the one with the bully pulpit dummy. Like Dan Synder the last couple of weeks, you’re about to prove the ole’ Ben Franklin adage: Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the barrel! (or can FB msg your better half to clue her in on the unsolicited bashing of the value of women’s athletics).
Is that more the old, standard T you were looking for?
Well at least you wrote something interesting that time. I was expecting an update on the women Bache ball team or how men’s shuffle board did at nationals. 3/4ths of it was incorrect but at least you put out some good effort. Though, again you’re writing about things that most of the readers don’t care about which was the message of my first post.
The real fans will be there tonight.… So we will see you at tip off right?
It’s one friggin post man. Get over it. If you don’t like it then just skip it and read the ones that interest you. Do you demand that every single article in a newspaper be written to meet your particular likes and dislikes as well? And if you find that you don’t like the blog in general, then go start your own. With your ability to easily identify exactly what interests all of our readers, I’m sure you could easily craft something that appeals to millions of people all around the globe.