Put a Fork in ’em

The Dukes lost to VCU this evening by the score of 76-62. We can always hope for a shocking upset at the CAA tourney, but I think that most folks would admit that the Dukes are done. The regular season wraps up with a game this Saturday against Drexel, a team that stomped the Dukes by 21 up in Philadelphia last month.

There is some good news though. JMU now holds a one-game lead over Delaware in the conference standings with only game remaining. The Dukes also won the head-to-head matchup against the Blue Hens, which gives JMU the tie-breaker should both teams finish with the same record. The bad news is that I just had to create an unnecessarily complicated way to explain that JMU clinched an 11th place finish tonight. Out of 12 teams. Not good.

I don’t think anyone can objectively claim that injuries and a depleted roster didn’t have a big impact on the Dukes this season. I also don’t think that means that the Dukes didn’t fail to play up to their potential anyway. Depleted roster or not, JMU was good enough to finish better than 11th. Plain and simple a team that splits the season series with VCU and William & Mary, shouldn’t be losing to UNCW, Towson, or Georgia State. Although, now that I wrote that I just saw that Towson knocked off William & Mary tonight, so apparently my logic is flawed at best.

Anyway, you can find the AP write-up about tonight’s loss here. Todd and I are going to let this one sink in and then come back next week with a regular season wrap up/tourney preview. In the meantime happy belated birthday to our buddy Priz!