JMU avenged an 18 point loss to Drexel two weeks ago, with an exciting 63-61 overtime win over the Dragons last night. The win moves JMU to 11-17 and 6-8 in the CAA. Drexel is now 14-12 and 6-7. After really letting Drexel’s experienced team run all over them in Philly, the Dukes battled all night game earned a hard fought win in the rematch. The Dukes defense pestered Drexel seniors Frantz Massenat and Chris Fouch, holding them to a combined 28 points after the duo burned JMU for 42 in the first match-up. After an ugly first half, JMU stormed out of the locker room to take the lead. Drexel hung in there and managed to keep it tight by hitting free throws. Late in OT when the pressure was at its peak, Ron Curry showed once again that he’s JMU clutch performer. With 6.5 seconds remaining and the game tied at 58-58, Curry hit a step back 3 from the top of the arc to take the lead. Andre Nation then stole Drexel’s inbound pass, was fouled, and hit two from the stripe. Drexel scored a bucket with time expiring, but it wasn’t enough and JMU walked away with a big win.
Talk about a tale of two halves. It was brick city in the Convo for the opening 20 minutes. The visiting Drexel Dragons shot a miserable 7 for 26. JMU was even worse, going 5 for 28 from the floor in the first half. Thankfully, the awful shooting was short-lived for the Dukes. In the second half and overtime, JMU knocked down 14 of 23 shots. JMU’s defense helped Drexel remain consistently awful on offense throughout the entire game. The Dragons improved on their 27% first half shooting performance. Not by much however, as they managed to hit only 10 out of 30 after the break.
JMU’s big three of Curry, Nation, and Cooke carried much of the scoring load for JMU. Curry led all players with 18 points. Nation and Cooke contributed 12 and 13 respectively. The big highlight was obviously Curry’s clutch three in OT. There was a lot to like about this win though.
Both teams are pretty solid defensively, but the shooting in the first half was unspeakably awful. It was so bad, that you assumed it couldn’t possible continue. Yet, for the very experienced Dragons it did thanks to some suffocating defense from the Dukes. On the other hand, the young and inexperienced JMU team made adjustments, and turned the game around offensively. Even when they hit a field goal scoring drought, they retained their composure and continued to control the game. There was no panic in the young Dukes. Freshmen Tom Vodonavich and Yohanny Dalembert had a block party down low, combining to swat 4 shots in the paint. And Vodanovich was a beast on the boards, finishing with a career high 11 rebounds. And for the cherry on top, he also hit two big buckets as the shot clock was expiring. It was the best game I recall seeing him play all year. Dalembert didn’t start due to an injury ankle, but he was aggressive on both ends and chipped in with 9 points on 3 for 4 shooting.
It was only one win. And a regular season win at that. But it gave fans a glimpse of this young team’s potential. The Dukes offense was atrocious in the first half. Somehow, they turned it around after the break and kept an experienced Dragons team from turning things around themselves. And as a fan, it was really fun to watch. Which is pretty much what it’s all about anyway.
As reliable as Dutch speedskaters, Kenny Brooks’ teams are always there at the end. And this year’s group is shaping up to be one of the best. Despite the national med
ia’s lightning-fast reversion to treating the CAA like the redheaded stepchild it currently is on the men’s side in the absence of Elena Delle-Donne, the Dukes have managed to at least begin to claw their way into the national conversation. JMU is up to 2nd in the mid-major poll is and finally receiving votes in the national polls. Those of us that geek out on advanced stats have noticed they’re up to 23 in the Sagarin ratings, and I can only assume those that enjoy “for entertainment purposes only” type things have probably begun to pick up on the fact that the Dukes have become the ATM of women’s hoops by slaughtering teams, and spreads, like mid-aughts-pre-hype Boise St. football.
You know when a college hoops team is really good? When the preseason conference player of the year (Kirby Burkholder) is entirely living up to that choice AND is only one of SIX players averaging in double figures! Needless to say, while BCS-slobbering Bracketologist doofuses like Charlie Creme (seriously, if you think men’s bracketologists are idiots who haven’t actually watched teams outside of Dickie-V called games play are bad, you haven’t seen anything till you’ve perused the Congress-esque wisdom that flies out of the women’s geeks) may still be severely underseeding them and they may need to run the table to raise their seeding, do NOT sleep on this team’s Sweet 16 chances. And if you feel like joining us at the ghetto-fabulosity of the ShowPlace Arena in Upper Marlboro, no problem bringing higher expectations than the previous weeks’ trip to B’More. This 21-4, 11-0 team beat #22 St. John’s, UVA, UCLA, and Pitt in the non-conference and lost in OT to #16 Vandy and by three to #10 UNC. If you’re not already on board Kenny Brooks’ badass bandwagon, now’s the time!
The Dukes held off a late surge from UNCW and secured a 64-62 win in the Convo. The victory wrapped up a regular season sweep of the Seahawks and got JMU to 10-17 and 5-8 in the CAA. UNCW fell to 8-20 and 2-11 in the league. JMU led by as many as 13 points in the second half before the offense sputtered. The Seahawks slowly chipped away and came all the way back to take a 57-56 lead with 4:18 remaining. From that point on, it was all Ron Curry. The sophomore point guard scored the Dukes’ final 6 points to close out the win at home. Here are a few quick thoughts on the win. read more…
JMU had a rough outing in Newark. And that’s putting it mildly. The Blue Hens defeated the Dukes by the score of 81-65. The loss drops JMU to 9-17 and 4-8 in the CAA. Delaware is now 19-7 and 11-0 in the league. The first contest between these two teams came down to the last possession. JMU had a chance to tie with time winding down, but a questionable no-call on a Ron Curry drive left the Dukes wondering what if. There was no wondering tonight. Thanks largely to Davon Usher’s 18 first half points, Delaware took control early and never looked back.
Silver Lining
If you’ve been reading this blog or following us on Twitter, you know we’ve been high on Yohanny Dalembert’s potential. He’s very raw, but has the strength and athleticism to develop into a really nice post player. And he plays really hard. His effort against Delaware will probably lead to more folks jumping on the bandwagon. He notched his first career double-double with 15 points and 13 boards. Coach Brady announced after the game that he’ll be starting over Taylor Bessick this Saturday against UNCW. read more…
Phew! After blowing a 17-point lead in full house-on-fire fashion by giving up an 18-0 run to a team they had been handling, the Men’s team managed to pull their head out of their asses, reassert themselves, and somehow pull off a 59-53 win in the CAA’s Battle of the Bottom of the Barrel against the Pride (nee Flying Dutchman). Believe it or not, this actually was a pretty big win for JMU as it helped them at least hang onto hope of avoiding the 8/9 play-in game in the CAA tourney and kept them alive to move up even higher. Just like this time last year, while it sounds insane to talk about seedings, we’ll be watching Wednesday to see if the Dukes can hang with first-place, but now undermanned Delaware and thus show just how wide-open this year’s three days in Baltimore will be.
Ron Curry was the star of this with 20 points and 6 assists, including a huge and-one down the stretch to give the Dukes the cushion they needed. While not his best game, it sure was nice having Andre Nation back on the court tonight, especially on the defensive end. In general, this game had exactly the kind of wild swings we’re beginning to expect from this Dukes team which can really defend (this is compounded when playing an even more ratchet Hofstra team!), but absolutely cannot shoot. Tonight’s incredible, but not exactly surprising stat, was that JMU managed to pull off a perfect 0-11 night from behind the arc. Gotta give ’em credit for consistency!
Also, bracketology is even worse on the women’s side than the men’s thanks to impossibly uninformed commentators, but we’re still pleased to see the Dukes slide up to the 7-line in ESPN’s latest projection. The ladies are threatening the Top 25 and are right on pace for an all-timer of a season in the ‘Burg. All Aboard!
File this in the “seemingly obvious and definitely incredible, yet somehow we all missed it” folder. It’s a Brady Bunch style t-shirt featuring the basketball Dukes. Because of course it is. And it is awesome. The first 500 students in the Convo for Monday’s game against Hofstra will get one. Which reminds me, does anyone have a JAC card I can borrow? Well done athletics marketing people. Well done.
h/t @JStheProffitt for bringing it to our attention
JMU was defeated by Drexel yesterday in Philadelphia by the score of 78-60. The loss dropped JMU to 8-16 overall and 3-7 in the CAA. Drexel got to 5-5 in CAA play and 13-10 overall. Andre Nation missed the game for personal reasons according to JMU. In his absence, Charles Cooke and Ron Curry paced the Dukes with 18 and 17 points respectively. Andrey Semenov chipped in with 12 points. Chris Fouch was the man for Drexel. He tallied 26 points thanks to hitting 5 of 10 from long range.
The Obvious
As a team, JMU can’t shoot the basketball. We’ve been attempting to either ignore that, or spin it somewhat by saying that the Dukes are struggling. They’re not struggling. Struggling implies that things are temporarily more difficult or that the team has hit a rough spot. They haven’t. They’ve been a poor shooting team for the entire season. read more…
Keeping with our tradition of posting any random list, subjective ranking, or otherwise unsubstantiated article that casts JMU in a favorably light, we need to bring your attention to this list of the 20 Colleges With the Most Hardcore Sports Fans. Our dear old alma mater checks in at number 16. Yes, we said 16.
We understand nobody is going to print off “16th Best” t-shirts for this (or any other) honor, but it’s pretty impressive. Especially when you consider that most of the schools ranked above JMU have won multiple national championships. Of course there’s always the exception that proves the rule. It’s still a damn fine list of schools to be associated with.
If JMU does in fact have the 16th most hardcore sports fans though, it brings up two important questions. Why doesn’t this blog get more traffic? And don’t JMU fans deserve a better blog anyway?
Today is National Signing Day. It’s an exciting day for college football fans, albeit one that often serves as evidence that they hype surrounding the game can sometimes overshadow the game itself. With that being said, like most of you, we were very anxious to see what sort of recruits Coach Withers and his staff could sign in their first year. While it’s impossible to really evaluate any recruits until after they played, there are a few general things about the class that we find encouraging. read more…
Well, the men’s team went on the road to Towson’s nice new arena to take on the CAA Preseason favorite Tigers and the conference’s best player Jerelle Benimon. Ultimately, the results were about as expected as the Dukes fell 80-71.