Really Dazz Thornton?! Really?!
Look, if Dazz was disqualified in another season, say one where Coach Brady wasn’t being forced to karmically pay back some old, misguided deal with the Devil, the Dukes might survive. But right now, when the locker room has turned into an externship opportunity for JMU’s huge (and obnoxious at graduation) RN program, was the absolute worst time for him to prove unable to live up to the extraordinary academic pressures placed on college basketball players. Apparently the crushing weight of Teaching Team Sports – KIN 211 was just too much for the young fellow. Or maybe River Canoeing – KIN 139* on Newman Lake, what with the intricacies of the bowsweep turn and the correct pronunciation of ‘gunwale’ was just beyond Mr. Thornton.
But in any case, this is just the latest in a series of tough breaks for the Dukes: First our incredible sophomore point guard, Devon Moore, goes out for the season. Then fellow super-soph Andrey Semenov joins him on the IR. And now Thornton. Tough to overcome 3 of your top 8 guys being out for the year before conference play is really even in full swing. And that’s without even mentioning games missed due to suspension from the two leading scorers, Wells and Bowles.
Unbelievably, Brady has begun to amass enough talent that the Dukes still have the firepower to play with anyone in the CAA on a given night and maybe, just maybe, if they can avoid further disaster (long shot), they might just be ready to make a sleeper-run in Richmond even if their seeding and overall record suffers now. But as we here at sportsBlog HQ have discussed in watching the team the last couple weeks, you have to wonder what kind of toll this is taking on the few remaining players, and especially those really shouldering the load (i.e. Wells and Bowles) who are being forced to play insane minutes. Not surprisingly, the squad just seems to wear down a bit late in every game and any type of foul trouble is felt even deeper than it othewrise would.
But there is good news: 1) Ben Louis can make gamewinners for us, 2) maybe Rockheed McCarter’s athletic career in the Valley isn’t quite over yet, and best of all, 3) the next four games are televised, including this Thursday night’s game in Williamsburg against the King and Queen/Wren/Pug/Griffins and the big rivalry game at the Convo on Saturday against Mason. Check your local listings and support the Dukes!
* I also took , and struggled with, both of these classes during my (inexplicably) long and very (un)distinguished career at JMU so no offense meant to Dazz. For the record, former Field Hockey star Karen Zarchin was in that team sports class. Concentration for a freshman with a senior of her “caliber” was just too much to ask. In the River Canoeing Class, which was (and may still be) actually taught on Newman Lake, the tough part was that the Final Exam practicum was on some raging (i.e. rippling) river southwest of campus. I ALSO took Racquetball – seriously, I friggin’ love JMU!!!
Ben Louis, big man on campus.
Ben Louis hit a game winning trey with 1.5 seconds remaining to lift the Dukes to a 69-66 victory over Townson this afternoon. Big, big shot off a great feed by Pierre Curtis. OK, so I’m not sure if anyone has ever callled the 6’3″ Junior from Australia, Big Shot Ben. But I do know, he hit a last second three to close out the first half and then closed the game with another clutch three. That’s worthy of a nickname for at least tonight, right? I’ve also got to imagine a game winning three in the afternoon equals pretty good odds with the ladies come nightfall. Godspeed to you Ben.
As we’ve come to expect, Julius Wells and Denzel Bowles each had good games. Wells hit on 5-13 from beyond the arc and finished with 23 points. Bowles chipped in 21 points and 8 rebounds. As Smokin Al Koken repeatedly stated throughout the telecast, Bowles showed tremendous patience and really let the game come to him. He didn’t get many looks offensively in the opening 10 minutes, but made his presence felt on the defensive end. He finished with 6 blocked shots.
One thing we consistently have been saying is that the Dukes need a reliable third scorer to emerge. This afternoon Darren White and Ben Louis both stepped up. Each of them had 10 points. Louis obviously was feeling it at the right time and White showed some tremendous athleticism. He’s young, but he’s got the talent to be really, really good. The kid can absolutely jump out of the gym.
Coach Brady seemed pretty frustrated with his team’s inconsistency. I’ve got say, I completely agree. Even with the injuries, JMU has enough talent to compete with any team in the conference, if (and this is a big if) they can play for a full 40 minutes. The Dukes were in position to really blow Towson out midway through the second half and then they just went to sleep. They came through in the end, but there were definite lapses when the entire team just lost focus. I get the feeling that doesn’t sit well with Coach Brady. We’ll see how the look Thursday against William & Mary.
Bet you didn’t know that the Women’s team’s Dawn Evans is leading the entire country in scoring at nearly 28 per and treys at over 4 a night. And she deserves at least this really small picture I found!
Bad*ass!
Here’s the official wrapup on JMU Sportsof last night’s 68-60 win a tough Georgia St. team that entered the game 10-2. The ladies have won eight straight at the Convo.
In other news: if you’re reading this at night, don’t think you can’t click over here to the stadium cam and not get anything. The crew’s been putting in some late nights using the stadium lights to work. Needless to say this delights us here at JMUSportsBlog HQ. Hoping for rebar soon!
As for the men, while we wait for the men’s team to come together, let’s all enjoy what we have to look forward to in March in Richmond: Thank you Kent Culucko (and Taryn Culucko).
JMUSB’s favorite team, Field Hockey, had five players named All-State. Might not be a big deal in other sports, but lots of great teams in the state for Hockey and Coach Lucas’ girls are the real deal.
Rumor mill is cranking about next season’s finalized Football schedule and word is the one team we’ll avoid from the North is New Hampshire, which would be a nice break for a change. On the other hand, scuttlebutt says Aaron Corp may be transferring from USC (yeah, the Pete Carroll, Marcus Allen one) and joining none other than the Richmond Ticks. Please submit early favorites for taunting chants at your leisure.
Lastly, please look out for a very special bonus post related to a true Harrisonburg landmark this weekend in honor of JMUSB’s Senior Lifestyle Correspondent, Uncle Ron’s, birthday!
Coach Mickey Matthews, now under contract until 2014
Our boy Deta can rejoice as Jeff Bourne extends Coach Matthews through 2014.
We wish this could have included news about a Dukes win over ODU, but it’s a great wrap up of this week’s CAA men’s hoop action regardless.
Another blogger captures the mid-major highlights from the week, including JMU & the CAA.
The makeup date for the JMU – Radford hoops game is all set.
Former Duke, JD Skolnitsky signs a futures contract with the Redskins.
CAA commish reassured the northern teams, or at least pretended too in this Portland Press Herald story from Maine, that they’re a valued part of the conference.
The Dukes’ women come up short in the CAA opener and fall out of the Top 25, but Dawn Evans leads the nation in scoring.
Five JMU ladies find themselves on the All-State field hockey team.
I was pretty sure this story died years ago, but apparently not. A federal judge rejected a bid to reinstate 10 eliminated varsity sports.
And finally, JMU lands at #21 on the Top 100 best values in public colleges list. Other Virginia schools on the list include UVa (wear ties to football games, nuff said), William & Mary (hang out a delis), & Virginia Tech (put WAY too many school stickers on their cars).
Last year, JMU was able to go on the road and shock the ODU Monarchs. Tonight, JMU battled with ODU the whole game, but couldn’t pull out the win. The Monarchs prevailed 74-72. We can’t ignore the fact that ODU is consistently near the top of the CAA, the fact that they’re pretty tough to beat in Norfolk, nor the fact that this JMU team is down 2 starters. Man, it would have been nice for JMU to pull this one off though.
Our JMU Sports Blog Norfolk Branch checked in after returning from the Ted. They summed it up like this:
Good crowd tonight, with JMU well represented. It was a pretty exciting game, but it obviously didn’t have the ending we wanted. The big man (Bowles) missed a tough reverse layup down the stretch that could have put JMU up, but he and Wells both looked really solid.
Julius Wells picked up where he left off Monday night and was good for 29 and 6. He had a great night from long distance, hitting on 7 or 12 from downtown. Denzel Bowles had another solid night in his return home to the Hampton Road area. He finished with 17 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 blocks. That’s below his scoring average, but a pretty awesome effort in what was his first big conference test, facing Gerald Lee, a first team All-CAA selection last season. It’s clear Wells and Bowles have the talent to go off for big numbers on any given night. They’re both playing a lot of minutes though and JMU is in dire need of a consistent third scoring option. Coach Brady has this team past the point of settling for moral victories, but a strong effort like tonight’s on the road, is definitely a good sign. I can’t wait to see the rematch at the Convo.
JMU got back on track and ended its 2 game skid, with a 71-65 win over Delaware at the Convo. Denzel Bowles returned from his one game suspension and had 26 points and 10 rebounds. Julius Wells poured in 24 points. For those of you that can’t do the math, that means the duo combined for 50 points! That’s pretty much all you need to know.
Wells is proving that he can score and Bowles is proving that so far, he’s certainly worth the hype. However, Wells launched 12 threes, hitting 4 and is shooting 36% behind the arc for the season. That’s not a bad percentage from long range, but he also had 7 turnovers gving him 40 for the season. I think the turnovers reflect the fact that without Bowles for a large portion of the season, he’s had to shoulder way too much of the load for this team. I’m confident he’ll cut down on the turnovers as he continues to mature. For the Dukes to compete with the stronger CAA teams, they’re going to need larger offensive contributions from others besides the big duo. We’ll see who steps up Wednesday night against Old Dominion in Norfolk.
Former JMU Duke, Charles Haley
When I first heard the stories of Charles Haley’s pranks, outbursts, and locker room antics, I laughed and thought to myself “that dude had major issues.” Unfortunately, it turns out that the former JMU great has been diagnosed with bi-polar disorder. And I’m pretty sure that makes me an ass. Brad Townsend reports on Haley’s struggle with mental illness in Sunday’s Dallas Morning News. It’s a must read article for all Dukes’ fans. Here are some snippets:
“I left a road of destruction when I played,” he says.
Haley isn’t referring to the linemen he annihilated en route to 100 ½ sacks and more Super Bowl victories, five, than any player.
He’s talking about the other carnage. The teammates and coaches he “wronged.” Some of the writers he cursed. And, most regrettably, the 19-year marriage he wrecked.
Haley’s teammates and family encouraged him to talk about his disorder and. It seems as if he’s making some positive strides:
They note that after years of struggling with bipolar disorder, Haley now manages the dramatic mood swings through therapy, medicine and personal resolve.
They say they have been heartened by his spiritual growth and atonements, especially during the past year. Now they want to help him repair two decades of collateral damage.
Despite their divorce, Haley’s ex-wife Karen, continues to be one of his biggest supporters in his quest for enshrinement:
“I’m very proud to witness his transformation,” she says. “I don’t use that word often, but I really feel it has been a transformation.
“One thing I think is unfair is that once people have a mental image of a person, it generally doesn’t change. I’m worried the negativity will prevent Charles from being in the Hall of Fame – and he is so deserving.”
The article continues to shed some light on Haley as a father and talks about how much he leans on Karen to this day:
“I don’t even know why she would talk to me, man, because I was out of control most of my life,” Haley says. “But she’s been there, directing me, helping me. She’s a strong black woman – I mean strong. I’ve never moved on. She’s always been the love of my life, and I feel she’ll always be part of my life. I’ve never been able to care for anybody like I do for her.”
Definitely read the whole article. It paints a different picture of Haley than most of us probably had in our heads. The 15 Hall of Fame finalists are announced this Friday. Todd and I have already gone on the record stating how badly we’d like to see Haley get elected. (Ed. note: Yes, in the very same post I joked about how Haley had issues. Again, I’m an ass.) Now, I’ve got to imagine that even non-JMU fans will be pulling for him as well. At the very least, I sincerely hope he’s able to continue to make positive steps towards controlling his disorder.
Why yes. This is the same pic of Wells we always use.
JMU fell to 0-2 in CAA play with a 73-61 loss to Northeastern yesterday. It’s not exactly time to hit the panic button, but I’m starting to get an eerie feeling about this team. Twelve points isn’t a blow-out, but Northeastern got off to a hot start, building a 9-0 lead, and never looked back. The Huskies ended up with a season high 18 assists and shot over 50% from the field, while knocking down 10 of 21 from behind the arc.
The good news for JMU was that Julius Wells hit on 4 of 6 from three point land and finished with a game high 18 points. JMU also had 18 fewer turnovers than last game, but I don’t think that counts as good news since they were coming off a 26 turnover stinker at Stanford. The bad news is that the injuries to Moore and Semenov seem to be catching up to this team. Wells played 40 minutes again, and was forced to carry the offensive load for a team short on options. Which brings us to the really bad news, Denzel Bowles missed the game because he was suspended by Coach Brady for a violation of team rules. The Dean Keener Dukes seemed to have a team rule prohibiting big men from actually being productive, which Bowles would certainly be in violation of. I’m pretty sure that rule wasn’t carried over to the Brady error though. I have no idea what Denzel did. I just hope it wasn’t too serious and that he’s back on the court this week. This team will struggle in conference play without him.
So Todd and I had this grand plan to do a complete sport by sport retrospective for the decade. That obviously isn’t going to happen. We’re new at this and didn’t realize that such project would require, well, lots and lots of work. Lesson learned. I’m pretty sure it would have been AWESOME though. We’ll make it up to you with an epic wrap up of the next decade in 10 years. Write it down.
Anyway, we thought we’d take a quick look back and think about some of the highlights, lowlights, and other memories that stood out from the decade that was in JMU sports.
Biggest Disappointment
Let’s get this one out of the way early. For me this one is pretty obvious, the men’s hoops team took a huge step back the past decade. This very well may go down as the lost decade for JMU basketball. What was it, like 8 straight losing seasons? Several years where the football team had more wins than the hoops team? Pretty pathetic. I don’t want to take anything away from the players, but it’s fair to say we had some coaches not live up to expectations. Luckily, Coach Brady and the team appear to have the program on the right track and ready to compete again in the CAA. We look forward to writing about multiple CAA championships and March Madness runs in the 1o years.
Todd’s take: Seriously, my annual day off work for the piligrimage to Richmond to play in the UPS Truck for the conference tourney has just been disastrous. Groundhog day: Go to Deta’s place, roll to Penny Lane, a few pints, and off to join the crowd (if 358 is a crowd) to watch the Dukes take on Northeastern of Ga. State or some other boring opponent on play-in day. Not sure we’ve scored more than 60 in a tourney game this decade. Icchhh. This is the year!
The men’s team undertook a sweet roadtrip and a bold step up in competition by traveling to Stanford last night. But despite huge numbers from Bowles (which thankfully seems to be more than a trend), this game actually wasn’t quite as close as the 80-76 score might indicate (but we’ll take it for sure and good work fellas). Wells hit 3 treys late, including two semi-garbage time in the last ten seconds to make it tight. The first one did cut it to six with :30 to play. If this were actually a tourney game, we’d of been dancing in the aisles and chuckin’ streamers at that point. From the little we could glean from following this online, Rob said:
seems like the typical “small school shows potential and then loses in the end” sort game. Bowles is definitely holding his own though and it was a smart move to schedule this game regardless of whether or not the Dukes win. Lots of turnovers for the Dukes. Even if JMU doesn’t win, this is a great pre-conf game to schedule. Going cross country will prepare them for CAA road trips and playing a PAC-10 team is always good.
Thankfully, the badass Lady Dukes proved they deserved to stay in the Top 25 by running Lafayette out of the Convo faster than Rockheed McCarter can switch sports. Apparently the Leopards are good for at least two things: whining about playoff berths despite a conference that couldn’t produce a winner even if it were D3 and padding JMU’s pre-conference resume. JMU 86, Lafayette 54
In other WBB news, word is that this is going to be handed out to early arrivals for the women’s game on Sunday, January 17th: 
Men’s team hosts archrival Mason the day before so should make for a good MLK weekend in the ‘Burg. No word yet on whether MM’s vein’s bust out of a reddening face when bobbling or if this will have a companion piece of a CAA zebra for him to chew out.
