Thursday News:

November 20, 2008 at 9:46 am
Filed under Basketball, Northwestern, Princeton, Today's News

Reports on last night’s Maine game are available on goprincetontigers.com, in the Trentonian, the Trenton Times, the Daily Princetonian and on goblackbears.com.

Shakespearean actor, a capella singing group member and Princeton basketball co-captain? Nick Lake is all of the above.

Three links from Princeton Alumni Weekly: Their coverage of the 42 retirement ceremony, an audio excerpt (.mp3) of Bill Bradley’s speech from that evening and finally a short preview of the 2008-09 Princeton Tigers.

Northwestern (2-0) won their second straight, 66-48 over Texas A&M - Corpus Christi. In the game, Wildcat Craig Moore set the school record for most career three pointers.

Around the Ivy League: An impressive 62-57 win for Brown (1-2) at Holy Cross. Harvard (1-0) started their season in fine form, collecting an 80-69 victory at New Hampshire.

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Maine pictures.

November 19, 2008 at 10:55 pm
Filed under Basketball, Photos, Princeton

Pictures courtesy of Stephen Goldsmith.

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Maine 58 Princeton 55 (OT).

November 19, 2008 at 9:36 pm
Filed under 08-09, Audio, Basketball, Princeton

Box Score

Postgame audio - Coach Sydney Johnson, Zach Finley & Kareem Maddox:

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Princeton led for most of the night, but Maine led when it mattered most - at the final buzzer.

The visiting Black Bears rallied from seven points down with six minutes remaining to force overtime and then held off the Tigers in the extra frame for a 58-55 victory.

Maine improved to 3-0 on the season with the win while Princeton fell to 0-2.

“Our inexperience showed,” said Princeton coach Sydney Johnson after the tough loss. “I don’t think that we had a good understanding that we were controlling the game. It is painful to have to learn this way.”

Freshman Doug Davis was the Tigers’ high man for the second straight outing, scoring 14 points on 6-12 shooting. Dan Mavraides added a career-best 13 off the bench, 11 in the first half.

For Maine, Kaimondre Owes recorded 11 and Junior Bernal tallied 10. The Black Bears’ leading scorer, Mark Socoby, was 0-6 from the floor and did not score until OT.

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Wednesday News:

November 19, 2008 at 10:06 am
Filed under Basketball, Northwestern, Princeton, Richmond, Today's News

Today’s Game: Maine (2-0 / 0-0) vs. Princeton (0-1 / 0-0)
Location: Jadwin Gym - Princeton, NJ
Time: 7:00 pm ET
Radio: 103.3 fm WPRB
TV: N/A
Internet: goprincetontigers.com
Series History: This is the first meeting between the two teams.
Last meeting: This is the first meeting between the two teams.

Texas A&M-CC vs. Northwestern - 8:00 pm ET - bigtennetwork.com

Brown vs. Holy Cross - 7:00 pm ET
Harvard vs. New Hampshire - 7:00 pm ET

Only one preview of tonight’s game - it is in the Trentonian.

Town Topics has their story about the Central Michigan game live.

Richmond (1-1) lost to Syracuse 76-71 at the Carrier Dome.

Northwestern hosts Texas A&M - Corpus Christi tonight in Evanston. Wildcat head coach Bill Carmody has more confidence in his bench this season.

Around the Ivy League: In NIT action, Cornell (2-1) rebounded with a 82-72 victory over Loyola (Md.). Penn (0-2) played at Drexel’s gym for the first time, walking home with a 66-64 loss. Despite a career-high 28 points by Alex Barnett, Dartmouth (0-2) fell 100-82 to Providence. Yale (0-2) was walloped by Vermont, 89-58.

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Tuesday News:

November 18, 2008 at 9:19 am
Filed under Basketball, Georgetown, Oregon State, Princeton, Recruiting, Richmond, Today's News

Richmond vs. Syracuse - 6:00 pm ET - ESPN

Penn vs. Drexel - 10:00 am ET - ESPN
Cornell vs. Loyola (Md.) - 4:30 pm ET - NIT Preseason Tip-Off
Yale vs. Vermont - 7:00 pm ET
Dartmouth vs. Providence - 7:30 pm ET

Princeton freshman Doug Davis was named the season’s first Ivy League Rookie of the Week. Penn’s Tyler Bernardini took home Player of the Week honors. TigerBlog puts Davis’ first game in historical context.

The Princeton Packet writes up the Tigers’ season-opener.

Georgetown (1-0) had four players in double figures, besting Jacksonville 71-62. The Washington Post and the Washington Times have more on the game.

Richmond plays at Syracuse tonight in the O’Reilly Auto Parts CBE Classic.

Two top-150 recruits made it official and signed with Oregon State.

Princeton is 14th in this week’s Schuylkill 16.

Around the Ivy League: Cornell (1-1) lost 86-75 to St. John’s. Brown (0-2) was blown out by George Mason, 89-52.

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Monday News:

November 17, 2008 at 9:38 am
Filed under Basketball, Georgetown, Northwestern, Princeton, Today's News

Jacksonville vs. Georgetown - 7:30 pm ET - MASN

Brown vs. George Mason - 7:00 pm ET
Cornell vs. St. John’s - 9:30 pm ET - NIT Preseason Tip-Off

Georgetown starts their season at home against Jacksonville tonight. The Washington Post previews “the next generation” of Hoya basketball.

Northwestern (1-0) shut down Central Arkansas, 81-39, the school’s largest margin of victory in 15 years. The Wildcats shot 60.9% from the field.

The Daily Princetonian files their report on the Tigers’ loss to Central Michigan.

The Maine Black Bears, Princeton’s next opponent, are 2-0 after winning the 100 Club Classic Championship.

Around the Ivy League: Columbia (1-1) lost 71-50 at Seton Hall.

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FIT 49 Mercer 42.

November 16, 2008 at 11:02 pm
Filed under 08-09, Basketball, Howie Levy, MCCC, Photos

I had some free time this afternoon to catch a Mercer County Community College game. The Vikings were playing FIT in the second day of the Mercer Classic. On Saturday, Mercer dropped a 73-72 decision to nationally ranked CCRI.

Former Tiger assistant Howie Levy has his team running many offensive sets that should be familiar to Princeton observers. During the course of Sunday’s action, plays called “Chin,” “Princeton,” “Circle,” “Forwards Out” and “Georgetown” were each set in motion.

Four games into the season, the Vikings are slowly learning what Coach Levy wants them to do, but reverted back to bad habits when the game was not going their way. “You just have to make [execution] their habit,” Levy told me after the game. “When it works, it works - they just haven’t done it enough and don’t have faith in it yet.”

Without a true big man who is, in Levy’s words, “different,” the Vikings are forced to play five near-identical, interchangeable players, each around 6′2″. Mercer has a wide back-up center who was the first player off their bench, but he is not 100%, recovering from a shoulder injury.

Stephen Goldsmith came with me to take some photographs - which you can see, along with some additional observations, after the jump.

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Sunday News:

November 16, 2008 at 9:48 am
Filed under Basketball, Chris Young, Denver, Northwestern, Princeton, Richmond, Today's News

Central Arkansas vs. Northwestern - 2:00 pm ET - bigtennetwork.com
FIT vs. MCCC - 2:00 pm ET

Columbia vs. Seton Hall - 1:00 pm ET

Richmond (1-0) defeated Randolph Macon 81-57.

Denver (0-1) lost their 32nd straight road game. The Pioneers were up on Northern Iowa by one with 4:22 left, eventually falling 61-56 in Cedar Falls.

Northwestern tips off their season against Central Arkansas this afternoon. The Wildcats are in position to increase their win total this year, according to the Daily Herald.

Sports Illustrated’s Luke Winn has conducted a fascinating “Hoops Ideology Report”, polling 301 of the 341 Division I college basketball programs. 5.3% of respondents say they are running some version of “the Princeton offense.” Can you name them all before you click on the above link? No peaking.

Chris Young can’t believe Trevor Hoffman will most likely not be a Padres next year. Young was one of several San Diego players who participated in the Adrian Gonzalez-Jim Stone Extravaganza golf tournament, raising money for the South Bay Family YMCA.

Around the Ivy League: Penn (0-1) lost by 15 at top-ranked North Carolina. Darmouth (0-1) was dropped by Army, 63-48.

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Twitter. Not crazy about it, but trying it.

November 15, 2008 at 4:51 pm
Filed under Administrative, Basketball, Princeton

I’m the first to admit that I don’t quite get Twitter, the web site built to provide real-time one line updates on your life. Many of my friends use it, and I am still convinced I don’t need to know their every move.

That being said, I think Twitter might have a two-fold practical application for princetonbasketball.com.

1. It can tell you when there is new content added to our site.

2. It would provide the chance to send breaking updates from games - for example, last night I might have posted “Strittmatter and Ma both out with injuries” to Twitter when I got to Jadwin.

So, despite my personal reservations, I’ve set up a Twitter account, which can be accessed here. It is a private account, so you will need to send me an approval request to see what I’m posting.

Like the idea? Hate the idea? Have no idea what Twitter is? I’m curious to hear thoughts on how this new innovation can be best-used and if it would actually be of use.

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Scorecard here. Get your Princeton scorecard here.

November 15, 2008 at 1:59 pm
Filed under Administrative, Basketball, Princeton

Last night at Jadwin Gym, the most popular question people asked me that I had no direct control over was “why isn’t there a scorecard in the program?”

As someone who always uses the program scorecard to assist with my note-taking during Princeton games, I was unprepared for this change.

Never again!

I’ve drawn up a complimentary, rudimentary scorecard (.pdf) you can use for the rest of this season.

Print it before each game, tuck it in your pocket and you won’t get caught scrambling once you settle into your seat.

Jon Solomon
princetonbasketball.com

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