college of charleston – Rush The Court

RTC Bracket Prep: Midwest Region

Walker Carey — Tue, 13 Mar 2018 19:35:31 +0000

Yesterday and today we will be rolling out our region-by-region analysis for the 2018 NCAA Tournament. Here, Walker Carey (@walkerRcarey) breaks down the Midwest Region from top to bottom. Also, be sure to follow our RTC Midwest Region handle on Twitter for continuous updates the next two weeks (@RTCMWRegion).

Favorite: #2 Duke (26-7, 13-5 ACC). While Kansas is the top seed in the region, Duke’s overall talent makes the Blue Devils the favorite. According to KenPom, Duke ranks third in the country in offensive efficiency and seventh in defensive efficiency. The Blue Devils are led by senior guard Grayson Allen (15.7 PPG, 4.5 APG) and [...]

Balance and Efficiency Taking UNC Wilmington to New Heights

Tommy Lemoine — Wed, 18 Jan 2017 14:01:43 +0000

Perhaps no box score better encapsulates UNC Wilmington this season than its 101-77 drubbing of William & Mary last Wednesday. By night’s end, six Seahawks had reached double figures—three with 18 points, two with 14 and one with 11—as the team shot a blistering 70 percent from inside the arc and forced 17 turnovers. It was the second straight game in which five players eclipsed double-figures, and the fourth time this season that UNC Wilmington had scored 100. Put simply, Kevin Keatts’ unit pushed the pace, created good looks and capitalized more often than not. Now 17-2 and ranked #43 [...]

Digging Through the Low Mids For Possible At-Large Bids

Shane McNichol — Sat, 07 Jan 2017 15:01:14 +0000

The path to the NCAA Tournament for any mid-major starts out simply: Win the conference tournament. The alternative is to build an impressive non-conference resume and cross your fingers on Selection Sunday. Ask last year’s Saint Mary’s team that went 27-5 and was relegated to the NIT. As the Gaels learned a year ago, the Selection Committee places the bar exceptionally high and scheduling is a significant factor. A lackluster non-conference resume meant that St. Mary’s two regular season games against Gonzaga held great value (which it swept), but a pair of losses against an uninspiring Pepperdine squad sealed the Gaels’ fate. The exact recipe [...]

O26 Power 13: New Year, New Order, Same Teams on Top

Tommy Lemoine — Wed, 04 Jan 2017 22:01:26 +0000

With 2017 now upon us and conference play ramping up, let’s take a step back and reexamine the best of the best across the O26.

1. Gonzaga (14-0) – West Coast. Despite its cast of untested newcomers, chemistry and balance have not been an issue for Gonzaga this season. The Bulldogs have cruised to a 14-0 start behind a lineup whose top six scorers all average between 9.3 and 13.8 points per game. In fact, only two players—Nigel Williams-Goss and Przemek Karnowski—get more than 30 minutes per night, thanks largely to the effectiveness of bench players like Zach Collins (10.5 PPG, [...]

Morning Five: 07.09.14 Edition

nvr1983 — Wed, 09 Jul 2014 13:01:15 +0000

Here’s hoping everyone out there is enjoying the summer and had a safe and happy Independence Day holiday weekend. Legitimate college basketball news remains somewhat incorporeal at this time of year (unless you enjoy silly contrivances over which coach is the “best” at his job), but over the last week-plus there have been a few stories that have made their way into the chattering class. The one that probably holds the most interest from a train wreck meets a dumpster fire convergence is the ongoing saga of former North Carolina guard Rashad McCants. At this point, UNC fans no doubt wish [...]

Don’t Look Now But Chane Behanan is Already Reinstated

Mike Lemaire — Mon, 11 Nov 2013 21:41:49 +0000

In October, Louisville coach Rick Pitino held a press conference in which he announced the indefinite suspension of star forward Chane Behanan for violating university policy. Pitino explained the suspension by saying, “This is not about basketball. This is about Chane Behanan becoming the person I think he can become.” Well, apparently it took all of 25 days for Behanan to become that person, because this morning Pitino announced that Behanan was reinstated and could play tomorrow night when the Cardinals play Hofstra.

Chane Behanan Will Be Back On The Court As Early As Tuesday

This announcement shouldn’t be all that surprising considering how quickly Behanan has managed [...]

Who Won the Week? Illinois, DePaul and Fans Everywhere…

Kenny Ocker — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 21:21:32 +0000

Who Won the Week? is a regular column that will outline and discuss three winners and losers from the previous week. The author of this column is Kenny Ocker (@KennyOcker), an Oregon-based sportswriter best known for his willingness to drive (or bike!) anywhere to watch a basketball game.

WINNER: The Fans

Fans, this horrible week is over. You’ve been freed, just like Arsalan Kazemi. (Also, can we please ignore the fact that a UO student misspelled “anchor”? I got my degree from there, and so did this photographer, and neither of us seemed to have any issues with that word.) [...]

ATB: Revival of Tennessee’s Offense, Belmont’s Place In the OVC, and Anthony Bennett’s FrOY Candidacy…

Chris Johnson — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:15:53 +0000

Chris Johnson is an RTC columnist. He can be reached @ChrisDJohnsonn.

Tonight’s Lede. Finals Week Is Nearly Gone. On a night dominated by talks of revolutionary conference transformation and the impending destruction of one of the sport’s proudest and most successful leagues in the past quarter century, paying any real attention to games – outside of a few noteworthy outcomes – was hardly anyone’s first priority. The good news is, thanks to the college hoops fan nightmare we like to call finals week, there weren’t many games worth watching in the first place. If you’re looking for big storylines or massive [...]

Tipping Off the Big East Countdown: #9 St. John’s

Dan Lyons — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 19:22:45 +0000

Few programs in the country went through the adversity that St. John’s found itself facing last season. Head coach Steve Lavin underwent surgery to treat prostate cancer in October of last year, and he was only able to coach four games in early November before deciding to sit out for the rest of the season. Multiple key players left during the season for various reasons, and at times the Red Storm were only able to play with a six-man rotation of scholarship players. This year should prove to be a challenge for the Johnnies, especially after the departure of Moe Harkless following last season, [...]

Morning Five: National Championship Monday

nvr1983 — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 11:00:05 +0000

In a rather surprising move, Kansas State announced that it was hiring Bruce Weber to be its next head coach. Weber replaces Frank Martin who left the school earlier in the week to take over at South Carolina (technically that was more surprising than the Weber hire). Weber, who has a 313-155 record in stops at Southern Illinois and Illinois, reached the national championship game at Illinois in 2005, but was criticized by Illini fans for having done so with Bill Self’s recruits and then failing to land many of the top recruits out of Illinois. Now he will be tasked with running a program [...]

Morning Five: 03.20.12 Edition

nvr1983 — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 11:00:12 +0000

Yesterday, the eyes of the college basketball world were fixated on a hypothetical operating room in Chapel Hill, North Carolina where North Carolina point guard Kendall Marshall underwent surgery to repair a fractured scaphoid. Right now information on the procedure and the outcome is limited outside of the usual useless PR information we always get. For right now we are getting conflicting reports with some people saying that Marshall hopes to play while others are saying it is unlikely he will play. In reality, the only people who are capable of making that prediction are Marshall and the orthopedic surgeon who operated on him. [...]

ACC Morning Five: 01.30.12 Edition

mpatton — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 13:01:02 +0000

CBSSports.com: Gregg Doyel hits the nail on the head in this column (by the way, Doyel covered the ACC for the Charlotte Observer before going to CBSSports.com and wasn’t exactly close with Mike Krzyzewski over the years) on Duke‘s Cameron Crazies. The one caveat is that he didn’t really offer a solution to the boredom and lack of ownership. For comparison’s sake Coach K offered his thoughts (courtesy of Duke Hoop Blog):

“Our crowd sometimes becomes fans instead of part of the game. Overall, our crowd has been part of what we’ve done. They haven’t come there to watch us play. [...]

Morning Five: 01.30.12 Edition

nvr1983 — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 12:00:10 +0000

While all season-ending injuries are disheartening, the one that has taken Kevin Parrom out for season is especially difficult after all he has had to endure recently. Parrom as you probably remember was shot while visiting his ailing mother in New York City just a short time before she died, which was a few months after his grandmother passed away. Parrom, who had been showing signs of playing like he used to recently, was dealt another setback as he will be out for the rest of the season after breaking his right foot in Arizona‘s two-point loss to Washington on Saturday. Fortunately, [...]

Checking In On… the Southern Conference

rtmsf — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 14:01:03 +0000

Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Southern Conference and Atlantic Sun Conference and a contributor to the RTC SEC Microsite. You can find him on Twitter @EricDMoyer

Reader’s Take

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Looking Back

Davidson created some separation in the South Division, besting Charleston, 87-69, on Saturday. The Cougars then lost at Georgia Southern on Monday to fall behind the Eagles, as well as Wofford, in the South standings. Jake Cohen led the Wildcats as he matched his career-high with 29 points (24 coming in the first half). In the North Division, Elon remained in first place, defeating preseason favorite Chattanooga, 88-87, on [...]

Checking In On… the Southern Conference

rtmsf — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 21:53:55 +0000

Eric Moyer is the RTC correspondent for the Southern Conference. You can find him on Twitter @EricDMoyer.

Reader’s Take

Take Our Poll

Looking Back

In the only regular-season meeting between Western Carolina and Davidson, the Wildcats established SoCon supremacy by beating the Catamounts, 88-67, in a contest between the early division leaders on Thursday. Jake Cohen, who entered averaging 12.4 points per game, torched the Catamounts for 26 points and connected on all four of his three-point attempts. Davidson has now won 13 of its last 14 SoCon regular-season games, dating back to last season. Meanwhile, College of Charleston – who entered Thursday one game [...]