Ray Floriani of College Chalktalk is the RTC correspondent for the MAAC and NEC Conferences.

LYNDHURST, NJ – The MAAC plays a few conference games prior to the New Year, so the time was appropriate to get a tempo free look at the results.

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Ray Floriani of College Chalktalk is the RTC correspondent for the MAAC and NEC Conferences.

SOUTH ORANGE , NJ –  Looking at the non-conference schedules you can’t accuse Loyola or Siena with loading up on sure Ws. Loyola had a stretch of 7 games in 16 days where the Greyhounds faced an ACC team (Boston College) , three defending conference champions (Mt. St.Mary’s, Cornell and Davidson), a preseason conference favorite (Vermont) and Tennessee St., who played in its conference championship game last season. Loyola did defeat Mt. St. Mary’s and Tennessee State but came up on the other side of the ledger in the remaining contests.

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Indiana & Kelvin Sanctions (cont.). The big news of the day was of course that Indiana managed to avoid postseason sanctions even though they’ll formally be on probation for the next three seasons.  Kelvin Sampson, to his credit, took responsibility for the complete lack of oversight at Indiana ‘while on his watch,’ but at least once Tom Crean gets this program moving in the right direction again, the Hoosiers won’t also be burdened by the crimson scarlet letter of postseason sanctions.  Recruits can still be sold on the basis of playing in the postseason at Indiana (although admittedly, that seems farfetched at this point, even within three years).  Sampson is now working for the Milwaukee Bucks as an assistant, but he’s now effectively barred from coaching in the NCAA for the next five years as part of a ‘show cause’ restriction (a school would have to show cause for the NCAA to allow it to hire him).  Frankly, this seems to us like a penalty that was ‘easy’ for the NCAA to prove, but one that doesn’t necessarily fit when we know of so many other obvious recruiting violations that are simply untidy for prosecution and therefore ignored.

Games of the Night. We had two great games today, for the first time all season.

• Notre Dame 81, Texas 80. This game was nearly everything we expected, and a little more (featured by Justin Mason, below).  Notre Dame was led by Luke Harangody’s 29/13 and a 40-footer at the shot clock expiration to what seemed like a solid win with a minute to go, up 79-71.  Then the bricks started – Tory Jackson missed two from the line; Zach Hillesland missed two from the line; then Harongody missed both with five seconds left, leaving the door open for Texas to win the game with a two (ND was only up 81-80 at that time).  Luckily for Notre Dame, AJ Abrams’ 60-footer at the buzzer was just a bit short (but right online).  Good performances abound – ND’s Kyle McAlarney had 19/5 including five threes, and Texas’ was led by AJ Abrams’ 23/5 and Damion James 11/12.  Both of these teams are top ten worthy, in our opinion, and we expect Notre Dame to give Carolina all they want tomorrow evening.

• Syracuse 89, Kansas 81 (OT). This was a phenomenal game with enough eye-popping plays to cause Beetlejuice to take notice.  Kansas appeared as if they were going to blow the game open in the mid-second half until Jim Boeheim changed his trapping defense up and seemingly stole the ball a dozen straight times for dunks and layups.  This 13-2 run led to a tight game down the stretch which was capped by Jonny Flynn’s (25/5 assts) dagger three with 6.4 seconds remaining (see below) to effectively send the game to overtime.  Cuse continued its hot shooting in the OT – Andy Rautins and Eric Devendorf combined for six threes in the game – and KU appeared to lose its confidence in the extra period.  KU’s Cole Aldrich (15/14) and SU’s Arinze Onuaku (19/12) both showed a strong skill set in the post as each tried to one-up the other during the game.  Both of these teams are going to be very good this season.

What’s Wrong with Steph Curry? Davidson 78, Loyola (MD) 48. Nothing, that’s what.  As in Steph Curry put up a donut tonight in the points column (get a good look below because we doubt you’ll ever see it again).  The word is that Loyola head man Jimmy Patsos strategized to take Curry completely out of the game by double-teaming him on every offensive possession, anywhere he went on the court.  Curry, happy to let his teammates play every possession 4-on-3, stood in the corner and watched as they got open look after open look (14 threes went down).  Remember, Jimmy Patsos is the coach who decided to leave the bench last week during a game to sit in the stands.  We’re starting to seriously worry that he could be losing his mind.  We’re not sure if a player averaging over 35ppg has ever had a scoreless game, but jeez, Steph, what happened on the three shots you missed?

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Ray Floriani of College Chalk Talk is the RTC correspondent for the MAAC and the NEC Conferences.

NEW YORK CITY – Niagara placed two on the weekly honor roll. Tyrone Lewis was a co-player of the week for his 20 point, 8 block outing in a win over Towson. The eight blocks is not a typo. Lewis, a 5-11 guard, just missed the school record by one. Naturally he set an NU record for guards. Presumably he also has some kind of record for rejections by players under six feet in height.

Co-Player of the Week with Lewis was Brett Harvey, a junior guard for Loyola. Harvey averaged 23.5 ppg and a gaudy 4.0 assist/turnover ratio as the Greyhounds split a pair their opening week.

Kasheif Edwards, a 6-5 freshman forward for Niagara earned Rookie of the Week for a five point, nine rebound outing off the bench in a win over Towson.

Caught Marist’s narrow two point loss at Rutgers last week in the Garden State Classic. Off that contest a number of observers were surprised the Red Foxes were picked at the bottom of the MAAC. They did have a change or overhaul of personnel and there is a new coach in Chucky Martin. He brought the dribble-drive motion offense learned under John Calipari as an assistant at Memphis. The DDM proved to be tough to defend and was instrumental in keeping Marist in the contest. Two nights later, the Red Foxes were routed at home by St. Bonaventure. It’s going to be that type of year. Still, the DDM will be a challenge for conference schools and don’t be surprised if Martin’s club pulls a few surprises along the way.

The Jimmy Patsos incident the other night was a bizarre one to say the least. Patsos can be a little on the ‘vocal’ side on the bench. In a game against Cornell this week Patsos earned a T (technical foul). To his credit he tried to avoid a confrontation with an official and risk ejection even to the point of seeking refuge with Loyola AD Joe Boylan in the stands. From all accounts, the official  seemed to continue the exchange by yelling at the bench. I’m not here to criticize an official  (I have been officiating two decades and know we are not perfect). I will say the camps I attend for officiating want you, if a T is warranted, to make the call and get back in position away from the bench. Let a coach do something crazy to earn another one but avoid being confrontational.

Saw MAAC commissioner Rich Ensor at Coaches vs. Cancer at MSG. Ensor was stopping by before heading to the Old Spice Classic which the MAAC operates. Why aren’t you in Puerto Rico (for Fairfield) I asked. “Even for me that would be a bit much,” he said laughing. Ensor and Co. are excited about the Old Spice Classic which features a Tennessee-Siena meeting in the opening round.

Amidst the rancor of all the games last night, we missed what might have been the most bizarre incident of the evening, and quite possibly, the new season.  During Loyola (MD)’s game with Cornell, Loyola head coach Jimmy Patsos got into a dispute with referee John Gaffney and earned himself a tech.  Later in the game, Patsos claimed that he was attempting to avoid a second technical foul when the following occurred.  From the AP report:

Gaffney then “yelled at me and my assistants,” Patsos said.  Patsos had no idea how to react.  “I didn’t want to get tossed out. I had my hands up in the surrender position,” he said.  Patsos said video of the scene shows Loyola athletic director Joe Boylan in the stands, placing his hands on his head in astonishment. Seconds later, Patsos climbed about two rows into the seats to sit behind Boylan and ask for some advice.  “I didn’t want to hurt the school or the program, but at that point I really didn’t know what to do,” Patsos said.

Photo Credit:  examiner.com

Didn’t know what to do?  This may be way out on a limb, but how about… continuing to coach your team without regard to the referee?  You said that you didn’t want to get thrown out, but weren’t you effectively throwing yourself out with this maneuver?  Patsos eventually came back down from the stands and sat with his team on the bench, but he let his assistant continue to call the plays.  Apparently, this was just one of several bizarre decisions that Patsos made during the game (according to Jeff Goodman).  Cornell, incidentally, won the game 82-72.

We old-timers immediately recalled when then-Northwestern coach Ricky Byrdsong pulled a similar stunt in a 1994 game with Minnesota.  This led to a 12-day, four game absence for Byrdsong (and persistent questions about his sanity prior to his death in 1999) and we wonder if Patsos is heading down the same path in dealing with the stresses of coaching.  To his credit, he’s rebuilt the Loyola (MD) program from a 1-27 disaster in the year prior to his arrival to three consecutive winning seasons.  We just hope that this incident was an isolated one and not a signal that larger issues are facing Patsos than simply how to beat a zone press.

Ron Wellman’s decision to elevate Dino Gaudio to the head coaching position at Wake Forest has been universally lauded by the hoopsnascenti over the last couple of days as a great hire. Nobody will dispute that this decision makes sense in terms of continuity for the program, the players and the university. But if you’ll indulge our playing of devil’s advocate for a moment, we ask the question – is this a good hire from a basketball standpoint?

This is a significantly tougher question to address, largely because Gaudio will be evaluated on games yet unplayed. We can point to his unimpressive records at Army and Loyola as evidence of coaching mediocrity; or, we can just as easily dismiss those situations as tantamount to coaching graveyards, where only the truly special of the business can succeed.

So we thought it could be interesting to see how elevating an assistant from within a program tends to work out, historically speaking. We took a look at all the mid- and high-major programs the last three offseasons (2004-06) that elevated an assistant from within its shop to the head coaching position. FYI – there have been six such examples in 2007 – Butler (Brad Stevens), Frank Martin (Kansas St.), Randy Peele (Winthrop), Jeff Reynolds (Air Force), Bob Nash (Hawaii), and Dino Gaudio (Wake Forest).

In 2004, there were four such instances. Three of those new head coaches have gone on to great success at their programs, and the fourth had a solid first year at his before moving on up the ladder the following offseason.

• Mark Fox – Nevada (following Trent Johnson) : rode Nick Fazekas to an 81-18 record the next three seasons, including two NCAA second round appearances. Contrastingly, his predecessor Johnson has largely struggled over on The Farm.
• Doc Sadler – UTEP (following Billy Gillispie) : Sadler continued the Texas Western renaissance for two seasons there, going 48-18 with one NCAA and one NIT appearance.
• Sean Miller – Xavier (following Thad Matta) : Xavier has continued to flourish under Miller, going 63-32 with two NCAA appearances, including the can you top this game vs. Ohio St. in the second round of 2007 that XU should have won.
• Chris Mooney – Air Force (following Joe Scott) : in his only season at AF, he was 18-12 (a slight drop from 22-7 the year prior) before taking a new job at Richmond.

Can Mark Fox continue his Reno Magic w/o Fazekas?

In 2005, there were only two instances. Here too both could be fairly qualified as successful transitions.

• Dave Rose – BYU (following Steve Cleveland) : in two seasons, Rose has taken the Cougs to one NCAA appearance and one NIT appearance, going 45-18 over that period.
• Andy Kennedy – Cincinnati (following Bob Huggins) : Kennedy enjoyed a 21-13 season in his only at the helm after Thuggins was fired, but what’s most telling is the utter collapse in the season after Kennedy was released by UC. The Bearcats were an atrocious 11-19 overall and dead last in the Big East (2-14) in 2006-07. Great decision there.

Last offseason there were four instances, and in a weird coincidence, two of those assistants were coach’s sons who had been formally groomed to take over the program. In one case, the new coach far exceeded his predecessor; in the others, it was largely status quo.

• Sean Sutton – Oklahoma St. (following Eddie Sutton) : Sean’s first year at the helm for the Pokes was up-and-down. OSU started strong, winning 16 of its first 17 games, but limped into the finish with an overall record of 22-13 (6-10) and losing in the first round of the NIT at home. This was still an improvement over his dad’s final season (17-16) (6-10), however.
• Tony Bennett – Washington St. (following Dick Bennett) : this was the feel-good story of the year, as son Tony updated his dad’s offense and took the Pac-10 and nation by surprise, going 26-8 (13-5) – a fifteen win improvement – and making the program’s first NCAA tournament since 1994.
• Ben Jacobson – Northern Iowa (following Greg McDermott) : this very solid mid-major program had its first non-NCAA appearance in four years during Jacobson’s first season at the helm, as his team sputtered to a pedestrian 18-13 campaign in the very competitive MVC.
• Fred Hill – Rutgers (following Gary Waters) : Hill’s first season is one he’d like to forget, we’re sure. The Scarlet Knights were 10-19 (3-13) and battled with Cincinnati for the distinction as worst team in the Big East all season long. Waters’ final season ended at 19-10, which was a cause for celebration with Rutgers basketball.

Tony Bennett is the Model for Gaudio

Obviously, it’s tough to draw a persuasive conclusion from this sample size, and we also realize that every situation involves different factors. Nevertheless, we find it striking that in seven of the ten instances above, the assistant coach who was elevated either outperformed his predecessor or kept the program at the level of success it already enjoyed (or not enjoyed, as with Oklahoma St.). In two cases, there was a slight dropoff from previous levels, and in only one case of a single season sample there was a significant decrease.

The problem with analyzing Gaudio’s situation at Wake in this light is that status quo means that he’ll be regularly finishing in the cellar of the ACC. With the recruits he has arriving one year from now, he’ll be expected to significantly outperform what Prosser accomplished during the last two seasons. Put another way, Deacon faithful will be satisfied with nothing less than challenging for the ACC title and annual NCAA appearances – much like the first four years of Prosser’s tenure. This is a high bar, but if the recent history of Gaudio’s peers is any indication, he may have a great shot at clearing it.