Atlantic 10 Notebook
Ian Nolan, A-10 Columnist
Leading off
With the Xavier-Cincinnati brawl grabbing not only conference but national headlines (until Indiana beat Kentucky), let's flip the script and start this week's notebook by writing about some positives.
Here are some of the "good" things taking place inside the league. We'll save the ugly for later, and if you can't wait, scroll down to the bottom of the page. Right now, let's give props to some student-athletes making a positive impact for their clubs. (Note: None of these players have previously been given serious ink in the A10 Notebook during the season).
Javarris Barnett of Charlotte scored 12 of his 15 points in the second half on Saturday to help Charlotte down rival Davidson for the Hornets Nest Trophy. Barnett canned five of six three pointers and pulled down six rebounds in the affair, in no way looking like the 27% shooter from deep he had been entering the game.
Freddie Riley of UMass scored 20 points during the Minutemen's four point win over Siena on Saturday and set a career high by knocking down six three pointers off the bench. Riley played 28 minutes off the bench and has scored a combined 34 points in his last two games.
Chris Johnson of St. Bonaventure set a career high with 19 points off the bench during Bonaventure's 19 point victory over Canisius on Saturday. Johnson had been seldom used until this weekend, but an injury to Michael Davenport provided the junior extended minutes and he took advantage: Johnson was five of nine from the floor and seven of eight from the line in 25 minutes. Johnson is so unknown, that when you click his name in a Bonaventure article on ESPN.com you are taken here instead.
Earl Pettis of La Salle scored 18 points in the Explorers win over Army on Saturday and is averaging over 14 points a game during his senior season. In a backcourt already underrated, Pettis gets the least publicity of the bunch. Pettis, a Rutgers transfer and Philly native, has scored no less than 15 points in each of La Salle's last four games and they've won them all.
Matt Kavanaugh of Dayton has shown himself to be among the league's most improved players though mid-December having displayed growth in nearly all facets of the game. The junior is averaging 7.2 points and 6.7 rebounds after averaging 1.9 points and 2.3 boards last year. Kavanaugh is shooting over 50% from the field, 84% from the line (53% career) and has teamed with Josh Benson to give the Flyers a better frontcourt than most expected.
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Required Reading
For a Cincinnati perspective on the chili brawl over the weekend, read this article from the Enquirer's Paul Daugherty; an excellent read.
With three teams from Philadelphia finding their way into our top six teams in the Power Rankings, the time is right to catch up on Philly hoops over at Aaron Bracy's Philahoops.com
Saturday, Duquesne beat Penn State, rendering PSU the worst team in the state (go check their schedule). To read about the good, the bad and the ugly in that one, check out this article.
Charlotte downed rival Davidson to win the Hornets Nest Trophy on Saturday. Check out the Observer for coverage of the game via Jim Utter's article.
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Power Rankings
(Power Rankings are a list of the top five teams in the league not solely according to record, but rather a combination of record, talent, momentum and other intangibles.)
1. Xavier (8-0) Notwithstanding this weekend's events at the Cintas Center, it was just another week in the life of the Musketeers as they went 2-0 beating Butler and Cincy. Kenny Frease continues his development as he posted a monster game against UC: 13 points, 13 rebounds, four blocks and one extreme display of emotion as he walked off the court bloodied but victorious on Saturday. Stat of Note: Xavier ranks 21st in the nation in rebounding but is 13th in the league in three pointers made per game despite their fantastic backcourt.
2. Saint Louis (9-1) Saint Louis has won three straight after their loss to Loyola Marymount which dropped them out of the top 25 two weeks ago. Give SLU credit for the 9-1 start, but their 166th ranked strength of schedule isn't impressive. Their upcoming slate of games includes: Alcorn State, Arkansas State, and Texas Southern. Stat of Note: Saint Louis coach Rick Majerus won his 500th game on Saturday against Illinois-Springfield. I'm sure that's just how he envisioned winning number 500.
3. Temple (6-2) Temple has slowly begun to find their legs after their 3-2 start by reeling off three wins in a row, most recently over rival Villanova on Saturday. Temple received 32 points from Ramone Moore, who simply rises to the occasion in the biggest moments against the best teams. Stat of Note: Temple leads the league in assists at 16.7 per game, led by Juan Fernandez's 4.1 helpers.
4. Saint Joseph's (7-3) Saint Joseph's notched its
biggest win of the year this weekend by knocking off 17th ranked
and previously undefeated Creighton at home led by the league's
leading scorer, Carl Jones, who dumped in 29 points. SJU used a +13
rebounding margin and seven blocks to offset their 30% shooting
from three and 65% shooting from the free throw line. Stat of Note: Only Tu Holloway
and Mark Lyons average more points than the Hawks backcourt of
Jones and Langston Galloway.
5. Dayton (7-3) Archie Miller claimed the biggest win of his short career at Dayton this week by knocking off 15th ranked Alabama before his team held-on and downed a pesky North Carolina Upstate team on Sunday afternoon. The Alabama game saw a combination of the old and the new spark UD to a signature win as Chris Johnson led the team in scoring with 20 points while first-year point guard Kevin Dillard added 14, including a huge sequence in which he connected on back-to-back three pointers. Stat of Note: The Flyers have the toughest schedule in the league (16th in the nation to date) and are the best free throw shooting team in the league at just over 76%.
First Out - La
Salle (7-3) Yes, the La Salle Explorers are
making their first appearance here in the Power Rankings. La Salle
started the season 2-3 but has run off five straight wins. Although
they haven't exactly loaded the schedule with BCS schools, credit
the Explorers for finding some consistency and winning five
straight. La Salle could run their win 
steak to nine (next up is Delaware, Central Conn. State, Boston
University and Hartford) before kicking off league play against
Xavier on January 4th. Stat of Note: La Salle is
second in the league in field goal percentage defense (37%) and is
third in the league in three point percentage at 40%.
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What I should have known
I should have known that George Washington was going to get a beatdown at the Carrier Dome on Saturday, as the Colonials were handed a 35 point loss from the soon-to-be top ranked Syracuse Orange. For some reason, I thought the game looked a bit like a trap game for the 'Cuse, at least in the sense that GW could make it interesting. My logic? A mid-December game, right before Christmas break, SU having already won 10 in a row could have meant their kids looking forward to Big East play, which is still over two weeks away.
In reality, I should have known GW didn't have the bodies to compete in the frontcourt with Syracuse who simply wore down GW and didn't need a superlative effort from any one starter. In fact, no starter even scored in double figures. SU's zone defense forced 18 turnovers and held the Colonials to just 3-18 shooting from three.
The spread was 20, and I thought that seemed like a good bet for a talented, yet work-in-progress GW team. Guess not.
What I knew
I knew St. Bonaventure was going do two things this week - 1) blow a nine point lead on the road against No. 23 Illinois on Wednesday, and 2) blow-out an awful Canisius team on Saturday night in one of those "we're really ticked off" games that teams have after a tough loss.
The Bonnies blew a nine point lead with under five minutes to go against the Illini in a loss that crippled their chances of an NCAA birth, as there simply are not many "resume" games remaining for SBU. It was the second time this season that the Bonnies blew a nine point lead on the road in the second half in a critical resume game; the other against Cleveland State in November.
Mark Schmidt's club has lacked the knock-out punch that all good teams seem to possess.
The reason? The Bonnies are a team formed around a big man in Andrew Nicholson and not guards ala Tu Holloway, Carl Jones or Ramone Moore. Having a forward be your go-to, or closer if you will, is difficult because you cannot be assured he'll get touches late in game. Too many times, Nicholson is left double-teamed in those instances and a secondary player is forced to connect on a big shot for SBU.
Stat of the Week- Flyers Dial Long Distance in Upset
Dayton entered its match-up against Alabama shooting the ball at a 35% clip from three point land; solid but not spectacular. They certainly picked a heck of a game to turn red hot from behind the arc. UD canned 10-19 from deep against the 15th ranked club from the SEC.
Meanwhile, Dayton was able to put a lid on the Alabama rim, holding the Crimson Tide to just 4-16 from behind the arc on the other side of the ball. Four Flyers players knocked down at least a pair of trifectas in the game: Chris Johnson, Paul Williams, Kevin Dillard and Josh Parker.
Three pointers are always the great equalizer when it comes to pulling off an upset and in this case, the recipe worked to perfection for Archie Miller and his club.
Nolan's Take
The Xavier-Cincinnati brawl has garnered attention from every angle of college basketball since Saturday afternoon. Every analyst, color-man and writer chimed in with their take on the rivalry turned basketbrawl. In the hopes of deviating from the norm a bit on this topic, here are my answers to a few questions I've received...
For purposes of sticking to the Atlantic 10 Conference, only Xavier is discussed during this portion of the notebook. I'll leave the UC questions on the sidelines.
Should the Xavier starters have been in the game when the fight broke out?
No. Xavier won the game by 23 points and when the fight broke out in front of the UC bench, Tu Holloway, Kenny Frease and Mark Lyons were all still in the game. Holloway connected on a lay-up with 18 seconds left and felt the need to do some last minute trash talking before the final buzzer sounded. Holloway had been irked during the week because UC guard Sean Kilpatrick said the Atlantic 10 player of the year wouldn't start for his team. He got in his trash talking, Dez Wells stepped in via a hard shove and next thing you know we're watching the second coming of the Malice at the Palace.
Was Chris Mack rubbing it in to a city rival? Who knows, but having your three best players in the game with under a minute left, up 20, doesn't exactly scream sportsmanship. Holloway and Lyons were running hot and Mack should've taken the last four minutes of the game to toss in his walk-ons, allowing Holloway and Co. to celebrate on the bench, waving towels and high fiving teammates. Keep an eye on Xavier blowouts the rest of the way. I'm betting the coach will give his stars an early benching and shower next time X is up huge.
Who is most to blame for the incident from the Xavier side?
In my opinion, Tu Holloway and Dez Wells. Again, this is not to say that trash-talking was one-sided or that blame isn't shared by both UC and X, but Holloway apparently lit the match with his and Wells tossed it into a can of gasoline with the shove. Holloway was not only trashing the UC players, but reportedly walked over to press row after the game and urged the writers tweet that Xavier put UC in an "$%$#&* bodybag."
That said, trash talking is one thing, but the shove was another. If the freshman doesn't interfere with Holloway and the UC player at the end, they might have been separated by an official. Instead, a shove sends a player to the floor, a ball is thrown at Tu, Kenny Frease is punched in the face and the rest is history.
Other thoughts on the situation?
Having Holloway, Lyons and company in front of a microphone immediately after a brawl was not going to end well. Holloway used the press conference as his own personal stage to fire off ill-advised comments. Some included:
"I felt disrespected for them guys to come at me and talk like that, so I let the whole staff over there and let their players know that none of them is like me. That's when it started".
‘I was just saying it's my
city right here,’ Holloway said. ‘I'm cut from a
different cloth. None of them guys on that team is like me.
‘That's what you're going
to see from Xavier and Cincinnati,’ he said. ‘We got
disrespected a little bit before the game, guys calling us out.
‘We're a tougher team. We're grown men over here. We've got a whole bunch of gangsters in the locker room – not thugs, but tough guys on the court. And we went out there and zipped them up at the end of the game.’
If I had to make a player available, I'd have chosen someone not directly involved in the melee, had him make a statement and answer questions on behalf of the team.
Were the Xavier suspensions fair?
Well, they were basically what I expected. Holloway (1 game), Lyons (2 game), Wells (4 games), Landon Amos (4 games). They all seem a bit light to me. In short, Xavier did the right thing in responding swiftly, but the length of the suspensions is not enough in my book.
What needs to happen next?
From here, Xavier needs to shut down all social media avenues as far as the men's basketball team is concerned. The university has worked too hard to develop and maintain an outstanding reputation to risk having it compromised.
Secondly, a refresher course with the Sports Information Department on how to conduct oneself during an interview, specifically after a close or controversial loss, would be helpful.
Finally, Chris Mack needs to meet with his team (which I'm sure he has) and let them know that trash-talking of any kind could result in immediate benching. In addition, I'd have the Xavier team compose an apology letter to its fans, the university and the conference and publish it in the Cincinnati Enquirer.
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Internal photos courtesy of Saint Joseph's Athletics and La Salle Athletics Media Relations
Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of College Chalktalk.
