A10 Plus: Hoops season finally takes center stage
February 8th, 2012
By: Dan Bonsall
For Charlotte, Richmond and Fordham fans, Margin of Error small in order to make Headway
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The ball was still rolling towards the back of the endzone on Sunday night when I turned the page. Rob Gronkowski had not yet reached the locker room to shower for his big night out when I first considered the empty fifth starter slot in the Red Sox rotation.
More often than not sports hurt and being a sports fan means more suffering than jubilation. Or if not suffering, it means patience and humility. It helps to stay light on your feet and move fast. One season ends? On to the next. One season gets thrown off the rails? On to the next.
The confetti from the Super Bowl champion’s parade is being swept up. Flower commercials are saturating the airwaves in anticipation of Valentine’s Day. Pitchers and catchers for the Seattle Mariners report to Spring Training Saturday, with their counterparts on other teams following shortly. Samuel Adams’ annual new Spring seasonal beer is now in a tap near you.
What does all this mean for hoops fans?
College basketball finally gets the stage to itself as teams enter the second half of conference play and the final month of the regular season.
Yet, fan bases in Charlotte, Richmond and the Bronx are struggling to feel any warmth or comfort in this A10 season.
The Niners lost four in a row before besting the Rams over the
weekend. That loss added to the woe of the Rams who have now also
lost four of their last five. And yet the Spiders have both topped,
only beating the Rams in their last six tips. That’s
trouble.
While Richmond or Charlotte have the potential to get make adjustments, get hot, and be disruptive down the stretch, the focus for both has to be aligned with Fordham on next year.
Next year begins with returning talent, something of which all three schools have plenty. According to Ken Pomeroy’s experience rating (0 = freshman, 3 = senior), only Richmond is above the national average at 1.7. As a fan, it’s hard not to start wandering down the depth chart and putting microscopes over this year’s role players.
Redshirt freshman Wayne Sparrow’s minutes have climbed for the Spiders the last few games, and the Spiders have three more freshmen redshirting to prepare for next season. The end of the roster is long and tantalizing. Fordham, on the other hand, will finally have a little experience. Darius McMillan and Branden Frazier will drive the Rams forward and hopefully upward. Charlotte (1.53 experience rating), like Fordham, will also lose only two contributing seniors. It only feels like Chris Braswell has been around forever. He will anchor a squad with another strong backcourt.
Fans like myself can be finicky with short attention spans. Players can’t afford the same. Neither Fordham, Charlotte nor Richmond will make it to CBS’ One Shining Moment montage. The respective fan bases are no doubt long resigned to this fact. The players, and the seniors in particular, still have time to find one shining moment over the next four-plus weeks.
Charlotte has a softer schedule ahead, starting with a week off before Rhode Island on Saturday. A week off at this point in the season can do a struggling team a lot of good. Senior forward Javarris Barnett gets one more shot at Xavier, in the Cintas Center, to try to avenge the Niners’ earlier four-point loss in which Barnett poured in 27 points.
Fordham has perhaps the best chance to play spoiler in the conference. The Rams face Dayton, St. Louis and La Salle before finishing with Temple, who may well have their A10 tournament bye sewn up, on Senior Night. Additionally, the Rams get another shot at one of their two A10 wins, Rhode Island.
Richmond meanwhile has a chance to right the ship with their next two in the Robins Center, including Wednesday against league surprise La Salle. Darrius Garrett and company will no doubt have February 15th circled on their calendars. In one week the Spiders will head to St. Louis and take on a highly-touted Billikens team against whom they match up surprisingly well: both being small and preferring a deliberate pace.
There is no next season for several players on these three teams. The players don’t have the luxury of patience fans have. Despite their overall youthfulness, each team has a key senior desperate for one more special night before they are forced to let go of their college careers.
Sometimes, watching an athlete compete in their final games is worth the price of admission alone; regardless of what's at stake.
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Dan Bonsall is also the editor of the Richmond Spider Bandwagon, which you can visit by simply clicking here. His column appears in this place every other Wednesday during the conference season. Ian Nolan's conference Notebook appears every Monday, while Doug Tifft's A10 column appears each Friday during the conference season.
Photos courtesy of Richmond and George Washington Sports Information Departments.
