SquidLegs

Can I paraphrase by saying, "Wait till two years from now"?

You are taking it to a whole new level xu1990.

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Hawk99

WH:

What type of contribution do you expect from St. Joe's freshman Isaiah Miles?

Martelli has been gushing about his play over the summer and expects him to contribute at several positions off the bench and take some PT from some upperclassmen.

Jonathan Watters

Folks seem to have some reading comprehension issues around here. It was a discussion about defense, I said the defense tanked. And it did. Did not say anything about the offense. The offense was good all year, and very good at the end of the season. Is there a way I can better clarify this?

Jonathan Watters

Evans, Jett and Mitchell are all high level athletes capable of taking on a larger role offensively. Loe, Ellis, Remuken and McCall should also be comfortable stepping into more important roles. It isn't a certainty, but odds favor St Louis being able to replace Conklin. The St Louis system doesn't rely on one player, it didn't last year and won't this year. Their lock down defense and ability to dominate the turnover battle means the offense would have to be pretty awful for the billikens to fall very far, I just don't see it happening.

Jonathan Watters

Both teams are ranked very similarly to where they ended last season. St Louis' returnees are much more established, Dayton will rely more on newcomers and the return of benson. It's possible that st Louis is a little worse than last year and Dayton is a little better, just like its possible that such a scenario could still leave st Louis in the ncaa's and dayton in the nit.

Mac539

From past experience, Martelli gushes don't seem to mean a lot.

ExplorerSteve

I am glad that WH gave props to SJU and UMass and not include the Explorers in the top 3. I know that the Hawks barely got by La Salle last year (Ramon Galloway played out of control in that game) and La Salle beat UMass twice.

It will be good to surprise some teams like the Hawks and UMass. The bigs for La Salle have improved and Rohan Brown looks like he will be a spark off the bench. Tyrone Garland will bring added depth from beyond the arc and DJ Peterson will be more then just a 3 pt specialist.

Wright is a top caliber A10 player. How good will he be?

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Free Quebec

I'm just waiting for the WH's writeup about newcomers. GW's best player is likely to be freshman Patricio Garino, their main glue guy is likely to be transfer Isiah Armwood, and freshman Kevin Larsen is likely to be one of the top 3 or 4 offensive big men in the league from day 1. None of those guys were even mentioned in WH's brief (but initially forgotten) blurb.

Nonetheless 13 is an understandable pick. Personally, I expect better, though when you look at these projected standings you realize that the league is so solid that a team could finish 10th or 11th and still be a strong basketball team.

Going to be a fun, interesting year.

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SpiderDave19

I think the consensus best teams this year are going to find it difficult to get road wins against just about every team. I think Richmond, GW, and St. Bonaventure are going to be stronger than most think, and any of the "iron" teams that look past them will get an unpleasant surprise. I just hope the non-conference performance is good so when these teams do get some upset wins, they aren't crippling to NCAA hopes. Xavier could be a bitch in that regard. I suspect they'll be a much stronger team in A10 play than in the non-con. Not a good mix. Their SOS should be good enough so even a disastrous non-con won't give them too bad an RPI, though. I think Duquesne will be overwhelmed, talent-wise, by most of the league this year. URI as well. Other than that, no easy nights in the A10 this year.

DistrictBaller

I'm not going to lie, I'm borderline terrified that VCU has its first road game at St. Bonaventure. It's like one of those games you can almost feel a loss coming even though you don't want to admit it.

It seems like people want to write them off because of Andrew Nicholson leaving, and I got a feel for how ridiculous he was watching the Orlando Summer League, but it seems like they have a lot of talent still on the roster that's being overlooked. Hopefully they can prove that in the OOC before that happens so we won't be taken by surprise or take the game for granted. That's a doozy of a road game to start though.

Richmond crushed us at the Robins Center last time we played there (I think they were up by like 30 in the first half that game) and they have some nice pieces and a really experienced and talented backcourt. I think URI and Duquesne are probably wins this year on the road, but Hurley will have URI playing tough regardless of the talent level on the floor. I'll admit I have no idea about Duquesne, but if we're losing to them this year, we have bigger problems than worrying about how many road games we're winning. Xavier is next to unbeatable in Cintas and their crowd alone will win them games not counting the fact they have a stud in Semaj Christon who should blossom and take over games for X this year. Games at SLU and Temple were going to be tough games to win regardless of whether they were at home or on the road.

Even with our home court advantage, I bet we drop a couple of games with the level of competition coming in. Butler, UMass, St. Joes, La Salle, Dayton, and Richmond are all talented enough to take us down on our home court this season.

If we dropped 'WTF?' games in the CAA, then that's almost definitely happening in the A-10, and then there are also better teams across the board. We'll have to adapt in a lot of ways. It will be interesting to watch, and probably both exhilarating and gut-wrenching at points of the season.

I just hope the league can live up to the hype in the OOC so that losing to some of you guys won't sting as much. I hope we hold up our end of the bargain too so that those of you who think we have no business beating you won't feel as bad if we do win.

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DukesDan

hahahahahaha dont count any win in the A10 until you have it. A game played vs a Duquesne team at home is never an easy win. Welcome to the A10, it is tough to win on the road anywhere.

You are almost guaranteed 2 to 3 WTF losses on the road in the A10. Dont let it put you down. Its part of the game. This is not the CAA.

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DistrictBaller

No offense man, but we had several WTF games in the CAA too. I pretty much said I wouldn't be surprised if we lost any game on the road in the A-10 outside of Duquesne. I'm giving the A-10 a ton of credit there. You could still beat us, but we won't be as good as we think we are if we are losing to you guys with the team we have this year and the team Jim Ferry has to start with this year. That will be one of those huge blemishes on any at-large profile that would keep us out on Selection Sunday and we would have no case to argue against it. If you beat us, great, I'll tip my cap to you, but we'll have serious questions about how good we actually are if that happens and we'll deserve to sit on our couches watching other teams dance.

Difficulty on the road has nothing to do with the strength of the league. Road games are tough regardless of the league you play in. The CAA wasn't as good as the A-10 but it was still a very good mid-major league and in our better years the top was just as good as the top of the A-10. We lost to teams like James Madison, Northeastern, Georgia State, and William and Mary in recent years and even came within one possession of losing to Towson on the road in one game.

Tough road games are not something unique to the A-10. Coaches are intimately familiar with schemes, personnel, and see your sets multiple times over years on film and in game settings. That makes those games way tougher than the typical OOC game.

I actually think VCU might have a small advantage in that respect since no one really runs our system in the A-10 except UMass recently with less defense and more offensive firepower. We're an unknown commodity playing a very atypical style against teams who haven't played us before for the most part. I don't anticipate us being road warriors either now or in the future however. We have already shown in the CAA that we can have trouble away from home.

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"We will wreak havoc on our opponent's psyche and plan of attack."
- VCU Head Coach Shaka Smart

Bill Russell

DB didn't say anything odd. He was pretty much dead on. The Dukes may surprise this year, but based on what they lost (on top of what they didn't do last year), it seems obvious they'll struggle this year. A VCU fan should probably expect to win in the 'burgh this year. No?

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WH

Astute summary, as usual, FQ. There will be some surprises and a lot of bunching up in the standings because the talent level across the league doesn't have as many highs and lows as it used to have during the low periods before and after the Elite 8 SJU team.

GW really seems to have done a good job in short order or replenishing the roster and getting some more skilled players.

I put them near the bottom for the obvious reasons. No established PG in a league that requires one and less experience than some of the best A-10 teams. None of the guys with experience - Byrnes, Kromah, Pellom or Smith - have shown they can carry a team.

Kromah hasn't been the same since his injury and Smith for some reason cannot put it all together despite his obvious athleticism and good all-round skills.

z8-Minutemen

Sorry, next year you may have a point, but Duquesne is as easy a win as it comes in the A-10 this year. You scare nobody. Put down the glass of koolaid, take your homer glasses off, and realize this.

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