 | HOPKINS AND NAVY'S TOURNAMENT HOPES
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/22/07 @12:19PM | Hopkins-The Blue Jays are 6-4 now, and have 3 games left-Towson, Mount St. Mary's, and Loyola. As long as they win 1 of those games, which they definitely will, they will have a winning record and will be eligible for the tournament. Due to their tough schedule, quality wins, and their name, as long as they have a winning record, I think they are in. In fact, I think that Hopkins has improved a lot and will win their final 3 games. Each additional win could improve the Blue Jays' seed in the tournament.
Navy-The Midshipmen have a better record than Hopkins, but their schedule isn't nearly as tough and they really don't have any super quality wins. Yes, their 3 losses-to Georgetown, Maryland, and Hopkins came by 1 goal, but still, a win is a win and a loss is a loss. The closest thing Navy has to quality wins are their victories over North Carolina and Army. North Carolina has improved a lot and is now #10, but when Navy beat they, they weren't very good. I say that, if North Carolina beats Duke in the 1st Round of the ACC Tournament next weekend, it will definitely help North Carolina, and it will also help Navy. If Navy wins the Patriot League Tournament, they get an automatic bid. However, if they don't, due to the reasons I just gave, I think they could end up being on the bubble for making the tournament. Look for Navy to go into the Patriot League tournament fired up to win it! | | | Reply to this
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 | SCHWARTZMAN'S SAVE ON DINGMAN
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/22/07 @1:02PM | | That was the play of the game, hands down. Navy was up 5-4, and had Dingman scored, Navy could have gone on a run an built a good lead. However, Schwartzman denied him and ignitied a 4-1 Blue Jay run. That must have been so sweet for Schwartzman. He had a rough 1st Half and was getting taunted by Navy fans. There is a picture in the Baltimore Sun of him jawing back at the fans. Boy, he shut them up! Way to go, Jess! | | | Reply to this
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 | NAVY TOP ASSISTANT JOHN TILLMAN
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/22/07 @2:07PM | | I have praised him many times before for being a great assistant coach and running a great offense. However, after watching the Navy-Hopkins game on television, my thoughts of him went to another level. Listening to the Navy huddle, both Tillman and Richie Meade spoke a lot. It seemed like there were 2 head coaches. Tillman gave some great motivational talks, and I think he would make a great head coach somewhere. Here is my prediction. He will be offered many more head coaching jobs. He may end up taking one. However, I have a feeling that Navy will want him to stay so badly that they will offer him a huge raise and offer to promote him to associate head coach. If this happens, he may well stay at Navy until Richie Meade retires. Don't forget that Tillman is 10-15 years younger than Meade. What do you all predict will happen? | | | Reply to this
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 | NO COACH COULD MAKE NAVY A FINAL 4 REGULAR
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/22/07 @7:44PM | | With their strict academic requirements and requirements after senior year, I can promise you that Navy will never be a regular in the Final Four. Even Bill Tierney, the best coach ever, most likely wouldn't be able to do that. I think that, for what Richie Meade has to work with, he couldn't be doing much finer. The 4 tough teams they play each year-Hopkins, Maryland, Georgetown, and North Carolina, are all much, much easier sells for great players. Therefore, it is quite impressive that Richie Meade coaches Navy to victory over a couple of these teams and even has them CLOSE year after year. On paper, with what Navy has to offer, they shouldn't even be close to these teams year after year. Personally, I think that Richie Meade getting Navy to the title game in 2004 and losing by 1 goal to a much more talented and athletic Syracuse team when Matt Russell, their 1st Team All American goalie was out most of the game and the goalie who took his place didn't play real well was | | | Reply to this
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 | when in doubt.....
| by RWHawks (#143077) on 4/22/07 @8:21PM | | buy new helmets, worked for syracuse, worked for hopkins. It seems to be the key to success. | | | Reply to this
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 | NAVY'S 2007 SCHEDULE
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/23/07 @6:02PM | This is what their regular season schedule has been for this season, but it is usually very similar to this one each year. I don't have the dates, but this is who they have played this season, in order:
St. Joseph's
Lafayette-Patriot League game
North Carolina
Lehigh-Patriot League game
Canisius
Holy Cross-Patriot League game
Colgate-Patriot League game
Bucknell-Patriot League game
Georgetown
Maryland
Army
Johns Hopkins
This is followed, of course, by the Patriot League Tournament and the NCAA Tournament.
Navy has to play everyone in the Patriot League, including a couple of teams who are not strong at all. Therefore, do you think that, if Navy dropped teams like Canisius and St. Joseph's and added teams like Delaware, Drexel, Towson, Hofstra, Ohio State, Notre Dame, Penn State, Denver, or even UMBC, it would help them in the long run in terms of decent competition? | | | Reply to this
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 | NAVY'S CUPCAKES COMPARED TO OTHER TOP TEAMS
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/24/07 @12:14AM | NAVY has 5 cupcakes on their 2007 schedule:
St. Joseph's
Canisius
Holy Cross
Lehigh
Lafayette
Of course, Navy has to play the final 3 teams mentioned, because they are all in the same conference.
HOPKINS has 1 cupcake on their 2007 schedule:
Mt. St. Mary's
UVA has 3 cupcakes on their 2007 schedule:
VMI
Mt. St. Mary's
Binghamton
DUKE has 3 cupcakes on their 2007 schedule:
St. Joseph's
Bellarmine
Air Force
Now, if Navy dropped St. Joseph's and Canisius and replaced them with 2 Top 10-Top 15 teams, their schedule would be just a little bit more similar to those other teams I mentioned.
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 | SOS
| by Bulzac (#139861) on 4/24/07 @1:57PM | | What I want to know is who figures out strength of schedule. I was looking at teams and their respective sos's, and Hopkins is number 1. No brainer there, they easily have the toughest schedule in college lax. But then I see Cornell with No. 2. How in the hell is Cornell number 2? Duke and UVa both have considerably harder schedules in my opinion (and a couple other schools for that matter), and they are like 26 and 29th in the nation I think. That just seems stupid. | | | Reply to this
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 | RICHIE MEADE-2007 PATRIOT LEAGUE COACH OF THE YEAR
| by Naptown Fan (#136419) on 4/26/07 @2:43PM | | Congratulations, Billy! | | | Reply to this
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