Hey Everybody! X is 17-2 and ranked 10th in the country!

HA! Sean is a happy camper!

Beating LSU on the road was a huge win for the Muskies. Should be a big confidence boost for the boys in navy. As an aside, should we fans push to havethe boys wear the navy blue unis at home? I love our road unis and it would make us different by wearing em at home. And I always like being different.

But anyways, going into Baton Rouge was always going to be a tricky proposition as LSU was hungry to get that “signature” win on their NCAA tournament resume. Plus, it came at an odd time of the year since both teams were already ankle deep in conference action. But our boy’s showed a lot of toughness and resolve in gutting out a ten point win.

The story for me was the down low play of Kenny Frease and Jason Love. They combined to go 10-13 from the field with 22 points and 11 ball-boards. Although I’d be very remiss not to mention Derrick Brown’s continued stellar play. Scoring 22 points on 7-11 shooting including 3-4 from with the three ball to go along with 9 rebounds is stellar play in my book. When D Brown hits that three ball it’s a thing of beauty. High-arcing shots are just prettier to watch go through that net.

Once again, the A-10 becomes our top priority. We’re 5-0 in the league coming into Wednesday night’s game against Charlotte at the beautiful Cintas Center. Definitely are in the driver’s seat but also St. Joes’s has yet to lose a game and Dayton, Richmond and Temple all have just one loss.

But I want to take this space to say just how stupid some of the message board talk has been of late in regards to the A-10. To say that the A-10 is holding us back is down right ludicrous. Both of today’s polls have us at #10 in the country. I mean, how far back can it really be holding us? If a team like Gonzaga can make it up to 4th in the polls when they come from a decidedly lesser conference than the A-10, then what is all the bitching about?

I mean seriously, woe is us. We are 5-0 in the conference and clearly have the best team. But that doesn’t mean we’ll win every game. UD, Temple, URI, and St. Joe’s all have enough talent to beat us and maybe even a couple others on the right day. But do they have enough talent to beat us over a 16 game conference schedule? I highly doubt it.

And of course I want the conference to get better, but it’s not like Xavier can do anything about it. All we can do is keep winning. Just remember, GW went 16-0 in the conference a scant three seasons ago and now look at em. Obviously, I’m not saying that is going to happen to us, cuz I don’t think it will, but just realize it doesn’t take a whole lot of time for things to turn south and in a hurry.

We are in an incredibly good spot right now. The past 15 years has seen a decidedly upward motion for Xavier basketball and that coincides directly with our affiliation with the A-10 conference. And it’s not like other conferences are chomping at the bit to get us to come to their side. So let’s calm down people. We’ve been a game away from the final four twice in the past five years. I can think of more than a few schools who would like have that distinction….

You Know it! Puerto Rico Tip-Off Champs!

(AP/Andres Leighton)

So yeah, 5-0, ranked 16th in the AP and 20th in the Coaches’ Poll, Puerto Rico Tip-Off Champs, and two tickets to the Crosstown Shootout were just purchased so Ledgewood and I can attend the game on December 13th. All in all, a great day and weekend to be a Musketeer fan!

It’s hard not to feel anything but very optimistic about the rest of the season. Two solid wins and one great win this early in the season with games still to come against UC, Duke, LSU, Butler, Auburn and Virginia mean we have the opportunity to put together a very special non-conference resume for the selection committee come March.

It was said during one the early games in Puerto Rico that Sean had the team watch the last five minutes of the loss to Tennessee from last year. The point of it being to show just how tough you have to be as a team in order to win games that go down to the wire. I think it’s safe to say this was a good motivational ploy by Sean to get the team in the right mindset. Sure, it took a little bit of luck with Dante’s last second shot, but it was readily apparent the toughness this team possesses and it can only mean good things for the future.

How about Kenny talking some trash? That was great. He is not backing down from anyone. Methinks we have a true point guard for the next four years in Mr. Tutu. 20-20 from the foul line from the tournament?! That’s just good stuff. Always nice when the guy handling the ball late in games is also your best free throw shooter. Also, it didn’t take too long for us Muskie fans to not be afraid of full-court pressure. Good times all around!

We have been (or maybe just me) a little hard on CJ for his turnovers but the leadership and toughness he brings to the table outweigh the negatives in his game. He is simply not afraid to go in amongst the big boys and more times than not he succeeds. Obviously, this rubs off on the rest of the team. We would not have won this tournament without him and he more than deserves the tournament MVP trophy.

Just imagine what this team will look like when our half-court offense rounds into shape like it did last year. I would venture to guess that will happen some time around the start of conference play. That should be a scary thought for the rest of the A-10. Our defense is already being executed at a very high level. It’s just like the old saying, “offense comes and goes, but defense can’t.” Truth.com on that one.

We shall return later in the week with not so polite words for our neighbors in Oxford.

Let’s go X!

Conference Play Begins to Heat Up

Seriously, what a great photo.

Xavier has moved up to 13^th in the AP and 14^th in the Coaches’ poll. Still don’t quite understand why we are behind IU in the Coaches’ poll. I mean, we did beat them by 15 earlier in the year and they have played exactly three good teams this year and have lost all three. But at this point, it doesn’t really matter. As long as we keep winning, the rest will take care of itself.

Besides, the polls should not really be at the forefront of any Xavier fan’s mind right now. We need to be worried about our league schedule from here on out. Because there are no more gimmes. And even though I didn’t think La Salle was a pushover, I would imagine most X fans thought this was an easy win. And to be frank, I would have to agree. We had to beat the Explorers. It was definitely our last easy game of the year. The only other one that comes close is our last conference game of the season at home to Richmond. And even they have proven to be much better this year.

At St. Louis, St. Joe’s, at Charlotte, at Rhode Island, Duquesne and at Dayton constitutes the remainder of February for us. Obviously, this is a very important stretch of games and more than likely will determine if we are to win the conference for the second year in a row.

Before the conference slate started up I believed a 12-4 mark should be the goal with 11-5 more than acceptable. At 6-1 we are head of schedule, but that could go by the wayside very quickly with this stretch of games.

St. Louis’s struggles have been well publicized, what with their 20-point outing against GW and all. But let us not forget that St. Louis has beaten us three out of the four times we have played them since they joined the A-10 two years ago. Rick Majerus is an excellent coach and they have beaten Umass and Rhode Island so they are capable of beating good teams.

But this is why Sean Miller wanted to have such a tough non-conference schedule. To prepare us for games like these. So instead of this being our first consecutive batch of truly intense games, it will be our second go around. This will hopefully prove to be very beneficial to our guys. But I’m relatively certain they know there can be no more games in cruise control. The seniors especially have to be starting to realize their time in college basketball is almost over. Hopefully, this will lead us to another A-10 title.

Till next time,

Go X!

Woah…

So we’re 15th on both polls. Awesome. I’m a little surprised we are that high, but a lot of ranked teams were losing games. So I’ll take it. And we’re a 3 seed in the updated Bracketology. Wow. All we gotta do is keep on winning, and we’ll keep getting ranked higher. Simple, yeah?

Everyone’s concern here has got to be that the high rankings and the ESPN.com write ups get to their heads again and they forget to play inspired ball. Also, those A10 teams are gonna be agunnin’ for us still as always, as we are the team to beat in this league as usual. But, I have confidence in Coach Milla and the boys. They already went through the whole thinking-we’re-so-good-and-forgetting-to-play-hard thing. We’ve learned, moved on, and were highly rewarded with a great ranking and lots of press. But March is a long way away. This great defense has got to keep up. We shot extremely poorly against UMass and still won, because we played great D. Drew is still playing amazing bball. He had 9 rebounds…9 rebounds against the Minute Men. Boy am I going to miss this lil’ guy next year. We kept their scorers in check and took another road game.

La Salle at home this La Saturday. I will be attending this game with my fellow blogger, Mr. Cody. Proly not much chance to move too many spots up unless more highly ranked teams blow it, as we only play Saturday. Still gotta beat the Explorers, though.

Go X! Beat these things!

Still Ranked, But Humbled

The new rankings came out today and the XU boys managed to stay in the Top 25 in both polls, 23 in the AP and 22 in the ESPN/USA Today. But Drew Lavender said it best after the GW win when he was asked if he and his team played like a top 20 team when he said “I think we played good enough to win. The rankings, we let everybody else talk about the rankings.” Well I hope it’s true anyway.

I am getting more and more excited about the Dayton game as the hours pass. ESPN’s Heather Dinich wrote about us yesterday in the College Hoops section reminding us Xavier fans that we aren’t the big dogs of the A10, at least not right now, and that we still have much to prove. But we already knew that. At least we should have. The Indiana game was a long time ago, and it feels like the 6 game winning streak was too. Rember back then? Those 100+ point games? Way back then? Ahh, those were the days.

Well, here’s our chance to get a little more respect in the BBall world. Thursday vs. Dayton and Sunday at UMass. Two quality A10 teams 3 days apart. We take those games and the people that Drew says to leave the rankings talk up to will have no problem seeing us as a top 20 quality team again. But along with a fancy schmancy number in front of our name during games and seeing our score early and often on the Bottom Line, it would ease many a doubting mind that was wondering what happened to the team from all of 3 or so weeks ago that the rest of the nation believes was some kind of a fluke or something. But, it’s like Coach Milla (to be said in a thick, yet humorous Itlian accent) said after the Bonnies game (a game in which if one heard only the post-game interview, they definitely would have assumed we lost), a tough non-conference schedule with quality wins and good losses is useless if we fall apart during league play.

SOOOOOOOOOO let’s stick together and kill Dayton, because I hate Dayton, even though they are our secondary rivals.

ALSO…

a quick Bracketology update, Joe Lunardi has updated his ESPN.com pride and joy today, and he has given the A10 much love this time around. He has 4 squads from the league entering, Xavier a 6 seed, Dayton a 5, Rhode Island a 9, and You Mass a 9 as well. I know that this thing doesn’t mean anything as far as match-ups go, but the 11 seed he has facing XU is An Ohio State University. I hate Ohio State. I hope they never win another game at anything they ever play in again.