A swift kick to the balls….

Because I’m a masochist and a glutton for punishment I watched the press conference to introduce Sean Miller as the new coach at Arizona.  Basically, he lied to us.  And if that’s not a good enough reason to hold him in contempt, then I don’t know what is.  Call me nutty, but I’m just not a big fan of being lied to.  

That press conference was an absolute treat I have to say, ya know, on opposite day.  I mean, my god.  Here’s a quick rundown.  

-Referred to us as “little old Xavier” in the context of all the big state schools within a 3 hour drive of campus.  

-Their AD called us Eggs-avier at least three different times.  

-Said being in the A-10 made it tough for us to have the success we’ve been having.  (As you may remember, this goes completely against his rhetoric that basketball is not like football in that conferences don’t mean as much and that we are all playing for the same goal)  

-Said players are his number 1 priority.  (this would seem to contradict his behavior yesterday in that he allowed the players to find out about his departure from the media.  I don’t care how busy you are taking a new coaching job.  You FIND the time to let the players know you are leaving before they get a chance to hear it form anyone else.  You owe at least that much to them since you lied to them about saying you would be at Xavier for the for seeable future.  I completely understand why Mark Lyons and Jordan Crawford were so pissed yesterday.  And I’m sure other players are just as pissed, but the media didn’t get to see it)

By the way, if you read this blog I would imagine almost all of you have seen this, but here’s the link anyways.  Great rundown of all the events that took place yesterday.   

-Never came out and said it, but it’s ABUNDANTLY clear that Sean does not feel he could accomplish all of his goals at Xavier.  

Like many Xavier fans I bought “Xavier Tales” and devoured it immediately upon it arrival to my doorstep.  The writer, Michael Perry interviewed many former Xavier players, coaches and others associated with the program.  Obviously, Sean Miller was one of those people.  Let’s revisit a passage shall we?

And I quote, “Miller remembers Rogers’ (Dawn Rogers, the then AD) most important question:  Did he believe that Xavier did not have to be a stepping-stone job?  He did.”  I am so sick of the phrase stepping-stone.  

Right after Sean was hired it quotes the players as being “thrilled.”  And after reading a few quotes from the players maybe this is a foreshadowing of things to come for Chris Mack.  Guess we’ll have to wait and see, though I doubt very long.  In Bobinski I trust.  Not that I have much of a choice,  but his track record has been impeccable during his tenure as AD at X.  

Alright, it’s time to at least start the process of moving on after this metaphorical swift kick to the nuts.  It will be a little easier once we have a head coach.  Although I have to say coaches are looking more and more like politicians to me.  Same sweet talk only a different expertise.  

Ugh….

Go Muskies damnitt!

Dear Xavier Fans Who Feel the Need to Thank Sean Miller,

I understand that you are trying to take the classy route.  I understand the clichés of ”being the bigger man,” “taking the high road,” etc.  But pretending you aren’t angry and bottling up emotions is damaging to one’s own psyche.  And for those who say they aren’t angry, bitter, etc., and that say they understand why he made the good business move he did, please read on.

I am no fool.  This was the best business decision Sean Miller has ever made in his life.  He can light  Cubans with hundreds and sip on the best single malt whisky money can buy.  I am not going to try and explain why he should not have accepted the Arizona job.  That would be dumb.  However, I am writing to explain that there ARE, in fact, reasons that you should all be angry with him. 

The man handled this situation better than his homeboy, Thadwick, did.  Congrats Sean, you get an F+.   I know you’ve all read the reactions of our players.  Mr. Miller obviously gave them NO INDICATION WHATSOEVER that this was a possibility at this time.  Just as Thad’s kids did, they found out from the likes of ESPN and such.  As a result, you get reports of Derrick Brown screaming “I ain’t coming back next year,” you have transfers that have seen more coaches than teammates and simply say “This is bullshit,” and who knows what is going to happen with the likes of TuTu, Kenny, etc.  Obviously, reactions like this should be taken with a grain of salt due to emotions being at an all time high,  but this is why as a coach you make sure they FIND OUT FROM YOU, NOT THE EFFING NEWS.  You find the time; I don’t care how busy you are.  I’ve heard X fans talk about how Sean Miller is a great father figure to these kids.  I hope none of you feel that way anymore, because obviously the kids on the team don’t…

You know what else the team had to find out?  That Sean Miller did not believe in them.  In his completely unnecessary and very brief press conference, he said the ultimate reason that made his mind up was because he could win a national title at Arizona.  Immediately after, he removed his foot from his mouth and said you could win one at XU.  If he believes that XU can win, then why not just BE HONEST and tell the team and everyone else that he just couldn’t pass up the paycheck?  And if he doesn’t believe XU can win the NC, well then I think we can all agree that he can go eff himself.

Saying meaningless little lies about why he is leaving in a stupid little press conference isn’t as bad as saying he was going to stay and then leaving (which he did not do), but that is why he gets an F+, not an F.  His actions and words hurt this team.  We can all hope and say that it will only make them stronger, but we don’t know that.  Our recruiting is already up in the air (we can’t be mad at him for that), but the last thing we need is the current roster in turmoil. 

In conclusion, Sean Miller should be hated by all of us X fans.  If you are going to say he gets a pass because it’s just too much money, then he should have saved all the loyalty and going-places talk he fed us in the past.  It should have been business from the start.  That way, you won’t have to make a complete jackass out of yourself in a pathetic press conference talking about following your heart to a place 2,000 miles away from your home.  I mean, how many times did we hear him say that we are not a mid-major, that this is a destination-type job for any coach?  It is true that he did not lie to us and say he would stay here.  But he buttered us up and fed us enough bull ess just as bad as any politician.  And that is BAD. 

I urge you all to never again buy into the fluffy hope that a coach tries to instill in us, and just focus all loyalty to the colors on the jerseys, to the students going to battle for those colors and for you, and to all of us that pay in some way to be a part of Xavier Universtiy, not to those that GET PAID to do so.  Remember that the man on the sidelines is just a suit, trying to further his coaching career and to move elsewhere as soon as the price is right. 

Depression has set in…..

The five stages of grief is a commonly known theory that explains the emotions a person goes through after experiencing a loss in his or her life.  Currently I am chin deep in the denial waters.  I just can’t believe he left.  I thought he was different.  I thought he would at least be here to see the culmination of his first five years as a head coach.  Next year is suppose to be THE year for Xavier.  Now, it all is up in the air.  

He even said it as much.  Im paraphrasing, but he said something along the lines of “Next year has all the makings of a special season for Xavier.”  Now he turns his back on it all and goes thousands of miles west to take over a program that for all intensive purposes hasn’t been recruiting for two whole seasons.  I don’t necessarily wish failure upon him but I sure as Hell won’t be losing any sleep if that’s what it comes to out west.  

Never again.  Never again will I trust anything a college coach says.  Even though every fiber of my being will want to.  

In the end, what  I want to believe will happen and what will actually happen are two things that are hard to separate.  I wanted to, nay, DID believe Sean Miller when he said Xavier is a school he does not look upon as a “stepping-stone” job.  

Honestly, I am in shock.  Call me naive if you want to.  But I just refused to allow myself to think he would take the job out west.  Ugh, why do I care so much?

I’m gonna go have a beer.

Let’s go X!

Dear Sean Miller,

If your heart can change overnight, then so can mine. 

I hope your plane gets safely to Arizona.  And then I hope you fail so miserably next season that they run you out of the dry heat in no time at all.  I know it’s a lot of money, and that there are some Xavier fans that are wishing you well and telling you that they have no hard feeling toward you because, hey, who could turn down that much money?  But not me. 

This is how I see it:  If you have no use for me and for my school, then I have no use for you.  I hope the door does, in fact, hit you in the ass on the way out.  In fact, get out of Cincinnati now.  We’ll send your things. 

You are leaving a Final Four team that you in turn are letting down.  The only difference between you and your best buddy Thad is that he told us that he wasn’t going anywhere and then did, but you were too much of a coward to face anyone and say anything.  But not saying anything is just as bad as being dishonest to me.  So kindly eff off. 

Your dishonesty has gotten Xavier fans’ hopes up that there was someone in the sports world with some loyalty.   Thank you for reminding us that every professional in sports is a whore and a liar. 

Here’s to never seeing you again,

Jason Philip Martynowski

Oh Well…

When Coolio shot that ball with about 50 seconds left on the clock, I was relieved.  I actually vocally let out a “Yessss!” because Derrick Brown had a hand in his face, he was just about at NBA-range, and someone obviously replaced the regulation-sized rims with smaller ones for the second half.  I mean, no one was hitting anything for either team.  There was NO WAY that ball was going in, yeah?

Oh well…

It was one hell of a shot.  And then it was one hell of a defensive play.  Add one more cliched “what-if” for X fans with D Brown just barely stepping out of bounds after a defensive stop whislt up by 2 with 1:30 left to play.  But it happened,  and Pitt took advantage of a mistake when it mattered the most.  They won, they deserved to win, and they deserve their very first Elite Eight appearance, because Greg Oden didn’t push anyone into the third row right before it happened. 

Despite what EVERYONE but X fans said it would be, this was a very evenly-matched game.  Both teams played tremendous defense.  Kenny Frease’s defense appeared to have improved ten-fold and is enough to get me already thinking about October.  Part of me wished Coach gave him more minutes in the second half just to get that big Massilon-bred body of his in front of Blair, who appeared to just steam-roll through whoever had position on him for something like 107 rebounds I think it was. 

Speaking of the second half, why did we have to have a half time last night?  We would have won by 20 if we skipped that nonsensical break after 20 minutes.  That was the sexiest defense I have ever seen.  Stupid dumb basketball rules… I mean as soon as the new 20 minutes began, the Muskies forgot how to hold onto the ball and we began seeing the silly turnovers that was there for a lot of this season.  Combine that and the ball just not going in for about 8 minutes and the momentum was officially out the effing window.

The thing about this game that bugs me is that even with the lack of offensive execution, X still could have won.  It was ours to lose.  Personally, I blame the economy.

Anysway, my heart goes out to our BJ and CJ.  These guys were on a mission in the first half of this game, willing us to a comfortable lead at the break.  It’s always tough to see your seniors go out in their last effort, but thus is the life of a college basketball fan… unless your an Ohio State fan (which probably means you didn’t go there).  Then you just watch your underachieving 7 footers leave EVERY year. 

Well, I lost about 5-6 years of my life watching this game.  My heart was lifted and then dropped like those ridiculous rides at amusement parks that I do not go on.  I lost more hair and I flipped off some old guys who were mockingly cheering for Pitt because myself and the other X fans were cheering so loudly for our boys (classy, I know).  But this was another great experience for Xavier, and there are many positive things to come away with after this season.

I just really wanted to post this picture.

Who would have thought we were going to make it this far and have a great chance to beat the no. 1 seed in the third round?  What that says to me is that we can now all EXPECT this team to be there every year.  And what that also means is that we undoubtedly  have one of the best coaching staffs in the NCAA, PERIOD.  Making the tournament was all we asked from this team.  They got us another A10 Championship, earned a 4 seed to the dance, and made it into the Sweet Sixteen again.  XU will never be Cinderella again.  Not with the formula we have.  We are all witnessing this program advance to another level before our very eyes.  We are obviously not among the very elite of the field, but we are not that far behind.  There are many in our rear view mirrors, and they are getting further behind. 

So here’s to the best program in Ohio.  I can’t wait to dance next year. 

We Can Beat These Guys Damnit!

I think it’s pretty safe to say that Xavier is playing with house money at this point in the tournament.  And that means we could be a very dangerous team tomorrow night in Boston.  Almost all of the pressure is on Pitt and the fact that they have not been to the Elite 8 since 1974.  And with all of their recent regular season success I can’t imagine this wouldn’t seep into the Panthers’ minds at some point before or during the game.  

Obviously, most of the Pittsburgh talk centers around their version of the “big 3.”  LeVance Fields, Sam Young and DeJuan Blair are as imposing a threesome as any in the world of men’s college basketball.  I’m not sure Xavier can really key into just one player in order to pull off the upset.  

DeJuan Blair is probably the toughest matchup in all the land.  Watching him get the better of Hasheem Thabeet in their win at UConn earlier in the season was more than impressive.  Plus, after the game he did an on the court interview with Jay Bilas and the two were basically eye level.  I know Blair is listed at 6′7″ but unless someone can tell me otherwise I doubt Jay Bilas is that height so I’d have to imagine Blair isn’t even as tall as his listed height.  And being an undersized center to begin with makes his exploits this season all that much harder to comprehend.  

I’d assume Jason, Kenny, and Jamel will all see time on him.  That’s 15 fouls to use on a player that shot 61% from the foul line on the year.  And it’s not exactly a secret that the best way to get Blair out of the game is to get him into foul trouble.  In all of Pitt’s loses this year that was the overriding theme.  If we can pull this off that would be great but can’t say I’m expecting it.  Not sure we have the penetrating prowess to pull it off.  It will probably take a couple cheap ones courtesy of the refs and I would whole heartily accept them.  

Sam Young is a great player.  At 6′6″ one would assume CJ and BJ, and perhaps Dante will get the brunt of the minutes guarding Young.  I would prefer CJ because we need BJ as fresh as possible on the offensive end of the court throughout the duration of the game.  BJ will need to be a factor for us scoring points in order for us to win methinks.  Back to Young, I’d imagine containment of him will be paramount.  We certainly cannot afford to let him score 30 points (on 12-20 shooting no less) like he did against OK State Sunday afternoon.  

The field general for this team is LeVance Fields.  Young and Blair may get a majority of the national headlines, but when the game is on the line the ball is in Field’s more than capable hands.   Hopefully, the groin injury he’s been playing through for almost the entire month of March will keep him off his game just enough to affect the outcome.  Couple that with the stifling defense Dante Jackson will bring to the table and this is the match-up I am hopeful will be the most successful for the good guys in navy.   

This may be the homer in me coming out, but I feel as though we match up the best with Pitt compared to the teams in the bottom of our bracket.  We both play half-court man-to-man defense and a disciplined half-court offense that only looks to run when the opportunity presents itself.  Pitt is also known for its bruising style of play, but I’m hopeful we can take it and then dish it back out accordingly.  

We have a big team.  One of the reasons I like starting Dante over Terrell is the fact that our starting line-up then goes 6′5″, 6′6″, 6′6″, 6′8″, and 6′9″.  That is a formidable front line for almost every team in America.  Now I know Blair plays much bigger than his aforementioned listed height of 6′7″ but take him out of the game and Pitt suddenly loses a lot of its force on the interior.  Hopefully that will happen, but I have a certain amount of faith we can get it done even with Blair in the game.  

But hey, we are in the effing Sweet 16!  I believe our boys are going to take the court with nothing to lose and play with a general looseness we may not have seen this season.  (hey, a boy can dream)  And let us not forget it was us that made the Elite 8 last year.  The core of this team has been in this position before and taken advantage of it.  Let’s hope that will translate into more success tomorrow night.  

Let’s go X!

Addressing the haters….

One of the weird things about being a Xavier fan is the apparent fact that we get more love from the national media than the local media.  I listened to Lance McAlister yesterday via the podcast and he could not believe how much backlash there was towards our success.  Which in and of itself is not surprising since Xavier has a decidedly small minority of fans in Cincinnati.  And I don’t expect UC fans to jump on the bandwagon, because I would never root for UC under any circumstances as well.  

It’s the rationale that drives me insane in the haters drive to belittle us.  Since we beat a 13 and a 12 seed that seems to somehow diminish our accomplishment of getting to the Sweet 16.  

I would imagine I speak for all Muskie fans when I say, “Sorry I’m not sorry.  No really, I apologize for our highly successful non-conference results and winning the conference title to EARN a 4 seed.  And I’m sorry Wisconsin didn’t bow down to Florida State after everyone and their brother picked the ‘Noles to get into the Sweet 16.  And I’m REALLY sorry we then had the audacity to beat the Badgers and reach the Sweet 16 for the second straight year.”

Ugh, why do I care so much?  

But ya know what?  This is one of the reasons I love Xavier.  There is something about having a small but very passionate and smart fan base that appeals to me in a very large way.  And X does not recruit players who want the attention.  We recruit players that want to WIN, period.  And that is more than evident from the quotes and demeanor of this and past year’s teams.  This was a quote from Derrick Brown I found off of Lance’s blog.  

“You can’t explain it to the outside world because they’re not in here, they don’t understand, People might think that it’s about stats and yadda yadda yadda, but we all care about each other and we got the job done. We’re going to the Sweet 16, baby!”

That pretty sums it up for this Xavier fan.  I doubt there are too many players around the country that think this way about their program and team.

And to all the haters I say, “Meh.”  

Tomorrow, we shall delve into the world of Pittsburgh basketball and our perception of how to pull off the upset.

Let’s go X!

Sweet… Pitt it is.

XU has advanced to their second straight Sweet Sixteen appearance for the first time ever to face off against Coach Miller’s Alma Mater Pittsburgh,  and I couldn’t be drunker happier.  The general discussion with Mr. Golfitup and I before the game was that this was going to be one of those first-to-sixty games, and this was exactly the case as XU won 60-49.

Xavier was the team to reach it first, and they did so with suffocating defense on the other end.  There was spread out scoring (signature Sean Miller coaching), big-time plays from just about everybody (except for Brad Redford’s 7-minute One Trillion), and did I mention The Muskies played with suffocating defense?  Well they did.  Wisconsin only shot 3-20 behind the 3-point arc, and only shot 28% total from the field. The biggest defensive play to me was a HUGE block by Kenny Frease all the way out to the 3-point line with about 7 minutes left.  He extended out to a guard and threw a shot back that could have tied this game, where every point was so important until X was finally able to pull away with 2 or 3 minutes to go.  But that isn’t meant to take anything away from the D the rest of the team played.  It was a thing of beauty.

Dante was a pain im the Badger Ass, Jamel’s 18 minutes included some of the biggest momentum plays of the game, Kenny had his best all-around game despite still strugling from the free throw line, and I drank Budweiser.  The thing that shocks me is that some things that I thought would be our Achilles  Heel in the tournament, especially in a back-and-forth close game like this did not spell our demise.

The Badgers shot about 13% better than us from the line with the help of some odd foul calls in the first half, and they only had 7 TO’s compared to our 14.  But it seemed as if every Wisconsin possession went down to the last 3 seconds of the shot clock before a bad shot was forced up or, you know, the occasional make.  Their epically slow style just appeared to fall right into the pack-line trap as they could hardly get anything by us,  and our Muskies had just a little more than enough offense to advance to the Sweet 16… again, bitches.

Now I get to nervously watch another huge game on Thursday, but until then, I will celebrate.  And I wonder how many times we will get to see this until and during our game against Pitt.  SEND IT IN JAMEL!!!

***also, did anyone else notice D Brown in the post-game interview say that they weren’t going to let CJ and BJ play their last games?  As in this wouldnt have been his last anyways?  I liked the way that sounded…

Muskies look to defeat secondary rivals for A-10 crown…

Before the season started I wrote what I thought should be the goals of the 2008-2009 version of the Xavier Musketeers.  Those goals were to win the A-10 regular season title and get into the NCCA tournament.  Now the latter of those two goals already appears to be in the bag.  And that’s all a fan can truly hope for in regards to entering a season in a supposed “rebuilding” year.  Although I highly doubt any of the players and coaches would agree with that sentiment.

Now in regards to the first goal of the season that means a lot is riding on tomorrow’s night game at the beautiful Cintas Center.  Dayton comes in off what many would say was a must-win game at home versus Temple, while X is coming off a hard fought road win at the Palestra against St. Joe’s.  Methinks I don’t need to remind anyone the conference title is on the line and we want that third straight A-10 title!  

Obviously, Jimmy Carter’s mug isn’t on this post just for kicks.  And I doubt  I need to remind anyone about the last time Dayton beat Xavier in Cincinnati.  Now one would have to reason that Dayton will eventually  beat X in Cincy, but it’s been so long since it happened I would think it’s just human nature for Dayton players to wonder if they’ll ever win at Xavier.  So while it may happen at some point I certainly don’t want it to happen tomorrow night or anytime soon for that matter.  Reminds me of  a very moving speech I find poignant at the moment.

Hell Oui!

Let’s go X!

Muskies to invade Palestra this time around

Playing St. Joe’s means I get to post one of my all-time favorite photos:

HA!

I’ve been looking forward to this game ever since finding out St. Joe’s would be playing all of its home games at the Palestra this year due to the renovation being undertaken at Alumni Memorial Fieldhouse.  It will be awesome to watch our Muskies play in arguably the most historic gym in the history of basketball.

St. Joe’s has been on a bit of a slide since their brief stay at the top of the conference standings.  After previously winning nine of ten the Hawks are now on a four game losing streak.  Clearly, their only ticket to the NCAA tournament this season will be through an A-10 tournament championship.  But you’d be foolhardy to count the fighting Martelli’s out of any game during A-10 play.  

Not only is Phil Martelli and excellent coach, but St. Joe’s also has the best player in the league this year.  Ahmad Nivins averages a 19 and 11 and is the focus of any defense that comes up against St. Joe’s.  But luckily, St. Joe’s has never employed a style of play that is conducive to exploiting the weaknesses our Muskies possess this year.  

The Hawks have always played a solid half-court man to man defense with an emphasis on forcing tough shots, not forcing turnovers.  If that sounds familiar it should, because it’s basically our philosophy as well.  (Quick Rant:  Those idiots who called into Sean Miller’s show last night to ask why we don’t play zone more often need to open their eyes and look at our style of defense.  It’s called a pack-line defense because we collapse around the ball to make sure no one can drive down the lane unimpeded.  There are actually a lot of zone principles in a pack-line style defense.  Even an amateur’s eyes like mine can figure that out with very little difficulty……ugh)  

St. Joe’s almost never utilizes full-court pressure and only converts 33% of its three-ball attempts.  However, as often is the case with basketball, anytime you have the best player on the floor anything can happen.  

Any who, I just hope our boys realize what an honor it is to play in the Palestra (I’ll bet Jason Love does) because I’ll be very grateful to watch my favorite basketball team play in a gym as hallowed at the Palestra.  Plus, it’s on ESPN2 with a national television audience.  

 

As many of you are aware our main man Mike Bobinski is apart of the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee this year.  I listen to the ESPNU college basketball podcast and it’s usually a good way to kill 20-30 minutes on the days they post a new episode.  The February 23rd version of the podcast features Selection Committee Chairman Mike Slive, who is the SEC Chairman and UCONN’s Athletic Director Jeff Hathaway who also is a member of the  selection committee.  They give some good insights into what the committee goes through not only on selection day itself, but also the days and weeks leading up to it.   Nice to get an idea of  what our boy Mike will be going through in the coming weeks leading up to one of the best days of the year!

Let’s go X!