Monday, December 3, 2007

Vermont Catamounts Update

Well...the good news is that the only season that matters for mid-major schools is the conference season. The bad news is that the Cats have been slightly disapointing in their out of conference games.

After losing their first 3 games to teams which on paper were superior to them (George Mason, Virginia and Loyola, MD), the cats won their next two (independent New Jersey Institute of Technology and Towson).

The Cats then suffered their most inexcusable loss of the year. A 76-75 heartbreaker to Dartmouth. Dartmouth has some solid players but that is a game the Cats need to win. This game exposed a lack of size in the paint but more disturbingly, a lack of toughness and commitment to defense. There is a decent amount of talent on this Vermont team but not enough where they can show up and win by just playing offense. Injuries have hurt the team's depth in the post but injuries do not affect the rest of the team's effort and that was a problem against Dartmouth. Perhaps this will serve as a wake up call for a team that desperately needs one.

The Cats played Florida after Dartmouth and lost by 25 to bring their record to a disapointing 2-5. I'm not going to judge them on that game because most teams are going to lose to Florida by 25.

We will see what kind of team UVM really has over the next five games before the conference season starts up. All five games are beatable opponents on the same level as the Cats. Perhaps these games can help build some momentum for the real season starting January 3rd against Binghamton.

6 comments:

Dews said...

Inconceivable!

To Dartmouth???

wtf man, the basketball team to busy with the elephant walk like the hockey team?

:)

Steve said...

low blow...

Dews said...

Yea, sorry, maybe a bit too much.. But still, Dartmouth???

Jack Gonzo, MD said...

That's tough, especially seeing SayHey's alma mater go on and beat Maryland on Sunday

SayHey Kid said...

We didnt just beat Maryland, we beat em in fine double digit fashion!!

If only I knew the game was at the Verizon Center I would have gone.....

Steve said...

Really, Dartmouth has been the only bad loss so far. But thats pretty bad. They need to win 4 out of the next 5 to bring their OOC record to respectable now.

There was never any chance for an at-large bid with this team anyway so I hope the Dartmouth game is a wake-up call that we avoided during the conference season.