Catching Up 11/29/10

What a hectic few days of sports, folks. I've just awoken from my turkey-induced slumber, and holy cow, where do I begin?

Football:

How about football? They did it! Every Akron fan that watched the end of the Zips' 22-14 victory over Buffalo feels like Kevin Garnett right now. Despite the officiating crew's attempts at keeping Buffalo in the game (some ridiculous late-game calls and reviews), the Zips closed it out thanks to a (who else?) Brian Wagner forced fumble.

Super-kudos to the 5,216 loyal fans that were in attendance the day after Thanksgiving.

Patrick Nicely finally looked like an FBS quarterback, completing 13 of his 24 passes for 193 yards and 3 touchdowns, and not a single interception. Each touchdown went to one of Akron's top receivers:

Jeremy LaFrance: 6 REC, 65 YDS, TD

Jalil Carter: 5 REC, 109 YDS, TD

Gary Pride: 1 REC, 15 YDS, TD

Keith Sconiers: 1 REC, 4 YDS

Also, this had to be an emotional game for 6th-year senior Alex Allen, and it showed in yet another impressive rushing game. He was given the ball a worthy 32 times and ran for 120 yards, but didn't reach the end zone. Nate Burney ran 4 times for 24 yards.

And, as always, Zack Campbell!

Zack Campbell: 5 punts, 185 YDS

On the other side of special teams, the Ever Dependable Igor Iveljic earned his nickname with two (count 'em!), TWO missed extra points. The Slightly More Dependable Branko Rogovic took his place and made a 39 yard field goal.

We finished with an FBS-worst 1-11 record, but the play of this team since the shutout at Temple, has been very promising (defense included). Add to that mixture that Rob Ianello is known for great recruiting, that the current players have already had one full offseason with Ianello, and that we have a fairly young team (other than Alex Allen and Jeremy LaFrance, who will be sorely missed), and we may see a 4-6 win team next year. Want evidence? Look at the MAC East Champion Miami Redhawks, whose team last year looked an awful lot like ours...

Men's Soccer:

The MAC Champions advanced to the Elite Eight yesterday, defeating an Indiana Hoosiers squad full of "the rich tradition of IU soccer" 2-1.

Let me just start by saying "WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!"

After last year's horribly disappointing runner-up finish, everybody that follows Akron soccer has been anticipating this year's championship matchup. That's a deadly thing. The team has been beaten by a mediocre Cleveland State team and gave up two very late goals last week against West Virginia. Any one of these tournament matchups has the opportunity to dash our hopes against the brick wall that we call sports, and there are still three games to go for a championship title.

Seeing the win today was like Christmas in...November...

After a hard-fought scoreless first half, Michael Nanchoff put Akron up 1-0 in the 53rd minute. One minute and eight seconds later, Darren Mattocks intercepted Hoosier goalkeeper Luis Soffner's pass and put in his 18th goal of the year.

Indiana pressed hard in the final minutes, scoring in the 82nd, but couldn't get close in the final few.

Here's what I'm wondering: How many incredible seasons is it going to take for people to start talking about Akron's rich soccer tradition?

Men's Basketball:

The team fell to 2-2 after losing 64-51 to Cleveland State, but at least in four games, they have a better record than the football team's whole season; so even if they finish with 2 wins, we'll still be able to say "it could be worse". Isn't optimism GREAT????

Basically, the Zips' hot 3-point shooting fizzled out during the wrong game. Cleveland State is a great team, yet they were held in check for the majority of the game, even though the Zips were led in rebounding by 6'4" Brett McClanahan (7) and 6'0" Darryl Roberts (5).

Some notes (all bad):

- Zeke Marshall played like a Zeke Marshmallow, scoring a team-high 14 points and sending 4 balls screaming for their mommies, but grabbing just 5 rebounds, allowing way too many inside points and dropping seemingly every pass that came his way (5 turnovers in reality).

- Nikola Cvetinovic was grade-A ball hog, putting up shot after shot, even though he was obviously cold. Don't be fooled by his 4 assists. Teams are starting to figure out that nearly every time he gets the ball he's going to spin to the middle for a layup. He finished 1/10 shooting with 6 points and just 3 rebounds in 30 minutes.

- Why is Mike Bardo not playing more? He had 4 rebounds and and a block in just 6 minutes, as well as a SICK follow up shot for his only points. The rebounds show just how much of a presence he is in the paint. He would have come in handy while Cleveland was catching fire in the paint in the second half; Cleveland State's Jeremy Montgomery and Trevon Harmon (who put home a momentum-crushing dunk over Zeke in the final minutes) had their way with Zeke Marshmallow multiple times.

- The bench (other than Bardo) is disappointing at best so far. Quincy Diggs had the most minutes with 10, and finished with 5 points and a rebound. Alex Abreu played 6 minutes and accumulated a foul and a turnover. Josh Egner had 1 block in 5 minutes, and Dakotah Euton bricked three times and had 1 assist in 7 minutes.

Roo News 11/22/10

1) The men's basketball team won a thriller in overtime against Youngstown State on Saturday.

In summation? Two words. Nik Cvetinovic. Oh, and Zeke Marshall. And Brett McClanahan.

Cvetinovic shot 10-12, and 7-9 from the line for a career high 27 points.

Marshall shot 8-16, 6-12 from the line for a career high 22 points, and also pulled down 3 rebounds and sent 3 basketballs screaming for their life.

McClanahan shot 8-13, 3-7 from behind the arc for a career high 22 points, and pulled down 10 rebounds! Remember earlier this year, when I said not to get too hopeful about Brett McClanahan because he's always been streaky? Ignore that. As far as you know, I didn't say it. See? I didn't even link to the post. I could be lying to you for all you know.

McClanahan has developed into one heck of an all-around player. He lives beyond 3-point range, but isn't afraid to drive the lane, and he's become an absolute workhorse on defense. I was watching him midway through the 2nd half. Every time the ball was shot, he was circling around his defender to grab the rebound.

So anyway, with just a few seconds left on the clock, Akron had outshot Youngstown State by 14% and three players had a career high in points, so naturally the Zips were down by 3 thanks to 56% free throw shooting. After two missed shots on the last possession, Zeke Marshall ripped the ball out of a Penguin player's hand for the rebound and swung it out to McClanahan, who promptly sunk the game-tying three. Overtime. Then Akron pulled away.

This game was tied 18 times; probably the most exciting Zips basketball game I've ever seen. So naturally I wasn't in attendance, but watching it on the hideous creation that is Zips Zone.

2) The women's basketball team dropped Niagara 77-58 yesterday afternoon. Rachel Tecca once again led the team in scoring with 20, as did Kara Murphy. The Zips were only up 64-58 late in the game, but scored 13 straight points to close out.

3) The men's soccer team advances to the round of 16 after beating West Virginia 3-2 yesterday. After leading 3-0 80 minutes in, and dominating in shots 15-2, the Zips got a little complacent, allowing four shots from the Mountaineers, two of which translated into late goals. Darren Mattocks scored his 16th and 17th goals of the season. The other was put in from 18 yards by Scott Caldwell, his 3rd of the season.

The next opponent for the Zips is Indiana, who dropped Tulsa 5-0 in the second round.

Stats Roundup 11/20/10

As I was sitting here wondering what I could possibly blog about during this Akron sports lull (I didn't forget to recap the football game, I chose not to recap it after Jeremy LaFrance fumbled the winning ball late in the game), it came to my attention that I have rarely blogged about overall statistics. So here we go, the first Stats Roundup:

Football:

Before I cover any individual statistics, I'd like to point this out:

2010 Overall FBS Rankings:

Passing Yards-111th

Rushing Yards-102nd

Points For-117th

Points Againts-111th

And that, folks, is why we are 0-11. I'm not ready to throw in the towel with Rob Ianello (although I still believe that firing J.D. Brookhart was an awful, awful idea). I think that a coach should be able to bring in at least three recruiting classes before he is evaluated for a firing, but holy cow, this could be a long three years of Akron football.

Passing:

Patrick Nicely-153/312 (49.0%), 1560 YDS, 7 TD, 13 INT, 90.1 RAT

Matt Rodgers-7/11 (63.6%), 95 YDS, 2 TD, INT, 178.0 RAT

While Patrick Nicely has been solidifying his spot as the worst starting quarterback in the FBS, Matt Rodgers has mysteriously suffered a number of "injuries", the latest being listed under "concussion" on Thursday. Say what?

It's obvious that Ianello is in love with Nicely, which may explain why he took him out of his comfort zone (shotgun offense) to allow him to utterly fail in the pro-style offense. Well, no. It doesn't. The good news is, Nicely's only a sophomore; so that for the next two years, he can continue to utterly fail in the pro-style offense. A new generation of Akron football, folks!

Rushing:

Alex Allen-154 CAR, 771 YDS, 5.0 AVG, 8 TD

Nate Burney-105 CAR, 443 YDS, 4.2 AVG

The rushing attack has leaned on Alex Allen more and more throughout the season, which is great, as he himself has just 1 less touchdown than our ENTIRE PASSING GAME. Man, do I miss the days of Chris Jacquemain and Dennis Kennedy.

Receiving:

Jeremy LaFrance-37 REC, 469 YDS, 12.7 AVG, 5 TD

Jalil Carter-25 REC, 303 YDS, 12.1 AVG, TD

Antoine Russell-13 REC, 221 YDS, 17.0 AVG, TD

Gary Pride-21 REC, 167 YDS, 8.0 AVG

Richard Hall-16 REC, 149 YDS, 9.3 AVG, TD

Alex Allen-17 REC, 115 YDS, 6.8 AVG

Keith Sconiers-8 REC, 71 YDS, 8.9 AVG

Austin Bailey-7 REC, 51 YDS, 7.3 AVG, TD

Nate Burney-7 REC, 33 YDS, 4.7 AVG

The receiving corps has been injury-plagued this year, but are improving as the weeks go by (especially former defensive back Jalil Carter and Gary Pride). The bad news is, LaFrance and Carter are seniors, and Pride is a junior. This leaves freshmen Antoine Russell, whose 17.0 AVG is a bit misleading thanks to a 56 yard reception, and Keith Sconiers, alongside sophomore Anthony Meriwether, who has been suffering from an achilles injury. Meriwether, you may remember, had his redshirt burned last year as a running back. The good news is, we have a coach that is infamous for successful position-switching...oh, that's right. We fired him.

Kicking:

The Ever Dependable Igor Iveljic-17/19 XP, 9/14 FG

Branko Rogovic-1/1 XP

Thank goodness these guys are both seniors. I don't know how many more botched extra points and shanked short field goals I can take. At least Rogovic has done a decent job with kickoff duty this year. Interesting stat for The Ever Dependable Igor Iveljic...he's 5/7 from 40-49 yards; while he has gone 2/5 from 30-39 yards. Say what?

The next game is against the 2-8 Buffalo Bulls, who play the 1-9 Eastern Michigan Eagles today. We have no reason not to win this game. Buffalo will have a short week of practice before coming to Akron for a Friday game, and we will have had a week and then some to warm up (and rest some injuries) for this one. I'd be ecstatic to see Matt Rodgers get the start, even though that's some serious wishful thinking. I was critical of him to begin the year, but he's proven in the games he's been in this year that he's the better quarterback. Patrick Nicely has 0-12 written all over him.

In basketball news:

If, like me, you were wondering why Brett McKnight didn't make an appearance in the loss to Dayton, it's because he's been indefinitely suspended for a "violation of university policy". According to the article, he had also been suspended for 30 days in the preseason, which may explain why he didn't play in the exhibition and his lackluster performance against Millikin.

Close Game = Akron Loss

After treating us to an hour of the Cavaliers' post-game show last night, FSN finally switched over to the Akron/Dayton men's basketball game. Just in time for the halftime show. And after what seemed like four days later, I got to watch some basketball.

Summary:

After a first half explosion from Chris Wright, the Zips trailed 42-31 at halftime, pulled back to 54-54 thanks to some ridiculous three point shooting, then did what every Dambrot-coached Zips basketball team has done in the last few years in a close game; tired out and allowed their opponents to walk away with a victory. This one happened to be a 76-68 victory.

There is absolutely no reason that the Flyers should have walked away with that win. They're a great team, don't get me wrong. But Akron was leading midway through the second half with 7'0" Zeke Marshall and 6'10" Mike Bardo on the bench with foul trouble, thanks to over 50% three-point shooting. With around 5 minutes left, Marshall reentered the game. Done deal, right? Surely McNees and McClanahan would stop shooting NBA-length threes. Surely they'd realize that hot streaks end. Surely they'd start giving the ball to Cvetinovic and Marshall, letting them get their work done on the inside.

Nope.

The Zips shot a ghastly 22-60 overall. Of course, that may have been largely due to their 14-36 three-point shooting. They were also dominated in every facet by the Dayton offense, who led in rebounding 42-27 and shot 30-56 overall. On top of this "Please don't touch me!" defense, the bench looked awful. For the love of Pete, folks, Nikola Cvetinovic led our team in assists with 7. How many did starting point guard Steve McNees have? 0. Not one. And he was 4-13 shooting. And he was 4-12 from three-point range. I feel like this blog is turning into College Basketbawful.

The good news is, it's a long season. The bad news is, this Zips team looks like the last few Dambrot-coached teams; playing to the level of their opponent, hanging in a close game, then failing miserably in the last two minutes. The rest of the good news is, Dambrot-coached teams translate end-of-game regular season failure into end-of-game tournament success. The rest of the bad news is, the streak of three-point shooting we saw yesterday won't happen every game. It probably won't happen in half of the games. If Zeke Marshall, Dakotah Euton and Mike Bardo can't establish a low-post presence, we're going to be in trouble.

Dayton > Millikin

The men's basketball team has a huge away matchup tonight with the Dayton Flyers. If you live in the Cincinnati or Dayton areas, tune in to FSN Ohio at 9 see your Flyers lose. If you live in the Cleveland, Akron, Toledo or Columbus area, the coverage of Akron/Dayton will pick up right after the Cavs/76ers.

Shocking Stat:

Alex Abreu's 8 assists last week were the most in a single game by an Akron player in almost three years. Dru Joyce had 10 in January of 2007. I read all summer long that Abreu was a talented point guard, and if he continues to improve his passing game we could see a very, very good Akron Zips basketball team in the next couple of years. One of the main issues with the team in the last couple years has been the lack of ability to distribute the ball in clutch situations. Last year's close home losses to Austin Peay and Rhode Island immediately spring to mind.

Look for a very intense game tonight. Both teams are very scrappy, underrated teams looking to impress a local televised audience.

In other news, the women's basketball team lost 69-54 to IPFW yesterday. Sophomore Rachel Tecca looked very impressive, playing 30 minutes while putting up 21 points on 10-17 shooting, 6 rebounds and 4 assists. Unfortunately, nobody else on the team scored more than 7. Tecca's 4 assists were also a team high. The lady Zips have another road game tomorrow against IUPUI.

Catching Up 11/15/10

Men's Soccer:

Won their fourth consecutive (eighth overall) MAC Championship via a dominating 3-1 win over Buffalo Friday night, and a 4-0 trouncing of Western Michigan Sunday afternoon. I don't have time to put up details, so here are some highlights, from ZipsAthletics:

Buffalo (MAC Semifinals):

Western Michigan (MAC Championship):

Men's Basketball:

Absolutely shut down Millikin in the season opener, to nobody's surprise. The 89-41 victory (48-9 at the half) makes Akron 1-0, but doesn't necessarily prepare them for a tough away matchup with Dayton on Tuesday, which will be televised on FSN. Again, sorry for the lack of a recap (I love doing basketball recaps), but here are the highlights:

Volleyball:

Lost their final game of the season to Ball State in four sets. Yuck. After starting the season 3-4, the lady Zips won 10 in a row, 5 of those coming in conference play, only to lose the next 6, then win only 2 of the last 5 to end with a lackluster record of 15-13 (7-9 MAC). The good news is, they still have a chance in the MAC tournament, playing 10th seed Buffalo on Tuesday.

Football:

This bye week prevented us from seeing another disastrous football loss, but the whole nation will be able to see that on Wednesday (if anybody outside of Ohio is insane enough to turn to ESPNU at 6pm for the game against Miami). I will be at the game, but I don't expect us to put up more than 10-17 points. The recap should be fun, though.

Roo News 11/12/10

1) The volleyball team lost a thriller to Buffalo yesterday, falling in five sets after leading 2-1 after three. The Zips seemed a bit too confident midway through the fourth set after taking an 11-6 lead, lost focus, and never recovered, despite some seriously intense timeout discussions from head coach Ron Arenz. This loss drops the lady Zips to 15-12 (7-8 MAC). They close out the regular at Ball State tomorrow.



2) The MAC men's soccer tournament begins today. The Zips have the #1 seed, and match up against the #4 seed Buffalo Bulls at 5 o'clock. When the two teams met in the regular season, it wasn't pretty. The Zips won 4-0, and outshot the Bulls 22-2. You can find the box score by clicking on the previous link, or by looking under the word "domination" in your local dictionary. GoZips.com has a nice preview here.

3) Elsewhere in soccer, former Akron standout and current Kansas City Wizard Teal Bunbury will join fellow MLS forwards Juan Agudelo (New York Red Bulls) and Robbie Findley (Real Salt Lake) on the United Stated national roster for the upcoming match against South Africa. He is the first Akron Zip to ever be selected for the national team.

4) The men's basketball team opens their season today at the JAR. After the Zips' 111-48 beatdown of John Carroll, fellow Division III program Millikin is going to need a lot to go their way (like Zeke Marshall suddenly shrinking 5 inches) for a win. It's also $1 Hot Dog and Pepsi night, so if you live in the area, are reading this blog, and haven't bought a ticket, buy one before I question your sanity.

The results should look very similar to the exhibition game against John Carroll, as the Zips once again hold a tremendous size and speed advantage. I'm curious to see how Keith Dambrot is going to handle the playing time of Alex Abreu and Quincy Diggs. I'm also wondering how much he plans on playing 6'10" center Mike Bardo this year. Bardo didn't get a lot of minutes last year thanks to some nagging injuries, but if he can hold those off, his size will help tremendously.

Catching Up 11/8/10

Men's Soccer:

The 16-1-1 #2 men's soccer team (man, that's disappointing to say) needed Michael Nanchoff's 80th minute penalty kick to defeat Hartwick (the 2-14-1 Hartwick Hawks!) 2-1 on Saturday. I'm not sure what's going on with the soccer team, but this is not the same team that scored a touchdown against Michigan. Hartwick is 2-14-1. And the Zips only outshot them 12-9.

The MAC tournament begins Friday, and Akron (obviously) has the #1 seed. We'll be playing Buffalo at 5pm. If the team becomes complacent like they seem to have been lately, we could see some serious trouble.

Volleyball:

The lady Zips won a 5-set scare over Kent State, but fell in four sets to Ohio the next day, falling to 15-11 (7-7 MAC), one game behind Ohio. MAC East play ends on Thursday, with a home matchup against 16-14 (4-10 MAC) Buffalo.

Football:

What. The. Heck. This year couldn't get worse. In fact, the team name "Zips" fits very well with that number in the win column. If you haven't seen, the Zips lost in double overtime 37-30 to Ball State on Saturday. This was our best chance to avoid a winless season, and pretty much fully explains how this entire season has gone.

But here's the best part: Do you want to know why the game went into overtime? The Ever Dependable Igor Iveljic. That's right. He missed an extra point.

On the bright side, this above-average offensive showing allows me to stop posting Zack Campbell's stats every week. But just for fun:

Zack Campbell-8 punts, 277 YDS

Alex Allen had a heck of a game, carrying the ball 25 times for 165 yards, but all of the touchdowns went to Patrick "Throws-the-ball-not-so" Nicely and the receiving corps.

Jalil Carter-6 REC, 69 YDS, TD

Alex Allen-5 REC, 29 YDS

Jeremy LaFrance-3 REC, 46 YDS, 2 TD

Anthony Meriweather-2 REC, 17 YDS

Richard Hall-2 REC, 17 YDS, TD

Patrick Nicely negated his best game of the year by throwing three interceptions. Wow, that guy has been awful this year.

Also on the bright side, the team gets to close out the season with two televised home games against Miami (OH) (5-4) and Buffalo (2-7).

UPDATE: Added a poll to the side bar. Let's see what you guys think.

Exhibition Games Are Hard To Recap...

The men's basketball team looked great yesterday in their exhibition matchup against Division III John Carroll, winning by a score of 111-48...but that's mostly because they were playing Division III John Carroll.

The Blue Streaks actually had the lead early on (8-5) before Akron ran away with it.

Looked Great:

- Nikola Cvetinovic, who put up 19 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists and a steal in just 16 minutes of play. He also shot 9-12 from the line, which is a breath of fresh air after he shot 50.6% from the line last year.

- Steve McNees, who took 7 shots in his 23 minutes of play, all from beyond the arc, and made 5 of them. Add to that his 5 rebounds and 9 assists.

- Zeke Marshall, and his role on the team. Statistically, he played 25 minutes, scored 14 points on 6-7 shooting, pulled down 5 rebounds, and had 3 blocks and an assist. The fact that he only got 5 rebounds looks worrying at first glance. And here's an interesting tidbit: After John Carroll started a full court press, the Zips ran a play with Zeke as the anchor, at midcourt. McNees, or whoever was at the point, would just heave it up to Zeke, who would seemingly jump 40 feet in the air, pull it down, and calmly hand it back to the point guard at half-court.

Looked Good:

- Brett McClanahan. He shot 5-11 overall, 5-9 from downtown. Four of those 3's came consecutively. Most likely, he will be just as streaky this year as he has been in the past, but as long as those streaks happen when it counts, he can be a huge boost to morale.

- Dakotah Euton. He was the only incoming player that didn't look shaky (see below). He ended with 6 points on 3-5 shooting, with 5 rebounds. One of those shots was a ridiculous three pointer that ended up somewhere in downtown Columbus. Other than that shot, however, he looked solid.

- The Zeke Marshall/Mike Bardo combo. Bardo only played 11 minutes, but pulled down 7 rebounds, with a block and a steal. He also had three points on 1-3 shooting. Having 7'0" Marshall and 6'10" Bardo on the floor at the same time will work wonders if the perimeter players play some good defense.

Looked Shaky:

- The incoming players (minus Dakotah Euton). Alex Abreu and Quincy Diggs look promising, but both just looked jittery yesterday. Abreu ended with 10 points on 3-7 shooting, and had 4 assists and 5 steals. There were times he looked like a wizard with the ball, but there were also moments when he didn't look for the pass at all. Those didn't end well. Diggs had 6 points on 3-5 shooting, with 4 rebounds in 17 minutes.

Other Notes:

- Josh Egner looked good statistically (10 points, 5 rebounds and 2 blocks in just 4 minutes), but also had a turnover and 3 personal fouls.

- Brett McKnight didn't play, but if he improves at all from last season, our frontcourt is going to be scary this year.

- I'd like to see some more play from Kyle Peterson. He only scored 2 points and 2 assists in 5 minutes yesterday, but this is largely because Egner took most of his shots in that period of time. Peterson is definitely better than a 2-minutes a season player.

- Want to know exactly how small John Carroll was? The Zips outrebounded them 62-35.

The Zips play another Division III team (Millikin) on Saturday, only this one will put a number on the standings. The game is at the JAR, and there are $1 Hot Dogs and Pepsi Products while supplies last. The $10 general admission ticket is well worth the price.

Roo News 11/3/10

1) Notes from head football coach Rob Ianello's weekly press conference:

- Feels like we learned a lot from the Temple game last week. Thinks that we were better on defense, offense, and special teams...Ianello says the darndest things sometimes...

- Has been impressed by the team's effort during practice this week.

- We had a field goal blocked, an early touchdown overturned, and a lot of close failed conversions. If those had been turned around, we may have seen a game.

- Jalil Carter sat out last week for a personal reason, but it wasn't disciplinary and he'll be back this week.

- Broderick Alexander is improving and should be ready for Spring practice. He will stay at running back.

- Ball State is better than their standing would indicate, and in some ways, face a similar story as us this year.

- There was a humorous moment when a reporter asked Ianello if he has talked to Director of Athletics Tom Wistrcill lately and what those talks were about (to paraphrase, will you be fired any time soon?). Ianello responded with "pardon me?" and then something along the lines of "we talk every day...about the future of the program" (to paraphrase, are you freakin' kidding me?).

2) The men's basketball team faces John Carroll tomorrow for an exhibition game. I wish I had the time to write up a nice big basketball preview, but you can read a nice preview from GoZips.com here.

3) The #1 men's soccer team defeated Michigan State 1-0 earlier today in convincing fashion, leading 14-3 in shots, and 5-1 in shots on goal. The lone goal of the game came from Darren Mattocks, his 12th of the year. The Zips move to 15-1-1 and end their regular season at Hartwick on Saturday.