The Colonial Athletic Association would be my home conference. I grew up an ACC fan, like any normal kid in southside Virginia, but not all of us go to big giant ass state schools, and some of us go to smaller ass artsy weird fuck schools like VCU. Back when I was there, they played their games downtown at the Richmond Coliseum, which meant you had to ride a shuttle bus to get to the games, and I can tell you that never in my life have I been a shuttle bus type of person. Greyhounds? Yes. School bus for a house? Sure. But a shuttle bus? Hell no, that's some sprawlish creepy crawl bullshit right there. So I never caught game one, even though back then we had two former McDonald's All-Americans (Kendrick Warren, who probably couldn't be trusted in any other school to be honest, and Kenny Something or other who had played his freshman year at UNC but had to transfer, most likely due to questionable decision making skills, as he had like three kids by five women back then, and he wasn't but still in his early 20s). But they built a new arena on campus, and a steady string of up-and-coming coaches (Jeff Kapel, who left to coach Oklahoma, and then Anthony Grant, who left to coach Alabama, and now Shaka Smart, who will leave to coach South Carolina in three years).
The CAA, along with the MVC, is probably the most notorious mid-major conference there is, and the one that big programs hate to face in the NCAA tournament. It was the CAA's George Mason who made that run to the Final Four a few years back, and then VCU followed that up by upsetting Duke the following year. So it's a conference capable of showing their ass in prominent mid-March basketball competitions.
The CAA tournament itself is a big part of that, it always being a clusterfuck of evenly matched teams that make for an interesting first two days and exciting grudge match final two days. And being it's held in the Richmond Coliseum (which technically is a pretty fair center point between all the schools), VCU always has a pseudo-home court advantage. Here are the fourteen dudes who scored the most points in the previous four CAA tourneys...
#1: Eric Maynor (VCU guard; 156 points in CAA tourneys '06-'09) - I took my oldest daughter to the CAA tourney semifinals and finals last year, and she absolutely fell in love (athletically, not physically... she's only 11) with Eric Maynor. And it was hard not to. Even though it's a Division I conference, he was just another two levels above everybody else, to the point they could fall behind by 10 points or more, and he could just completely take over a game, single-handedly. He did just that when he was CAA tourney MVP in 2007, and basically just decided at the end of the game when VCU was down by 6 or 7 points to George Mason, that they were gonna win. It was like somebody playing NBA Jams who knew all the cheat combos. He was drafted into the NBA by the Utah Jazz, where he played a little before getting traded to the Oklahoma City Thunderbirds where he's a steady bench contributor as a rookie, and I can't help but think a team with him and Kevin Durant is a team with a solid as fuck futuristic back court.
#2: Dre Smith (George Mason guard; 126 points in CAA tourneys '07-'09) - Before I speak upon Dre Smith, I want to mention I just googled news his name, and this was part of what I got: "fuhrte US-Boy Dre Smith nahtlos fort: Punkte in Serie!" No doubt 'bout that. Dre was but a young buck, not even on the team in an active capacity when they made their Final Four run, but he took over in his time. And he's been rewarded with a starting gig in Austria with the ABC Lions Dornbirn. And to think just last year, I saw him trading threes with Eric Maynor in the Richmond Coliseum. That was in the championship game, and this year, if VCU wins their opening round game against Delaware, GMU and VCU will rematch in the quarterfinals.
#3: Will Thomas (George Mason forward; 120 points in CAA tourneys '06-'08) - A major player in the Final Four run along with Jai Lewis, and that notoriety got him some NBA Summer League action, but he landed on Belgacom Liege Basket, in the Belgian League, where he's been a solid contributor. That team even played in the Eurochallenge, which I can only assume is some sort of super league competition of Euroleague champions. He's still cold kicking it in Belgium, to this very day, eating waffles like a motherfucker and washing it down with beers that come in big bottles with corks held on by twisted wire.
#4: Folarin Campbell (George Mason guard/forward; 118 points in CAA tourneys '06-'08) - Another Final Four run roleplayer, who landed in Europe, first in Italy and now upgraded to the prestigious German League, starting for the Artland Dragons Quakenbrueck, which oddly enough, was the name of a gang of drunken handicapped Mennonite kids gone awry back in my high school.
#5: Antoine Agudio (Hofstra guard; 92 points in CAA tourneys '06-'08) - Double A was a straight shooter, who could light it up for 30 points no problem if you weren't careful and he got that feeling. He was hot enough to get a look from the New Orleans Hornets before the 2008 NBA draft, but nothing came of it, and he starred for a year in Turkey for the Banvit Basketbol Kulubu, who are involved in phone card scams that filter money to Islamic organizations. After their involvement in the Eurochallenge, he got hooked up with the Albuquerque Thunderbirds in the NBA D-League, where he's been solidly scoring points, hoping for a 10-day contract somewhere in the NBA on the far end of somebody's bench, beside the guys in the suits with the torn ACLs and sprained ankles.
#6: Laimis Kisielius (William & Mary forward; 84 points in CAA tourneys '06-'08) - My man Laimis was the foreign hotness there in the CAA at one point, taking over a tourney a couple years back and carrying shitty William & Mary all the way to the championship game before they bit it against a George Mason team. A native Lithuanian, since finishing college, he's played for multiple teams in his home country, as well as in the Ukraine and Latvia, where he's currently stationed as a starter for Liepajas Lauvas. Judging by the pictures I've seen looking him up, they use some pimp ass designed basketballs in some of those Euro leagues. Seems like when we do alternate color styles in America, we get stifled by the awesomeness of the red, white and blue old school ABA balls. But you'd have to figure countries with a stronger soccer identity would know how to pimp a round ball out better than us anyways.
#7: Danny Sumner (William & Mary forward; 83 points in CAA tourneys '08 and '09) - Still in college.
#8: Leonard Mendez (Georgia State guard; 81 points in CAA tourneys '06-'09) - Mendez was another dude like Antoine Agudio who could just light it the fuck up sometimes, just he played on Georgia State, which has at best been like middle-of-the-pack in the CAA. It must be hard being the southernmost team in a league situated mostly in Virginia with schools way the fuck up in New England as well, although I'm sure the other schools enjoy a nice trip down to Georgia's weather in the dead of winter. The only thing Mendez has done post-college was playing in some sort of Eurobasket Summer League in Las Vegas last summer, so I can only assume he is working at the UPS in Atlanta now. Although these smaller school guys all actually graduate and get degrees, so he might've got a business degree and has some sort of internet start-up going. Google news shows nothing, so whatever he's doing, it's dwelling in the shadows of the real world.
#9: Loren Stokes (Hofstra guard; 76 points in CAA tourneys '06 and '07) - Former Hofstra dude, as you will say, travel well. Since wrapping up his college career in 2007, here is the resume of a young Mr. Loren Stokes: Long Island Primetime (America), assorted pro-scout heavy summer leagues, Aspis Apoel Nicosia (Cyprus, including some FIBA EuroCup action), Generali Okapi Aalstar (Belgium), Aget Imola (Italy), BS Odessa (Ukraine), and now back at Generali Okapi Aalstar. Imagine the crazy characters a young American basketballer all over Europe like that has bought his weed from.
#10: T.J. Carter (UNC-Wilmington guard; 73 points in CAA tourneys '06 and '08) - Another domineering shooter, which basketball dork analysts always call "pure shooters" as if there's some sort of eugenics program for guys who shoot threes well and have nice floating jumpers. Carter was good as fuck though, and has kicked it for Duesseldorf Giants in Germany's top league for a couple years now, where he is one of the league's top sixth men.
#11: Herbert Courtney (Delaware forward; 71 points in CAA tourneys '06-'09) - Delaware's basketball team has never been that great, because even in smaller schools, some schools are football schools. The Delaware Blue Hen Division I-AA tradition is strong (that's where Joe Flacco came from), and that hasn't translated to the roundball too often. Still, Courtney made a strong enough showing to allow himself the odd post-collegiate pro career travels of Argentina to Israel to Turkey, where he was dropped in December from a team called Final Genclik, which I think is some sort of Armageddon-based song by Testament. Or maybe it was Kreator.
#12: Gerald Lee (Old Dominion forward; 68 points in CAA tourneys '07-'09) - Still in college; will speak upon him tomorrow.
#13: Charles Jenkins (Hofstra guard; 68 points in CAA tourneys '08 and '09) - Still in college.
#14: Carlos Rivera (Hofstra guard; 66 points in CAA tourneys '06 and '07) - I barely remember Carlos Rivera as Hofstra's point guard, but apparently holmes is like a Puerto Rican superstar, and proud boriquas everywhere think he should be in the NBA. Post-college, he has run up his frequent flyer miles, playing for Atleticos de San German (in Puerto Rico HOOOOO!), then SPEC Polonia Warszawa (in Poland), then back to Puerto Rico (HOOOOO!) to play for Capitanes de Arecibo, then fall ball back in Poland for Atlast Stal Ostrow Wielkopolski, then summer back in Puerto Rico (HOOOOO!), again for Capitanes de Arecibo, and he kept it close to home this fall, going to Mexico to play for Halcones Rojos de Veracruz, starting in all of those places. So dude has pretty much played year-round professional ball since he finished his collegiate eligibility in spring 2007. And people say Puerto Ricans are lazy.
No comments:
Post a Comment