forth and back

on the 19th, columbia observed the presidential inaugural by traveling to ithaca.  starting slowly, they managed to craft a narrow half time margin before thoroughly dismantling ezra cornell’s rubes, 67 -58, behind big mark cisco’s 18 points and 9 boards.  brian barbour chipped in with 16 while steve frankoski shot 60% from beyond the arc.   saturday last the blue returned home  to welcome the aforementioned ag schoolers to the craggy heights of morningside.  the result?  in front of a packed levien gymnasium crowd, the boys returned the favor, falling 63 – 66.  granted, it is only two games into the league season, but i gotta tell ya, the game reeked of must win to me.  road w’s are so valuable and home losses so costly, especially in the ivies, that i’m left if not dismayed, deeply disappointed.  a measly two more made field goals and the team sits at  2 – 0, atop the league and surveying the hoi polloi beside haughty harvard.  alas, no happy recap.  let us consider the loss.

controlling the tipoff, the lions seemed much the better team for the first four minutes of play – quicker, more aggressive, simply livelier.  that zest yielded little, however, as they made only 2 of their first 9 shots.  at the 16:00 minute mark of the opening period, the blue led 4 – 0.  that was their largest lead of the evening and hence forth they would be chasing the big red.  the lions trailed by 12 at the half and fell behind as many as 15 in the second period before staging a frantically exciting but ultimately futile rally.  along the way the crowd was treated to a rim rattling slam by forward john daniels off a steal by and lead pass from maodo lo.  daniels  literally carried defender shonn miller skyward upon his shoulders as he completed the throw down.  his samson act was rewarded with a foul shot and daniels completed an old fashioned three point play.  we also enjoyed brian barbour’s death defying layup with 8 seconds to go and subsequent foul shot which got the boys to within a single point.  two final free throws by cornell, though, ended the unsuccessful comeback.

what had changed in the week?   perusal of the box score points to the most obvious difference.  though the refs seemed even handed in the distribution of fouls, whistling columbia for twenty two and the visitors for twenty, they did manage to hand more offensive opportunities to the cornells who did not waste their chances.  big red converted 23 of 25, with elan cancer going a cool 11 -12 on his way to a 19 point performance.  the lions only received 17 chances at the stripe and their six misses were enough to scuttle the ship.  ordinarily i would heartily chastise the zebras for their myopia, but the blue cooperated all to well in their demise.

credit where due, first.  cornell more vigorously contested the lanes that had been exploited up in ithaca (most niftily by isaac cohen) for passes into mark cisco who dominated down low.  whereas number 55 had fifteen shots on the road, at home saturday he took only six.  even when the ball was successfully entered to him, cisco faced very physical play from eitan cherminski as well as double teams from weak side defenders.  adding to this frustration down on the blocks, steve frankoski, who had dropped 13 on the big red up at cornell, never warmed up on the outside.  though messrs lo, mullins, rosenberg and barbour all chipped in from beyond the arc, the crew rarely seemed in rhythm when hoisting their treys and netted only 8 of those 26 attempts.  again, kudos to cornell for seldom allowing a lion to catch, set and shoot.  clearly, frankoski is an important part of coach smith’s rotation and counted on for instant offense when he enters.  when he struggles, other players try to fill the gap and neglect their own usual contributions, or rather, try to do too much.

this weekend, the lion pride takes its hunt south and visits the killer p’s.  let’s hope steve rediscovers the range, that mark plays big on the blocks and that the rest of the fellows do what they must.  need at least a split to stay in the chase early on and a sweep of the traditional league powers would be sweet.  i very much look forward to my first visit to jadwin and an opportunity to see the tigers humbled.

d up and peace out,

paulie b