February 8th, 2009: Loyola at Marist

Marist Red Foxes 86, Loyola Greyhounds 53

The Game Notes fall in love and depend on the kindness of strangers.


I think I may be in love. But not enough that I'm gonna spend $27 on train fare on a regular basis.

Note to future travelers from Grand Central Station to Poughkeepsie: HopStop will tell you that it's a mile and a half on foot from the Metro-North station to Marist. Take a cab. That mile and a half starts out in a sketchy neighborhood, involves a lot of hills, and culminates in a patch sans sidewalk right near Route 9. It's doable if you have nerves of steel and good stamina, but you'd be better off cabbing it.

The McCann Center is positively adorable. It's efficiently set up, for the most part, though they could do with another aisle for the center sections. It's obviously meant for sports that require a larger space, but the basketball teams make good use of the excess by setting up the snack carts, sponsor stations, and smoking exit behind the general admission section in the endcourt. The reserved seating is worth the extra $2- o noes, you're paying $7 for Top 25 basketball. Bring a seat cushion, though. The wooden bleachers are hard, and given Marist's crowds, you're not likely to have much room to stretch your legs on the seat in front of you. I do like the wood paneling of the room, and the extra scoreboard in the corner.

Marist has one of the best atmospheres I've experienced all season. Unlike many of the schools I've visited this season, they have a band, and a full band about forty strong, at that, with a very enthusiastic band director. They have both cheerleaders and dance team. They have flags. They have a slightly snarky announcer. They have a fight song. And they have fans. Oh, do they have fans. I can't remember the last time I was at a women's basketball game where I had people on both sides of me, people in front of me, and people behind me. The Brian Giorgis bobble-head giveaway was for the first thousand fans- and they ran out. I'm not used to this. St. John's still has leftovers from their season-opening giveaway.

(As for the bobble-head, I think my favorite parts are the lovingly rendered drawstring on Coach's sweatpants and the precision of the Marist logo on the jacket.)

Marist started off pitching a four-and-a-half-minute shutout, while putting 12 on the board themselves. It took about five minutes for Loyola to get a rebound. I'm not exaggerating here; Marist's scorecards include rebounding numbers, and I tried to keep track. I'm not very good at tallying the boards, though. The sheer magnitude of the ass-whuppin' meant that the reserves got lots and lots of time. Rachele Fitz only played half the game, and still put up 18 and 9; more impressively, after she sat with 13 minutes to go, Marist actually extended their lead by ten points. What I find amazing about her is that she finds ways to ensure that the ball goes in the basket. It just does. She gets hit, ball goes in the basket. It's more surprising when she misses a shot than when she hits one. Viani seemed off her game- again, I think teams are keying on her and forcing the ball out of her hands. Unfortunately for them, her teammates are just as good at setting each other up. She might be better served moving to the two-guard permanently and putting the offense in Elise Caron's hands. I'm really liking Erica Allenspach, who got over the reluctance to shoot that she displayed at Iona, and also showed off her very quick hands, much to the dismay of Loyola's ballhandlers. Laterza was working hard on the boards, and was a big presence inside that I'm not sure Loyola knew how to deal with. But the extent of the lead allowed Giorgis to play with his lineups and really get his reserves into the game. And again, I found myself really enjoying Corielle Yarde's play. She has some of Fitz's knack for making sure the ball goes into the basket, and she never gives up on a play- occasionally to her detriment. If she finds a lower gear to shift into when necessary, she could be the next big thing for the Red Foxes. Very solid bench play, overall. And it's always nice to see the last player off the bench- in this case, Courtney Kolesar- hit one, and the place erupted when she canned a three.

Obviously, it's hard to judge the talent and quality of a team when that team gives up 12-0 runs and loses by 30. The scoring tends to be limited, as do the rebound chances. That being said, Loyola seemed to depend on the three-point shot- perhaps they figured that having an on day was the only chance they had at coming into McCann and defeating Marist. And it sort of worked, with Siobhan Prior notching four treys and Ashley Alexander putting in three of her own. Marist was daring those two to shoot, and that was really the end of the story. I thought Kaitlin Grant did a pretty good job rebounding in the time she had- she picked up her third foul early in the second half and had to sit for a long time. Either she or Candice Walker was fairly hot-tempered when it came to foul calls- understandable, since Loyola did kinda get shafted in the first half. Melissa Bangay, off the bench, got some good looks inside- of course, the fact that the 6-1 forward was being defended by 5-4 guard Kristine Best might have had something to do with it, and credit Best with cojones. Loyola's coach seemed pretty desperate for answers- he called three or four timeouts when Marist was on their various runs, and I almost wanted to go down there and tell him that there really wasn't any way to stop what was coming.

Nice timeout management by the Red Foxes, as an aside, though it's a habit they shouldn't get into for close games: Yarde and Allenspach each used a timeout to maintain possession on what would otherwise be a jump ball, and both times Loyola had the arrow. Hey, you're up 25 and you don't get bonus points for keeping them, might as well use them strategically.

I had forgotten how much I missed the pageantry that is supposed to come attached to college basketball. It makes me wish St. John's had a clue.

But let's end this entry in a happy place. The people on both sides of me were very nice, especially the ladies on my left who, when I asked for a recommendation on what taxi company to call to get back to the Metro-North station (because, see above re: mile and a half hilly walk through sketchy neighborhoods and across highway) offered me a lift instead. My heartfelt and sincere thanks once again go out to them, and I hope to see them again during March Madness.