Historical Association #10 2005-2006 start

[Wayne23]

Ed Ward, new coach of Princeton. A strict, demanding coach. He expects his players to give their all, both athletically and academically.

[Wayne23]

5/1: We hire a #2 and #3 assistant, cut our walk ons.

6/26: 4 scholarships.

8/21: We offer to a PG, an SF, 2 PFs.

8/29: Hurricane Katrina.

9/11: We lose 2 recruits.

9/18: We get 2, lose one. We get 2 PFs, #22, 39.

9/25: We lose one.

10/2: We get one, lose one. We get an SG, #27.

We’re picked 7th in the 8 team Ivy.

10/24: Rosa Parks dies.

11/6: 9 man rotation to start:

Senior Mo Cest starts at PG, backed by soph Odo John.

Frosh Leon Cole is at SG, backed by frosh Marc Will.

Soph Sal Sell is at SF. Sophs Ric Loot and Jon Dart sub at SF and PF.

Junior Cory Dorn starts at PF subs at C.

Senior Ray Hart starts at C, subs at PF.

[Wayne23]

11/20: 1-1 start. PF/C Cory Dorn seems to be my go to guy. PG Mo Cest is getting 14.5 per. After that it’s all patchwork, but high expectations for C/PF Ray Hart. Rebounding is an issue right now.

All 3 recruits sign. We still need a guard.

12/4: 4-2, RPI #186. Rebounding is much better and we’re handling the ball pretty well. D could be tighter. Dorn is still leading the way. We’re making progress.

12/25: 9-3 with one more to play before the Ivy sched. starts.

Al Hold, who doesn’t play, is becoming a real annoyance. He may be gone if he doesn’t clean up his act. I don’t put up with much.

1/1/2006: 10-3, RPI #79, going to Ivy play. +6.1 PPG, +3.9 RBs, +2.7 TOs. Cory Dorn is tearing it up with 20.5, 8.6. Starting guards Cole and Cest are both averaging in double figures, and Hart is doing okay on O, great on D. This team is exceeding my expectations. Let’s see if it continues in conf. play.

[Wayne23]

1/15: 12-5, 2-2. We’re winning at home, losing on the road so far in conf.

1/22: Evo Morales becomes President of Bolivia.

1/29: 13-8, 3-5. Not a good road trip. RPI #126. +2.9 PPG, +0.2 RBs (This is a big part of the problem), +2.9 TOs. Dorn continues to lead us with
18.2, 8.0. We need to turn it around.

2/12: 17-8, 7-5, RPI #89. Tied for 3rd with 2 to play. A split will assure that we finish in the top half, which is one of our goals.

2/26: We finish the regular season at 18-9, 8-6, alone in 4th place. RPI #95. +4.3 PPG, +0.4 RBs (Sigh), +3.1 TOs. Dorn has 19.0, 7.7. SG Leon
Cole gets 12.6, and PG Mo Cest gets 11.8.

World population is at 6.5 billion.

[Wayne23]

3/2: We play #1 seed Harvard, 13-12, 10-4, in the semifinals (4 team tournament, I forgot to change it). They beat us by 2 and by 17. We’ll need to play well.

3/3: 70-76. It was close all the way, but in the end they were a little better. 20, 4, 5 for Ray Hart at C, 13 each for Sell and Cole. Only 12 and 5 for Dorn. We go as he goes, and that hurt. -6 RBs and -6 TOs.

Will we get invited somewhere post season? Hard to say. With an RPI at around 100, and a record of 18-10, 8-6, I think there’s a chance.

3/12: CHI #3 East. We play #6 Birmingham, 17-13.

3/14: 72-59. 18, 5 for Dorn, 15, 5 for Cole, 12, 7 for Sell. We played well!

#7 seed East Tennessee ST, 21-11, is next.

3/21: 65-74. We couldn’t make shots in the 2nd half. 18 for Cole, 16 for Cest, 12, 10 for Dorn.

Good first season. The big question is if I get a decent offer to coach somewhere else, will I leave? I’m ambitious. Yes I will.

4/3: #7 Indiana wins the title.

4/4: Awards: Junior Cory Dorn is Ivy POY and 1st team, along with Ray Hart, a senior. Leon Cole is Frosh OY and 2nd team. I am Ivy COY.

4/9: Going to Vanderbilt in the SEC. This is a big step up, and to the kind of school that really fits my style- military school discipline, strong emphasis on grades. They have at least two really good recruits coming in, too. We may be weak at the guard positions.

4/23: I ask for a budget increase. No.

19-11, 8-6 for my first year as a head coach. I’ll take it!

[Wayne23]

5/1: No reports.

6/5: Looking at transfers. Offering to one.

6/12: No luck.

6/26: 5 scholarships. We want 3 guards. We don’t have a ton of money but if we’re careful it should be enough.

8/21: We offer to 3 PGs, a PF, a C. I usually try to go with the best player available, but we need guards- badly.

9/18: We lose a PG.

Hawaiian shootout vs. NC Greensboro.

9/25: We get a C, #75, and a PG, #78, and lose 2.

10/2: We lost two more. Okay, I’ll admit it, I pitched a major fit. Fortunately, I did it behind closed doors while I was alone. We NEED guards, at the very least one more guard. DAMN!!!

1st day of practice. We’re picked to finish 12th in the 14 team SEC. I’m hoping to finish 7th, but that may be unrealistic. We’ll see.

10/23: Damn frustrated about recruiting. Come on guys, give us a chance!

10/30: We lose another recruit. Yes, a guard.

11/6: 8 man rotation with not much set in stone:

Frosh Chad Nick is at PG, with junior Mel Brin subbing.

Frosh Tad Kerl is at SG with junior Lee Weed backing him.

Frosh Ron Blon is at SF. Senior Jin Rage subs at SF and PF.

Soph Kam Mill starts at PF, subs at C.

Senior Boo Bows is at C.

[Wayne23]

11/15: We won our first, by 13. Now we go to the Hawaiian Shootout. We’re the #3 seed. We play #6 NC Greensboro.

11/18: 70-67. 23, 15 for Center Boo Bows. Our frontcourt looked really strong. We know we have guard issues, but they weren’t bad tonight.
#2 seed, #8 ranked California, 2-0, in the semis. Tough team.

11/19: 64-71. 17,7 for Bows, but he was in foul trouble all night, fouling out after playing only 16 minutes. We need him in the lineup. 15, 9 for PF Kam Mills.

11/20: 2-1 start. Not bad. Most of our preseason schedule is composed of cupcakes, so we should do okay.

Our 2 recruits sign, but we need to corral more recruits.

11/27: 3-2. We’re still tweaking the lineup.

We get another recruit, a PF, #150. We need guards.

Iraq is a disaster. The country is in ruins and the entire region is destabilized.

12/4: 3 game losing streak and we’re at #13 Houston next. Not good. TOs are killing us. The fact of the matter is that we simply do not have a Point Guard. We’re using SGs and even SFs in that position. We have a decent PG coming in but we need at least one more.

12/11: 3-5, RPI #119. The next two are at home, which should help.

12/25: 5-5, RPI #59. +0.3 PPG, we’re only #252 in PPG. +5.5 RBs, E in TOs. We turn it over too often. We put Lee Weed in at guard and he has definitely added some outside scoring for us. Tad Kerl, an SF, is at the Point, and he’s doing better than our other guys did. Some SEC teams are going to beat us up badly. We’ll need to play well against the others to meet our goal of a 7th place finish.

12/30: Saddam Hussein, a puppet who was put in place by the U. S. military and the C. I. A., is hanged.

[Wayne23]

1/1/2007: 1-1 start. Amazingly, we beat #6 Kentucky at our place by 8. That was the best we’ve played all year. Then LSU blew us out of the building, there.

1/4: Nancy Pelosi becomes the first female Speaker of the House.

1/10: W escalates the illegal invasion of Iraq by sending in an additional 21,000 troops.

1/15: 7-9, 2-4, RPI #101. We’re in over our head in the SEC, at least so far.

1/29: 8-12, 3-7, RPI #124- it should be higher, the SEC is TOUGH! We’re in a 3 way tie for last place. I think we’ll do a little better but 7th place looks like it might not be possible. Occasionally, we look great- we just beat #23 ranked Georgia, but most of the time we are outclassed. Not sure it will get better this year, and if we don’t get another decent guard, it won’t get better next year either. We really have three decent players, Boo Bows, Lee Weed, and Kam Mill. Bows is the only senior, but he is easily our best player. I’m actually being patient. These guys are playing up to their ability. We just don’t have the talent to compete.

-5.1 PPG, +2.4 RBs, -2.4 TOs.

2/12: 11-13, 6-8, RPI #122. We finally won a conf. road game (in OT)! In a 3 way tie for 7th, but 2 of our last 4 are against ranked teams.

2/19: 12-14, 7-9, in a 4 way tie for 7th place, but the #10 seed. We need to win either the home game against the ranked team, or the road game.
Neither will be easy, and we may need to win both to reach our goal of finishing 7th!

2/26: We upset #19 MS ST here. That meant that, going into the last regular season game, all of our season goals were on the line. We NEEDED a win. We lost 87-88 at Arkansas, on a last second desperation three from 28 feet.

[Wayne23]

3/6: We play #7 seed Arkansas, 15-13, 9-9. Beat them by 18 at our place, lost by 1 there, last week. We need this game.

3/7: 69-66. 22 for Weed, 11, 13 for Bows, 17, 9 for Mill. We overcame 22 TOs.

#2 seed, #20 ranked Mississippi ST, 20-7, 13-5, in the quarter finals. Their starting C is out with a broken hand. We split with them in two lopsided games. We’ll need to be on top of our game to have a chance.

3/8: 62-64. Tough loss. We fell WAY behind early, as many as 21. We caught up with 1:01 to go, but they scored, we scored, and then, with 1.1 left, they scored for the win. 31, 6 for Weed, but 23 TOs.

14-16, 8-10, RPI #116. Hoping to make the NIT, but it’s a long shot.

3/11: We get a PG, #124. He looks great in lots of ways, but he is NOT a good defender.

3/12: No post season tournament. Very disappointing, but not totally unexpected.

4/3: #1 Oklahoma wins the title.

4/4: Awards: Boo Bows makes the SEC 1st team. That’s it. I thought Weed might have a chance at 2nd.

4/9: I feel a little guilty about it, but I’m going to Iowa ST, in the Big 12.

4/16: The entire staff left. I’m pretty happy with the assistants I was able to get.

4/23: We want a budget increase. No.

14-16, 8-10 in my only season at Vanderbilt. Overall, I’m 33-27, .550.

I expect to be in Ames, Iowa for a while.

[Wayne23]

5/1: National basic.

6/5: We’re looking at transfers… Nobody.

6/25: 2 walk ons rated 3.5 each. I need them so I’m keeping them. (New rule: I can do that if and only if I give them scholarships.)

6/26: 6 scholarships. 3 and 3 or 4 guards.

8/7: SG Pete Mell is #20 on the Norton list.

8/21: We offer to 4 PGs, an SF, a C.

9/18: Got one, lost one. We got the guy we wanted most, a PG, #35.

Caribbean Challenge vs. Muncie.

9/25: We get three- a C, #58, and 2 more PGs, #68 and #77. 2 more to go!

10/2: We get a C, #92.

1st day of practice. We’re picked 3rd in the Big 12. That would be nice!

11/6: 8 man rotation:

Junior Will Ely is at PG. Senior Pete Mell is at SG. Frosh Dave Huld subs at both guard spots.

Juco junior Ed Hinn is at SF. Senior Matt Mead subs at SF and PF. Juco junior Jaba Watt also subs at PF.

Frosh Ata Raif starts at PF, subs at C. Senior Jeff Smol is at C.