Heelllloooo Everyone, welcome to er...uh.. a dynasty report following Coach James Ellington potential rise or potential fall in the college basketball ranks starting in Brooklyn

Welcome to St Francis of Brooklyn

Nicknamed the Terriers, St. Francis Brooklyn is one of seven Division 1 teams in New York City and has the dishonorable distinction as 1 of 4 teams to not make the NCAA tournament despite being eligible for every one. The program was founded in 1896, making it the oldest collegiate program within New York City. They play in the Northeast Conference, last winning it in 2014-2015 (but losing in the Conference Final to Robert Morris). St. Francis has also won the 1951 Nation Catholic Invitational Tournament, and finished 4th in the 1956 NIT. But enough history, what about this new era under a new coach?

Strategy
When it comes to style of play my focus is on one of my favorite styles, run and gun….well run n’ gun -esq. We are going to play with a high tempo, get out and run in transition, crash the offensive boards, and play tight defense on the other end.

We’ll primarily run a lot of freelance plays as I don’t want the kids slowing down to run a set play. Not to say we won’t run any though, we still plan to run a bit of a half court offense, only maybe 30% of the time, but enough to not be a constant track meet and to give the kids a chance to rest a bit. When we are running sets, we’ll going to stick with a motion offense but throw in a bit of triangle now and then to mix things up. We tend to favor getting good looks inside and easy layups to jacking up threes.

On the defensive side I like to run the basic man to man defense, with a tiny bit of 2-3 zone thrown in when we need it. While I feel man to man is risky, especially at a smaller school where we aren’t expecting to bring in the best of the best at on or off ball defense, I like to use it as a selling point that we will prepare the kids for the pros. Sure, none of the kids we bring in will probably ever go pro unless it some small European country or maybe as G-League bench filler, but hey, nothing wrong with trying to sell a dream right?


Recruiting Strat/Overview
Now we’ve shared our strategy and how we want to play, the biggest question everyone has is, “Coach, what are your plans for recruiting?” Well I want to focus on being the communities team and part of that is I want to try to keep recruiting mostly local. I’d love to get players from Brooklyn or the surrounding boroughs, but even just the in state kids from New York will do. Given our proximity, we’ll also take trips down to New Jersey and Connecticut. We’ll also dip our toes at times overseas just to see if there are any diamonds in the rough, and look at Florida for kids who parents moved down south but still Heart NYC.

Position wise, starting with PG, we want guys who can bring the ball up, spot the open man, and make the pass. If they can shoot it is a bonus but not necessary for the way we want to play. Defense will always be a plus with out Man-to-Man D, and they need to have the stamina to maintain the pace.

At SG and SF we are looking for guys not afraid to take a shot, even if it means they take a few bad ones now and then. They need to be able to hit outside shots, with it being a plus if they have some sort of inside game as well. Like PG they need to be able to run up and down the court and ideally be decent defenders. We’d like decent size at the SF position, I don’t want to be starting 6’3 guys there! And SG though I’m willing to work with undersized players if they meet the rest of our needs. Oh, and we want both guys to be good ball handlers, and would love if they were at least decent passers as well. Obviously, as with everyone else, good defense is a plus too.

To the big guys now, these guys size is more important to us. We want a C that can tower over the smaller players we expect to see in conference, and if we can find a PF that is the same, then that is a bonus! We need these guys to be able to rebound, as we are going to place heavy trust in them getting defensive boards while our guards and SF look for easy fast break points. Shot blocking is the other key we want out of at least one of our bigs, if we can’t protect the paint than it doesn’t matter how much we score on the other end. After that I’d like them to be decent ball handlers and passers, and on-ball D doesn’t hurt. I’m willing to overlook athleticism here if need be, and don’t mind if they aren’t scorers. Though I do like having a big to dump the ball down to either in our Triangle sets or just when the offense isn’t working.


Next time around, we'll talk about the team, staff, scheduling, and get ready for the start of the season. My plans are to not put out a ton of updates, mainly doing them at preseason, start of the season, start of conference play, end of conference/conference tournament, maybe the NCAA tournament? And postseason.

Great start! Bring St. Francis (NY) their first ever taste of the NCAA Tournament, Coach Ellington!

My first action as the new coach at St. Francis was to build my staff that will hopefully start a long term relationship. Lead Assistant Dave Wojcik was kept after I met with him and was quite impressed, plus I feel having a familiar face to the players will help us in the short term while the players get to know me. I then brought in Glendon Peterson after being impressed with his scouting knowledge and Joey Jensen came in as my 3rd Assistant after seeing his resume, in particular how he developed players in high school. The downside is I could only offer 1 year deals so I’m hoping they can be convinced in the project here and want to stay longer term.

After getting the staff sorted, I met with the A.D. and discussed recruiting, our plans, and the budget. With him only being able to offer a limited budget due to the new hires, we chose to just get a basic report from a local scouting agency on the upcoming recruiting class. We did splash a bit of cash to visit the local prospect showcase though since it’d be silly not to take the trip down to MSG.


Scheduling
My focus for scheduling was to try and play similar weak teams and hopefully pad out our win column. We also wanted to avoid too many travel expenses so the goal was to stay within the region, though a couple trips to Florida would be okay in hopes to get our name out in the state. In the end I feel fairly happy with what we ended up with:

November 15: at Cornell
November 18: at South Florida
November 22: Monmouth
November 25: at UCONN
November 29: Marist
December 2: at St. Bonaventure
December 6: Manhattan
December 13: at NJIT
December 20: at North Florida

Overall I’m happy, a few more home games would be nice but I understand it can be hard for a smaller school, even if we are in Brooklyn. We get our Florida trips with visits to South Florida and North Florida, but I’m most excited for the NYC showdown with Manhattan. Hopefully we can keep them as a yearly opponent, and win. The UCONN game will be ugly, but hey it’s a short trip and it’ll bring in some needed cash for the program.

As we get ready for the roughly 5 hour bus ride up to Ithaca for our first game against Cornell, I thought I'd share what we're looking at for the 2018-2019 team:

PG: Ben Carson (SR, 6’1, 206, 3.0/3.5)
SG: Maurice Abrams (SO, 6’0, 198, 4.0/4.0)
SF: Charles Jeffries (FR, 6’7, 216, 3.0/3.5)
PF: Andy Coleman (SR, 6’8, 214, 3.5/3.5)
C: Logan Hawkins (SR, 6’7, 226, 2.5/2.5)

PG Germaine Walton (JR, 6’1, 203, 2.0/2.5)
PG Craig Bratton (JR, 6’5, 202, 1.5/3.0)
PF Ashley Sanders (SR, 6’6, 234, 3.0/3.5)
C Lavell Curry (SO, 6’10, 245, 3.0/3.5)

Center was the only tough choice as it was close between Curry and his size, or Hawkins and his playmaking. In the end I decided to go with Hawkins for now, but we’ll keep an eye on it and may change before going into conference play. Our two expected stars are Andy Coleman and Maurice Abrams.

Power Forward Andy Coleman, weighing just 214, could use a few more trips to the local McDonalds but still projects to be a key piece of our team. From Marcellus, NY, Coleman provides good rebounding out of the 4 spot with some surprising passing. He good at blocking shots and has active hands which is a plus, and has a decent looking jumper. His inside game could be better, and has only average IQ but does provide decent on-ball D. Overall expect him to get blocks, steals, and boards but put up a few too many shots for a mediocre scorer.

Joining Coleman as a key piece of the team is Maurice Abrams. Standing at only 6’0, Abrams looks more like a 1 than a 2, and if it wasn’t for having plenty of PG depth, the Sophomore from Ravena, NY probably would be at the point. He has good playmaking skills though handles are only a bit average and lacks a bit in court intelligence. On the plus side for us he loves to shoot and has a good looking jumper, plays some decent D and has fairly active hands. With his ability and willingness to shoot, we are hopeful he’ll put up some big numbers in our system both this year and the years to come. Secretly we're hoping he can be our discount A.I.

At the 1, we have Ben Carson. from Albany, NY, He is a great outside shooter and playmaker with surprising rebounding skill and decent defense. His handles and court intelligence could be better though but are at least average.

At Small Forward is a player the coach staff is pretty excited for. Freshman Charles Jeffries out of Middle Village, NY, has a great jumper, is good at getting steals and blocks, a good rebounder, and has energy for days. Our main concerns are his lack of ball handling and inside scoring at the 3. He also needs to be willing to put up more shots than he does, but we are hopeful as he gets used to the system and team that'll come to fruition.

Rounding out the starting 5 is Center Logan Hawkins. From Ontario Center, NY, Hawkins is an undersized 5 standing at just 6'7 (and weighing only 226lbs) but we like his stretch 5 potential with his great jumper. He adds to that some underrated playmaking ability and active hands. He doesn't have the best stamina though but with good depth behind him, we can work with it.


Overall despite low expectation this year, the A.D. only expects us to not finish last and win at least 10 games, I feel we have a good chance at making a run. 3 starting seniors is nice, though with a new system in place I'm not sure it'll be enough. Hopefully though having young starters in Jeffries and Abrams having this season to get used to it, will propel us to our first dance come next year (but we're really hoping it this year).

I'm curious, how well did fall recruiting go for the Terriers?

Magic Bird wrote:I'm curious, how well did fall recruiting go for the Terriers?

Sorry haven't been on in a bit, it went...okay. We missed on a lot of targets but did manage to get a couple early commits at least. Got Ed Smith, a 6-6 SF from PA, supposed to be a B scorer, with B defense, can shoot both inside and out, and average at passing, rebounding, shot blocking, and steals. only C athleticism though.

The other commit is another SF, Jason Garrett 6-7 out of Wellsville, NY. Hoping to possibly run him as a smaller PF as he has A passing and B rebounding plus B steals and another who can shoot either inside or out. Again only C athleticism though and doesn't shoot enough (C) for what I want from the 3 but hoping he can make a good stretch 4.

Right now we are targeting Abe Logan from NY for a PG, not the ball handling I want (C) or defense (D) but our scouts think he could a pretty good player overall. Also looking at a few INTL guys but we're just kind of waiting to see how things play out and for SAT scores to come out. Oh and have a couple big 7'0 270 Centers from FL with a bit of interest, as well as a 6'11 JUCO PF. Haven't decided between the Centers, if either, one is pretty traditional but has great HS stats right now (15 and 11, plus 3 BPG), the other could be a stretch 5 but not as good rebounding or defending.

St. Francis (48%) 71 at 79 Cornell (52%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Logan Hawkins – 16 pts (7-8), 10 reb, 3 steals, 1 blk
Cornell Player of the Game: Paris Caspers () – 20 pts (8/11; 4/4 3PT), 8 reb, 2 ast, 3 steals

Not the start we wanted, it came down to we couldn’t shoot and couldn’t stop them from scoring. We finished with a putrid 36.9% from the field (and 20.8% from 3!) lead by Andy Coleman going 0-10 and Maurice Abrams 2-12 (1/8 from 3, oof). We did well on the offensive glass at least, getting 14 boards to their 6. Lavell Curry came off the bench to put in a good performance (16pts, 7 reb) as the only other real highlight.

St. Francis (56%) 63 at 78 USF (44%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Ben Carson – 22pts (8-16; 4-7 3pt), 2 ast, 4 stl
USF Player of the Game: Mark Phelan () – 20pts (6/9; 1-2 3pt), 7 reb, 3 blk, 1 stl

Next up was the trip to Florida that we were somehow favored for. Sadly we didn’t play like it though, defense was better only giving up 44% shooting, but 41% from 3. Created 25 turnovers but got killed on the glass (24 to 41!). Abrams was a bit better but Coleman has now gone 0-19 in the first two games.

St. Francis (49%) 93 vs 75 Monmouth (51%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Andy Coleman – 19 pts (7-13; 2-3 3PT), 7 reb, 2 ast, 1 blk
Monmouth Player of the Game: Jamar Young () – 9 pts (3-4), 5 reb, 2 ast, 2 stl, 3 blk

We come back home and get our first win in a toss-up match. The team’s scoring touch came alive as we shot 48% from the field and 36% from 3. Coleman finally remembered the goal is to make your shots and ended up coming out with player of the game. Now maybe he can start teaching Abrams who went 2-7, though 2-4 from 3 at least (chipping in with 4 ast but 5 TO). Hawkins also had a good game chipping in 12 pts, 8 reb, and 3 steals. Oh and Curry got back to form off the bench with 16 pts and 5 reb (including going 8 of 8 from the FT line).

St. Francis (11%) 71 @ 75 UCONN (88%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Logan Hawkins – 14pts (6-10), 7 reb, 1 blk
UCONN Player of the Game: DeMario Jones () – 25pts (8-14; 5-10), 5 ast, 4 reb, 1 stl

Losing by only 4 to UCONN feels like a bit of a victory to be honest, like the bookies I was expecting us to be blown out early. Instead we went into the half down just 7, and actually outscored UCONN in the 2nd, just not by enough. Our shooting was great, just 42% but did well from 3 (even if we only shot 19) with a 47.4%. Abrams took less shots but actually scored, ending with 9 points and going 3 of 4 from 3. No one really stood out though, Jeffries got 3 blocks and 8 boards, and Carson got 6 assists.

St. Francis (57%) 100 vs 77 Marist (43%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Logan Hawkins – 23 pts (9-12), 2 reb, 2 blk, 1 stl
Marist Player of the Game: Bernard Holtz () – 20 pts (6-9; 1-2), 9 reb, 1 stl, 1 blk

Hawkins is quickly establishing himself as our leader with another POG. Overall we shot extremely well (60.3% FG and 43.8% 3pt) while they didn’t (37%) and was able to get our second win back in front of the home crowd. Abrams had probably his best game with 14 pts, 4 reb, 6 ast, 3 stl and 3 blk. Jeffries also showed up in this game with 19 pts and 4 reb, and Bratton came off the bench for big minutes (31) and did well with 16 pts, 6 ast, and 4 reb.

St. Francis (56%) 69 @ 94 St Bonny (44%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Maurice Abrams – 16 pts (6-14; 4-10), 2 blk
St. Bonny Player of the Game: Dan Wells – 28 pts (12-19; 3-4), 11 reb, 2 ast, 2 stl, 2 blk

Start of Abrams coming out party, not a lot outside of scoring today though. Team shot well (41%, 60% from 3) but did a horrible job defending leading to another road loss. Hawkins didn’t have a great game, not much on offense and got destroyed by Wells. Carson had a decent game though going 4/4 from 3 and ending with 14 pts, 5 ast, 3 reb, and 3 blk.

St. Francis (49%) 87 vs 77 Manhattan (51%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Lavell Curry – 17 pts (6-9), 6 reb, 2 blk, 1 stl
Manhattan Player of the Game: Tanner Cephas – 26 pts (9-12; 3-5), 7 reb, 2 ast, 1 blk

I think we really prefer to stay in Brooklyn. 3rd win, all at home, again we shot well but more from the field than 3 this time (55.4%, 33.3%). Curry got POG from the bench, but Hawkins also played great with 19 pts on 8 of 11 shooting, 4 rebounds, 2 assists, a steal and a block. Another good game by Abrams, finishing with 15 points (5-7) and 4 assists as well as 2 steals. Coleman added 12 points and 6 rebounds.

St. Francis (45%) 85 @ 103 NJIT (55%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Charles Jeffries – 11 pts (4-9; 3-7), 7 reb, 3 ast, 2 stl, 2 blk
NJIT Player of the Game: Travann Williams – 32 pts (12-15, 3-4), 4 ast, 2 stl, 1 blk

Lots of points, good, losing (and by almost 20 at that) bad. Jeffries gets our POG but it was close between him and Coleman, who had 13 points, and 7 rebounds. Abrams didn’t point up much in points (8) but did add 4 assists and 2 steals but also 5 turnovers. Really we just had another poor defensive performance, allowing NJIT to shoot 56.5% from the field and that sunk us. A plus was our 3P% was 43.5%.

St. Francis (40%) 74 @ 95 UNF (60%)
St. Francis Player of the Game: Charles Jeffries – 21 pts (8-15; 3-9), 5 reb, 1 blk
UNF Player of the Game: Matt Jones – 27 pts (11-13; 4-5), 4 reb, 1 stl

Last non-conference game and we weren’t able to come out with a win sadly. Jeffries gets his 2nd POG as the only starter to play more then 24 minutes, and in general our only good player besides Curry (15 and 5). Our defense was putrid, giving up 46%! from 3 and likely why UNF just ran away with it.