MAC Sports Blog by VanDelay Sports

VanDelay Sports is sitting on press row for the MAC Basketball Tournament this week, so since it’s Thursday and most people are stuck in work we’ll be running live diaries during the games. We’ll be updating this at most of the media time outs. Hopefully this will be somewhat entertaining and informative for those who care.

Preview - Based on yesterday’s game I feel like Central Michigan needs to play much, much better to have any chance of hanging with Akron here today. Yesterday’s game against NIU definitely won the ugly award for the hardest game of the day to watch, but maybe they’ll come out and surprise me.

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17:02 - “Told you so” alert… Akron opens up the game with 7 unanswered points. CMU with a timeout to try to right the ship before this one gets away from them.

15:13 - CMU comes out of the TO and hits two three-pointers to cut it to 7-6. Jeremiah Wood is all business early with 4 points and 2 boards.

11:19 - CMU leading 12-10. All 12 of their points are on 3’s. If those stop falling, or Jeremiah Wood keeps blocking them like he did to Chris Kellermann consecutively on the last possession, the Chips could be in trouble.

6:40 - Central is playing much better than they were yesterday and they’re up 22-17 on the strength of some sweet outside shooting, going 6-14 from behind the arc so far. This is reminiscent of some of John Beilein’s old WVU teams who could beat teams by shooting primarily from behind the arc.

3:45 - 24-23 Central leads. Jeremiah Wood is the guy really keeping this one close as he’s been doing a little bit of everything out on the court in the first half. Just like last year in the Q, Wood seems to turn his intensity up a notch for these tournament games. So far he has 6 points, 3 rebounds, 3 blocks, and assists. Akron’s keeping this close with their inside game as they’re out scoring CMU 16-4 in the paint.

0:17 - Central has gone kind of cold from the floor but 2nd chance points are keeping them afloat. Akron leads 32-29.

Halftime - Linhart hits a floating 8 footer as time expires and Akron goes to the half up 34-29. With how well CMU played in the first half, they’re still down 5. If this were a boxing match I wonder if Akron just took the best couple of punches that Central had to throw at them, yet stayed on their feet. The first 8 minutes of the 2nd half should tell the story. At this point Akron is winning thanks to Jeremiah Wood and their play in the paint, outscoring CMU in the paint 24-8.

16:34 - Akron opens it up to a 10 point lead, 41-31. Central is reeling and they call a timeout.

11:23 - Akron seems to be pulling away in this one up 51-38. When Central cooled down from 3 towards the end of the 1st half is when this one began slipping away from them… in fact CMU has only attempted one three-pointer in the 2nd half. If you’re looking for a difference in the game look at FG% with Akron shooting 53% and CMU only shooting 36%.

10:07 - Akron with another quick 5 and they go up 56-38. This one’s quickly becoming a laugher.

Bold prediction alert - Jeremiah Wood is gonna be on the All-Tournament Team (probably not that bold of a prediction).

7:58 - 61-39 Akron, these updates are going to become less frequent for the rest of this game unless CMU starts gunning themselves back into this game somehow.

2:24 - Akron in control 73-49 and it looks like they’re bringing in their mopup guys to finish this one off. Wood with 17 points, 9 rebounds and 3 blocks. Linhart has looked great too with 16 points, 6 boards, 2 steals, and 2 blocks. Forgettable final game for Giordan Watson with 11 points on 3-11 shooting, 3 assists and 3 turnovers.

Final - 81-60 Akron. After starting out really slowly the Zips looked strong in this one. Should be a really good game with Akron and WMU playing tomorrow night.

Dan Whitmyer is the head basketball writer at VanDelay Sports. He can be reached at dwhit@vandelay-sports.com

VanDelay Sports is sitting on press row for the next four days, so since it’s Wednesday and most people are stuck in work we’ll be running live diaries during the games. We’ll be updating this at most of the media time outs. Hopefully this will be somewhat entertaining and informative for those who care.

Pregame - You know who has a good band? Northern Illinois (though they do carry music, so -10 points for that). It’s a shame that they’ll probably be gone after this game (Central is favored by 7).

17:03 - 11-4 CMU lead early on the strength of a couple of Ben Watson 3’s.

Crazy Q update: There’s a flock of maybe 5 birds flying around near the top of the arena, between the rafters and top of the scoreboard and stuff. When we came back in from a food break earlier the people sitting next to us had bird poop on their laptop. I tried to tell them that’s considered good luck and they shouldn’t wash it off. They weren’t buying it.

11:14 - 21-13, CMU has continued to open up their lead against the Huskies on the strength of some early 3 point shooting (5-8). If NIU can cool the Chippewas off from out there they’ve got a chance, as they’ve been dominating them (10-2) in the paint.

7:38 - 24-17 Central still leading as both teams have cooled down on offense considerably over the past 4 minutes. NIU with only one team assist so far, could explain the lack of offensive production.

3:50 - 27-20 Central leading. This game has been really, really ugly so far. Not a lot of movement on offense on either end, dumb fouls, lazy turnovers. In fact there are already 16 combined turnovers and neither team is over the 40% shooting mark. I’m already calling for a 20-point Akron win tomorrow over the winner of this game.

Halftime - Ugly half with Central leading 37-30. They’re certainly letting NIU hang around… finally I have 1st half stats. The story in this one so far is CMU’s 3 shooting as they’ve gone 8-15 behind the arc so far. NIU has a big edge on the inside, up 18-6 on points in the paint and +7 in rebounds, but they’re only 1-5 from 3, which pretty much explains the point differential, or “The Diff” as they call it on the scoreboards here at the Q.

Living on a Prayer Count - 2… yet I’ve still heard nothing that rivals this.

18:07 - CMU with a quick couple of buckets to push it to 41-30 and force NIU to call a quick timeout.

15:51 - 48-34 Central starting to open up a comfortable lead. For those wondering about CMU’s second leading scorer, Nate Minnoy’s absence, word on press row is that he’s been suspended indefinitely for a violation of team rules. He’s definitely done for the tournament, not sure beyond that.

13:22 - NIU still hanging around enough to make this thing interesting. Michael Patton laces a 3, cutting it to an 8 point deficit and the Chips are forced to take a time out.

11:59 - CMU answers back and has built the lead back to 12, with a 54-42 score. NIU has been having a lot of trouble getting good looks, and then converting on them. It took me nearly 3/4’s of the game to realize this, but Central Michigan didn’t bring a band for some reason… I guess I just thought they were really quiet.

7:51 - 67-47, CMU is putting this one away.

2:58 - 75-61 Central, I’ll post more when this one is over and I’ve got the final stats.

1:01 - I still think it’s too little too late, but NIU has put on a nice little run to close it to a 9-point game with the ball, 77-68.

Final - Central closes out a comfortable 12-point win and Watson is named Player of the Game with 20 points and 4 assists. Like we mentioned at the half, 3 point shooting was the difference in this one. While the Huskies did hit a couple of shots, ending 4-10 from behind the line Central was on fire from 3, shooting 12-23. They’re going to need to keep lighting it up from the outside to have a chance at keeping it competitive with Akron, especially minus Minnoy.

Dan Whitmyer is the head basketball writer at VanDelay Sports. He can be reached at dwhit@vandelay-sports.com