Colonial Athletic Association Notebook
by Jay Pearlman
Once it begins, college basketball season moves at the speed of sound. It seems it was just yesterday that we convened in DC for conference Media Day, voted preseason honorees, took real note of who graduated and began thinking about their replacements.
For the Virginia Commonwealth University Rams, at 6-3 through nine games (1-0 in that conference opener), all that remains before full conference play is a home game against Longwood, a week of exams, a road game at Bradley in Peoria, and the Christmas and New Years holidays. Then every game counts (really counts), beginning January 2 in a visit to Harrisonburg to play the league’s most improved team, James Madison.
As the season started, we knew VCU would be good with point guard Eric Maynor and forward Wil Fameni back, and I acknowledged that I wish I’d voted for Maynor last year as CAA Player of the Year. But with Jesse Pella-Rosa and B.A. Walker gone from last season’s champs, T.J. Gwynn just a sophomore, and Lanse Kearse just a heralded recruit, we didn’t know how good; we simply didn’t know who, if anyone, would replace that lost productivity. Enter Jamal Shuler.
Six games into the season Anthony Grant’s Rams were 3-3, with respectably close losses to Miami (FL) and Arkansas at the Puerto Rico Tip-off and a not-as-bad-as-it-looks loss at much-improved Hampton. But it was the December 2 Maryland game at DC’s BB&T Classic – the same event at which George Mason stubbed its toe against East Carolina – that showed us the new VCU Rams, a team now featuring senior 2-guard Jamal Shuler. Yes, Shuler had contributed nine points and two rebounds off the bench last year in his first season at VCU; but no one – at least no one outside of Richmond – knew whether that was his ceiling, or whether another round of improvement was coming his senior year. Well, to Jamal’s credit (and the coaching staff’s), Shuler has taken that next step, and the coming out party was against Maryland.
In the Maryland game, a hard-fought 85-76 VCU win, often matched up against erstwhile pro Greivis Vasquez, Shuler had the game of a lifetime, scoring 30 points in 36 minutes on 10-19 shooting (including 6-11 on threes), five rebounds, and four steals. And with Maryland’s strong backcourt of Vasquez and Eric Hayes being outscored by Shuler and Maynor 55-26, VCU overcame the powerful forward play of Bambale Osby (17 points, 10 rebounds, and 7-9 from the line) and James Gist (nine points and eight rebounds), to win by nine.
Now, with less dramatic wins following Maryland, by 14 in conference against William & Mary and by 20 against local rival Richmond, Shuler has one of the best season stat lines in the conference: 17 points (.1 behind Maynor), 4 rebounds, 1 assist, 2 steals per game. And at least for now, Virginia Commonwealth fans don’t seem to miss Walker and Pella-Rosa quite so much.
CAA news and notes
- Through December 11, CAA teams remain one game over .500 out-of-conference, with a record of 43-42.
- The biggest game of the coming week in the conference: Old Dominion hosts Virginia Tech on Saturday at 4 pm at the Constant Center.
- Don’t look now, but while Delaware is just 2-5, they’ve won two of their last three, over Towson and Albany. And while this writer jumped quickly from Delaware to JMU as most-improved, remember that transfers Marc Egerson (Georgetown) and Jim Ledsome (Nebraska) will soon be eligible.
- With any luck this writer will catch Delaware on Sunday at Central Connecticut, on my way back from Charlotte-Hofstra the previous day.
