KENT, Ohio – Wednesday night’s Bowling Green-Kent State game was the first time I’d seen BG in the Louis Orr era, in fact the first time since fairly early in the “Dakich Administration” (and no, I don’t much care for their current Brown uniforms). I had seen Kent State, the preseason favorite in the MAC’s Eastern Division, twice before in this Coach Geno Ford’s inaugural season. Sitting on press row next to a Kent administrator last night, I whispered that play appears down in the MAC from my short tenure with Dakich ten years ago, that BG has nobody on this year’s team like Antonio Daniels, Anthony Stacy or Keith McLeod, and that Kent State has no one the likes of Trevor Huffmann, Demetric Shaw or Antonio Gates. Clearly a fan of major conference basketball (and specifically Duke), that administrator made the case that college ball is down everywhere, implying that result to be the trickle down effect of so many prep players and underclassmen turning pro. The major programs have to take lesser, as do the mid-majors, low-majors, and so on. And I agree. And as a result, Ivy teams this decade remind me of Division III teams when I coached at that level in the early 80s.
But that wasn’t the whole story. Back in the 90s, the MAC was viewed as a strong and improving basketball conference, the best in the Midwest short of the Big Ten (and head and shoulders above the Horizon, then called the Midwestern Collegiate Conference). So good, in fact, that BG’s Antonio Daniels was – apparently – overrated in the 1997 draft, made the fourth pick overall by the then-Vancouver Grizzlies. So good that there was little dispute that Jim Larranaga’s move from BG to George Mason in the spring of 1997 was a downward move. (To Larranaga’s credit, his 11+ years at Mason constitute a primary reason why the Colonial Athletic Association, like the Horizon, is now clearly above the MAC.)
With those observations as a backdrop, it was hardly surprising – and must be attributed to way more than home-court advantage – that in the battle of preseason MAC and Horizon League favorites earlier this season, Cleveland State beat Kent State 67-41, and the Vikings looked like they could name the final score.
Last on this, in sports as in life it often takes excruciatingly long for change to be recognized. For that reason, the MAC still convenes each year for a “big-time” conference tournament at Cleveland’s Quicken Loans Arena, while the Horizon has yet to “go public,” preferring to play tournament games at separate venues, hosted by higher seeds (and that’s only after protecting the first two seeds with that awful double-bye).
All of that said, the games are still played, and traditional rivalries respected. Perhaps the biggest these last ten years in the MAC’s Eastern Division is that between Miami and Kent State, which will be renewed this Saturday in Kent. Here’s hoping both Kent State-Miami games are great ones in this final season for Miami’s fine coach, Charlie Coles.
Coming into last night’s game against Bowling Green, we all knew what Ford had in his backcourt. Undersized senior second guard Al Fisher was last year’s Player of the Year in the conference, having averaged 14 points (over 16 in conference play), 4 assists, nearly 1.5 steals, and a remarkable 4 rebounds. This year he’s at 15 points, nearly 4 assists, nearly 2 steals, and 3 boards. Three inches bigger, stronger, and a better shooter, much-traveled former big-time recruit Tyree Evans joined Fisher in the backcourt in mid-December, and is averaging 17 points, and shooting 46 percent both in front of and behind the arc. 6-4 broad-shouldered junior Chris Singletary is more of a point guard than the aforementioned Fisher and Evans, like Fisher averages nearly 4 assists, scores 14, grabs 4 rebounds, and is the acknowledged team leader. (Ford calls Singletary “another coach in the huddle.”)
But the forward positions have been more problematic, with 6-9, 270-pound junior Brandon Parks often too low and too slow to help offensively, or on the boards. Lefty senior Julian Sullinger has proven clever near the goal, but while stout he’s closer to 6-3 than to his listed 6-5, and as his coach acknowledged often “too short to grab lots of rebounds.”
Enter newcomer and junior Anthony Simpson, a transfer from Illinois’ Highland Community College. Simpson can run and jump and looked more like a real basketball player than any other forward in the gym last night. This will make the point: I’d seen two of their games from start to finish before last night, had committed the names of six Kent State players to memory, and Simpson wasn’t any of the six. All I knew about him was that there was a JUCO transfer who split time with Sullinger at the power forward spot, who seemed to be taking a few minutes away from Julian, though apparently is more productive off the bench than as a starter. In Sunday’s loss at Ohio opening Kent’s conference season Simpson had played a total of six minutes, missed the only shot he’d attempted, and pulling down just one rebound.
He came into the BG game having started four of Kent’s 15 previous games, averaging 19 minutes, six points, and six boards (actually, six boards in 19 minutes is a terrific total; as a result of watching Cleveland State’s George Tandy, this writer has started to love the phrase – and the statistic I can’t find anywhere for the college game – “rebounds per minute played”). Ford said that he held Simpson to just six minutes at Ohio Sunday because “he couldn’t sustain playing competitively over any more minutes.”
In last night’s first half, Ford played Simpson 13 minutes, playing him more than previously along with Sullinger, largely in place of Parks due to Parks’ two early fouls. Simpson managed to contribute offensively near the goal, scoring eight in that half, on 3-4 shooting. But rather inauspiciously, Simpson managed a total of zero rebounds during those 13 first-half minutes. Combined with just one rebound for Sullinger in 16 first-half minutes, Kent State boasted a total of one rebound from the forward positions for the entire half. As a team BG out-rebounded KSU 23-14 in the half, grabbing 11 offensive boards to Kent’s nine defensive boards, and at halftime the game was tied at 33.
Then a new player came out of the locker room at halftime wearing uniform no. 21, and in a his best half of the season Simpson dominated the paint, scoring another eight points (on 4-6 shooting) and grabbing seven big rebounds. Kent State won the boards in that second half by four, and won on the scoreboard by 24, finishing with a convincing 72-48 win. Fisher contributed 23 points (many in the second half of the second half, after the issue was decided), but the story of the game was Simpson. And not a moment too soon with Miami in town Saturday.
I asked Ford what he said to Simpson at halftime to elicit that kind of play, and he responded only half-kiddingly that “Anthony may not have understood a word I said at halftime.” But Ford acknowledged that he needed that kind of game – that kind of half – from Simpson desperately, that to compete with the better teams in the MAC he needs Simpson to build on that performance, and live up to his “big, strong, athletic body.” And if he does, with the three quality guards we all know about, maybe this Kent group will be good enough to win the Eastern Division this down year in the MAC, maybe even win the MAC Tournament, and in post-season (the NCAA Tournament if they win the conference tourney), just maybe be good enough to give some team from another mid-major conference, one that’s passed the MAC in recent years, a run for its money. At least, that’s Ford’s plan.
