SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – When a top seed goes down before the championship game in a conference tournament, there is often a lot of buzz. There was probably some when Iona beat Niagara 79-73 in the MAAC Tournament semifinals on Sunday. But in all reality, not only is the MAAC notoriously competitive, but this Niagara team is not one many thought would have won the regular season title, and that wasn’t lost on Joe Mihalich, who had a mix of feelings after the loss.
“I don’t know if we had any business winning 13 games in that league this year, but we did,” said Mihalich. “We got one in the playoffs, won a regular season championship.”
Niagara has one of the youngest teams in the country, not unlike last season. According to KenPom.com, they are the youngest team in the MAAC and the 40th youngest team in the country. They start three sophomores, a freshman and a redshirt senior. It’s a good leap from being the third-youngest in the country last year, and next season they should be on a different end of the scale.
With all that youth, they were picked fifth in the MAAC’s preseason poll, so finishing first wasn’t exactly what everyone expected. It’s also a nice leap from the year before the core of this team got to campus, when the Purple Eagles struggled to an 8-23 mark with a lot of youth.
“It’s hard to be disappointed, but I am, but I’m just so proud of what this team’s done,” Mihalich added.
On plenty of occasions this season, that youth still showed. While they went on to win seven MAAC games on the road, which tied its best conference road record, doing that in non-conference play was a little tougher. They had chances, but never broke through for a road win in non-conference. Instead, they lost close games at St. Bonaventure (by five), Central Michigan (by two) and Brown (by one in overtime). The loss at Brown is one they gave away as they blew a big lead.
Still, this team had a lot in their favor. They were a pretty healthy team most of the year, for one thing, although the injury bug hit them at a bad time. Early in Saturday’s quarterfinal, freshman point guard Tahjere McCall went down awkwardly and didn’t look good. He was in crutches later with a knee injury, and the good news is that there isn’t a tear. Not having him on Sunday certainly hurt, though it’s very debatable if he was the difference between winning and losing.
“He gives us 20-23 minutes of terrific perimeter defense, he gives Juan’ya (Green) a chance to get off the ball and not have to do as much,” said Mihalich. “There are excuses, and there are facts. We missed him. We missed him a lot.”
The Purple Eagles also went 9-4 in games decided by four point or less, which for a team this young is remarkable. Any number of those games could have, and perhaps should have, gone the other way.
As regular season champions, the Purple Eagles will be in the NIT. That means they continue to compete, but it also means they can get in more practice time and get better in games. That is often as valuable to a team in their place as anything, and Mihalich isn’t discounting that as a benefit for this team. He was also talking up the tournament.
“We’re going to a special postseason tournament,” said Mihalich. “We’re going to let the pain wear away here, and if I know these guys, they’re going to start a new set of goals to do something special in the NIT.”
The future is bright, and the NIT can be part of that for this team. Sophomores Antoine Mason and Green were both first team All-MAAC players and can get better, and freshman T.J. Cline was selected to the All-Rookie team. Next year, the Purple Eagles will be more experienced and picked to contend.
“The sky is the limit,” said Mason of next season. “In the summer after this season, I’m going to make myself better. I’m going to get stronger, I’m going to take time to watch the games. I’m definitely going to be a different person next year. I know my team feels the same way, they’re going to go hard. The sky is the limit next year.”
Added Cline: “I think it really motivates us because we were one game away from the MAAC championship, we’re a young team, we lose (Devon White) but that’s about it. I think it’s really going to motivate us because we know that we can come back, we can win, we know what it feels like and we know the disappointment.”
This year’s MAAC was as competitive and even as ever from top to bottom. It was no accident that the teams that made the championship game were the No. 4 and No. 6 seeds. The Purple Eagles weren’t anyone’s pick to have the season they had, even with the track record Mihalich, the dean of coaches in the conference, has. So while it might be a surprise that they went down in the semifinals as the top seed, there’s no reason for much buzz about it. This team already surpassed expectations in a very competitive conference this season.
