Spartans Road to Detroit Starts with Robert Morris
Submitted by Paul Mercier on Wed, 03/18/2009 - 17:10
At this point, we all know who the Spartans are tipping off against in the NCAA tournament. However, the casual fan may be sitting at home wondering, who the hell is RobertMorrisUniversity? So I thought we’d take a look at just who the Spartans will be playing in the first round.
According to Wikipedia, RobertMorrisUniversity is located in Moon Township, Pennsylvania. It is a small private school of about 5,000 students and their athletic teams are called the Robert Morris Colonials-Robert Morris, the man, was famous for signing the Declaration of Independence and helping to finance the ensuing war with the British.
OK, enough of that. Now, how is their basketball team?
Well, they won their way into the tournament by beating Mount Saint Mary’s 48-46 in their conference tournament championship. However, the low scoring championship game should not be used as a barometer for their scoring output. In fact, they average 70.7 points per game-even scoring over 100 against Wagner during conference play. The Spartans, by the way, only average 1.2 points more per game. Now, the obvious difference comes when examining each team’s conference.
The Big Ten is obviously known for its shut-down defense and grappling tempo, where as the NEC features many small teams that the average basketball fan hasn’t heard of. The Colonials finished the regular season with a record of 24-10 overall and 15-3 in conference play.
The Colonials did schedule some tough non-conference opponents, however struggled mightily in those games. Most notably were losses to Pitt (92-72), Xavier (78-57), and Duquesne (88-62). MichiganState looks like a runaway winner on paper. However, the #2 seeded Spartans will do well to dispel any George Mason-like Cinderella runs early in this game.
A motivated Travis Walton, fresh off of an awards night which saw him win three team awards, will need his team to be performing well if he hopes to avoid becoming the first senior in the Tom Izzo era never to make it to a Final Four. Look to see Raymar Morgan step up his game with some much needed intensity, while Kalin Lucas continues to create openings for his big men underneath.
Tournament time has arrived, get excited.
Tipoff time is 9:50 eastern.
