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ABJ Photos: The best Akron/Kent State games of the last 10 years Good stuff.

We played like @clarkwgriswold told the team we were skipping a game to get to Game 22. ? The positive takeaways... - For as bad as we were last night, and for getting out-rebounded by nearly 20, it says something that we only lost by 3 and had a chance to win. We really are back with the top of the pack in the MAC (I'm a poet and I didn't know it). - We shot 90%+ from the line last night, only missing two out of twenty-two. LCJ was 11-11. I love how we focus on the fundamentals of basketball. - LCJ is quickly becoming the best player I've ever seen in a Zips uniform. Overall, it was a bad game. This is the transition season where we start shedding some of the monkeys on our back that have bogged down the program the past couple of seasons. Our road woes are seemingly over, we have good team chemistry, and aside from arguably Liberty, we didn't lose any OOC games we weren't supposed to. Buffalo & Toledo are still 2 monkeys on our back we need to get rid of, but that will come soon enough - I'm confident in that. The little things win in Cleveland, and we're taking our licks now to be the best we can be come March. We're going to have off nights, and we're going to have matchup issues, but I like that we're figuring those out and how to overcome them now rather than in a few weeks or in March. I didn't think Riak was that bad last night. He had a missed alley-oop dunk, and wasn't as strong on the boards as you'd like to see, but I thought our lack of focus on defense as a team put him in some bad positions to help on defense. I think we might have been a bit surprised by Buffalo's athleticism, too. Toledo shot lights out on us; Buffalo out-athleted us, which is the first time that has happened since Louisville/WVU. I trust this staff and this team to learn, adapt, and overcome some of these recent struggles. Participation Trophies are garbage, and that's not what I'm advocating for in this post. But our two conference losses are... - By 10 to a team that put up 99 points on 55%+ shooting from both the field and from 3 - By 3 to the previous King of the Conference when we played our worst game of the season I'm still very optimistic, and I'm excited for Friday. Go Zips, eh?

If it wasn't clear before, it should be now that winning the MAC Tournament is the only way into the Big Dance for all MAC teams. Any misstep can lose a tiebreaker. Fortunately, this year there doesn't appear to be one dominant team and it can be wide open in Cleveland. Groce won with Ohio in 2010 after going on the road in first round and beating Ball State in OT. They then took out Kent before shocking the Zips in the finals. The following year Ball State got revenge on Groce and the Kittens (who hosted a first round game) in the QFs and took them out in OT sending the Kitten fans into utter meltdown. 2011 Akron came from a 5th seed to beat Kent in OT in that wild final. The next year, a double-bye year, Groce and the #3 Kittens came back and took out Akron by one point and went to the Sweet 16. In 2013, the Zips crushed Ohio in the second half of the final and sent Jim Christian and DJ Cooper off to greener pastures. Since then it's been all Buffalo except for Western MIchigan and Kent. This is the best I can do with the seedings considering Central is short two games. The Huskies have some nice tiebreakers wins over Kent and Buffalo: (feel free to correct my miscalculations) 1. BGSU would face Toledo/Miami winner 2. Akron would face Ball State/Ohio winner 3. Central Michigan would face Buffalo/Western Michigan winner 4. Northern Illinois would face PCCC/Eastern Michigan winner 5. PCCC 6. Ball State 7. Buffalo 8.* Toledo 9. Miami 10. Western Michigan 11. Ohio 12. Eastern Michigan *Akron's loss to Ohio at home sent them to the dreaded 8th seed and a QF match up with Buffalo last year.

My favorite video from a Zips/Flashes contest. Singletary with his hands in the air telling the ref "Who me, no way". Geno playing the innocent leader of a group of thugs. Senderhoff sheepishly sitting on the bench.

Really good stuff. Stokes up what truly is one of the better mid-major college rivalries (I'm not bias - you're bias) ahead of a key matchup. There have been some awesome games. That 2011 Title Game was one for the ages.

Did someone mention Up In Smoke? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWxgfTMLtc0

It was never anything but smoke.

I'll take on the role of Captain Obvious here. It's more important who's in at crunch time than who's in at the start of the game. The problem is that when the bench is unproductive, or even worse a liability, the coaches can't commit to using them much as they cost the team points. The only place where a sub doesn't cause a significant dropoff right now is Riak to Reece. Tribble shows promise and tries hard but is a work in progress for an outside game. Ali tries hard and generally makes good decisions but he's obviously still learning and has no shot yet, and as such is a huge dropoff from X. Dawson is lost and a non-factor thus far. Sayles looks like Shaquille O'Neal one possession and Tip O"Neill the next. I think with some minutes under them, at least two of them will be valuable by MAC tournament time.