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"Commentary"


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"And though the Great Danes have made the NCAA Tournament the past two seasons and the Saints haven't, that's attributable to the Danes' playing in a conference that's inferior to the one in which Siena plays."

"Commentary" from TU.

 

I'll be the first to admit that I don't read the TU very often, so I'm not sure what "commentary" means. Can someone help me out?

 

Is a commentary just an editorial written by a staff writer or is it supposed to be a news piece (with fact-checking and whatnot)?

 

Some of the Numbers

In 2005, the America East was 16th in the Conference RPI rankings; the MAAC was 22nd. The America East NCAA Tourney entry was Vermont - a 13 seed; the MAAC entry was Niagara - a 14 seed.

 

In 2006, the MAAC was 14th in Conference RPI rankings; the AE was 27th. The MAAC Tourney entry was Iona - a 13 seed; the AE entry was Albany - a 16 seed.

 

In 2007, the America East was 20th in Conference RPI rankings; the MAAC was 23rd. The America East NCAA Tourney entry was Albany - a 13 seed. The MAAC entry was Niagara - a play-in game participant.

 

In 2008 (so far, very early), the MAAC is 21st in Conference RPI; the AE is 25th.

 

RPI Reference

NCAA Tourney History

 

If a "commentary" is just an editorial by a staff writer, opinion rather than fact, then not much can be said about the statement above. It's Etkins' opinion, and while I may disagree, he's the one with a column, not I.

 

If a "commentary" is supposed to incorporate "news" - and the attempts at accuracy that should accompany news reports - then Etkins might want to check facts before he sends things to press.

 

A fair assessment would be that the conferences bounce back and forth in terms of difficulty (now and in recent history, though not historically), but that doesn't make for nearly as good of a line, despite (or perhaps because of) its accuracy.

 

This was an excellent win for Siena, and the "commentary" - such that is was - was deserved, as Siena deserves recognition for winning a tough game, but the off-hand swipe at UA's two consecutive NCAA appearances was, at best, inaccurate and misplaced.

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Zalman B - very good post.

 

I sat this morning and wondered what the intelligent Etkin would have wrote if Franklin missed his free throws and UA buried a three.

 

Probably not the column he wrote!!!!!

 

Therefore his column and his total way of thinkig was based on and could have switched due to a meager 6.6 seconds of play.

 

It shows how much insight he actually put into his article.

 

I'm sure when UA loses 3 road games in OT, Double OT and by 4 they are definitely signs of a team being dominated.

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This writer frequently writes off the wall commentary and takes shots at Albany. You are right to question his accuracy as it is lacking here. If the "scoreboard rarely lies", full season results lie even less and the maac has been no better than the AE over the last 3 years. Sure the maac was better than the AE 10 years ago(or whatever long time period you want to use to define tradition), but that is ancient history to today's players, none of whom were in college then. It is also ancient history to the coaches as very few were coaches at their current school then and it is even ancient history to the schools as enough of them were not in the same conference then to make a 10 year comparison relevant.

 

As far as yesterdays game, it certainly was a good win for Siena and after wins against Stanford and Albany they should win the maac this season. However there are no guarantees and the losses to James Madison and Cornell raised legitimate questions about this team. If they fail to win the maac it won't be because the league was too difficult, it will be because Siena wasn't good enough or consistent enough for the whole season.

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This writer frequently writes off the wall commentary and takes shots at Albany. You are right to question his accuracy as it is lacking here. If the "scoreboard rarely lies", full season results lie even less and the maac has been no better than the AE over the last 3 years. Sure the maac was better than the AE 10 years ago(or whatever long time period you want to use to define tradition), but that is ancient history to today's players, none of whom were in college then. It is also ancient history to the coaches as very few were coaches at their current school then and it is even ancient history to the schools as enough of them were not in the same conference then to make a 10 year comparison relevant.

 

As far as yesterdays game, it certainly was a good win for Siena and after wins against Stanford and Albany they should win the maac this season. However there are no guarantees and the losses to James Madison and Cornell raised legitimate questions about this team. If they fail to win the maac it won't be because the league was too difficult, it will be because Siena wasn't good enough or consistent enough for the whole season.

 

>

He seems to be the type of guy who is TOLD what to write.

He seems to be a guy that follows the herd.

He seems to be a guy who probably went to a small, dinky, bland, private college, in a less than mediocre town... providing him with the security of a small, little campus.

He seems to be a guy who would jump on the 'popular' bandwagon...

 

Wait, in 5-10 years when know one cares about $iena basketball anymore, and UAlbany has risen to even greater heights, he will be praising UAlbany as we were his favorites all the while.

 

I'm sure the TU makes it a point to support $iena, the one sport wonder after 31 years of D1 athletics.

 

After 6-7 years, how many America East championships have we won, and how many NCAA appearances.... lots.

From D3 to D1, from the bottom of the AE to the top of the AE in most sports, in only 6-7 years.

 

How many conf championships for $iena? We can count on a few fingers.

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http://www.timesunion.com/graphics/colsigs/ettkin.jpg

[/img]

He seems to be the type of guy who is TOLD what to write.

He seems to be a guy that follows the herd.

He seems to be a guy who probably went to a small, dinky, bland, private college, in a less than mediocre town... providing him with the security of a small, little campus.

He seems to be a guy who would jump on the 'popular' bandwagon...

 

Wait, in 5-10 years when know one cares about $iena basketball anymore, and UAlbany has risen to even greater heights, he will be praising UAlbany as we were his favorites all the while.

 

I'm sure the TU makes it a point to support $iena, the one sport wonder after 31 years of D1 athletics.

 

After 6-7 years, how many America East championships have we won, and how many NCAA appearances.... lots.

From D3 to D1, from the bottom of the AE to the top of the AE in most sports, in only 6-7 years.

 

How many conf championships for $iena? We can count on a few fingers.

 

 

I think you are mistaken. If we had won, he would have written something different, but given the results, it's not too far off the mark. As much as we'd like it to be different, we're going to have to win a couple of these games.

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http://www.timesunion.com/graphics/colsigs/ettkin.jpg

[/img]

He seems to be the type of guy who is TOLD what to write.

He seems to be a guy that follows the herd.

He seems to be a guy who probably went to a small, dinky, bland, private college, in a less than mediocre town... providing him with the security of a small, little campus.

He seems to be a guy who would jump on the 'popular' bandwagon...

 

Wait, in 5-10 years when know one cares about $iena basketball anymore, and UAlbany has risen to even greater heights, he will be praising UAlbany as we were his favorites all the while.

 

I'm sure the TU makes it a point to support $iena, the one sport wonder after 31 years of D1 athletics.

 

After 6-7 years, how many America East championships have we won, and how many NCAA appearances.... lots.

From D3 to D1, from the bottom of the AE to the top of the AE in most sports, in only 6-7 years.

 

How many conf championships for $iena? We can count on a few fingers.

 

 

I think you are mistaken. If we had won, he would have written something different, but given the results, it's not too far off the mark. As much as we'd like it to be different, we're going to have to win a couple of these games.

 

And how are we going to do that when we've had heartbreaking losses 3 years in a row? Will equality in the matchup really help? Or are we fated to not win like the Mets and no-hitters or the Cubs winning a World Series at Wrigley? I've tried to be hopeful about all of this, but I think there are greater forces at play than us just narrowly being outplayed.

 

I wonder what would happen if we walked away from the matchup...would the TU completely quit covering UA sports as a spite move? I've tried to be optimistic about all of this, but I think that UA could win a Lacrosse title and hit the Sweet 16 in men's basketball and it'd be a non-event for the TU :angry:

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This writer frequently writes off the wall commentary and takes shots at Albany. You are right to question his accuracy as it is lacking here. If the "scoreboard rarely lies", full season results lie even less and the maac has been no better than the AE over the last 3 years. Sure the maac was better than the AE 10 years ago(or whatever long time period you want to use to define tradition), but that is ancient history to today's players, none of whom were in college then. It is also ancient history to the coaches as very few were coaches at their current school then and it is even ancient history to the schools as enough of them were not in the same conference then to make a 10 year comparison relevant.

 

As far as yesterdays game, it certainly was a good win for Siena and after wins against Stanford and Albany they should win the maac this season. However there are no guarantees and the losses to James Madison and Cornell raised legitimate questions about this team. If they fail to win the maac it won't be because the league was too difficult, it will be because Siena wasn't good enough or consistent enough for the whole season.

 

>

He seems to be the type of guy who is TOLD what to write.

He seems to be a guy that follows the herd.

He seems to be a guy who probably went to a small, dinky, bland, private college, in a less than mediocre town... providing him with the security of a small, little campus.

He seems to be a guy who would jump on the 'popular' bandwagon...

 

Wait, in 5-10 years when know one cares about $iena basketball anymore, and UAlbany has risen to even greater heights, he will be praising UAlbany as we were his favorites all the while.

 

I'm sure the TU makes it a point to support $iena, the one sport wonder after 31 years of D1 athletics.

 

After 6-7 years, how many America East championships have we won, and how many NCAA appearances.... lots.

From D3 to D1, from the bottom of the AE to the top of the AE in most sports, in only 6-7 years.

 

How many conf championships for $iena? We can count on a few fingers.

Well Ettkin's pretty much out to lunch...(remember that wierd anti football stadium rant/column a few weeks back???)... .if you read his column consistently you will note that stylistically and substantively...he offers little...but hey...he's a sport commentary guy in America's "50-th something media market"...so he's hardly Grantland Rice...heck he ain't even Mike Lupica for that matter...he's in fact nothing more than an overpaid sportswriter that Hearst Corp needs to find work for......while I agree that Siena deserves credit for the win and credit for the wins of the prior 2 meetings before that...I do not think that those wins merit the conclusions Ettkin arrived at (particularly the inference that the MAAC is vastly superior to the A-East and that by further inference our NCAA bids are somehow tainted...regarding these two conferences relative to each other... its a hair split at best ...absloutely so at the top of the conferences...no real difference either way, despite what some of us Dane fans or the Siena people may say to the contrary...)...now since Mr. Ettkin thinks the A-East is so inferior I would fervently hope he keeps his butt out of SEFCU (and the attendant press hospitality room....) when U-A wins the bid to host the 09 A East Mens Tourney...I would not want Mr. Ettkin to be exposed to this event since the conference is so clearly inferior in his view....but you know what...if Hearst hasn't transferred him to the Lubbock Picayune or the Bakersfield Times-Ledger or whatver by then, he'll be there because reporters will always show up for free food!!!!

 

BTW- Congratulations to the INDIANS on the win...well deserved and hard fought...we look forward to beating the INDIANS next year!!!

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Here is Ettkins blog and he partially admits he was wrong in his comments.

 

“And though the Great Danes have made the NCAA Tournament the past two seasons and the Saints haven’t, that’s attributable to the Danes’ playing in a conference that’s inferior to the one in which Siena plays.”

That sounds like a knock on UAlbany basketball, a program I have a great deal of respect for and have written as such on many occasions. I would argue UAlbany has benefited from playing in a conference in which it has lesser overall competition than if it played in the MAAC (if you disagree, that’s fine). But that in no way diminishes what the Danes have achieved: back-to-back conference tournament championships and NCAA Tournament appearances.

My assertion as stated reads as if I am diminishing that. If I could have the words back, I’d take them, because that was not my intention.

 

http://blogs.timesunion.com/ettkin/?p=189

 

He also makes a half hearted defense of his comment that the maac is better than the AE.

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I'm glad that he at least replied (though of course it's on his blog and not in the paper itself).

 

"I'd argue the MAAC, with Marist, Niagara, Loyola and Siena, had greater depth and parity last season at the top than the America East but was dragged down by Saint Peter's (5-25) and Iona (2-28) at the bottom.

The America East's lower-rung teams weren't as bad as the MAAC's last season, but besides UAlbany and Vermont, none of its teams had a conference record better than 8-8 or an overall record better than 13-16."

 

He's obviously not a follower of the "a (fill in the blank) is only as strong as its weakest link" theory. The overriding point of the conference RPI is to equally evaluate all the conferences, incorporating depth, powerhouses, bottomfeaders, etc. Plus, with the number of AE teams near .500 conference records, it's that that shows real parity. Not sure how it's parity in the MAAC (as compared to the AE) with Marist and Siena near the top with 20+ wins and then Saint Peter's and Iona with just 5 and 2(!!), respectively.

 

If this is how Ettkin thinks about conference/team 'rankings,' I'd just loooove to see a bracketology type predicition from him..lol.

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Take Ettkin for what he is. The last two jobs he had were in larger markets - he's is on the way down, a career in decline. He looks for love, but in all the wrong places. Similar to any parasite, he's chosen a host body, becoming a siena pimp and hoping for continued nourishment. At some point sooner than later he'll likely be in a smaller town latching on to one high school team at the ire of another.

 

As with the inevitable superiority of UA basketball in the area - this will require just a little more patience than most of us would have wanted. But it will come.

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