Colonials Corner

Robert Morris was all over the North American airwaves Friday, mostly via Mike Rice and Karon Abraham.

Mike Rice parried several questions about his future, especially locally. He did admit that he’ll probably listen to offers if they materialize, but said that it’s human nature with some of the contracts that get waived around that you at least take a look.

However, he went on to say that he loves being at Robert Morris, especially because of the support from athletic director Craig Coleman and president Gregory Dell’Omo. Rice said that the combination of support and input from those two is something that’s very hard to find in Division I.

Locally:
93.7 the Fan, where Rice has become a regular on the Vinnie and Cook show.

1250 ESPN, where he joins Guy Junker and Rob King.

Karon Abraham also joined 1250 ESPN, hooking up with The Drive.

ESPN’s Mike and Mike in the Morning talked about RMU/Villanova, including the refs.

Toronto 590 AM picked him up because Jack Armstrong, who was Rices’ boss when he was an assistant at Niagara, is a cohost.

Sports Radio 790 the Zone out of Atlanta

WFAN in NY had him on the Mike Francesca show.

Mezie Nwigwe slumps to the floor after launching his desperation three-pointer at the buzzer. AP Photo

It felt epic from the start. Sitting along press row next to hundreds of reporters and in front of three busloads of Robert Morris fans, the atmosphere seemed perfect for something unexpected to happen.

Unexpected, indeed.

Robert Morris’ upset bid fell short, but the amount of attention nationally for this program just skyrocketed. It’s one thing to get bounced in the first round. It’s quite another to take a completely neutral court by storm, turn the vast majority of the arena into Robert Morris fans, and create a national buzz all while still losing.

I finally left the Dunkin Donuts Center in Providence at halftime of the fourth and final game today, Tennessee and San Diego State. As I walked out of the press room, three reporters were huddled around a TV, watching Lehigh and Kansas.

A game was being played live fifty feet away. Another was on TV in front of them. A dozen others had been played earlier.

They were still talking about Robert Morris.

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PROVIDENCE, R.I. – No stats, no rosters, none of that. You know this team by now. Villanova’s numbers are very good, their roster should be familiar to college hoops fans, especially Big East fans.

Instead, we do one last pregame round of links before tipoff at 12:30.

If you do want a sort of preview, check out our preview article in the Beaver County Times. We also have a longer piece on Velton Jones. The redshirt freshman didn’t just sit out last year to focus on academics; he also had to handle the death of his father. Now, a year later, Jones is in the NCAA Tournament.

You can also check out a piece from our other employer this morning over at PaPreps, where we check out the rash of Pennsylvania players playing in the NCAA Tournament.

Other links:

• If you ever wanted to know who outfits the Colonials, here’s the story from the NY Times.
• The Boston Herald’s look at all of the games in Providence today.
• Renowned NY Times basketball writer Pete Thamel makes his NCAA picks.
• Coverage from Mike Sanserino of the Post-Gazette.

There’s a lot more out there, but we’re absolutely bushed. Full day tomorrow. Enjoy the tourney.

PROVIDENCE, RI – Welcome to Rhode Island, the smallest state in the union. I’m holed up in the Ocean State, awaiting the start of the tourney, and I have to say, I’m ready for it to begin.

To kick things off, I did a Q+A with a Villanova blogger, Fact on Villanova Sports, much like we did two years ago with a Syracuse site. You can check out his answers to my questions below, and you can read what I had to say about Bobby Mo on his site.

As for today’s links:

• The Philly News and Pitt Tribune Review team up for a funny article about Mike Rice and Jay Wright’s previous relationship as Philly residents.
• The Trib also picked up a Philly Daily News article on Phil Martelli rooting for his son, assistant coach Jimmy Martelli, and his plans to attend Thursday’s game.
• Think Villanova can’t be upset? American University nearly pulled it off last year. Villanova recovered, but Philly.com says the memory of nearly blowing it lingers.
• Russell Johnson was a Robert Morris student last year, but he wasn’t allowed to practice or play with the team. Now as a redshirt freshman, the Delaware County Times shows how the Chester, Pa. native gets the full experience this time around.
• Tim Keown of ESPN does a humorous look at 64 things about the NCAA tournament, including a bizarre Final Four by a CBS broadcaster.
• Joe Sheehan of Basketball Prospectus has some thoughts on each team in the tourney, including Robert Morris’ chances at pulling the upset.
• The Dunkin Donuts Center, home to 8 games here in Providence, got a facelift prior to the event.

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Some additional news and notes from the day after Selection Sunday. Nice and short, because we have a 9-hour drive to get to the media hotel in Providence:

• Our article from the Beaver County Times, Paul Schofield from the Pittsburgh Tribune Review
• Everyone in Philly is still surprised at Villanova getting the second seed. Coverage from The Inquirer
• SI.com has an article up about Scottie Reynolds looking to finish his career with a bang.
• With the national media coverage also comes the speculation on the future. The NY Times Quad Blog takes a stab at Mike Rice’s future.

It’s that time of year again. With your Robert Morris Colonials in the NCAA Tournament, we’ll be pulling as many media clippings and interesting tidbits about the 15th seeded Colonials taking on the #2 seeded Villanova Wildcats

Once again, tip-off is scheduled at 12:30 on Thursday in Providence, Rhode Island. It is the third earliest game in the entire tournament, as Brigham Young and Florida will kick the tournament off at 12:20 from Oklahoma City, and Notre Dame and Old Dominion will start at 12:25 in New Orleans.

One thing will change from last year: I’ll be going to Providence and providing coverage for the Beaver County Times and this site.

By the way, for those of you watching on CBS, you’re in for a treat. Verne Lundquist and Bill Raftery will call all of the Providence games for CBS.

Without further adieu, news and notes:

• Selection Sunday coverage, including my piece from the Beaver County Times, Paul Schofield’s from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and Michael Sanserino’s from the Post-Gazette. The coverage reflects the surprise surrounding Robert Morris’ 15 seed, something that’s echoed across the state. Villanova was surprised to get a 2-seed, as evidenced by the coverage in the Metro, CSN Philly, and from PhillyBurbs.

• If there’s a 15-2 upset this year (the first since 2001 and fourth overall), ESPN voters say that Robert Morris beating Villanova is the most likely. You may have to vote to see the results.

• The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel says that ‘Nova guard Scottie Reynolds and Bobby Mo freshman Karon Abraham are players to watch in the South regional.

Coverage will likely kick into high gear tomorrow. We’ll add what we can.

Use this as a catch-all for all topics about the Tournament and the first round matchup pitting No. 15 Robert Morris against No. 2 Villanova on Thursday in Providence, Rhode Island.

Update #1: Tip-off is scheduled at 12:30. It is the third earliest game in the entire tournament, as Brigham Young and Florida will kick the tournament off at 12:20 from Oklahoma City, and Notre Dame and Old Dominion will start at 12:25 in New Orleans.

None of the Pittsburgh area teams will play in the evening. Pitt tips off Friday in Milwaukee against Oakland at 2:45, while West Virginia takes on Morgan State from Buffalo on Friday at 12:15.

Games in Providence following RMU/Villanova: #7 Richmond/#10 St. Mary’s at 2:50, #3 Georgetown/#14 Ohio at 7:15, and #6 Tennessee/#11 San Diego State in the nightcap at 9:45.

Some of you may have noted a few cosmetic changes around here in the links, and may have seen references elsewhere, so it’s time to make the announcement.

Earlier this week, I began my new role as the publisher of PaPreps. It is the Pennsylvania high school section of rivals.com, and I’ll be editing all of the content on the site as well as producing and writing articles on Pennsylvania high school sports.

It’s another step in my career, as I’ll now be writing for a national media company (Rivals is owned by Yahoo! Sports). At the same time, it allows me to continue writing for the Beaver County Times and continue writing here. Naturally it will take some of my time, but it shouldn’t be too drastic of a change. But please keep in mind that the Times and Rivals pay me for the work, whereas I run this site on my free time and out of my own pocket, so they will naturally take priority.

I took down the “Colonials Corner Elsewhere” section because a large chunk of the articles are sadly no longer available. But if you want to read my material elsewhere, you can always check out papreps.rivals.com, timesonline.com, or just look for links on my Twitter feed. Links are also available in the Bio/Contact section.

As always, thank you very much for continuing to read and support the site.

A few things worth sharing from the past couple days since Robert Morris clinched their conference record 7th NEC title and NCAA Tournament.

• Karon Abraham made a short appearance on 1250 ESPN radio the day after as part of The Drive with Scott Paulsen, Mike Logan, and Chris Mack. It’s a short appearance, and Mack and Logan weren’t quite up to speed with RMU, but it’s still the first solo radio appearance for Abraham.

• I linked to Luke Winn’s piece from Sports Illustrated and SI.com in the post-game thread, but here’s another short national piece from Fox Sports’ Jeff Goodman, again on Karon Abraham.

• Mike Rice stopped by the new CBS sports radio station in Pittsburgh. He’s actually become somewhat of a regular on the “Vinnie and Cook” show, and he took time to talk about NCAA Tourney bid #2. If you want, you can also listen to another appearance he had back on March 3rd. I highly recommend it, because there’s a highly entertaining surprise guest appearance around the 7 minute mark from someone who comes in on another phone line.

• Finally, a resource for the next couple days. The Bracket Project’s Bracket Matrix has compiled an aggregate of all the bracket projections done by basketball writers and basketball sites across the country. It’s updated regularly, and I’ve relied heavily on it to see how things come down. For now, the prognosticators truly believe Robert Morris will be nothing more than a 16 seed.

RMU guard Mezie Nwigwe is at the center of the Colonials' celebration following their win over Quinnipiac. AP Photo

Entering the season, Mike Rice talked about having six seniors and six freshmen. He was fudging the numbers a bit – Gary Wallace is only a junior – but his point was sound. He had a team that only looked experienced, that needed the seniors to teach the freshmen early and often about how to play Division I basketball. He expected his senior captains, Rob Robinson and Jimmy Langhurst, to shoulder the load.

Wednesday night, a trio of freshmen – with a little help from last year’s hero – handed Robert Morris their second straight Northeast Conference championship with a 52-50 win over Quinnipiac.

Tournament MVP Karon Abraham scored 16 points, Russell Johnson scored 9, and Velton Jones hit a leaner in the lane to give RMU the lead for good. Last year’s hero, Dallas Green, had nine points, blocked a James Feldeine three-pointer with eight seconds left, and hit two free throws down the stretch to give RMU the win. A last second heave by James Johnson fell short for Quinnipiac.

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