The basketball team won't have to wait long for a test. The team opens its season this Friday with a trip to the Resler Tournament in Rochester, N.Y., where it will play some of the top teams in the country.
"We're going to be facing some tough teams early on," senior tri-captain Brian Fitzgerald said. "Hopefully that will be a good measuring stick to see where we're at and what we need to work on."
The Jumbos will open their season with a tough match against Wittenberg College, ranked No. ten in the country in the preseason polls. If the Jumbos can survive the Tigers, they will face Rochester, the 2004-2005 NCAA Tournament runner-up. On Nov. 22, the Jumbos will travel to Springfield to play a team that received votes in the preseason national polls.
"We finished second in the conference last year and have improved in a lot of areas," Fitzgerald said. "Our chemistry is good. We hope to finish first this year, even though the NESCAC is one of the toughest conferences in the country."
Despite the loss of last year's leading scorer Reggie Stovell to graduation, the Jumbos return all but three players from last year's conference-leading offense. Returning for the Jumbos are last year's starting point guard, small forward, center and sixth man, and the team should have plenty of options on the ball.
"The ball's going to move a lot more," junior tri-captain Dave Shepherd said. "A lot of times last year [Stovell] was the focal point. This year, it's going to be a lot more balanced."
That balance includes a trio of perimeter players who made a big impact last year. Shepherd will once again captain the offense at point guard. As last year's iron man, Shepherd started all 26 of the team's games, averaged 34.6 minutes.
He also did a little bit of everything on the court, contributing 6.7 assists, 1.5 steals and 3.7 rebounds per game. One area in which Shepherd will look to improve on last year's performance is in the turnover category. Cutting down on his five turnovers per game, the highest of an offense which, while the best in the league with 81.7 points per game, also averaged 18.6 turnovers, will only help the Jumbos this season.
While Coach Bob Sheldon has been working to reduce turnovers, with the high speed offense that the Jumbos employ, he knows giving the ball up comes with the territory.
"We play an aggressive style and run a lot, so we turn the ball over a little more than a team that plays at a slower pace," Shepherd said.
Shepherd will be joined in the backcourt by sophomore Jeremy Black, who sat out the 2004-2005 season after tearing his ACL in preseason, and sophomore Ryan O'Keefe. Last year, O'Keefe was a threat off the bench, scoring 10.9 points per game as the team's sixth man. When starting small forward junior Brian Kumf couldn't play due to an illness, O'Keefe stepped in and scored 16.8 points a game over a five-game span.
Last year, the Jumbos lobbed up 19 attempts per game from behind the arc. Sophomore Jake Weitzen hit 43.8 percent of his shots from long range, and 56.2 percent overall from the floor, while averaging 11.1 points a game in just 18.4 minutes of action each game.
While Black, O'Keefe, Shepherd and Weitzen will take shots from the outside, the Jumbos also feature a trio of inside players. At small forward, Kumf provided energy on the court last year in addition to his 10.7 points and 5.9 rebounds.
At the power forward position, Fitzgerald will be asked to fill the void left by Stovell's departure. Last year, Fitzgerald played just 12.3 minutes a game, but made the most of his limited time on the boards, contributing four rebounds per game.
At center will be 6'8" senior Dan Martin. Martin struggled with foul trouble early in the season in 2004-2005, but when he was able to stay on the floor, he scored nine points per game and pulled down 6.8 rebounds. In the first round of the NESCAC Tournament, Martin scored 26 points and grabbed 15 rebounds to lead the Jumbos to a 99-88 victory. The Jumbos will need Martin to step up in the post in place of Stovell.
"I expect a huge year from him," Shepherd said. "He is playing as well as I've ever seen him play."
Defense may be the team's weak spot. The 2004-2005 Jumbos' top-producing offense was counterbalanced by their defense, which gave up the most points per game in NESCAC.
In the offseason, the Jumbos brought in former Lasell head coach Chris Harvey as an assistant to Sheldon, and Harvey has been focused on the team's defense.
"Defense is more of an attitude than anything else," Fitzgerald said. "It's a willingness to work. Our new coach, [Harvey], has been stressing that in practice."
If the Jumbos can improve that defense, they could find themselves in contention for a NESCAC Championship. The competition will be stiff, however. Amherst enters the season No. 5 in the nation, while Trinity figures to be strong with the return of senior Tyler Rhoten, a member of last year's All-NESCAC Team.
