When the Colonial Athletic Association announced its men’s basketball preseason awards and predictions Wednesday, Northeastern was picked to win the conference. No surprise there, the Huskies have five starters returning from a team that won the CAA regular season title a year ago.
But Charleston knocked off the Huskies in the CAA Tournament, nabbing the conference’s one and only bid to the NCAA Tournament in the process. That’s the unfortunate reality of mid-major life. A team can dominate a conference for more than two months and lose its opportunity at the NCAA Tourney over the course of one weekend.
“We use (the CAA Tournament championship game) as motivation over the summer,” Northeastern star guard Vasa Pusica said. “Everybody remembers that feeling after that loss. We don’t want that to happen again and we will do everything we can to make sure we don’t have that feeling this time around.”
Pusica was joined on the All-CAA first team by preseason player of the year Justin Wright-Foreman from Hofstra, UNCW's Devontae Cacok and Charleston's Jarrell Brantley and Grant Riller.
James Madison senior Stuckey Mosley was named to the second-team, along with William & Mary's Nathan Knight and Justin Pierce, Hofstra's Eli Pemberton and Elon's Tyler Seibring.
JMU, like Northeastern a year ago, was picked to finish sixth in the conference behind Northeastern, Charleston, Hofstra, William & Mary and UNC Wilmington.
Northeastern coach Bill Coen is doing what he can to protect his team from the same kind of conference tournament heartbreak this season.
The Huskies non conference schedule was put together in a way to help Northeastern build a resume for an at-large bid. The Huskies play at Harvard, themselves a mid-major which could be in the mix for an at-large bid. After that they take on Alabama in the Charleston Classic and could also see a likely Top-25 Virginia Tech team in the same tournament.
Games at Davidson, Bucknell and Syracuse are also opportunities to rack up quality wins.
“We’ve always tried to schedule the very best non-conference schedule that we possibly could,” Coen said. “It does two things. One, it prepares you for what lies ahead in the CAA. But it also gives you a second bite of the NCAA apple. If you can schedule up and get the type of competition you look for, and if you are fortunate enough to win some of those games, you are going to be in the conversation for an at-large bid.”
Helping the CAA return to the days of multiple NCAA Tournament bids would be a boost to James Madison and the rest of the league, but it’s not necessarily something every coach in the conference thinks about in scheduling.
“We can’t necessarily control what the NCAA decides when it comes to Selection Sunday,” UNCW coach C.B. McGrath said. “I don’t worry about Selection Sunday when I’m making the schedule. I just try to be the best team at the end of the year. If it so happens we get an at-large or we do win the tournament, that’s what it is.”
Outside of the Huskies, Charleston could be the CAA's next most likely candidate for an at-large bid. And while the selection committee is phasing out RPI, the Cougars also have a schedule that should look good to more modern metrics.
Charleston landed a home game against Rhode Island and heads to Oklahoma State less than a week later. The Cougars are also in an Advocare Invitational field that includes LSU, Florida State and Villanova and play at VCU.
Yet every coach in the conference seems to agree while the selection committee can be unpredictable, the best way to get attention is to simply win games.
“All we can control right now is our attitude and our effort,” Charleston coach Earl Grant said. “We are going to put our best foot forward and see where that takes us.”
