Senior night from press row

Lauren:

And years from now, when I think back on this senior class, and when I watch them play in their final SoCon championship in a few weeks and receive their diplomas a few months later (should I get a B.A. or a B.S.?), it won't ultimately be the basketball that I'll remember. It'll be the reasons I am able to say yes, this really is that special of a place, to the so many people that have asked me over the years since the run of 2008. The notes on my desk when I'm "late" for work. The heys from the hallways. The post-game high fives. The pranks. The SID lunches. Dart games and photo shoots. SIDIOTY applications. The graduation announcements. The wedding invitations. I have watched over the years as these four have transformed from shy freshmen into team captains and homecoming kings and ambassadors for the game and the kind of people that leverage their influence to raise thousands of dollars for malaria in Africa.

Just my way of saying, Thanks guys. Make us proud the rest of the way, in basketball and in life.

Painting it red

The Lagos Project.

The Lagos Project

Lauren:

I wrote an entry for the team’s blog “Signed, Sealed and Delivered” at Wildcats’ Roar, in which I wrote that I hadn’t come up with an answer to the question “How was Nigeria?” I still haven’t, and I don’t know that I ever will.

It was hot, and we were tired, and we were dirty, but I learned so much about the world, about Frank and Andrew and about myself in those 10 days. Even all these months later, I’m still processing it.

Andrew: “I know I am not there but my heart will be there on that very day.” Watch.

Exhibition win over L-R

Last night:

Four Wildcats scored in double figures as the Davidson men’s basketball team earned an 87-65 exhibition win over Lenoir-Rhyne Saturday night at John M. Belk Arena.

Seniors Will Archambault and Bryant Barr led the ‘Cats in scoring with 18 and 17 points, respectively. Archambault hit 7-of-13 from the field, including one trey, and was 3-for-3 on free throws. Barr went 6-for-11, hitting 5-of-9 from behind the arc. Steve Rossiter and Brendan McKillop both scored 10 points each.

McKillop to DavidsonNews.net: “Equal opportunity.” L-R. Box. Lauren: A.S.I.F. Bryant: Need to be more consistent but some great first steps. Stephen: I'm missing my old teammates.

Nigeria

The trip starts tomorrow. Follow along here.

Updates

Bryant. Lauren. Will.

Not just hoops

Bryant: Nothing But Nets. Also: Help send Lauren to Nigeria.

30

Lauren:

... 30 needed 30 to become the all-time leading scorer in Davidson history.

At Exit 30.

In the 30th game of the year.

(Not that I think about this kind of stuff on my 9-hour drives back to Florida.)

A man for others

Lauren Biggers on Andrew Lovedale. The Andrew Lovedale Shoe Drive.

83-43

Missed the first five or so minutes -- matricide trial this week -- but it was like 14-2 when I flipped on Teamline. Gracious. What is there to say? That’s what happens when arguably one of the best teams in the history of the modern Southern Conference plays arguably one of the worst. 30 with a cake-easy 30? Up by 40 on a dunk by Frank? The other team scoring four points in the first -- WHAT? -- 17 minutes of the second half? I had a feeling McKillop might go in there at halftime and say something like: Here’s how we get better tonight. We don’t let ‘em score this half. So: scores of 60-32, 70-33, 83-34. McKillop to Kilgo: “That second-half defense was as good as we’ve ever had.” Charlotte. Greenville. AP. DavidsonNews.net. Lauren.

The day after

A few thoughts:

*** Ben Allison had seven points, five rebounds, three assists and a steal in 17 very, VERY impressive minutes. Four of those rebounds were on the offensive end. Some of them were of the I-don’t-care-that’s-MY-ball variety. No way to know for sure what happens from here, of course, and it was somewhat lost in all the Curry-for-44 fervor, but my initial impulse is to call those 17 minutes THE most important development out of yesterday’s game.

*** Seemed, watching the game, like Andrew wasn’t having anywhere close to his best outing, and he didn’t. But the stat sheet was sort of surprising: 12 points on 6-for-13 shooting, nine rebounds, including SEVEN offensive rebounds, and two blocks in 38 minutes. I’ll take that.

*** Rossiter? Ten rebounds, one of them, of course, near the end of the game, off that airball, being hugely important.

It led to what is seriously one of Davidson’s bread-and-butter plays at this point.

Missed shot.

Offensive glass.

FIND 30!

*** Scott Fowler asked in the presser how deep that last three from Stephen might have been.

McKillop thought.

He paused.

Grinned.

“Thirty-seven?” he said.

Stephen?

“I didn’t see,” he said almost apologetically. “I just saw the rim.”

*** I asked Stephen in the hallway outside the locker room how LeBron was entered in his phone. In other words, when a text message arrives on his phone from, you know, the best basketball player on Planet Earth, what’s it look like on his screen?

LeBron?

James?

The King?

Everybody’s in his phone with a full name, he explained, so …

Good luck.

From: LeBron James.

*** Add this to the always fun, always growing list labeled How Things Have Changed: There was Sidney Lowe, coach of the N.C. State Wolfpack of the Atlantic Coast Conference, after a loss to Davidson College, 1,700-student Davidson College, Davidson College of the Southern Conference, telling the assembled press, and with a quite straight face, that this LOSS was “something we can hang our hats on.”

*** Also, this: There are tickets for sale for Davidson’s game against Duke next month in Durham -- right now, as I write this -- selling on StubHub.com for $1,200.

*** Bottom line: That was a game, against an ACC team, that Davidson could have lost, and certainly did enough things to lose -- but won.