Women’s Notebook
By Stephen Zerdelian
The last we heard of a basketball bouncing in the region was on March 21, when Pace lost to North Georgia at the Elite Eight in Birmingham, Alabama. A lot has changed in the region in the intervening months but the one thing everyone is hopeful for is a full, uninterrupted, smooth season. What a sight that would be…
Three straight seasons have been blighted by the COVID-19 pandemic, yet it feels twice as long. The 2019-’20 campaign was normal until the pandemic exploded and forced the cancelation of the season just before the NCAA tournament was about to begin. In 2020-’21, we endured a bizarre, truncated season which saw fewer than half the teams in the region participate, and even then, the number of games played was limited. What I call the ‘Asterisk Season’ was a forgettable slog that is best left in the past with qualifiers attached for eternity. Last winter things were better but there was still a plethora of games shifted, along with a number cancelled outright. Protocols had to be adhered to (well, mostly adhered to, if we are being frank) and the atmosphere was never right. It was something of an empty shell of a season – it looked filling, but it left a void.
Now, at long last, we may be ready to embark upon a normal, complete and satisfying season. To be sure, COVID may yet rear its head and force some players to miss games, and possibly even a few postponements, but hopes are high that it’ll look and feel like the last pre-pandemic season. And with that comes excitement and expectations.
Change is also in the wind. The region waves goodbye to two powers on the women’s side of things, Stonehill and the University of the Sciences. The former has reclassified to Division I and is now a a part of the Northeast Conference; the latter was swallowed up by St. Joseph’s University and no longer exists as a separate entity. They will be missed and will leave vacuums in both the Northeast-10 and Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference.
The University of Bridgeport made a move, as well, but theirs was a shift from the East Coast Conference to the CACC (North), meaning the CACC remains at 13 teams (the same number as the NE10, for that matter). The school formerly known as Nyack College has changed their name to Alliance University but remain a CACC North outfit.
With the NE10 now at 13 teams, their divisional alignments have been scrapped and all clubs will make the playoffs based on their overall finish. The top three seeds will earn first round byes and join the conference tournament at the quarterfinal stage along with the five first round survivors. The ECC and CACC keep their same playoff formats from a season ago – the ECC sends the top six teams to the playoffs (with the top two receiving byes) and the CACC grants the top four teams in each division playoff status.
In a rather quiet off-season on the coaching front, the region has only one new mentor, D’Youville’s Ali Bouman. Next week this space will look at the overall body of regional coaches, breaking them down into specific categories. It’s not a ranking, per se, rather a macro-check on the region as a whole.
As for us here at D2 East Hoops, we will do our level best to give you fresh and interesting content all season, including the occasional podcast. We are working on that and hope to post something soon. Tim, Chris and I will provide (mostly) weekly columns and we have a few new other items in R&D which we hope to test out this winter. As usual, it’s an on-going process to see what sticks.
One thing we would like to stress – please check us out on twitter. It’s @D2EastHoops – please follow us if you would like to keep on top of all our postings and tidbits.
Games that matter tip off starting this Friday, November 11. Go see one, or more. Embrace normality!