Matt made the war top as bleak as the news for Siena fans.

I think we all had to figure this was going to happen. As much as I’ve heard Fran on every single phoner say that he is very happy in the capital region and with Siena, there were just so many opportunities that (apparently) loved him.

I think, Matt agrees that this is more a testament to how badly the Seton Hall and St. John’s jobs aren’t wanted. The upside there is being 8th in the Big East, maybe. While the upside in the Big Ten, presumably, is competing for a league title.

However it happened, I’m happy for him and wish him the best at Iowa. Now onto Siena’s search for a new head coach, oh an Iona’s too since Kevin Willard left for the Seton Hall job.

Expert Bracketology
The ‘What If’ Game
Q&A Hammer & Rails
Andy Glockner
Michael Ospioff Gary Post Tribune
John Gasaway Basketball Prospectus
Kenny Hasbrouck signed by Heat
Predictions

MAAC/Arena Square off over fans. Siena fans rushed the court Monday night when they won and the MAAC, trying everything to stop them, is very mad at the Times Union Center. So the TUC General Manager and MAAC Commissioner square off. Next time this happens at a MAAC tournament, they should just have a duel.

Siena: Expert Bracketology. I reached out to a countless number of Bracketologists and got a ton of quotes on Siena’s chances on who they’ll play and what seed they’ll be. It’s a lot tougher and more of a news piece than just looking up the seeds on the internet every day plus I think it turned out to be a piece that I’m proud of.

The What if Game. Since Siena was so close to the brink of losing the championship game Monday, I decided to play a what if scenario with the experts on if Siena could have made it if Colin Nickerson’s shot fell. Farifield had a great year by the way, probably will play in a postseason tournament and could be the favorite next year when the tournament goes to Bridgeport. Only reason I say could be is because they lose Seniors Anthony Johnson and Mike Evanovich which is a little bit of a loss.

Selection Sunday will be fun for me. I’ll be on a train heading home from work when, in all likelihood, Siena’s seed and pairing will be announced. From there I will head home, search for the other team’s writers/bloggers out there and try to get answers on their team. Meanwhile someone will write a profile of the Saints on our site and we’ll have big traffic numbers Monday!

Meanwhile the site was being mentioned at ESPN.com of all places on their College Basketball Nation Blog:

Siena Saints Blog has video of McCaffery explaining the move and getting testy when the media tried to question him about it.

Then follows that up by quoting our article on the matter. Not the Times Union, not the Troy Record but our article on it! This is why you pair video and stories, for things like this!

Meanwhile I am working on my HTML skills again in Albany this weekend at the MAAC Tournament..

Ryan Restivo is the RTC correspondent for the CAA and an occasional contributor.

That’s the line I like. I also have a piece on RotoSavants for today which is now part of the YardBarker network! Troy Patterson, who doesn’t need my personal compliments, does a great job running the site as it will start to see the steady increase of pre-draft day hits and he writes as great stuff at The Hardball Times too.

I also have coverage of the BracketBuster game between Siena and Butler over at SienaSaintsBlog.com from the past week which includes an interview and a scouting report on Butler’s best player.

Meanwhile, now is the time I’ll break down the CAA results and write my RushTheCourt piece for the week on the Colonial Athletic Association. Including all of the postseason tournaments, I wouldn’t be surprised if 5 teams reach postseason play for the conference.

Now there is zero room for error for the Saints. When we watch them at the MAAC Tournament in Albany it will determine if they are going to the NCAA tournament or hosting an NIT game. Sorry, I’m not on the bandwagon of an at-large bid even with the weak class of Pac-10 and other major conference teams. Only if they went undefeated in the regular conference season would I have given the Saints a chance. That or if there is an extremely controversial play or suspension that might not let the Saints in.

If the Saints win their BracketBuster game at Butler it might help their resume. I mean look at Siena’s profile now compared to this 2005-06 team you might remember, not much difference there.

On SienaSaintsBlog we have done more video and are getting more and more hits. Siena came out in their alternate gold’s for the first time this year, I believe, and came out firing in last Friday’s win over Iona.

More here:

I opened a league on RotoSavants and it filled in 19 hours.

The Siena-Butler collision course? Is it possible? Butler was 37-3 at home heading into the week, when I did the research on potential games. It is official now and we knew about it at the time so we could break it at the right time. ESPN embargoes the information for going into a release from schools/sites/anything which I find ironical because there was an embargo ESPN broke once in 2007 but I digress.

My weekly CAA piece for RushTheCourt came out Monday. George Mason is atop the league at 10-1 but I would say there are five teams that could win the automatic bid and I’m not counting Drexel who has been very good as of late. Also it’s my opinion that Benny Moss at UNC Wilmington shouldn’t have been fired. Unless he committed a major NCAA violation or a crime, there are no real benefits to firing your head coach in season in college basketball.

My CAA piece was mentioned on the ESPN.com College Basketball Nation Blog. Cool!

Rush The Court checks in on the Colonial, where George Mason, Old Dominion, and Northeastern have all crowded the top of the standings.

Also my RotoSavants piece last week was: I hate drafting Derek Jeter. I think Jeter is going to hit that age, soon enough, where the production won’t help. If you add a position move, which is almost inevitable, to the outfield then how much of a great fantasy player is he? I like the new design of RotoSavants.com and everyone should check it out!