VCU is your 2007 CAA champion after a wild and whacky tournament at the Richmond Coliseum. From the very first game to the final buzzer, everything pointed to a fantastic ending. After the miracle shot of Georgia State’s Leonard Mendez to beat William & Mary on opening day, there was no doubt that this CAA Tournament would be special. Fans saw everything you would ask for in a tournament from buzzer beaters to Cinderellas.
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One question remains after all is said and done, however, and it concerns all of the CAA teams. Has the CAA shown that it deserves multiple bids to the NCAA Tournament on a regular basis? The only answer that this CAA Tournament has provided us is: No.
Going into last weekend four teams were considered on the “Bubble Watch” by ESPN’s Joe Lunardi. This tournament was “supposed” to be an epic battle between the top four seeds, with only the two that made it to the final game having a chance to compete in the big dance. Old Dominion had won 11 straight games, Drexel had won an outstanding 13 road games including Creighton and Syracuse. VCU was the regular season champion, and Hofstra has the highest scoring guard tandem in the country. Two of these teams were “supposed” to battle it out for the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament with the loser most likely getting an at-large bid, but that didn’t happen.
The CAA Tournament showed us that there are no dominating teams in this conference. George Mason struggled all season long to get a 9-9 conference record and got stomped at Northeastern in their final regular season game by 23 points. Yet they got by Hofstra and conference player of the year Loren Stokes, who was held to nine points. They kept Old Dominion’s Brandon Johnson to two points in a blowout performance, ending Old Dominion’s 12-game winning streak and making them look silly in the process. And if it were not for the late heroics of VCU’s Eric Maynor in the final minutes of Monday night’s championship game, a middle-of-the-pack team that had to beat the league’s bottom dwellers to get any conference wins during the regular season would be getting the automatic bid from the CAA. Do not be deceived, this is not the George Mason team that went to the Final Four. George Mason probably won’t even make it to the NIT this year.
The NCAA Tournament selection committee will see right through the win streaks, the road records and the national scoring leaders. They will see that the CAA is still a mid-major league in which any team could come out on top given the right circumstances each and every year. What the CAA needs to do is get a constant steam of talent into the conference and schedule more opponents from major conferences. CAA teams are going in the right direction, but they are not quite there. On Selection Sunday don’t be surprised if VCU is the only team that is going dancing.