Who's afraid of the Saints?
Siena's men's basketball team has gotten so good that big-time schools are now afraid to play them. From ESPN's Andy Katz:
Saints coach Fran McCaffery has won two straight NCAA first-round games against Vanderbilt and Ohio State. So, of course, he would have no problem securing more big-time nonconference games, right? Wrong. Even though the Saints are exactly the team a "big six" conference foe should play, they struggled throughout the offseason to get games. But the Saints return leading scorer Edwin Ubiles and sharpshooter Ronald Moore and that's enough to scare most opponents away from scheduling them.
In the weird calculus of college basketball, a loss or close win against a good "mid-major" team such as Siena is somehow much worse than absolutely dominating a cream puff. So it goes. The Saints will have just have to save their giant killing for March.
By the way: Katz has Siena in his pre-season Top 25 at #20.
Siena opens its season November 13 on the road at Tennessee State (see the part about big-name schools above).
[via @peteiorizzo and @SienaSaintsBlog]
photo: Siena
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