By Paul Meyer
www.rmucolonials.com
Dec. 3, 2009
Meyer on Morris Link
Moon Township, Pa. - Robert Morris and Mount St. Mary's meet for the first time this season Thursday night at the Sewall Center in each team's Northeast Conference opener.
"And,'' Mountaineer coach Milan Brown noted, "if history says anything, it will be the first of three games between us.''
That could very well be.
In each of the past four seasons, in addition to playing each other twice during the regular season, Mount St. Mary's and Robert Morris also have met in the NEC tournament.
Each team has won twice in the tournament, including Robert Morris' pulse-throbbing 48-46 win in last season's NEC championship game at the Sewall Center - the culmination, so far, of this heated rivalry.
"The stakes are what build (the rivalry),'' Brown said. "When we've met, somebody has stopped playing basketball and has to sit with that the entire summer and fall.''
The Mountaineer/Colonial rivalry has not gone unnoticed by the NEC office.
It's not a coincidence that the teams are paired on the opening night of conference play - or that they meet again on the final night of the regular season.
The league wanted a marquee matchup for television Feb. 27. It selected the Colonials and Mountaineers.
"Over the (past four) years, Robert Morris and Mount St. Mary's has developed into perhaps the best rivalry in the league,'' said Ron Ratner, the NEC's interim commissioner. "It's just good old-fashioned, hard-nosed basketball when they match up. The idea was to pair up the two teams in the final game of the regular season in a made-for-TV matchup.''
Because of the league's "mirror scheduling,'' that meant the teams wound up meeting in the opener, too.
In a way, this is kind of a strange rivalry.
The teams began playing each other in 1989, and Mount St. Mary's won 17 of the first 22 games, including 13 in a row.
However, the Colonials have won 17 of the past 24 games, including eight of the past 10.
Dominance by one team usually doesn't create a rivalry, but one has to look beyond the results to discover why these teams have become so intensely involved.
Robert Morris senior Dallas Green thinks the rivalry really gained stature in his freshman season (2006-07).
"I've never lost a regular season game to Mount St. Mary's, but when it counted in the playoffs they always beat us (in 2007 and 2008), so that's when I think it really started,'' Green said.
However, most people think the intensity began ratcheting up the season before Green arrived at Robert Morris.
In 2005-06, the Colonials lost twice to Mount St. Mary's in the regular season - by a total of three points - and then won at Mount St. Mary's 67-66 in the first round of the NEC tournament on freshman Jeremy Chappell's deep three from the left baseline with only a few seconds left.
"I don't think we really knew what was forming,'' Brown said. "Those were rough-and-tumble games (that season) - getting-after-it games. We'd been down for so long and were trying to build a program and see if we could get to 13, 14, 15 wins (overall). And Robert Morris had been at 14, 15 wins and trying to get to 18, 19, 20 wins.
"After that game (decided by Chappell's shot), it's taken on a life of its own.''
The next season, Robert Morris got to 17 wins and seemed ready to make a real run in the NEC Tournament. However, the Mountaineers, a fifth seed, decisively beat the fourth-seeded Colonials 78-61 in the first round at the Sewall Center.
In 2007-08, Mike Rice's first as the RMU coach, the Colonials took even a harder fall. They'd gone 16-2 in the league during the regular season and raised their overall record to 26-6 by the time they met Mount St. Mary's in the NEC semifinals - again at the Sewall Center.
However, the Mountaineers again won handily 83-65 en route to winning the NEC championship.
Last season, Robert Morris won both regular season games for the third straight season and once again played the Mountaineers in the conference tournament - and once again at the Sewall Center.
This time, the result was different. The Colonials outlasted Mount St. Mary's on Green's 12-foot jump shot from the left baseline with about three seconds left. Green wasn't supposed to take the last shot, but the ball slipped from Chappell's grasp as he drove for the shot, and Green wound up being in the right spot at the right time.
"It was hard to lose it that way,'' Brown said, "but he made the shot. You tip your cap, get on the bus and go home.''
Now the Mountaineers return to the Sewall Center for the next chapter of this rivalry in which eight of the past 12 games have been decided by five points or less.
The veteran Colonials have been trying over the past few days to impress on six RMU newcomers what this rivalry means.
"I think (the new players) know about the rivalry, but they don't know how intense it's going to be,'' senior Jimmy Langhurst said. "They don't know how it 'feels.' I think it's going to hit them.''
Fellow senior Mezie Nwigwe conceded that the newcomers don't really know how it's going to be to play Mount St. Mary's Thursday night.
"The only way we can show them is by the intensity at practice and how we prepare for (Mount St. Mary's) and how serious we're going to be about this game,'' Nwigwe said.
"We've always had a battle with them,'' Langhurst said. "As coach Rice says, it's scratch and claw. That's what it is every game with them. It's real intense between us.''
"They're tough,'' Nwigwe said. "They don't stop. If we get on a run, a lot of teams will say, 'Dang, Robert Morris is doing it again.' But (the Mountaineers) don't stop. They play tough. They do whatever it takes to win. That's why they're Mount St. Mary's.''
"The last two or three years, we've always been probably two of the top four teams in the league,'' Rice said. "We've played each other in the tournament. That's always a heated rivalry. It's been very chippy, and that's a good thing. When you've got two good teams wanting to win, emotions run high and that's why it's a good rivalry game.''
There's also respect for the other team on each side.
Last season, the teams also met in the regular season finale at the Sewall Center, a game won by Robert Morris 66-63. The conference tournament hadn't even begun yet, but the players seemed to sense that the top-seeded Colonials and second-seeded Mount St. Mary's would meet for a third time.
"When both teams were shaking hands after that regular season game,'' Brown said, "both teams said to each other, "We'll see you in a week.'''
NOTES: Mount St. Mary's senior point guard Jeremy Goode leads the Mountaineers with an average of 14.7 points per game ... In his career against Robert Morris, Goode has averaged 11.8 points and 5.2 assists per game ... He's shot 40.5 percent from the field, including 30 percent from beyond the arc, and 65.8 percent from the free throw line ... The Mountaineers will be without senior guard/forward Will Holland, who sustained a knee injury against American Nov. 18 and might be out another week or two.
