The CAA Tournament Experience

by Joseph Kuykendall

            Similarly for many of the fans, the CAA Tournament is one of my favorite parts of the whole season. It encompasses what college basketball is all about and truly defines “March Madness”.

            As a freshman last year, I was spoiled with my first CAA Tournament experience for obvious reasons. Continuing off those expectations this year, the result wasn’t what I wanted but the experience lived up to what I expected it to be.

            The CAA holds its banquet the night before the first day of competition. With the play-in game on Friday this year, the banquet was held on Thursday night. We left Harrisonburg early Thursday afternoon to give us enough time to get to Baltimore, check-in and get ready for the banquet.

            We stayed in the Renaissance Hotel this year right on the Inner Harbor. Unlike last year where all the teams (except Drexel) stayed at the Richmond Marriott, we were joined in the Renaissance by Hofstra and Drexel only. I can’t be certain, but I’m assuming all the other teams were stationed at the Baltimore Marriott—where the banquet was held. The Renaissance was extremely nice (as was the view from my room) but it wasn’t as much of an experience as the Richmond Marriott provided. The Richmond Marriott had a great college basketball vibe because most of the teams stayed in the same hotel with all the fun games in the lobby along with T Millers—everyone's go to hangout spot.  

The wonderful view from my hotel room.

            We had a little downtime in the hotel before we snazzied up and headed to the banquet. I was very excited for the banquet this year because my grandmother had bought me a purple sport coat the week prior. I was ready to outwardly display my Duke Dog pride to the rest of the CAA. I even got a black (purple) eye the week before in an intramural basketball game so the purple eye complimented my purple jacket and gold tie well.

A glorious selfie showcasing my incredible
JMU spirit, purple eye included.

            As I was heading down in the elevator with Coach Deane to catch the bus to the banquet, none other than Blaine Taylor (in town to broadcast the games for Comcast SportsNet) got on the elevator with us. He began to step off the elevator on the fifth floor when Coach Deane asked where he was going. He went on to tell us that when he asked the hotel folks they said the banquet was on the fifth floor. Somewhere there was a major miscommunication and Taylor was going to be stuck at the hotel with no banquet because he failed to arrange a ride to the Marriott assuming the banquet was at the Renaissance. It was then that Taylor asked if he could ride our bus and Coach Deane accepted his request. So it was a nice bus ride through downtown Baltimore with the team….plus Blaine Taylor.

            The beginning of the banquet involved lots of socializing and pictures. All the players wanting pictures all suited up while all the coaching staffs were mingling and networking. Because we started the support staff games this year, the banquet was even more fun for myself because it gave me and the rest of our support staff a chance to catch up with the other support staffs in the league that we played against. In fact, we tried organizing a mini CAA Tournament for the support staffs in Baltimore but it was just too much to put together. As we better the support staff games in the future, we’re hoping to make the support staff tournament happen next year (if there is a next year for us in the CAA Tournament).

            The banquet began with a few opening remarks from the Baltimore Director of the Visitors Bureau (or some fancy title like that) and then the meal began. As a food connoisseur, it wasn’t a bad meal--typical hotel food but decent quality. The mashed potatoes were on point. The only negative was that I was seated at the very last table to get called to the buffet so food options were scarce by the end.

            Once everybody had a full tummy, the ceremony part of the banquet began. Tom Yeager said a few words as did the Mayor of Baltimore--then the awards. The CAA does a really good job of putting highlight videos together and videos of the awards. Instead of somebody reading off a piece of paper they play videos with highlights announcing the award winners in each category. They were very well done except for a minor faux pas seen below:

Can you spot what's wrong?

Post-banquet we headed for the exits (with Blaine Taylor, of course) and went back to our hotel for a good night’s rest.

            Friday was a bit different at the tournament since we typically don't have a full day off. Sometime early afternoon, we headed to the Baltimore Arena for our 20 minute shootaround slot. This was nothing serious, simply just a chance for the guys to get up some shots on the rims and get adjusted to the flooring. After this brief period, we headed back to the hotel and had lunch. I went to lunch with a good friend of mine that I met through living in Boston, Mike Brodsky. Mike is arguably (actually not much argument) the biggest Northeastern basketball fan and was a former manager for them in the early 90s. We always have great sports conversations and he tells me some classic manager and Mike Deane (Coach Deane was at Siena when Brodsky was a manager at NU and NU and Siena were in the same conference) stories. He makes the CAA Tournament trip every year and it has become our annual (if two times makes it annual) “catch-up” time.

            Coach Summers and I handed out the CAA gifts at this point. Every year there is a list of gifts that each student-athlete, manager and GA gets to pick something from. It's usually some pretty nice stuff. This year we all got our gifts and a CAA backpack from Under Armour who was a tournament sponsor. I picked out the Fossil watch that was on the list of options. Here is a good article on the conference gifts: "For hoops teams, swag season is here".

            Following a good lunch with Mike, the team once again boarded the buses this time on our way to UMBC. With so many teams, no team could have a full practice at the Baltimore Arena so the CAA arranges practice times at other local gyms.  Our location of practice was UMBC. For all the Convo haters, be happy for what you have. UMBC’s gym is a high school gym and UREC all in one. UMBC’s gym made Convo look like JPJ.

            After practice a few players and coaches went to the Baltimore Arena to watch the play-in game, I instead opted to check out the harbor along with Dimitrije Cabarkapa, Tom Rivard, and Tom Vodanovich. It was a pretty nice walk besides the cold and it gave Rivard and I a chance to take this picture imitating Duke Dog from his visit to Baltimore for media day in the fall.

            We walked along the shore and checked out some of the ships outside the aquarium with our walk ending at Phillips Seafood. Rivard and I really wanted to munch on a crab cake while we were in Baltimore, it is crabs and basketball after all, right?

            That put a cap on the night as our minds were then turned towards bringing home back-to-back championships.

            The team had a morning shootaround slot on Saturday. The team did not use it but Semenov really wanted to head over to get up some shots. Seme, Coach Phillips, and I got an early breakfast and headed to the arena to let Seme get his shots up. Coach Phillips ran a few drills, I rebounded and Seme did what he does best—shoot the rock.

            The rest of the afternoon was a typical gameday. Dimitrije, Kevin Albright (GA), and I walked around a little more and explored the mall that was next door to our hotel. Then mid-afternoon the team met for a brief walkthrough and pre-game meal.

            By late afternoon it was go-time. We got to the arena in time to catch the end of the Northeastern/Drexel game and then had to sit around for a bit. One of the things about tournaments like this (and NCAA) is that they are very structured so neither team can step foot on the court until 60 minutes to tip. Sounds weird, but makes sense in order to make it an even playing field.

            The locker rooms at the Baltimore Arena were obviously not made for basketball as you could tell they brought in curtains, cubbies, etc. for the tournament.

            Usually I am filling water bottles pregame but for whatever reason they did not give us Gatorade. Therefore Cal Hall (our trainer) and I were running around trying to get a hold of someone to get us Gatorade. Finally a few minutes before tip, someone showed up with a jug of water and a bag of Gatorade mix. Then I did what I do best and mixed Gatorade as quickly as I could. In the end it all worked out and I got to use an extremely long whisk—a new experience for me.

            The game didn’t go as my mind had scripted but it was a great turnout by JMU Nation and it was another wonderful experience. The locker room was somber after the game but there was also a sense of growth and urgency to make things happen next season.

            We boarded the bus, packed our bags at the hotel and headed back to Harrisonburg that night. It was a different feeling for me (returning to Harrisonburg on the losing end) because I was spoiled the season before but the loss made me appreciate 2013 even more.

            Now it’s time to shift focus and get the women’s team a CAA crown. I went out west to spend time with my family for spring break but made sure I booked my flight home on Saturday in order to support the Lady Dukes on Sunday!

Confessions from a Stir-Crazy Manager and Team

by Joseph Kuykendall

            I’m writing this as I sit on the bus ride back to Harrisonburg. Because of our road-heavy schedule this year it takes a lot for me to say this but I couldn’t be more happy to be on this bus right now. A place with usual feelings of being entrapped now has an obscure feeling of freedom—a feeling I (we) haven’t felt since Tuesday.

            We got to Delaware Tuesday night, per usual, and things got off to a great start with our dinner that night—I had some delectable shrimp tacos. A great workout (except for the random smelly dude in the workout room who I hope got deodorant for Valentine’s day) with Director of Ops. Rob Summers, grad assistant Kevin Albright and fellow manager Michael Qura prepared me for a great night of sleep. A last minute quality conversation with roommate Andrey Semenov and I knocked out dreaming of spoiling Delaware’s unblemished conference record.

            Wednesday was like any other game day and a few minutes before we left the hotel for the game we got word to bring all of our belongings because we were going to depart towards home following the game no matter how long it took us to get home.

            You know how the game went, no need to rub salt (especially ice salt because it didn’t work well enough to get us home on time, apparently) in that wound. Following the game I was scrambling around trying to get game film and a basketball from Delaware (when Delaware won at Convo it was Monte Ross’ 100^th win so they took the game ball agreeing to give us one when we played at their place, therefore I was the one tasked with making sure we got it back). It took longer than usual for me to do that but luckily Qura (known as “Q”), and other manager Josh Warren (known as “Sitch”) took care of the locker room cleanup. 

           I finally had everything I needed and made it back to the locker room. I saw it was snowing outside which, although I love snow, wasn’t the greatest thing to see considering it wasn’t supposed to start in Newark until midnight. That’s also about the time that Q and Sitch relayed the message of no school (yes!) but that we have to stay another night (no!). What college student wants to spend a snow day away from school let alone cornered in a hotel in a place you know nobody? I was emotionless because of the mixture of happy and sad emotions.

            Administration had called and requested we stay the night for the safety of the team. As much as that is not what I wanted to do, it made complete sense. Rash decisions around safety aren’t always our best ones and our safety is more important than making it back in time to have a day off in the ‘burg.

            So Wednesday night was spent contemplating what we could be doing if we were all back in Harrisonburg with the rest of the college crew. It ended up being a low key night with a bunch of “chilling” until midnight when I affectionately jumped on Dimitrije Cabarkapa to wish him a happy 21^st birthday. What a birthday for the guy who had the game of his short career the evening before! Hopefully it’s the start of something great.

            It ended up being another late night for no reason and I went to bed with the intentions of the team leaving at 11 in the morning (on Thursday) to make it back to the Valley. We woke up had a great breakfast and packed everything up. I was having a few laughs in Dimitrije and Kevin’s room when I went to go walk to my room to get my bags and head for the bus. As I was in the hotel hallway walking to my room, I heard the words of doom, “We’re staying another night.” Again, at the moment not what I wanted to hear but when safety is in the best interest for the decision, not much to complain about.

The view out my hotel window Thursday morning.

            All it meant was another day of just sitting around and staring at each other (not actually) because there was nothing better to do. We utilized the day off to watch film as a team and begin preparing for the next game. I can’t remember who exactly, it was either Q or Christian Pierce, had the quote of the trip when they walked into film saying, “This is worse than jail. In jail they at least have arts and crafts.”

            Some of our free time was spent pulling minor pranks on people. In charge of the movement was resident jokester Dimitrije. You can see what level of boredom we were brought to and how even the littlest things made us crack up. Can you say cabin fever?!

            Now, as we’re almost back to Harrisonburg it’s time to work hard and start a new winning streak—it all begins tomorrow. #CramTheConvo  

The awkwardly disproportionate amount of snow
 that was on my car hood and no where
else when I got to my car Friday morning.

The Best Road Trip

by Joseph Kuykendall

I do enjoy exploring new college towns and arenas, there is one town and arena in particular that I look forward to playing in every year. Simply put, Boston.

Although I moved around a bunch as a kid, (5 houses, 4 states, 3 years—and no, I’m not in a military family) I spent the most recent eleven years of my life just North of Boston. Boston and Massachusetts are my home and luckily Northeastern is in our conference. Every year I have the joy of traveling back to the best city in the US for a few days.

I don't even like coffee but I was back in New
England so I had to, right?

            There is more to the trip than just going back home to Boston. My senior year in high school I was the beat writer for the Northeastern basketball team for a local sports blog. That meant many nights at Matthews Arena interviewing the likes of Bill Coen, Jonathan Lee and Joel Smith. I even went to Richmond to cover them in the CAA Tournament before they eventually bowed out to eventual champion VCU. It was a great experience covering the team and going to Richmond. I will never forget how welcoming Northeastern was of me despite being a high school student.

            Therefore in addition to making a trip to my home city every season I get to go back to Matthews and see a few familiar faces including their SID, Matt McDonald, and co-writer, Joshua Kummins.

            I am blessed to have many supporters so it's been great to have different family and friends attend the games in Boston the past two years. I sure help fill the place with purple! At least My family isn’t in the Philadelphia area because of all the players and coaches that call the Philly area home and use up all the tickets!

Seeing friends and family at the
game is a huge plus!

            Last year we had a lot of free time in Boston so I was able to play the role of tour guide. A few of us ate at Legal Sea Foods the night that we arrived in town and on game day myself and Graduate Assistant, Kevin Albright, did some exploring. We took the subway to Fenway Park, got ourselves a tour (of the eventual World Series champion’s park!—had to throw that in) and then ate burritos at a local Mexican joint that is one of my all-time favorite restaurants in Boston. It’s called El Pelon, if you’re ever in the city give it a try, you won’t regret it.

            Traveling to Boston this year was extra special. My family moved to Colorado this summer when I left to head back to JMU in August. When we flew into Boston last week, it was my first time back in the Bay State since moving. It was a little weird being there without it being “home” but nonetheless it was great to be back. The only thing that was missing was seeing my parents at the game but they’ve been great supporters of the team having been to the Winthrop, Richmond, Sam Houston State, Stephen F. Austin and William & Mary (home) games.

            Kevin and I didn’t have much time to do touristy things in the city this year but we did walk around the city to a few shops and saw the site of the marathon bombings which was 

a very eerie feeling.

            Although I am a big fan of any kind of change in life, switching conferences would mean no more trips to Boston or Northeastern, something I’m not sure I want to lose.

Traveling with the Dukes

(The article was started Sunday and finished Tuesday)

With this season’s road-heavy schedule, it seems only fitting that I write about the ins and outs of a road trip with the JMU Men’s Basketball Team. I am writing this post while on the team bus en route to Charleston. After last night’s great win in Wilmington to start CAA play we are heading directly to Charleston before heading home as to save a little bit of travel especially since we aren’t missing any classes by doing so.

            The travel is an obvious perk of being a team manager. I love traveling and exploring and seeing new places (biking cross-country this summer is a great example of that). Little nooks and crannies of the US are so fascinating to me (i.e. Nacogdoches, TX). Additionally, the annual road trip to Northeastern provides a brief but worthwhile excursion home to see friends and family.

Most road trips and travel days are all similar. For every away contest we always go the day before the game and spend the night to be relaxed the day of the game and get acclimated in preparation for the game. (Yes, even for UVA we went the night before). The majority of the time we have a practice at Convo before getting on the road. After the brief practice we have about an hour in between the end of practice and the buses departure. While this is a time for the players and staff to relax, grab a bite to eat or shower this is the time for us managers to shine and get our stuff done.

One of the first things we do is get the drinks and snack bin. We have cases of Powerade and water locked up in a closet and we usually take a Powerade to water ratio of 2:1. After lugging the cases to the bus with my fellow manager(s) and/or graduate assistant(s) we must get all the gear from our equipment manager.

Each player is responsible for bringing his own practice gear but we as managers are responsible for bringing their game gear. The players have separate undershirts, socks, etc. for games and practices so we get a big bag from our equipment manager, Kevin, full of jerseys, shooting shirts and their game laundry loops (undershirts, socks, pads). The players never see their jersey or game gear until we arrive at the arena for the contest.

Another bag we get from Kevin is the gameday bag. The gameday bag holds all of our supplies. It has the whiteboards, markers, blank DVDs and extra gear for the guys in case they forget or lose something. It also has an empty bag in it, in case we need an extra bag for dirty laundry on the roadie.

Once we have all the bags we need, we put them on the bus along with the drinks. One case of water and one case of Powerade always go on the bus for consumption while the other cases are left under the bus. Once all is packed, it’s seat claiming time. Some people like the left side while others like the right (I’m a left-side kind of guy) and the battles for seats are usually around which seats have plugs. Sometimes every row has plugs but often only every third row has a plug. Those are the high-priced seats.

The loaded bus

Sometimes the rides go fast and other times they seem like they take forever. I usually pass the ride by doing homework or sleeping. Forgetting a pillow is a nightmare. It’s hard enough to sleep and get comfortable when you do have a pillow.

When the bus arrives at the hotel I B-line to the lobby for a luggage dolly. With all the team and personal bags we have to carry it’s never fun to carry every bag by hand.

My best friend--the luggage dolly

Most of the time the rest of the night is ours. I’m often found in the GAs room just sitting around sharing laughs and watching sports. And then I’ll get a text to head back to my room so a player can grab a Powerade.

Also the night before the game, we play our support staff game. This is something that I look forward to every road trip. We started doing it this year and it’s when we play the support staff of the opposing school the night before the game in a friendly pickup game. Support staff refers to managers, GAs, trainers, Director of Operations, etc.—anybody who wants to play. Our players enjoy coming to watch (laugh and make fun of us). The games are a great way to play some pickup and meet the staffs of the other teams.

Not typically, except this Wilmington/Charleston trip because we aren't going home, we do laundry on the road. I coordinate ahead of time with the other teams manager(s) and/or Director of Operations to use their laundry facilities. This trip, Charleston has been great to work with in allowing us to use their facilities. I am very grateful of their generosity. 

Doing laundry in Charleston

On gameday we wake up around 9:30 and have breakfast catered at the hotel. Hotel meals are always hit or miss—sometimes they’re very good and other times they were clearly just heated up in the microwave. This year, though, our Director of Operations, Rob Summers, has really come through with some quality meals.

A few hours after breakfast we head to the arena for shootaround. This is our chance to get acclimated to the gym. It is a very light, hour-long practice. It usually involves a simple shooting drill or two and then a run-through of our own sets as well as how to defend the opponent’s sets. Every once in a while I get placed on the scout team (running the opponent’s plays) and get to release my inner Jerrelle Benimon or Marcus Thornton. You ask me, I get buckets. You ask the players, I get locked up. You can decide who you want to believe.

Post-shootaround is the time to chill and get in game mode. Save for pregame meal four hours before tip it’s a relaxing time. This is usually a prime time to squeeze in a quick snooze. And then two hours before gametime we leave for the gym. We typically go home right after the game so we must be all packed up by this point. I have to be sure I’m ready to go before the bus is ready to leave so that I have time to get all the bags onto the bus.

Mixed in with all the free time we have is usually a workout in the hotel gym with Dimitrije Cabarkapa. We like to put in a hard workout together.

My pregame routine includes passing out the jerseys, setting up the bench and making sure everything is running smoothly until it’s time to rock & roll.

After we get the win, it is my duty to make sure everything is put back the way it was before. I collect all the players dirty clothes in the laundry bags and clean up the bench and locker room. Especially on road trips, I take pride in making sure the locker room and bench are cleaner or as clean as when we showed up. People take note of that and associate it with JMU. I’m usually the last one on the bus after I cleaned everything up and then its all zzzz’s until we get to Harrisonburg early the next morning and have to get up and go to class.