SoCon Fans

(North-1) Appalachian State 77, (South-2) College of Charleston 54

The one-and-done nature of conference tournament basketball is exhilarating for the winner and wrenching for the loser. Life as a mid-major is so fragile because one bad shooting day can make the difference between a big run and a devastating defeat. On Sunday night in Charlotte, N.C., the College of Charleston found out once again that if threes don’t drop, a promising season can suddenly come to a halt.

More will be said about the victorious Appalachian State Mountaineers in a moment, but the particularly poignant story of this second semifinal at the Southern Conference Tournament was the departure of the team that so fervently hoped to cross the threshold this season.

The College of Charleston – over the past two decades – has been part of a trend in the Southern Conference. The school has borne witness to a procession of New York-born basketball coaches who have come south to experience success. The Charleston program flourished and won NCAA Tournament games during the storied tenure of John Kresse, a product of the Big Apple. Four years after Kresse’s retirement, another child of New York came to the Palmetto State, as Bobby Cremins – with a thick accent belonging to the big city – returned from a post-Georgia Tech exile to captain the Cougars from the bench. The other SoCon program to succeed with a New Yorker as its coach has been Davidson, the North Carolina school guided by Bob McKillop. By bringing Stephen Curry to campus, McKillop created the single most successful SoCon squad of the past decade. All in all, the link between New York and Southern-flavored mid-major basketball is a strong one.

It is especially close for Cremins.

The wizard with white hair has made his living not just as a successful basketball coach, but as a bench boss in the South. Cremins actually piloted none other than Appalachian State to three regular-season SoCon titles in the late 1970s and early 80s. The fruits of that apprenticeship in Boone, N.C., enabled Cremins to jump to the big-time with Georgia Tech in the ACC. Cremins won multiple ACC titles – in both the regular season and the league tournament – during his stay in Atlanta, and he also reached the 1990 Final Four. However, the good times didn’t last forever at Georgia Tech, and he stepped down at the end of the 2000 season, when the Yellow Jacket program had become appreciably stagnant.

Cremins spent six years away from the tumult of collegiate coaching, but he felt a distinct craving for the thrill of life inside the arena, and so when Charleston came to him in 2006 with a job offer, Cremins accepted it. He won 22 games in his first season, and last year, in this third campaign with the C of C, Cremins upset his fellow New Yorker – McKillop – as Charleston raced past Davidson and into the Southern Conference Tournament final against Chattanooga.

This is where Cremins’ past intersects with the present day… and with the victory of the Appalachian State team that ruined his dream.

In Charleston’s championship challenge 12 months ago against the Mocs of Chattanooga, the Cougars struggled mightily from the field, experienced multiple extended field goal droughts, and never found any rhythm or consistency in a lopsided 80-69 loss that was much worse than the final score suggested. One bad game from mad bomber Andrew Goudelock – 5 of 17 in that loss to Chattanooga – showed Charleston what could happen if it relied too much on the three-ball.

Well, history just repeated itself for Cremins’ kids against Appalachian State.

Head coach Buzz Peterson led his Mountaineers within one game of the SoCon mountaintop on Sunday, as his team benefited from yet another display of deficient shooting from Goudelock and the rest of the Cougars. On a night when the Mountaineers limited Charleston to 28 percent shooting from the field, Goudelock – who has great range but often lacks the discipline needed to take wise shots – hit only 6 of his 21 attempts in a stinging reminder of the Chattanooga game. With no one on the Cougars providing any offensive consistency, the Mountaineers closed in for the kill. Appalachian State got 37 points from guard Kellen Brand, who had exactly the kind of night Goudelock hoped to have, yet couldn’t produce. Brand went 14 of 19 from the field, 5 of 6 from 3-point range, and 4 of 4 from the foul line in a masterful effort that left Bobby Cremins out of the Big Dance yet again in Charleston.

One game, with great shooting on one side and poor marksmanship on the other, is all it takes to prolong one season while stopping another. Appalachian State lives, while the College of Charleston’s NCAA dreams will be delayed at least 12 more months. Such is life in the mid-major precinct of a land called Bracketville.

What’s Next

Appalachian State, the top seed in the North Division of the Southern Conference, will take on the top seed in the South on Monday night. Wofford is the opponent that waits in the SoCon final, and if this contest is anything like the teams’ first matchup in the 2009-2010 campaign, it should be pretty special. Back on Dec. 7 of 2009, Appy State traveled to Spartanburg, S.C., and tipped Wofford by a single point, 77-76. Both ballclubs have evolved and changed a great deal since that thriller, so while these are conference foes, there will be a certain level of mystery surrounding the last SoCon game of the season. Peterson and Wofford coach Mike Young will be locked in a battle of ever-shifting adjustments, and the team that catches on to its opponent’s maneuvers with more elasticity and awareness will very likely own an NCAA Tournament ticket when Monday night is over.

By: Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Senior Staff Writer