THEY WON

Yeah, Marcus and company may have won, but the hard work was already done. The incumbant 5-1 Spring 2004 Champs went out in the semi-finals to the 3-3 Dats All Day. As if that isn't and upset in and of itself, Dats All Day played the entire game with only 4 players. Granted, Justin Wilson was one of them, but come on. Really? I was watching the game and the entire time, I felt like there was going to be some point in which the shots started falling for the Champs. But they never did. And then they were in trouble. And then they were gone. Props to Dats All Day for their play in that game. They ended Reggie's streak of however many championships he had won before then. Maybe they should have played the championship game with only 4 players too. In the lowest scoring game of the entire NBA season, We Won squeaked out a 31-28 victory to give Marcus his first title in his freshmen year. Maybe there's a new dynasty on the way. Whether there is or not, there's a new kid at the top of the hill and one certainty is that there will be other kids trying to knock him off soon enough.

We Won, Spring 2004 Intramural NBA Champions

SIGMA ALPHA EXCELLENT

After missing the playoffs in the fall league, SAE came back in as a relative favorite, or at least as a team with a few recognizable faces. But they entered the playoffs as a #5 seed and needed to hack their way through some tough competition to win it all. They started out by beating the #4 Team Who Cares by 2 in the last minute. That granted them the right to play the undefeated #1 Team Euro in the semis. And as if it wasn't enough that Euro hadn't lost a game in their last 13 attempts, they also spanked SAE by 17 just two weeks earlier. Again, you just figured at some point that Euro's shots would start falling and they'd be on top of SAE. But they didn't. Euro averaged over 50 points all season long and only managed 35 against SAE. And they came up 3 short. So SAE won two close games and were on to play their second undefeated team in a row. #2 And 1 had just beaten #6 Undisputed by 3 in the semis (Undisputed had upset #3 Dynasty by 3 in the quarterfinals) and expected to have a tough battle against Team Euro. They were relieved at the sight of SAE in the finals. Until they finally ran out of gas in the second overtime period. And so goes the story of SAE. Congrats to Mek, Paul, Rob and the rest of the gang. Next year, don't lose so many regular season games. You start to give the other teams a false sense of hope. (As a side note, this was the most competative playoff season in reecnt history. Every game with the exception of the 38-34 double overtime game in the finals was decided by 3 points or less.)

SAE, Spring 2004 Intramural ABA Champions

YO MAMA DON'T DANCE, BUT SHE CAN RUN THE ROCK

After a brief scare at the manager's meeting when it didn't look like we were going to have enough interest to run a CBA league, Jon Rice and Yo Mama breathed a sigh of relief when they found out that Geoff was getting the 3 free agent girls and an old veteran to recruit a few more players so we'd be able to have a CBA league. Honestly, it's a tribute to all of our participants that we are running three leagues again. We haven't done that since Spring 2000. As far as Yo Mama's play was concerned, there wasn't another team that even came close to beating them this year. The Secret Agents came close led by their trusty point gaurd, but in the end, Erin just couldn't do it by herself. The Best gave them a decent run in the regular season and the playoffs, coming within 8 points both times. But that was it. The most exciting game of the season must have been the semi-final game between the Secret Agents and Patapsco. They had met earlier in the year and te Secret Agents won 35-33 in OT. This game would take more than one overtime period. In fact, it took four. It is the longest basketball game that intramurals has even seen. At the end of regulation, the Secret Agents, up by a point at the time, fouled a Patapsco player as time ran out and put him on the line to shoot two free throws. He made his first and missed his second. The same thing happened at the end of one of the overtime periods with the same result. At the end of the fourth overtime, Ed fouled out as time ran out, putting another Patapsco guy on the line, this time down by two. He sank the first one, and missed the second, finally bringing the marathon game to an end. I'm sure both teams were happy to see the end of that game, as a total of four people had fouled out. So the Secret Agents made it to the finals and got destroyed by Yo Mama 38-23. Congrats to Yo Mama. Good luck in the ABA next year.

Yo Mama, Spring 2004 Intramural CBA Champions

March 30, 2004 - Playoffs for all three divisions are set and will begin tomorrow. Well, there's only one game tomorrow, but there are a few Thursday and even more on Friday. And though they aren't scheduled definately yet, the ABA semi-final games will also take place Friday. Pay attention to them, PLEASE. Thanks and we'll see you on the court.

• NBA
• ABA
• CBA

March 29, 2004 - OK. It's come to our attention that there was a game in the ABA between SAE and Pi Kapp that was postponed and never made up. As it turns out, that game will have some playoff implications for the 4-6 seeds in the playoffs. So we'll need to make up the game tomorrow (Tuesday) at 3:00. The playoff schedule will be on hold until the outcome of the two ABA games tomorrow. Both ABA quarterfinal games and possibly one or both of the NBA semi-final games will take place on Wednesday 3/31. Schedules should be finished and online sometime around 7pm tomorrow. Please call or e-mail Geoff Rupert at 410-455-2118 or grupert@umbc.edu if your have any questions.

For the record, here's what the ABA standings look like right now. Right now, Team Euro and And 1 earned the top two spots respectively and first round byes based on their undefeated season. Dynasty and Team Who Cares have a 4-2 record and SAE will also have a 4-2 record with a win over Pi Kapp tomorrow. Because Dynasty has beaten both of them, they get the #3 seed. If SAE does beat Pi Kapp, they will get the #4 seed based on point differential, giving Team Who Cares the #5 seed. However, if Pi Kapp beats SAE tommorrow, they will bump Team Who Cares up to #4 and if they continue on to beat the Donkies, they will take the #5 seed and knock a 3-3 SAE down to #6. However, if Pi Kapp splits their two games tomorrow, they will make a four-way tie for sixth place at 2-4 with Undisputed, Off Da Heezy and Pimps. Because not every team has played each other, the first tie-breaker is point differential. Undisputed has a -26 right now, which is best among those three. But Pi Kapp has a -18 right now, which means if they split their two games tomorrow, they will still get in as the #6 seed, unless they lose the game that they lose by at least 8 more than they win the game that they win by. I know that sentence is hard to read, but it's correct. So basically, Undisputed and Pi Kapp are fighting for the last playoff spot, and Undisputed can't really do anything about it now but watch and hope. And Pi Kapp just needs to win one of the two games as long as they don't lose by 8 more than they win by. There, that was a little easier. Good luck and I'll see you playoff bound teams Wednesday.

Februrary 26, 2004 - Call your players (or playas, as it's commonly spelled now) and show up. No excuses, only buckets. And we squeezed in six games for everybody. Any questions or concerns should be addressed to the big man, Geoff Rupert. You can bling him at 410-455-2118 or drop him a note at grupert@umbc.edu. Awesome. See you on the court tomorrow.