Keith Simmons also had a workout with Golden State Warriors today. Torey worked out with Knicks/Nets today.

"“Disrupt” is the perfect word to describe what Southern Illinois does to teams defensively. The Salukis don’t apply a full-court team press, but Lowery has his point guard, Bryan Mullins, pick up the opposing team’s point guard and defend him the full length of the floor. That can really wear a point guard down and make it difficult for a team to get into its offense. And once a team manages to get into its half-court offense against SIU, it’s under constant pressure. Each Salukis defender gets right up in his man’s grill when he has the ball. Virtually every pass is contested, let alone every shot. It’s rare to see a team get a clean, uncontested shot against Southern Illinois.

And on the offensive end, Lowery’s Salukis are extremely disciplined as well. You’ll rarely see them take a quick or forced shot. They’ll pass the ball around the perimeter looking for an open jumper or for their big men inside, using the majority of the 35-second shot clock in the process. That wears teams down too, having to play defense for that long."

I have seen talk on various boards around the league and on Hoop Time about the lack of the Lehigh student section, and I felt the need to chime in. I am currently a senior out here, and must say that the situation is sad.

About four years ago a group of sophomores started regularly attending games and painted themselves (the L-E-H-I-G-H guys, you refer to them as). In the beginning they were usually the only students at the games, but word grew around campus that basketball games can be fun, and the team was starting to play a lot better, so some (stress some) students started to join them. Over the next few years, it turned into a nice student section that would travel to Maryland for the league tournament, up to Colgate for a game, up to HC a few times, over to Army and BU, and even having a better showing than the Zoo-Crew in their building. (Actually in one of your posts from two years ago, you commented on the presence of the Lehigh student at Lafayette in that game we lost).

Unfortunately, most of the original L-E-H-I-G-H guys have graduated, leaving me (although I never paint myself) and maybe about 8 other regulars. Most Lehigh students who do come will sit behind us and not really get into the game anymore. The atmosphere at Stabler is nothing less than depressing this season. I think it is a combination of the team not performing that well and these guys graduating. Another thing to look at is the distance that we must travel to get over to the game. If I am not mistaken, I think all Patriot League arenas are within walking distance of where most students live. You know this is not the case at Lehigh. Ultimately, this kills attendance. On top of that, the Athletic Department shows no commitment to Lehigh basketball. Very rarely do they promote a big game in ways that go beyond a few fliers around their building and outside the ticket office. We never get campus wide e-mails like HC students do. The student paper is a joke, when it comes to LU sports.

The whole situation is a mess out here, which is unfortunate. We have a great, young coach who is an unbelievable recruiter. We have the best freshmen in the league (by far) and possibly the player of the year (although his last few games may indeed hurt him). Students should want to see this team play and actively cheer them on. They really are missing something thousands of other students are getting across the country exciting college basketball.

Hopefully I was able to shed a little light on this mess. I don t see things changing at all in the near future. For senior day on Sunday, being at 1PM, my guess is most LU students will be hung over, and not show up. Those that do will show up at about 1:15, missing the chance to honor Jose, Jason, Kyle, and Adam. Next week, for the 1st round of the tourney, expect a student crowd half of what was there for Bucknell. From there, it is up to the team to try to win at an arena (most likely Bucknell) where more than a handful of students give a bleep about their team.

Do you have any thoughts?

*by the way, if you do post this on your site, do not hold me responsible for poor grammar or spelling. I should have written this on a word file and sent it to you, but I just typed it into this little box...which is tough to proof read...i didn't think I would ramble on this long, but I wanted to get a lot of things off my chest.

The Bison and Crusaders have combined to win five of the last six Patriot League titles, and they are the only two league teams to have won in the postseason (Bucknell in the 2005 and 2006 NCAA Tournaments, Holy Cross in the 2005 NIT).

These two teams have met 10 times in 16 Patriot League Tournaments, including three times in the championship game. Bucknell defeated Holy Cross in the 2005 and 2006 title tilts, while the Crusders topped the Bison in the final in 1993.

Excluding games against each other, Bucknell and Holy Cross are a combined 71-3 against the rest of the Patriot League since the start of the 2004-05 season. The Bison have not lost to a PL team other than the Crusaders since Jan. 30, 2005 at Navy.

The Bison and Crusaders had never met until the formation of the Patriot League in 1990-91, but in 16 years since then they have clashed 43 times, an average of 2.6 meetings per year.

Bucknell had won four straight and six of the last seven in the series before Holy Cross ended that streak with a 65-60 win at the Hart Center earlier this season. Bucknell now leads the series 24-19.

Bucknell is 11-7 against Holy Cross in Lewisburg, including 4-1 at Sojka Pavilion.