Author: ssmith19

Former Captain and Vice-President of Towson Dodgeball. Sporting #19, Sean's talents as a content writer range from previews, interviews, postgames, and excessive uses of both satire and sarcasm. Also, he is the first person to bring some much needed East Coast flavor to the NCDA site.

Did you forget about us?

This article was put together by Sean Smith (Towson ALumni)

The month of February appears like it will be very telling for how the rest of the NCDA season can expect to go down. The recent WAR in Akron provided a lot of insight as to where teams are, on all levels of the strength spectrum.

There’s no doubt that Grand Valley is still the odds-on favorite to win the title in April. They have everything on their side, history, talent, even home court advantage. Even if the Lakers should somehow falter, the Michigan Region looked much improved after this month. Michigan State followed-up their performance at WAR by exorcising their MDC demons (finishing with 2 wins), and Saginaw Valley and Central Michigan appear to have significantly improved since earlier this year as well. Outside of the Michigan Region, Towson appears to be a top choice, if not the choice to contend for the title in two months. Putting my personal feelings about my alma mater aside, I feel as if their meteoric rise past preseason expectations has cast a shadow over another true contender for the crown.

Continue reading “Did you forget about us?”

Outside Reaction to Nationals

So I heard the NCDA had a tournament this weekend. I also heard that Grand Valley won… again. I can’t say that is a surprising result to hear, but congratulations to the Lakers… again. That being said, there are a few other takeaways we can gather from this weekend. Here’s my take from everything I heard and saw from this year in the NCDA: Continue reading “Outside Reaction to Nationals”

Nationals Preview, Best Case Scenarios: East Coast

Nationals is only a few weeks away people! Not that anyone needed me to tell them that, but as many would expect that means it’s time to start previewing all potential facets of the crazy weekend to come. As a warning, these will be filled with a lot of optimistic thinking but, based on current standings, here are what I think the best case scenarios are for each team on the East Coast heading into Lexington: Continue reading “Nationals Preview, Best Case Scenarios: East Coast”

Outsider’s (Over)reaction Monday

As everyone should know, there were a lot of matches played yesterday in the NCDA. Unfortunately, I was not able to attend either tournament in person, but I was able to watch most and glean a pretty good idea of how both went down and what it means for everyone. Here’s my interpretation from an outside perspective of what yesterday meant for the NCDA, and most importantly, for April. Continue reading “Outsider’s (Over)reaction Monday”

Top 5 Players I’ve Ever Gone Against

Much like the articles for The Players’ Tribune where current and former players compile a list of the best people they’ve ever gone against, it seemed like an appropriate time to make a spot where people can list the best players they’ve ever gone against.

For me there are a few layers to the criteria in my list: do they have a good arm, are they a good catcher, blocker, do they have a knack for being one of the last people in a match, and how frustrating is it to go up against them? I’m also trying to base my list against people who I’ve had direct interaction with while on the court. So if I played someone, but we stayed on the opposite side of the court most of the time from each other I may exclude their name. Former teammates were also excluded since I technically played against them.

I’m sure several people will have an opportunity to read this, and I implore all of you to include your list in the comments if given a chance. Especially Jon Shaw and Wes Peters, I know you two guys read practically everything on this site. Continue reading “Top 5 Players I’ve Ever Gone Against”

OPINION: The 5 most frustrating ways to get out in a match

Dodgeball, as we know, has a ton of different ways for a player to get out in a match. From what I’ve heard, most participants would say that catching a throw in the face is the hardest way to get out of a match; but is it the most frustrating way to get out? The type of eliminator that makes a player roll their eyes, groan and trudge off the court in complete frustration or disbelief? Here are my 5 most frustrating ways to get out, and I’d love to see what other people think. If you have an opinion, please add to the comments section! Continue reading “OPINION: The 5 most frustrating ways to get out in a match”

First Impressions of the East

As just about everyone knows at this point, Towson hosted the first East Coast region tournament this weekend. While not every staple team from the EC was able to make it, three of mainstays (Towson, UMD & VCU) along with a young squad in Stevenson were able to get together for a day of action. Now that I’m on the outside looking in, I was able to watch and learn a lot more than I could in the past, as I was probably trying to keep myself awake in between matches or find a quick bite to eat. I caught most of the matches, and while I didn’t see everything, I saw enough to get a good impression on each of the four teams. Here are my impressions of the four squads involved in Sunday’s action: Continue reading “First Impressions of the East”

Top 5 Venues (that I’ve been to)

Now that I’m a part of the “old guy” crowd who has been around the league for a while I can take a moment to look back at my time in the league and find some of the hidden gems that made my NCDA career so enjoyable. One thing that is highly underrated about an NCDA trip is getting to check out a new area and see what that place has to offer. I may not have gotten to see all of the venues, but here is a list of my top 5 favorite venues in the NCDA.

Continue reading “Top 5 Venues (that I’ve been to)”

MVEC Preview

     

Oh man, what do I even say about this tournament? It feels like ever since JMU hit the national scene about five years ago that the players between these two conferences have been clamoring for a regular season blowout tournament. Ok, maybe not a blowout, but people have been hoping that as the East Coast Conference has risen the teams over here would be able to face their Midwest counterparts during the regular season. There have been some regular season matchups before (BEAST and other various tournaments), but this marks the first time I can remember that multiple teams from either region have travelled the distance to the other. Saturday looks to be a barometer for a lot of teams heading into April and Nationals. Let’s take a look at the matchups.

Continue reading “MVEC Preview”

Perception in the NCDA

ncda_logoIt seems that more than ever this year teams in the NCDA are travelling to a variety of tournaments while staying as close to home as possible. Teams in the more Midwest area of the league are staying in states like Ohio, Kentucky and Michigan. Teams further west like DePaul and Wisconsin make it to as many as they can, but can’t travel with the ease of an Ohio State or Grand Valley. While they are capable of making the drives, the teams on the East Coast seem relegated to battle amongst themselves the majority of the season per usual.

As the dynamic of league travel evolves into more condensed areas, so too can perception of teams. Those who get to see more know more and typically have different ways of seeing each and every member team. Using two prominent teams, Michigan State and James Madison, it seems more appropriate than ever to examine how perception plays a major role in the NCDA. Continue reading “Perception in the NCDA”

Season Preview: Penn State

Location: State College, Pennsylvania

psu-logo

NCDA Region: East Coast

2014-15 Record: 3-8

National Tournament Finish: Lost to SVSU in the first round

2015-16 Captains: William Deutsch – C, Justin Lin – C, Kenny Russ – C

Returning Varsity Players: All

Players to Watch: Justin Lin

Overview: Fun fact number one: Penn State has been to as many regular season tournaments as they have Nationals (2). Fun fact number two: The Nittany Lions have taken a point from Grand Valley before their East Coast counterparts UMD and Towson could. Continue reading “Season Preview: Penn State”

Season Preview: UMD

Season Preview: UMD

Location: College Park, MD

umd-logo

NCDA Region: East Coast

2014-15 Record: 11-8

National Tournament Finish: Lost in 1st round to UK

2015-16 Captains: Rohan Mittal – C, Mike Cariello – , Drew Bongiovanni – A, Tyler Wieland – A

Returning Varsity Players: Approx. 11

Players to Watch: Matt Greenspan and Drew Bongiovanni

Overview: The season did not end as expected for the University of Maryland Terrapins; probably the biggest understatement of the offseason. Expectations were high going into Nationals, but the Terps went 0-4 during the NCDA’s championship weekend, raising eyebrows among many in the league. Continue reading “Season Preview: UMD”

Season Preview: James Madison

Location: Harrisonburg, VA

 jmu-logo

NCDA Region: East Coast

2014-15 Record: 22-3

National Tournament Finish: Lost to CMU in OT in the Final Four

2015-16 Captains:  Derek Pierce – C, Joe Bringuier – A, Tanner Weaver – A

Returning Varsity Players: 10-13

Players to Watch: Doug Schilling, Tanner Weaver

 

Overview: When it comes to JMU I normally know exactly what to say and what to expect out of them this season. I’m not so sure this season and consider the Dukes as a bit of an enigma heading into the 2015-16 season. Coming off an overtime loss to the eventual runners up in Central Michigan, the team looks to avoid the rebuilding label early in the season. Continue reading “Season Preview: James Madison”