JMU is one step closer to the big dance

   JMU’s season hung in the balance as one player had the opportunity to either send the Dukes to the Colonial Athletic Association finals or back to Harrisonburg. That player was fifth year senior Devon Moore. The result, two made free throws with just 3.7 ticks remaining on the clock sending JMU to the CAA championship game with a 58-57 victory over Delaware Sunday evening in Richmond. The scenario could not have been more fitting. Moore has been through every up and down faced by this program over the past five years and it was sheer fate that put him on the free throw line, down one with so many opportunities resting in his hands.

   Many have said this is Moore’s tournament to win or lose and he is on the verge or writing a storybook ending to a historical career at JMU.

   It was a dramatic turn of events as the Dukes looked like they would possibly need a two or three just to send the game to overtime. With 13 seconds remaining, Delaware up 57-56 with the ball, Jarvis Threatt dribbled down the sideline following an inbounds waiting to be fouled and go to the line with a chance to make it a two or three point ball game. Instead the whistle sounded, not for a foul, but for a Delaware turnover. Threatt dribbled the ball onto the sideline handing JMU possession with 11 seconds remaining.

   UD coach Monte Ross thought differently.

   “He wasn’t out of bounds. He didn’t step out of bounds. The ball didn’t go out of bounds.”

 Did the ball touch the line? Let’s leave that for the tapes, but it was seemingly a gift to JMU from the basketball gods, a present maybe long overdue depending on who you ask.

   “I’ve been here before…and I’ve missed a lot of them,” Moore said. I’m thankful to make these. Coach and everybody has a lot of confidence in me.”

   Moore is statistically the best free throw shooter on the team at 75 percent, but how do you not let all the pressure under those circumstances get to you, especially when the team has struggled from the line recently (50 percent last night, 70 percent tonight)?

  “[I] just had to slow down and do my same routine and I was able to hit them,” Moore added.

   Delaware’s Jamelle Haggins fouled Moore as he went up for a layup near the basket. No one else really expected the ball to be in anybody else’s hands in that moment and Brady would intellectually agree.

   “I’m not the smartest guy in the room, but I know you keep the ball in Devon’s hands,” he said. “Not only can he make he make the play, he can make the pass, he can make the shot, and he’s going to make the free throws.”

   With 40 seconds left, before all of this pandemonium, the Dukes had a shot to retake the lead following a timeout, but freshman Andre Nation was rejected by Haggins. Nation may have been trying to do a little too much in that situation, but nonetheless his presence was felt on both sides of the ball. He finished with 12 points and an outstanding team high, five blocks. Haggins only had four, and he was second in the CAA in that category.

   “I just wanted to get a bucket and help my team out,” Nation admitted. His role in JMU’s 44-press style defense largely contributed to the win.

   Brady described tonight’s victory as another “huge step forward,” but it didn’t come cleanly.

   Like many of JMU’s come from behind victories, tonight was not pretty at times, but when the 40 minutes are up, no one ultimately cares how dirty you may come out.

   “I don’t know how cleanly the game was played,” Brady said. “There have been very few teams that have knocked us out and we’re not drawing on that experience.”

   JMU was just kicked around by the Blue Hens on the glass, which could have been expected by the Blue Hens award winning post presence. They outrebounded JMU 45-27, with 17 offensive boards that resulted in 23-second chance points for the Hens. This would have been the deciding factor in a loss for JMU.

   It didn’t help that redshirt senior Rayshawn Goins got into early foul trouble for the Dukes. Goins got hit with two early fouls in the first half and only played a total of 14 minutes. Freshman Taylor Bessick saw the majority of minutes in the five spot for Brady, which would have been for speed purposes. Sophomore Enoch Hood even got in on the action when the Dukes needed size, but in just five minutes, Hood racked up three personal fouls.

   While JMU was getting crushed on the boards, Delaware’s turnovers helped level the playing field. The Dukes didn’t capitalize on all of them, but scored 13 points off 16 Blue Hen turns.
   The best statistic of the night had to be on the defensive end. The Dukes quieted the CAA's leading scorer, Devon Saddler. Averaging 20 points/game, Saddler finished with a mere seven tonight on 3-14 shooting.

   Brady didn’t do any tweaking to Sunday’s starting five from the lineup he used seventeen hours prior on Saturday night. Moore, A.J. Davis, Nation, Alioune Diouf, and Goins. He’s used these five to start each of the four halves played in Richmond. One can imagine it won’t change tomorrow night either.

   Davis finished with team high 16 points to go along with four steals. He made yet another market on highlight reels with his second monstrous tip slam in as many days. Moore, his cousin also found him from one of their signature alley-oop plays as well. Tonight marked the seventh straight game that Davis has finished in double figures. He’s averaging over 21 points a game in the last seven. In a season that looked like it could have been a loss for Davis, he has managed to turn it around 360 degrees.

   So yet again, the Dukes fight for another day in Richmond. They will face Bill Coen’s Northeastern Huskies in the CAA championship game, nationally televised tomorrow evening at 7 p.m.

   “We’re going to have to play better tomorrow night if we’re going to be happy up here on this podium,” Brady said.

   So Devon, when was JMU’s last trip to the CAA championship game?

   “I’m just ready for tomorrow, I definitely don’t know,” Moore said Sunday night. “We definitely want to get this one tomorrow and bring it back to JMU.”

   In 1997 a six seeded JMU team lost to the one seed Old Dominion Monarchs in the championship game in this same building.

   Coach Brady, so just how big would a CAA championship win tomorrow be?

   “It would be monumental. It’s huge for JMU. This is a school with remarkable school spirit. This is a university that takes great pride in its athletics.”

   In the earlier game Sunday it looked like George Mason would walk away with an easy upset. Northeastern didn’t score their first bucket of the game until the 10:25 mark of the first half. Even worse, they were down by 24 at one point, but stormed back in the second half to stun Paul Hewitt’s Patriots.

   These two teams met just once this season, as they have for the past few seasons, but he game was quite memorable. JMU went in looking for the upset, but was denied when David Walker hit a tie-breaking jumper with just seconds remaining. A fade away three from A.J. Davis fell short and Nations put back to send it into overtime did not beat the clock.

   Moore described the loss as a, “bitter taste.” “We know it’s going to be a tough game and a great game, and we just cant’ wait to just get out there and play.”

“It’s a new game,” Nation added. Northeastern is making their first appearance in the CAA finals since joining the league in 2005.

   Moore and Davis will get another chapter to fill in tomorrow night in the championship. Whether it ends nicely like a Disney movie, or quite tragically like a horror film is still to be seen. One thing is for certain though. The James Madison Dukes men’s basketball team is just 40 solid minutes away from cutting down the nets and going to their first trip to the NCAA tournament since 1994.

   “We’re doing this for more than the 13 guys in the locker room,” Brady said. “We’re doing this for a lot of people that have been waiting for this game for a long time.”