Cornell Daily Sun
March 20, 2009
BOISE, Idaho – The Red will look to etch its name in March Madness lore today later on this afternoon as it takes on No. 3 seed Missouri in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. The Red earned a 14-seed after winning the Ivy League's automatic bid while Missouri stands as one of the top teams in the nation after winning the Big 12 conference tournament.
The Red will come into the game featuring some of the best players in the Ivy League: All-Ivy first team junior members Ryan Wittman and Louis Dale and Defensive Player of the Year, junior Jeff Foote. The Tigers players have more national recognition starring senior DeMarre Carroll, who was All-Big 12 first team performer. The Red will also have its hands full with junior J.T. Tiller was named co-Defensive Player of the Year in the Big 12. Tiller is a just another cog in Missouri coach Mike Anderson's full court pressure defense. The Red has faced tough pressure in its preseason schedule with teams like Minnesota and Syracuse, but no other defense can compare to Anderson's version of the “40 Fastest Minutes of Basketball.”
“I think just playing that type of talent has prepared the guys to face Mizzou,” Gore said. “We haven't actually played or probably seen a pressure like they're going to bring, but that's pretty hard to simulate and I think we have done the best we could in practice and with our preseason schedule.”
Ever since earning its NCAA bid, head coach Donahue has made sure the Red practiced against the press, often times using six or seven people on the “grey squad” to simulate the pressure. Thanks to last year's trip to the NCAAs, the Red enter this year's tournament with a chip on its shoulder. The Red lost to Stanford — which lost two players to the NBA draft — last year by double digits and will look to redeem its image on the national scale.
“Obviously experience is going to help us,” Wittman said. “I think last year we might have got caught up a little bit in that. We heard a lot about how it was the first time Cornell had been to the tournament in 20 years, I think. This year I think we're a little more focused.”
“This year we were very excited, but it's more like this job's not done. Let's go to work,” Donahue said. “I think that that taste in your mouth after you are so disappointed, not just that Stanford beat us but we didn't play well. We were very disappointed in our performance. I think for our team's sake and our fan's sake and our alumni's sake and our league sake we want to prove that there is good basketball in the Ivy League level and just really show better than we did last year.”
Unlike the Red, the NCAA isn't familiar territory of recent memory for the Tigers. The No. 3 seed hasn't been to the tournament since 2003, which could be an advantage for Cornell.
“Just for our first time experience we're definitely going to have some butterflies,” Tiller said. “Just because this is a place we haven't been before. We're going to have that nervousness. That nervous energy. We're going to get rid of that very quickly.”
After watching tape, the Tigers found out what many Cornell fans knew already — the Red can shoot the rock. Cornell enters the tournaments as the third best 3-point shooting team in the field of 65 and will look to use its shooting talents to pull off the upset. The Tigers enter the tournament with goals of a national championship and will ride its defense in hopes of eliminating Cornell and the rest of its probably opponents.
“I don't too much worry about the opponent,” said forward Leo Lyons. “I think if we do the right things such as our defense, we're doing it the right way, we can compete with anybody in the country.”
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