CSNbbs

[from Jan 24, 1993 JC Press]

[Nice big front-Sports page article with TWO lead articles, and a nice pic of Niblett driving around a defender.]

"Appy Can't Run From Dominating Bucs" - Kelly Hodge

Appalachian St. may be changing its ways, but some things never seem to change.
The Mountaineers unveiled their new run-and-gun approach to basketball Sat. and were promptly shot down again by East Tennessee State University. This time it was 98-79, the 11th straight Buc win in a series that dates back to 1928.
The Bucs had a simple message for their mountain rivals afterward: Like your style.
"We've always felt comfortable playing that style," said forward Jerry Pelphrey, who led all scorers with 25 points. "It was a fun game. Both teams like pushing the ball up the floor, the officials let us play. Anytime you're in that situation, you have to enjoy it -- especially here."

The victory before a Varsity Gym crowd of 6,823 upped ETSU's record to 10-4 overall, 6-1 in the SoCon. They hold a 1/2 game lead over UTC, which knocked off GSU on the road later in the day.
The teams will meet Wed. night in Chattanooga.
"Chattanooga is a good basketball team, said ETSU coach Alan LeForce. "They were rated No. 1, they're the team to beat. We'll have to go down there and play our tails off, play as well as we can."

LeForce would gladly take a carbon copy of Saturday's game.
The Bucs shot a season-high 56% from the field, including 12 of 24 from 3-point range. They outrebounded the Mountaineers 45-36 and held them to 38 percent shooting for the game.
When ASU erased an 18-point first-half lead, the Bucs simply tightened up the defense and roared away again. The Mountaineers scored 10 points in the last 10 minutes.

"The thing I'm most pleased about," said LeForce, "is we had the lead, we blew the lead, then we regained our composure and went out and won the ballgame."

The Bucs got a very composed 53 points and 13 assists from their guards.
Eric Palmer, just moved from the point to off-guard, matched his career high with 22 points and dished out seven assists. Jason Niblett had 17 points and six assists. Each hit a pair of 3-pointers.
And freshman Andy Pennington chipped in with 14 points in 19 minutes. He matched Pelphrey with four 3-pointers.

"We were just in the flow today," said Palmer, who made 9 of his 12 shots. We're so accustomed to this style of basketball, it gets us going. But we're also able to change gears, back it out and change the tempo of the game."

Billy Ross, ASU's high-scoring swingman, never found his shooting rhythm this day. He matched his season average with 24 points but had to jack up 31 shots to get it.

The muscular senior made only nine and was 3 of 13 from long range. He was held to a single field in the final 11 1/2 minutes.

"We wanted to make Ross run as much as we could with whoever he was guarding," said LeForce. "And we wanted to keep fresh people on him. Nine of 31, that's a pretty good job."
Ross was hounded most of the night by Trazel Silvers and Justin McClellan. The extra effort didn't take a noticeable toll on Silvers, who collected 12 points and a career-high 18 rebounds.

The only real damper for ETSU came seven minutes into the game when Tony Patterson's left knee buckled as he went up for a .....

[sorry, that's all I've got. It goes over to another page I don't have.
See second article upcoming.]

"Rivalry Maintains Intensity" - Doug Janz

It may be the most one-sided rivalry the Buccaneers have, but no matter how often they beat Appalachian St. it still looms as a big game.

East Tennessee State University made it 11 in a row over the Mountaineers, winning 98-79 Sat. afternoon. Once again the game was intense and so were the fans in Varsity Gymnasium, a place that seems to bring out the best in the Bucs.

"We never have any problem getting up to play here," said ETSU's Jerry Pelphrey, a senior who's never lost to App State. "It's a big rivalry for the fans and it's just a big game for us. It feels great to win again."

The temperature always rises a few degrees for the ETSU-ASU games in this gym, but it didn't appear to bother the Bucs. Pelphrey scored 25 to lead five ETSU players in double-figure scoring, while Trazel Silvers had 12 points and 18 rebounds.
For Silvers, a man who thrives on the crowd and even engages in some friendly jawing during the game, it's a way to step his game up a level.
"I love it because the crowd is on me," he said with a grin. "That pumps me up and makes me play that much harder. I hate a dead crowd.
"They were sayin' 'Your momma's this' and 'your momma's that'. They were saying 'Do you know what two plus two is?' and I said 'No, but multiply it by five and that's how much you're down.'"

The fans for both sides have always kept things interesting, and the players have been pushed to the limit, too. This time, though, there wasn't much on-court trash-talking and finger-pointing.
Except for a double technical foul on ETSU's Darell Jones and ASU's Chad McClendon for getting ready to face each other down -- the call had no effect on the game -- it was clean and well-played.

Afterward the App State players had nothing bad to say about the Bucs. Leading scorer Billy Ross, who looks like a bruiser but keeps an even demeanor and speaks softly, banged and bumped for 24 points and 10 rebounds but still suffered his 10th straight loss to the Bucs.
"We look forward to playing them," he said. "It's a great rivalry. I don't think the score always.....

[again, that's all I have - it goes to another page.....]


*** This is the kind of coverage and excitement we used to have here. TWO reporters (yes, it was a nearby game, but how long has it been since *that* happened?). More than the entire top half of the front page is nothing but ETSU basketball. Almost 7,000 in Boone. Those were the days.......

[Other stories beginning on the bottom of the front page were about Buffalo going for a win in their third attempt at the Super Bowl, UT, with Alan Houston, awaiting a visit from the Gators, and a story about how the members of Meadowview Golf Club were planning on building a new golf course to replace theirs, on which the Meadowview Convention Center was to be built.]

[Please excuse any typos in these articles, I've typed them out by hand.....]

Quote:Almost 7,000 in Boone. Those were the days.......

I was on an App website a few months ago and I read that the largest crowd to ever witness a basketball game in Boone was against ETSU during Mister's Senior year. They packed over 8,000 into Varsity Gym that day. I know we talk about how when Seth Curry was in the Socon every team had big crowds. Well they were even bigger when Mister was in the conference. Even Furman drew 6,000 + crowds when we came to town. Furman NEVER draws anywhere near that anymore, not even for Seth Curry.

It was always WAR in that old gym

Thanks for posting that. I had forgotten about some of those players... i.e.: Andy Pennington. I think he was that years version of Skylar McBee but not as athletic. Pennington unfortunately didn't live up to his billing...

It hurts my feelings that we couldn't get McBee in the fold. Same thing happened when Sonny Smith and BJ Johnson got Ralph Sampson to visit ETSU. The sales pitch was Larry Bird... Indiana State was nothin' till Bird showed up and they made the final four because of that one person. Sonny's pitch was that increased his value. Come to ETSU with our supporting cast and you can duplicate what Bird did. Of course it didn't work as Sampson went on to a boring career at Virginia.

Great line from Trazel Silvers....

They were saying 'Do you know what two plus two is?' and I said 'No, but multiply it by five and that's how much you're down.'"

There is no come back when your actions are louder than your words.

Quote:"They were sayin' 'Your momma's this' and 'your momma's that'. They were saying 'Do you know what two plus two is?' and I said 'No, but multiply it by five and that's how much you're down.'"

Must have been great

Yeah, I absolutely love Trazel's line, too. That was part of the reason I typed all that out........

Wasn't Pennington from somewhere down around Madisonville? Did he only play one year and then transfer?
I think the McBee comparison is apt, but I think he was as athletic as McBee. I thought he could have stood some more PT, too, but with that team, how do you take out Palmer and Niblett?

I miss playing Appy.

I mean the real Appy of course. The SoCon rival App State, not the alternate universe one we play now :(

Great line by Silvers.

Thanks for the memories poster. Those games in Boone were intense.

Boone's biggest mistake was building that new gym. The old one was a death trap.

(02-16-2010 11:16 PM)Goldfinger Wrote: [ -> ]Boone's biggest mistake was building that new gym. The old one was a death trap.

I like their new gym a lot. It's a nice place but I agree the old one was a true home court advantage and the new one, not so much. Bigger and nicer is not always better, which is why Duke should never even think about leaving Cameron Indoor Stadium.

I hate their new gym. It's like Western Carolina. It's Thompson Bowling chopped off at the ankles. That's why I want to see something much more original at ETSU.

Gold- if ASU doesn't build that new arena, ASU never goes to the NCAAs and the entire perception of Buzz Peterson's coaching talents is different.

(02-17-2010 09:42 AM)PittsburghBucs Wrote: [ -> ]Gold- if ASU doesn't build that new arena, ASU never goes to the NCAAs and the entire perception of Buzz Peterson's coaching talents is different.

That's pure speculation.

Andy Pennington transferred to Carson-Newman.

Look at Peterson's coaching career post-ASU. The new arena helped his cause.

Any basketball player being recruited by ASU, if they had the old gym, would have thought ASU was so football centric they were damning the hoops squads to that place. It may have been intimate (I remember having no room to put my chair back on press row), but it wasn't first class.

Besides, I want to get intimate with Hollywood starlettes, not basketball teams.

This is what makes ETSU basketball so frustrating. If ASU could make the NCAAs with a new arena, what (conceivably) could ETSU do?

Well, nothing with the current administration, but if and when competency is ever restored?