At the conclusion of the annual Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference (MAAC) postseason awards banquet, Fairfield head coach Ed Cooley embraced his counterpart from Manhattan, Barry Rohrssen, a sign of solidarity between two coaches that have experienced the trials and troubles of the regular-season.
Consider the embrace an anomaly of sorts here in Albany.
Now the real works begins.
On Saturday afternoon, the Stags challenge the Jaspers in the quarterfinals of the MAAC Championships, the second time in eight days that the two teams will play one another. The two teams split the season-series.
‘I think it is luck of the draw a little bit,’ Cooley said. ‘Both teams are familiar with each other. I’m just glad we’re not playing Loyola. I’m pretty sure Manhattan is happy to play us and we’re happy to play them, and that’s reality.
‘If we do some little things, hopefully we’ll be fortune,’ Cooley said.
Fairfield has yet to win a game in the MAAC Championships in Cooley’s tenure, losing to Loyola (Md.) in both seasons. The Stags have also lost three consecutive tournament games with Albany as the host city.
Ironically, the team’s most recent tournament win in the Capital Region came at Manhattan’s expense, a 67-50 victory in the 1999-2000 MAAC Championships.
This season, given the team’s improbable string of hard luck, the Stags relish the idea of a new beginning and a fresh start.
‘It’s the old cliché, but everyone is even going up,’ Cooley said. ‘We had to try to put (the loss to Rider) behind us quick and look forward to the MAAC Tournament.’
As for the matchup against Manhattan, the Stags edged the Jaspers, 56-55, on Feb. 27 at the Arena at Harbor Yard in the team’s final home game of the season. In that game, Mike Evanovich totaled a double-double; the senior forward scored 17 and added a season-high 14 rebounds. Fellow senior Herbie Allen scored 13 points in the victory.
The team’s previous meeting, however, lives in infamy in the Fairfield season. Following a 65-60 setback to the Jaspers in Riverdale, senior guard Jon Han and assistant coach Brian Blaney engaged in a locker room argument following the loss. Ultimately, Han opted to leave the team and forego the rest of his senior season, citing personal reasons.
For now, Cooley focuses on the present, and the obvious maturation of his new ‘- and very different ‘- lineup.
‘Well, it’s the only lineup I’ve got,’ Cooley said. ‘I think our guys have done a really good job, I’ve been saying it now for a month. When you look at all the adversity, it’s helped us all grow in a lot of ways, not just from a basketball perspective but from a life perspective.’
Cooley was especially pleased with the progress the team showed in the season-finale against Rider. Despite a 73-69 loss, the head coach cited the team’s grit in the game’s final minutes ‘- which included a 9-0 run that began at the 4:25 mark – and the contributions of sophomore point guard Lyndon Jordan and freshman guard Sean Crawford.
‘This team is all about taking advantage of opportunity when it is given, and today (against Rider) was another good example to grow from,’ Cooley said. ‘We may be on the losing end, but there were a lot of winning battles in this game.’
The Stags echoed Cooley’s newfound approach.
‘I’m going to approach it like these last five or six games our team has played,’ senior guard Herbie Allen said. ‘We are going to come out and play hard and play forty minutes a game.’
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