Sports

Coverage of Hoya sports.



Sports

Outside looking in

When Georgetown kicks off its Big East Tournament run and takes the floor at Madison Square Garden this afternoon, there will be one nagging, unspoken thought in the minds of Hoya fans everywhere: If only Octavius Spann’s mohawk were still around to laud during televised timeouts…

Sports

Welcome to the Major League:

In a cross-town pairing relocated nearly a thousand miles to the south, Georgetown played an exhibition game against the Washington Nationals at Space Coast Park in Viera, Fla. The Hoyas lost the contest 15-0 in the first action of Spring Training for the Nationals, who compete in Florida’s Grapefruit League. And while it may have been a walk in the park for the likes of Dmitri Young, Ronnie Belliard, Austin Kearns and Ryan Zimmerman, it was an important litmus test for a Georgetown team poised to make great strides in 2008. The game was the Hoyas’ first taste of baseball’s highest level since 1901, when they last competed against a major league franchise.

Sports

Taming the Wildcats

The Big East Tournament, like any other bracket-based affair, is designed to give the top seed the easiest road to victory—a right that team has presumably earned throughout the season. This might have been difficult to stomach for Hoya fans when the conference tournament bracket was finalized earlier this week. Top-seeded Georgetown (25-4, 15-3 BE) would face the winner of the 8/9 game between the Syracuse Orange (19-13, 9-9 BE) and the Villanova Wildcats (20-11, 9-9 BE). Both teams step up their game against longtime conference rival Georgetown, and the Orange had already defeated the Hoyas at the Carrier Dome earlier in the season.

Sports

Finding a future in football

For seniors who may be unsure about their plans after graduation, the question always lingers. It echoes from the tonsils of elderly family members and scarcely-seen acquaintances alike: “So what are you doing next year?”

Sports

Court troubles

I haven’t been able to stand watching Georgetown play basketball lately. My roommates and I frequently curse at the television, and no player has been safe from our lashings. Even JTIII has been the recipient of a few unkind words. Every time I watch the highlights of top teams like UNC, Texas, Kansas and UCLA, I can’t help but think how scared I’d be to watch Georgetown play any team in the current top seven. It’s not that Georgetown can’t beat these teams, but with the way they are playing right now the Hoyas would get smacked, straight-up. Don’t let the recent blowout of Cincy fool you. If they want to play in April, the Hoyas have some things to fix, and quick.

Sports

What Rocks

After ending the Hoyas’ eight-year medal drought in the Big East Championships and setting four Georgetown swimming records, junior Goran Bistric was surprisingly humble.

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The Sports Sermon

With warmer weather rolling around, spring sports are gearing up for their seasons. In particular, baseball is taking advantage of the shift to green grass and sun, both off campus and on. Spring training has begun and teams are counting down to opening day.

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Hoyas stop the Red Storm

Georgetown (23-4, 13-3 BE) faced an unexpected handful in the St. John’s Red Storm (10-17, 4-11 BE) last night. The Hoyas couldn’t repeat the 32-point rout they enjoyed earlier this year at Madison Square Garden, but walked out with an important 64-52 victory.

Sports

Hoyas drop Louisville for Big East regular season crown

None of the 19,000 fans piled into the Verizon Center on Saturday could hold the Big East regular season championship trophy higher than seven-foot senior Roy Hibbert. At his side, fellow seniors Jonathan Wallace, Patrick Ewing Jr. and Tyler Crawford did their best, each taking his turn displaying the trophy for the Hoya faithful. These four, honored before the game during the Senior Day celebration, are part of the first ever Georgetown team to win back-to-back Big East regular season titles after the 11th-ranked Hoyas (25-4, 15-3 BE) defeated the Louisville Cardinals (24-7, 14-4 BE), 55-52.

Sports

The Sports Sermon

Although the New Year’s resolution influx of Yates visitors has subsided, a new motivation is pushing numbers up at the gym. With spring break a week away and warm weather in mind, if not in sight, more people are trying to tone up what they let go during the winter months.

Sports

Hoya Hockey

While some Georgetown students may know the mall in Ballston, Virginia solely as the unofficial chain-restaurant capital of the world (in all seriousness, the food court is amazing), others come for the breakneck speed and devastating hits. I’m talking about action on the mall’s eighth and top floor. Here, in the Kettler Capitals Iceplex, Georgetown’s Club Ice Hockey team does battle.

Sports

Hoyas can’t slide by DePaul

The Hoya women’s basketball team did not come out strong against the DePaul Blue Demons. In the early minutes DePaul shot at a 69.2 percent clip, while the Hoyas managed to turn the ball over seven times, resulting in an early 25-8 Demon lead.

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Shooting guns

Everyone knows there’s one primal, raucous, smoking-hot urge that every young adult yearns to satisfy—even at Georgetown, Jesuit institution that it is. It’s raw, it’s pulse-pounding and on President’s Day, along with five open-minded friends, I finally satisfied this visceral desire for the first time. I shot a gun.

Sports

Going Bearcat hunting

Cincinnati basketball is less than three years removed from the ultra-intimidating, uber-athletic Bobby Huggins era. Since the current West Virginia coach’s forced resignation in 2005, the Bearcats have stepped out of the Conference USA stratosphere and into the Big East basement. The once-feared Bearcats have looked more like kittens in their first three seasons in the conference, and the Cincinnati sideline that was once stalked by the imposing Huggins is now occupied by the diminutive Mick Cronin.

Sports

What Rocks

Last weekend, the Georgetown softball team (3-7) traveled to Statesboro, Ga for the Georgia Southern Invitational tournament. While there, freshman Aimee Moffat hit the Hoyas’ first homerun of the season—a two-run homerun—in the bottom of the 7th inning during a Friday game against Drexel. Her two RBIs were the only Hoya runs in their 4-2 loss to the Dragons.

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Settling scores up north

When asked about the Georgetown/Syracuse rivalry, senior center Roy Hibbert recalled a story that former coach John Thompson, Jr. told him about its roots: in 1980, the Hoyas defeated the Orange to snap a 57-game home winning streak in the last ever game at Syracuse’s Manley Field House. Now, 28 years later, the rivalry is “part of the fabric of the Big East,” according to current coach John Thompson III.

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Fast Break

The Georgetown women’s basketball team came into their game against second ranked nationally Connecticut on a two game winning streak. The first win being over No. 22 Syracuse—the Hoyas’ first win over a ranked opponent in over four years. This momentum wasn’t enough to give the Hoyas another victory over a ranked team. Despite a hard fought first half, Georgetown was unable to contain the offensive barrage of the Huskies, falling 80-48.

Sports

Bleeds of glory

A bloody trail twisted from one end of the rink to the visiting bench in the Buffalo Sabers’ HSBC Arena on Sunday night. But this macabre remnant was not nearly as disturbing as the sight of a dazed Richard Zednik leaning heavily on a teammate and clutching at his neck, which had just been cut open by the errant skate of another teammate, Ollie Jokinen. For the fans present, and even for those who watched in horror at the slow-motion replays that followed, it was one of the most terrifying sports accidents in recent memory. But for a recent Georgetown grad, Jokinen’s skate-blade may have sliced a little too close to home.

Sports

Hoyas vs. Cardinals

In her fourth season as head women’s basketball coach, Terri Williams-Flournoy has made some giant strides with the program overshadowed by the Georgetown men’s basketball team. Williams-Flournoy led the team to a 10-3 record in the non-conference season, including winning streaks of five and three games. With one of the best defenses in the Big East, the Hoyas have beaten a ranked Syracuse team, lost by a mere 10 points to national powerhouse Rutgers and, despite a 3-7 Big East record, have been a thorn in the side of many of the league’s leaders.

Sports

What Rocks

Make no mistakes; Brendan Cannon is a consistent offensive powerhouse for the preseason fourth-ranked Georgetown men’s lacrosse team. Last year he led the team in goals, assists and points, and the coaches of the East Coast Athletic Conference voted him the favorite to win the conference’s Offensive Player of the Year award.