By MONTE DUTTON Click here. Now, I’m kidding, okay? The last two times I’ve watched Clemson play basketball, the Tigers have come from hopelessly behind to losing barely. Against Louisville, if not for an unbelievable “no call,” they may well have won. Against the McNeese State Cowboys on Thursday, Clemson was way back. Yet the …
Tag: Monte Dutton
North Texas wins as Paladins cool in latter half
On the bright side, Eddrin Bronson didn't miss a shot (Furman photo). Click here. DENTON, Texas -- Furman played hard, as it did all season. North Texas played great defense, as was its reputation. In the second half, the Paladins’ shots stopped falling with the same frequency, and the result was a 75-64 victory by …
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Porter’s Bronze Derby tribute is a keeper
By MONTE DUTTON (Maudlin Pond Press) Click here. I have been remiss in overlooking Chip Porter’s significant book, which, in a way, isn’t a book at all. The Little Bronze Derby That Was! is a scrapbook that tells the remarkable story of the lost, much lamented football rivalry between Presbyterian and Newberry colleges, contested for …
Games getting farther apart
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. One aspect of sports – in most every one except NASCAR, where races are increasingly contrived – is that close games and matches are becoming rare.Once I was at a trade show in Pennsylvania and said to a favorite race driver, “A man’s got to drive like hell to lose …
Terriers get their shooting dialed in, 92-85
By MONTE DUTTON Cooper Bowser guards Corey Tripp (10) (Monte Dutton photos). Click here. ASHEVILLE, N.C. – It’s not the first time I’ve invoked the memory of the late Jim Beauchamp on such occasions, and it probably won’t be the last. I think of “Beech” (his name was pronounced “BEE-chum”) often because he was larger …
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Two tickets to Camelot left
By MONTE DUTTON Nick Anderson (7) maneuvers. Trey Bonham (2) pursues (Monte Dutton photos). Click here. ASHEVILLE, N.C. – It’s the time of basketball season that leads grown men to cry.March brings tears of joy and tears of sorrow. When Furman and Wofford play on Monday night for the Southern Conference championship, eyes from both …
All in for the Paladins thus far
By MONTE DUTTON And away they go (Monte Dutton photo). Click here. ASHEVILLE, N.C. – A college basketball tournament has much in common with a living organism. Mostly new sets of fans file in and out, the Harrah’s Cherokee Center forever breathing with new life.Sitting at my seat, often cracking wise with colleague John Hooper, …
Slow starts back home
By MONTE DUTTON Gardner-Webb coach Jeremy Luther took his medicine in Johnson City (Monte Dutton photo). Click here. Being away on my great basketball road trip spared me an inglorious period back home.It was sorrowful in Johnson City, Tenn., too. (I can’t say those three words without thinking of “Wagon Wheel.”) I was moved by …
Free throws were few and far between for Blue Hose
By MONTE DUTTON Kaleb Scott works the paint (Monte Dutton photos). Click here. JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. -- It wasn’t the shot selection. That was excellent. It was inaccuracy at the free-throw line that ran Presbyterian College’s Hose out of the Hercules Tires Big South Basketball Championships.Shooting was where the rubber met the road. Or didn’t. …
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Smith finds nothing but net at Wofford
By MONTE DUTTON The Terriers couldn't contain PJay Smith (Monte Dutton photos). Click here. A trip to Spartanburg is seldom easy for the Furman Paladins, whether it’s basketball, football or club rugby.As head men’s basketball coach Bob Richey said later, “We knew [Wofford wasn’t] going away.”The final 1.1 seconds of the Paladins’ 78-75 victory over …
Nightrider's Lament 