columbia

Columbia’s 2016-17 best-case scenario

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Columbia’s run to the CIT title, including a semifinal win over NJIT and Jim Engles, felt like catharsis for a class that had seen its fair share of ups and downs.

Now it’s November and the leaders behind that run are gone: Kyle Smith to San Francisco, Maodo Lo and Alex Rosenberg to overseas contracts, Grant Mullins to Cal, and Isaac Cohen to the working world. So if everyone hits their 99th percentile performance in Morningside Heights this season, what can we expect? A group whose most experienced players are bigs and a coach who promises to run at a breakneck pace (at least compared to Kyle Smith’s) is a recipe for either the greatest incarnation of Seven Seconds or Less ever, or at least the most hilarious one. We do not know what Columbia’s lineup will look like. We do not know which freshmen will be able to contribute starting Friday at Stony Brook. What we do know is if everything goes according to plan, Columbia is going to win the Ivy title in the most ridiculous way possible.

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Columbia Season Preview – Watermarks and Engles

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What happened last year (25-10, 10-4): Columbia was expected to vie for last year’s Ivy title with Yale and Princeton, but an overtime loss at home to Princeton midseason relegated Columbia to a lower tier within the conference and a CIT appearance. Columbia made the most of the CIT, though, winning the tournament and sending off the four that roared – Isaac Cohen, Maodo Lo, Grant Mullins and Alex Rosenberg as champions. Then Kyle Smith subsequently left to coach at San Francisco, and Jim Engles from NJIT was tapped to succeed him.

What’s new: With the four that roared gone, senior forward Luke Petrasek will likely be asked to shoulder much more of the offensive burden than he did a year ago, but more on that later.

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Q&A interview with Columbia coach Jim Engles

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Jim Engles comes back to Columbia to helm the program after five years as an assistant there from 2003-08. (USA Today Sports)
Jim Engles has come back to Columbia to helm the program after five years as an assistant there from 2003 to 2008. (USA Today Sports)

IHO’s Sam Tydings caught up with first-year Columbia head coach Jim Engles, who took over the Lions’ program in April after eight years as head coach at NJIT, ironically after Columbia defeated NJIT en route to the 2016 CIT title. Engles discussed 2016-17 team leaders, what pace he wants the Lions to play at and why he’s not talking about winning with his players at the moment:

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Alex Rosenberg joins Israeli Premier League

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(Ike McLaughlin/Columbia University)
(Ike McLaughlin/Columbia University)

Former Columbia forward Alex Rosenberg has signed a two-year deal to play professionally for Maccabi Kiryat Gat of the Israeli Basketball Premier League, Columbia Athletics stated Wednesday.

Rosenberg graduated in May after finishing sixth in school history with 1,430 points and his 478 free throws ranked second in Lions history as well.

Makai Mason joins Maodo Lo on German national team

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Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv reported Friday (and our own Richard Kent confirmed) that Yale junior guard Makai Mason will play with the German national team for the next two months and then in the World Games 2017, joining Columbia 2016 graduate (and fellow All-Ivy first-teamer) Maodo Lo.

Lo has played for the German national team for the past two years and remains an “intriguing prospect from an NBA standpoint” on the Philadelphia 76ers’ Summer League roster per The Sixer Sense.

Maodo Lo, Shonn Miller to join NBA Summer League

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Maodo Lo, Columbia’s all-time leader in three-pointers, and former Cornell standout Shonn Miller is headed for the NBA Summer League.

The 2016 Columbia graduate will join the Philadelphia 76ers’ Summer League teams in Utah and Las Vegas in July, as reported by ESPN’s Fran Fraschilla.

Miller, who used his final year of eligibility at UConn last season after four years in Ithaca, has agreed to a Summer League deal with the Utah Jazz, as reported by Bleacher Report’s David Pick.

The Utah Summer League takes place from July 4-7 in Salt Lake City, while the Las Vegas Summer League runs from July 8-18. Both events will air on NBA TV.

Columbia legend Jim McMillian dies at 68

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Jim McMillian, one of the greatest men’s basketball players in Ivy League history, died Monday at 68. (Big Gaff Sports)

Jim McMillian, one of the most celebrated players in Columbia and Ivy League basketball history, died Monday at 68.

The Los Angeles Times reported McMillian died from heart failure complications at a hospital in Winston-Salem, N.C. after being in failing health in recent months.

McMillian led Columbia to a No. 6 national ranking and the program’s last Ivy championship to date in 1968 and a No. 14 national ranking in 1969. In 1970, McMillian made his third consecutive All-America team, his third consecutive All-Ivy team, and won his third consecutive Haggerty Award for the best New York City college basketball player.

Columbia went 63-14 during McMillian’s three years as a varsity Lion, and the program’s ’68 league title was due to his 37 points on 22 shots in the team’s 92-74 Ivy playoff win over Princeton.

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Grant Mullins to transfer to Cal

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Grant Mullins will trade sunrises over the Atlantic for sunsets over the Pacific.

The point guard from Burlington, Ontario will play his fourth season of college basketball as a graduate transfer at Cal, ESPN’s Jeff Borzello reported Wednesday.

Concussion symptoms, stemming from an injury suffered in a game at Princeton in February 2014, caused Mullins to miss the entire 2014-15 campaign. The Ivy League does not generally permit medical redshirts, so Mullins’s final year of eligibility will be played in Berkeley.

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On The Vine Special: Jim Engles Interview

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Introduced one week ago as the 23rd coach in Columbia history, Jim Engles has a lot on his plate: hiring a staff, meeting new players, replacing a legendary senior class… and finding decent cell phone service in Levien Gymnasium.

Once we switched to a land line, I spoke with Coach Engles in a wide-ranging interview for this special episode of On The Vine. Among the news that will interest Lions fans: Kyle Smith’s entire 2016 recruiting class has committed to being at Columbia next year, Jesse Agel is definitely coming on board as an assistant coach, and one of Engles’ goals for next year’s team is making the Ivy League Tournament.

One moment that stood out to me came from near the end of the interview (a full transcript of which is available below the audio file). I asked Engles to speak directly to Columbia fans, and here’s part of what he said:

I watched the championship game on TV, and I saw how the crowd reacted, and I saw the gym packed. Those are moments for these people, because they want to see those moments. They want to win a championship. And that’s exactly how I envision this. That’s what I want to do. I really want to win for all those people who’ve been with Columbia for such a long time, and have been fans through the good times and the bad times.

Many thanks to Coach Engles for coming on the show, Columbia Athletics for making him available, and Miles Johnson and Sam Tydings for contributing questions.

Here’s the full transcript of the interview. Any errors of transcription are mine alone.

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Ivy 60 for 60: Armond Hill

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Armond Hill helped lead Princeton to the 1975 NIT Championship.
Armond Hill helped lead Princeton to its first NCAA Tournament appearance in seven years in 1976. (Princeton Alumni Weekly)

Following our countdown of the top 10 moments in each Ivy school’s men’s basketball history this summer, Ivy Hoops Online is delighted to continue celebrating the 60th anniversary of modern Ivy League basketball by honoring the top 60 players in Ivy hoops history (in no particular order). For the next entry in our Ivy 60 for 60 series, we focus on Armond Hill, one of the greatest players in Princeton basketball history…

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