Skidmore ready to face DI Yale on ESPN+
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. >> At the collegiate basketball level coaches have to have many talents and skills, having a few friends along the way doesn’t hurt either.
It took some doing, but Skidmore College men’s basketball Coach Joe Burke was able to schedule just the third Division I contest for the Thoroughbreds – ever, a 7 p.m. match-up Tuesday at Yale University with the game being broadcast live on ESPN+.
“I’ve known James Jones at Yale for years and we had a conversation and mentioned that he needed a Division III game and he said ‘ I’m not playing you!’,” Joe Burke said prior to making the trip to New Haven Monday afternoon. “I told him I would help him, but I really need a game. At the end of the day he couldn’t find a good match-up and I said I really needed a game and this week worked.”
Skidmore played Cornell University on two separate occasions in a Division I versus Division III match-up in 1997 and 2000.
The drought has not been due to a lack of effort on Burke’s part the past nine years.
“It’s been hard for me to get
games because having done scheduling at that level, and with all due respect to a lot of the Division III schools, when you’re a Division I school you are trying to play a program that is not so good if you are playing a Division III game,” Burke said. “You are almost trying to guarantee a win or ‘ buy yourself a game’ as they say.
“We’ve been a good program so it has been hard for us to get Division I games.”
Skidmore is currently 5- 0 in the Liberty League, 7- 3 overall and is coming off a pair of wins against RPI (70- 69 on Friday) and Union (90-83 on Saturday). Meanwhile the Bulldogs are on a five-game winning streak and had key wins over Cal in the PAC-12 and Miami in the ACC.
Skidmore is not short on talent or size.
The Thoroughbreds are led by sophomore guard Norah Meren who is averaging 22.8 points per game, 16th nationally and senior guard Edvinas Rupkus, Skidmore’s all- time leading scorer and NABC All-American last year who is averaging 17.3 points per game, ranked 30th nationally.
“They are really athletic and long and they play fast,” Burke said. “You can’t give them extra possessions, it’s a game where we have to take care of the ball. We have to make really good decisions because the game can get away from you quick with their ability to score.
“I like the match- up from a size standpoint because if there is one thing I’ll say about my team and we’ve got a way to go, we’re kind of built like a Division I team with our size so we we’re not undersized by any stretch, but they are a little more athletic across the board and they’ve got some really good players.”
Burke is also very familiar with the Yale coaching staff, especially one of its newest additions.
“Ironically we had that game scheduled and then two to three months later (James Jones) called me and had an assistant spot open and that’s where Rey Crossman went, picking up the basketball operations spot there,” Burke said.
Crossman was a Burke assistant from 2015 to 2018, earning two trips to the Division III tournament, a Liberty League title in 201516 and also the recipient of the Liberty League Coaching Staff of the Year honors in 2016 and 2017.
“I don’t think there is an intimidation factor, but I think there is an excitement level for our guys, just to say we’re a good basket- ball team, Division III, Division I, Ivy League, Liberty League, there are a lot of parallels,” Burke said. “They may be considered a notch above us, and they are, but I think our guys have a little bit of an edge about us that is like we’re out to prove something which is fun.
“I just think my guys getting that experience and I told him that they want to roll anyone anyway and they want to be challenged. We have good enough talent, we’ll go up there and compete and we’ll give you all we got and see what happens.”