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November 15, 2009

Cagers ready for fresh start



PLATTSBURGH — Chris Ruiz was sleeping on the bus when he found out the bad news.

An hour before, Ruiz helped the Plattsburgh State men's basketball team come back from a double-digit deficit to win its last game and stay in the playoff hunt.

But the last seed was taken by Brockport, who upset Geneseo while the Cardinals waited to hear an outcome.

That meant Tom Curle's Cardinals missed the playoffs for the first time in his six seasons at the helm.

It meant the Cardinals weren't able to defend three straight SUNYAC tournament titles.

Ruiz awoke to the disappointing news. The team, he said, didn't disprove the detractors who doubted the Cardinals because they lost many standout players.

But 2009-10 is a new season, a fresh start.

"This is a redemption year for us; we're trying to get back to our winning ways and show how great of a coach Coach Curle is," Ruiz said.

The Cardinals open their season at home at 1 p.m. today at Memorial Hall against Lyndon State, a nonconference opponent.

Plattsburgh State returns ten players from last year's team that went 8-16 overall and 6-10 in conference play. That was also a first for Curle — a losing record with the Cardinals.

Curle said this season will offer insight as to why the Cardinals suffered through a rough 2008-09 campaign. Was it youth and inexperience caused by losing five senior starters, or was it something else?

"I don't know yet," Curle said. "But I think that this season will provide the answers to that. If it was purely youth, we will have a better season this year.

"If it was that players get tight at the end of games, then we will know that, too. I think that how we finish games and so forth this year will provide the answer to why we had the kind of season we had last year."

While a majority of the roster returns, including leading scorer and First-Team All-SUNYAC guard Ruiz, the Cardinals did lose size with the departures of forwards Brad Mader (6-foot-8) and Brian Gadzinski (6-foot-9).

Mader was a 19-game starter and, despite missing time and having a slow recovery because of an illness, he still finished as the team's third-leading scorer. The Cardinals also lost Shawn Gutzman (6-foot-3), the only senior on last year's squad, who had the ability to guard multiple positions.

The new players don't match that size. Instead, the Cardinals roster has a number of guards right around six feet.

Steve Thomas (6-foot-2) and Carl Munnerlyn (5-foot-10) are two new guards expected to make contributions early on for the Cardinals.

"Losing Mader and bringing in those two, it kind of brings us to a different style of play at times in terms of a little bit more isolation, one-on-one type things, a little bit more wide open at times," Curle said.

Curle has options as to what five he has on the court — whether it be a larger group or a quicker, guard-heavy lineup.

The Cardinals have an experienced, if undersized, collection of forwards. Errol Daniyan, the team's leading rebounder and one of its top athletes, will likely start. R.J. Ponesse (6-foot-9) remains one of the larger players in the conference, but foul trouble — he led the team in personal fouls — limited him to an average of 14.7 minutes per game.

The team's only seniors, Farris Thomas and Danny Tangney, will take on more forward responsibilities.

"What we do with our forwards, offensively, might be a little bit different," Curle said. "Defensively, I fully expect Farris and Danny to guard pretty much anybody."

Tangney, who began last season as a starter and had 10 throughout the year, said he doesn't think the lack of size will hurt the Cardinals.

"We're going to have to adjust to that," he said. "I don't think size is going to be our problem. I think it's going to be an advantage — I think we're going to be quicker than a lot of teams."

Ketema Brooks came in as a highly-regarded freshman point guard last year and was the only player to start every game. He showed a lot of improvement as the season went on and finished strong, ending up third in the SUNYAC in assists.

Returners Josh Bruno, Tim Havens, Junghoon Roh and Joe McCarthy add depth at the guard position.

Also new to the team are Ryan Poirier and Virgilio Torres, a walk-on.

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