Top of the NESCAC

Jeremy is Berning: Goals That Really Count

I can't tell you that I solved their problems. I don't think that I changed their lives. I'm not even sure that they'd remember me now. I'm positive that I didn't cure AIDS. I'll tell you what though: for an hour every week those kids forgot about their lives. They forgot about the smell of the power plant, of the trash, of the mud. They forgot about walking home in big groups with heads bowed in an effort to draw as little attention as possible. They forgot about their mother, their father, their cousin, who had died of AIDS.

Jeremy is Berning: Better than the Weather

If you think baseball is a boring three-plus-hour game where fat steroid-users parade around with big muscles, big heads, and "bacne," you're right. And you're missing the point. Sure, the games are long and the pants are tight. The muscles may be more artificial than the hot dog meat and the grass not as green as the players' bank accounts. The fans may be more interested in perfecting The Wave and the tickets might cost more than a 50 percent share in GM. But it's baseball, and it's back.

Jeremy is Berning

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

Jeremy Bernfeld

Columnist

March 27, 2009

A regular season NESCAC championship? Yawn.

A league title? Yes ma'am. The NCAA tournament for the 10th straight year? You bet. One of the top 25 teams in the country? Check.

If I don't have your attention yet, I'm sorry to disappoint, but you've stumbled on the Orient's sports column. There's not much else the Bowdoin Women's Basketball Team can do.

March: the month of mud, spring break and basketball. But in Brunswick, the Madness of March is over and we're left with just the mud and the all-too-distant-and-hazy memories of vacations in the sun.

Sure, "The Tourney" still rages on around the country. Brackets are still poised to be made or busted and that company pool prize still seems within reach. We've seen upsets and blow-outs, tears and fist-pumps, and we've seen more than a few low-seeded teams sweat.

But March Madness came home to Brunswick this year, and has every year for the past 10 seasons. It might be getting warmer outside, but March is still kind to Polar Bears.

Bowdoin athletes have a lot on their plates, and let's face it, they put the student in student-athlete. So it's no surprise that there are some teams on campus that don't routinely make the NESCAC tournament.

The women's basketball team hasn't just made the NESCAC tournament; they have won it every year but one since its inception. If you could hit eight-of-nine shots from three-point range, you'd have a better shot than Ray Allen. If you've won eight-of-nine league titles, you're on the Bowdoin Women's Basketball Team.

This year's team didn't disappoint. The Polar Bears won their final seven regular season games to clinch the NESCAC regular season title at 8-1 in league play and 21-4 on the year. Then, storming past Williams, Trinity, and Amherst, the team won the program's eighth NESCAC championship and notched another national tournament selection.

Tragically, Muhlenberg cut the season short after only one NCAA Tournament victory, over Castleton State. It says something about a program when one tournament victory isn't enough. Not NESCAC tournament, but NCAA Tournament.

And the team's honor roll doesn't end there. Senior tri-captain Maria Noucas garnered first team all-league honors and first-year Jill Henrikson was named NESCAC Rookie of the Year. Not to be outdone, first-year head coach Adrienne Shibles nabbed New England Coach of the Year honors, too.

After the final buzzer sounded in the game against Muhlenberg, the women's basketball team's season may have been over, but it won't be forgotten. It was a great season, there's no doubt about that, but one can't shake the feeling that the Polar Bears should have played just a few more games in March.

You might enjoy watching Rick Pitino's Lousiville squad shoot threes or Jim Boeheim's Syracuse squad play lockdown D. I'll take Shibles' Polar Bears any day, because I like champions.

Incidentally, I'll also take them over Memphis, who will win this year's Big Dance. For the record.

On and off the court, these Polar Bears represent us with skill, dignity, and class. It's been a pleasure watching them as a fan and as a journalist.

And, oh yeah, they've been good. Real good. This year's senior class, the triple threat of Noucas, Alexa Kaubris, and Jill Anelauskas have gone an incredible 99-19 over their time here in Brunswick.

Unfortunately, the gym is quiet these days. The air is too heavy and the squeak of the floor is too loud. The bleachers are empty and the scoreboard has long been snuffed-out.

All that's left are the team's championship banners. And that's not bad.

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