The Convo is a different beast once you get 8,000 in the building. I believe the Convo with 8,000 people feels more big time than Stroh with 4,000. That said, it is too big and Stroh is too small. 10,000 would be a good capacity for us. I'm not a fan of tarps or curtains, but we used to keep the outer ring of lights off which would darken the upper levels and make the place feel more intimate, especially for those weeknight games.

I kind of wish we didn't have as big of a lead at halftime. The team came out tight on offense to start the second half. I don't think they were prepared for BG's approach to starting the half, but you had to know it was coming. I thought Boals should have called timeout after the first dunk that brought the score to 39-28. Nip that momentum in the bud. Instead we waited until it was 39-35.

Anything can happen in March, but I will be shocked if anyone knocks off Akron or BG before the MAC final. I've watched all of our games and a small handful of other MAC games. Akron appears the most talented and BG appears to be the most mentally tough. There's a huge gap between those two and the middle of the pack.

Focusing on the positive - I was thrilled to see the team come off the CMU win with their best half of basketball all season. It’s great to see them use that leverage, especially on the road. That’s the beginnings of a winning culture! We all knew BG would make a run. Kudos to our kids for getting the lead back up to 7. There were so many chances to separate and win, despite being short Jordy and McDay. This team is so close to figuring it out. No doubt about it, this loss is going to sting, All the same, I am anxious to see how they react on Tuesday. There is still a lot of basketball yet to play! Go Cats!

If you need a scapegoat for this loss, I volunteer. When Ben Roderick stepped to the line, I confidentially told my wife, "He's a good foul shooter. He swishes nearly everyone. Hardly ever even hits iron." It was a. do-it-yourself, announcer jink, from the home bleachers.

One sign of improvement I've noticed is that they're not making passes to nobody. Even early in the MAC season there would be two or more times per game where the player with the ball tossed it to where he expected somebody to be but nobody was there. It would wind up in the bench or up in the crowd. Haven't seen that for the last five or six games. Preston almost did it early yesterday when he apparently mistook a ref for a teammate (a drawback of the black unis). Communication is improving and they're getting to be on the same page.

I disagree that it is a "different beast" simply by having 8,000 in there as it would still mean about 40% of the arena has empty seats. Meaning, you're still playing in front of a nearly half-empty arena even with an exceptional crowd for a MAC school.

A good example that stands out to me about the Convo was the Virginia game. Some UVa friends of mine made the road trip from Charlottesville to Athens for the UVa-OU game. At tip-off, they kept commenting on how dead and empty the Convo was. Keep in mind, the attendance was about 7,500 that night in a game Ohio ended up actually winning. Both teams were having so-so season, which took some of the luster off having an ACC school visiting Athens, and it was a different UVa program than the one they've developed into in recent years. But what was interesting about their comments to me was, UVa's home arena at the time was University Hall, which seated about 8,500. So the 7,500 in the Convo that day would have nearly had UVa's arena filled. But I agreed with them, the Convo still had an empty-ish feel to it. That said, I have been in the filled Convo for a select few games where it did feel big time. But that's not the norm whatsoever.

Ball State falls into the same type of category as Ohio does as MAC schools with the two biggest arenas, yet, both suffer from the cavernous feel even with good crowds in them. Ball State's arena at least feels and looks a little more like an athletic venue to me compared to the Convo. The Convo looks and feels a little more like what it's actually named, a convocation center, than say Worthen Arena. I've never liked that there are three Convocations Centers in the MAC (OU, NIU and EMU) as each has the look and feel of exactly that over a basketball arena in some ways (mainly the capacity).

The two venues that suffer the worst, by far, are NIU and EMU. They have the 3rd and 4th largest venues in the MAC, respectively, and they are often horribly empty and are the two worst examples of empty arenas in the MAC. Miami's is odd because it has the feel of basketball being played in a non-arena all together. Even by not counting the empty seats behind curtains, the empty space is still obvious that it's there. I've never minded it that much, probably because of the success Ohio has had in it. I do like they way they turn off the lights above the seating and that they replaced those awful greenish, vomit colored seats.

IMO, Toledo and Buffalo have some of the best combinations of capacity/attendance/fits in the MAC. Their venues top out at capacity figures that aren't too big but also aren't too small and they usually have crowds that feed into that. To me, Toledo's capacity pretty much is spot on as the mean for a MAC arena. While I don't like UB's arena layout or look, it actually appears and feels bigger to me than what it seats, and the capacity works for UB. Obviously these are both urban schools.

When looking at the bottom half of the MAC for capacity, schools like Kent State, Akron, WMU, CMU and BG all play in the smaller arenas in the MAC. But they better fit their needs. While they aren't venues that you walk into and gasp at their size, they also aren't venues that are cavernous and empty when you put an average MAC crowd in from week to week or year to year in any of them either.

Personally, I love how college basketball arenas differ from one to another. Not just in the MAC, but nationally as well. When looking at the MAC, the 12 MAC football stadiums are more similar as a whole than the 12 MAC basketball arenas are to one another. Still, to me, each of the 12 MAC basketball arenas have their pluses and minuses. They different so much based on what exactly you are ranking them based on. Case in point, EMU has what one could argue is the nicest or best arena in the MAC, but it also features the worst atmosphere, and that's parts not even really up for debate.

Do you cringe when he shoots the ball?

The dude can't throw the ball in the ocean. 9-39 from the field (23.1%) and 2-15 from three (13.3%). Do we WANT him shooting at all, especially from three?

He also has a pretty sterling 9:14 Assist:TO ratio.

He's young. He can improve. I like his athleticism and defense. But to say he's anything other than a HUGE liability on the offensive end is just a lie.

SBH was fearless on the basketball court at Grover Center. You didn't want to see him handling/shooting the ball, however, unless you were the opponent.

I do cringe when I see him taking shots, especially from behind the arc. It's hard to imagine saying that about a player that averaged 33 ppg last season.

I had the feeling, and said it out loud, if he misses the front end we're cooked. I hate being right sometimes.

Arkley tweeted that Dartis was just cramps again. McDay had rolled his ankle in practice, but I saw no specific updates on him.

I wonder if it would be possible to do something similar (obviously the exact same wouldn't be possible) to what Cleveland does for Rocket Fieldhouse, closing off the upper sections with some sort of temporary/removable device? Probably not feasible with the Convo, just a thought.

If the AM station is giving you an issue, use Tune In Radio -- https://tunein.com /, or their app on your phone. I listen to the app with the game, and the app allows me to "sync" it with the game on the screen by pausing, etc.

The app is awesome. If there's a game that is produced by Learfield/IMG, it's on the Tune In app, so probably 75-80% of college hoops radio is on the app.

And time. A facility that big would take time to build, meaning it would almost have to be on a new site so the Convo would remain in use until it was complete.