GMC's Super Sunday

Today is undoubtedly the best day for Middlesex County basketball each year. The remaining 8 teams in the tournament all take the court at Middlesex County College to dwindle the field down to the final 4. If it was up to me, I think this round should still be on the higher seeds court. It is a great advantage to lower seeds to have them playing at neutral sites rather than the higher seeds court. I think they should start doing the neutral court with four teams left, not eight. My high school has been involved in some great games in the past at Middlesex County College such as the Bishop Ahr Overtime game a couple years ago, or the ferocious comeback last year against J.P. Stevens who looked like they were going to beat us for a long time last year. Each of the four games looks to be pretty good and anything can happen on a neutral site. Here are my predictions(the +/-'s indicate the spreads according to Born Power index).

#1 St. Joe's-12 over #9 Cardinal McCarrick by 15

I think Cardinal McCarrick will be able to hang with Joe's in the first half, but I think Joe's will be too much for them to hang with for the entire game. McCarrick does not have a good enough defense to shut us down for 32 minutes. They like to score points and so do we. That's what's traditionally been good with St. Joe's. They've usually been a defense first team but have shown to hold their own on offense too in games like the Red Bank Catholic game last year. They also don't have the team they had two years ago or even last year. Mike Burwell and Julio Rosario are gone which should make things go much smoother for Joe's. By most acccounts, we should've won the county title two years ago if the reffing weren't so blatantly biased. That was easily the worst game I've ever seen reffed. We got screwed of a county title, plain and simple. That was with both Burwell and Rosario. Last year we made amends for that loss and took care of McCarrick with Rosario fairly easily. Now with both of them gone, it should be even easier, but McCarrick has played well against good teams this year but have still struggled and are now 13-9 or so which is deceiving because they're a better team than that and if Joe's isn't careful they could get beat.


#4 East Brunswick-11 over #5 Spotswood by 10

This is another game for the GMC Red to make a statement. With Bishop Ahr's loss, Spotswood is the lone team remaining from the GMC Blue. Spotswood is very new to this. This is the first time they have ever made it to the final eight, which is why I expect that East Brunswick will be too much for them. East Brunswick is loaded with seniors and is extremely deep playing about 11-12 guys a game. They are fundamentally sound and will be a tough team to beat today and in states. Spotswood also has a lot of seniors, but I think the Red is much stronger than the Blue and think that East Brunswick's big game experience will help them pull this one out.


#2 Monroe-14 over #7 New Brunswick by 15

The other side of the bracket is a GMC White division affair with all 4 teams belonging to it. Regardless of what happens today, the White will walk out of this round with at least 2 teams in the Semis, 3 if McCarrick beats St. Joe's which is very impressive. While New Brunswick has proven to be solid, Monroe has shown that they're in the arguement with St. Joe's for best team in the GMC. I expect this game will be a walk in the park for Monroe. They are very deep and have played a pretty challenging schedule this year that I don't think they will be very tested by New Brunswick. Monroe's also won 14 straight in the GMC and 16 of their last 17 since January 2nd. New Burnswick has went 4-36 in the last 2 years and 12-48 in the last three while Monroe has proven to be one of the models of consistency in the GMC over the last few years. They returned 4 starters from last year's GMC Final Four Team and have a good group of underclassmen to help carry the load. After the loss to Ridge, Monroe has won their last 3 games by 23 points. It will take something special for New Brunswick to win today.

#14 North Brunswick+5.5 over #6 Sayreville by 3

I'm really taking this just cause I'd like to see an upset and I really don't see any of the other 3 being upsets. I feel North Brunswick is definitely capable of beating Sayreville, but I was very impressed by Sayreville in this game last year. North Brunwick's got a good blend of young and veteran talent. Sayreville though certainly has a height advantage and an advantge when it comes to perimeter scoring. They split during the season. I think this one could be the game of the day and unfortunately, it's the first game of the day.

So those are my picks and in terms of the spread given, I'll take St. Joe's, Spotswood, Monroe and North Brunswick.

I'm looking forward to the games and if you're not doing anything today, come on by. All the games have the potential to be good ones and you never know when a classic could come about. Good luck to the eight teams today and I'll preview the final four on Wednesday.