Article

America East coaches pick Boston and UVM to win it all

After tallying votes for the preseason poll, Binghamton men rank 8th and women 9th
Dan Philion - Asst. Sports Editor

All votes are cast and all picks have been made for the Div. I America East preseason polls. Boston University, which returns all 11 letter winners from last year’s squad, is the favorite to win the 2002 men’s basketball championship. On the women’s side, the University of Vermont, which lost in overtime in the 2001 finals, is the head coaches’ pick to take it all this year.

The Boston Terriers gathered five out of a possible nine first-place votes and 77 total votes to finish just in front of the University of Maine, which received the remaining four votes and 76 overall.

These schools were followed by Northeastern University (59), UVM (54), the University of Hartford (40) and the University of New Hampshire (37). The last three spots on the poll belong to the State University of New York at Stony Brook (35), SUNY Albany (16), and Binghamton University (11).

Binghamton is ineligible for the America East Championship until its official transition to Div. I in 2004.

UVM’s Catamounts earned eight of the possible nine votes for first place, and 80 votes altogether, due to their 19-11 performance last year. The one remaining vote went to the University of Hartford, which tallied 69 votes for their 15-14 record last season.

The University of Maine came in third with 64 votes, followed by UNH (49), Boston University (41), Northeastern (41), and Stony Brook (26). America East newcomers Binghamton and Albany tallied 23 votes and 12 votes, respectively.

The eight-team 2002 Friendship Cottage Cheese America East Women’s Basketball Championship, held in Hartford on March 7-9, determines which of these teams will advance to the NCAA Championship.