March 16, 2005

Today began with breakfast in the hotel. Our team breakfast always beats the bowl of cereal I grab in the dorm room when we're back at home. After breakfast, we had an hour of mandatory study hall. It's tough to get work done on the road, but we do what we can.

The team went through our official scouting report for Chattanooga, then left to practice at Cleveland State's practice facility. This practice would be the first of two on the day. It was focused more on running through our plays and defending Chattanooga's plays. The next practice was in the Cleveland State Convocation Center (the site for our first round game) and was open to the public. The coaches tried to get the guys as many shots up as possible in order to feel comfortable with the shooting background.

At the end of shootaround, Coach Prosser divided the team up into two lines. One for anyone from North Carolina and one for the "World". Coach always has a shooting contest between the two groups at each location in the postseason. Since the North Carolina group had two more players than the World group, Coach told me to draft someone from their team. I went with the proven veteran Taron Downey. The contest was a race to 15 from just inside the three point line. Sure enough, Taron hit the winning shot for the World team. Great job Vytas, Lev, Viss, Jessen, Feather, Critty, Coach Kels, and Taron. We were the underdogs.

The seniors decided to have dinner in the hotel tonight. It was relaxing to stay in and have some free time.

Time to get some sleep now. Tomorrow's a big one.