Nothing huge going on, but a couple of things certainly worth blogging about: 

• A link to my story in The Trentonian about Rider's NIT hopes. My take on the situation: Were I on the NIT selection committee, I'd put the Broncs in as an eight seed. With 23 wins, a co-championship in a fairly strong mid-major conference and far more quality wins (Penn State, at Siena, at Rutgers if you want to count it) than bad losses (at Drexel is the worst they had and even that isn't THAT damaging) I think they're more deserving than a team like Seteon Hall, which went 17-15 and has a slightly better RPI. So that's what I think SHOULD happen. What do I think WILL happen? It's tough to say, especially since conference tournaments are still going on and the list of teams with automatic NIT bids isn't finalized. But I think the Broncs are right on the bubble and will either be one of the last teams in or the last teams out. 
• If they're one of the last teams out, they're probably heading for the inaugural College Basketball Invitational. I put in a call to Rick Giles, the president of the Gazelle Group, which is running the tournament, and should be able to get you a story some time later this week. For now though, here's a link to the tournament web site. 
• I went to the Big East tournament yesterday with fellow Trentonian staffer Eleazer Gorenstein just to sit in the stands and watch. We ended up missing all of the Villanova-Syracuse game (long story), but I saw a good game between West Virginia and Providence, in which the Mountaineers trailed almost throughout but rallied to hand the Friars a loss that may have cost Tim Welsh his job. But the most interesting part of my trip had nothing to do with the Big East. The most interesting part was that ...
• After the game, I went in to Borders to look at some books. As I was coming out, I saw an old acquaintance who played a major role in the beginning of my career as a sportswriter: former Fairfield coach Tim O'Toole, who's now a studio analyst at SNY. I hadn't seen Tim since the night he announced he had essentially been fired (technically his contract wasn't renewed) after a first-round loss in the 2006 MAAC tournament in Albany. He was in a hurry, so we didn't have a long time to talk, but I told him about this gig in Trenton and he told me what I had read online but hadn't thought much about: he is a candidate for the head coaching job at NJIT. 
• My take on the NJIT gig: With no conference affiliation, no tradition, no real recruiting base other than one that is shared with many other schools and a team that went winless for an entire season, you can make a strong argument that it's the single worst head coaching job in the country. Having said that, if I were in Tim's shoes, I'd be itching for the opportunity. Here are two reasons why: 1) Sure, it's not exactly Duke. But it's a Division I head coaching job. There are thousands of coaches who would like to have one of those and only 341 each year who actually have one. So it beats the hell out of sitting behind a desk all day. 2) If he gets the job, he can't take the program anywhere but up. Even if the Highlanders only win two games next year, that'd be a two-game improvement over what they had this year, and whoever coaches them to those wins will get at least some kind of credit. With such low expectations, the school would have to give him a minimum of three years to get things going in the right direction. Were he to succeed, his coaching career would be back on track. Were he to fail, it would be no worse off than it is now, and he could tell people, with good reason, that it was simply impossible to succeed in that situation. 
• As I wrote in this 2006 column in the Fairfield Mirror immediately after his last game, I was sorry to see him go. With that said, I think if Fairfield is a serious contender for the MAAC title in the next two years -- which I think will happen -- there will be near unanimity that Gene Doris made the right decision by making a change and bringing in Ed Cooley, who I also like a great deal and who I think has the program headed in the right direction. 

I don't know of anyone associated with Fairfield basketball of whom more people have an opinion, either positive or negative, than Tim O'Toole. I'm sure there are dozens of Fairfield and MAAC fans out there with plenty to say about the Stags' former economics student, player and coach. So let's hear some of them! What does everyone out there think about the possibility of him returning to the sidelines?