2009 did not end well for the Erie BayHawks. Sure, they won their last game, but they finished the calendar year with a 4-9 record (1-5 at home). If things don’t change in 2010, you can’t say they didn’t try.
The BayHawks shook things up in a big way on New Year’s Eve, trading their leading scorer Donell Taylor to the Idaho Stampede for Mike Gansey in an effort to bolster their outside shooting. Soon thereafter, the team cut Martin Zeno and signed a sharpshooting guard out of Creighton, Booker Woodfox. While Woodfox did not play, Gansey started both games in the D-League Showcase this week and starred in the latter. Erie won both games (over Reno and Los Angeles) to start their first winning streak of the season.
By playing well on the D-League’s big stage, in front of scouts and NBA executives, the BayHawks proved that they’re capable of bigger and better things this season. With more than half of the season schedule to go, there is still time to turnaround after a disappointing start, but there is also little room for error. And it starts this weekend against Erie’s rival, the Fort Wayne Mad Ants.
Erie and Fort Wayne play eight times the rest of the way. That’s approximately 25 percent of their remaining games against one team. It’s the same team they played in preseason, and a team Erie knows well. I wrote about the budding rivalry earlier this season. But it’s worth a quick refresher on the common threads between these two organizations as they prepare to meet in Erie tomorrow, Sunday, and Wednesday.
On draft day, Fort Wayne sent its first-round pick Alade Aminu to Erie for the rights to Rob Kurz. The Mad Ants also signed Rod Wilmont and Oliver Lafayette after they were cut in preseason by the BayHawks. Similarly, the BayHawks recently signed a player that the Mad Ants cut in camp, Booker Woodfox. That makes five of the 20 players involved in these games with ties to both teams, plus the coaching staffs, who have been behind these moves. It will be interesting to see if any of these players take a little extra motivation from this matchup where they’ll get a chance to show the opposition that they made a mistake by not keeping them.
At 6-11, Erie is in no position to start talking playoffs, but if they can take their 2-0 finish at the D-League Showcase and build on that with 2-of-3 (or, ideally, a sweep) against the Mad Ants, the BayHawks will suddenly be in position to make a playoff push in the second half of the season. It’s going to take an improved effort at home. It’s going to take better outside shooting, which they should get from Gansey and Woodfox. And it’s going to take a more businesslike approach as they took during the Showcase.
There’s hope for the new year for the BayHawks. But like resolutions, hope can disappear quickly if they don’t pay attention to detail. The first homestand against Fort Wayne should give fans an idea whether this team’s serious about a 2010 resurrection or not.
Matt Hubert is the author of Blog Talk BayHawk.After the hectic holidays prevented him from sticking to his once-a-weekish guest post guarantee, he’s hoping to author a BayHawks post at least a once or twice a month the rest of the season.
