men’s basketball in ireland, part 1

The Muhlenberg men’s basketball team is in the midst of a nine-day trip to Ireland. Sophomore Spencer Liddic sent back the following reports:

Friday, August 21
We arrived in Shannon, Ireland, at 7 a.m. Thursday after a smooth flight. We met up with our tour guide, Paul Reynolds, and began our journey to Killarney. After first stopping in Adare for a quick breakfast, we arrived in Killarney and spent the entire afternoon napping. We then enjoyed a delicious welcome dinner in our hotel resteraunt. Players and coaches split up and both enjoyed a great night out on the town. The next morning we woke up tired and went on the Ring of Kerry tour. We enjoyed a wonderful tour all around the beautiful mountains of Ireland. I think we’ve definitely learned that its going to be a great but expensive trip.

Sunday, August 23 a.m.
We awoke early the next morning for departure to Dublin. We drove two hours to Blarney Castle where some of us chose to kiss the famous Blarney Stone, which was a little wet from all the previous kisses. We grabbed a quick lunch and headed back on the bus for a four-hour ride to Dublin. We learned on the way to Dublin, however, that the father of twins from the team we were supposed to play that evening died unexpectedly. This forced the team to cancel the game, leaving us with no one to play. The coach of that team was nice enough to give us tickets to watch the Ireland’s men’s national team play Luxembourg’s national team. Ireland won by 15.

After the game we headed to the hotel, which was about another half-hour drive into the city of Dublin. We arrived at the hotel around 9 p.m. and unpacked and headed out for the night. We decided on going to a section of Dublin called Temple Bar, which was described to us as a mixture between Mardi Gras in New Orleans and New York City. We had another great night but the prices jumped even more in the city, which is leaving everyone broke. The third night left us with even more memories and stories to tell (or not to tell) when we get back to States.

This morning (Sunday) we woke up at 10, which was the latest time so far, and toured around Dublin with our tour guide and explored many of the famous sites. We had a team dinner at 2 p.m., getting us ready for our 6:30 game against a local Dublin team.

Sunday, August 23 p.m.
Tonight’s game didn’t go as well as we hoped. We played Killester, which is a junior national team here in Dublin. As good as the week has been going, the game was much different. I think a mixture between jetlag, less sleep and no practice for the past few days really threw us off our game as we lost, 98-64. We were down 55-28 at half and played as bad as I’ve seen our team play. We hope this is the lowest point of our season.

We played hard but just came up short tonight. Leading scorers were Spencer Liddic with 22 points, shooting 9-for-12, and Evan Tozer with 19 points, shooting 5-for-9 including three three-pointers. Obi Nwizugbo scored eight points, and Max Jablonski chipped in with six points. Leading rebounders were Liddic with seven, including three offensive, and Jablonski and Tozer each had five rebounds.

We have another game tomorrow and hopefully things go better!