- W&M's men's basketball team will close out the regular season Saturday night against Virginia Commonwealth ... The Tribe has won four straight and six of the last seven games against the Rams in Williamsburg ... W&M is 9-7 overall against VCU since the start of the 1996-97 season, the year after the Rams joined the CAA ... The last time VCU won in Williamsburg was Feb. 6, 1999 ... Earlier this season, W&M fell to the Rams, 71-60, in Richmond on Dec. 6.


Complete game notes (PDF, 504 KB)


Top Storylines
This will be the final home game for the Tribe's three seniors, Zeb Cope, Adam Hess and Dave Holtzmuller ... During their time at W&M, the three have combined for 1,904 points, 842 rebounds and 267 assists in 194 games.

Senior forward Adam Hess was voted the 2003-04 CAA Preseason Player of the Year by the league's media ... Hess leads the CAA in scoring with 20.2 points per game, 3.3 ppg more than the next closest player and is ranked in the top 15 in the league in seven other categories, including rebounds and steals ... Earlier this season it was announced that Hess was named NABC First Team All-District 4 and Academic All-District III for the second straight year.

Freshman forward Corey Cofield is making a strong case for CAA Rookie of the Year honors, leading the league's freshmen in points per game (13.2), rebounds per game (6.6) and field goal percentage (.567) ... His .567 field goal percentage is currently fifth-best in W&M history ... Overall in the CAA, he is 12th in scoring, fifth in rebounding and fourth in field goal percentage ... He has been named CAA Rookie of the Week three times this season (Jan. 12, Jan. 26 and Feb. 9), more than any other player, and leads the team with six double-doubles, including four in the last six games ... In games against CAA opponents, Cofield is averaging 15.5 points per game (second among rookies by just seven total points), while still leading all conference freshmen with 7.5 rebounds per game and a .567 field goal percentage ... In the Tribe's last 10 games, he is averaging 16.6 points and 8.9 rebounds per game.

Hess Heating Up
Picked as the CAA's Preseason Player of the Year, senior forward Adam Hess has lived up to the billing throughout the season, leading the league with 20.2 points per game, more than three points ahead of any other player ... He also is ranked in the top 15 in the league in seven other statistical categories, including rebounds and steals, and is currently playing some of the best basketball of his career ... In the last 10 games, he has averaged 21.0 points, 7.4 rebounds and a .456 field goal percentage ... In the Tribe's last five games, Hess is averaging 22.8 points and 6.2 rebounds per game, while shooting .526 (41-78) from the floor and .385 (10-26) from the three-point line.

Fabulous Freshman
Forward Corey Cofield is making a strong case for CAA Rookie of the Year honors this season and has been named the CAA Rookie of the Week a league-best three times, including his most recent pick on Feb. 9 ... He leads all conference rookies in scoring (13.2), rebounding (6.6) and field goal percentage (.567) and is the only freshman ranked in the top-20 in the CAA in both scoring (12th) and rebounding (5th) ... As impressive as his overall numbers are, he is even better against conference opponents, where he is averaging 15.5 ppg (T6th overall and second among rookies by just seven total points) and fourth overall and first among freshmen with 7.5 rpg and a .567 field goal percentage.

Helping Hand
Junior guard Nick D'Antoni has returned to the level of play that earned him CAA All-Rookie honors two seasons ago ... The nephew of Phoenix Suns head coach Mike D'Antoni, Nick is leading the team with 144 assists against just 68 turnovers ... That includes 11 assists at Towson (1/14), 10 at Hofstra (1/24) and 11 at George Mason (1/31) ... Only 16 other times has a Tribe player had 10 or more assists in a game, and only one other has accomplished the feat three times in a single season ... He is third in the CAA with an average of 5.54 assists per game and fourth with a 2.12 assist-to-turnover ratio ... D'Antoni is second in W&M history in single-season assists and assists per game ... The only time a Tribe player ended a season averaging more than five assists a game was when Scott Coval averaged 6.22 in the 1984-85 season.

Seeing Improvement
Senior Zeb Cope, junior Nick D'Antoni and sophomore Taylor Mokris are seeing significant improvement under head coach Tony Shaver ... Cope has recorded the only two double-doubles of his career with 21 points and 11 rebounds in games at VCU (12/6) and against Drexel (1/17) ... After shooting just 1-4 from long range in his first three seasons, he has been given the green light to shoot from the outside, and is connecting on a team-best 38.0% (35-92) of his shots from the three-point line, the eighth-best single-season percentage in W&M history ... With a team-high 144 assists, D'Antoni is second in school history with a single-season average of 5.54 assists per game ... In the last four games, Mokris is averaging 10.5 points, while shooting .500 (12-24) from the field and .588 (10-17) from the three-point line in 19.3 minutes per contest.

Bringing Home the Hardware
Recently it was announced that Adam Hess was voted to the College Sports Information Directors (CoSIDA) Academic All-District III team and to the National Assoctaion of Basketball Coaches (NABC) District 4 First Team ... This is the second straight year that Hess has earmed both honors ... He is the only player in W&M history to have earned first team NABC all-district honors more than once.

Rebounding Rampage
After being out-rebounded by 18 (49-31) in its game at Hofstra (1/24), the Tribe has had a renewed focus on recovering missed shots ... That emphasis has paid off and the Tribe has been out-rebounded just once since then, including six games with at least a nine-rebound advantage ... W&M opened the stretch by out-rebounding Old Dominion by 22 (45-23), the Tribe's largest margin since out-rebounding Elon by 23 (44-21) in a game at Stanford on Dec. 22, 1998 ... W&M is currently fourth in the CAA with a +2.2 rebounding margin per game.

Killer Cs
Senior forward Zeb Cope and rookie forward Corey Cofield are each having outstanding seasons for the Tribe this year ... Cope has started all but one of W&M's games, is third on the team with 12.0 points per game, 5.8 rebounds per game and second with a .457 field goal percentage ... Arguably the most improved player in the league this season, he is more than tripling his career scoring average (3.5 ppg), almost doubling his career rebounding average (3.1 rpg) and shooting more than 40 points higher than his career field goal percentage (.410) entering this season ... Cope has both of his career double-doubles this year, each being 21-point, 11-rebound efforts (at VCU and home against Drexel) ... A Rookie of the Year candidate in the CAA, Cofield has started the last 19 games for W&M, leading the Tribe with 6.6 rebounds per game and a .567 FG% (fifth-best in school history) and he is second on the team with an average of 13.2 points per game ... He has six double-doubles (incluidng four in the last six games) and has been named CAA Rookie of the Week three times (Jan. 12, Jan. 26 and Feb. 9).

Mr. Everything
The conference's top scorer at 20.2 points per game, Adam Hess is currently ranked in the top 15 in the CAA in eight of 12 statistical categories ... Sixth in the conference with 6.6 rebounds per game and eighth with 1.65 steals per game, he is one of only two players in the CAA ranked in the top 10 in all three categories (points, rebounds and steals) ... Hess is also ranked in the top 15 in free throw percentage (8th), three-point field goal percentage (11th), three-point field goals per game (5th), offensive rebounds (6th) and defensive rebounds (T5th).

Straight Shooter
Rookie forward Corey Cofield is on pace for one of the most accurate shooting seasons in school history ... He has connected on 56.7 percent (118-208) of his field goal attempts this season, fifth-best in W&M history ...The W&M single-season record (with a minimum of 200 attempts) was set in the 1995-96 season by Carl Parker, who shot .599 (164-274) from the floor ... Against James Madison (2/4), Cofield was 9-9 from the floor, tied for the third-best shooting night in school history ... The last Tribe player to shoot that well was Tom Bock with a 10-10 game at Navy (Feb. 15, 1989) ... Jim McDonough also went 10-10 at Richmond on Feb. 21, 1976, while Keith Cieplicki was 9-9 against Virginia Commonwealth on Feb. 23, 1982.

Tony Shaver Eighth in Nation
Through Feb. 22, W&M head coach Tony Shaver had the eighth-best winning percentage in the nation among active Division I coaches, taking into account results from every level of college basketball ... Shaver currently has a record of 365-140 (.723).

1,000 Points (Again)
Adam Hess became the 27th player in W&M history to score 1,000 points in his Tribe career when he scored a layup with 17:21 left in the second half at UNCW (1/7) ... He currently is 13th in W&M history with 1,299 points while playing for the College and is the fifth W&M player to accomplish the feat while totalling three or less seasons in a Tribe uniform ... Hess scored 246 points in his freshman year at Eastern Michigan before transferring to W&M, and has 1,545 points in his college career ... Ironically, he scored the 1,000th point of his overall college career at UNCW last season ... Hess is averaging 17.6 points per game in his W&M career, seventh-best in school history ... The last person to score 1,000 points for W&M while playing less than four years is also the only person to do it in just two seasons ... Bob Sherwood scored 545 points in 1967-68 and had 506 in the 1969-70 campaign, for a total of 1,051 ... Jim Moran was the last Tribe player to get 1,000 points, ending his career in 2001 with 1,324 points, 12th in school history ... A complete list of all 27 of W&M's 1,000-point scorers is on page six of this release.

Long-Range Bomber
Junior guard Nick D'Antoni went 6-7 (.857) from beyond the three-point line at James Madison (1/28), the second-best single-game shooting percentage from outside the arc in W&M history and tied for the sixth-best in CAA history ... The six made threes is tied for the seventh-most in a game in school history.

Hess Climbing the Charts
Adam Hess' career numbers currently rank him in the top-20 in W&M history in 18 statistical categories ... His name also appears 24 times on the Tribe's single-season top-20 lists.

Quick Hands
At George Mason (1/31), Adam Hess had a career-high six steals just one short of the W&M record of seven, set by Randy Bracy in both the 1997 and 1998 seasons ... Hess is currently 12th in Tribe history with 1.10 steals per game in his career ... The last time a Tribe player had as many steals in a game was when Bracy had six at American on Jan. 13, 1999.

High-Scoring Hess
Seven times this season, the high-scoring games of Adam Hess have ranked him in the top 20 in the nation in scoring on that day ... That includes four efforts that placed him in the top-five in the nation, the last time being his 27 points vs. JMU (2/4), tied for the fourth-most points in the country ... His average of 20.2 ppg is first in the CAA and through Feb. 23, his 20.2 ppg was 22nd in the nation.

Tribe Perfect From Line at Drexel
W&M shot a perfect 13-13 from the free throw line in its game at Drexel (2/7) ... Just two players shot free throws for the College in the game, with Adam Hess making five and Corey Cofield connecting on eight ... The last time the Tribe was perfect from the charity stripe in a game was a 12-12 performance at home against UNC Wilmington on Jan. 17, 1997.

Jack's Back
W&M announced on Jan. 15 that forward Jack Jenkins has returned to W&M and the men's basketball team ... A two-time CAA Rookie of the Week, Jenkins was also selected to the league's all-rookie team last season, when he averaged 8.2 points and 4.3 rebounds per game ... Jenkins did not attend the College for the 2003 fall semester ... The team plans on redshirting Jenkins this season, giving him three more years of eligibility starting with next season.

Hess 30-Point Games
Adam Hess recorded his first 30-point game of the season at Drexel (2/7), when he scored a career-high 36 points, shooting 14-21 from the floor ... Last season, Hess set a school record with five 30-point games in a single season ... He also had two games in which he just missed the mark, scoring 29 points ... With 31 points at Campbell on Dec. 30, 2002 and 33 points against Charleston Southern on Jan. 2, 2003, he became the first W&M player with 30 or more points in consecutive games since the 1966-67 season, when Ron Panneton had 31 against Hampden-Sydney on Jan. 11, 1967 and put up 38 at Richmond on Jan. 14, 1967.

High-Scoring Tribe
This season the Tribe has scored 80 or more points seven times, three more than the four times it accomplished the feat in the previous three seasons combined ... The College is currently averaging 72.4 points per game, the most for the team since the 1995-96 season, when the team averaged 74.0 ppg ... The Tribe's 99-86 win at James Madison (1/28) was its most points scored in a game since defeating Elon, 101-69, at Stanford on Dec. 22, 1999 ... It was also the most the College had scored against a CAA opponent since defeating George Mason, 116-94, at home on Feb. 27, 1995, and was the most scored on an opponent's home court since winning at UNCW, 103-85, on Feb. 20, 1993 ... Along with the 86 points W&M scored in its next game against ODU (1/26), the 185 points is the most combined points in a two-game stretch against Division I opponents since the 1975-76 season, when the Tribe won at Richmond, 107-102, (Feb. 21) and lost to No. 3 Rutgers, 90-100 (Feb. 25).

Tribe Adds Junior College Transfer
On Jan. 9, the College announced that sophomore Adam Dutton had transferred to W&M from Cuesta Junior College in San Luis Obispo, CA ... A 6-0, 185-pound guard from Winchester, VA, Dutton will have two seasons of eligibility after sitting out the rest of this year ... Dutton graduated from Handley High School in 2001 and was a first team all-state pick in both basketball and football (wide receiver) ... He was a high school teammate of W&M's current starting quarterback, junior Lang Campbell, and starting senior linebacker Paul Carpenter ... Dutton is the Tribe's first junior college transfer in men's basketball since forward Chris Hall played for the 1994, 1995 and 1997 seasons, averaging 2.1 points and 1.6 rebounds in 56 games.

W&M's Adam Hess Voted CAA Preseason Player of the Year
Senior forward Adam Hess was voted the 2003-04 Colonial Athletic Association's Preseason Player of the Year by the media at the conference's annual media day, held at the Washington, DC ESPNZone on October 29 ... Hess was also projected by Sporting News as the league's best player ... No W&M player has ever been named CAA Player of the Year at the end of the season ... Only twice in history has a Tribe men's basketball player been selected as any league's player of the year ... Jeff Cohen (1961) and Tom Jasper (1971) were each named Southern Conference Player of the Year ... Hess has been unanimously picked to be the only player this season to repeat as a first team All-CAA honoree, including predictions by the conference's coaches and media and numerous publications, including Athlon, Basketball News, Lindy's, Sporting News, and Street & Smith's.

Quick Trigger
Sophomore forward Steve Sorenson quickly took advantage of his playing time at Hofstra (1/24), scoring on his first touch of the game at the 7:52 mark of the second half, just two seconds after he entered the game for the first time ... Sorenson also scored on a putback at the 7:04 mark, giving him four points in his first 50 seconds of action.

Two-Sport Athlete?
Early in January, the Tribe spent part of its extended stay in Charlottesville, VA on the other kind of hardwood*a bowling alley ... Junior point guard Nick D'Antoni demonstrated his versatility by posting a team-high single-game score of 223 ... Also impressive was junior guard Reid Markham who, with his dominant broken right hand in a cast, was still able to roll a 109 with his left.

Road Woes
Since the start of the 1998-99 campaign, W&M has had a tough time winning on the road ... Since then the Tribe has a record of 14-65 (.177) on its opponents' home court, including a 7-44 (.137) record against CAA foes ... W&M's record since then at home is 44-31 (.587) and the Green and Gold is 3-9 (.250) in games on a neutral court ... This year, the Tribe is 1-13 on the road, with a win at James Madison (1/28).

Starting Lineups
This season W&M has used six different starting lineup combinations ... Senior Adam Hess and junior Nick D'Antoni are the only players to have started every game this year ... Nine of the 11 active players on the Tribe roster have started at least one game, including walk-on guard Adam Trumbower ... He is the first walk-on to start for W&M since guard Sam Steen made 13 starts as a junior in the 1996-97 campaign.

More Praise for Hess
Many people that cover W&M and the CAA know of the abilities of senior forward Adam Hess, as evidenced by his selection by the media as the league's preseason player of the year ... Now the national media is also jumping on the bandwagon, starting with a recent piece on the website collegeinsider.com, that focuses on mid-major Division I teams ... In a front page article on the site this season, Matt Drake wrote that he believes Hess may be "the BEST mid-major player in America," adding, "the Michigan native plays with poise and has an excellent shooting stroke, with seemingly unlimited range. Sure there are a lot of players with quicker feet and more pure talent, but few are as complete a player as Hess."

And He's Smart, Too
Not only is Adam Hess one of the top players in the conference and the state, but he also excels in the classroom ... Recently he was voted to the CoSIDA Academic All-District III First Team for the second straight season and last yearhe was named a second team Academic All-American (this year's team will be announced in early March) ... In addition, last year Hess earned his second selection to the CAA All-Academic Team and was named the league's first ever Men's Basketball Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

Tribe Wins Tourney Opener
The Tribe broke a long string of in-season tournament first round losses with the win against St. Francis in the first round of the Red Auerbach Colonial Classic ... The last time the Tribe had won the first game of such an event was Dec. 29, 1981 with a 58-48 win over Auburn at the Iron Duke Classic in Durham, NC ... Since that season, W&M had played 38 games in 19 in-season tournaments, with a record of 10-28 (.263).

Keeping it in the State
W&M is scheduled to play 13 regular season games this year against in-state opponents ... So far this season, W&M is 3-9 against Virginia teams ... The Tribe will play nine of the other 12 Division I schools in Virginia ... The only in-state Division I schools that W&M won't face this season are Norfolk State, Richmond and VMI.

Season Openers
W&M's season-opening win against Liberty marked the fifth time in the last eight years that the Tribe has won its first game of the season, despite losing its two previous lidlifters ... Last season the Tribe began the year with a 79-76 home loss to Fordham on Nov. 22, 2002 ... The College's previous season-opening win was an 87-62 defeat of High Point on Nov. 17, 2000.

Home Openers
The Tribe has now won four of its last five and six of its last eight home openers, with a record of 41-18 (.695) since the 1945-46 season.

CAA Openers
The Tribe opened its 19th season of play in the Colonial Athletic Association with a 67-66 overtime win against two-time defending league champions UNCW ... W&M was a charter member of the CAA, which officially started with the 1985-86 season ... The Tribe has a record of 8-11 in CAA openers and has won the last five times that W&M opened the conference season at home.

Back-to-Back Games
W&M opened the 2003-04 season with games on consecutive days in different locations (Nov. 23 at home vs. Liberty and Nov. 24 at Radford) ... It was the first time W&M played on consecutive days in different arenas since the 1976-77 season, when the Tribe won at UC Santa Barbara (78-65) on Dec. 22, 1976, before falling at eighth-ranked UCLA (59-55) on Dec. 23.

W&M Coaching Debuts
Tony Shaver became the 13th of W&M's 30 head men's basketball coaches to win his Tribe debut ... W&M's first-time coaches have done well since the start of the 1974-75 season, with five of the seven winning their first game at the College, and the other two losing by just three points each ... The last time a Tribe mentor had a winning record in his first season at W&M was Bruce Parkhill's 16-10 (.615) mark in the 1977-78 campaign.

Tribe Picked to Finish Ninth in CAA
At the league's media day in Washington, DC on October 29, W&M was picked to finish ninth in the Colonial Athletic Association ... George Mason received nine first place votes and narrowly edged out Virginia Commonwealth and UNC Wilmington as the preseason favorite to win the conference ... Last season the Tribe finished eighth in the league with a 7-11 conference record.

W&M vs. Virginia Commonwealth Notes
William and Mary and Virginia Commonwealth will meet for the 33rd time on Saturday... The Rams lead the series, 22-10 ... W&M has won the last four and six of the last seven meetings between the two teams in Williamsburg ... VCU's last win in W&M Hall was Feb. 6, 1999 ... The Tribe has a 9-7 record against the Rams since the start of the 1996-97 season, VCU's second year in the CAA.

W&M vs. the Colonial Athletic Association
Saturday's game against Virginia Commonwealth will be the 296th meeting between William and Mary and a current member of the Colonial Athletic Association ... The Tribe is 104-192 (.351) all time against the league.