MBB: Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[WoostAr]

Looks like we have a basketball season about to start!!

The SCIAC appears to be down this year in the minds of voters -- not a single vote for the SCIAC in d3hoops top 25. 

Looking forward to La Verne kicking off the season at 12:01 am this evening/tomorrow morning.  Going to attend to the 110 Rivalry at Oxy this saturday-- Caltech looked good in their scrimmage against Masters, not so good against USD.  Looks like there is some talent missing from Oxy's roster last year and a new (old) assistant coach coming back meaning a new (old) system?? -- I think this is the guy who ran the triangle with oxy?? -- interested to see if they run the triangle....or what??

[Lets Play Two]

The Poets looked good in spurts vs. UNLV last week, trailing 72-50 with 5 + minutes to go.  Whittier emptied their bench and UNLV outscored the Poets 22-4 down the stretch.  Poets are athletic and quick, but lack size.  Looking forward to a good SCIAC season!

[WoostAr]

Caltech with a 9 point victory over Occidental last night in the season-opening 110 Rivalry game: http://gocaltech.com/sports/mbkb/2015-16/releases/20151115az701u

Some great things happening for Caltech -- their offense appears to be clicking and the players seem to be thriving in it -- Caltech shot 55% from the field and 47% from three.  The gap in their game was free throw shooting -- 53% from the charity stripe.  David Lebaron was the break out star of the game with 25 pts -- he got great opportunities out of pass-outs from post touches and made the most of them.

Bright spot of the bench was Freshman Brent Cahill.  Fearless going to the hoop and showed the ability to hit outside jumpers -- when he adjusts to the speed of college basketball he will be something special.

The potential problem with this team is depth -- they have lost a couple players since last year who were expected to be contributors.  They have a 7 man rotation so I am interested to see how they get through their back-to-back games against Whitworth and Whitman -- they're going to have to find some rest periods for their starters. 

Caltech is now 4-4 in their last 8 games against SCIAC opponents...I look for them to make some waves in the league this year.

[WoostAr]

Chris Ballard wrote an 8 page article on Caltech Basketball in this weeks Sports Illustrated.

[cawcdad]

Redlands played well and hung with one of the top NWC teams in Lewis & Clark losing 66-62 in Santa Cruz. The Dogs played everyone. The difference was rebounding. The Boxers controlled the boards. Images- http://blog.d3photography.com/2015/11/slideshow-men-s-basketball-redlands-vs-lewis-and-clark-november-21-2015/

[Gray Fox]

Chris Ballard wrote an 8 page article on Caltech Basketball in this weeks Sports Illustrated.

Great article.  Read it at my dentist's office.

[gordonmann]

Me too, but in my living room instead of the dentist office.

It's very well done.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Best line in the SI article (explaining that Caltech cuts no admissions slack whatsoever for athletes) "One of last year's top recruits had to settle for his safety school: MIT."  Only at Caltech could MIT be a safety school!

[magicman]

Best line in the SI article (explaining that Caltech cuts no admissions slack whatsoever for athletes) "One of last year's top recruits had to settle for his safety school: MIT."  Only at Caltech could MIT be a safety school!

I also laughed when I read that line and thought the same thing. It was a great article though and a pleasant surprise to see a national sports magazine, especially the top sports magazine out there, devote such a long article to a Division III story. Usually if Division III gets mentioned, its an athlete in Faces in the Crowd or a 1 page article or a paragraph or two in Scorecard. I have 40 years of Sports Illustrated in boxes in my basement. I don't ever recall an article of that length for any winning program in Division III Sports, hard to believe one of the biggest losing programs got all the ink. Glad they did.    

[cawcdad]

Cal Lutheran and Whitman played a very entertaining game after almost an hour delay when the power went out on the UC Santa Cruz campus. The first half was back and forth with exchanging the lead and tied at the half 30-30. The Missionaries jumped out in the lead in the second half, getting up by as many as 8, but the Kingsmen chipped away to tie the score just before the end of regulation. CLU scored the first points in OT but couldn't hold on. Images of the game at http://blog.d3photography.com/2015/11/slideshow-men-s-basketball-cal-lutheran-vs-whitman-november-28-2015/

[WoostAr]

Caltech has looked absolutely awful this week: the only bright spot is their half court defense, but they can't break a press and they have no clear direction on offense.  This leads to weird stat boxes where they out rebound their opponent (Linfield) by 29 and LOSE.  They only out rebounded Sarah Lawrence by 9 and managed to lose that one too despite Sarah Lawrence not winning a d3 game since, well, ever!

There has to be something going on in the locker room -- the players are simply not on the same page.  Here's hoping they get it together in the next week before Santa Cruz.

[D O.C.]

Weird Al Redlands likes to shoot, doesn't he?

[Gray Fox]

Caltech has looked absolutely awful this week: the only bright spot is their half court defense, but they can't break a press and they have no clear direction on offense.  This leads to weird stat boxes where they out rebound their opponent (Linfield) by 29 and LOSE.  They only out rebounded Sarah Lawrence by 9 and managed to lose that one too despite Sarah Lawrence not winning a d3 game since, well, ever!

There has to be something going on in the locker room -- the players are simply not on the same page.  Here's hoping they get it together in the next week before Santa Cruz.

Star struck after beig featured in SI.

[Gosox]

Hey have not heard from Oxy Bob nor Stagg44...is all well?...enjoy the posts...I pray all good...Merry Christmas ALL!!!

[Gray Fox]

Hey have not heard from Oxy Bob nor Stagg44...is all well?...enjoy the posts...I pray all good...Merry Christmas ALL!!!

Oxy Bob no longer posts.  All is well with him.