MBB: Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[Sabretooth Tiger]

Stagg44 is spot on with the scholarship $$ observation. 

[sciac_is_fun]

Hey everybody, got an idea.

Now that the SCIAC offseason is upon us again, how about some stimulating All-Decade discussion to keep some interest going?  I know it might be a year late, but here's what I propose: give your All-Decade team for the school you support, and then at the end we can pick some SCIAC all-decade teams from those.  That way we get some intra-school debate, as well as overall debate. 

So for example, my all-decade team for CLU:

G Victor Esquer
G Kyle Knudsen
F Zareh Avedian
F Ryan Hodges
C Justin Muth

Quite the team, if you ask me   Plenty of size, scorers, and defenders.

[tigersports]

Oxy:

C:  Sam Betty
F:  Finn Rebassoo
F:  Dallin Wilson
G:  Song Cun
G:  Connor Whitman

I'm willing to be overruled on Wilson.  The others are no-brainers.

[stag44]

CMS:

G: Bob Donlan
G: John Parsons
C: Brian Jolly
F: Miles Taylor
F: Chris Blees

I'd say the only one up for debate here is Parsons vs Jameson. Other than that, the rest were all very dominant during their eras.

[cmsme]

I see Whitworth lost to Eastern Mennonite.  So our entire bracket branch has died and fallen off the tree.  No wonder it is so difficult to get into the Top 25 poll.
It will be interesting watching the championship game.

[OxyBob]

Having seen only the DIII playoff game in ORANGE last week I have a question about recruiting. How many truly big men of grace and power ever play in SoCal DIII? (Maybe since 1999) I ask because the 'big men' were 6'7" and I saw only one leaper above the rim and he was not a center.

None. If they're bigger than 6'7" and can play, they don't play in the SCIAC.  They get scholarships. Best "big men" since I've started doing this ('00) were Al Lloyd, Andy Meier, Jeremiah Martin and not much else.  Maybe OB can help me out here.

Zach Miller, Mychal Owens. What about Justin Sexton? He's a big man along the lines of Bob McAdoo, though not quite as wide.

EDIT: Oh, yeah, what about Ben Turk?

OxyBob

[stag44]

Congrats to Chris Blees on making the All-West Region 2nd Team. Back-to-Back years he's done that now, and looking forward to him making a run at All-american and hopefully a NCAA win!!

[OxyBob]

my all-decade team for CLU:

G Victor Esquer
G Kyle Knudsen
F Zareh Avedian
F Ryan Hodges
C Justin Muth

Good team, but I might replace Esquer with Deshion Inniss, one of the most clutch players CLU ever had.

C:  Sam Betty
F:  Finn Rebassoo
F:  Dallin Wilson
G:  Song Cun
G:  Connor Whitman

I'm willing to be overruled on Wilson.  The others are no-brainers.

I was always big fan of Zach Phillips. I would take him over Wilson. There's also another guy who could play on the front line and who was pretty good for the Tigers -- Brian Newhall. And of course there's Oxy basketball's famous legend, myth, fable, and fish story -- Barack Obama.

OxyBob

[sciac_is_fun]

my all-decade team for CLU:

G Victor Esquer
G Kyle Knudsen
F Zareh Avedian
F Ryan Hodges
C Justin Muth

Good team, but I might replace Esquer with Deshion Inniss, one of the most clutch players CLU ever had.

OxyBob

Inniss would be on my second team (along with Andy Meier, who deserves mention as well).  Esquer is there because he's the best perimeter defender I've ever seen at this level, and because of his leadership.  He was really the only consistently solid guard on those good CLU teams of the early part of the decade.

[D O.C.]

You're slipping, Barry Obama.

[etule]

I think that academics play as large a role as scholarships! Some of the UAA and I'm sure a number of  other Midwest and Western Region schools will have a couple of slots for players below entry standards. I know that some or most of the SCIAC schools do not. That is huge on a year in year out basis to compete against. Also most SCIAC teams do not bring in JC kids. Most NW conference teams don't either with one big exception! Guess who Whitworth!!! They have been very sucessful in filling holes with very good JC players or NAIA transfers! Their record speaks for itself!
This is not a criticism just the facts of life in D3 basketball.

[The Roop]

You make a good point regarding transfers and academic standards but at the same time it's not the epidemic you imply. Besides, there are plenty of legitimate reasons why someone might attend a junior college first. Typically it's a financial concern. Other times people are still hoping for that scholarship offer to come. And yes, sometimes it is an academic issue. Maybe school X turned you down because you were marginal by their standards and they said try J.C. for a year and get your grades up.

In conclusion, not all transfers are hired guns brought in to bolster a program for a year or two. Even though it looks like it at times.

[Gregory Sager]

You make a good point regarding transfers and academic standards but at the same time it's not the epidemic you imply. Besides, there are plenty of legitimate reasons why someone might attend a junior college first. Typically it's a financial concern. Other times people are still hoping for that scholarship offer to come. And yes, sometimes it is an academic issue. Maybe school X turned you down because you were marginal by their standards and they said try J.C. for a year and get your grades up.

In conclusion, not all transfers are hired guns brought in to bolster a program for a year or two. Even though it looks like it at times.

Excellent point, Roop. Junior colleges have an unwarranted stigma attached to them. Every student-athlete is different -- and anyone who thinks that a student-athlete who transfers in from a juco automatically has some sort of academic taint attached to him is someone who does not know the full story.

[etule]

As a person who attened JC myself I was not implying that is was a black mark but rather that most D3 schools do not go after JC transfers in SCIAC and the NW conference except for a couple of exceptions and they have had success.
Even with decent grades it is difficult to get into Pamona,Claremont and Oxy.
I don't think that these schools have athletic slots that allows kids that are below entry standards. I know some very good UAA schools have slots and I think it is not a bad idea!

[OxyBob]

From today's Los Angeles Times:

Spurs attained their elite status the old-fashioned way: They earned it

Their style hasn't been spectacular, far from it, but the results have been — four titles in 11 years for Coach Gregg Popovich, star Tim Duncan and a changing supporting cast. And they're not done yet.

...

"I don't think my owner's going to fire me tomorrow, but I feel failure, just like everybody else," he says. "I feel a responsibility to getting these guys back to what they were. That's my concern or fear, of whatever you want to call it. . . .

"I think the overriding common denominator with me, I still think I'm a Division III coach. Because that's what I am.

"I'm really a Division III coach who had a lot of good fortune and ended up in a situation, as I've said before, where I didn't screw it up.

"Beyond that, I sometimes wonder what the hell I'm doing here. Do we really have those championships? Did we really do that?

"I just shake my head because, at heart, I'm a Division III coach."

Popovich really was an NCAA Division III coach at Pomona-Pitzer, but if he wanted to coach in college again, I'm sure he could land a Division I job.
...

OxyBob