WBB: Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference

[WLCALUM83]

Wow! Another crazy night in the NAthCon!

WLC scored the last 13 points of the game to shock CUW, 64-58. If calculations are correct, the Warriors have clinched the NAthCon North Championship. Lakeland also clinched a spot. (I'm eating crow--lots of crow--with a smile!)

Alverno pulls off a mild upset of Edgewood at home on Senior Night.

Scenarios:

Maranatha:  One more loss and the Crusaders are out.

Marian:       @ Lakeland, vs. Alverno
Edgewood:  vs. WLC, vs. Lakeland

(between the Sabers and the WI Eagles, seeing as the Muskies factor into the jockeying, I wonder which one of those squads thrunt01 would prefer to make the playoffs-- should Marian and Edgewood finish with equal records it would come down to tie-breakers since those squads split in their 2 meetings).

[thrunt01]

Wow! Another crazy night in the NAthCon!

WLC scored the last 13 points of the game to shock CUW, 64-58. If calculations are correct, the Warriors have clinched the NAthCon North Championship. Lakeland also clinched a spot. (I'm eating crow--lots of crow--with a smile!)

Alverno pulls off a mild upset of Edgewood at home on Senior Night.

Scenarios:

Maranatha:  One more loss and the Crusaders are out.

Marian:       @ Lakeland, vs. Alverno
Edgewood:  vs. WLC, vs. Lakeland

(between the Sabers and the WI Eagles, seeing as the Muskies factor into the jockeying, I wonder which one of those squads thrunt01 would prefer to make the playoffs-- should Marian and Edgewood finish with equal records it would come down to tie-breakers since those squads split in their 2 meetings).

Good question but honestly who gets in between EC or Marian doesn't matter to me, LC has locked up at least 3rd place in the North. My focus now is on hoping CUW drops their game @ MBBC and that LC takes care of business against those same Sabers and Eagles and possibly move into 2nd place in the north which would earn them a home game in the tournament, which is possible but not entirely probable. What is a bummer is the fact that LC could finish with a better record than Dominian or MSOE and still have to go on the road for their first game of the tournament. I continue to see more and more of these types of issues crop up as I follow this conference closer. The first thing is why has the south hosted the NAC challenge for 3 straight years? I get that it might happen back to back years when they shuffle the divisions but 3 straight years seems ridiculous. Also these schools all play each other I see no reason why a team who places higher in their division rankings but finishes with a worse record than a team in another division should get the higher seed in the tournament. Or why it needs to be the top 4 teams in each division that make the tournament in the first place. Play out the divisions but the 8 teams with the best conference records should make the tournament regardless of division. Let's take this year as an example, CUC AND Benedictine will make it over either Marian or Edgewood AND MBBC. In my opinion all three of those teams are better and thus more deserving of a tournament birth than either CUC or Benedictine but two of them will be left out. Not only that but they all have better records despite the fact that CUC and Benny got to play the two worst teams in the NAC, Rockford and Aurora, TWICE. I just don't see how the powers at be can think this is a fair and equitable way to determine a conference champion.

Enough ranting and raving from me because at the end of the day the teams have a chance to prove who is the best out on the court. March Madness, or late February madness in this case, is just around the corner and I am getting fired up just thinking about it.

[Just Bill]

thrunt, I don't think you understand how the Challenge game sites are determined. The team that hosts the NAC Challenge is pure chance. Once the matchups are set it depends on which of the two teams hosted the regular season meeting. The other one then gets to host the Challenge game. It's not a alternating division thing as you seem to be saying.

Lakeland will be away (assuming they finish 3rd), because they already played both of their two possible opponents, CUC and Benedictine, at home this year. WLC will be at home for the same reason. They have already played both Dominican and MSOE on the road this year.

So it has nothing to do with previous seasons or whose turn it is. It's just luck of the schedule and the matchup. Fortunately, the NAC is getting rid of the Challenge game after this season. Dumb idea from the start.

I do agree with you on Tournament teams and seeding. The discrepencies are even worse on the men's side this year where clearly the best 3 teams are all in the North. My vote would be to guarantee spots to the top 2 in each division and then take 4 wild cards. Then seed all by conference record regardless of division.

[WLCALUM83]

2/11/12 guesses:

WLC over Edgewood:  (Eagles can take this if the Warriors aren't allowed to run the break on them, and WLC's not hitting 3s--)  Methinks the Milwaukee squad would like to keep its' momentum going.

Dominican over Aurora:  Stars keep pressure on MSOE.

Lakeland over Marian:  (loss of Zutz hurts the Sabers' inside game; Muskies have better balance.)

CUW over Maranatha:  (Crusaders need to hit on all cylinders. If Peotter and Co get a boatload of turnovers and points off them, MBBC takes good care of the ball, CUW has an off day shooting and MBBC's DeLozier and her fellow talls have the best rebounding day of their careers in the same game, they could pull off an upset. I doubt that will happen, however.)

MSOE over CUC: 

Benedictine over Rockford:  (Banged up Regents squad doesn't have much depth.)   

[WLCALUM83]

More unexpected happenings:

In CUC's upset of MSOE, CUC got a lot of offensive rebounds and was able to get to the line and hit a lot of free throws late in the 2nd half.

Benedictine also won, so the 4 South playoff teams are set.

Maranatha pulled off the other upset, on a DeLozier basket with 10 seconds left. (thrunt01's squad got the help it wanted today.)

North scenarios:

A Lakeland win over Edgewood puts the Muskies in 2nd in the North (they swept CUW)

Maranatha can keep things interesting by beating Alverno on Monday night. A Crusader win there and 3 teams would be tied for the last playoff spot in the North. (I wonder who'd get in if those three were still tied after the regular season ends.) 

Marian gets Alverno at home, and Maranatha gets WLC on the road to finish up.

(We'll find out how motivated Alverno is to play spoiler.)

[thrunt01]

thrunt, I don't think you understand how the Challenge game sites are determined. The team that hosts the NAC Challenge is pure chance. Once the matchups are set it depends on which of the two teams hosted the regular season meeting. The other one then gets to host the Challenge game. It's not a alternating division thing as you seem to be saying.

Lakeland will be away (assuming they finish 3rd), because they already played both of their two possible opponents, CUC and Benedictine, at home this year. WLC will be at home for the same reason. They have already played both Dominican and MSOE on the road this year.

So it has nothing to do with previous seasons or whose turn it is. It's just luck of the schedule and the matchup. Fortunately, the NAC is getting rid of the Challenge game after this season. Dumb idea from the start.

I do agree with you on Tournament teams and seeding. The discrepencies are even worse on the men's side this year where clearly the best 3 teams are all in the North. My vote would be to guarantee spots to the top 2 in each division and then take 4 wild cards. Then seed all by conference record regardless of division.

You would be correct, I guess I just assumed stuff like that would be predetermined but I was wrong. So teams get an extra home or road game pretty arbitrarily? That just seems like you said, dumb. Particularly this year when the drop off from #2 to #3 is so significant, it might actually be better for a team like CUW to place 3rd, play CUC or Benny and have LC have to play AT MSOE (unless I am again mistaken and challenge games don't count for conference record and tournament seeding). Given this information I'm glad they're going away from it. Maybe they could have a NAC challenge just for the teams that don't make the post season, so at least half of those teams can end their season on a high note. It would kind of be like a bowl game in football. It would give more teams a taste of a "postseason" without really impacting much else. On the other hand those teams might just want the season to be over. Thanks for the information on the challenge.

[WLCALUM83]

2/13 guess:

Alverno at Maranatha:  Tough call here, both teams have momentum going in, coming off upset wins. If Alverno plays like it did in its' last game, the Crusaders will be in trouble. Maranatha's at home, they need to cut down on turnovers and at least stay even in terms of rebounding.

(WLCALUM83 doing a slow count to 30 while thinking further. . . )

Have to go with my head over my heart on this one--figuring Alverno will try to deny Crusader talls the ball down low quite a bit.

Pick:  Inferno plays spoiler on the road in a tight one.

[WLCALUM83]

Halftime:  Maranatha is up by 4 on Alverno.

[WLCALUM83]

Alverno/Maranatha going to overtime:

[WLCALUM83]

Final:  Alverno 71, Maranatha 68   (Inferno's Galstad hit a go-ahead bucket and Speerscheider 2 ensuing FT's, then a potential game-tying 3-pointer by Peotter bounced off the rim.)

Marian and Edgewood are still alive for the last playoff spot in the NAthCon North.

[WLCALUM83]

2/15-16/12 guesses:

2/15:  Dominican over Benedictine  (can't see Stars missing out on opportunity to take South title outright)
         MSOE over Rockford
         CUC over Aurora

         Alverno over Marian:   (Inferno plays double-spoiler on the week.  Marian can still take this if they're hitting on their 3's and Kontowski gets in early foul trouble--however, the Sabers have been outrebounded in most of their games of late.)

          Lakeland over Edgewood:  (Muskies claim 2nd place in the North with a win.  If they can run on the WI Eagles and slow down Tobin enough down low --the better their chances.)


2-16:  WLC over Maranatha:  Warriors will get a win on Senior Night (surely they've been reminded of how in the previous match-up the Crusaders came out of the gate hitting on all cylinders and WLC was down by 12 before they could blink,)-- they came back for the win that time. (I wonder who'll get more steals-- Dillon or Peotter?)

  (The one NAthCon in-conference loss that will probably sting the most for the Crusaders IMHO is the one they took at home against Edgewood. If they hadn't gone cold on offense toward the end of that game--still, I wasn't expecting them to beat Lakeland and CUW.)

             

             

[WLCALUM83]

Welcome to the NAthCon playoffs, Marian!

(Hitting on 12 3s sure was a shot in the arm for the Sabers tonight).

(Pardon the pun.)

[WLCALUM83]

NAthCon Challenge guesses:

WLC over Dominican  (Stars can take this if they're hitting their 3s early)
Lakeland over MSOE  (Raiders are in a bit of a slump) (Muskies are the hottest team in the conference right now.)
CUW over CUC in a tight one (If CUC shows the same intensity on D that it did in the 2nd half against MSOE, this could get interesting)

Benedictine over Marian  (figuring the IL Eagles will try a big-time denial of 3s after how Marian shot the lights out from beyond the arc last night)

Edgewood over Rockford
Maranatha over Aurora
Alverno over Mt. Mary

[WLCALUM83]

MSOE knocked off Lakeland, (I've got a feeling that cooling is only going to be temporary, however)

That was the only guess I missed on the NAthCon Challenge.

[Just Bill]

2012 Northern Athletics Conference Women's Basketball Tournament
http://www.northernac.org/sports/wbkb/2011-12/tournament

Quarterfinals - Wednesday, Feb. 22, 7 p.m.
#8 Benedictine (10-15, 6-11) at #1 Wisconsin Lutheran (21-4, 17-1)
#5 Concordia Wisconsin (15-10, 13-5) at #4 Lakeland (18-7, 13-5)
#7 Marian (13-12, 9-9) at #2 Dominican (17-8, 13-4)
#6 Concordia Chicago (9-16, 7-10) at #3 MSOE (16-9, 11-6)

Semifinals - Friday, Feb. 24, 7 p.m.
#1/8 vs. #4/5
#2/7 vs. #3/6

Final - Saturday, Feb. 25, 7 p.m.