MBB: Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[funbballer]

 Oops - just re-read the morning papers: it was the Detroit Free Press (not AANews) and just the three recently-departed asst. coaches (no players), but they did unanimously pick the Hoyas to go all the way.  Final score: OSU 67, G'town 60.  (Maybe this helps explain why they are now former Michigan coaches! ) [/quote]

...and fully explains why I don't know what the heck I'm talking about either!

It was a hunch, but thought the Hoyas would be "the surprise" of the Final Four. Given that, UCLA didn't do/look any different from their game last year. The Gator-Buckeye match up looks to be a dandy......like a football repeat!

I'll take Florida

[columbianmaffia]

Sum, in regards to the McDonalds game, youre right that the pace was not playing to Aldrichs talents. However, that pace didnt stop a guy like Kevin Love (low post scorer who is not as comfortable in a full court game, in the same vein as Aldrich) from making a huge impact. Thats what seperates top tier caliber center prospects like Love from good prospects like Aldrich. Enough people have mentioned it, but Love found a way to stand out with something as basic as outlet passing. Aldrich could contribute in 2 years at Kansas, but Love will be one of the top players in the country next year-and that difference showed in the game. Out of all the big men in the game, Aldrich was arguably the most forgettable. Thats not a horrible thing, considering it was a Big Mans showcase (Mayo and Gordon failed to impress, as the 'pundits' promised). If your an Aldrich fan, youve got to be a little leery of him going to a coach like Self, whos notorious for not developing players and underachieving with superior talent (this year being the most egregious failure).

in an interview i read according to cole he is the missing piece of the puzzle for KU and he thinks players might not leave early for the NBA because he will be going there next year 

[concordia of the north]

columbian, do you know the source for that article? any link or anything?

[TommieHoops4Life]

I saw the Minnesota high school all-star series this weekend at Concordia-St. Paul. Mbakwe is absolutely sick and will be a star at Marquette. That was the first time I had seen him in person, and I don't know that I've ever seen somebody who can jump as explosively as him. Carlson from Shakopee won the dunk contest, but only because Mbakwe was trying hard dunks and missing. He's very physical and should have no trouble rebounding at the next level. I understand that there's no defense played in these games, but he was fun to watch. Would have been fun to see Hoffarber, but he didn't play.

[columbianmaffia]

columbian, do you know the source for that article? any link or anything?

ill try to find it...sometimes im surfing the world wide web and i forget where is see things

[columbianmaffia]

well that didnt take too long

here is the link

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2007/mar/31/aldrich_already_embracing_rivalry_spirit/?mens_basketball

also pretty disappointed to see what he had to say about his team just wanting the season to be over half way through the year this season...im glad they lost in the first round of state now

[funbballer]

Cmob....I think I read or interpreted (sp?) it a bit differently. From what I read in the papers and a few people I talked with, Jefferson was average, at best, towards the end of January and would imagine there was a sense of frustration with them. I think in tribute to Cole, he rallied his teammates and they obviously improved as the season went on. While the guard play was reportedly pathetic, Cole did lead his team to a tie for the conference title and the section championship. I had a HS coach tell me that if the Jefferson coaches would have had any kind of clue as to how to feed a 6-11 guy, especially in the last few seconds of the game, they would have won their quarterfinal game. This HS coach said Cole didn't even TOUCH the ball....figure that one out!

I don't think he was dissing his teammates....after all he stayed there to play with them, they must get along fairly well, don't you think?

[Gregory Sager]

Thanks Greg. Appreciate your insight. I will be the first to weigh in on a couple of the points you touched on.

1) Outside of the metro area, I don't believe the talent pool is very deep. Certainly there are exceptions to this, but in general there have not been dominant "programs"  outstate. There are a variety of reasons for this, not the least of which is multi sport athletes with BB being there secondary sport. With the NCC, NSIC, DAC-10, recruiting all or large portions of the same territory as the MIAC attracting those border line talents is difficult.

2) I believe there is an ego "thing" involved when choosing between a Dll, Dlll and NAIA school. Rather than choosing a Dlll school kids will choose a place so they can say they are getting a scholarship. I am not saying this is always the case but it plays a factor in the decision. Once a kid gets to the scholarship school other factors come into play and he may rethink the school choice and transfer to a Dlll school he originally looked at.

3) It's been mentioned before but the $$$ also have to play a factor in the decision. The cost of attending a MIAC School versus a state school is double! You only have to have a modest AGI to find your offspring on the wrong side of the financial aid equation. Yes there are academic scholarships for most kids attending private schools. But it is still a significant financial burden for most kids to attend a MIAC school

The depth of the Minnesota talent pool is definitely a concern in terms of the MIAC being able to build itself up as a national powerhouse. As Drake said, the Land of 10,000 Lakes is not a heavily populated state as compared to Illinois, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, or most of the D3-heavy northeastern states, plus I agree with you that the popularity of high school hockey in Minnesota cuts into the available talent pool of high school athletes to a degree that really isn't the case in other states aside from Massachusetts. The only powerhouse league in D3 that isn't located in a heavily-populated state is the WIAC, and the WIAC has the advantages of cheap tuition and very little instate competition from small scholarship schools -- the only instate D2 is UW-Parkside, and the only instate NAIA programs are Viterbo and Cardinal Stritch.

Your #2 and #3 are very much in evidence as well, but they're issues that the MIAC has in common with everyone else in D3 in terms of being recruiting hurdles.

[Gregory Sager]

Glad to see there are still some people lounging around in the board.  I just got back from a work trip to Texas. 
*************
I like this discussion.  It makes me wonder what other states/regions are heavily skewed in a particular sport? Or perhaps what states produces the most/best collegiate/pro atheletes for a certain sport?

Basketball:
California?  But i could see one of the midwest states

Football:
Since I just came from there, TEXAS

Hockey:
As mentioned, Minnesota

Baseball?
....and for that matter

Soccer? Curling? Swimming? Track/field? Skiing? CHEERLEADING? Darts? Bowling? Archery? Weight lifting? Wrestling? Rugby? Lacrosse? Table Tennis? BEER PONG?

Basketball's really a broadly national sport in the sense that it's not dominated by any one particular state or region in terms of talent. California's a good source of basketball talent, sure, but California's population is more than half again as large as that of the second most populous state (Texas), so it's no surprise that the Golden State churns out more hoopsters than anyone else. Per capita, I'm sure that states such as New York, Indiana, Illinois, New Jersey, etc., do just as well at turning out good basketball players.

Football? Texas is king in terms of manufacturing gridders, as it has been for decades. But don't forget Florida (most of the players from the state's Big Three college programs are home-grown, plus a lot of midwestern schools have drawn their skill-position players from the Sunshine State for many years). Ohio and Pennsylvania are two other traditional football states. Pennsylvania in particular is known as the cradle of quarterbacks -- of 21 QBs inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in the modern (post-WWII) era, six of them are from western Pennsylvania: George Blanda, Johnny Unitas, Joe Namath, Joe Montana, Dan Marino, and Jim Kelly. And there's currently five western Pennsylvanians playing the position in the NFL: Marc Bulger, Bruce Gradkowski, Gus Frerotte, Mike McMahon, and Charlie Batch. That's a pretty astonishing legacy.

Hockey? Minnesota's #1 by a mile. Massachusetts is a distant second, followed by Michigan, New York, Wisconsin, and the smaller New England states. After that, you find that high schools that even offer hockey programs, much less turn out top-notch hockey players, are few and far between. Illinois, for example, has a huge population and is the home of one of the NHL's Original Six franchises -- and yet only a tiny handful of Illinois high schools have hockey teams, media coverage is practically nonexistent, and the state's interscholastic competition organization (the IHSA) doesn't even recognize the sport.

High school baseball's dominated by warm-weather states, just as high school hockey is dominated by cold-weather states. California has produced more major-league ballplayers than any other state for close to three generations now, even going back to the era when it wasn't the most populous state in the republic. Florida, Texas, even less-populated warm-weather states such as Mississippi and South Carolina, turn out a lot of ballplayers. Golf's the same way; any spring or fall outdoor sport that requires well-groomed playing surfaces (as opposed to football) will naturally be dominated by warm-weather states, since their practice and playing seasons can go longer.

[Pat Coleman]

RIP Herb. 

A generation fades away

[Nites]

well that didnt take too long

here is the link

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2007/mar/31/aldrich_already_embracing_rivalry_spirit/?mens_basketball

also pretty disappointed to see what he had to say about his team just wanting the season to be over half way through the year this season...im glad they lost in the first round of state now

Cocky son of a gun.  He's likely in for a rude awakening.

[funbballer]

well that didnt take too long

here is the link

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2007/mar/31/aldrich_already_embracing_rivalry_spirit/?mens_basketball

also pretty disappointed to see what he had to say about his team just wanting the season to be over half way through the year this season...im glad they lost in the first round of state now

Cocky son of a gun.  He's likely in for a rude awakening.

Isn't any high school senior a bit cocky heading off to college? He appears to be very excited and enthusiastic about taking his game to the next level and, I think he's more confident than cocky. In talking with people that know him, he's described as a very nice young man.

Besides, what's wrong with having a little "swagger" about your game?

But, I do agree he's in for some "awakenings" and a few lessons that will come his way. After about 2 hours of his first practice and getting the crap kicked out of him....he'll be settling back to earth real fast!

Wouldn't mind seeing him in the maroon and gold though, wouldn't you?

Cmob....I've declared today as "National Triple Burger Day." Go for it, big fella!!

[sumander]

Kneez, Nice post!

Story in this mornings Daily Planet about the NSIC voting this afternoon to admit 4 new schools (Duluth, Kato, SCSU & Augustana). Sound like it is a no brainer for the NSIC.

What impact, if any, will this have on future recruiting for the MIAC. If it does have an impact will it be immediate or will it take a few years to surface?

Adding those 4 schools will certainly change the dynamics of that conference.

[Drake Palmer]

As always, it'll be interesting to see how this year's recruiting class shakes out.  Sum – I'm of the opinion that having the NSIC & NCC situation resolved helps in the recruiting matters.  Now everyone should know which school is trying to go D1 - NDSU, UND, USD, etc. or D2, & which conference the schools will belong to.

As Greg Sager mentioned, in an ideal world, the MIAC schools would get their topnotch recruits at the beginning of their college years.  However, I think we'll continue to see the trend of kids transferring back to a MIAC school after 1 or 2 years at a scholarship granting school.

If the MIAC basketball coaches (& parents) are doing a good job of recruiting, they should be telling those kids to look real closely at the scholarship package the D2 schools are offering.  At the D1 level, schools are offering full scholarships, but at D2, the athletic scholarship is often a partial scholie, & worth anywhere from 10-50% of the total college costs.  I've heard typical D2 scholarships average around 25% of actual costs.  Most MIAC schools can put together a financial aid package for the family that can at least put the college in the same ballpark with the D2 school. 

But then again you're dealing with 17 & 18 year olds & sometimes the ego's siren call is too inviting.  The pleasure of telling their friends they got an athletic scholarship to East of Nowhere State College & sitting the bench is better than saying they're going to St. Olaf or anywhere else in the MIAC.  After a year or two of riding pine or seeing the handwriting on the wall, some kids will end up transferring back.

[columbianmaffia]

well that didnt take too long

here is the link

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2007/mar/31/aldrich_already_embracing_rivalry_spirit/?mens_basketball

also pretty disappointed to see what he had to say about his team just wanting the season to be over half way through the year this season...im glad they lost in the first round of state now

Cocky son of a gun.  He's likely in for a rude awakening.

Isn't any high school senior a bit cocky heading off to college? He appears to be very excited and enthusiastic about taking his game to the next level and, I think he's more confident than cocky. In talking with people that know him, he's described as a very nice young man.

Besides, what's wrong with having a little "swagger" about your game?

But, I do agree he's in for some "awakenings" and a few lessons that will come his way. After about 2 hours of his first practice and getting the crap kicked out of him....he'll be settling back to earth real fast!

Wouldn't mind seeing him in the maroon and gold though, wouldn't you?

Cmob....I've declared today as "National Triple Burger Day." Go for it, big fella!!

nothin better than a tripple burger on the twins opening day!! and a beer to go with it!!

you maybe right on cole...i think its good to have a swagger in your attitude and in all his interviews ive seen on tv he didnt come off like that...this article kind of rubbed me the wrong way i guess

i couldnt believe they couldnt get cole the ball for the last shot in that game...absolutly shocking...i think the gaurds all had a little extra weight in their shorts after the last 20 seconds of that game