MBB: Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference

Pat Coleman · November 01, 2006, 10:46:24 PM

They're members immediately.

HCAC hoops · November 04, 2006, 12:24:47 PM

Just want to hear what people think...
Hanover is young.... 5 non-freshmen. they have 4 juniors though that played time last year and as freshmen. Can a solid core of players (2 or 3) make them title contenders?
Anderson does not have Nick Rogers on there roster. Is he playing or not? Clarification
Transy picked up some good recuits... can they get back to the NCAA tourney like last year?
Franklin is pre-season number 1, who all can challenge them for the top spot?
Any other sleepers in the league...
any early MVP canidates....

Rose Basketball · November 08, 2006, 11:17:09 PM

Anyone want to take a crack at a Pre-Season All HCAC Team?

RO_24 · November 13, 2006, 03:24:59 PM

Darryl,

Heard the boys looked good up in Berea over the weekend. I don't know if you were there or heard anything, but they won by 4 in their last warm-up before the openers this weekend. Hopefullt that will bode well for the rest of the season.

Anyone know how Hanover is looking this year? I haven't talked to Neuman lately.

Darryl Nester · November 14, 2006, 09:35:10 AM

Rod: I also heard about the scrimmage with BW. A nice performance against the preseason #6 team.

Rose: There are an awful lot of unknowns for me to attempt a preseason all-conference team, but here are a few thoughts in that direction, mostly just based on last season's stats.

AU -- who knows? Aside from the five seniors they graduated, they lost their two top freshmen, Nick Rogers (14.5p, 7.9r) and Terry Coleman (6.4p, 4.9r). Top returning scorer is Nick Cochran (4.0p). The best I can say is, someone (or several someones) will have to step up this year for AU.

BU -- I could name a lot of people here (I'm more than a bit biased), but I'll just go with Mike Anthony and Eric Schwieterman.

DC -- C.J. Johnson and Anthony Pettaway

FC -- Dustin Marshall and John Neill

HC -- Clint Parker and Robby Brown

MC -- Wes Gardner and Jamaal Wade (Wade missed last season, but two years he scored 14.8p as a sophomore).

MSJ -- Robbie Noschang and Tony Blomer

TU -- Joey Searle and Joey Verax

RHIT -- I will leave it for someone from Rose to fill in these blanks.

What do others think? Who do you expect to step up at your school?

Rose Basketball · November 14, 2006, 02:42:12 PM

In terms of potential All-Conference performers from Rose-Hulman, here are a few candidates.......

Jason Bednarko, 6-2, Sr.

Lorenzo Rice, 6-4, Soph.

Jared Moore, 6-3, Jr.

AndOne · November 17, 2006, 08:21:41 PM

Bluffton over Cardinal Stritch by 16 points at the North Central (IL) Tourney. Nice outside shooting by numbers 22 and 33. Good floor leadership by #4. Sorry--gotta run--just wanted to give BU fans the score.

Rose Basketball · November 18, 2006, 12:52:44 AM

Rose-Hulman 57, Wabash 50.

Brian Bibb had 14 points and 9 rebounds for the Enginners (1-0).

Rose plays Aurora University tomorrow afternoon for the Championship of the Wabash College Tip-Off Tournament.

Darryl Nester · November 18, 2006, 09:57:31 AM

AndOne -- Thanks for the update, even though I'd read the results on the NCC site before checking the board this morning. Have a karma point ...

Congrats to Bluffton, RHIT, MSJ, DC, HC, MC, TU, and AU on opening on the plus side. Good showing by Franklin, losing by 3 at Wheaton. Altogether, not a bad first night for the conference.

P.S. RO_24, I saw that NO_24 had 8 points off the bench in his debut as a Beaver.

AndOne · November 18, 2006, 12:34:04 PM

Darryl

You are welcome & thanks for the point.

Bluffton will play North Central for the championship tonight at 8:00 (central time)
Based on how they played last night, it will be Bluffton's outside shooting vs NC's inside game.

NC will also play Franklin from the HCAC next Sat, the 25th, at NC at 7:30 (ct). They have played the last 2 yrs with NC winning by 4 and 12 respectively.

Rose Basketball · November 18, 2006, 08:38:47 PM

Rose-Hulman failed in their bid for a 2-0 start this afternoon, as they drop a 66-61 contest to Aurora University.

http://www.rose-hulman.edu/sports/mbasket/07msum02.htm

AndOne · November 19, 2006, 04:53:28 PM

North Central beat Bluffton in the NC tourney final last night 63-49.
NC shot only 42% for the game, but held Bluffton to 31% shooting.
BU actually closed an 11 point halftime deficit to 2 points with about 7-8 minutes gone in the 2nd half.
One suggestion I would have for Bluffton is to play #24 more. I don't know if any increased PT he might get would be at the expense of #4 as he seems to be the player who runs the offense and sets up most of the BU plays, but he (#4) presents almost no offensive scoring threat. If the opposing team also had to defend #24 (18 pts), it would create more offensive opportunities for #s 22 and 33, both of whom appear to be pretty good shooters. However they were a combined 2 for 13 last night. due at least partly to NC's being able to sag off #4 and help on them. I am not saying #4 is a bad player, just that BU may need to give up some of his floor game in order to create more scoring opportunities.

I was talking with one of the BU players and his family after the game and was surprised when they told me BU was picked for dead last in the conference. If this is true, the HCAC must be one hell of a good conference from top to bottom. After seeing BU play the first 2 games of the season, I think picking them for last place in the league is rubbish. Keep in mind that this comes from a CCIW fan who has no bias for or against any HCAC school. Not knocking the other conference teams here, just saying if you are playing BU and think you are going to have an easy game against the team picked for last place, be prepared to be surprised.

Darryl Nester · November 20, 2006, 09:37:32 AM

AndOne -- thanks for the observations. As we noted in earlier conversations after the pre-season poll came out, 4th and 9th place in the poll were separated by 5 points, so mostly, the poll just tells us that the coaches don't know what's going to happen. (I also heard that after Franklin's coach Kerry Prather saw that his team had been picked #1 overall, he sent an e-mail to the other HCAC coaches suggesting that based on that result, he was tempted to push for drug-testing for coaches.)

RO_24 · November 20, 2006, 10:58:36 AM

Thanks for those updates AndOne...I wanted to listen to the game on Saturday, but was preoccupied sobbing over the Michigan loss. The conference is typically pretty solid from top to bottom I think, you'll have your blowouts some nights though. Be interesting to see how Franklin matches up with North Central. Big week for Bluffton with 3 games this week, I'll be heading to all 3 of them, so hopefully they can come away this week with some confidence. Maybe I'll see you in Bluffton this weekend Darryl, if not, have a good Thanksgiving, as to everyone else.

Gregory Sager · November 21, 2006, 02:13:51 AM

Quote from: RO_24 on November 20, 2006, 10:58:36 AMBe interesting to see how Franklin matches up with North Central.

And how! Franklin is a guard-oriented team that's small up front. North Central is a big, forward-oriented team that's inexperienced in the backcourt. It should prove to be a complete contrast of strengths and weaknesses, the sort of scenario that always proves interesting.

I'll say this for the Grizzlies, whom I saw on Saturday -- they're small and they're young, but they're very fundamentally sound.