FB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[devildog29]

Does that mean I'm officially my father now?

[scotty]

devildog29, sadly i agree but that is the way of the world...

[Mr. Ypsi]

I think I'm beginning to detect at least ONE of the problems in Bloomington - aside from Devildog and me, are there ANY Titans still posting?  On the bball board, they complain that the board is dominated by 'green wienies'.  Despite PAST success in fball, have we become entirely a bball school?

While I'm obviously (overly?) proud of our bball success (as my tag line will make clear!), I'd hate to see us throw in the towel on other sports!  C'mon Titans - you were 6-1 in conference as recently as '00 and '01 (and undefeated in '92 and '96)!  Has 'going to Salem' in bball overruled success in other sports??!!

[devildog29]

Ypsi, as I was sort of alluding to before, I don't think the school has given up on the other sports, look at baseball, softball, etc., overall the school is still one of the top athletic schools in the conference, all sports.  Football has just suffered from a down recruiting period I think.  Wesleyan has always been finesse, big play type of team.  Even on our teams in the 90's when I was around, we were never known to just wear a team down with long sustained drives and totally control the clock.  We always hung around, hung around, hung around, and then bam, 65 yard touchdown.  Our offense was never much at ball control, which really tested the defense.  Because of this style of play, you need to have tremendous athletes to make those kind of plays (Chris Basaillon, Tommy Monken, Lon Erickson, Deion Hornsby, Ryan Tusek, Dana Smith,, Eric White, etc).  I don't think we have the athletes to pull those type of plays off right now.  So added together, poor ball control, and lack of supernatural athletes breaking big plays, the defense is on the field a WHOLE BUNCH during the game, which will catch up to you and has the last few years.

[Mugsy]

devildog,
Honestly I don't think I can make much of a comment about the level of defense over the past 5 to 10 years in comparison to the past, given I don't get the chance to see nearly as many games as I used too.  That being said, you don't see many CCIW teams giving up between 10-12pts a game or less like you used to.  This may be in part to some extremely potent offenses (30+ pts).

It seems to me that in addition to Augie's tough D, Millikin used to have a very powerful, athletic defense as well (always some stud middle linebacker).  IWU in the years where they contended for the conference title, did so with defense (as they usually have a wide open pro-style offense with good QB and receivers).

The opinion has been expressed by several CCIW posters over the past few years that until the CCIW champion can attain a higher level of defensive prowess, it will be difficult to get past the Mount Union or any other opponent deeper into the playoffs, without a perfect, mistake free game.  While Augie had a very powerful, ball possession offensive in the 80's, it was their defense that won championships.  Look at the scores of some of their playoff runs and at how they shutdown their oppenents.

[Mugsy]

Mr. Upsi,
The past few years there have been very few regular IWU posters (and by regular I mean frequency of posts  )  Quite the opposite of the D3Hoops post, where it seems as if sometimes it is really the IWU post, not the CCIW post.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Mygsu (oops!),

That's OK, I''m used to telemarketers and customer reps who can't figure out Ypsilanti - I just tell 'em, 'think of the Y as an I and it is just like it sounds'!

Yeah, I realize that the Titans have not fallen out completely in other sports, but let's face it - football and bball are the only ones that (alas) seem to matter (even Pat has taken to attaching a 'tag line' that 'no, we are not adding any other sports'! - I've probably kidded him one too many times about d3soccer.com or d3lacrosse.com)!

It's true that CCIW Chat (the bball board) is (alas) mainly IWU (and Wheaton); while I wouldn't expect this board to be DOMINATED by Titans, I wish there were SOME of us!  Maybe I'm wrong, but I think the absence is due to a fall-off in passion for fball.  I go WAY back (football would be '66-'69 seasons), but we used to come out 3,000 strong to see Steve Laub and company!  While we never had a national run like Augie, we used to be a conference threat EVERY year - it is sad to see consistent bottom-half finishes.

[Mugsy]

Mr. Ypsi,
Sorry for the typo... I was only off by one key though.  Not too bad for 11:30pm...

[diehardfan]

D3Hoops post, where it seems as if sometimes it is really the IWU post, not the CCIW post.

Lol... true that!

Most bizarre post of the past week award - Mugsy getting ragged on for posting recruiting information. Um, why?

[diehardfan]

Conference rings, to my knowledge, arent given to the team, but the team can get one made, paid out of their pockets. 

yeah... that's what alumni are for, hah!

[Augie6]

DanSand,

Good guess (although probably not too hard).  You're right.

All,

Comments about Augie and Defense in the CCIW are right on.
The philosophy at Augie during Reade's tenure was:  we will practice it until we get it right (repetition), then we will out-execute the other team on game day.  We made very few adjustments to our basic philosophy, just dared people to out-execute us.  On defense, the philosophy was simple:  1) Get a turnover 2) go 3 and out.  We did this by being very aggressive/pressure oriented in our defensive scheme.  We wanted our offense to be on the field pounding our opponents defense as long as possible and, typically, that's what happened.  Over the past few seasons, Augie's defense has been average at best, pathetic at times.  When an Augie offense scores 38 points and the team loses, you really have to question everything about that defense (players, coaches, philosophy).

Carthage seems to be on the right track with an aggressive/attacking defensive scheme, however, they still gave up almost 20 points per game last year which isn't going to win National Championships.  During our last two championship seasons (85 & 86), we gave up an average of 6.1 and 5.6 points per game for the season, and, more importantly, kept both averages under 10 points per game during the playoffs (9.5 in 85 and 6.75 in 86). 

Although some of the offenses in the CCIW have been very strong over the past several seasons, it doesn't mean a team(s) can't develop strong defenses.  During our champioship run, Wheaton, Millikin, Elmhurst and IWU had highly rated offenses on a national basis.  In 1983, Wheaton, Elmhurst and Augie were rated 1-3 in the nation in total offense (yards per game).  As several of you have pointed out, until we see defense played at a much higher level in the CCIW, it will be difficult for any of the teams to win a national championship.

[79jaybird]

Mugsy, you're right, I misread that.  Now it makes more sense.  
I couldn't imagine a 303 lb linebacker being able to move.
Pat, I have mixed feelings either way.  During our broadcasts my analyst and I have proposed trophies for EC vs. NC  EC vs. Carthage (Elmhurst's arch rival) and IWU vs. Millikin  For the EC vs. NC I thought of "the bird bowl"  have a big bird painted half blue and half red mounted on a trophy with the winning team engraving their name in it annually.
For the EC vs. Carthage I thought of the I94 battle  have a 94 one side painted blue, the other red.
For IWU vs. MIllikin I thought of two.  The corn bowl  or the Route 51 bowl.
These are goofy names of course, but there should be more traveling trophies in the CCIW like the Oaken bucket, Paul Bunyon Axe, or Cortaca Jug.

[Mugsy]

Jaybird and Pat,

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I interpretted Pat's comment about having trophies as to having a trophy for the conferrence champion (as opposed to individual rings).

Also, there already is at least one game a year in the CCIW where the winner gets a trophy.  The game for the "Little Brass Bell" between NCC and Wheaton, which was introduced in 1946.  Wheaton holds a 42-14 advantage in the battle for the bell.  For the history behind the trophy check out page 38 of the *.pdf file at the link below.

http://www.wheaton.edu/Athletics/football/Yearbook.pdf

"Thus endeth the lesson..." (history lesson that is)

[diehardfan]

"Thus endeth the lesson..." (history lesson that is)

"Thus endeth the history lesson" would make a great signature for you, Mugsy 

[Mugsy]

diehard,
Touche... and that it would!    Adding it now...