FB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[USee]

Illinois Wesleyan Titans

Roster 131

SR: 20, Jr: 19, So: 41, Fr: 51

Returning Starters:

Offense: 3 (RB, WR, QB) Key Losses: RB Bulli, 5 OL. Key Returners: WR Hamilton. Key Newcomer: QB Lemanger
Defense: 5 (2 DL, 3 DB). Key Losses: LB Metzger. Key Returners: DT Murphy. Key Newcomer: LB Wingerter

2021 Record 3-7

IWU is an interesting case study. They had their first losing year in 15 seasons in 2021. It was a disaster and probably shouldn't have been that bad. This season they return only 8 starters (7 now that they have named a new QB starter) and on paper shouldn't be as good as they were last year. On offense they lose 5 OL that started every game and their top 2 RB's. On Defense they bring back just 4 of their top 10 tacklers and have to replace their entire LB crew. But this year feels like a better year than last year in many ways. They have 20 seniors and 19 juniors. Many of this years starters have seen significant playing time or are upper classmen. There is talent among the ranks. Charlie Hamilton is an upper level CCIW WR. Connor Murphy is a POY candidate on Defense and they have just named a Mt Union transfer as their starting QB, supplanting a 2 year starter (Sage Shindler)who completed 63% of his passes and started almost 20 games (so this kid must be good). Seth Albin takes over at RB where he gained 362 yds in '21 and Eash is an OL coach so, while that group is young, they will be well coached. On defense they have 5 returning starters but another 3-4 who have played a lot. Their schedule is not great but they do have a very winnable game vs OWU and get NCC, Carroll and Augie at home along with Carthage and NPU. I feel like this kind of year is when Norm Eash does some of his best work. Last year was worse than expected and I think this year the Titans outperform their preseason pick. This is a bold prediction for me but I think they could win as many as 7 games and shouldn't get blown out in any games. My prediction 7-3

[USee]

Wheaton College Thunder

Roster: 115 (estimate: '22 roster and numbers not posted yet)

(All of these numbers are estimates based on LY's roster) GR: 5, Sr: 30, Jr: 13, So: 37, New comers: 30

Returning Starters:

Offense: 5 (3 OL, RB, WR). Key Losses: WR Terrini, C Hibben, QB Anthony. Key Returners: RB Weeks, QB Tucker, OL Wall. Key Newcomer: OT Aiden Kingsbury (Princeton Transfer)
Defense: 1 (1 DE): Key Losses: DT's McCrae and Holaday, DE Shindledecker, LBs Schwartz and Lee. Key Returnees: DE Anthony, LB Shaffer

2021 Record: 10-2 (2nd Round NCAA Playoffs)

Wheaton loses their top 11 tacklers on defense from their 10-2 team a year ago, returning only #11 tackle leader Brayden Anthony (30 tackles, 5.5 sacks) from last year's generationally superb defense. Lots of new faces on defense with very little playing experience and that is going to show up early in this schedule. Defensive Coordinator CJ Nightingale will have the toughest task of his tenure at Wheaton. He has to shape a bunch of players with no experience on the field into a cohesive defensive unit capable of competing at the national level.  Offensively Wheaton is in better shape with 3 returning OL and pre-season AA candidate Giovanni Weeks (8.5 ypc, 18 TD's 133 ypg; 23 receptions 362 yds) at RB who was the most productive RB in the conference last year. The running game should be excellent and is the strength of this team. They also get back QB Jeremiah Tucker (57% completions, 4 Td's 0 Int; 401 yds rushing) and his brother Matthew at WR (39 Receptions 500 yds). Transfer OT Aiden Kingsbury from Princeton and QB Will Bowers from Liberty will help make the offense the strength of this team.  They have the toughest schedule in the conference hosting IWU, Elmhurst, Carroll, Millikin and NPU and travelling to Trinity TX, Augie, NCC, Carthage, WashU. Wheaton scored 48.3 ppg last year and gave up just 13.8. They are going to have to improve on that offensive number as the defensive number is going to double or triple in the early going most likely. The Thunder have a defacto playoff game September 10th at #9 Trinity Texas (21 returning starters from a 9-0 team) as they absolutely have to win that game to have any hope for the post season. This could be a disappointing year for us Thunder fans unless some young players on this roster emerge. Jesse Scott has his work cut out for him and this Thunder team could be 6-4 or 9-1 depending on how good the inexperienced talent is and how well they get coached up. Prediction: 8-2

[USee]

North Central Cardinals

Roster: 120

SR: 12, Jr: 20, So: 48, Fr: 39

Returning Starters:

Offense: 9 (5 OL, QB, TE,RB, WR). Key Losses: WR Kamienski, OL Clarke. Key Returners: 6 OL, RB Greenfield, WR Hardy
Defense 6 (3 DL, 3 DB). Key Losses: DB Beesley, Cremeens, Lindmark, LB Wong and Simmons. Key Returners: DE Gilroy, Rich, DB Bell

North Central enters the 2022 season with the fewest questions. 15 returning starters are back from their 13-1 national runner up campaign. On offense they have to replace one of the most productive WR in D3 history in Andrew Kamienski as well as one of the most dominant OL in Sharmore Clarke. Clarke will be replaced by a deep offensive line bench where 3 of them have starting experience. Kamienski is tougher to replace and with Blake Williams also gone that leaves DeAngelo Hardy as the primary target for sophomore Luke Lehnen. But Ethan Greenfiel and Terrance Hill will be featured this season as NCC will no doubt try to build on the 293 yds average per game rushing they established last year.  In the offensive backfield the Cardinals have an embarrassment of riches. Of the top 25 rushing leaders in the league last year, North Central has 5 of them. Greenfield with 1796, Terrance Hill is 3rd with 796, Luke Lehnen 11th with 464, Joe Sacco 313 and Darius Byrd 213 yds.

Defensively North Central returns 2 very productive DE's in Gilroy *8.5 sacks, 15 TFl, 35 tackles) and Rich (8.5 sacks, 31 tacksle) and DT Greifelt. Julian Bell's return in secondary is huge as he will pair with speedster corner Nic Rummell and safety Sam Taviani. North Central has plenty of talent to make another deep run into the post season. They upgraded their non conference slate with a visit to Crawfordsville vs Wabash as the opener. Home games vs Elmhurst, Wheaton, Millikin, NPU and Augie are favorable with challenging road contests @WashU and @IWU in the back half of the season. I see no reason they can't repeat their 53 ppg on offense (100 TD's) and stay close to their 14.5 ppg (21 TD's) defensive production. Prediction: 10-0

[Next Man Up]

Not going to delve too deeply into a full analysis, but after a perfunctory review of the 2022 NCC Cardinals, I sense some of the more important aspects the Cards need to address this season might include the following;
* A new Blake Williams needs to emerge as a second strong receiver in order that opposing pass defenses not be overly able concentrate on DeAngelo Hardy.
* Particularly strong play by the offensive left tackle in protecting Luke Lehnen's blind side.
* Continued development and efficiency on Lehnen's part, further building on the great foundation he laid down as a freshman last season.
* While the D line and backfield come in strong, the Cards need a couple of LBs to step up into the shoes of Wong & Simmons, two very valuable components of NCC's recent successes.
* Brad Spencer has been a major reason why NCC has been as good as they've been for an extended period of time, and he enjoys strong support from the Cardinal community. While it's likely he will carry over many aspects of the philosophy, team building, and game planning of the Thornes' he undoubtedly will do some things differently. I think how quickly his new mode of operations can be assimilated and ingrained by the team will play an important role. I trust spring and now fall practice will have taken care of most of this "brake-in" period.

[USee]

Wheaton College Thunder

Roster: 115 (estimate: '22 roster and numbers not posted yet)

(All of these numbers are estimates based on LY's roster) GR: 5, Sr: 30, Jr: 13, So: 37, New comers: 30

Returning Starters:

Offense: 5 (3 OL, RB, WR). Key Losses: WR Terrini, C Hibben, QB Anthony. Key Returners: RB Weeks, QB Tucker, OL Wall. Key Newcomer: OT Aiden Kingsbury (Princeton Transfer)
Defense: 1 (1 DE): Key Losses: DT's McCrae and Holaday, DE Shindledecker, LBs Schwartz and Lee. Key Returnees: DE Anthony, LB Shaffer

2021 Record: 10-2 (2nd Round NCAA Playoffs)

Wheaton loses their top 11 tacklers on defense from their 10-2 team a year ago, returning only #11 tackle leader Brayden Anthony (30 tackles, 5.5 sacks) from last year's generationally superb defense. Lots of new faces on defense with very little playing experience and that is going to show up early in this schedule. Defensive Coordinator CJ Nightingale will have the toughest task of his tenure at Wheaton. He has to shape a bunch of players with no experience on the field into a cohesive defensive unit capable of competing at the national level.  Offensively Wheaton is in better shape with 3 returning OL and pre-season AA candidate Giovanni Weeks (8.5 ypc, 18 TD's 133 ypg; 23 receptions 362 yds) at RB who was the most productive RB in the conference last year. The running game should be excellent and is the strength of this team. They also get back QB Jeremiah Tucker (57% completions, 4 Td's 0 Int; 401 yds rushing) and his brother Matthew at WR (39 Receptions 500 yds). Transfer OT Aiden Kingsbury from Princeton and QB Will Bowers from Liberty will help make the offense the strength of this team.  They have the toughest schedule in the conference hosting IWU, Elmhurst, Carroll, Millikin and NPU and travelling to Trinity TX, Augie, NCC, Carthage, WashU. Wheaton scored 48.3 ppg last year and gave up just 13.8. They are going to have to improve on that offensive number as the defensive number is going to double or triple in the early going most likely. The Thunder have a defacto playoff game September 10th at #9 Trinity Texas (21 returning starters from a 9-0 team) as they absolutely have to win that game to have any hope for the post season. This could be a disappointing year for us Thunder fans unless some young players on this roster emerge. Jesse Scott has his work cut out for him and this Thunder team could be 6-4 or 9-1 depending on how good the inexperienced talent is and how well they get coached up. Prediction: 8-2

This week down in San Antonio, the Thunder kick off their 2022 campaign. They are facing a team that brings 21 starters back from a team that went 9-0 and was forced (due to archaic NCAA policies) to play UMHB in the first round of the playoffs because of proximity and costs. They have an AA type quarterback, Tucker Horn (68% completions, 33 TD's/3 INT 2,473 yds) who was POY in their conference, who will be throwing to 3 veteran WR's (39, 33, 29 receptions and 22 TD's) and an AA LB, Caleb Harmel (70 tacksl, 2 INT) who was DPOY in their conference.

Wheaton has a brutal schedule to start the year, playing 2 top 10 teams on the road in their first 4 games and hosting IWU (predicted 7-3) and traveling to Augie (predicted 6-4) between those contests. 3 road games in 4 weeks and 4 games against the best teams the Thunder will play all season.  We will know quickly what we have with this years Thunder squad.

[79jaybird]

I know it's only week 1 and anybody can have a bad day at the office, but it's going to be a LONG year for Elmhurst.
The Jays generated just 79 yds of offense and that's not going to beat anybody.   Going into the game I knew it was a tall order
to beat UWRF,  but I was just hoping (minimally) for some consistency and drive.  I didn't see either.  Neither QB looked all that sharp and overall IMO, just a sloppy game.   

[iwu70]

USee, thanks for all the information and assessments of the CCIW teams and rosters.   Much appreciated.

I hope you are right about IWU, though my own sense of it is more likely to be 6-4 or even 5-5.   We'll see.  It's pretty clear the 3-7 result last season has left a very bad taste in the mouth of many returning IWU players and coaches. 

Here we go starting this weekend with Ohio Wesleyan. 

'70

[kiko]

Saturday looks like this:

Matinees:
Hendrix at Wash U
North Central at Wabash
Ohio Wesleyan at Illinois Wesleyan

Evening:
Carroll at Wisconsin Lutheran
Wheaton at Trinity (TX)

[Thunderdome21]

Wheaton College Thunder

Roster: 115 (estimate: '22 roster and numbers not posted yet)

(All of these numbers are estimates based on LY's roster) GR: 5, Sr: 30, Jr: 13, So: 37, New comers: 30

Returning Starters:

Offense: 5 (3 OL, RB, WR). Key Losses: WR Terrini, C Hibben, QB Anthony. Key Returners: RB Weeks, QB Tucker, OL Wall. Key Newcomer: OT Aiden Kingsbury (Princeton Transfer)
Defense: 1 (1 DE): Key Losses: DT's McCrae and Holaday, DE Shindledecker, LBs Schwartz and Lee. Key Returnees: DE Anthony, LB Shaffer

2021 Record: 10-2 (2nd Round NCAA Playoffs)

Wheaton loses their top 11 tacklers on defense from their 10-2 team a year ago, returning only #11 tackle leader Brayden Anthony (30 tackles, 5.5 sacks) from last year's generationally superb defense. Lots of new faces on defense with very little playing experience and that is going to show up early in this schedule. Defensive Coordinator CJ Nightingale will have the toughest task of his tenure at Wheaton. He has to shape a bunch of players with no experience on the field into a cohesive defensive unit capable of competing at the national level.  Offensively Wheaton is in better shape with 3 returning OL and pre-season AA candidate Giovanni Weeks (8.5 ypc, 18 TD's 133 ypg; 23 receptions 362 yds) at RB who was the most productive RB in the conference last year. The running game should be excellent and is the strength of this team. They also get back QB Jeremiah Tucker (57% completions, 4 Td's 0 Int; 401 yds rushing) and his brother Matthew at WR (39 Receptions 500 yds). Transfer OT Aiden Kingsbury from Princeton and QB Will Bowers from Liberty will help make the offense the strength of this team.  They have the toughest schedule in the conference hosting IWU, Elmhurst, Carroll, Millikin and NPU and travelling to Trinity TX, Augie, NCC, Carthage, WashU. Wheaton scored 48.3 ppg last year and gave up just 13.8. They are going to have to improve on that offensive number as the defensive number is going to double or triple in the early going most likely. The Thunder have a defacto playoff game September 10th at #9 Trinity Texas (21 returning starters from a 9-0 team) as they absolutely have to win that game to have any hope for the post season. This could be a disappointing year for us Thunder fans unless some young players on this roster emerge. Jesse Scott has his work cut out for him and this Thunder team could be 6-4 or 9-1 depending on how good the inexperienced talent is and how well they get coached up. Prediction: 8-2

Wheaton's 2022 Roster is now up.

24 Freshman
34 Sophomores
14 Juniors
42 Seniors (30 Fourth year, 12 Fifth year)
2 GY Transfers (QB Bowers from Liberty and K Winnett from University of Georgia)

The fifth year seniors are the same as I mentioned in an earlier post (Wall, Tucker, Ledbetter, Anthony, Shaffer, Cannon, Watson, Skakovac, Erickson, Bentley,) along with Steve Barker and Tyler Gautier both of whom are receivers.  Gautier coming back is especially big due to his athleticism and will catch everything thrown his way, like the incredible circus catch against Carthage last year. 

I went to Wheaton's Scrimmage against Olivet Nazarene (ONU) about 10 days ago and the offense looks really good. All three QBs (Bowers, Tucker, Thorson) were given equal playing time and all of them did really well but Bowers was almost perfect, making 10 out of 11 of his throws.  ONU loaded the box, which really opened up the passing game for Wheaton and the receivers caught every ball that was catchable except for one. Whether it is Tucker or Bowers as the QB, this offense has the potential to be better than both 2021 and 2019. The only drawback is that they don't have an All-American type TE like they've had in years past.

As for the defense, the lack of experience did show during the scrimmage. There were some unnecessary penalties that hurt them, but the D-line (especially DE Anthony and DT Ferlita) looked good. The linebackers held their own (although there were a few times they were out of position), but the real concern will probably be with the defensive backs again. Although as a unit they have more length and athleticism than last year's group. In the scrimmage, they gave up some big plays as a result of miscommunication and a few missed tackles but I didn't see the D-backs getting beat in one-on-one coverage the way they did in last year's scrimmage against the same (All-American) WR. Correction...Actually I do remember it happening one time in this year's scrimmage.   While the defense will not be nearly the dominating force that it was last year, it has some potential to be pretty good. But it also has the potential to allow 40pts against a high powered offense because of their inexperience.       

[Next Man Up]

The North Central Two-Deep for this season's opening game at Wabash on Saturday lists new offensive starters at left guard, right tackle, and wide receiver. Defensively, the Cardinals entire front four return, but 2 of three linebackers will be new, as well as both safeties, and one of the cornerbacks.

North Central SID Clark Teuscher and his staff do a tremendous job with Game Notes, Rosters, and 2 Deeps. Here they are for the Wabash game:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/sidearm.sites/northcentralcardinals.com/documents/2022/9/7/fb_gamenotes_20220910.pdf

[USee]

The North Central Two-Deep for this season's opening game at Wabash on Saturday lists new offensive starters at left guard, right tackle, and wide receiver. Defensively, the Cardinals entire front four return, but 2 of three linebackers will be new, as well as both safeties, and one of the cornerbacks.

North Central SID Clark Teuscher and his staff do a tremendous job with Game Notes, Rosters, and 2 Deeps. Here they are for the Wabash game:

https://s3.amazonaws.com/sidearm.sites/northcentralcardinals.com/documents/2022/9/7/fb_gamenotes_20220910.pdf

Will Ebert at RT is not a new starter. He has more than 20 starts at NCC. Zach Fortier has also been a starter but isn't on the 2 deep, may be hurt?  So 9 starters are back on offense , with transfer Joey Lombardi starting at WR, so really just the freshman LG and the other WR, Braithwaite.

On defense, Julian Bell at safety is also a returning starter for NCC, albeit a couple years removed, and starting corner Antwain Walker is a transfer with a couple years college experience at NIU. Only 3 of the 4 DL are returning starters. Dan Lester played some last year (10 tackles in 8 games) but I don't think he ever started. Looks like 6 returning starters on defense.

Either way, NCC has seemingly filled their holes and are loaded.

[83LittleGiant]

For those of you interested, below is the link to the Wabash game notes for this weekend's game.  For those of you making the trip, safe travels. 

https://sports.wabash.edu/documents/2022/9/8/9-10-22_vs_North_Central_College.pdf

[Ralph Turner]

Listening to a wonderful book by S C Gwynne about the Air Raid offense called The Perfect Pass.

He notes that the first forward pass occurred on Sept 5, 1906, by St Louis U versus Carroll College.

Most readers will pick it up after supper and finish it before midnight.

[WUPHF]

A mildly interesting footnote...

If you talk to a SLU alum, they may say their beloved institution invented the forward pass.  But, the forward pass had been around for many years, though illegal, and many schools, including the Ivys and the Western Conference schools, were practicing the forward pass before the 1906 season started.

At the time, football season began in late September or early October for most institutions, but SLU had what they recognized as a scrimmage with Carroll weeks before the regular season began and the rest is history.

SLU later built a fantastic stadium that would have been worthy of a Division I football program, but four decades later, SLU quit football altogether.

[matblake]

I really am looking forward to the Wheaton/Trinity game.  I think it will be a good test for both teams.  It will be interesting to see how Wheaton handles the travel.