Top 25 talk

[formerbant10]

True Fan, clearly the Midwest has the deepest amount of talent...that goes w/o saying.  Any chance of having some northeast teams in your top 25?

[True Basketball Fan]

I'm sure there will be a few.  I'll have to get back to you on that one, just became extra busy at work.

[titan2000]

I wonder if the UW-O Titans will be number 1 after defeating the Lawrence Vikings in 2 OT by a score of 87-85 in their 2005/2006 opener at Alexander Gym in Appleton.

Will the lack of respect for LU bring them down, or will it just be another win in the ratings game ?

[Titan Q]

Let the annual Street & Smith's debate begin...

(Division III preview by Chuck Mistovich, Basketball Times)

1. Illinois Wesleyan
2. Mississippi College
3. UW-Oshkosh
4. York
5. Virginia Wesleyan
6. Ursinus
7. Amherst
8. Ramapo
9. Wittenberg
10. Wilkes


Illinois Wesleyan

Coach Scott Trost's Titans are loaded.  The top eight scorers return on this senior-laden team that was 21-5 last year, and they are looking every bit as good as the Wesleyan team that won the NCAA Division III Tournament in 1997.  All-America candidates are 6-6 Keelan Amelianovich (17.9 ppg, 4.8 rpg) and 6-3 Adam Dauksas (15.1 ppg, 5.6 apg).  Wesleyan also features 6-7 Zach Freeman (14.2 ppg, 6.8 rpg) and three 6-6 inside men who make the Titans look more like a Division II team than Division III.  These seniors have reached the NCAA playoffs three straight years with a combined 64-18 record.


Street & Smith's Preseason All-America Team:

First

Keelan Amelianovich, Illinois Wesleyan
Adam Dauksas, Illinois Wesleyan
Tyler Rhoten, Trinity (Conn)
Justin Wansley, Randolph-Macon
Tyler Winford, Mississippi

Second

Chris Braier, Lawrence
Sekani Francis, Lehman
Cedric Isom, East Texas Baptist
Kyle Myrick, Lincoln (Pa)
Daniel Russ, Wittenberg

[Pat Coleman]

I see four teams in that poll that might not be in my preseason Top 25: 2, 6, 7, 10.

[True Basketball Fan]

I agree, Mississippi College at #2.  That's ridiculous, they don't play anybody.  Unfortunately, they'll probably stay up there with their lack of competitive opponents, then get ousted by a midwest team in the NCAA Tourney.

Who would you put up in those 4 spots mentioned?

[Pat Coleman]

Well, they won't "stay up there" because Street & Smith (thankfully) does not do anything other than a preseason poll.

I don't have enough information to so a legitimate preseason poll at this time, but I would have UW-Oshkosh and Illinois Wesleyan in the top two spots (might be a coin flip)

[David Collinge]

A coin flip to decide between UW-O and IWU?  A tight Titan tie? 

[Mr. Ypsi]

Well,

As long as Titans are in the top two slots, I guess I could live with either order!

[Mr. Ypsi]

Pat,

Out of curiosity, does Smith & Street (and the other one-shot wonders, with one page for d3) even do a poll?  Isn't it more likely an intern assigned to produce 'something, anything' to give a slop to (ie, hopefully sell a few copies to) those wierdos who root for anything above d1?

[True Basketball Fan]

Their poll is always very different than say, D3hoops.com.  I know which one is more accurate, as do all of you.  I imagine their research is minimal, but so is their focus.  They probably shouldn't even do a poll at all and just stick to giving those extra pages to the DI scrubs.

[Titan Q]

Street & Smith's does a Division III Top 10 each year, but they do not have any sort of ongoing poll.

As noted above, the S & S 2005-06 Division III preview was done by Chuck Mistovich, who is the Small College Editor for Basketball Times magazine.  I don't know much about Mistovich, but I do know he has been covering small college basketball (NAIA, NCAA II, NCAA III) for a long time.

A sample of a couple articles by him I found via Google search...

http://nabc.collegesports.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/021805aaa.html

http://nabc.collegesports.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/011905aaa.html


I think it is fair to say that Street & Smith at least found someone who knows small college basketball to put together their small college pieces.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Q,

I'm not sure it is 'fair to say' Smith & Street [and, yes, that is a deliberate mis-statement of their name] has come up with an expert for d3 - can anyone really be an expert on NAIA, d2, and d3?  It may be an improvement on my presumed intern, but is it REALLY any major progress?

I'd be curious as to this 'expert's' top 25, 'cause his top 10 sure looks weird (not that I'm complaining about IWU, mind you!).

[Titan Q]

Chuck, I did not say they came up with a "D3 expert."  I said:

"I think it is fair to say that Street & Smith at least found someone who knows small college basketball..."

I posted his notes on Illinois Wesleyan.  Notes on 2, 3, 4, and 5...

2. Mississippi College

The Choctaws were supposed to be rebuilding last year.  Instead they reloaded.  Only one senior returned to the team, but 11 newcomers and 6-5 freshman Tyler Winford (11.9 ppg) joined the program and carried coach Don Lofton's club to a 24-5 finish and Sweet 16 appearance in the NCAA Tournament.  The return of four starters, 16 total lettermen and more recruits should energize Mississippi College, whose opponents shot just 38.9 percent from the field and averaged only 62.5 points per game last season.

3. Wisconsin-Oshkosh

The Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference has produced four NCAA champions in the last seven years.  Wisconsin-Stevens Point is rebuilding and probably won't win its third in a row, so Oshkosh may very well carry the league banner this time.  After all, the Titans were the last team Stevens Point lost to, during a WIAC game last February.  Coach Ted Van Dellen returns four starters and nine other lettermen from last year's 19-8 team.  Defense is the Oshkosh game, as the Titans allowed just 62.7 points per game last season.  Top returnees are 6-7 Jim Capelle (14.4 ppg, 5.4 rpg), 6-3 Andy Jahnke (14.6 ppg) and 7-1 Kerry Gibson (11.7 ppg, 6.5 rpg).

4. York

The Spartans won't surprise anyone this year, not after their school-record 28-4 mark and a Final Four appearance in 2004.  Coach Jeff Gamber welcomes back seven veterans, led by 6-3 Brandon Bushey (16.0 ppg) and double figure scorers Kenny Fass, 6-7 Chad McGowan,  and 6-8 Brian Singer.  York has size, depth and talent - all attributes of a potential national champion.

5.  Virginia Wesleyan

The Marlins are deep and talented, with four starters and 13 lettermen back from a 24-6 team that received and NCAA bid last season.  There is plenty of firepower with the likes of 6-5 Brandon Adair (18.2 ppg, 7.8 rpg), 6-1 Ton Ton Balenga (12.7 ppg), and 6-0 Marques Fitch (10.5).  Coach Dave Macedo has only three seniors on this experienced team.

[Gregory Sager]

Well,

As long as Titans are in the top two slots, I guess I could live with either order!

Does this mean that you're going to be road-tripping to Westminster (PA) games this year, Chuck?

Speaking of Chucks ... Chuck Mistovich certainly has impeccable credentials. He's been around forever. I can remember subscribing to some broadsheet -- it might've been Basketball Times, if they were using a broadsheet format on newsprint back then -- back in the early eighties, because Mistovich's column in it was the only source for D3 basketball's national scene (that was much more of an oxymoron then than it is today ) that I could find anywhere.

But in retrospect, I'm sure that what Mistovich was doing was recycling press releases. I strongly doubt that he was actually getting out to a lot of D3 gyms during the season to come up with his own material, especially since his beat also included NAIA and NCAA's D2. It was a long time ago, but I distinctly remember that the CCIW program that made the most appearances in his column (his column consisted of two- or three-sentence blurbs on various teams or players, for the most part) was Elmhurst. I remember how that used to confuse and frustrate me, since Elmhurst was the rock-bottom program in the league during the eighties. Thinking back on it now, I'm sure the reason behind those mentions in the column was because Elmhurst had an SID who had Mistovich on his mailing list.

I'm grateful that he was actually writing that column, though, such as it was. The pre-d3hoops.com era was the Dark Ages for those of us who wanted to follow D3 outside of our own leagues. His column, and the annual Street & Smith D3 preview, were like the D3 basketball version of the Berlin Airlift. I used to haunt convenience stores every September waiting for that S&S issue to come out so that I could find out what such mysterious entities as Salisbury State, Southern Maine, and Muskingum were up to.

Now the S&S preview looks shabby and under-researched by comparison, thanks to this website. Still, if I ever run into Chuck Mistovich, I'm gonna shake his hand and give him a hearty "thank you" for all the tidbits I gleaned from him over D3's years in the information wilderness.