MBB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

Ralph Turner · January 09, 2009, 08:06:50 PM

Southwestern 36, Trinity 30 at the half.

I cannot find Livestats for Southwestern.

pbrooks3 · January 09, 2009, 09:14:24 PM

Trinity pulled out a squeaker - 75-73. Didn't get to follow the game, but the Live Stats were on the Southwestern Athletic Department website. Didn't see a link at the SCAC. I love Southwestern's live stats - it is one of the best I've seen.

Watched Millsaps lose a tough one on the video capture tonight by 2 to Austin after making up a 15-point halftime deficit. I didn't track things carefully, but the scoring seemed to come to a grinding halt with about 5 minutes left in the game. Millsaps got up by at least a point several times and I thought they were about to take control, but everytime they got the lead, Austin took it away. A couple of good road wins for western division teams.

pbrooks3 · January 09, 2009, 09:18:35 PM

My beloved Colonels had a easy time of it tonight against Rhodes winning 87-50. Rhodes shot 33%, and Centre played its bench with 11 players getting in the scoring column. Several of the freshmen made big contributions, including James Melloan with 10. Kris Bentley continued his hot hand with 15 points, all on threes.

Ron Boerger · January 10, 2009, 12:38:50 AM

I was at the SW-Trinity tilt. Southwestern came out bombing from beyond the arc and had the lead the entire first half. Trinity was having problems getting around the screens and the SW players had some decent space. SW ended up 11-18 on the night from three point land. Trinity turned up the defense and went on a nice run; Southwestern started missing free throws (I think they shot better from downtown than from the stripe) and Trinity started getting back into it. Trinity didn't get its first lead until halfway through the second and it was back and forth from there. Their biggest lead of the night was five just before the buzzer when TU gave SW an uncontested three. Trinity also played tighter coverage on the three point shooters in the second half. Once again the Tigers show up as a second half team, outscoring the Pirates by 9 in the second to secure the win.

Calderera led the Tigers with 22.

Some of the SW faithful were wearing shirts that said "Buc U Trinity". I can't decide if it was clever or silly. Funny thing it was mostly older women wearing them.

Ralph Turner · January 10, 2009, 09:01:51 AM

Quote from: Ron Boerger on January 10, 2009, 12:38:50 AM
...
Some of the SW faithful were wearing shirts that said "Buc U Trinity". I can't decide if it was clever or silly. Funny thing it was mostly older women wearing them.

In my grandfather's 1924 annual from Southwestern, there are numerous uses of Buccaneers instead of Pirates in the "Sports" section. Maybe those fans date their Southwestern heritage from that era.

frank_ezelle · January 10, 2009, 08:24:22 PM

I've been rotating between several photo projects today and finally decided to take a break to add a post regarding the Millsaps and Austin game. Regarding Austin, while I don't get a great overall look at a game when taking photos, I thought Austin looked like a very dangerous team. They have a lot of size, they have good depth, and Friday night they won the game wtih lights out shooting from behind the arc (9 of 18).

Regarding Millsaps, I discovered a team that is going to give you everything they've got and I was impressed at how they worked their way back from 15 down at the half into a couple of leads late in the game. The last second loss to Austin comes on the heels of a last second lost to Southwestern. The other two games weren't as close, but Millsaps was within 3 of Trinity with less than 9 minutes to play and in the 12 point loss to Hendrix the Millsaps team was an ice cold 3 of 24 on 3-point attempts. While the bottom line is an 0-4 SCAC record, it is impressive that Millsaps is playing so competitively with so little experience returning.

They only have 5 on the roster who return from last year--Chris Sanders (29.4 mpg, 31 starts), Chad Songy (24.4 mpg, 22 starts), Blake Martinez (13.1 mpg, no starts), Cameron Varnado (12.2 mpg, no starts), and Russell Booth (8.4 mpg, 1 start). The only other upperclassman on the roster is Chris Ingle who redshirted with an injury last year. You have starters without a lot of experiences backed up by freshmen, but you also have a team that seems willing to fight you for 40 minutes regardless of the situation. It's a team that's going to continue to get better as the season progresses and I hope a few breaks will go their way and they'll get one of the 8 spots at the SCAC Tournament. It would be a nice reward for a bunch of guys who seem to giving their all night after night.

Ron Boerger · January 10, 2009, 10:24:07 PM

In an earlier post I incorrectly said Trinity would travel to Birmingham-Southern for a game tomorrow. That game actually happens this Friday, followed by a game at Sewanee a week from tomorrow.

jekelish · January 11, 2009, 12:10:03 PM

Any outlook on today's big game between Hendrix and AC? Should be a good one...AC brings a 5 game win streak, an 8-4 record overall and a 3-1 mark in SCAC play into Conway to try to overtake the Warriors in the standings. One thing of note is that 3 of AC's 4 losses have come against ranked teams (twice to UT-Dallas, once to Trinity) and two of those losses (second loss to UTD, and then Trinity) were tight games until about 5 minutes left.

I know squat about Hendrix other than they're 10-3 and have been beating a lot of the same teams as the 'Roos.

Any thoughts?

Walter17 · January 11, 2009, 04:16:39 PM

There were some interesting games it looked like today. Hendrix won by 5 against Austin. DePauw absolutely abused Rhodes. Centre won by 10 against BSC and Millsaps got their first conference win against Colorado. Anyone catch any of these games? I'd love to hear how they went down.

frank_ezelle · January 11, 2009, 04:56:16 PM

The Colorado at Millsaps game was tied at 29 after a half and Colorado scored the first 4 points to go up 33-29 early in the second. From there, Millsaps outscored CC by 20 to win 78-62. Just as an interesting sidenote, the Millsaps women led over Colorado by 19 in the second half and then lost in overtime. It makes the point that a team had better be ready to play the entire 40 minutes because a game can slip out of control in a hurry.

I'll post the box score link below. One thing that stands out is greatly improved shooting by Millsaps with 12 of 22 on 3's, 18 of 21 on free throws, and 24 of 47 overall. It will be nice if that kind of shooting carries over to Tuesday's game with Dallas--I believe the skills to shoot well are there but it has taken time for players to get acclimated to new roles this season. Freshmen Ben Cooper and John Love chipped in a combined 13 points which was nice to see. They were the only freshmen who played double-digit minutes but at one point in the first half Millsaps was playing with an all freshman team.

Here's the link to the boxscore: http://www.millsaps.edu/athletic/basketball-m/mcm08-13.htm

pbrooks3 · January 12, 2009, 08:55:36 AM

Centre is at that juncture of the season where they must focus carefully not to allow a letdown. The schedule is favorable because they opened the SCAC part of the season with 3 road games going 2-1. They only have 2 more road trips the remainder of the season doing Millsaps/Hendrix one weekend and Rhodes/BSU another. Everything else happens at home with the Austin/Colorado College matchups this coming weekend. Austin will be a tough opponent for the Colonels just like Trinity will be later in the season. DPU and OU will be tough home games as well. The old motto of "taking them one game at a time" must be the order of the day, or they will be in for a surprise. You cannot take a night off in the SCAC.

brave heart · January 12, 2009, 01:03:11 PM

A really nice weekend for DPU. This team is getting better each week.Moore is stepping it up and the post is more consistent. They must also watch out for a let down.One more weekend at home and then on the road.

Walter17 · January 12, 2009, 01:41:08 PM

I agree. DPU statistically looks to be the hottest team in the conference right now. Trinity has been good, but most of their recent games are close. This road weekend will be a great test (especially at Birmingham Southern) for the Tigers.

Ron Boerger · January 13, 2009, 11:42:59 AM

After several teams above them lost last week, Trinity makes a big move in the D3hoops.com Top 25 poll all the way to 10th. Centre is receiving votes, "32nd".

We'll see what TU can do on the road. They have got to start getting off to better starts than what I've seen in several games so far.

Walter17 · January 13, 2009, 01:43:21 PM

I couldn't agree more. I'm not sure if this Trinity team is a top 10 team, with only one or two real obstacles so far on the schedule. I believe their real test will be Jan. 30 and 31 AT DePauw and Centre, respectively. Obviously, this weekend's road games should be solid tests for them, but Trinity has never had too much success playing at DePauw, so that game will really show the team's true colors.

We don't really have any Birmingham Southern fans on here. What is the word on them? Who is good for them? What style of play do they play? I'll probably be following along the livestats, but I just wanted to know what to expect for my Tigers.