MBB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

[Pat Coleman]

Both regional rankings and at-large selections are governed by the same criteria:

http://www.d3hoops.com/faq.php?question=45

[Fundamentals]

First time poster.....

I'm going to say that DePauw and Centre have the toughest roads in the conference.  Depauw and Centre travel to Trinty/Southwestern this weekend, home weekend against Birmingham Southern/Rhodes, play each other AT DePauw and then on the road at Oglethorpe/Sewanee.

Millsaps has 5 of their last 7 at home including home games with Colorado (0fer) and Austin. The one tough road game they do have left is Trinty on the road.

Trinty has Millsaps at home and still have to make the Colorado/Austin trip.

I would say that Millsaps is in the best position as far as remaining schedule is concerned.  If they could have knocked off either Centre or DePauw this past weekend it would have been huge for them but with their remaining schedule I can see them running the table (the exception may be the game at Trinty!)

Interesting to say the least!

[Pat Coleman]

Welcome to the board -- spread the word!

[DPU3619]

I'm going to say that DePauw and Centre have the toughest roads in the conference.  Depauw and Centre travel to Trinty/Southwestern this weekend, home weekend against Birmingham Southern/Rhodes, play each other AT DePauw and then on the road at Oglethorpe/Sewanee.

That may be true, but what I think is considerably more important for those two teams is which one of them comes out of that mess with the better record. 

The one who wins the East will likely face Trinity in the second round of the conference tournament and would potentially avoid Millsaps until the final.  The team with the worse record would see the Majors in the second round.  Not knocking Trinity, but Millsaps may have a cushion in that Western division after this weekend.  I think the Majors are probably the team everyobdy is trying to avoid in the West.

Then again, stranger things have happened at that tournament.  Maybe it's not that important at all.

[frank_ezelle]

Wes, amen to the comment "stranger things have happened at that tournament".  You are looking at it from the East point of view of who would you face in the semi-finals.  From the West point of view, the big question is who will you face in the first round.

As it stands now, the 1W would play 2-6 Rhodes and the 2W would play DePauw(6-2) since OU (6-2) won over DePauw.  With all due respect to Rhodes, and keeping in mind that a #8 seeded Rhodes team beat a #1 seeded Trinity team in recent years, it just seems to me that the 2W team is going to have the hardest road to the championship out of the top 4 seeded teams.  Not that there is an easy road to the finals.  It looks like this is a year where any team that looks past their first round game is likely to be going home after the first round.

[pbrooks3]

I echo Pat's comments, Fundamentals, welcome aboard!

Don't disagree on toughest roads the remainder of the season - Centre & DePauw have pretty tough sledding ahead.  Centre's road record looks pretty gaudy right now, but the meat of its road games are ahead of them with the Trinity & Southwestern series being of critical importance for positioning.  My hope is the Colonels can finish the weekend no worse than 1-1.  DePauw would benefit tremendously from winning both games.  I expect OU will win their weekend games, too.   The E side of the SCAC, in my opinion, is far from over.  My sleeper in the East continues to be Oglethorpe as I think they're improving every single game, and I am wishing every day that our remaining game with them was in Danville, not Atlanta!

I hope to have a better handle on the W side this weekend when I get my first actual look at Trinity in San Antonio.  Logic tells me to go with Millsaps as the lead dog on the west side.  But as several others have remarked, strange things can happen the remainder of the regular season to set the tone for the SCAC tournament brackets.

Fixing to fly to San Antonio soon.  Will blog from Texas some time later this week.

[Fundamentals]

One of the neat things about the SCAC is the fact that you play the games on the weekends and have all week to discuss what went on and the implications of that weekend.  Good stuff!

I think the West will be easier to see after this weekend.  With Trinty playing both Centre AND DePauw it will have it's fate in front of them.  If Trinty could pull off the sweep things could get really interesting with Millsaps. 

My guess is that Millsaps is pulling for Centre AND DePauw this weekend??

[hendrixfan]

The next few weeks should be interesting for Hendrix & Southwestern fans as they fight for the third seed in the west.  Southwestern is 4-4; Hendrix is 4-5 in the conference standings.
Here are the matchups:
FEB 1 - DePauw @ SW, Birm Southern @ Hendrix *
FEB 2 - Centre @ SW
FEB 3 - Rhodes @ Hendrix

FEB 8 - Austin @ Hendrix
FEB 9 - Trinity @ SW
FEB 10 - Colorado College @ Hendrix, Dallas @ SW *

FEB 15 - Millsaps @ SW, Hendrix @ Trinity
FEB 16 - Hendrix @ SW

FEB 22 - SW @ Colorado
FEB 23 - Hendrix @ Millsaps
FEB 24 - SW & Austin

[billzeffer]

I think Trinity could have a rough weekend with Centre and Depauw coming to town.  I think this will be an excellent test to see what they are really made of because if you can't win big games like these at home it's tough to expect to win them on the road come tourney time.  That being said I just don't know if this years Trinity team has the fire power to keep up with the red hot colonels.  Trinity has a good record but if you look closer into it you'll see that they have squeaked out many of these games against lesser opponents.  I know a win is a win, but the scores tell more than just the W or the L.

 

[pbrooks3]

BillZeffer, I agree Friday's game should be a good test for both teams. Centre has not beaten Trinity in San Antonio in something like 10 years so this is not one that you can automatically give to the Colonels. I expect to see a defensive struggle, and hope the Colonels exhibit better defense then they've been showing of late. Even though I've not seen the Tigers play yet this season, I've assumed some of the low victory margins Cunningham's team have had are more the result of long possessions and solid defense than lack of fire power. Glad I'll have a chance to see this one in person Friday night.

[Dave84]

pbrooks, you'll be down in san antonio friday?  hopefully you can give a recap on how my tigers play.  I think Trinity and Centre are a great matchup.  The colonels have a little more winning experience in their lineup, but it's hard to overlook such a strong/streaky group of juniors for Trinity.  They'll be ready to come out and play after the defeat they took in the championship last year.  Britt vs. Moon matchup is a very athletic one that will be interesting to watch.  Britt is having himself a terrific season and is definitely putting his name in the hat for POY.  This is really a weekend of great guards in san antonio.  Britt, Moon, Nestheide, Houston....4 good SCAC players who will be sure to match up with one another.  I believe this game will be decided by the play of Charles Houston.  He's one of the best individual on-ball defensive players I've seen in the SCAC for some time (just look at his steals the past two seasons, and those are usually straight up on-ball) and if he can put in a solid game, these Tigers have a great shot.

[pbrooks3]

Agree, this should be a fun game to watch given that I like good defense. Not sure whether Houston will be matched with Britt. My guess is Houston will guard Nestheide and Moon will be matched with Britt starting the game.  Nestheide is really the engine that makes Centre offense go. Of course everyone knows this and teams have taken away some of his shots this season.  Britt is having a standup year both offensively and defensively. Thomas and Matt are both excellent on-ball defenders. Will attempt to blog Friday and keep folks updated during the game.

[frank_ezelle]

In a bit of old news from last week's games, I was looking at the SCAC website for the preseason baseball picks and I saw that Edrick Montgomery made the D3 Team-of-the-Week last week.  Edrick is a gifted athlete, having won the 100 and 200 meter state championship in high school as well as having been an outstanding basketball player.  If he is 100% focused over the last half of this season, and admittedly there are times when that is not the case, then Millsaps will be a team that gets into a higher gear to close out the season.

Link for team of week:  http://www.d3hoops.com/tow/index.html

[FlightofthePetrel]

I'll be making the treck to Colorado this weekend to do the Oglethorpe Men's and Women's games.  If anyone is interested here's the link: http://www.oglethorpe.edu/athletics/listen_live.asp

You can also watch it live for a cost of $6 here:  http://www.b2livetv.com/default.asp?v=Basketball

Does anyone know if Austin does any type of broadcast of live stats?

[jekelish]

AC, at this point, does not have the capability to do live stats, but I know it's something they are looking into to have ASAP.

However, for today's game, they won't have anything.

I'll post some updates, though.