MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[David Collinge]

Wooster also clocks in at #5 in the preseason DIII News rankings (PDF).  John Carroll is #9, Hope #11, Calvin #18, and Capital #24. 

[wooscotsfan]

Wooster also clocks in at #5 in the preseason DIII News rankings (PDF).  John Carroll is #9, Hope #11, Calvin #18, and Capital #24. 

David - thanks for the DIII News rankings.  Using that list, there is a strong possibility that Wooster will have played #1 Wash. Univ, #7 St. Thomas and #9 John Carroll by the end of December if the tourney matchups go as projected.  Wooster may have the toughest non-conference schedule in D3 this year!

Hopefully, the non-conference opponents will help prepare the Scots for another NCAA tourney run this season!

[David Collinge]

Ah, Billy, we'll miss you after this season.  Good luck in the HCAC; Earlham will be a credit to that league like they were to ours, and I hope the Quakers succeed over there.

Down to nine teams in most men's sports after this season.  Ask the women, especially the basketball coaches, how much fun it is trying to schedule a nine-team league, complicated by the fact that two of the teams are >450 miles apart.  I wonder if that's enough of an impetus for the league to try to find a new 10th team.  (Of course, the women benefit by going to an 8-team loop all sports, at least all of them that Hiram sponsors.)  One thing that's probably gone is the dreaded annual East-West trip:  'Gheny and Hiram playing two games in two days at Wabash and the EC was tough enough, but substitute Wittenberg for Earlham and it makes both the logistics and the competitive balance unsupportable.  (Plus, they'd probably have to go both directions each year in a full round-robin schedule; this is what the women have been doing for years.)  Full round-robin is the happy result of this move.

I wonder how well this is going to work where one school is no closer than 185 miles to any other conference school.  There are other schools with similar problems, like Colorado College in the SCAC or TheWhitworthPirates in the NWC, but I'm not being facetious when I say that long travel is just different in the west than it is in the east; things out here are so spread out that people get used to long travel at an early age.  (Plus, I expect CC flies to their away dates anyway.)

This is going to be an interesting story to follow as it develops.

[David Collinge]

Denison's hoops teams get a pre-season pep talk from Bill Bradley.

[smedindy]

What does the NCAC do? Drop the unbalanced schedule and go home and home for all 16 games?

[Titan Q]

For help with my D3hoops.com Preseason Top 25 ballot, can you guys help me sort out the 2010 NCAC race?  Wooster seems to be a heavy favorte, correct?  Who do you see in slots 2 & 3?

Thanks!

[David Collinge]

What does the NCAC do? Drop the unbalanced schedule and go home and home for all 16 games?

If the conference stays at nine members, the nine-team men's schedule would likely be the same as the current women's nine-team schedule, which is a full round-robin 16-game schedule.  They have two three-game weeks each season, with a game on Tuesday followed by back-to-back Friday/Saturday games.  It is on those weekends that the "Big Trip" is made, with Allegheny and Hiram traveling to Earlham and Wittenberg, and vice versa.  However, as I noted above, whether the men would want to adopt that, with the western half of the trip being Wittenberg and Wabash (185 miles apart), is an open question due to numerous logistical and competitive issues.  The fallback would be just a plain vanilla 16-game home and home schedule, although Wabash, 'Gheny, and Hiram might object to that as their travel costs would rise. 

I edit this to add that, of course, in a nine-team loop, every "game night" someone is either playing a non-conference foe or taking the night off. 

Volleyball has an interesting solution, which I can't see basketball adopting but is worth a mention.  This year they'll play half of their season schedule (8 games for each team) in two "Power weekends" held at the outermost points of Allegheny and Earlham.  These are essentially what we hoops fans might think of as classic-format (i.e. pre-determined pairings) tournaments, with each team playing two games per day.  The other half of the season schedule (8 games) is played in regular home-and-home fashion.  This must hold down the travel costs quite a lot, and since it's volleyball and not hoops, attendance is probably enhanced (I'd guess that attendance at volleyball matches is only an interesting subject at Wittenberg, and they may also be the only school to charge admission--if they do, I don't know.)  Of course, you can't play four basketball games in two days, and hoops coaches are loath to give up home games for neutral-site games, but there may be a germ of an idea here.

[David Collinge]

For help with my D3hoops.com Preseason Top 25 ballot, can you guys help me sort out the 2010 NCAC race?  Wooster seems to be a heavy favorte, correct?  Who do you see in slots 2 & 3?

Thanks!

Just off the top of my head, I'd say Wabash, who brings virtually everyone back, and OWU, where Mike DeWitt has I believe established a "reload not rebuild" program that will ameliorate heavy graduation losses.  Wittenberg gets their top gun Gregg Hill back from injury along with 12 other lettermen, so they should be in the mix as well.  Also Hiram, where everyone returns (if they return, always a question at Hiram) except Ian Pfouts.  That's a big loss of leadership, but they return a lot of talent.  How last season's late-season swoon will affect them will be interesting to see.  Kenyon will go as far as Dave Knapke and JT Knight can take them; they're aiming to be a consistent top 4 team, but that might be a stretch this year.  Allegheny will have seven seniors, including George Raftis, but they need to stay healthy and have everything go right to be in the top 4.  I'll mention Oberlin, Denison, and Earlham out of courtesy.  But yes, Wooster is the solid favorite, even with lingering injury concerns for Brandon Johnson and a very tough non-conference schedule.

[David Collinge]

I just got word from a reliable source that the 2010-11 conference schedules have been released to the schools, and that they are double-round-robin for both men and women, with no "Big Trip" weekends for either.  There will be an increased number of men/women double-headers in an effort to hold down travel costs, which is good for fans but can be uncomfortable for players having half the bus space they're used to.  (I note that Earlham has been doing this for some time.)  The men will have bye dates in their conference schedules, since only eight of the nine teams can play conference games on a given night.  The women will play a 14-game season concentrated on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and will have two extra non-conference games available.

[sac]

I just got word from a reliable source that the 2010-11 conference schedules have been released to the schools, and that they are double-round-robin for both men and women, with no "Big Trip" weekends for either.  There will be an increased number of men/women double-headers in an effort to hold down travel costs, which is good for fans but can be uncomfortable for players having half the bus space they're used to.  (I note that Earlham has been doing this for some time.)  The men will have bye dates in their conference schedules, since only eight of the nine teams can play conference games on a given night.  The women will play a 14-game season concentrated on Wednesdays and Saturdays, and will have two extra non-conference games available.

Does this open up a December weekend or two for non-conference games or is the NCAC still going to start in December?

[David Collinge]

I haven't seen the 2010-11 schedule, but I don't see why this change would do away with the December games.  After all, it's still 16 games.  Just looking at Wooster's 2009-10 schedule as a point of reference, they have conference games every Wednesday and Saturday* from January 9 through February 20 (after which the conference tourney begins), and that's only 13 games.  There's nowhere to squeeze three more games in that doesn't involve December (or three-game weeks).

And upon further reflection, I realize that the "December problem" will get worse, not better, in this new 9-team world, because of the now-necessary byes.  Each team will have to sit out one of every nine Game Days (i.e., Wednesdays and Saturdays) on average.  Looking again at Wooster's 09-10 schedule, those 13 January/February games are in 13 Game days.  Next year, the Scots will only be able to play 11 or 12 (conference) games in those 13 slots, leaving 4 or 5 for December (or, gulp, November) or forcing some three-game weeks in the New Year.  This looks more and more like it's going to be a bitch to schedule; non-conference games are hard to find after the First, which means that, in order to have a full 25 game slate, teams may have to schedule as many as fourteen games between Nov. 15 and the Christmas holidays (worst-case scenario.)  Yikes.

*Wooster plays at Wabash on Sunday 2/7 for some reason; Sat. 2/6 is open for both teams.

[smedindy]

The big to and from Wabash trips may be during break, just so class time won't be missed. That's my speculation.

That may play havoc with holiday tournaments, but that's how I can see it.

Wabash goes out to Hiram and Allegheny one Friday / Saturday.
Hiram and Gheny trek out to Wabash the next Friday / Saturday.

Heck, Gheny's bus can pick up Hiram on the way! Perhaps they can have epic battles of Go Fish, Crazy 8's, and Old Maid on the way to C'ville. 

[wooscotsfan]

I got a hard copy of Wooster's 2009-2010 Roster (18 players) which is not available yet on the COW website:

#10 Brandon Johnson Sr. Guard 6'2"  (starter in 2008, 11.3 ppg, 3.8 rpg)

#14 Matt Fegan So. Guard 6'1" (4.7 ppg, 1.5 rpg)

#22 Nathan Balch Jr. Guard 6'1" (returning starter, 12.6 ppg, 3.1 rpg)

#23 Dave Mallett Fr. Guard 6'2" (Naperville Central High School - IL)

#24 Justin Warnes So. Guard 6'2" (bench player last year)

#30 Eric Robbins So. Guard 6'1" (bench player last year)

#31 Ibrahim Ibrahim So. Guard 6'2" (bench player last year)

#32 Bryan Wickliffe Jr. Forward 6'6" (returning starter, 7.9 ppg, 6.2 rpg)

#33 Ian Franks Jr. Guard 6'4" (returning starter, 15.5 ppg, 4.2 rpg)

#34 Kaleb Reed Jr. Forward 6'4" (bench player last year)

#35 Tom Adams-Wall So. Guard 6'2" (JV team last year?)

#40 Justin Hallowell So. Forward 6'7" (returning starter, 14.2 ppg, 4.7 rpg, D3 Hoops freshman of the year)

#41 Eric Fertig Jr. Forward 6'6" (bench/JV player last year)

#42 Mike Evans So. Forward 6'4" (4.1 ppg, 1.9 rpg)

#44 Josh Claytor Fr. Forward 6'6" (Oxford Talawanda HS, 23.3 ppg, 12.3 rpg;  was recruited by Cornell University)

#50 Gideon Mabeny So. Center 7'0" (The Sudan, Fork Union, team videographer last year with ACL surgery)

#52 Jake Mays Fr. Center 6'7" (Tallmadge HS, 17.0 ppg, 10.8 rpg, 61% FG; 2nd Team Inland District)

#54 Greg Ross So. Forward 6'5" (4.2 ppg, 3.3 rpg)

Note: Parenthetical information is my comment/addition

Coaches:  Steve Moore, Doug Cline, Bruce Martin, Tim Vandervaart (Tom Port not listed)

Who did not return: Marty Bidwell-graduated, Dustin Geitgey, Drew Sawyer, Terrence Williams, Scott Voiers

Newcomers: 3 big men in Claytor, Mabeny and Mays.  Mallett and Adams-Wall at Guard

Comments - Wooster looks very strong with the 4 returning starters plus the 3 new big guys.  Brandon Johnson will hopefully be a big addition off the bench with his experience and knowledge of the game.  With his recovery from a second knee surgery still in process, Johnson may not play until January.  I like the addition of Tim Vandervaart as a coach who can teach Claytor, Mabeny and Mays some of his famous spin moves in the pivot.  Dustin Geitgey will be missed but Matt Fegan played solid reserve minutes last season and if Brandon Johnson plays that still gives the Scots 4 strong guards.  Ian Franks looks like he grew an inch this summer to 6'4" .  Let's recall that Nathan Balch got significant playing time 2 years ago on a Division I team and we also have a D3 Hoops freshman of the year, Justin Hallowell, who shot over 50% from the 3 point arc last year.  It will be interesting to see who is the 5th starter for the Scots when the season begins.

Wooster has the potential to be a top 10 team in Division III this season.  The Scots will be the favorite in the NCAC again and hopefully can make another run in the NCAA tourney.

GO SCOTS!

[seinfeld]

Info has been slow to get on Wooster's new athletic Web site.

wooscotsfan, do you know why Geitgey is not playing this year? If Brandon Johnson were healthy from day one, Geitgey wouldn't have played much. But with that not being the case, Wooster only has three guards it can play against strong opponents. So if one gets hurt or is in foul trouble, depth could be a problem. Depth along the frontline, however, has probably never been better.

[ScotsFan]

Thanks for the info wsf!  I can't believe the hoops season is right around the corner! 

It will be interesting to see who is the 5th starter for the Scots when the season begins.

Wooster has the potential to be a top 10 team in Division III this season.  The Scots will be the favorite in the NCAC again and hopefully can make another run in the NCAA tourney.

GO SCOTS!

Would one of the bigs be a candidate for that 5th starting position?  My thoughts would be leaning towards Greg Ross and it could be the freshman Claytor depending on how good he is.

I'm interested to see what kind of a role Mabeny plays on this team as well.  One thing that can't be taught is height and he's certainly got that!