MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[David Collinge]

I'm afraid I'm going to need a better source than Wooster Booster's friend on the Lycoming story.  It just doesn't ring true to me.  If Wooster didn't actually want to play B-WC in the first round, then why wouldn't the choice have been Thiel?  Thiel is the weaker of the two, but more importantly, Thiel is an in-region game for Wooster, whereas Lycoming is both extra-regional (MA Region) and outside the 200 mile limit (about 315 miles).  The "logical" (or "traditional") 1st round pairings would have been Thiel/Wooster and Lycoming/B-WC.

I'm not trying to question WooBoo's veracity, I just think this whole story is implausible enough (and, if so, libelous, in a small sort of way) to warrant verification.

[Pat Coleman]

Agreed. And I had other discussions with people off the board over the preseason that lead me to believe that isn't true either.

[woosterbooster]

I'll talk to my source (who I consider very honest and reliable) and find out where he got his information regarding Lycoming not wanting to play Wooster.

[imderekpoe]

Wouldn't an extra-regional game would be better for the Scots (QOWI-wise) rather than an 8-pointer against Theil?  The game last night lowered the Scots' rating from 8.857 to 8.750, if my calculations are correct!

[ScotsFan]

I'm afraid I'm going to need a better source than Wooster Booster's friend on the Lycoming story. It just doesn't ring true to me.

There was a statement about this in the Wooster Daily Record in the scouting report on Lycoming.  Here is the direct quote:

Scouting report: The Warriors were a late edition to the "Mose" Hole/Kiwanis Classic and agreed to enter if they would not be paired against Wooster in the opening round.

Why would they just make somehting like that up?  Besides, the Scots did get their 2 in-region games anyway.  I don't know though.  This whole pairing thing makes no sense. 

Congrats to Tom Port and Brandon Johnson on making the All-Tournament team.  No surpirse that Tori Davis was the MVP.  Also no surprise that Tyler Sekarik was named Defensive MVP. 

Wooster broke their team record for 3-pointers in their game last night with a 20-37 effort.  They certainly could have used a couple of those for Thursday night.   I'd say the Scots are well on their way to breaking their school record of 245 3-pointers made for the '02-'03 season.  Through 11 games Wooster is 125-286.  They are threatening the record for 3-point fg. percentage as well.  They are currently tied with the record of .437 set back in '89-'90. 

[smedindy]

But this also testifies to the fact that its hard to fill out these tourneys with teams at times.

[DenisonFan]

How about the Big Red? 

Win the tournament!!  WOW!! Even the great Smed didn't see this one coming.

Either Ghilloni has figured it out or dumb luck but he has suddenly playing 9 guys.  NOT eleven.   He didn't have Hodgkinson and Hern on the bench together for 7 minutes at a time.

Stats don't lie:  He plays Hern 35 minutes, Hodgkinson on 18 because of foul trouble but the two of them along with Izzo (28 minutes) 57% of the offense.  Hodgkinson had 15 points in 18 minutes.  Koecheler gets into foul trouble in game two and plays 14 minutes and did not score.  Game one  28 minutes and has 4 points.  That is not going to win you games.

Game two: plays Hodgkinson 35 minutes and Hern 33 and the two provide 51% of the offense.   Any pattern here???

Good teams play 8 guys, 9 max.

The Shea's give them 19 an 12 in game one.  Game two, almost the same time played and you get 4 and 6.

Ghiloni has some prime time players.  The others are "role players".  Hodgkinson and Hern bring it game in and game out.  You can not count on anyone else to be consistant.

Eberst was huge yesterday!!  But he gave you 6pts in game one.

I have preached all year, you can not go 11 deep and think you can win.

Hodgkinson, Hern and Izzo should be at 34 minutes a game.  The role players come off the bench and give them a blow of 3 minutes a half.   That is the blue print to success and these past two days showed it.

Dance with who you brought to the prom.  Simple as that.

Hodgkinson:  Tournament MVP
Hern:      All-Tournament

Good way to end the year!!  Now let's hope they learned something.

GO BIG RED!!

[ScotsFan]

One thing I missed in this whole pairings issue is that Coach Moore was quoted in yesterday's Daily Record as saying that it was Wooster's choice to schedule BW in the first round as opposed to playing a tune-up game in the 1st round against Hiram.  My best guess was by scheduling BW in a 1st round game, it guaranteed Wooster a quality in-region game.  Pat mentioned this in his Daily Dose blog.  RM-C did the same thing in their tounament in scheduling the 2nd best team in their field (Fisk) and they also got beat.  It's a calculated risk, but there's no guarantee that Wooster and BW would have met in the finals either.  Just look what happened in the 2001 Mose Hole.  ONU came into the tournament ranked #11 and Wooster was unranked.  It was still a highly anticipated final between the Scots and the Polar Bears until Thiel knocked off ONU in the semis.  BW was also Wooster's only OAC opponent.  Ususally the Scots face at least 2-3 OAC teams in the regular season, so maybe they just wanted that guaranteed matchup.  Of course, this doesn't prove or disprove what was said about Lycoming.

Smeds, I don't think anyone is arguing over whether or not these tournaments can be hard to fill.  It's obviously not easy, as Lycoming was already a late edition to the field, so it isn't a stretch to  say that they had some negotiating power on their side.  Either Wooster caters to their demands and have a tournament, or not cave in and have a chance at no tournament.  Seems like an obvious choice. 

[Darryl Nester]

There was a statement about this in the Wooster Daily Record in the scouting report on Lycoming.  Here is the direct quote:

Scouting report: The Warriors were a late edition to the "Mose" Hole/Kiwanis Classic and agreed to enter if they would not be paired against Wooster in the opening round.

Did the Wooster Daily Record really refer to Lyco as "a late edition"?

[ScotsFan]

That was a direct quote from the paper.

[David Collinge]

Apparently Lycoming, after initially agreeing to come to the tournament, balked at having to play Wooster on the first night. 

Scouting report: The Warriors were a late edition to the "Mose" Hole/Kiwanis Classic and agreed to enter if they would not be paired against Wooster in the opening round.

I hope you can see that these are two entirely different things. 

Because we are talking about a services contract, the common law applies.  The facts suggest that a valid offer to play in the Mose Hole was extended by Wooster to Lycoming.  In the first scenario, it appears that Lycoming accepted the offer, then attempted to force a contract modification.  (It is not an anticipatory repudiation, which would allow Wooster to suspend performance and sue immediately, because the language of repudiation is not unequivocal.)  Such modifications are not valid without consideration, and would be subject to the Statute of Frauds (applying the "equal dignity" rule) if the original contract was made more than one year prior to the date of the tournament.  Wooster seemingly acquiesced to the demand, and performance may be seen by the court as a substitute for consideration, making the contract modification valid.  If on the other hand Wooster's agreement was the result of fraud or duress, if for exmple Lycoming knew that its withdrawal would cause the tournament to fail for lack of participation, the court might find the modification to be unconscionable, which would be an absolute defense to enforcement.

In the second scenario, Lycoming's acceptance of Wooster's valid offer was made expressly conditional that they not play Wooster.  Because the common law applies, a purported acceptance that introduces new or different terms is treated as a rejection and a counteroffer.  If Wooster agreed to this counteroffer, as we can infer from the facts, than a valid contract was formed with the condition that Wooster not play Lycoming in the first game.  In this scenario, Wooster would not have an actionable position.

Warning to Kyle Witucky: This is what your life will be like for the next 3+ years.  It's not too late to change your mind about law school!

(I can hear Li'l Giant banging his head against the wall all the way from San Antonio.  )

[smedindy]

I guess Wabash isn't a good team because they play 11 to 12 a night, eh? They're 7-3, not shabby.

Witt has 11 players averaging in double digit minutes a night. They're not good, are they?

Puget Sound must be awful - as 11 players have played in every game for them.

Boy, Hope must stink. They used 14 players against Madonna in a seven point game.

Geez, UW-Stout is rotten. They play 11 guys nightly.

[smedindy]

Oh, and it makes no sense to play the big guns 35 minutes in blowouts. So I still don't understand the carping about minutes against Wooster, Witt, Akron and Capital.

[woosterbooster]

David -

I've spoken to my friend, and his information came exclusively from the article in the Wooster Daily Record.  When he first told me about the Lycoming situation, either he mispoke or I misunderstood him, as I believed him to be speaking of the situation you describe in your first scenario.  Now it seems as if your second scenario is the way that it happened.

I apologize to everyone for posting information that was incorrect, and especially to Lycoming.  I see no problem at all in them being upfront about not wanting to play Wooster in the first round as long as that was done before accepting the invitation.

David, did you study under Professor Kingsley?  

Jack

[David Collinge]

Agreeing to come on the condition that they not play Wooster is less obnoxious than threatening to quit if they have to play Wooster, but it's still not a terribly admirable position.  However, if the ultimate source for this is the Daily Record, where fact-checking, like spelling, is not exactly a hallmark, I'll continue to reserve my doubts about the accuracy of the whole thing. 

I wonder if we've got the wrong spin on this.  Maybe what Lycoming said was, "we'll come if we get to play Thiel?"  I'm sure they didn't want to come just to take double-digit losses from COW and B-WC.  Plus they might have found a 200 mile path to Thiel, making it a regional game (it looks like 210 miles to me, but I didn't try very hard.)