MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[David Collinge]

Thursday's games:

Oberlin at Salve Regina, 3pm -- live stats
Taylor at Wittenberg, 7pm -- audio and live stats

[LGHistorian]

Brent Harris said on the pre-game show that Pete Nicksic came down with the flu after the last practice and did not dress for the game tonight.  That's why Colten Craigin got some playing time early in the game.

[ScotsFan]

I'm having a hard time figuring out how Wilmington has won only 3 games this season.  Obviously they don't bring it every night like they brought it tonight because they would have more than 3 wins if they did.  Especially on the defensive end where they held the Scots to a season low 40%.

The Quakers are certainly a scrappy bunch and Wooster didn't seem to have an answer for Bowman (although he should have fouled out with about 3 or 4 minutes to go in the game...).

I was really surprised to see Wilmington keep fighting until the end as they did.  Wilma did come out fighting in the first half which I kind of expected.  But Wooster came out on a mission to put the game away early in the 2nd half and I thought once they got up by 15, Wilma would all but fade away based on their previous games.  But to their credit, they kept fighting back again and again.  

Once again, balanced scoring gets it done for Wooster who put all 5 starters in double figures tonight.  Franks and Balch led the way with 18 points each.  Hallowell had another nice game with 16 and Wick also chipped in 16 and Fegan rounded out the double digit scorers with 10.

Nice to see Wooster come out of the Mose Hole picking up 2 more in-region wins.  Now it's off to sunny Florida for 2 more games Saturday and Sunday.  It will be interesting to see how the Scots do finishing out playing 4 games in 6 days.

[bashbrother]

Sutherlin stepped up big for the Little Giants tonight.  The rebounding and opponent field goal percentage were a few of the areas that jumped out at me from the box score.

Go Wabash!

Edit:  Along with allowing 7-9 (77%) from beyond the arc.  Not having the big guy inside probably had the entire defense off-balance.

[kiltedbryan]

I'm having a hard time figuring out how Wilmington has won only 3 games this season.  Obviously they don't bring it every night like they brought it tonight because they would have more than 3 wins if they did.  Especially on the defensive end where they held the Scots to a season low 40%.

SF, couldn't agree more.  The Wilmington team that I watched online just simply seemed to be better than what their results to date indicate.  They have players with talent, and especially with quickness, enough to give Wooster fits on the defensive end throughout the evening.  They had a good, generally organized offensive attack, and played some quality defense (with the exception of rebounding, which was a key to the Wooster win tonight).

Perhaps this is the sort of loss that will actually help the Quakers as they look to right the ship in OAC league play, as I'd think that taking nearly taking a top five team to the ropes, on that team's home floor, has to be a confidence boost that says "we can play with anyone" even if the Quakers didn't pick up the W tonight.

Wooster's scoring balance is an immense strength this season.  Count JCU coach Mike Moran among the believers:

"I think it's the best Wooster team I've coached against," said Moran, whose teams lost in the NCAA Tournament to The COW in both years the Scots reached the Div. III NCAA Final Four (2003, 07), and had to beat them along the way to get there themselves in 2004. "(Wooster coach) Steve (Moore) and me have probably been bumping heads for 20 years now, but this team is the best I've seen for them.

"They just have a real nice blend of experience, maturity and so many different weapons. They're a very hard team to defend against and they're so well-coached. I'm glad they're not in the OAC, put it that way."

(Quotes from today's Wooster Daily Record game recap.)

[wabco]

bashbro

I agree ... believe these were the result on center problems we had tonight ... permitting both rebounds and second put backs which to date are not normally there for our opponents.  

The game on Jan 8 should be a good one.  I hope both teams are healthy.  My sense is that whoever has the first "off night" period will be on the short end.  Two good coaches.  Having said that ... I do like Mac.  Over the years I would put him right up there with the best tactical coaches and this year's team appears to be one of those which can execute the TO plans he lays out.  Witness the TO after the made free throws with 12 seconds left.  Franklin ... down 3 ... never gets a shot off.

[wooscotsfan]

Once again, balanced scoring gets it done for Wooster who put all 5 starters in double figures tonight.  Franks and Balch led the way with 18 points each.  Hallowell had another nice game with 16 and Wick also chipped in 16 and Fegan rounded out the double digit scorers with 10.

Back from Timken and I agree with ScotsFan that Wooster's balanced scoring was the difference in this game.  Ian Franks and Justin Hallowell did not shoot well tonight from the floor but they were picked up by Nathan Balch 18 points and Bryan Wickliffe 16 points who both shot a high percentage and got key baskets.

Ian Franks is an All-American because he knows how to get points for Wooster at critical times.  He drove the ball hard in the lane tonight and the result was that he made 10 of his 18 points at the free throw line.

Hallowell played great defense and cleaned the boards well.  Wickliffe nearly had a double double with 9 boards.  A big reason that Wooster won was that they outrebounded Wilma 43 to 29.  Clutch free throw shooting by Franks, Hallowell and Fegan also helped to secure the win down the stretch.

Wooster is now 11-0.   Good luck to the Scots on the Florida trip! 

[pennstghs]

good win for Witt as suprisingly I wasn't able to see the game tonight, however, I did catch the opener of the tourney in Taylor/Heidelberg. Should be a good game vs Taylor tomorrow night (or tonight I suppose). They have some good shooters on their team and play the pick and roll insistently til they rotate and get a mismatch to open up shots.

This probably would be better on the OAC board, but with the athletes that Heidelberg has and I saw in person today, are they just not that disciplined as they showed today? They were down 5 early in the second half and slowly over time their focus wilted and were down 22 with 2 intentional and unncessary fouls in the course of that run.........

[ScotsFan]

Perhaps this is the sort of loss that will actually help the Quakers as they look to right the ship in OAC league play, as I'd think that taking nearly taking a top five team to the ropes, on that team's home floor, has to be a confidence boost that says "we can play with anyone" even if the Quakers didn't pick up the W tonight.

I was kind of thinking the same thing.  If there ever was a 'good loss' I think Wilma could put this in that category.  And I also think they could actually use this loss to build off of as the season rolls on.  Or, maybe it was just a case of the Quakers stepping their game up because this was their chance to shock the world by beating the #1 team in the land.   Whatever the Quakers take away from last night's loss, I will say they were definitely better than what I expected.  BTW, Spalding, who beat Wilma 2 nights ago lost to JCU by 25 last night!  This is the sort of thing that makes you scratch your head wrt Wilmington playing Wooster closer than JCU?!

[ScotsFan]

Not knowing too much about Wooster's next 2 opponents down in Florida I have just done some minor perusing of William Carey's and Baruch's respective resumes.

William Carey is in the ORV of the NAIA I Top 25.  They are currently 8-4 on the season, but 3 of their 4 losses have come vs. teams currently ranked in the NAIA I Top 25.  And in addition, they also have 5 wins vs. teams that have been ranked in the NAIA I Top 25.  The Crusaders seem to be very athletic and should pose a considerable threat to beating the Scots.  Good thing for the Scots is that even if they do happen to lose, this game basically didn't happen in the eyes of the NCAA come time for NCAA tournament seeding.  WCU does appear to be fairly deep as it looks like they go with a 10 man rotation.  They also seem to be fairly balanced in scoring as they have 6 guys averaging between almost 8 ppg to their leading scorer who is averaging almost 14 ppg.  WCU does not appear to be very tall as their tallest player is listed at 6'5" although they do have some taller guards who are probably pretty athletic and play taller than their height.  William Carey's last game was in December 18th btw.

Here's WCU's probable starting 5:

G   Julius Blanks, Sr,  6'3" - 5.2ppg
SG Drew Meyerchick, Sr,  6'1" - 13.2ppg (leading scorer and has made 26 treys on the season)
F   Jamal Doss, So, 6'5" - 7.8ppg
PG Marcus Spann, Sr, 5'11" - 7.5ppg
F   Jonathan Woodland, Sr, 6'3" - 11.9ppg

In Wooster's second game they will be taking on Baruch from the tiny metropolis of NYC.    Baruch comes into the game with a record of 6-3, but again, their record may be a bit deceiving.  Their losses have been a 3 point loss to #5 Middlebury (66-63) who is undefeated and a one point loss to #26 Manhatanville (68-67) who is 8-1.  Their their 3rd loss of the season was against Rutgers-Newark (88-75) out of the always competitive NJAC and they too have only one loss on the season (9-1).  BC appears to go 10 deep although 2 of the 10 in that rotation average just over 5 minutes/game.  The Bearcats also don't appear to be very tall as their tallest starter goes 6'5" and they have a 6'7" guy coming off the bench.  Baruch also hasn't played a game since the 12th of December.  This game also means nothing in the eyes of the NCAA come selection Sunday.

Here are the probable BC starters:

G     Tammer Farid, Sr, 6'2" - 10ppg
G     Lionel Hillaire, Sr, 5'11" - 17.8ppg (26 3-pointers made-leads the team)
G/F  Chris Beauchamp, Jr, 6'1" - 20ppg (leading team in scoring, 47-51 at the ft line  )
C/F  Sean Loftus, Sr, 6'5" - 10.4ppg
G/F  Arki Wisnu, Sr, 6'3" - 4.1ppg

Should make for an entertaining couple of games to start the New Year for the Scots!  

[kiltedbryan]

This game also means nothing in the eyes of the NCAA come selection Sunday.

If Baruch ends up as a regionally-ranked team, though, doesn't that matter?  Isn't one of the five primary criteria "results vs. regionally-ranked teams"?  It doesn't qualify to say "results against regionally-ranked teams in your region," right?  So having a result against a team that might be regionally ranked, regardless of what region that is, could be valuable to the Scots, right?

[ScotsFan]

If Baruch ends up as a regionally-ranked team, though, doesn't that matter?  Isn't one of the five primary criteria "results vs. regionally-ranked teams"?  It doesn't qualify to say "results against regionally-ranked teams in your region," right?  So having a result against a team that might be regionally ranked, regardless of what region that is, could be valuable to the Scots, right?

Here is what I found in the FAQ:

What does the NCAA use to select and seed teams into the tournament?

These are the selection (and seeding) criteria for 2009-10:

The following primary criteria (not in priority order) will be reviewed:
• Win-loss percentage against regional opponents.
• Strength-of-schedule (only contests versus regional competition).
- Opponents' Average Winning Percentage (OWP) (weighted 2/3).
- Opponents' Opponents' Average Winning Percentage (OOWP) (weighted 1/3).
- Add OWP and OOWP to give total strength of schedule
• In-region head-to-head competition.
• In-region results versus common regional opponents.
• In-region results versus regionally ranked teams.

According to that last criteria, it looks as though results vs. regionally ranked teams only include 'in-region' results which would also include administrative regions.  Baruch is not in the same administrative region as Wooster, nor is it within the 200 mile rule either so, if I had to guess, I would say this game won't help or hurt Wooster win or lose.

[wally_wabash]

There is a lot of gray area in these selection criteria.  I don't think the committees disregard out of region results entirely...they certainly don't when it comes to football selection and seeding.  Whether the committee factors it in or not, I don't think Wooster will need the result against Baruch to get into the tournament.  There are enough wins left on Wooster's schedule that they should be pretty safe no matter what happens in Florida.  What is unfortunate is that I don't think there will be any extra benefit to Wooster's opponents who might be chasing tournament spots as I don't think the SOS math includes non-regional games. 

[kiltedbryan]

Thanks SF.  I'd forgotten how unambiguous the "in-region" part of the primary criteria is.  The game against Baruch would only show up in the secondary criteria, and in particular perhaps in the "Results versus all DIII ranked teams" (if Baruch does end up being regionally ranked) and "Overall DIII Strength of Schedule."  The primary criteria SOS calculation does not include out-of-region results, according to the FAQ.

I agree with Wally that Wooster (or Wabash, for that matter) probably won't need the secondary criteria to make the tournament as a Pool C, but that at the same time they probably wouldn't completely disregard the result, either.  However, the FAQ seems to indicate that the committee doesn't use the secondary criteria for seeding the tournament, just for "[regional] ranking and selecting" it.  It generally seems that the secondary criteria only really come into play for the final 3-4 entrants to the dance as well as the final 3-4 that get left on the table.  (I wonder if using secondary criteria is more common in football, where teams have no more than 10 in-region games; with most teams having 20 or so in hoops, there will be more differences among the primary criteria.)

[wally_wabash]

I'm sure sample size has a lot to do with it, kb.  I'd prefer to see all of this regional emphasis in the handbook go away.  Games are games...for better or worse, they should all count.