MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[imderekpoe]

Question for any Wabash fans... Who are you pulling for on Friday?  I assume that you'd rather not play Wooster (esp at home) if you make it to the finals, but would you ever root for DePauw?

My understanding is that it was Wooster's option and they chose to play the early game.

[wally_wabash]

Question for any Wabash fans... Who are you pulling for on Friday?  I assume that you'd rather not play Wooster (esp at home) if you make it to the finals, but would you ever root for DePauw?

Definitely not rooting for DePauw, but if they win, they win.  The bigger issue is going to be Friday night against a team that has morphed into the Dan Russ era Tigers.  I'd be happy to see Wabash playing anybody on Saturday with a chance to win a championship. 

[fantastic50]

Question for any Wabash fans... Who are you pulling for on Friday?  I assume that you'd rather not play Wooster (esp at home) if you make it to the finals, but would you ever root for DePauw?

My understanding is that it was Wooster's option and they chose to play the early game.

When the conference moved up the start time of the Saturday championship game from 7:00 to 4:00 (just a couple of years ago), it was also agreed that the home team would have the choice of whether to play in the first or second semifinal on Friday evening.  I recall that host Wittenberg also chose the early game last year, to allow a little more recovery time before the final.

[wally_wabash]

Question for any Wabash fans... Who are you pulling for on Friday?  I assume that you'd rather not play Wooster (esp at home) if you make it to the finals, but would you ever root for DePauw?

My understanding is that it was Wooster's option and they chose to play the early game.

When the conference moved up the start time of the Saturday championship game from 7:00 to 4:00 (just a couple of years ago), it was also agreed that the home team would have the choice of whether to play in the first or second semifinal on Friday evening.  I recall that host Wittenberg also chose the early game last year, to allow a little more recovery time before the final.

Feels like overthinking it, but I've won about 800 fewer games than Steve Moore so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Would be interesting to see the stats on this across the division- what's the tournament finals W/L record of the team that wins the late semifinal the night before?  Probably very little, if any, correlation.  The correlation is probably going to be stronger with variables like which team was seeded higher and who is playing at home. 

[HopeConvert]

Six ball screens. Awesome. 

[bufordscot]

There's a video link on Depauw's website

[kiltedbryan]

At the half,

DePauw 21
Wooster 44

It's been all Scots from the jump ball in this one. The shooting stats tell the story: Scots shot 17-30 (56%) for the half while holding the Tigers to 9-35 (25%) including 1-12 from long-range.

[wooscotsfan]

Final: Wooster 73  DePauw 52

Final: Wittenberg 89  Wabash 75

Ohio teams win the semi-finals setting up a Witt-Woo third game this season for the NCAC tourney title and the NCAA automatic bid.

GO SCOTS! 

[bufordscot]

Would have liked a different outcome but that was a classic D3 basketball game.  Appreciate the way Donte asserted himself in the second half.  Good things to come.

[wooscotsfan]

Final: Wittenberg 79  Wooster 75

Back from Wooster where I saw a high intensity D3 classic game this afternoon.  Congratulations to the Wittenberg Tigers on a very well played game and securing the automatic bid into the NCAA tourney.  They may end up hosting in the first weekend due to this impressive win.

Major kudos to Wooster Senior Reece Dupler who had 33 points on 13 of 19 shooting and by himself kept Wooster in this game to the very end.

As a Wooster fan, I attribute this loss to two major factors:
1. If you allow the other team to shoot 55% from the floor and score 79 points, you will not win most of the games.  Too many layups given to Witt.

2. If your best player spends 45% of the game on the bench, you will not win most of the games.  Danyon Hempy has 50% of the responsibility for this stat because he committed some dumb fouls.  He must play 75% of the game for Wooster to have a good chance at a victory.  The Wooster coaches bear the other 50% of the responsibility because they only played him 9 minutes in the 2nd half and HE DID NOT FOUL OUT OF THE GAME.  Making Hempy sit for over 8 minutes after his 4th foul and then only reinserting him with ~4 minutes left in the game and Wooster down by 4 points was a bad decision.  Hempy should have been reinserted with 7-8 minutes left so he could have more time to impact the outcome of the game.

Newsflash: if Wooster is going to make any noise in the NCAA tourney, then both Hempy and Dupler need to play more than 30 minutes in each game!

Regardless of how many fouls either star player accumulates, PLAY THEM because there is no next game in the NCAA's when you lose with them sitting on the bench.

GO SCOTS!

[MUC57]

wooscotsfan

I feel your pain. Baldwin-Wallace 79, Mount Union 75. Score sound familiar? But life goes on - so will The Scots and The Purple Raiders! We'll get 'Em next time. 🏀 

[wally_wabash]

Back from Wooster where I saw a high intensity D3 classic game this afternoon.  Congratulations to the Wittenberg Tigers on a very well played game and securing the automatic bid into the NCAA tourney.  They may end up hosting in the first weekend due to this impressive win.

I think they've earned that.  After a weird January (lost at home to Denison, played four overtime games against bottom half teams) that culminated in an OT loss at DePauw, Wittenberg flipped a switch.  In the four weeks since that last loss, they're on a ten game shredder wherein they've won twice at Wooster and kicked the crap out of everybody else they've played.   They are playing as well as anybody in the division right now and I'm not sure they shouldn't be the top ranked team in the region when we see those final rankings. 

[kiltedbryan]

Wittenberg draws Emory...on a neutral court at Guilford, who hosts Sewanee. I must say that's quite surprising. Perhaps the Tigers didn't file to host?

Wooster hosts a pod, facing Baruch, with Wheaton (Il) and Hanover in the other game. A surprise hosting assignment for Timken Gym, and the Scots first hosting duties since 2014 I believe.

Other hosts in Wooster's quadrant are Augustana, Oswego St, and Marietta. As fantastic50 pointed out on twitter, if hosts swept the first weekend, neither Marietta nor Oswego could make it to overall top-seed Augustana. In that case, Wooster or Marietta could serve as a second-weekend geographical host.

[fantastic50]

Augustana can't get to Marietta, as even there to Wooster is right at the 500-mile limit.  I think they will need to fly someone if Augustana & either Marietta or Oswego advance but Wooster does not.

[imderekpoe]

Augustana can't get to Marietta, as even there to Wooster is right at the 500-mile limit.  I think they will need to fly someone if Augustana & either Marietta or Oswego advance but Wooster does not.

Wasn't there a conversation (on another board) that Wooster to Augustana is 500 miles, but Augustana to Wooster was over 500?