MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[WoosterFAN]

DC - I saw that in the poll about 7 teams in the top 11.  I would love to hear from Pat about how that could affect playoff selection, seeding and placement.  It is a controversey every year and not jsut about who gets left out and who goes where but how the seeding is done.

Even if they move 4 of those teams, Wooster, Witt and Albion could all be in the same bracket.  If the season ended today, I would like the to think that NCAA would want WOO, WITT, ALBION and HOPE in the final four. Since they are the four "best teams" but we all know that it will very very different and maybe at best we can expect these teams to eliminate each other for a spot to the VA.  Simply an injustice!!

[WoosterFAN]

And on the issue of Football vs Basketball vs Baseball. All were big at Wooster while I was there and the staffs for Football were thin with "graduate assistants" and other coaches.  You could tell that football was not a primary sport due to the number of kids that left the program because they did not get the attention they thought they needed or the number the migrated to other sports like lacrosse, baseball and even golf while I was there.  As a point of reference, this was during Craig Lombardi, Karl Penn, Brock Jones and Coach Bob Tucker (who is not even mentioned on the Scot Football History) era.
    Athletes were different then, remember that Matt Hiestand was 3 sport athlete at Wooster but did not even mess with the football team and I consider him the greatest athlete in Wooster History.

[smedindy]

Just wanted to correct something about one of the T's in the Wabash / Wooster game. No 'magic word' was spoken - it was another case of rabbit ears on the ref and not any profanity. Sorry about the allusion.

[AndersDY]

wooscotsfan, I was going to correct the Barnes thing too, but he beat me to it. From what I understand, COW football was so bad in the years right up until Barnes' arrival that they would get cheers of "put the band in!" because the band figured they couldn't look any worse. By the time Barnes left, that cheer would come out because COW was good enough that they were blowing out the bottom half of the NCAC so they might as well let everyone get some playing time in those games.

Barnes can't compete with the original dominant period of COW football though, under undefeated coach Kinley McMillan who actually beat Ohio St. 64-0. Of course half of his wins came against Denison and his 7-0 record all took place in just a two year career while his players were wearing leather helmets... but impressive nonetheless. Just shows another gap in the athletic programs: the football team has to go back 90+ years to talk about beating OSU while the COW baseball team can claim that just a few years ago. 

[imderekpoe]

There's a nice article in The Daily Record this morning on the Scots high-scoring offense, currently ranked 5th in DIII in total points (101.5 ppg, behind Grinnell, Redlands, Emory & Henry, and Westminster), and 1st in scoring margin at 22.3 per game.

http://www.the-daily-record.com/article.php?pathToFile=/articles/sports/&file=_sports1.txt&article=1&tD=


Another semi-interesting (at least to Scot fans) tidbit:  Devin Fulk is ranked 18th nationally in FG percentage at 65.5%.  That's a pretty amazing stat considering that 2/3 of his shots are from behind the arc!  (Note that he dropped to 61.6 % overall since the last NCAA stats were published.)

Go Scots!

[wally_wabash]

How many times do we have to go over this.....

The NCAA doesn't care one whit about who goes to the final four.  They care, especially at the D-III, about putting on the least expensive championship tournament possible.  Of the following: Witt, Wooster, Hope, Albion, IWU....only one can win a national championshp this year (not to say that any of those teams will win the national championship only to say that just one of them can do so in any given year).  Whether Witt has to beat Hope or Albion or Wooster or IWU or B-W or JCU in the sectional or in Salem, it doesn't matter at all to the NCAA.  I think it's best to not delude oneself into thinking that this is the year that the NCAA will toss geography out the window in order to balance the brackets.  They won't.  These teams in the GL and MW regions will all end up in the same sectionals and regionals like they do every year.  It doesn't do anybody any good to gripe about it, because it isn't going to change.  

And also, just because all of these highly ranked teams are going to end up in the same quadrant of the bracket doesn't necessarily mean that the bracket is unfairly balanced.  This year's football bracket is a great example.  People screamed bloody murder when the West Region was announced...it just wasn't fair!  As it turned out, the West region was the least competitive of the four regions and the national champ didn't even come from the West region.  

Make that half-empty glass half-full...be thankful that you're in a region where you've got a good chance to see final four quality hoops without having to trek all the way to Virginia for it.  

[ScotsFan]

Darkside, I thought the primary reason Barnes left was the opportunity to coach at his alma mater, Augustana.  I'm sure there were other extenuating circumstances that went into his decision, but I thought coaching at Augie was his primary motivating factor for leaving.

WoosterFAN, probably the main reason Bob Tucker isn't mentioned in the Scot Football History is because the Scots weren't very good during the Bob Tucker era.  Their overall record during his tenure was a measly 29-66-1.  That's not so good.

As for why basketball and baseball have a more rich history at Wooster than football, I'd have to agree with wsf, in that it stems back to consistency in coaching.  Like wsf said, Wooster basketball has basically had 3 coaches over it's rich history.  Wooster hit a bit of a lull in the few years in between Moore's arrival and Van Wie's departure.  And in baseball, the Scots have only had 2 different coaches since 1976.  Bob Morgan, who really got the program on the map, was here from '76 to '81.  Tim Pettorini then took over the reigns and has kept Wooster baseball as one of the premier programs in DIII.  Football, on the other hand, has had a fairly consistent coaching carousel for years.  Hopefully, Schmitz can establish himself as one who brought Wooster football to consistent prominence.

[imderekpoe]

Looking further into the NCAA Stats, every NCAC team except Allegheny is listed in either the team or individual rankings (natl rankings in parentheses):

Wooster: Scoring Offense (5), Scoring Margin (1), FG % (4), 3-pt FG/gm (10), 3-pt % (7), Rebound Margin (70), W-L % (7), Fulk - FG % (18), Witucky - Assists/gm (74).

Witt: Scoring Defense (11), FG % (64), FG % Defense (3), 3-pt % (39), FT % (12), Rebound Margin (52), W-L % (7), Borchers - FT% (8).

Wabash: Scoring Defense (19), Scoring Margin (27), FG% (94), FG% Defense (7), W-L % (53).

OWU: Scoring Margin (100), 3-pt FG/gm (29), Rebound Margin (87), W-L % (97).

Earlham: FG% (59), 3-pt FG% (21), Henry - FG% (66).

Kenyon: FT% (62)

Hiram: FT% (74)

Denison: Hodgkinson - FG% (44), Hern - Rebounds/gm (69)

Oberlin: Godwin - 3pt FG/gm (35), Godwin - 3pt FG % (51), Spenser - Steals/gm (53)

[smedindy]

Amazing, Wabash is still 7th in FG percentage defense after getting lit up by Wooster.

Let's hope for more clanging from Earlham and Kenyon!

[imderekpoe]

I think those stats are from a week ago.  It will be interesting to see what the game against Wooster does to those figures.

[tyrone]

Curious--what is the all-time record between Woo/Witt, broken down by games at each place (i.e. Witt is 12-1 vs. Woo at home, while 1-14 vs Woo at Woo)?

Have they ever met at neutral sites, or in non-conference tournaments?

[wally_wabash]

After the Wooster debacle, Wabash's FG% defense is up to 38.7% which would rank them somewhere between 20 and 30 this week.  Still not shabby. 

[smedindy]

D'oh! The cold medicine is getting to my brain.

[Vanilla24COW]

I could be wrong but I thought I remembered seeing that the tournament was being expanded to 48 teams this year??? If that is so it would make those matchups being discussed occur farther down the bracket although like Wally mentioned geographically either Woo, Witt, Albion, or Hope will have to win against each other in order to get to Salem. Is this the year the field is expanded or am I out in left field??

[Li'l Giant]

D'oh! The cold medicine is getting to my brain.

You didn't pick that stuff up from Doc Baird did you?