MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[jscwittfan]

The 'Gheny students keep chanting "U-S-A, U-S-A" which has the Witt announcer perplexed.  I assume it's aimed at Borchers, who is from Russia, after all.  Pretty clever.

Yes, Borchers is from Russia . . . but Russia, Ohio, not the country!  So either the Allegheny students were confused, misinformed, or felt like chanting USA anyway just because of the relation.

I was worried there for a while, thought Allegheny was gonna pull it out.  I'm from the same hometown as Casey McCloskey, and since he played for the "golden school" of our local media, he got a LOT of exposure.  He's a very good player, and Witt needs to find a way to shut him down when the Gators come to Springfield for the regular season finale.

Now we get to the next interesting game of the day.  Wooster - Port Game 1.

[witt4ever]

I'll go with scotsbrod explanation concerning the USA chant.

Even the Gator fans knew deep down it would take a miracle.

[ScotsFan]

Man, I thought the Gators were going to pull out the upset.  Oh well.  Witt's composure down the stretch won them that game.  There was no panic.  They just chipped away until they finally took the lead.

Still, even though Witt avoided the upset bug, Albion wasn't able to as they were upset by Calvin 69-66!!!  They have been anything but impressive since their blowout win over Hope.  They barely beat Alma and K-zoo and they lost today.  

[witt4ever]

I don't know what it is, if it's a very poor microphone, low bandwith, or what, but the Witt netcast is really hard on the ears.  The sound is stacatto, or to compare it to light, strobish.  Somewhere between there and here, it goes south.

I, too, find the coverage of Wittenberg sports embarassing.

The last game was not  even on the radio, WUSO 89.1. They decided to broadcast the women's game on the radio and put the men's game on the internet only. Politically correct, I guess.

Also, the coverage is  by numerous people. Scott Leo, his brother  did the game today (Allegheny), Dave Williams and Sean(?) Golden and no Marty Bannister.

WIZE 1340 used to broadcast Witt games before WBLY took over. WIZE, still a station in Springfield, but a clone(same broadcast content) of WONE (Dayton) now carries Wright State games. Real exciting listening to Wright State games. 

Marty Bannister was the prime broadcaster until A.D. Purnell pissed WBLY (WULM)off and stopped carrying Wittenberg sports.
Marty had a daily noon sports show on and a weekly Saturday morning show on WBLY.

Wittenberg claimed that WBLY breached their contract because they refused to carry Wittenberg's women basketball.

Numerous people at Witt have quit or been fired because of Purnell.

Something has to be corrected pretty soon, I hope the new university president steps up and corrects this obvious glaring problem(s).

The WIZE signal goes about 30 miles, the WBLY signal about 10 miles, and the WUSO signal barely 5 miles. I know a person that lives 1 mile from campus and can't pick up the signal. I live 5 miles from the signal and have to listen to the internet to listen to  the games. If I attempt to listen on the radio, the signal bleeds with Central State radio. 2 games for 1. 
I can only imagine the internet broadcasting quality if a person does not have DSL or Cable.

In case, Witt officials see this post.

Combine the coverage of Cedarville University's network (about 10 stations throughout the Midwest) and the MWC's videostreaming that was presented last week (Wheaton College is a close second in the videobroadcasting quality) but the MWC(midwest conference) quality was unreal with no breakups (DSL here). It was like watching tv.

[David Collinge]

Halftime at Wooster

Wooster 52
OWU 42

Torrid shooting on both ends: Wooster is 22/36 (61%) and 5/8 (63%) from the arc; OWU is 17/31 (55%) and 6/13 (46%), respectively.  OWU has a 15-14 edge on the boards, but has turned the ball over 9 times (to just 4 for Wooster.)  James Cooper leads all scorers with 15 on 6/10 shooting.  Dustin Rudegeair leads the Bishops with 10.

[billy_pilgrim]

Well, a late final update from Oberlin....and the Yeodome (does anyone really call that crappy gym by this name?).

Earlham cruises 82-63. Oberlin had no answers for Brandon Miller (26 and 9) or Markous Jewett (25-9) as Earlham opens up what was once just a 6-point halftime lead.

Quinton Spencer goes for just eight for Oberlin. Tyler Stewart has put him on lock for the last two years.

For some reason, I always get nervous when Earlham plays at Oberlin. It probably dates back to the upset loss that Earlham took two seasons ago on the final day of the NCAC regular season.

Another highlight....Bronson Lickliter scores 2 points, completing the strangest gap ever between college baskets. After playing two years for Earlham in the late 90s, Lickliter became a volunteer student assistant. After graduation, he became a volunteer assistant. After spending some time working in Hawaii, he became the graduate assistant. After leaving his job and getting married, he came back to the Earlham Masters program to earn his teaching certificate. While in the program, he joined up with the team and started working out with them, later pracitcing and now on the team as the 12th man. Hey, it worked out....two points for my good friend Bronson. Congrats buddy.

[David Collinge]

Elsewhere, Denison downs Hiram 80-72.

Wooster has run out to a 15 point lead early in the 2nd half.

That's a great D3 story, Billy.  Thanks for posting it.

[earlhamalum]

Nice win for Earlham today.  Now we have to focus on Denison.  I hope to make it up to the game on Wed. (DF) 

It looks like Brandon Miller may have NCAC player of the week.  2-0
In two games.  25 PPG, 10.5 RPG, 4.5 SPG, 2.5 APG, 1.0 BPG  If anyone can find someone with a better stat line then that... feel free to Post. 

Congrats EC

[David Collinge]

OWU is hanging tough, trailing by 10 with about 2:30 left.  It's 99-89.

I'm listening to Wooster, playing Scrabble, and watching NBC Nightly News (remember, I'm in the West) where my brother-in-law is about to appear to discuss movies.  Too many balls in the air! 

[wooscotsfan]

Final:  Wooster 103  Ohio Wesleyan 94

In their first game without Tom Port, Wooster was led tonight by James Cooper who scored a career high 37 points.    Tim Vandervaart had 15 points, Kyle Witucky had 11 points and Evan Will chipped in 9 points.

Kudos to James Cooper who really picked up the scoring load in Port's absence.  Marty Bidwell (8 points) and Brandon Johnson (8 points) both got more minutes tonight and they played well.

Wooster is now 16-1, 8-0 in the NCAC.     Next game at Kenyon on 1/25.

GO SCOTS!!

[wooscotsfan]

Updated NCAC Standings thru Today's Games:

8-0  Wooster (16-1)
7-1  Wittenberg (16-1)
6-2  Earlham (9-8)  Quakers have won 3 in a row, sole 3rd place
5-3  Wabash (11-6)
5-3  Ohio Wesleyan (10-7)
4-4  Denison (8-9)  Big Red have won 4 in a row, beating #7 thru #10
2-6  Allegheny (6-10)  Gave the Tigers a scare today
2-6  Kenyon (5-12)
1-7  Hiram (3-14)
0-8  Oberlin (0-16)

[blindwatchmaker]

Wooster players really stepped up to plate tonight.  Cooper was fantastic and Will, Johnson and Bidwell played extremely hard.  Some of Cooper's shots were pretty amazing to watch.  He has some great moves that make your jaw drop at times.  

Have to say Wooster was playing pretty good D but OWU was able to get their shots to fall.  They have a couple of shooters on that can hit from downtown.  

Was a fun game to watch, close enough to keep it interesting but never really in doubt.

Kudos to Woo for coming out and playing hard.  They deserved the win tonight.

Also a shout out to Rummy who was the guest coach tonight!  

[Marty Bannister]

"Witt4ever"........my not doing the Wittenberg games has nothing to do with
Garnett Purnell.....i have taken on the duties as play-by-play announcer for the
Ohio State women's basketball games and simply do not have time to devote to Wittenberg mens games as in the past. I found it not fair to the listeners and to myself  to do half the Witt schedule, and have someone else step in to do the other half. I'm sure your concerns re: the broadcasts are being addressed, Scott Leo is handling that and I'm sure whatever problems that are occuring will be corrected. The radio station situation is also not Purnell's fault, that blame falls on the current management team at WULM (formerly WBLY). Moving the games to the student station ensured they would
stay on the air in some form. Efforts were made to work out an agreement with WONE,
but numerous attempts failed. I hope this helps you in some way

[woosterbooster]

Some thoughts on Wooster - OWU:

A very solid performance by Evan Will who, especially early on, found himself defending away from the basket (in Port's role) and did a commendable job.  He gets tougher on the boards every game.

The man who, to me, unexpectedly stepped up his game was Marty Bidwell.  He picked up both his defense and rebounding, which wasn't that surprising, but it was his offensive play that caught my attention.  He made a number of really nice moves to get to the basket, and finished.  Plus, he handled the ball on the break a few times, kept it until the right moment, and then dished it off nicely.  A really solid game tonight.

What can you say about James Cooper?  He scored from everywhere, in every fashion, including a double-pump underhand fling shot from close in on the right side.  Had anyone else thrown that thing up I'd have been yelling and swearing, sure that it would never draw iron.  Cooper's attempt didn't draw iron, either.  It went straight through the hoop, just as I expected it to.

I've been trying to figure out who to compare him with, and still can't really put a finger on it.  Except that there's a little bit of Dick Barnett (going way back here) in him.  Barnett, from mid-range and in close, had a little fadeaway on his jumper, which enabled him to get it off in traffic.  Cooper does, also.  And you can almost imagine Cooper yelling "Fall back, baby!" after he drains those long threes.

OWU shot the ball extremely well.  The made a bunch of mid-range jumpers with hands in their faces and quite a few long range threes.  I didn't expect them to keep that up, but they did.  If that's their normal accuracy, I can see how they can be a pretty tough opponent.

[wooscotsfan]

It looks like Brandon Miller may have NCAC player of the week.  2-0
In two games.  25 PPG, 10.5 RPG, 4.5 SPG, 2.5 APG, 1.0 BPG  If anyone can find someone with a better stat line then that... feel free to Post.

NCAC Player of the Week has to be James Cooper!!
In 2 wins:  64 points, 25 of 38 shots made, 7 of 11 three pointers, 6 assists

His 37 points tonight vs. Ohio Wesleyan was a career high and Cooper scored 22 of those points in the crucial 2nd half as he led Wooster to the win.