MBB: North Coast Athletic Conference

[sac]

Cradle of coaches, indeed; it occurs to me that nobody has yet mentioned in here that Marietta's new (Apr. 18) head coach is Jon VanderWal, an assistant to Mike DeWitt at Ohio Wesleyan the past four seasons.  Story in the Notables section of this site (scroll down a bit).  VanderWal played at Albion, graduating in 2001, and coached for two seasons at Defiance before departing for Delaware and, now, Marietta.  I guess he's just a snowbird, albeit a very slow-moving one.  Maybe he'll turn up at Emory in about a dozen years, with stops at Bethany, Maryville (TN), and Sewanee. 

Funny observation DC, you can add to that.......Jon is from Cadillac, MI which is a little more than halfway up the lower peninsula, then to Albion which could be considered Southern Michigan........and so on. 

VanderWal was also a fine pinch hitter back in the day with the Expos, Rockies and Padres. Oh, wrong one! 

At the time Marietta's Vander Wal played, Hope had its own VanderWall (Kyle), spelled with a second 'L'.  They'd occasionally end up defending each other. 

The baseball Vander Wal was born in Grand Rapids, MI and attended Western Michigan.  He'd be a regular feature on the late night sportscast if he got a hit.

[David Collinge]

I have a lot of respect for assistant coaches, and I'm glad to see these three doing well in their careers.  Some of the best guys in our conference are assistant coaches.

I can't help but notice that the three top contenders to Wooster's title are the teams that just lost their top assistants.  I know that if Wooster lost Doug Cline, it would definitely have an effect on their success, and he'd be very hard to replace (even considering that Wooster has about a half-dozen assistants.)  That makes me wonder how much losing VanderWal, Mulligan, and Taylor will hurt OWU, Wabash, and Wittenberg (respectively) this season.  Since we have no OWU regulars, what do you folks think about Wabash and Witt?  Also, who will become the top assistants at these schools this year?

As for OWU, this loss may hurt significantly, as I believe VanderWal was DeWitt's only assistant (at least, only full-time assistant.)  I just took a quick look at their website, and there are no other men's basketball coaches listed besides Mike.  Plus, losing VW in April must have had an effect on their recruiting.  I wish someone close to the Bishops program would log in and give us an update on this.

Looks like ODU is black and gold. Drat. I was hoping for some teal, or chartruse, or purple!

Black and gold?  Something tells me that Artie's wardrobe is not long on those colors!  Some Big and Tall Men's store in Columbus is about to have a great sales day. 

[David Collinge]

*crickets chirping*

I guess I should know better than to ask a basketball question to Witt and Wabash fans in July.  Methinks their minds are elsewhere...

Wabash schedule is posted, maybe thanks to the gentle nudge provided by roadtrip.  Here's a link: LINK

LGs get to spend New Years' Eve in San Antonio, taking on Trinity and Southwestern (the schedule doesn't reveal the matchups, but this is probably a classic format tournament; no reason for SCAC rivals Trinity and SW to meet in a holiday tournament.  Which means that the LGs avoid Ohio Northern on that trip.)  Wabash faces Wooster and Ohio Wesleyan back-to-back twice, including two road tilts on Feb. 6 and 9.  In fact, they have a very tough stretch at the beginning of February, starting with Wittenberg at Chadwick on Jan. 30, followed by Kenyon's visit to C-ville and the trips to OWU and Wooster.  That looks to me like the two week "make or break" stretch for the Giants' season.

[smedindy]

No Pete Thorn??? Hmmm....

[Pat Coleman]

Seeing who they've invited to the tipoff tournament, perhaps it's a good thing they have only one tournament. Two NAIA's and a Canadian school?

[Gregory Sager]

LGs get to spend New Years' Eve in San Antonio, taking on Trinity and Southwestern (the schedule doesn't reveal the matchups, but this is probably a classic format tournament; no reason for SCAC rivals Trinity and SW to meet in a holiday tournament.  Which means that the LGs avoid Ohio Northern on that trip.)

There's no "probably" about it, DC. Trinity (TX) and Southwestern annually participate in this holiday tournament that the Tigers host down in San Antone, and it's always set up in the classic format. Last season the two visitors were Pitt-Greensburg and Swarthmore; in 2005-06 it was Manchester and Dominican; in 2004-05 it was Ohio Wesleyan and Illinois Wesleyan; and in 2003-04 it was Augustana and Wheaton. In 2002-03 the tourney was held over Thanksgiving weekend, and the visitors were Chicago and Washington (MO).

[roadtrip]

DC
I think you'll be able to tell if Wabash will be a contender this year by the end of the Trinity tourney. If they can come thru the "pre-season" with good guard ball handling I believe it would bode well for the NCAC season. IMO the front line will be big and deep as alot of guys got their feet wet last year and will be expected to improve. A lot of 6'5/6"6 225/
230 guys if the freshmen hit the weight room over the summer. If Wabash guards can show they can handle the rock, run the offense with limited turnovers and be leaders I think they could make the W's pay them some mind. Wabash has some serious streak shooters at the guard spots so I would think they would be OK on the scoring side but you still need the driver to break down the D for the easy buckets against the good teams.

[Gregory Sager]

DC
I think you'll be able to tell if Wabash will be a contender this year by the end of the Trinity tourney. If they can come thru the "pre-season" with good guard ball handling I believe it would bode well for the NCAC season.

"Non-conference", not "pre-season". Non-conference games count towards a team's record.

First time I've trotted out my hobby horse in 2007-08!

[Witt4ever]

Wittenberg's Recruits:

http://zeke.phpnet.us/wittbb.html

Also, it looks like Mark Caraway is not returning.

[roadtrip]

The "pre-season" was an attempt at humor...winning the NCAC, beating the W's and getting the auto bid is the goal....and being from the Chgo area I wouldn't mind seeing Wabash come up north for a few games/tourneys

[sac]

Any recruiting class with a player from Bellefontaine gets an A in my book. 

Mostly because of the pronunciation.

[David Collinge]

With thanks to the UAA/SLIAC poster "Wydown Blvd.", here's a link to a New York Times slideshow of clever college T-shirts.  All but one of them are D3 schools, and two of them are from our own witty conference.

So I take it that nobody wants to talk about assistant coaches?

[Li'l Giant]

LGs get to spend New Years' Eve in San Antonio, taking on Trinity and Southwestern

Wow. I came in here to wish DC condolences on the passing of his favorite filmmaker and figured out that come New Year's week I will get to see my first Wabash basketball game in person since the spring of 1999. I'm stoked about this. Of course, as DC pointed out, my mind was on the gridiron.

[David Collinge]

I came in here to wish DC condolences on the passing of his favorite filmmaker [...]

Second favorite, behind Ozu, but thanks.  Bergman was 89, and while he was still very active, it's fair to say that he was at or near the end of his creative years at death.  Would that the same could be said for all great artists (for example, Jerry Hadley, who I've commemorated since his tragic and untimely passing two weeks ago). 

Still it is a great loss in a summer of great losses.

[wally_wabash]

Oooh...ONU is headed down for that tournament also.  Wabash might even get a regional game out of the deal!

That's pretty sweet that the LGs are headed down to your backyard.  Make sure they hit Chris Madrid's before they leave.