WBB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

[jekelish]

Austin College just barely edges out Trinity in the preseason voting (61 points to 60): https://www.scacsports.com/sports/wbkb/2020-21/releases/PreseasonPoll

[Ron Boerger]

Austin College just barely edges out Trinity in the preseason voting (61 points to 60): https://www.scacsports.com/sports/wbkb/2020-21/releases/PreseasonPoll

That's pretty much the top 3 I would have chosen.   Trinity is fortunate to get both Austin and Colorado at home this season, but AC gets the tournament.   Even lacking fans I'd rather be playing at home than dealing with COVID measures on the road. 

[jekelish]

Austin College just barely edges out Trinity in the preseason voting (61 points to 60): https://www.scacsports.com/sports/wbkb/2020-21/releases/PreseasonPoll

That's pretty much the top 3 I would have chosen.   Trinity is fortunate to get both Austin and Colorado at home this season, but AC gets the tournament.   Even lacking fans I'd rather be playing at home than dealing with COVID measures on the road.

Agreed. AC and Trinity are the obvious top two (on paper, in whichever order you prefer), and as long as Gertz is there, Colorado College seems like the odds on favorite to be the third team in the mix.

[Ron Boerger]

Austin College just barely edges out Trinity in the preseason voting (61 points to 60): https://www.scacsports.com/sports/wbkb/2020-21/releases/PreseasonPoll

That's pretty much the top 3 I would have chosen.   Trinity is fortunate to get both Austin and Colorado at home this season, but AC gets the tournament.   Even lacking fans I'd rather be playing at home than dealing with COVID measures on the road.

Agreed. AC and Trinity are the obvious top two (on paper, in whichever order you prefer), and as long as Gertz is there, Colorado College seems like the odds on favorite to be the third team in the mix.

I totally forgot about St. Thomas, who beat both TU and AC last season but weren't eligible for the SCAC championship.  Trinity draws them this weekend, but with the Celts losing both All-SCAC Sheridan Thomas and the conference DPOY Jazz Taylor, it will be interesting to see what they can bring to the table in their first year of SCAC tourney eligibility.   

[Ron Boerger]

Trinity couldn't buy a basket early, trailing 10-2 at one point, and didn't take a lead until late in the first half, but behind 15 from Maggie Shipley, mostly during a 27-4 third quarter, almost double up St. Thomas, 73-38.

Shipley indeed is a player, and I look forward to seeing her the rest of the season.

[jekelish]

Similar shaky start for Austin College. Couldn't buy a basket early and Dallas jumped ahead 22-11, but the 'Roos dominated from there for a 93-73 win.

I'll tell you what, Dallas is definitely not finishing last in the SCAC, like the preseason poll projects. They are SIGNIFICANTLY improved. They've got some solid players and multiple shooters. I think when it's all said and done they'll be around the 5-7 range in terms of where they finish.

[Jester1390]

Scoring is way up in hcac and I imagine everywhere with no scrimmages defense seems to be suffering I would have to double check bit a lot of game both teams in the 60 or 70

[Ron Boerger]

Similar shaky start for Austin College. Couldn't buy a basket early and Dallas jumped ahead 22-11, but the 'Roos dominated from there for a 93-73 win.

I'll tell you what, Dallas is definitely not finishing last in the SCAC, like the preseason poll projects. They are SIGNIFICANTLY improved. They've got some solid players and multiple shooters. I think when it's all said and done they'll be around the 5-7 range in terms of where they finish.

I saw their numbers were up a bit, though they are very young and don't have many returners.  I hope you are right, they have had a few tough years in Dallas.

[jekelish]

Much better performance from Austin College today, and UD came back down to Earth a bit shooting the ball with an 86-52 final in Sherman. Keep an eye on 'Roo freshman Megan O'Neil out of Coppell, she's scored 15 in each of her first two games and is 6-of-11 on threes. Gonna be a heck of a player.

Dallas is still much improved - they're just very young and inexperienced, but they have some solid players and in a year or two have a chance to be in the mix for a top 4 or 5 seed in the tournament. I honestly believe that. Lots of youthful mistakes today but they've got some pretty good young players.

[Ron Boerger]

CC with the big upset at Trinity 57-55 as Ashlyn Milton's wide open (but deep) three rims out at the buzzer.  CC outrebounded Trinity 56-34, Trinity's defensive pressure didn't phase CC especially in the 2nd half (2 steals), and a bizarre shooting night where Trinity shoots a boatload of threes (10-32) and a subpar 9-37 inside the arc.   Shipley was 1-12 and was pressing hard as the game went on.  Emily Daniel (16 on 6-15) and Ashlyn Milton (12 on 4-11) were the only home Tigers in double figures;  CC got 14 from Braley, 12 from Cloud, 10 from Faneli.

Colorado doesn't play Austin, so tomorrow's result may have a lot to say about who ends up with the top seed in the tournament.

Edit:  Trinity went scoreless the last 2:28, missed 12 of their last 13 shots, and scored one point in the last 6:39.   

[jekelish]

Austin College pretty much dominated against Southwestern but the score wound up being closer than they'd have liked, winning 66-59 in Sherman. It was a 15 point game with about six minutes left before the Pirates started chipping away, as Austin College had an uncharacteristically poor performance at the free throw line (11-of-22 overall) and were unable to ice the game. In particular, Kacie West - who last year shot 81% from the line - was, shockingly, 0-for-5 tonight.

Ally Longaker continued her strong start to the year, scoring 21 points and grabbing 9 rebounds, but she was likewise poor from the FT line. Last year she shot 75%, tonight she was just 5-of-11. All 11 of Austin College's missed free throws came from those two seniors.

[Ron Boerger]

Another loss for Trinity today, this time in OT 61-64, after an open J in the lane wouldn't fall for Hailey Coleman as regulation wound down.   TU had a 13-point lead midway through the third quarter but once again the offense stalled late and Colorado took advantage.   The difference today, other than Trinity's poor shooting, was a 21-7 advantage at the line for the visitors - and Trinity helped by missing all but 2 of theirs.   Three of Colorado's starters played more than 40 minutes with Anna Fanelli (13 pts, 6 ast, 6 reb) once again playing every possession.  Rosie Braley and McKenzie Gertz each had 16 points and 9 boards to lead the way for the visitors, who held on despite scoring no field goals in the last 4:01.

After being outrebounded badly last night, Trinity managed to keep the  margin close (36-41) today.  Ashlyn Milton had 14, Jordan Rudd 13 for Trinity, who have yet to find the offensive flow that makes them so dangerous.   Part of that comes from Colorado limiting the damage from Trinity's press (14 steals, 26 total turnovers today), but for the second day little fell for the home team (26-78 [33.3%] overall, 7-27 from beyond the arc) despite good opportunities throughout.  The normally resilient bench contributed only 19 points with Maggie Shipley (10 points) leading the way.   That's an improvement over yesterday, when the bench had a *total* of 4 points, but is something to pay attention to the rest of the season.   

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

The Division III basketball season technically started nearly three months ago, but it has taken until the end of January for it to start feeling like the season is really underway. Even so, only about a quarter of the division has played just a single game. Another quarter of the division will never take to the court. And in between is wide gulf of different options.

On the first video-version of Hoopsville this season, Dave McHugh is joined by much of the D3hoops.com crew, Pat Coleman and Ryan Scott, to react to what has been one of the more unique seasons ... to say it lightly.

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[Ron Boerger]

Trinity looked more themselves tonight against TLU, especially in the first half, winning handily 78-52 with everyone seeing lots of playing time.  Emily Daniels had 13, Jordan Rudd and Ashlyn Milton 12 each as Trinity shot over 56% on the evening while holding TLU under 35%.  Tigers didn't press a whole lot tonight, possibly because Mel Dixon's teams handle that pressure pretty well.  Abby Hroch led all scorers with 14 for TLU.

0-4 Southwestern now 1-4 after defeating Colorado College in the thin air, 65-58 as Noel Pratts had 19.   The mountain Tigers, who seemingly couldn't miss against Trinity last week (especially in the second game), struggled to shoot 30% at home tonight.

[jekelish]

AC comes in at #9 in the first D3Hoops Top 10 of the year, with two votes for #1 (which I found interesting). The 'Roos were off this past weekend and head to St. Thomas this week for their first road games of the year. They've been hit by the injury bug quite a bit this year so hopefully they'll be able to get through this weekend and be back to nearly full strength by the time they have to head to Trinity.