WBB: Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

Just counted it up: 10 teams in the Top 25 lost this week, and 11 teams who were receiving votes took losses as well. Man, the weekend really was a bloodbath (more so than I even thought).

Forgot to mention, there is a place you can see a lot of the info you went and looked up. The women's Top 25 Discussion. Darryl updates that on Thursdays and Sundays throughout the season ... and on the men's side as well.

[TroyP]

 New to the message board, I have enjoyed reading about the SCAC and especially all the Trinity University information. My daughter has committed and been accepted to go play for Coach Hill at Trinity University next year. It is super exciting to see how well the team is playing and only losing two seniors to graduation after this year, that she gets to be a part of a team and group like that. I'm looking forward to the next four years. Go Tigers!

[jekelish]

New to the message board, I have enjoyed reading about the SCAC and especially all the Trinity University information. My daughter has committed and been accepted to go play for Coach Hill at Trinity University next year. It is super exciting to see how well the team is playing and only losing two seniors to graduation after this year, that she gets to be a part of a team and group like that. I'm looking forward to the next four years. Go Tigers!

I'm an Austin College fan but good luck to your daughter! I hope she has a great career in the conference.

[Ron Boerger]

New to the message board, I have enjoyed reading about the SCAC and especially all the Trinity University information. My daughter has committed and been accepted to go play for Coach Hill at Trinity University next year. It is super exciting to see how well the team is playing and only losing two seniors to graduation after this year, that she gets to be a part of a team and group like that. I'm looking forward to the next four years. Go Tigers!

Welcome, Troy, and congratulations to your daughter for being accepted to Trinity.  Coach Hill is a super human being, a fine coach from a family of coaches (dad Bob was an NBA coach including the Spurs and Pacers, brother Casey is an assistant with the Clippers, other brother Chris is head coach at Jesuit Dallas HS; all three brothers attended TU and I think played ball there) and I hope your daughter will enjoy your time working with him and the other players and staff.   Jekelish (AC) and I (TU, class of sometime last century ) are about the only SCAC posters these days so feel free to ask any questions you might have about the conference or the schools.   We're also fortunate to have our friends from d3hoops, Dave and Gordon, weigh in from time to time so they can add national perspective.

The conference is a bit weak this year, normally TLU is much more in the mix as it's been a three-school battle with AC and TU the last few seasons.  Colorado College is normally a step behind the conference leaders.  Southwestern used to have a much stronger program but have really struggled with this year being the worst I can remember.  Johnson and Wales (CO) joined the conference a few years back and haven't put it together yet; St. Thomas (TX) is probably the third-best team in the conference right now but aren't eligible for championships as they're in the first (or maybe second) year of transferring to D3 from NAIA.  UDallas, Centenary, Schreiner are among the weaker teams most years, including this one.

[jekelish]

What an absolutely brutal loss for AC, falling 76-73 at Southwestern tonight. Just a dismal performance against a team that, for whatever reason, just has a mental hold on the 'Roos the last couple seasons. Unbelievable.

[Ron Boerger]

What an absolutely brutal loss for AC, falling 76-73 at Southwestern tonight. Just a dismal performance against a team that, for whatever reason, just has a mental hold on the 'Roos the last couple seasons. Unbelievable.

Yeah, that was totally unexpected.  The SW game writeup said they moved Naomi Brown to starter and that she helped deal with pressure, but AC doesn't do a lot of full-court pressure, does it?  Stats say 8.8 steals/game vs 6.1 allowed, so it looks more like opportunistic pressure than continual, and even with the change AC had a 7-4 advantage in steals, 8-16 in turnovers, just shot well below their average (36% to SW's 47%) and lost the battle on the boards 28-37.  Still might have won had the Pirates not finally started hitting free throws at the end (were shooting around 50% from the line until the last minute or two, ending up 18-30 on the night).  Sorry, Jek, here's to a better night against TLU.

I won't say much about the Trinity blowout of poor JWU, who were without their leading scorer and ended up on the short side of a 103-26 margin.  About the only good thing for the visitors is that they were able to play seven women; in their prior loss to Colorado they only had five available due to other injuries.  Get well soon, Lady Wildcats.  Trinity will face a stiffer challenge tonight against Colorado, who after last night's results suddenly find themselves tied for second (with St. Thomas) in SCAC play, a half game ahead of AC. 

[Ron Boerger]

Colorado College kept it close for a little over a quarter, trailing 25-23 early in the second, but Trinity went on a 19-2 run over the next six minutes and pulled away for a 90-66 win in San Antonio.   Abby Holland continued her excellent play of late with 26 points (10-15 shooting) and 8 boards, and Ashlyn Milton was 4-of-4 beyond the arc in scoring 19 points in 20 minutes.  Kelly Simmons added 12 points and 9 boards for the home side.   The visitors were led by McKenzee Gertz who had 15 and 10. 

Colorado handled Trinity's pressure well, with 7 TU steals (well below the season average of 17) leading to 14 CC turnovers.

[jekelish]

Good response from AC after last night's flukey result (no offense intended to Southwestern but I think most would agree that result was far from expected) with a 30 point win over Texas Lutheran. TLU had seemed to be getting things together a bit but the 'Roos were dominant after the first quarter.

[gordonmann]

Austin is still ranked, hanging in at No. 24.

And Trinity (Texas) is finally ranked in front of George Fox, which probably should've happened sooner.

https://www.d3hoops.com/top25/women/2019-20/week7

[jekelish]

I'm legitimately surprised AC is still ranked, but glad for obvious reasons and also not so obvious ones. There's definitely an extra something in the AC/Southwestern rivalry where you can basically throw the records out the window these days. Happy for the 'Roos they have a chance to build on their TLU win and have apparently built up enough national respect to be able to withstand a bad loss and continue to get votes.

[Ron Boerger]

That's about where I'd put Trinity and it's great the voters continued to show AC respect despite what I agree with jekelish was a fluke loss.   Sounds like AC::SW as TU::TLU.   Will be interesting to see what the result is for the latter in this weekend's installment.

[Ron Boerger]

For anyone wondering (hi Jek!) the first regional rankings will be out Feb 12 (per https://ncaaorg.s3.amazonaws.com/championships/sports/basketball/d3/women/2019-20D3WBB_PreChampManual.pdf).   That's a week later than last season. 

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

For anyone wondering (hi Jek!) the first regional rankings will be out Feb 12 (per https://ncaaorg.s3.amazonaws.com/championships/sports/basketball/d3/women/2019-20D3WBB_PreChampManual.pdf).   That's a week later than last season.

It's three weeks before selection.  That's pretty typical.

[Pat Coleman]

It's the season that is a week later.

[Ron Boerger]

You guys know this, people like me just look at dates.