MBB: St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[Denny McKinney]

JoeVegas - Were Coaches aware of the Gentry injury before the poll. From the games I watched last year, there wasn't a whole lot of gelling going on then either. This could end up being a New Look. FU has the size. Question will be can they score enough points to win. I look at this weekends games as two that FU should win. We will see.

[hopefan]

Coach's poll is up on SLIAC.org

2013-14 SLIAC Men's Basketball Preseason Poll
1. Spalding University
2. MacMurray College
3. Westminster College
4. Webster University
5. Eureka College
6. Fontbonne University
7. Greenville College
8. Iowa Wesleyan College
9. Blackburn College
10. Principia College

So let's hypothesize what the coaches were thinking..

As I expected, Spalding and Mac were the top two... Spalding getting 5 first place votes, Mac 4...I thought Mac might finish first... there is a mention of 3 talented frosh joing Spalding which may have tipped the scales in their favor....

Westmin comes in as no 3... probably as good of a selection as any... With Lee and James leading the way, and a talented transfer as a 3rd guard who hit for 35 vs vs Mo S&T, they'll be a fun team to watch... question is, what will they do for size...  James may miss a little time with ankle injury

Webster is no 4... good experience returning... wondering who will pick up the scoring beyond Ahmad Smith... Aaron Griffin out with injury, when will he return?

Eureka at 5 speaks to a hoped for high quality recruiting year... a boatload of transfers, can coach wilde put all the new faces together like he did two years ago....

Fontbonne at 6... kind of surprised at this... If Gentry out for season, the whole format could change offensively..some very talented frosh join some pretty good sophs... Coaches evidently think this will be a learning year, but I think Fonbonne could be as good as number 3....

Greenville at 7 ... will have to see how many players from last year actually fit in... some good talent, but it was a mess... if the problems are mended, and several new faces blend in, Greenville could challenge..

Iowa Wesleyan at 8 is just like Eureka, they lost everyone who played last year ... how good are the new kids... we'll wait and see... Denny said they didn't look too bad on the internet...

Blackburn at 9... I just don't know...

Prin at 10... I'm hoping the coaches are wrong.....

[Joevegas]

Not sure if coaches new before poll.  My understanding is that they didnt look good in a scrimmage they had last week either. 
The problem for them is gaurd play.   In the SLU game the gaurds were the killer.  If Gentry is really out the big guys will suffer cause they wont get the ball.  That is the strength of Fontbonne.  You have Greenlee, Degeres, Tucker and Guinn.  But the gaurds must be able to get the ball upcourt without turnovers.  Guess we will see.  I think they have two games this week.  If they lose them it could be a long season for  the kids. 

[hopefan]

Not sure if coaches new before poll.  My understanding is that they didnt look good in a scrimmage they had last week either. 
The problem for them is gaurd play.   In the SLU game the gaurds were the killer.  If Gentry is really out the big guys will suffer cause they wont get the ball.  That is the strength of Fontbonne.  You have Greenlee, Degeres, Tucker and Guinn.  But the gaurds must be able to get the ball upcourt without turnovers.  Guess we will see.  I think they have two games this week.  If they lose them it could be a long season for  the kids.

A couple of comments just to expose another side of the story..

There are some people who would think the big guys, or wings, didn't get the ball very often WITH Gentry...  as I said before, his game had to improve this year... granted, with him out, and the backup point from last year opting for baseball, they almost have to go with the freshman at point.  It will be tough...

Rhodes, Fontbonne's opponent on Sunday, should be good... they were 16-10, 11-3 last year, 2nd in their conference, a conference that is thought of as better than the SLIAC... Masey has Fontbonne as a couple point favorite over Hendrix (Saturday), and an 8 point underdog to Rhodes.... they should be good competitive games... 2 losses would be disappointing, but not crushing... the conference season here is EVERYTHING....  I'll point to Webster several years ago playing a great non conference schedule and winning 0 or no more than 1 or 2 non conf games... then took that experience to win the conference title.... You just can't realisticly use the performance against SLU as a measuring stick for anybody, guards or big men.... let's see how things go this weekend.....

[WUPHF]

There are some people who would think the big guys, or wings, didn't get the ball very often WITH Gentry...

This was absolutely the case in a few of the games I watched last season.

Otherwise, I am excited about the weekend.  I am also excited about the collaboration between Fontbonne and Washington University; something you almost never see except in varsity athletics.

[Denny McKinney]

I heard that FU beat Illini College 2 out of 3 halves on Saturday.

Rhodes lost two of their top players. One being the conference's leading scorer. Greenville beat both Rhodes and Hendrix in the opening weekend last year. In fact GC beat Hendrix by 20 and WC beat them by 31.

FU returns a Lot of experience from last year. Doerhaur, Welch, Rucker and SLIAC NOY Greenlee saw all the minutes they wanted. Add size and pedigree of DeGeere, Quinn and Tucker. The SLU game saw freshmen PG Hayward playing most of the minutes. The problem in that game was nobody could get open in their sets for Hayward to pass to. FU won't see that kind of defense again this year.

I thought Doerhaur should of got some PG time last year. I can't see FU is looking at a long season just because of the loss of one player. IMO

"There are some people who would think the big guys, or wings, didn't get the ball very often WITH Gentry...  as I said before, his game had to improve this year... granted, with him out, and the backup point from last year opting for baseball, they almost have to go with the freshman at point."

Hopefan I agree with you on this statement.

[GC Panther 01]

Before the games are played, I'm thinking that 3-7 could come down to who can win 1-2 tight games on the road.

[hopefan]

Before the games are played, I'm thinking that 3-7 could come down to who can win 1-2 tight games on the road.

Seeing GCPanther post reminded me that I had never checked out GC's exhibition box score vs SIUE... Old head alex Mumphard (17) and soph Tim Daniel (16) were leading scorers in double figures in a 97-61 loss... new faces got much of the rest of the time...one interesting stat is that Greenville got 30 free throws, hopefully meaning they're active to the basket....two new JC'rs started for Greenville and 3 frosh got significant time off the bench..... excited to see them tomorrow over at Westmin...

[ecreddevils]

Well, that magical first weekend of the season approaches... all 10 SLIAC teams play:
Friday
     Spalding vs Birmingham So at Birmingham So Tourney
      Principia vs Illinois College at Illinois College tourney
      Greenville vs Millikin at CCIW/SLIAC Tourney at Westminster
      Westminster vs Elmhurst at CCIW/SLIAC Tourney at Westminster
       Blackburn vs Wheaton at Wheaton Tourney

I have no problem making predictions with little to no data:

Friday:

B-S 89   SU 68
IC 75 Prin 53
GC 67 Millikin 64
Elmhurst 72 West 64
Wheaton 93 BC 51

[Denny McKinney]

Before the season gets underway I have several inquiries:
1.) Why would Wheaton invite Blackburn College to their tourney and how big of a guarantee do they get for 2 whoopings?

2.) Why is Millikin scheduling both Blackburn and Principia?

3.) What is Blackburn doing on IWU's schedule?

I thought the CCIW was all about SOS and OWP. Is this the year of the cupcake?

Bold Prediction of the weekend: Principia gets a non-conference Win.

[hopefan]

Bold Prediction of the weekend: Principia gets a non-conference Win.

I've got my fingers crossed on that one too......

[ecreddevils]

Bold Prediction of the weekend: Principia gets a non-conference Win.

I've got my fingers crossed on that one too......

Prin could easily wake up 2-1 next Wed. morning.  Knox is not a good ball club and the STL Pharma game last year was a nail biter. I just don't think they beat IC.

[Denny McKinney]

Where have I been. Coach Bushong has returned to the PC sidelines. He , gentlemen, is the only winning coach in PC history. And, he has five he can put on the floor and compete. Returns the 3rd and 4th leading scorers in the SLIAC last year. Kenny Sydness 6'4 Sr. avg. 15.8 pts and 7 rpg. And, Damon Willgus 5'10 Sr. G. avg. 15.4 ppg. Returning after a year when he played just 7 games Larry Patterson 5'10, who was averaging 15.5 ppg. Also, returning Matt Jones who averaged 9.6 ppg.

Coach Bushong landed a very good recruit in Justin Ball 6'8 230 Fr. Center. Very talented HS player who has over all good size. He is joined by HS teammate Sawyer Grow 6'6 195. Frontcourt 6'4, 6'6, 6'8 and a couple Sr. Guards. Not your usual PC team.

Veteran scheduling has PC opening @ Illini College, vs Knox and the Host. 1-1 (?). Then 8 straight Home games. StL. Pharma, William Woods, Millikin, Spalding, Mac, Westminster, Loras and Webster. First 2 road games are @ IWC and @ BC. With a game @ StL Pharma later in February.

Those 8 home games will be very good to the Panthers and very tough for a visiting team on any night. Good Luck, Coach.

I'm Just Sayin' 

[ecreddevils]

Where have I been. Coach Bushong has returned to the PC sidelines. He , gentlemen, is the only winning coach in PC history. And, he has five he can put on the floor and compete. Returns the 3rd and 4th leading scorers in the SLIAC last year. Kenny Sydness 6'4 Sr. avg. 15.8 pts and 7 rpg. And, Damon Willgus 5'10 Sr. G. avg. 15.4 ppg. Returning after a year when he played just 7 games Larry Patterson 5'10, who was averaging 15.5 ppg. Also, returning Matt Jones who averaged 9.6 ppg.

Coach Bushong landed a very good recruit in Justin Ball 6'8 230 Fr. Center. Very talented HS player who has over all good size. He is joined by HS teammate Sawyer Grow 6'6 195. Frontcourt 6'4, 6'6, 6'8 and a couple Sr. Guards. Not your usual PC team.

Veteran scheduling has PC opening @ Illini College, vs Knox and the Host. 1-1 (?). Then 8 straight Home games. StL. Pharma, William Woods, Millikin, Spalding, Mac, Westminster, Loras and Webster. First 2 road games are @ IWC and @ BC. With a game @ StL Pharma later in February.

Those 8 home games will be very good to the Panthers and very tough for a visiting team on any night. Good Luck, Coach.

I'm Just Sayin' 

PC actually has an intriguing roster with the addition of Ball and Grow (please stifle any snickering).  They also have the best player profiles on their website of any SLIAC school.

[hopefan]

The records I pulled from NCAA.org indicate that Coach Bushong was 48-78 as Principia coach from 1985-90, and unfortunately 0-50 since his return.... if he coached Prin and Prin was NAIA (non-NCAA) prior to the 1985-86 season, then there would be additional years to add to the record, but they are not listed in NCAA.org or on his writeup in the Principia site...  they were not included in an article written when he was hired..

Anyway, Denny, if you have prior records to support the detail that he has or had a winning record at Prin(assuming career winning record.. yes he did have a one season winning record in 1988-89) prior to 85-86, I'd be curious to see it, just to update the records I posted a couple weeks ago...

I've met Coach Bushong a couple of times.. very nice guy, soft spoken... he was helpless with the talent level of the last two years, especially with Patterson not playing 2nd semester, so it will be interesting to see if they can end the streak and be competitive this year with Patterson returning and the addition of the Frosh.. I know of at least two other prominent D3 schools that were recruiting Justin Ball only to lose out to Prin....