MBB: St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[Gregory Sager]

I'm certain that Coach Barber will deal with it in-house. I would expect Cooley to be running a bunch of extra suicides in practice, or he might even get stuck with a suspension or a DNP-CD for a game.

Young men make lots and lots of behavioral mistakes, whether they're basketball players or not. Remember, the human brain doesn't fully shift from processing information with the amygdala (the emotional center) to the prefrontal cortex (the rational center) until the person is in his or her mid-twenties. That doesn't excuse Cooley's unsportsmanlike behavior, but it does contextualize it. I cringe when I think back on some of the stupid stuff I said and/or did when I was in college. I strongly suspect that every other poster feels the same way about his own post-adolescent period.

Please don't make snap judgments about whether the Greenville team is accurately reflecting its institution's values based upon one isolated (and, to be honest, relatively harmless) incident, or whether someone is easily triggered or not if he makes said snap judgment about your alma mater. Post with your prefrontal cortex, not your amygdala.

[hopefan]

... you do present as someone who is triggered easily.

Was this necessary?

Greenville (and Greenville fans) had to be be feeling it, going 1-whatever prior to this game and finally getting a conference win.  LOL

By the way, I am certainly not mocking Greenville here, but instead pointing out that they deserve some slack after struggling through a tough year.

Come on WUPIFF... not for that.... win the game and jump around as you deserve to, as much as you want to... but don't do that dunk and seemingly go wild over it....

[hopefan]

I'm certain that Coach Barber will deal with it in-house. I would expect Cooley to be running a bunch of extra suicides in practice, or he might even get stuck with a suspension or a DNP-CD for a game.

Young men make lots and lots of behavioral mistakes, whether they're basketball players or not. Remember, the human brain doesn't fully shift from processing information with the amygdala (the emotional center) to the prefrontal cortex (the rational center) until the person is in his or her mid-twenties. That doesn't excuse Cooley's unsportsmanlike behavior, but it does contextualize it. I cringe when I think back on some of the stupid stuff I said and/or did when I was in college. I strongly suspect that every other poster feels the same way about his own post-adolescent period.

Please don't make snap judgments about whether the Greenville team is accurately reflecting its institution's values based upon one isolated (and, to be honest, relatively harmless) incident, or whether someone is easily triggered or not if he makes said snap judgment about your alma mater. Post with your prefrontal cortex, not your amygdala.

This is no one of a kind mistake surrounding GU over the last 5 or 6 years... 

[Gregory Sager]

Are you saying that Coach Barber doesn't discipline his team? That he takes a laissez-faire attitude towards player conduct?

I don't want to put words in your mouth. I don't want to infer something that you're not implying. So please come right out and say whatever it is that you're thinking.

[hopefan]

The late game dunk was not classy.  I cringed when I saw it.  That said, it was not the most interesting thing from that game. 
That said, I am not surprised that this was your main take away as you do present as someone who is triggered easily.

GU... I am that rare fan who is strictly a SLIAC fan....I have no favorite in the race... If I cheer for anything, it's the underdog in a game, and that the game will be close, and that the standings tighten up. 
When I see something that bothers me, I'm going to write about it...

[hopefan]

Are you saying that Coach Barber doesn't discipline his team? That he takes a laissez-faire attitude towards player conduct?

I don't want to put words in your mouth. I don't want to infer something that you're not implying. So please come right out and say whatever it is that you're thinking.

I won't agree/disagree with your laissez-faire statement because I'm not in the Greenville locker room, nor have I conversed with Coach Barber in years....I could point out several incidents that I have witnessed or that were conveyed to me by opposing coaches over the last 5-6 years that have darkened my image of the program.  Some fans will justify them... but I haven't witnessed or heard of remotely similar actions from any other SLIAC program in that time frame....

[GU1999]

I'm certain that Coach Barber will deal with it in-house. I would expect Cooley to be running a bunch of extra suicides in practice, or he might even get stuck with a suspension or a DNP-CD for a game.

Young men make lots and lots of behavioral mistakes, whether they're basketball players or not. Remember, the human brain doesn't fully shift from processing information with the amygdala (the emotional center) to the prefrontal cortex (the rational center) until the person is in his or her mid-twenties. That doesn't excuse Cooley's unsportsmanlike behavior, but it does contextualize it. I cringe when I think back on some of the stupid stuff I said and/or did when I was in college. I strongly suspect that every other poster feels the same way about his own post-adolescent period.

Please don't make snap judgments about whether the Greenville team is accurately reflecting its institution's values based upon one isolated (and, to be honest, relatively harmless) incident, or whether someone is easily triggered or not if he makes said snap judgment about your alma mater. Post with your prefrontal cortex, not your amygdala.

This is no one of a kind mistake surrounding GU over the last 5 or 6 years...

You see what you want to see and I will see what I want to see. 

I choose to see the Dr. Barber who has won more team sportsmanship awards than any other coach in Conference history. 
I choose to see the Dr. Barber who has recruited, trained and graduated men of high character who themselves are coaches and professionals of that same high character.   
I choose to see the Dr. Barber who has not shied away from taking a kid on who comes from a tough background and makes it is work to help him succeed during their time at GU but also afterward. 
I choose to see the Dr. Barber who has made extremely difficult roster decisions mid season, to the basketball detriment of his team, to ensure that standards are upheld.

If that is me being a "fan" so be it. 

[Gregory Sager]

I'm not discounting what hopefan has seen or heard, and he's certainly entitled to his own opinion. All I can address vis-a-vis Greenville's behavior during the Barber era is from what I've seen, and that comes down to comparatively few exposures -- perhaps a half-dozen or so livestreamed contests, plus the game that the Panthers played at NPU three years ago. (I probably would've watched more online Panthers games, but Greenville's live feed was usually so staticky and fuzzy and so prone to feature herky-jerky camera operators that I wouldn't watch the Panthers unless it was a high-quality opponent or they were on the road.)

The only remarkable thing that I saw about the Panthers (since I'd seen so many Grinnell games and North Central women's games over the years that the System didn't strike me as remarkable at all) was the fact that they held up an arm when they committed fouls. It's a small but telling point. In earlier eras of basketball, players were taught from a young age to raise their hand whenever they committed a foul and heard a whistle, so as to aid the officials and the game's scorekeeper in identifying the offending player. That was a courtesy that was prone to subterfuge at times -- on North Park's threepeat national championship teams, for example, power forward Jim Clauson, who was a role player, would often quickly dart his hand up in the air and adopt a hangdog guilty look on his face if he heard a whistle after lane contact and Vikings superstar center Michael Harper was in the vicinity. It was a form of what we now call "gaslighting" -- dupe even the official who was going to make the call against Harper into believing that it had actually been Clauson who committed the foul. (You'd be surprised by how often it worked.) Regardless, the practice of raising your hand when you heard a whistle and knew that a foul was going to be called on you was considered to be proper sportsmanship in that long-gone era. Players stopped doing it in the early '80s, not coincidentally around the time that half of the fouls called in any given game became a source of heated debate on the part of players as well as coaches.

Whenever a Greenville player committed a foul and heard a whistle in that game at North Park three years ago, he immediately raised his hand. I appreciated that as the scorekeeper (I was moved down from the broadcast perch to the table for that game because North Park's SID wisely figured that a second spotter would be needed to track Greenville substitutions for live stats, leaving me as the most experienced scorekeeper left on staff in a situation in which a highly-experienced scorekeeper was an absolute necessity), but as a basketball fan I was struck by what an ancient and bizarre throwback that hand-raising gesture was. It was like watching a modern baseball pitcher windmill his throwing arm at the start of his windup, as pitchers often did back in the deadball era.

But as the game went on I began to appreciate Coach Barber's obvious intent in making his players perform that hand-raising ritual. As the code of basketball sportsmanship got pared down to bare minimum over the years, the sport lost a lot of its humanity and became a cutthroat battle of egos in which inflicting humiliation became more important than achieving success, and the art of disrespecting opponents became as much the currency of the game as points and wins. By going old school -- old "old school", really -- Coach Barber was making his players see the game that they loved through new eyes, in a way that translated into a life lesson about respecting others and owning your mistakes. I gained a lot of respect for him that evening.

Again, I'm not gainsaying hopefan's complaints at all. I'm just relating my own, admittedly limited, observations.

[GU1999]

I'm not discounting what hopefan has seen or heard, and he's certainly entitled to his own opinion. All I can address vis-a-vis Greenville's behavior during the Barber era is from what I've seen, and that comes down to comparatively few exposures -- perhaps a half-dozen or so livestreamed contests, plus the game that the Panthers played at NPU three years ago. (I probably would've watched more online Panthers games, but Greenville's live feed was usually so staticky and fuzzy and so prone to feature herky-jerky camera operators that I wouldn't watch the Panthers unless it was a high-quality opponent or they were on the road.)

The only remarkable thing that I saw about the Panthers (since I'd seen so many Grinnell games and North Central women's games over the years that the System didn't strike me as remarkable at all) was the fact that they held up an arm when they committed fouls. It's a small but telling point. In earlier eras of basketball, players were taught from a young age to raise their hand whenever they committed a foul and heard a whistle, so as to aid the officials and the game's scorekeeper in identifying the offending player. That was a courtesy that was prone to subterfuge at times -- on North Park's threepeat national championship teams, for example, power forward Jim Clauson, who was a role player, would often quickly dart his hand up in the air and adopt a hangdog guilty look on his face if he heard a whistle after lane contact and Vikings superstar center Michael Harper was in the vicinity. It was a form of what we now call "gaslighting" -- dupe even the official who was going to make the call against Harper into believing that it had actually been Clauson who committed the foul. (You'd be surprised by how often it worked.) Regardless, the practice of raising your hand when you heard a whistle and knew that a foul was going to be called on you was considered to be proper sportsmanship in that long-gone era. Players stopped doing it in the early '80s, not coincidentally around the time that half of the fouls called in any given game became a source of heated debate on the part of players as well as coaches.

Whenever a Greenville player committed a foul and heard a whistle in that game at North Park three years ago, he immediately raised his hand. I appreciated that as the scorekeeper (I was moved down from the broadcast perch to the table for that game because North Park's SID wisely figured that a second spotter would be needed to track Greenville substitutions for live stats, leaving me as the most experienced scorekeeper left on staff in a situation in which a highly-experienced scorekeeper was an absolute necessity), but as a basketball fan I was struck by what an ancient and bizarre throwback that hand-raising gesture was. It was like watching a modern baseball pitcher windmill his throwing arm at the start of his windup, as pitchers often did back in the deadball era.

But as the game went on I began to appreciate Coach Barber's obvious intent in making his players perform that hand-raising ritual. As the code of basketball sportsmanship got pared down to bare minimum over the years, the sport lost a lot of its humanity and became a cutthroat battle of egos in which inflicting humiliation became more important than achieving success, and the art of disrespecting opponents became as much the currency of the game as points and wins. By going old school -- old "old school", really -- Coach Barber was making his players see the game that they loved through new eyes, in a way that translated into a life lesson about respecting others and owning your mistakes. I gained a lot of respect for him that evening.

Again, I'm not gainsaying hopefan's complaints at all. I'm just relating my own, admittedly limited, observations.

Great observation Mr. Sager.  They still do this.  Even when the really don't want to.  OR even when they have to do it almost 23 times per game. (wow, that a lot of fouls).
For example, I noted last night in the game at about the 7 minute mark in the first, K. Cooley thought he took a charge.  It was a block and call properly.  He stood up, and at first did not raise his hand, but then he did, although if i could read his mind it was the last thing he wanted to do.   

[hopefan]

GU... I do appreciate your loyalty...

One final thought, then I return to thinking about games and standings...

Dr Barber pre system is not the same Dr Barber I saw from 2016-2020 (system)   2020 is when we moved permanently to Florida....

[hopefan]

I wrote previously that Matt Mitchell, Head Coach at Westminster, started the season with 293 career wins.... I got that number from the NCAA site.... yesterday's win over Webster was win no 7 for Westminster this season, so I figured congrats were in store...

HOWEVER.. some how something went different... the NCAA site, while recognizing 7 wins this season, shows Coach Mitchell's win total is sitting at 298.  I have no clue where 2 wins might have disappeared on the ledger, and can only hope I didn't pick up a wrong number when I first posted. 

Anyway, per the current NCAA stats, Coach Mitchells overall wins are at 298, needing 2 for 300, and his overall record shows 298-299... he needs one game over .500 the rest of the season to finish his career at .500.   

His career you ask?  Yes It was announced that Coach Mitchell (despite not looking a day over 40) is retiring this season to move southward...  I Will be rooting heavily for the Jays these next several weeks!!!  Getting to win no 300 should be accomplished... getting that game over .500 in the remaining schedule is a challenge, but is feasible.

And of Note.. Todd Creal, current Associate Head Coach at Westminster and former Head Coach at now defunct MacMurray College, will be taking over the reigns of Westminster Basketball at the end of this season!!!

[hopefan]

Looking at remaining schedules, every SLIAC school has made up or is scheduled to makeup any conference games missed due to Covid.   Unfortunately, one game remains on the postponed list...Eureka at Prin which was missed on Feb 3 due to snow covered roads.   So far, no makeup is being shown on either team's site.   One interesting (but remote) possibility lies in the fact that Prin is scheduled to play at Eureka on the final Saturday of the regular season... perhaps, if Prin was willing, they could go up to Eureka on that Friday and play Friday/Saturday both games at Eureka.....

Spalding also has a very interesting final weekend.. they will travel to the St. Louis area to play at Webster on Thursday Feb 17, Saturday at Greenville, and Sunday at Fontbonne.   Would seem sensible that it will be a 4 day trip, rather than going back to Louisville after the Webster game and coming back up Saturday morning for the Greenville game Saturday Afternoon.   

[hopefan]

Hoping Clark Davidson can return quickly for Prin....maybe even tonight???  He missed Saturday's game vs Eureka.... 15 PPG and 8.4 RPG... he is irreplaceable given Prin's thin bench.....  Announcers said Covid protocol on Saturday....

[y_jack_lok]

Just saw this  https://lyonscots.com/news/2022/2/8/general-important-information-for-lyon-college-athletics.aspx and wondered what conference they might affiliate with. Geographically they might work in the SLIAC or SAA, but I'm guessing institutionally the SAA is more likely.

[Pat Coleman]

Just saw this  https://lyonscots.com/news/2022/2/8/general-important-information-for-lyon-college-athletics.aspx and wondered what conference they might affiliate with. Geographically they might work in the SLIAC or SAA, but I'm guessing institutionally the SAA is more likely.

We actually think maybe the ASC. Here's our story from yesterday:

https://d3sports.com/notables/2022/02/lyon-college-applying-to-d3