BB: IIAC: Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[youcantseemestill]

The last word on this ridiculous argument.  IN conference stats from the last 5 years........

Year and finish        ERA     H Allowed     ER Allowed      BB      SO      EB Hits      BAA
2009 (6th place)      4th         8th                5th            2nd     2nd       4th          7th
2008 (2nd Place)     2nd         3rd                2nd           3rd      1st        3rd          2nd
2007 (6th Place)      8th          6th               6th            2nd      7th       6th          8th
2006 (1st Place)      3rd          4th                1st            5th      2nd       1st          5th
2005 (5th place)      2nd         4th                2nd           2nd      1st       2nd         4th

[Floyd in Iowa City]

Ben Schott was 4-4 in the first game and Ryan Bahnemann was 3-3 with 4 RBIs in the 2nd game as the Norse won 15-0 and 13-1 over Martin Luther.

The Norse are now 10-6 while Martin Luther is 0-10.

Schott hit 2 HRs and is hitting .500 right now.  Big series with B.V. this weekend!

[doolittledog]

Dubuque Telegraph-Herald with a bit on Loras...

http://www.thonline.com/article.cfm?id=278106

[Floyd in Iowa City]

I saw the Duhawks dropped a pair of one-run games to UW-P in some real shootouts (15-14 and 11-10).  Tough that they could not find a way to at least split that.

It is still early for everyone though.

[Floyd in Iowa City]

Frontline starting pitching struggled again today for the Norse as B.V. beat Luther 13-9.  Luther had 23 baserunners but were playing from behind almost the whole time.

The defending co-champs are 0-4 now in league play and 10-7 overall.  B.V. is 1-0 and 6-6.

[doolittledog]

Dubuque Telegraph-Herald story of the Central/Dubuque game...

http://www.thonline.com/article.cfm?id=278467

[youcantseemestill]

Interesting start so far to the season.  A little disappointed that the talk has slowed on here so much.  Lets try and pick it back up gentlemen!   

Okay, Luther is really struggling through two series.  They are 0-6 and its on their pitching.  7.51 ERA through 6 games in conference is just not going to get it done.  Add 15 errors on top of that and you have a recipe for disaster. 

Coe and Simpson played the best series of the year so far splitting two, one-run ballgames over the weekend and then Coe takes the series on Monday with a 5-2 decision.  Both teams are 4-2.  Coe's defense in the infield has to get better if they want to compete for a championship.  Offensively, Simpson is a 3 man line-up in Rasmussen, Johnson and Ethell.  The rest of the guys are all pretty much role players (but they serve their role pretty well).  For Coe, Schisler is swinging the bat really well right now and Lewis and Baranowski are dominating on the mound.  If Cody Raisch figures it out, this team's top three are going to be REALLY tough!

Wartburg is killing the ball right now.  13 home runs through 6 games is amazing!  9 of those 13 have come in two games.  The Knights have been really hot and cold on the mound as I never would have seen Cornell scoring as much as they did against Watson and company over the weekend.  Pat Grau is definitely the early season favorite for POY.  4 homers already coupled with his .470 batting average is a great start!

Some good match-ups over the next week.
mid-week series: (top 4 battle each other early on at the same time which might give us a little clearer view of where teams are right now)
Wartburg and BV   
Coe and Central
Loras and Luther
Cornell and Simpson

This weekends series:
Central @ Cornell
Coe @ BV - - This one is easily the big one of the weekend!
Loras and Simpson
Wartburg @ UD

Thoughts??

[Swing4theFences]

It does look like Luther is struggling but 0-6 is nothing that can't be overcome by two sweeps of Dubuque and Cornell.
Coe and Simpson series was a very good one and you are right that the infield for Coe has to clean it up if they want to win. That team has the bats and arms to win a championship but everyone knows defense is what wins it.

Looking into the series this weekend I see...
Central over Cornell for a sweep of 3
Simpson taking 2 of 3 from Loras
Wartburg sweeping UD....too much firepower

And finally the matchup of the weekend between Coe and BV. I see Coe taking 2 of the games from BV with strong pitching to shut down Pietryk and BV's offense. Schisler has been swinging the bat well and with the middle of that lineup (Schisler, Richmond, Velvick) if they can get enough runs for Lewis/ Baranowski I see them winning two and maybe even getting one if Cody Raisch pitches well. They really need him to start up

[wartburgalum]

Even sweeps over Dubuque and Cornell does not do a lot for Luther, at this point they basically have to sweep the rest of the conference season.

I have been seriously impressed with Wartburg's offense to this point.  I don't know if all of the homeruns are a result of poor pitching/timely hitting or a change in philosophy with the guys that they have now.  Used to be string together hits, steal bases and put pressure on the defense.  Now it would appear that they can sit back and wait for that big inning.

Wartubrg's pitching is still a concern for me.  Shut down a offensively good Central team, then give up a whole lot of runs against Cornell. Should be interesting to see how the Wartbug starters do once they start facing some of the tougher lineups in the conference.

[Floyd in Iowa City]

Luther finally got the first conference of 2010 with a 4-1 win over fellow 2009 co-champ Loras.  Cody Hyland had his best statistical game of the year giving up 1 run over 8 innings, and freshman Danny Smith picked up the save.

This does not solve the pitching issues in league play, but it gives some hope that the Norse could still play their way out of dead last.

I thought there had to be a good reason Smith did not start the 2nd game against St. Mary's on Monday (the Norse lost that game to split the doubleheader), but maybe he is going to be the bullpen stopper (or the closest thing to it).

Mark Weber is having a nice year in the Norse lineup, but the offense has not been the overall issue this year.

Two years ago Luther was 3-5 to start conference play, but that year the pitching was not the issue to a bad start.

[Floyd in Iowa City]

For those that have been impressed with the Wartburg offense, and especially those who follow the Knights, why did the team struggle both on offense and defense for decent chunks of the preseason?  Was it just youth/experience issues?  It seems like this is the 3rd year in a row that they have not had been the Wartburg of the Holst era during the preseason.

Coe-B.V. should be a fun series to take in.

The Beavers have been scoring runs pretty well in league play as well as they beat Wartburg yesterday, 11-4.

[youcantseemestill]

Looked like an exciting game in Cedar Rapids yesterday.  Coe beats Central 4-3.  Definitely a pitcher's duel though.  9 total hits and 6 of the 7 runs coming in the last 2 and a half innings.  Schisler hits a game winning homerun.  A complete no doubter from what I was told.  Cody Raisch pitched a lot better giving up one run in 7.1.  Corey Eisenman matched him though only giving up 2 earned runs in 7 innings. 

So for the big series of the weekend, it look like we won't see Wuebker from BV or C. Raisch from Coe.   Maybe an offensive series?

[wartburgalum]

To Floyd:

I am not sure what was/is going on with them.  Could be that they did not see much practice time in the preseason, but you would certainly hope that was not an issue with the new Rec Center.

My guess is that it has a lot to do with experience/youth.  It seems as though they are still searching for their identity; are they a power team, are they a small-ball team, etc.?

The fact still remains that their offense won't matter much if they continue to give up double digit runs to everyone.  I am afraid to even go look at what their team ERA is at this point.  When I was at Wartburg our team ERA was a source of pride for us on the pitching staff and we wanted to make sure we were on top of the conference (though did not always happen). 

[Floyd in Iowa City]

Looked like an exciting game in Cedar Rapids yesterday.  Coe beats Central 4-3.  Definitely a pitcher's duel though.  9 total hits and 6 of the 7 runs coming in the last 2 and a half innings.  Schisler hits a game winning homerun.  A complete no doubter from what I was told.  Cody Raisch pitched a lot better giving up one run in 7.1.  Corey Eisenman matched him though only giving up 2 earned runs in 7 innings. 

So for the big series of the weekend, it look like we won't see Wuebker from BV or C. Raisch from Coe.   Maybe an offensive series?

I wasn't as sure about Central going into the season as some others, but they have been solid to this point in the season.  They may not have the conference record right now that they had from 2004-2006, but they seem to be playing like a team near that level.  It is still a little hard to tell what to think of them as the league opponents have been very mixed.  A couple of the past Central teams had very good offensive numbers though.

I have not seen anything of Coe yet, but it looks like they are starting to play like the team that many predicted in the preseason.  Makes that B.V. series even more fun this weekend in that they both took care of business during the week.

[Floyd in Iowa City]

To Floyd:

I am not sure what was/is going on with them.  Could be that they did not see much practice time in the preseason, but you would certainly hope that was not an issue with the new Rec Center.

My guess is that it has a lot to do with experience/youth.  It seems as though they are still searching for their identity; are they a power team, are they a small-ball team, etc.?

The fact still remains that their offense won't matter much if they continue to give up double digit runs to everyone.  I am afraid to even go look at what their team ERA is at this point.  When I was at Wartburg our team ERA was a source of pride for us on the pitching staff and we wanted to make sure we were on top of the conference (though did not always happen).  

In the new "W" Center does the Baseball team practice on a fake grass/turf surface that perhaps football also uses?  I have no idea what great perks there are for the time the teams actually practice for baseball or football.  Is it a big upgrade over the old Center for sports like baseball, or is it just the overall size of the space/practice time issues?  I used to talk to old Wartburg players quite often, but not so much in the last couple of years.

I never had any issues with Luther practice or any other facilities other than the sharing time during the winter.  In reality I think the sharing stuff gets overblown during recruiting as practicing at staggered times during the winter did not hinder my skill development.  Good facilities and a good campus are not supposed to mean as much as the people you work with, but they do matter.

Wartburg seemed to reload much better for years under Holst than they have been lately.  The results are still great, but I didn't know if there some things with the coaching staff, player retention, or recruiting that have changed in recent years compared to some of the truly dominant seasons.  I don't want to make too much of it as the Knights might be back to dominating both league and non-league teams next year.