MBB: Midwest Conference

[Hardscrabble]

Ha, ha, ha. A disappointing loss? How can any Beloit loss be considered disappointing at this point?? What a total joke. You have a guy (Josh Hinz) who is going to pass the legendary Ron Bontemps in school scoring - potentially the best DIII basketball player of all time - and the program has never been above .500 in his bloody tenure. Beloit is a total joke. They have a banner in their gym commemorating an ESPN appearance. What a total farce.

[Greek Tragedy]

They have a banner in their gym commemorating an ESPN appearance. What a total farce.

That's pretty sad. 

[The Roop]

HS-This loss was disappointing for a change because I was absolutely thrilled with their other losses.

OS-It's not sad to have a banner because they are only 1 of 2 DIIIs that could have one. What bothers me is that they made it bigger than all the conference championship banners; now consolidated into 1 with the years listed. Still not sure why there are softball banners in the basketball arena though. I'm pretty sure they weren't indoor softball championships.

gobucs-Ripon is close enough to me for a week night game so I'l be there.

Early/Knox2ct-I'm not sure when Knox last won at Ripon either. I'll guess 1992 as they made the tournament as the top seed from the West that year. Losing to a 13-10 Ripon team in the semis at Beloit.

[hjmphelp]

Nice rebound win for the Pioneers! You know, the real ones from Grinnell? The ones with the candy-ass schedule? Congrats to GC for a great win in Wisconsin! It CAN be done.

Off to Chicago today to sneak in on 'that girl'-New play opens tonight at Friar Tuck's Pub called "Valet Mafia" It is free and unadvertised and is performed every Tuesday and Sunday night for 4 weeks, so stop in and say hey if you are in the CIty. Her Birthday today too!!!

[LU_nut]

a couple of thoughts on the weekend:

A devastating weekend for Ripon.  I really view them as real iffy to make the conference tourney at this time.  You cannot lose two home game to mid-level conference games.

Knox being up and down does not shock me.  they have two terrific players on Macklin and Zick.  If they had guards to play with, they would be tough.

Grinnell is very fortunate to not have to go to Carroll this year.  That should help get them in the third spot in the conference.

Carroll and LU are the top two teams.  It will be a war on Wednesday in Alex.  Carroll might have the best first five.  Lu probably has surperior depth.  Should be a toss-up.

The race for the number fout spot between LF, Knox, and Beloit will go the wire.  If Ripon gets going, they could threaten. 

Nothing against St, N, Monmouth and IC, but they are already out of luck.

[siwash]

I believe the last time Knox won in Ripon was 1975!  An amazing streak if my records are right.

[The Roop]

LU_nut,

Take a look at Grinnells schedule. 4 of their last 5 are on the road, don't automatically put them in as the #3. It's gonna take 10 wins to make the tournament this year and they don't have that many "automatics" left. They need more road wins. A good example might be the year the New Orleans Saints started 8-0 and missed the playoffs.

Scottie Scottie Scottie,

Let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the death of Scots. I'm afraid Monmouth has to run the table now; but they won't.

[gobucs]

Hardscrabble and Old School;
Yes, it was a disappointing loss, too bad that we continue to play at the level of our competition.  As far as the banner, nothing wrong with that, not too many D3's can say they were televised!
Hinz is a great player, gives it all he's got.  Now he and the other seniors need to inspire the rest of the team to play as intense as they did against Lawrence:)  In my opinion, the seniors need to step it up and put it on the line, or we definately won't make the top 4.

[The Roop]

gobucs,

I think it's worth pointing out that somebody, anybody, has to step up and take an open shot from the outside when it's there. Aside from rebounding the thing that bothered me (next most) was that Beloits shots were almost always a lay up or a 3 in the second half. Last I heard if you make a shot from outside, but inside the 3 point stripe, they still give you points for it.

Whether this was a coaching strategy or players being tentative, I don't know. All I know is you score more points when you take more shots. Good defense is a definate plus but I have yet to see a basketball player score points on defense.

[The Roop]

In addition............

While Beloit does not have a target on it's back like Lawrence does, teams have figured out that Beloit is no longer a bye on their schedule. Beloit needs to keep the pace of the game in their favor, if that means bad possessions at times, fine. 80+ should be the goal. While playing and winning half court games in the 60s is nice, they should have put 90 on the board this last time out and had the outcome decided by halftime.

Too many athletes on the Beloit roster this year to expect anything less.

[Greek Tragedy]

OS-It's not sad to have a banner because they are only 1 of 2 DIIIs that could have one. What bothers me is that they made it bigger than all the conference championship banners; now consolidated into 1 with the years listed. Still not sure why there are softball banners in the basketball arena though. I'm pretty sure they weren't indoor softball championships.

Actually, that is pretty sad.  Hey, we were on ESPN one time!  Come on!  Was it this board that was commenting on a team that had a 3rd place banner in their gym?  I remember something like that.

Anyway, a lot teams, for the most part, hang all their conference championship banners and whatnot in their gyms. 

Hardscrabble and Old School;
Yes, it was a disappointing loss, too bad that we continue to play at the level of our competition. As far as the banner, nothing wrong with that, not too many D3's can say they were televised!
Hinz is a great player, gives it all he's got. Now he and the other seniors need to inspire the rest of the team to play as intense as they did against Lawrence:) In my opinion, the seniors need to step it up and put it on the line, or we definately won't make the top 4.

I still stand by my opinion!  I don't recall Stevens Point having banners in their gym that say they were on Fox Sports or CSTV (College Sports television) anywhere...oh wait, we do have two National Championship banners though!  Sorry, low blow. 

Grinnell is very fortunate to not have to go to Carroll this year.  That should help get them in the third spot in the conference.

I find it amazing that the MWC teams can't play each other twice.  I hate this unbalanced schedule that we see in the Big 10 and other large number conferences like that.  The MIAC has ELEVEN teams in it's league and they play everyone twice.  I can't see why the MWC can't do the same so everyone plays everyone twice home and away to be fair. 

In the end, don't some teams say, "Well, we had to play Lawrence and Carroll twice, while so and so didn't!"?  If the MWC added two more games to its schedule, it would guarantee two more in-region games at least, instead of MWC teams playing out-of-region and NAIA games that don't mean anything come NCAA tourney selection time.  Over in the NESCAC, there are 10 teams and they only play each other ONCE...now that's a shame.

[The Roop]

Old School,

You need to stop making sense for a moment and realize that you are talking about the MWC. I'd love to see an 18 game conference schedule but it will never happen. Play everybody twice ?? OMG, we'd lose out of region games then....

[Gregory Sager]

I find it amazing that the MWC teams can't play each other twice.  I hate this unbalanced schedule that we see in the Big 10 and other large number conferences like that.  The MIAC has ELEVEN teams in it's league and they play everyone twice.  I can't see why the MWC can't do the same so everyone plays everyone twice home and away to be fair. 

In the end, don't some teams say, "Well, we had to play Lawrence and Carroll twice, while so and so didn't!"?  If the MWC added two more games to its schedule, it would guarantee two more in-region games at least, instead of MWC teams playing out-of-region and NAIA games that don't mean anything come NCAA tourney selection time.  Over in the NESCAC, there are 10 teams and they only play each other ONCE...now that's a shame.

I absolutely agree with OS on this. Any league that doesn't play a double round-robin loses some of my respect. Of course, nobody loses as much of my respect as does the NESCAC, which only plays a single round-robin. That's a joke. It's more like having a bunch of independents that play a postseason tourney than a bona-fide league, in my opinion.

The MWC is two games shy of a full double round-robin. That's certainly better than what the NESCAC does, but the imbalance does end up leaving certain teams with unfair advantages (e.g., Carroll and Grinnell this season). I think that a league should do everything it can to make the playing field as even as possible when it comes to scheduling. OS is right, and if the MWC isn't willing to permit its members to add two more games to the regular-season schedule, it should have them dump two of their non-conference games and use those two scheduling slots to fill out the full double round-robin.

[The Roop]

Amen Brother Sager. Glad to see you on the MWC board again. NESCAC scheduling is very questionable indeed. 2 Conference games  then cupcakes the rest of the way. Kinda like being in Hawaii. 25 games and only 5 teams on your schedule.

[systemfan86]

I ain't saying they is...I ain't saying they ain't...but if not Grinnell, who can we reasonably expect to jump into the tournament?

As it stands today Lawrence, Carroll, Grinnell, and Lake Forest are in the top four spots. After that we have Beloit, IC, Knox, Ripon, St Norbert, and Monmouth. Given how they've played to this point, which team do you like to make a run? None of them have a better than .500 overall record - Beloit and IC are both 6-6 overall.