MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

Hey!  I thought IWU patented the 5-guard ploy!

No, Bob patented it. That's why we let him make the post about how Carthage has now become Backcourt College.

[AndOne]

The Carthage Basketball Roster is now up on their website:

http://www.carthage.edu/athletics/mens/basketball/#

Doesn't appear that Shannon Adams enrolled?

Bosko's son Steve's bio is quite interesting to read....he had one heck of a high school career and an outstanding senior year.  He should have a terrific college career as well -he has the ability to play the 1, 2 or 3 spots.

Perusing the Red Men roster/bios raises some interesting questions:

1. Based on last season, Higgins seems entrenched at the point. If Bowens (9th in league scoring according to his bio info), who has been ineligible for parts of 2 of his first 3 seasons, can stay on the team, he seems a lock to start at the 2G. As Mark said above, Bosko's son does have a very "interesting" record of accomplishment in HS. If he plays up to his seemingly very high degree of potential, what does that do to the minutes that Sean Fendley, who had a nice frosh season, will get?? All things being equal, tell me Bosko is not going to play his son.

2. If Shannon Adams played on the Carthage "Red" team in the Des Plaines summer league, he wouldn't see any court time this year anyway.

3. It would be interesting to know what the criteria is at Carthage as far as awarding letters in basketball. Eric Moore played 39 mins in 9 games & scored 6 pts. Steve Ideran played 9 mins in 2 games & scored 2 pts. Cody Hilton played 2 mins in 1 game and did not score. Yet, all 3 were awarded letters!   Interesting.

[Gregory Sager]

1. Based on last season, Higgins seems entrenched at the point. If Bowens (9th in league scoring according to his bio info), who has been ineligible for parts of 2 of his first 3 seasons, can stay on the team, he seems a lock to start at the 2G. As Mark said above, Bosko's son does have a very "interesting" record of accomplishment in HS. If he plays up to his seemingly very high degree of potential, what does that do to the minutes that Sean Fendley, who had a nice frosh season, will get?? All things being equal, tell me Bosko is not going to play his son.

That's a good question, and you also have to factor veterans Billy Jacklin and Bill Shemerdiak -- neither of whom can play the 4 or 5 -- into that rotation of the three smaller positions. Plus, Bosko may have a hard time keeping 6'0 freshman Logan Derrick off the floor for the varsity. I've seen that kid play, and he's super-talented.

It's a lot of players to pack into only three positions.

I figure that Bosko will go with Nebojsa Franciskovic at center and Milos Vukosavljevic at power forward. Beyond that at the two big-man spots, he's got ... who?

(If Franciskovic, Vukosavljevic, and Steve Djurickovic are all in the starting lineup, Carthage might have to import a PA announcer from Belgrade. )

3. It would be interesting to know what the criteria is at Carthage as far as awarding letters in basketball. Eric Moore played 39 mins in 9 games & scored 6 pts. Steve Ideran played 9 mins in 2 games & scored 2 pts. Cody Hilton played 2 mins in 1 game and did not score. Yet, all 3 were awarded letters!   Interesting.

I don't know anything about how letters are awarded -- my guess is that it varies from school to school -- but I would imagine that Carthage is not the only school to award letters to anyone who participated in a varsity contest in a given sport.

[Titan Q]

IWU has one additional newcomer whose name hasn't made it here yet to my knowledge.  6-1/195 junior point-guard Robert Beauchamp transfered to Wesleyan from Parkland JC in Champaign to play both football and basketball.   Beauchamp, from Cerro Gordo H.S., is IWU's primary kick returner and has played quite a bit at DB in the first two games.

As a basketball player, Beauchamp's game is a little similar to Sean Dwyer's from what I've heard -- team-oriented, smart, pass first type point-guard.  Also like Dwyer, Beauchamp is very well put together physically.  He doesn't have the upside Dwyer does, but I think he's capable of playing PG in the CCIW.   

Beauchamp was an Academic All-American at Parkland.  Sounds like a solid young man who will provide valuable insurance for the Titans at the point.  With Dwyer still not ready to go, I think his presence is important.  I'd like to see all of Andrew Gilmore's minutes at the 2 and even maybe the 3 this season.  If Beauchamp emerges as a reliable back-up point-guard that should be the case.  Of course, playing both football and basketball is pretty tough to do, so we'll see.

[kenoshamark]

Greg,  Jacklin primarily played the 4 spot last year and I would suspect that will be the case this year as well.  I'd agree that he'd be a better 3 but due to the lack of size on the team, he had to fill that role.  He was second on the team in rebounding at 5 per game and really works hard on defense.  

Unless someone from the incoming class or returnees makes a huge impact I would think that Neb Franciskovic would be the 5, Jacklin the 4 and Bowens the 2.   I think the other two spots are open to competition between Fendley, Higgins, Steve and Bill Shmerdiak.    Maybe a freshman will surprise (Derrick) but would be hard to believe anyone would be better than those four !!!!  

Lets hope one of the returning players makes great strides and can provide some needed help in the frontcourt....sure could have used some big men among the newbies for the future.

[Titan Q]

Greg,  Jacklin primarily played the 4 spot last year and I would suspect that will be the case this year as well.  I'd agree that he'd be a better 3 but due to the lack of size on the team, he had to fill that role.  He was second on the team in rebounding at 5 per game and really works hard on defense.  

Unless someone from the incoming class or returnees makes a huge impact I would think that Neb Franciskovic would be the 5, Jacklin the 4 and Bowens the 2.   I think the other two spots are open to competition between Fendley, Higgins, Steve and Bill Shmerdiak.    Maybe a freshman will surprise (Derrick) but would be hard to believe anyone would be better than those four !!!!  

Lets hope one of the returning players makes great strides and can provide some needed help in the frontcourt....sure could have used some big men among the newbies for the future.

Mark, what about Milos?  I liked him a lot last year...won't he be in the mix to start at the 3?

[Mr. Ypsi]

Q, that's great knews about Beauchamp.

After last year, and with Dwyer questionable, I was very concerned about the continued good health of Rosenkranz!

[AndOne]

Greg,  Jacklin primarily played the 4 spot last year and I would suspect that will be the case this year as well.  I'd agree that he'd be a better 3 but due to the lack of size on the team, he had to fill that role.  He was second on the team in rebounding at 5 per game and really works hard on defense.   

Unless someone from the incoming class or returnees makes a huge impact I would think that Neb Franciskovic would be the 5, Jacklin the 4 and Bowens the 2.   I think the other two spots are open to competition between Fendley, Higgins, Steve and Bill Shmerdiak.    Maybe a freshman will surprise (Derrick) but would be hard to believe anyone would be better than those four !!!!   

Lets hope one of the returning players makes great strides and can provide some needed help in the frontcourt....sure could have used some big men among the newbies for the future.

Mark, what about Milos?  I liked him a lot last year...won't he be in the mix to start at the 3?

No way I have the knowledge of a Carthage insider, but heres an educated guess from an interested outside observer-----

Carthage starters:

5-Neb
4-Jacklin---Great springs. Has the potential to be a rebounding machine and is a             
                 capable inside scorer. Muck quicker than he looks.
3-Milos----As with Titan Q, I give him the nod here. I also think baby Bosko may end
                up seeing the majority of his minutes as a wing 3.
2-Bowens----A very good pure shooter who can launch from beyond the arc off the
                     pass, and use his quickness & explosive 1st step to create off the     
                     dribble or drive the lane when he is a little closer in and usually                         
                     defended more closely. He is also a much better than average on the
                     ball defender WHEN HE WANTS TO BE. With his quickness and ball         
                     handling ability , I feel he would make a more than adequate backup
                     PG when the need arose. I saw this kid play about half of his games
                     his last 2 yrs of HS, so I'm not blowing smoke here. Bowens biggest
                     barrier to success is his head. He thinks he is fouled on every play,
                     and mopes when he doesn't get the call.
                     I also saw Fendley play about 10 times in his senior yr. He is much
                     stronger now, but due to several factors is really not well suited to
                     anything other than the 2. He could well be the best pure shooter
                      Carthage has so he will get his minutes and be a valuable player.
1-Higgins--Virtually invisible as a scorer and fairly slow afoot, he just takes damn
                  good care of the ball and makes good decisions. On top of that, he
                  seems to understand the entire offensive system and every other
                  player's role in it. Sounds like qualities many coaches would want in
                  their PG 

                     
                     

[AndOne]

Q, that's great knews about Beauchamp.

After last year, and with Dwyer questionable, I was very concerned about the continued good health of Rosenkranz!

IWU fans-----

Information please-------

I have never seen Rosenkranz play. I have seen several pictures of him in action and I was struck by the fact  that I didn't see even one in which he doesn't look quite thin/frail. So much so, in fact, that I would worry about his ability to take much of a physical pounding at all. And, we all know how physical things can get in the CCIW. My question is---is he really as frail as he appears in the pics I have seen of him or are my eyes just deceiving me due to either the camera angle or the fact I just can't see very well at my advanced age?

[Gregory Sager]

Greg,  Jacklin primarily played the 4 spot last year and I would suspect that will be the case this year as well.  I'd agree that he'd be a better 3 but due to the lack of size on the team, he had to fill that role.  He was second on the team in rebounding at 5 per game and really works hard on defense.

I should restate what I said last night. Jacklin can play power forward ... he just can't play it very well by CCIW standards (or, at least, he couldn't last season). When I saw the Red Men last year they played a heap of zone -- something that at one point would've been unthinkable for a team coached by Bosko Djurickovic, although he's utilized it much more in recent years than he did throughout the early part of his coaching career -- and I think that much of the reason for playing zone when Jacklin was in the game was to keep him from being posted up or pushed around underneath. Yes, I agree that Jacklin seems to be a very hard worker and a savvy all-around player, but I don't agree at all with AO about his upside as a 4. He's best suited for the wing, where I've seen him use his size to much better advantage. F'rinstance, the havoc that he wreaked as a part of Carthage's full-court press was the key to the Red Men's huge second-half comeback at NPU in '06.

I'm also not that sold on Milos Vukosavljevic starting at small forward. At power forward, maybe -- the guy is all shoulders and chest -- but he's slooooow as CCIW small forwards go, and I think that opposing SFs in this league can make Milos look like a road pylon when Carthage is on defense. He also seemed to have fallen deep into Bosko's doghouse at the end of last season; Milos played a grand total of eight minutes in Carthage's last three games of 2006-07, and one of them was an overtime game. He was advertised as a shooting specialist when he arrived last season, but his shooting stats (.375 from the field, .374 from downtown -- including a .273 trey percentage in CCIW play) weren't really light-'em-up numbers. I think that AO and Bob are higher on him than I am.

Of course, all of this is open to re-evaluation. We've all seen lots and lots of players improve their games dramatically in one or more phases from one season to the next.

Lets hope one of the returning players makes great strides and can provide some needed help in the frontcourt....sure could have used some big men among the newbies for the future.

My guess is that Bosko's doing exactly that: Rolling the dice that either Dave Mikolaitis or Richard Williams has picked up his game enough to give the Red Men sufficient quality minutes off the bench.

[Titan Q]

Q, that's great knews about Beauchamp.

After last year, and with Dwyer questionable, I was very concerned about the continued good health of Rosenkranz!

IWU fans-----

Information please-------

I have never seen Rosenkranz play. I have seen several pictures of him in action and I was struck by the fact  that I didn't see even one in which he doesn't look quite thin/frail. So much so, in fact, that I would worry about his ability to take much of a physical pounding at all. And, we all know how physical things can get in the CCIW. My question is---is he really as frail as he appears in the pics I have seen of him or are my eyes just deceiving me due to either the camera angle or the fact I just can't see very well at my advanced age?

Travis should be fine, And One.  I saw him play 5 or 6 high school games and I think he's very ready to start and play well in the CCIW.

[NCC_alum62]

Most of you have seen Greg do it before, but if you would like to see his handy-work of dissecting a dumb posters own words...check out the IBC Football board.  Truely hilarious.

Greg, you the man.

[mifflin]

AndOne,
             How about an educated guess on NCC as an interested inside observer.

[kenoshamark]

Bob,  I shouldn't have excluded Milos but I do tend to agree with Greg that I'm not quite sure that the 3 spot is where he will see his minutes.   He has the frame to play a 4 but really doesn't rebound well enough for that spot and he is a bit slow to cover small forwards.   He had a terrific game against IWU down in Bloomington and then he really dropped off after that.

I was very impressed with his shooting range after watching their first scrimmage at home but then he got banged up and didn't play at all for the first 4 to 5 games After that he started a stretch of about 10 good games. 

I even picked him for my CCIW fantasy team and thought he was going to be a steal when I got him in the fourth round but he had a tough finish to the year.

I can't say for sure but I don't know that he was really in Bosko's doghouse.   I think he got injured again in the middle of the year and when he came back he just wasn't the same player and certainly not the same shooter, as Greg alluded to.

[kenoshamark]

AndOne,   

Nice job on your analysis of a possible projected starting five.   I wouldn't disagree on that group starting the year but my take is Bosko will tinker with the starting five early and often until he gets the rotation he likes.   I also would say that if that group were the starters, there might be three of them that would see less total minutes than some of the subs.   That particular group has two spots that are real challenged to provide points.   If the other three were Wiertel, Garnes and McDaniel you could get away with the intangibles that Jacklin and Higgins bring but the only proven scorer would be Bowens. 

The real "X" factor is going to be Neb.   If he can score consistently with Bowens, it will allow for some flexibility at the other spots.  If not, Bosko will need the point production that Fendley and his son can offer.

I really liked what I saw from Neb at the end of last year from an offensive standpoint.  He was looking to score in the low post and had developed some nice moves.  He has made some nice strides and might be a real surprise this year.   I thought he might turn out to be a player similar to Bill Garner who handled the middle back on the first championship team back in 2000.  Garner was a great role player who played tough defense and rebounded very well.  It looks like Neb will be a better offensive player.  He won't be a 15 to 17 point type of guy but if he can give Bosko 10 to 12 points each night, that will be a nice bonus.

The player who probably resembles Garners style is Mikolaitas so he is probably the backup to Neb in the middle, along with Williams.