MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[iwumichigander]

An outstanding effort by Carthage last night in a one point loss to IWU.  No 'quit' in the Red Men.  It will be interesting to watch, with the recent loss of Bowen & Hart, how Carthage responds throughout the CCIW schedule.  However, I think Bosco and the Red Men have a game result to build upon from this contest.

[Stat]

Q,  last night after I got you in that full nelson, and KM pounded your midsection, I realize that I have no further hostilities toward the greenies.
However, If Hammer ever mentions that name again, G_ _ _ _, Stat will take him to the woodshed.  You do have wood sheds in Normal, right?
But seriously, the "Jones Brothers" will take you guys to Salem.

PS.  couldn't help but notice you put on a few pounds along the midsection, better increase the time on the trendmill.

[augiedad]

The last CCIW team to enter the season as the preseason #1 in this site's poll was Carthage in 2001-02.  That team made it to the Final 4 and finished 3rd.

Here is how that season played out for CC per the main CC site:

Home loss, Elmhurst 75- 76
Home win, Millikin 84- 68
Road win, Wheaton 71-61
Home win, Illinois Wesleyan 72-49
Road win, Augustana 64-63
Road win, North Park 80-62
Road win, Elmhurst 70-63
Road win, Illinois Wesleyan 76-56
Home win, North Central 85-52
Road win, North Central 83-73
Home win, North Park 74-59
Road win, Millikin 74-61
Home win, Wheaton 83-72 (OT)
Home win, Augustana 84-74

That year the league finished:

Carthage 13-1
Augustana 9-5
Elmhurst 9-5
Wheaton 6-8
Illinois Wesleyan 6-8
North Park 6-8
North Central 4-10
Millikin 3-11


In the CCIW, the difference between a title and 10-4 or 9-5 comes down to a few big plays and bounces of the ball here and there and how a team responds to the little bumps in the road along the way.

[titanhammer]

Dog, that was Vet that spoke about Bosko pulling Schlemm.  I just commented about Bosko having a regular voice:  I've usually heard it after he's been yelling for 40 minutes.

Stat, Q and I tried to stick up for you and your boys when they played JG and company.  We pulled into the parking lot at the Salem Civic Center to a bunch of Otterbein students taking in a few suds and spouting off that they were National Champs, before the first game was even played.  Q informed them about the Carthage three headed monster (your son, Garnes, and McDaniel).  They replied that it didn't matter what Carthage had because they had Jeff Gibbs.  Carthage didn't play their best game that night, which is what they needed to get the W.  I'm sure some people walked away from that game not being very impressed with Carthage...as you didn't seem to be last night with IWU.

[iwumichigander]

Carthage may have given IW its best game last night, but let's not forget that the Red Men did it without Bowens, Hart, and Hood. That's a lot of missing talent and experience. It makes the Carthage performance last night all the more remarkable.

My guess is that Carthage will play very uninspired basketball Wednesday @ Elmhurst and lose by 20+ to a Bluejay team that is almost cooked.

Carthage should look to their performance v IWU as a confidence builder.  The Red Men did a lot of good things in that contest and no reason to play uninspired @ Elmhurst.

[Pat Coleman]

It is not blindingly obvious actually.  There are a lot of people around the league or even country who will see that IWU beat 4-8 Carthage by 1 point and automatically assume IWU played poorly vs the same Carthage team that lost to Team A by so many points, Team B by so many points, etc. 

I do think, for what it's worth, that the Top 25 voters understand this, and we've seen it manifested frequently in results.

I also think coaches on the selection committee understand this, though such opinions are more or less negated these days by the strict reading of the almighty criteria.

So you're left with fans -- though there are a lot of them.

[thegreatest]

i actually took some initiative to go down and see carthage play last night against illinois wesleyan. it was a pretty descent game, amelianovich showed me exactly why he has the status of an all american. i didnt see much in dauksas at all other than his quickness to the basket. jones was pretty dominant throughout the game also. jeffery and imani did a great job keeping the red men in it. the red men definitely didnt take advantage of their free throw opportunities or rebounding.

i actually saw bowens at the game talking to hood at half time on the bench. there were also some conversations in the crowd about bowens coming back to the team in a few weeks. if that is true with the way carthage played last night and if they continue to play that way with bowens' 16 ppg and 34 min/per game teams could be in a lot of trouble in the cciw.

just a thought of mine though.

[Titan Q]

Stat, I've seen a few dirty plays in the CCIW over the years, but possibly none dirtier than the sneak-up-from-behind full nelson you put on me, with the ensuing body blows administered by Kenosha Mark. 

I do appreciate your concern over my midsection.  I think it just "must have been the clothes" though.  I've got it back down to last year's pre-achilles tear "playing weight" of 192 after weighing in at 208 the day the cast came off on May 1...that wasn't good.  I've been running 4 miles a day 5 days a week, but for you I am going to step this up to 5 miles and throw in a crunch or two.  Maybe even a couple weeks of the South Beach.  At 34 now, I'm finding it difficult to keep that professional beach volleyball player physique you and K-Mark always sport.

[Pat Coleman]

That's alright, man, doesn't mean you couldn't still use some time on the "trendmill" -- whatever that is. Sounds like a euphemism for People magazine to me.

[Titan Q]

Five photos from a very good game last night in Kenosha.  (Photos courtesy of Bob Freeman, Andrew and Zach's father.)


http://www.iwuhoops.com/cc1.jpg

http://www.iwuhoops.com/cc2.jpg

http://www.iwuhoops.com/cc3.jpg

http://www.iwuhoops.com/cc4.jpg

http://www.iwuhoops.com/cc5.jpg

[augiedad]

IWU, and anyone that beats IWU (NCC), has a nice tie to the DI top 15 --


Illinois Wesleyan 81
St. Xavier 61
(11/28)

St. Xavier 74
Illinois-Chicago 73
(11/23)

Illinois-Chicago 73
Georgia Tech 51
(11/25)

Georgia Tech 60
#11 Boston College 58
(today)

[Mr. Ypsi]

Stat, I've seen a few dirty plays in the CCIW over the years, but possibly none dirtier than the sneak-up-from-behind full nelson you put on me, with the ensuing body blows administered by Kenosha Mark. 

And (how typical!) the ref swallowed the whistle!

[augie_superfan]

Got my only chance of the year to see Augie play last night vs. Elmhurst.  Rick Harrigan can just about take a game over anytime he wants.  It's been impressive seeing his stats and listening to webcats but seeing him play in person was great last night.  I think he had only one shot in the first 10 minutes of play or so.  Something like that.  Then, with about 7 minutes left in the first half, he scores 12 points in the next 3 minutes.  Augie could get nothing done but he just stepped up and knocked down some much needed shots.  

Augie did a great job in making Martin seem nonexistent in the game.  He did score some and pull down a bunch of rebounds but nothing like the guy is capable of.  Did anyone else see when Martin tried to lean into and listen to the Augie huddle before he was to shoot free throws?  I was on the other side of the gym so I didn't see it clearly but was he just being bush-league or just trying to joke around?

It was nice to see the Augie win and hopefully they can keep it up for the rest of the conference season.

[veterancciwfan]

In my opinion, the last thing Carthage needs is for a return of Bowens. Also, Bosko played 11 (I think) on Saturday, which is about 3 too many. It might be helpful if several other marginal players quit so Bosko could play his 8 or at most 9 best. Carthage has talent and Bosko is a great coach. My bet is Carthage makes the conf. tourney while Augie and Elmhurst fight it out for the 4th spot. The big if is whether Carthage can keep the intensity they displayed against IWU when they play lesser teams. If they revert to their dismal play against Beloit in the league, it's going to be a long year for Bosko. But I don't think that will happen.

[cardinalpride]

Since NCC's SID never comes to any away games, the box score is always late to post on our Website.  Here is the boxscore from last night's game taken from AU's website:

http://www.aurora.edu/scoreboard/stats/bball-m/mnccau.htm