MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Titan Q]

The Titans have added a very nice piece to the puzzle in 6-3 guard Pat Sodemann.  The transfer from D2 Truman State is not going to be a superstar-type player, but he's just very solid on the floor in so many areas.  The bottom line is that he's just a smart basketball player -- you feel good with him on the floor.  He comes from a basketball family and it really shows.  I can see Sodemann on the floor in every close, late-game situation for the Titans the rest of the way.

PG Dylan Overstreet really played well today.  He's certainly not a pure PG, and he's not terribly efficient in bringing the ball up the floor, but once he gets into the halfcourt offense he's a really nice weapon for the Titans.  He's a good perimeter shooter, a good penetrator, and good at what I'm going to call "driveway one-on-one moves" (just little random 6-foot turnaround shots in the lane and that sort of stuff).  I have concerns about his ball-handling ability, but today's performance was encouraging.

If IWU can get Brady Zimmer (concussion) and Mike Mayberger (foot injury) back before CCIW play, the pieces are all there to be in the mix for the CCIW title.

[wheels81]

Another question pertinent to a discussion of the Wheaton attack besides "I wonder if Northwestern played zone against Wheaton?" is I wonder how often Northwestern forced the Wheaton offense to go to its right?

If you analyze the Wheaton offensive patterns, you will see, unlike most teams whose first tendency is to go to their right, Wheaton often employs a Japanese philosophy and tends to like to flow to the left to begin many of its offensive sequences. By a Japanese philosophy I mean a tendency to take the obvious and reverse it. Most teams come down the floor with the PG on a right handed dribble, and his natural tendency is to then either continue to dribble right or to pass right to begin an offensive play. Wheaton is adept at going left, and seems to often favor doing so to initiate its offensive. Making them go right seems to often take them out of their comfort zone. Food for thought. 

No offense +1 but that's gotta be the biggest bunch of hooey that I've ever seen written on this board.  You are really stretching the "analysis" end.  To quote our friends from the Cheese state.  "Oh Geez!"

[Titan Q]

IWU's last three opponents - Tufts, Washington U, U of Chicago.  A serious stretch of academic powerhouse institutions there!

[AndOne]

North Central really struggled with Benedictine. Eagles came out in a 2-3 zone on makes and dead balls, which neutralized the Cardinals on the inside.

Gamble and Raridon also got in foul trouble in both halves and sat out for about 6 minutes in the second half, in which both teams didn't score for four minutes as the score stalled at 44-38.

Scary thing for North Central, is that they were unable to create much offense with those Gamble and Raridon on the bench. If CCIW teams are able to get those two in foul trouble and prevent them from getting it inside too much, Cardinals can get beaten and beaten handily. If Benedictine makes any shots, they win that game.

In the absence of an offense, the quality of which you would normally associate with a team ranked #4 in the country, the Cardinals turned primarily to defense to carve out this afternoon's victory. Even though they at times played defense on a stink level equal to their offensive ineptitude, they were still good enough on the defensive end of the floor to limit the opposition to 56 points---a figure most coaches would be glad to have their team duplicate on any given night.
Aaron Tiknis did have a nice game with a double-double of 14 and 10.
In summary:
1. Should the Cards again play as inefficiently as today, other than perhaps against Millikin, the likely result will be a loss.
2. Kudos to Pat Rourke who, in 14 minutes off the bench, went a perfect 6 for 6, hitting both of the 3 pointers he took as well as all four of his FTs. It was his 2nd excellent performance in a row.

[WheatonFanChris]

Wheaton atoned for its loss to the other Billy Graham school last night with a 73-49 pasting of North Central (MN) in the Twin Cities this afternoon. Tyler Peters had 17, Tad Fisher chipped in 16. Nate Serenius contributed 13, and Caleb DeMoss added 10 for the Sonic Atmospheric Disturbance. Freshman Michael Berg appears to have hit the wall for Wheaton. After a scoreless 11 minutes of action last night in which he went 0-4 from the field, he again went 0-4 today and and didn't score a point in five minutes of play.

I only caught the last 3 minutes of the game, but in Schauer's postgame interview, he referred to how no one is healthy multiple times, referencing Tyler Peters specifically, but I wouldn't be surprised if that meant Berg too.

Also, he said, "We won this game because of Caleb Demoss. We should have had him guard their best player yesterday if we had a coach who knew what he was doing." Always a humble Schauer, but I think that also shows how hurt Peters is (not sure what the injury is) as well as how well the young pg Demoss is progressing in some extra minutes with Teuscher and Kwam absent.

[ExBBaller40]

North Central really struggled with Benedictine. Eagles came out in a 2-3 zone on makes and dead balls, which neutralized the Cardinals on the inside.

Gamble and Raridon also got in foul trouble in both halves and sat out for about 6 minutes in the second half, in which both teams didn't score for four minutes as the score stalled at 44-38.

Scary thing for North Central, is that they were unable to create much offense with those Gamble and Raridon on the bench. If CCIW teams are able to get those two in foul trouble and prevent them from getting it inside too much, Cardinals can get beaten and beaten handily. If Benedictine makes any shots, they win that game.

In the absence of an offense, the quality of which you would normally associate with a team ranked #4 in the country, the Cardinals turned primarily to defense to carve out this afternoon's victory. Even though they at times played defense on a stink level equal to their offensive ineptitude, they were still good enough on the defensive end of the floor to limit the opposition to 56 points---a figure most coaches would be glad to have their team duplicate on any given night.
Aaron Tiknis did have a nice game with a double-double of 14 and 10.
In summary:
1. Should the Cards again play as inefficiently as today, other than perhaps against Millikin, the likely result will be a loss.
2. Kudos to Pat Rourke who, in 14 minutes off the bench, went a perfect 6 for 6, hitting both of the 3 pointers he took as well as all four of his FTs. It was his 2nd excellent performance in a row.

Agree with everything you said and Rourke hit the two shots that actually turned out to be the difference in the game when it was 44-42 NCC. They need that sort of production off their bench, especially, if like tonight, someone gets into foul trouble

[veterancciwfan]

IWU should be in good shape with Overstreet, Soderman, Zimmer, and Dolan at guards; Mayberger, Ziemnik & Musselman at the wing; and Reed, Davis, Ziemnik, and Anderson at the posts with Dortch available for defense and rebounding. That might be 2 players too many. IWU has a lot of good players but no outstanding player. So far, Reed and Mayberger have been the most consistent. I look for Victor Davis to get back to the outstanding player he was in the 5 2012 NCAA tournament games. If so, IWU will be a very good team.

If Tyler Peters is hurt, Wheaton is in huge trouble. He is the best player I have seen so far this year. He makes the whole Wheaton offense extremely efficient with his dribble/drive penetration with either hand and then the dish to a wide open shooter, and Wheaton is loaded with shooters.

[Titan Q]

IWU should be in good shape with Overstreet, Soderman, Zimmer, and Dolan at guards; Mayberger, Ziemnik & Musselman at the wing; and Reed, Davis, Ziemnik, and Anderson at the posts with Dortch available for defense and rebounding. That might be 2 players too many. IWU has a lot of good players but no outstanding player. So far, Reed and Mayberger have been the most consistent. I look for Victor Davis to get back to the outstanding player he was in the 5 2012 NCAA tournament games. If so, IWU will be a very good team.

If Tyler Peters is hurt, Wheaton is in huge trouble. He is the best player I have seen so far this year. He makes the whole Wheaton offense extremely efficient with his dribble/drive penetration with either hand and then the dish to a wide open shooter, and Wheaton is loaded with shooters.

I feel very good about IWU's personnel now.  Adding Pat Sodemann and Brady Zimmer (who I think will be back soon) to the mix at the 2-spot really changes everything for the Titans relative to early in the non-conference, when Ron Rose was starting Eric Dortch at the 2.  Dortch is an athletic player a great defender...but he's just not a starting SG.  Sodemann and Zimmer are talented guards that bring a lot to the table.

Ron Rose has a very versatile group now, with...

* Dylan Overstreet, who can play the 1 or the 2
* Pat Sodemann, who can play the 1 or the 2
* Bryce Dolan, who can play the 1 or the 2
* Brady Zimmer (injured), who can play the 2 or the 3
* Mike Mayberger (injured), who can play the 2 or the 3
* Eric Dortch, who can play the 2 or the 3
* Andrew Ziemnik, who can play the 3 or the 4
* Victor Davis, who can play the 4 or the 5

(And of course the two 5s - Kevin Reed and Nick Anderson.  I think 6-8 Parker Musselman may be the odd man out now...he needs to get himself in better shape if he wants to realize his potential.)

There are a lot of different combinations possible with that mixture, depending on the game situation.  For example, I want to see: Overstreet/Sodemann/Zimmer/Ziemnik/Davis.  Five good scorers/perimeter shooters/FT shooters/basketball players there.

What IWU is missing, however, is a pure point guard.  That is my biggest question with this team moving forward.  Can "combo guard" Dylan Overstreet handle the 1 against great teams?  We'll see.  The thing Overstreet has going for him is that he is a tremendous leader and has the complete support of his teammates - I hear great things about Overstreet's character and leadership abilities.  I just don't know if he's a 1.  I really hope Overstreet proves me wrong.  He certainly did a great job yesterday against the very quick, pure PG Royce Muskeyvalley from Chicago.

[AndOne]

Excluding Musselman, 10 men mentioned in TQ's above post. I love a 10 man rotation, keeping all the starters fresh on a game by game basis, keeping another full team in a ready to play "game mode," and helping insure the durability of the starters for the long term so they still have some gas left in their tanks come conference and national tourney time.     

[iwu70]

There were some minutes yesterday vs. UC when the Titans did go with a three guard set-up, with Overstreet, Sodemann and Dolan all on the floor.  We may see that kind of quicker, more offense-oriented set up more, or with Zimmer and Mayberger in that array too.  They pushed the ball on the break better yesterday, too.  Sure would be nice to get everyone healthy at once.

Pgraph reported today that Molinari was not with the JV, but missed the UC outing due to "personal reasons," not injury or disciplinary reasons.  Hope he's fully recovered now, too, and can get back into the mix.  Guess he's a pure PG of any on the IWU roster, but not in the mix, in game shape as yet. 

Nice to have 10-12 players of that quality, getting more experience.  But, as several have mentioned, if things go well and Davis starts to produce more up to his level of late last year, the Titans will be pretty strong across the board, and have a better set-up on the perimeter.  I agree that right now Nelms and Musselman appear to be just outside the full, primary rotation. 

I'm pulling for Dylan Overstreet to be able to pull it off at the PG spot this year, and continue to provide his leadership, energy, intensity, intermediate range pull-ups, and trey shooting, improving in his ball-handling and court vision skills as the season progresses.  He had his best outing yesterday for sure.

Good luck to the Titans in Orlando next week, esp. vs. Hope.  Should be two good games.  Let's hope the Titans are able to continue healthy, continue making progress, playing well.

I'm a big fan of Kevin Reed and his quick post moves, strong rebounding, consistent play, running the floor well.  He had four blocks yesterday as well, and stole the ball in the open court for a layup.  16 points.  Just a very good overall game, with many kinds of contributions.  He even smiles, laughs at himself when he misses a play, seems to be enjoying his game, his senior year right now.  Good to see. 

Happy holidays to all CCIW Chatsters. 

IWU70

[iwu70]

Augie over MacMurray last night, by 12.

IWU70

[augiefan]

Randy Reinhardt, aka "Scribe", coming hard with the alliteration in paragraph two..

I thought former Peoria sports writer Bill Liesse was the true "Scribe" of central Illinois.

[augiefan]

An okay road win for Augie against MacMurray, but more importantly Kevin Schlitter and Graham Pils were back on the court after sitting out a few games with injuries. The Quad Cities Times article on the game claimed George Dexter dealing with back issues also played, but the Augie box score did not list him, so that may be a mistake.

It appears Titan Q was right about the excellence of Augie's freshman class, but the conference season in the CCIW is generally not kind to even talented freshmen. The Vikings probably are not up to par with NCC, Wheaton (with Peters) and IWU, but they have the potential to challenge those conference big dogs.

[Gregory Sager]

The CCIW now stands at 47-25 (.653). Upcoming games this week are:

Monday
Carthage (4-4) @ Northwood (FL) (10-1)

Tuesday
North Park (4-4) @ Albion (3-5)

Wednesday
Carthage vs. St. Thomas (FL) (10-2) @ Northwood (FL)

Thursday
Loras (4-4) @ Augustana (9-1)
Benedictine (2-8) @ Elmhurst (2-6)

Friday
Mississippi C. (4-3) vs. Illinois Wesleyan (6-2) @ Orlando, FL
UW-LaCrosse (8-1) @ North Park

Saturday
Hope (4-4) vs. Illinois Wesleyan @ Orlando, FL

[Gregory Sager]

In honor of the release of The Hobbit in theaters everywhere last Friday, Bosko Djurickovic and Rollie Massimino staged a fight tonight to see which one of them would be the Lord of the Rings. The guy with only one national championship ring beat the guy with five, as Massimino's Northwood (FL) team staved off Carthage in overtime, 98-90, in the home gym of the Seawolves in West Palm Beach, FL.

Carthage had some outstanding individual performances in this one. Tyler Pierce had a 23 and 6 night, Mitch Thompson logged 21 and 7, Luke Johnson chipped in 14 points, and Donte Logan came within an eyelash of a triple-double, as he finished the night with 13 points, 9 rebounds, and 13 assists. His 13 dimes ties for the Carthage all-time single-game record, set twice by -- guess who? -- current Red Men assistant coach Steve Djurickovic, who culled a baker's dozen worth of successful handouts twice in his career, once against Elmhurst in the 2009-10 season and once against Purdue-Calumet the following season.

Rollie's team looks very interesting. It features five big men 6'7 or taller from overseas (two from Germany, one each from Sweden, France, and Ukraine), with a 6'4 wing from Antigua thrown in for some extra spice. The leading scorer for the Seawolves tonight was a 6'1 kid from White Plains, NY named Rashad James, who went off for 39 points on 16-21 shooting from the field ... but only four of his 21 FG attempts were from distance. Guess the guy's got some moves to the basket. The other interesting player for the Seawolves is their point guard, Tyrone Davis. He's listed at 5'2, 134, and, judging by the team picture, those numbers appear to be accurate. He had 14 points and 9 assists tonight, so he can obviously ball despite his lack of size.

Hard to know what to make of this game if you're a Carthage fan, since it's an out-of-state NAIA opponent. But the Seawolves were the national runner-up in NAIA D2 last year, and came into this game with a 10-1 record, so methinks that this outfit is legit. If so, this may make this one of those so-called "good losses" for Carthage.