MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[AndOne]

Not a good effort by IWU tonight.  Bad decisions, not enough hustle and too many mistakes.  This was a game that IWU should win

Michigander--

I don't believe you're giving Benedictine enough credit. IWU did make bad decisions, probably didn't make enough hustle plays, and did make a lot of mistakes but many, if not most, of IWU's deficiencies were forced by Benedictine's efforts. Among other things, BU out rebounded the Green despite having a smaller lineup, and they played strong defense, committing only 12 fouls.

[AndOne]

Final from Cincinnati:

Augustana 51
Albion 47

(The game was tied at 26 at the half.)

Perhaps the western Vikings are not the juggernaut they were widely reputed to be. One fly in the ointment was the fact that neither the Augie starting PG nor his primary backup managed assist. A 3rd player at the position posted 1 helper. A strong superstructure, but a rudderless ship??
And whats with neither Hoepfner nor Schlitter starting? AC also shot a blistering 54.5 from the line.
Albion was picked to finish 4th in the MIAA.

[Titan Q]

And whats with neither Hoepfner nor Schlitter starting?

Brandon Motzel started at the 5 for Augie in their final 7 games last year.

[Titan Q]

Not a good effort by IWU tonight.  Bad decisions, not enough hustle and too many mistakes.  This was a game that IWU should win

Michigander--

I don't believe you're giving Benedictine enough credit. IWU did make bad decisions, probably didn't make enough hustle plays, and did make a lot of mistakes but many, if not most, of IWU's deficiencies were forced by Benedictine's efforts. Among other things, BU out rebounded the Green despite having a smaller lineup, and they played strong defense, committing only 12 fouls.

Benedictine was very good on both ends last night.  And down the stretch, the plays and shots they made were extremely impressive.

[Gregory Sager]

Final from Cincinnati:

Augustana 51
Albion 47

(The game was tied at 26 at the half.)

Perhaps the western Vikings are not the juggernaut they were widely reputed to be. One fly in the ointment was the fact that neither the Augie starting PG nor his primary backup managed assist. A 3rd player at the position posted 1 helper. A strong superstructure, but a rudderless ship??

It's one game ... and the opening game, at that. Aren't you being a little hasty, Mark?

[augiefan]

No doubt about it a lousy effort by Augie yesterday. A better test today against host Mt. Saint Joseph, a better team than Albion. TOs in addition to lousy rebounding and horrid FT shooting were offset by tough defense by Augie. I think the team might have gone into this game a little to full of themselves after the win over Bradley.

For the record I think IWU not Augie will end up being the league champ this year.

[AndOne]

Final from Cincinnati:

Augustana 51
Albion 47

(The game was tied at 26 at the half.)

Perhaps the western Vikings are not the juggernaut they were widely reputed to be. One fly in the ointment was the fact that neither the Augie starting PG nor his primary backup managed assist. A 3rd player at the position posted 1 helper. A strong superstructure, but a rudderless ship??

It's one game ... and the opening game, at that. Aren't you being a little hasty, Mark?

A little hasty?--Yes. Perhaps some wishful thinking. 
However, first game or not, I think you would expect the nation's #3 team to beat Albion by more than 4 points.

[Gregory Sager]

Not necessarily. I don't know if you've ever seen Albion play, Mark, but the style taught by Brits coach Jody May is much like that of his predecessor and mentor at Albion, Mike Turner. It's intensively defense-oriented for all forty minutes; in fact, it's not that much different than Grey Giovanine's style, except that Albion doesn't go as deep (whether by choice or because Augie is able to recruit ballhawks in greater quantity than Albion is a good question). Albion's style has always been to hold down the score and keep it close. As the MIAA folks who frequent this room will tell you, Calvin and Hope usually beat Albion, but, whereas the two traditional MIAA powers usually whup Kalamazoo or Alma or Olivet by scores of 80-65 or 85-68, they tend to beat Albion by 62-57 or 65-58 -- and Albion traditionally comes out on top against Calvin or Hope more than the other five MIAA foes do. (This varies a bit from year to year, of course, depending upon personnel -- but the long-term trend is a well-established truth of MIAA basketball.)

This is indicative of why there's always a certain number of head coaches out there who love the defense-first philosophy: it's basketball's great equalizer. Offense comes and goes, and even great shooting teams can have an off night. But good defense is a constant. And a good defensive team usually does better over the long haul at pulling off upsets than does a good offensive team. Of course, the flip side to that is that good defensive teams can sometimes agonize at the offensive end, which means that they can in turn be more prone to upsets due to an inability to pull away from lesser teams, and, if you get a good healthy lead on a defense-first team that doesn't score much, it often has a hard time pulling off a comeback.

[iwu70]

Totally agree with Q's assessment of the first IWU game.  Why a time-out wasn't called with 10-12 seconds remaining and IWU with the ball, down one, is beyond me.  If the Titans play this year like that and only score in the low / mid-60s, it is going to be a very long year.  Marietti, Coyle and Seibring surely have to contribute more, rebound better and play better interior defence.  Several times Overstreet came down, made no passes, posted himself up, and tried to score, with four other Titans standing around watching.  What ever happen to the idea of ball movement?  A sad first effort.  Yes, it's a long long season and teams take time to find their way, their identity.  This edition has time to figure it out, but that was not a stellar first try.

Q, I guess we found a team that should be ranked higher than IWU -- it's called Benedictine.  OK, just kidding a bit  . . . but that was truly a tepid first outing.  I do give credit to BU.  They made shots and contested the IWU offence pretty well. 

IWU70

[iwumichigander]

Not a good effort by IWU tonight.  Bad decisions, not enough hustle and too many mistakes.  This was a game that IWU should win

Michigander--

I don't believe you're giving Benedictine enough credit. IWU did make bad decisions, probably didn't make enough hustle plays, and did make a lot of mistakes but many, if not most, of IWU's deficiencies were forced by Benedictine's efforts. Among other things, BU out rebounded the Green despite having a smaller lineup, and they played strong defense, committing only 12 fouls.

Benedictine was very good on both ends last night.  And down the stretch, the plays and shots they made were extremely impressive.

AO - Benedictine earned the win.  In addition to your and Q's comments, I made note how BenU was very efficient.

But the Titans beat themselves IMHO - too many mistakes - that don't necessarily show up in the stats or score book.  And,  when a team shoots 6 - 24 3pts that team is not going to win many if any ball games especially when some of those missed 3s were open, uncontested looks.

[oldknight]

Not necessarily. I don't know if you've ever seen Albion play, Mark, but the style taught by Brits coach Jody May is much like that of his predecessor and mentor at Albion, Mike Turner. It's intensively defense-oriented for all forty minutes; in fact, it's not that much different than Grey Giovanine's style, except that Albion doesn't go as deep (whether by choice or because Augie is able to recruit ballhawks in greater quantity than Albion is a good question). Albion's style has always been to hold down the score and keep it close. As the MIAA folks who frequent this room will tell you, Calvin and Hope usually beat Albion, but, whereas the two traditional MIAA powers usually whup Kalamazoo or Alma or Olivet by scores of 80-65 or 85-68, they tend to beat Albion by 62-57 or 65-58 -- and Albion traditionally comes out on top against Calvin or Hope more than the other five MIAA foes do. (This varies a bit from year to year, of course, depending upon personnel -- but the long-term trend is a well-established truth of MIAA basketball.)

Yup; can't argue with that summary.

[Titan Q]

Why a time-out wasn't called with 10-12 seconds remaining and IWU with the ball, down one, is beyond me. 

I'm pretty sure an overwhelming majority of good coaches would have played that just like Ron Rose did.  No timeout, trust your team to go get a good shot.

[sac]

Final from Cincinnati:

Augustana 51
Albion 47

(The game was tied at 26 at the half.)

Perhaps the western Vikings are not the juggernaut they were widely reputed to be. One fly in the ointment was the fact that neither the Augie starting PG nor his primary backup managed assist. A 3rd player at the position posted 1 helper. A strong superstructure, but a rudderless ship??
And whats with neither Hoepfner nor Schlitter starting? AC also shot a blistering 54.5 from the line.
Albion was picked to finish 4th in the MIAA.

True and I can't understand why.  Albion finished tied for  3rd last year with Trine, beat them twice and return as much if not more than Trine this year.  I think the MIAA coaches missed this one.  We'll see.

Not necessarily. I don't know if you've ever seen Albion play, Mark, but the style taught by Brits coach Jody May is much like that of his predecessor and mentor at Albion, Mike Turner. It's intensively defense-oriented for all forty minutes; in fact, it's not that much different than Grey Giovanine's style, except that Albion doesn't go as deep (whether by choice or because Augie is able to recruit ballhawks in greater quantity than Albion is a good question). Albion's style has always been to hold down the score and keep it close. As the MIAA folks who frequent this room will tell you, Calvin and Hope usually beat Albion, but, whereas the two traditional MIAA powers usually whup Kalamazoo or Alma or Olivet by scores of 80-65 or 85-68, they tend to beat Albion by 62-57 or 65-58 -- and Albion traditionally comes out on top against Calvin or Hope more than the other five MIAA foes do. (This varies a bit from year to year, of course, depending upon personnel -- but the long-term trend is a well-established truth of MIAA basketball.)

This is indicative of why there's always a certain number of head coaches out there who love the defense-first philosophy: it's basketball's great equalizer. Offense comes and goes, and even great shooting teams can have an off night. But good defense is a constant. And a good defensive team usually does better over the long haul at pulling off upsets than does a good offensive team. Of course, the flip side to that is that good defensive teams can sometimes agonize at the offensive end, which means that they can in turn be more prone to upsets due to an inability to pull away from lesser teams, and, if you get a good healthy lead on a defense-first team that doesn't score much, it often has a hard time pulling off a comeback.

To further Greg's point going back to 2001, Albion has only had two years where they didn't win at least one game from Hope or Calvin.  2010 and their disaster of 2013 (their worst season in 40 years).

Playing close games is just what Albion does. 

[toooldtohoop]

Final from Cincinnati:

Augustana 51
Albion 47

(The game was tied at 26 at the half.)

Perhaps the western Vikings are not the juggernaut they were widely reputed to be. One fly in the ointment was the fact that neither the Augie starting PG nor his primary backup managed assist. A 3rd player at the position posted 1 helper. A strong superstructure, but a rudderless ship??
And whats with neither Hoepfner nor Schlitter starting? AC also shot a blistering 54.5 from the line.
Albion was picked to finish 4th in the MIAA.

True and I can't understand why.  Albion finished tied for  3rd last year with Trine, beat them twice and return as much if not more than Trine this year.  I think the MIAA coaches missed this one.  We'll see.

Not necessarily. I don't know if you've ever seen Albion play, Mark, but the style taught by Brits coach Jody May is much like that of his predecessor and mentor at Albion, Mike Turner. It's intensively defense-oriented for all forty minutes; in fact, it's not that much different than Grey Giovanine's style, except that Albion doesn't go as deep (whether by choice or because Augie is able to recruit ballhawks in greater quantity than Albion is a good question). Albion's style has always been to hold down the score and keep it close. As the MIAA folks who frequent this room will tell you, Calvin and Hope usually beat Albion, but, whereas the two traditional MIAA powers usually whup Kalamazoo or Alma or Olivet by scores of 80-65 or 85-68, they tend to beat Albion by 62-57 or 65-58 -- and Albion traditionally comes out on top against Calvin or Hope more than the other five MIAA foes do. (This varies a bit from year to year, of course, depending upon personnel -- but the long-term trend is a well-established truth of MIAA basketball.)

This is indicative of why there's always a certain number of head coaches out there who love the defense-first philosophy: it's basketball's great equalizer. Offense comes and goes, and even great shooting teams can have an off night. But good defense is a constant. And a good defensive team usually does better over the long haul at pulling off upsets than does a good offensive team. Of course, the flip side to that is that good defensive teams can sometimes agonize at the offensive end, which means that they can in turn be more prone to upsets due to an inability to pull away from lesser teams, and, if you get a good healthy lead on a defense-first team that doesn't score much, it often has a hard time pulling off a comeback.

To further Greg's point going back to 2001, Albion has only had two years where they didn't win at least one game from Hope or Calvin.  2010 and their disaster of 2013 (their worst season in 40 years).

Playing close games is just what Albion does.

Wonder if Albion could beat Bradley?  Or maybe just 75 D1 teams?

[toooldtohoop]

Wheaton gets a first game win against  Franklin College.  Franklin came out strong and hot early.  They got good shots and hit a high percentage.

The Thunder
came back and controlled play at the end of the first half and through the second half.

Wheaton will need to learn and grow fast in order to compete in conference. Tough road game Tuesday at Defiance.

Go Thunder!