MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[David Collinge]

Regional interest:  Transylvania defeats Franklin 63-48 to win the HCAC.  Franklin's season is over.

National interest:  Hope defeats Calvin, Wittenberg nips Wooster, Baldwin-Wallace survives ONU in OT.  Wooster and Calvin get sure C-bids, but ONU is probably left out.

[diehardfan]

I told you Hope was going to win David 

IWU sure is surprising me right now... 

It has been very interesting to watch NCC in these past two games... they would/will be a great tourney team... have a feeling they'll represent this conference well, and I didn't always feel that all season. Gosh it would be nice if we got three teams in it, huh? 

[augiefan]

The Wheaton womens' team beat IWU 74-60 today to win the CCIW tourney and playoff spot.

[Dennis_Prikkel]

nc beats iw 51-49, great comeback by iw 21-1, but couldn't score in the final 4:48.

mw

[tjcummingsfan]

I hate to bring this up, but I'm curious...  Has a pre-season #1 ever not made the NCAA Tourney?

[augie_superfan]

Great inagural championship game tonight....congrats to NCC...so does this mean that Augie is not considered conference champs?  Or are they still conference champs and NCC just gets the AQ?

[iwumichigander]

Augie is the CCIW Conference Champion;  NCC gets the AQ

[augie_superfan]

Alright...I would hope that is how it would be

[Dennis_Prikkel]

I hate to bring this up, but I'm curious...  Has a pre-season #1 ever not made the NCAA Tourney?

North Park in 1988.

mw

[augiefan]

A few years ago Iowa won the BTT and Steve Alford went around claiming they won the B10. Needless to say he got a lot of grief from the regular season champ, which I believe was either Illinois or MSU. A full season determines the champ, but the tourney this year worked to the CCIW's advantage, as we might now have three qualifiers.
Augie and IWU fans will have a long wait until tomorrow night's selection Sunday.

[augiefan]

Congratulations to NCC on a well deserved berth in the NCAAs. I think they proved down the stretch that they are the top team in the CCIW going into the post season with successive closing victories over their toughest rivals Augie, Elmhurst and IWU. They may be short on depth but the starting 5 is terrific.

With Raridon as coach they'll only get better. The rest of the CCIW is forewarned as NCC now has the best FB coach in the conference and possibly the best basketball coach. They have definitely shed their former doormat status in the two biggest sports in the conference.

[dansand]

Congrats to North Central tonight. They, especially Anthony Simmons, played about as good a first half as you can, taking a 37-21 lead. I made the comment at halftime that NCC would be a tough team to come back against, because they are so efficient with their offense I didn't think IWU could string together enough stops. Needless to say, the Titans proved me wrong, holding the Cardinals scoreless for almost NINE minutes in the second half.

But in the end it was the Cardinals who made the plays they needed. Dan Walton, who looked like he was playing on a bad ankle, hit a huge runner in the lane to tie the game and Adam Krumtinger followed in a Simmons miss down the stretch to provide the margin of victory. Walton also had the biggest defensive play of the night, blocking a Dauksas 3-point attempt in the last minute.

Defensively, the Cardinals put the clamps on Dauksas and Amelianovich. They went a combined 4-for-20 from the field and 2-of-12 from 3-point range. Amazing. I think, much like Harrigan and McAdams-Thornton for Augie on Friday, their poor shooting was due in part to great defense and in part to just having off nights. I've seen all four of those players make the type of shots they were getting in both of those games.

I think the odds are better than even that we'll see three CCIW teams in the NCAA tourney, but it's far from a certainty. We'll just have to sit back and wait to see what the selection committee does tomorrow. As I said earlier I would imagine all three potential tournament teams are looking forward to playing someone from outside the CCIW (unless, of course they match two of them up against each other!).

Speaking of odds, Devildog, my guess is:
C) Stalker.

Thankfully, no "over-rated" chants at Carver tonight.

[kenoshamark]

Here is the box score from tonight:

http://www2.noctrl.edu/athlet/basketball_m/05-06/06cciw02.htm#GAME.BOX

[maddog]

I just returned home from the first CCIW tournament championship game and what a game it was. I want to congratulate NCC on earning the CCIW AQ by edging the Titans 51-49 in a clean, hard fought contest. NCC played very well in the first half, with high energy and took IWU out of their offense by contesting every pass and every shot. Again, the Titans could not stop Simmons at all and were down 37-21. Inthe second half, NCC pushed their lead to 19 before the Titans started their amazing comeback. IWU showed alot of heart, character and determination in fighting back to take the lead. I thought a key to the game was when the Titans had three chances to extend the lead to 4 points but could not get the job done. Then, NCC shoes their heart, character and determination by coming back to take the lead, the win and the AQ. Tough ending for IWU, Zack had two shots to tie at the end, grabbing his own rebound before getting fouled with .03 seconds left. Unfortuanately, he missed the first free throw. NCC held the Titans too just 21 first half points and IWU then gave up just 14 second half points.

[maddog]

I have not been very happy with the coaching of Trost during most of his time at IWU, but he did what I think is his best weekend of coaching in his 5 years on the Titan bench. The Titans showed several new and different offensive sets in the two tournament games. The changes resulted in a few back door lay ups and it was great to see the Titans return to having a good, power low post game. And he seemed to keep control of his emotons and stay in the games mentally.