MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[cardinalpride]

CCIW Math 101

Take this class if you need some easy credits. There is only one thing you need to know.

Where X = No offense
and Y = No defense

X + Y = Defeat

* NCC took 80 shots compared to CC's 57. But, with 23 fewer shots, Carthage made one more basket.
* NCC shot only 33.8% compared with Wisconsin's 49.1%. Five Cardinals combined to go 3 for 27. Let me repeat that - 3 for 27!
* NCC took 42 threes. I'd think that might well be a record for shots from downtown Naperville since the current sheriff pinned on the badge. Problem is, they hit only 13, or 31%. Historically, that isn't NCC's game, and you wouldn't think it would be with a pre-season All-American F/C, even though he led the conference in 3 point percentage last year.
* 10 of the 42 threes were taken by freshman Nick Chambers who saw his first extended minutes of the season. Nick showed how it's done, hitting 6 for all of his team leading 18 points. It should be noted his 10th attempt was really just a desperation heave with 3 seconds left.
* Connor Raridon and Alex Sorensen had nice statistical totals. Connor had 17 points, 6 rebounds, and 10 assists. Alex had a double-double with 14 points and a game high 14 rebounds. However, Connor needed 17 shots to register his 16 points from the field, and Alex needed 14 for his 13 points. I think both would tell you they need to be more efficient.
* All 5 Carthage starters hit double figures, led by Brad "The Student Body" Perry with 20. The 6'11" 285 pound Perry was just about unstoppable inside, and hit 60% (9 for 15) of his shots. Mike Stevenson had 19, and Jordan Thomas, seemingly generously listed at 5'11," continually got his shot off over taller defenders for 17 points.
* NCC had only FIVE turnovers for the entire game. 

From watching them online, NCC is missing some toughness from this team!  Both mentally and physically! An increased mental and physical adjustment has to be made when expectations increase! This league has never given a title to any team over the years and it never will. Titles are earned in the CCIW! Something this team is starting to find out.

[lmitzel]

I wasn't at Merner last night, but I've watched the game, and I'm trying not to panic too much after this one. It's another concerning loss, and I have a feeling a lot of teams are going to look into playing that zone defense against the Cardinals and daring them to shoot the long ball. If they shoot like they did last night, they're going to be in trouble.

I kind of echo AndOne's concerns about the defense. Teams that have been shooting well on average on the season replicate those numbers pretty easily against NCC (the Aurora game and this one come to mind), which means games like the North Park one scare me. I still think there's too much talent on this roster though, and they'll get it together.

What I wanna know is this: Where was Sam Fehrle last night?

He's been hurt. Didn't play in the Wesleyan win either.

[Gregory Sager]

According to my now fuzzy memory no NP team has ever won at AC and Iw in the same year.

I looked it up last night, because I wanted to make sure that Kevin Shepke had this info for his gamer. Your now-fuzzy memory is correct. NPU had never beaten both AC and IWU in their respective gyms in the same season.

Two games in, and these Vikings have already done something that none of their predecessors had ever been able to do. That's just flat-out amazing, no two ways about it.

Interesting future research project how many teams from the north have completed the downstate southern triple. I believe Wheaton did it five times in the fifties, but I doubt there is another five in the 70 year history of the league.

Way ahead of you on that one, because among the myriad questions I was fielding last night as my phone and computer were blowing up were several about what we dubbed "the downstate trifecta" here on CCIW Chat back in the early '00s.

As you mentioned, Wheaton completed the downstate trifecta five times back in the '50s, when this league was still called the CCI (Carthage's campus was located in downstate Carthage, IL at the time, and Carroll was not yet in the league). Since then, the downstate trifecta has only been completed twice: North Central did it in 1989-90, and Carthage did it in 2001-02.

Given what Millikin looks like this season, I like the Park's chances to add one more name to the downstate trifecta list.

[AndOne]

Dave,

My original point was not centered on or confined to the singular point of two conference teams being scheduled to face each other within 10 days. It's really more of a continuing conundrum of malfeasance on the part of the CCIW conference staff with regard to scheduling. The same teams within 10 days wouldn't be a problem by itself. But when you add in things like the same year's schedule having two teams open the season against each other, and then not playing again until the very last conference game, you begin to wonder why all the inconsistencies in the same year's schedule. And why do teams have to be scheduled for 3 games in a row either at home or away? Depending on standings and what point of the year you're at that could be handing one team a nice advantage while putting another team at a competitive disadvantage. And yes, I understand the concept that if you have 3 in a row at home, you should make hay and chalk up 3 wins. However, I do think it would make more sense if teams had no more that 2 in a row either at home or away. Also, would it be that hard to have teams play each other in the same order, or close to the same order, the second half of the season as the first half? Then there is my favorite - having a team finish one year with their last 3 games all on the road, and then making the same team play 4 of their last 5 on the road again the following season. That's 7 or their last 8 away over two consecutive seasons. If you are going to screw a team one year fine, but be nice to them the next year. The CCIW brain trust doesn't seem to grasp that concept.

[Gregory Sager]

Speaking of our friends in Decatur and the possibility of a downstate trifecta:

Not to be mean or cruel, but just to tell it like it is... None of the CCIW teams, or their supporting staff on these pages, need worry this year, EVER, about the slightest possibility, of being upset by Millikin... after seeing them for the 3rd time this year, losing again to my SLIAC teams, I can vouch for certain... They are really bad...   Nadelhoffer works hard trying every possible combination of players, uses timeouts to work his guys up, and the Big Blue play hard the whole way, but wow....BAD...and against Webster's zone... REALLY bad....  Several times poor Coach N could only bury his head in his hands...  I'm not sure Millikin could even beat the SLIAC's two lowest, Mac and Fontbonne, this year...

Millikin attempted nine more shots than Webster, hoisted up nine more trey attempts, and outrebounded the Gorloks by eight, with a whopping 19-8 advantage on the offensive glass ... and still lost by 15 points.

Not sure the current status, but about 10 years ago some VERY nice plans on campus for a remodeling of that space. Very, very nice, not sure what will ever happen to it with the addition of Rec Center that was built a bit ago, and I believe there was quite a bit of city "red tape" due to the building being on the corner of the Foster and Kedzie intersection, needless to say there are some things that could be done at NPU gymnasium to really spruce it up.

The problem is, North Park has been making remodeling plans for the crackerbox since I was a student. One administrator told me that they were trotting out ideas to put in a north-wall mezzanine back when they were trying to get Dan McCarrell to stay -- and McCarrell left to coach at Mankato back in 1984.

This league has never given a title to any team over the years and it never will. Titles are earned in the CCIW!

Amen and amen, CP. The league office ought to engrave those words on the championship trophy.

Maybe that coach from Ke-nowhere does have a clue about the X's and O's of this game after all?

Zing!

I still think there's too much talent on this roster though, and they'll get it together.

Agree. It's far, far too early in the season to write a eulogy for the 2016-17 Cardinals. For that matter, it's far, far too early for the 2016-17 Vikings to start planning their championship celebration party.

What I wanna know is this: Where was Sam Fehrle last night?

He's been hurt. Didn't play in the Wesleyan win either.

Thanks.

Dave,

My original point was not centered on or confined to the singular point of two conference teams being scheduled to face each other within 10 days. It's really more of a continuing conundrum of malfeasance on the part of the CCIW conference staff with regard to scheduling. The same teams within 10 days wouldn't be a problem by itself. But when you add in things like the same year's schedule having two teams open the season against each other, and then not playing again until the very last conference game, you begin to wonder why all the inconsistencies in the same year's schedule. And why do teams have to be scheduled for 3 games in a row either at home or away? Depending on standings and what point of the year you're at that could be handing one team a nice advantage while putting another team at a competitive disadvantage. And yes, I understand the concept that if you have 3 in a row at home, you should make hay and chalk up 3 wins. However, I do think it would make more sense if teams had no more that 2 in a row either at home or away. Also, would it be that hard to have teams play each other in the same order, or close to the same order, the second half of the season as the first half? Then there is my favorite - having a team finish one year with their last 3 games all on the road, and then making the same team play 4 of their last 5 on the road again the following season. That's 7 or their last 8 away over two consecutive seasons. If you are going to screw a team one year fine, but be nice to them the next year. The CCIW brain trust doesn't seem to grasp that concept.

We're in a brand new scheduling cycle now, Mark, because this is the first year of the nine-team setup. Let's wait until next year before we pass judgment on how the league is setting up the schedule.

[sac]

There are really only a couple ways to conduct a round-robin schedule without creating a jumbled mess

Mirror
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
--------- flip location
Week 5
Week 4
Week 3
Week 2
Week 1

Same order
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
----------flip locations
Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5



Sometimes you'll see the middle weeks flipped in a mirror schedule just so the same opponents aren't playing in consecutive weeks (this is actually what the UAA should do)

Week 1
Week 2
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
----------- flip locations
Week 4
Week 5
Week 3
Week 2
Week 1

Often times the odd quirks in a schedule are actually agreed upon by both parties to help one school or another with facility conflicts or academic calendar issues.   They just aren't publicized that way.   My understanding from just reading the CCIW board over the years is that the league has a couple academic situations to consider (paticularly with Augustana)

One thing you cannot do and I believe all conference commissioners will tell you this is try to schedule a basketball season based on the perceived strength of the schools.  It has to be random in some way.

[sac]

One thing I forgot is travel.  Its common practice in some conferences to make sure some of the longest travel games are on Saturdays (see NCAC with Allegheny, Wabash, DePauw).  This often requires flipping and moving dates that can create other issues conferences and schools just have to live with.

I would bet the CCIW is doing something with Millikin and Carroll in that vein.

[Gregory Sager]

There are other basketball-specific issues involved in setting up a double round-robin schedule for nine teams, sac. One is Saturday home dates. A primary consideration for the league office when setting up this first iteration of the nine-team double round-robin was to make sure that everybody got the same number of Saturday home dates. That really threw an additional kink into the process.

One casualty of the new scheduling is that women and men aren't mirroring each other on Wednesdays as they were in prior seasons. F'rinstance, last night the NPU men were at IWU, while the NPU women hosted Millikin. The Carthage men were at NCC, while the Carthage women hosted Carroll. And so on.

[hopefan]

Speaking of our friends in Decatur and the possibility of a downstate trifecta:

Not to be mean or cruel, but just to tell it like it is... None of the CCIW teams, or their supporting staff on these pages, need worry this year, EVER, about the slightest possibility, of being upset by Millikin... after seeing them for the 3rd time this year, losing again to my SLIAC teams, I can vouch for certain... They are really bad...   Nadelhoffer works hard trying every possible combination of players, uses timeouts to work his guys up, and the Big Blue play hard the whole way, but wow....BAD...and against Webster's zone... REALLY bad....  Several times poor Coach N could only bury his head in his hands...  I'm not sure Millikin could even beat the SLIAC's two lowest, Mac and Fontbonne, this year...

Millikin attempted nine more shots than Webster, hoisted up nine more trey attempts, and outrebounded the Gorloks by eight, with a whopping 19-8 advantage on the offensive glass ... and still lost by eleven points.

Actually they lost by 15.... 69-54.... and it was really worse than that... Webster put in their last 5 reserves from the bench, 4 of whom hadn't played at all in the game, with 2:58 left and the score 65-41... the bottom 5 just played brutally bad and Millikin cut it to 65-54 (a 13-0 run in 2 minutes) with 50 seconds left... finally the Webster 5 recovered a little poise, made a couple points to get to the final score....Millikin problems mainly were turnovers.. 23 of them, many NOT caused by pressure...and failure to find reasonable shots, therefore forcing bad ones as the clock ran down... no hint of a go to guy, or a consistent perimeter shooter...the big guy in the middle, just a freshman, is decent around the basket with the ball, but doesn't see it often enough to be a difference maker....

[lmitzel]

One thing I forgot is travel.  Its common practice in some conferences to make sure some of the longest travel games are on Saturdays (see NCAC with Allegheny, Wabash, DePauw).  This often requires flipping and moving dates that can create other issues conferences and schools just have to live with.

I would bet the CCIW is doing something with Millikin and Carroll in that vein.

They are; all of Millikin's games against Wisconsin CCIW teams are on Saturdays.

Like Greg said, it's still the first year of scheduling basketball for nine team conference play. They'll look things over in the offseason and work out the kinks. But I still don't see the problem. As long as you play everybody once in the first go around and then a second time in the second go around, it doesn't matter what order they're in.

[AndOne]

One thing you cannot do and I believe all conference commissioners will tell you this is try to schedule a basketball season based on the perceived strength of the schools.  It has to be random in some way.

I agree with this 100%. But that still does not mean you have to make a team play three games in a row either on the road or at home, especially at or very near the end of the season. It also doesn't mean that if you 🔩 a team one year, you can't be a little nicer to them the next - even if it's the first year with a nine team set up rather than eight. 

[Gregory Sager]

Actually they lost by 15

Yeah, I had noticed that and edited my post a few minutes ago.

One thing you cannot do and I believe all conference commissioners will tell you this is try to schedule a basketball season based on the perceived strength of the schools.  It has to be random in some way.

I agree with this 100%. But that still does not mean you have to make a team play three games in a row either on the road or at home, especially at or very near the end of the season. It also doesn't mean that if you 🔩 a team one year, you can't be a little nicer to them the next - even if it's the first year with a nine team set up rather than eight. 

Again, Mark, it's a completely different cycle this time around. Give it another year before you show up at Chris Martin's door on Brainard Street with a chainsaw or a meat cleaver, because this year's sked has absolutely no relation whatsoever to last year's.

[AndOne]

Sorry, but last night's loss combined with this frickin' cold has caused today's number on the bitch-o-meter to be quite high! 

[Gregory Sager]

Sorry, but last night's loss combined with this frickin' cold has caused today's number on the bitch-o-meter to be quite high! 

Yeah, I figured as much. Can't blame you.

Moving right along ...

Outcomes like the Elmhurst "Can't Beat A SLIAC Team To Save Our Lives" Bluejays whipping previously 4-1 Carroll on the home floor of the Pioneers -- a game that EC led by 23 before John Baines took his foot off of the gas pedal -- and the shocking Carthage upset of NCC in the airplane hangar, not to mention NPU's win over IWU at Shirk and the near-upset at Carver by Wheaton, make me wonder if this isn't going to be one of those seasons in which the CCIW cannibalizes itself. Oh, sure, history tells us that as the season goes along there will be some separation as a team or two or three emerges as being clearly better than the pack. But if the second- or third- or fourth-place teams are registering an inordinate number of losses in CCIW play due to cannibalization, then you start to wonder about how that will affect Pool C berths for the league come tournament selection time.

With that in mind, perhaps it's time for the league to start approaching non-conference games with more of a sense of urgency.  The league is only 29-16 (.644) outside the circuit, and it can do better than that. Of course, there's really nothing that anybody can do about weak-sister Millikin, as the Big Blue appear to be doomed to lose to Rose-Hulman, Calvin, and either Wittenberg or Geneva to round out their non-con docket. (And, boy, I'd love to see them prove me wrong!) But everybody else can certainly step it up (or, in NPU's case, keep it going).

First team on the hot seat is Wheaton, which draws the Saturday CCIW bye and will be using it to play non-conference foe Calvin. The Knights appear to finally be getting their act together after an atypically horrid start, which is bad timing for the Sonic Atmospheric Disturbance ... except that WC also appears to be gelling pretty well itself right now.

This will strike some as odd, given that I have family connections to Calvin and that the words "Wheaton College" don't exactly flood my heart with warmth, but I want to see Wheaton send the Knights packing on Saturday at King Arena. I don't care if Mike Schauer has to yell until he's purple-faced at his team, the refs, the scorer, the custodian, some guy in the fourth row, or the girl who's popping the popcorn at the concession stand ... git 'er done, Mike.

[wheels81]

Aston Francis (35 pts, 14/22, 4/9-3FG) is as gifted a scorer as anyone in the CCIW.

I'll dispute that, although there's no doubt at all that Francis can really fill it up.

So Greg are you softening your dispute?  Maybe just a litte?
                                GP-GS  Min--Avg  FG-FGA   Pct 3FG-FGA   Pct  FT-FTA   Pct  Off Def  Tot  Avg  PF FO   A  TO Blk Stl  Pts  Avg
01 Francis, Aston.....  7-7   241 34.4  58-121  .479  25-60   .417  24-35   .686    8  16   24  3.4  14  0  25  20   2  18  165 23.6

Bully, let me introduce you to this gentleman:



His name is Jordan Robinson. (His hair's no longer frosted, by the way; this is a photo from last season.) He's a 6'3, 195 (generous listings, BTW) junior forward from Hoffman Estates HS. He plays for North Park.

Let's see how the statistics of the two stack up:

player	GP-GS	Min	Mpg	FG-FGA	Pct	3FG-FGA	Pct	FT-FTA	Pct	OffR	DefR	TotR	Rpg	PF	FO	A	TO	Blk	Stl	Pts	Ppg
Francis	7-7	241	34.4	58-121	.479	25-60	.417	24-35	.686	8	16	24	3.4	14	0	25	20	2	18	165	23.6
Robinson	6-6	208	34.7	54-100	.540	18-32	.563	25-37	.676	17	42	59	9.8	17	0	24	20	7	5	151	25.2

As you can see, Robinson scores a point and a half more per game while taking fewer shots. That's because he's a dramatically better shooter, both inside and outside the arc. He's a better rebounder by a country mile than Francis, and while that might not seem germane to GoPerry's original point about being a gifted scorer, stop and think about the fact that someone who can work the offensive glass -- and Robinson's collected more than twice as many offensive rebounds than has Francis in one fewer game -- has an extra arrow in his quiver that other scorers don't have.

This is not meant to be a diss of Francis in any way. He's the league's best newcomer this season. But Robinson's a more gifted scorer, as well as a better player overall, than Francis. Heck, I'd likely take Juwan Henry over Francis as a scorer, too. Henry has a tendency to force things too much and be erratic on occasion -- he's done that in the past two games -- but he's by far the best player in transition in the CCIW and at this point he has a better ability to create shots for himself than does Francis.

You got me on lining up the stat liines better but I still think he's a scorer and I don't think we said he's better than other scorers I just think he ranks up there with the rest of the scorers.  Your guy has 2 inches (ok maybe) is in his 3rd year, is a forward and so different position so naturally he's going to have different stats.  Less than 2 pts per game is not that great a separation in scoring so Francis is that much a better scorer with one less "arrow" in his "quiver".  Imagine if he did he'd be reigning supreme right?  I think Henry is a good comparison as he runs the team and scorers do force things sometimes because that's how scorers work, they don't always wait for the perfect spot, to borrow a hockey term, you gotta put pucks on goal to score. 
Though that can hurt some times as they got to know their situation.  For all his ball handling he's only listed with 20 turnovers which is the same as Robinson and Francis has played one more game :-)  Francis should have more assists but sometime scorers tend to be "black holes" :-)