MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Mr. Ypsi]

Yep. Got it. Forgot to consider the history. 
Ypsi, work on that spelling! 

Sorry 'bout that!  Sometimes I will get a certain spelling stuck in my brain, and every time I try to correct it my brain says - NO, it's the other way!   I'll probably misspell it again sometime in the future, but no offense is intended.   I have the greatest respect for Coach RaridOn.

[GoPerry]

Wheaton has to guard against a natural letdown from the Whitworth W and play with a new norm of intensity tonight @ George Fox.

An even greater benefit of Tuesday's win could potentially be the team's glimpse of a 'less is more' exercise -  less reliance on one or two  guys with more ownership and contribution coming from the rest.  Aston Francis only took 19 shots vs Whitworth while using his terrific passing ability to draw a crowd and dish off/kick out for easy layups or wide open looks.  21 pts and 9 assts are All American #s just as much as 30+ points.  Would love to see Spencer Peterson less at the 3pt line where he's not needed and more near the basket where he definitely is. 

[AndOne]

Yep. Got it. Forgot to consider the history. 
Ypsi, work on that spelling! 

Sorry 'bout that!  Sometimes I will get a certain spelling stuck in my brain, and every time I try to correct it my brain says - NO, it's the other way!   I'll probably misspell it again sometime in the future, but no offense is intended.   I have the greatest respect for Coach RaridOn.

Ypsi,

Perhaps your problem is the same one I suffer from. You can spell, but you just can't type very well. 

During our post game discussion Tues night Todd RaridOn emphasized that reaching 500 wins has been achieved as much due to having good players and good assistants as it has been due to his technical expertise and coaching abilities.

[AndOne]

Completely agree. Very impressive team effort and win over a balanced Whitworth squad.

That's Whitworth's first non-conference regular-season loss since Nov. 22, 2014 when St. Thomas beat them.

And, in fact, since that 11/22/14 loss, Whitworth had won 30 straight against non-conference opponents. The streak was the longest in D3.
It was the Thundering Crusaders first road win against a top-25 foe since defeating then #17 U of Chicago on 12/3/14.

[duckfan41]

Wheaton has to guard against a natural letdown from the Whitworth W and play with a new norm of intensity tonight @ George Fox.

An even greater benefit of Tuesday's win could potentially be the team's glimpse of a 'less is more' exercise -  less reliance on one or two  guys with more ownership and contribution coming from the rest.  Aston Francis only took 19 shots vs Whitworth while using his terrific passing ability to draw a crowd and dish off/kick out for easy layups or wide open looks.  21 pts and 9 assts are All American #s just as much as 30+ points.  Would love to see Spencer Peterson less at the 3pt line where he's not needed and more near the basket where he definitely is.

I couldn't agree with you more on this one. I was very happy to see Spencer only take two threes, and shoot and make all of his FT attempts to get to 19. He didn't come close to his rebound total potential, but Jay Spencer picked him up there. Also nice to see Kobe break out of the slump he was in for the past several games. This is without a doubt a trap game, but I feel that our guys are mature enough this year (wouldn't have said the same about last year's team) to avoid that. I'm excited to watch our Thunder tonight!

[Gregory Sager]

Final from the Don Lane Classic in Lexington, KY:

Emory & Henry 74
North Park 69

Colin Lake: 25 pts, 5 rebs
Billy Kirby: 25 pts, 5:2 a:to
Matt Szuba: 7:3 a:to, 5 rebs
Matt Mohr: 5 rebs

The Vikings almost came all the way back from a 14-point deficit late in the first half, and a 12-point deficit at the intermission, as they got within three points and had a chance to tie with ten seconds left. Colin Lake's trey attempt was off, however, and the Wasps stayed in the undefeated ranks at 9-0.

The bad news, aside from the fact that NPU didn't win, was that the Vikings reverted to their only-Colin-and-Billy-can-score m.o., as Matt Szuba followed up his 16-point performance yesterday against Guilford with only a single point today, going 0-5 from the field. Matt Mohr, Antonio Gardner, and Jack Gurvey had six points apiece, and nobody else got into the scoring column. NPU definitely needs to get more consistent support for Lake and Kirby; Colin's averaging 22.7 ppg, Billy's at 13.4 ppg, and the rest of the team combined is only averaging 28.7 ppg, or only slightly more than Aston Francis of Wheaton averages all by his lonesome.

The good news is that the Vikings won the battle of the boards for the second day in a row; Kirby continued to recover nicely from his trey-shooting coma (4-7 today, 8-12 for the tourney); and NPU showed an ability to work its way back from a double-digit deficit against a good team (the Wasps are #17 in Massey). It's just a shame that Colin's last shot didn't go in.

[voxelmhurst]

In overtime...

Elmhurst 97
Benedictine 90

A very hard fought win for Elmhurst in a back and forth game. Elmhurst led by 6 at halftime and led 54-44 with 16 minutes left in the second half before Benedictine went on a 23-6 run in the middle of the second half to lead 67-60 with 9 minutes left.  Elmhurst got back into the game behind the shooting of Jake Rhode (29pts), Derek Dotlich (27pts), and Jeremy Ireland who had another double-double with 19 points and 10 rebounds. 

Brayden Olson had 36 points for Benedictine and 3 other Benedictine players also scored in double figures.

Dotlich, for me, was Elmhurst's MVP in this one. He lead the Jays in scoring in the first half and he seemed to hit the big shot when EC needed a big bucket. Also, he saved the game for Elmhurst with a monster block at the end of regulation that seemed to come out of nowhere. This block alone might have been worth the price of admission.

Elmhurst snaps a 2 game losing skid and are now 6-3 heading into their Oregon trip next week.

[duckfan41]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

Wheaton escapes this trap game, not without drama as George Fox took a late 70-69 lead as part of a run which saw their full court press uncharacteristically rattle Luke Peters and forced many turnovers from the Thunder as they were sped up. Big time contribution from Tyrel Derrick who played more minutes in this one than he had the entire season previously. Made many hustle plays and filled the gaps when Francis was on the bench with the fouls. Overall impressed with our guys as they made it out of their "big win hangover" with another solid W going into the short break for Christmas.

[duckfan41]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

Wheaton escapes this trap game, not without drama as George Fox took a late 70-69 lead as part of a run which saw their full court press uncharacteristically rattle Luke Peters and forced many turnovers from the Thunder as they were sped up. Big time contribution from Tyrel Derrick who played more minutes in this one than he had the entire season previously. Made many hustle plays and filled the gaps when Francis was on the bench with the fouls. Overall impressed with our guys as they made it out of their "big win hangover" with another solid W going into the short break for Christmas.

Sorry to quote myself, but the Thunder also shot a season high 66% (31-47) from the field in this one. And that's with Aston Francis only attempting 8 shots for his 16 points. Aston was looking to dish off to others more often tonight which, as Coach Schauer alluded to in the Whitworth post-game, makes this team very dangerous because more people get chances to score, and Aston is always going to be the focal point of opposing defenses as he's third in the country in scoring near 28ppg (but that will drop slightly after a 16 point performance tonight).

[izzy stradlin]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

Wheaton escapes this trap game, not without drama as George Fox took a late 70-69 lead as part of a run which saw their full court press uncharacteristically rattle Luke Peters and forced many turnovers from the Thunder as they were sped up. Big time contribution from Tyrel Derrick who played more minutes in this one than he had the entire season previously. Made many hustle plays and filled the gaps when Francis was on the bench with the fouls. Overall impressed with our guys as they made it out of their "big win hangover" with another solid W going into the short break for Christmas.

I missed the game.  Francis only played 21 minutes because of foul trouble yet finished with only 3 fouls?

[duckfan41]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

I missed the game.  Francis only played 21 minutes because of foul trouble yet finished with only 3 fouls?

Picked up his second foul early in the first half putting him on the bench for most of it. Then picked up his third early in the second half and Tyrel played well off of the bench both times, so I could assume Schauer was comfortable enough to leave him in there to keep Aston from fouling. This also would have been helped by Eichelberger exploding offensively as he did tonight.

(modified by GS for formatting)

[iwu70]

Very impressive, successful West Coast swing for Wheaton.

'70

[GoPerry]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

Wheaton escapes this trap game, not without drama as George Fox took a late 70-69 lead as part of a run which saw their full court press uncharacteristically rattle Luke Peters and forced many turnovers from the Thunder as they were sped up. Big time contribution from Tyrel Derrick who played more minutes in this one than he had the entire season previously. Made many hustle plays and filled the gaps when Francis was on the bench with the fouls. Overall impressed with our guys as they made it out of their "big win hangover" with another solid W going into the short break for Christmas.

Sorry to quote myself, but the Thunder also shot a season high 66% (31-47) from the field in this one. And that's with Aston Francis only attempting 8 shots for his 16 points. Aston was looking to dish off to others more often tonight which, as Coach Schauer alluded to in the Whitworth post-game, makes this team very dangerous because more people get chances to score, and Aston is always going to be the focal point of opposing defenses as he's third in the country in scoring near 28ppg (but that will drop slightly after a 16 point performance tonight).

Good summary duckfan.

Wheaton pulled it out in what I thought was a somewhat sloppy game for the Thunder with 21 turnovers.  Wheaton just couldn't extend much beyond 10 pts due to some bad turnovers or bad possessions and allowed GF to stay within reach.  When the Bruins came back to take that lead by 1 with about 5 mins left I wasn't sure how they'd respond but they did a good job breaking the press for the easy baskets to get out of there with the W.  They out rebounded their 3rd straight opponent 36-25

The high shooting % had a lot to do with Eichelberger constantly going to his patented move and couldn't be stopped on the drive.  He also ran the break for some easy lay ups.  Samuelson was also the recipient of at least 4 or 5 back doors and was glad to see him come back with a very nice game.  I also thought Derrick (and Zach Kvam) did  a solid job with Francis' minutes and Derrick making some free throws down the stretch to help seal the win.  Trevor Gunter started but only played 4 mins and not sure why – maybe was ill?  Luke Peters another super solid game 7 assts vs 3 turnovers.

Just glad for 2-0 on this trip going into CCIW play.  Merry Christmas all!



*****



Condolences to the Muskingum team and the family of Jarrell Marsh.  A terrible tragedy just days before Christmas.

http://d3hoops.com/notables/2017/12/muskingum-student-death

[USee]

The Thunder led by 13 at the break on the back of a 15-2 run from a tied score with 4:33 left. They held that lead mostly until about 9:33 left in the game (they were up 12) when GF went on a run to take a 1 pt lead. The Thunder had some bad turnovers during that stretch and GF went with a 5 guard lineup (one reason why the rebounding numbers are so lopsided). In the end the Thunder were able to hang on and make enough plays down the stretch for a hard fought win.

Aston Francis was on the bench for much of the early second half but came back for good with the Thunder up by 14 and about 10:50 left.

[AppletonRocks]

Final from Newberg:

Wheaton 86
George Fox 81

Eichelberger the high scorer with 28 on 11-16 shooting. Samuelson with 23 on 9-12 shooting. Aston Francis with a "quiet" 16 while also dishing out 6 assists in a game plagued by foul trouble.

Wheaton escapes this trap game, not without drama as George Fox took a late 70-69 lead as part of a run which saw their full court press uncharacteristically rattle Luke Peters and forced many turnovers from the Thunder as they were sped up. Big time contribution from Tyrel Derrick who played more minutes in this one than he had the entire season previously. Made many hustle plays and filled the gaps when Francis was on the bench with the fouls. Overall impressed with our guys as they made it out of their "big win hangover" with another solid W going into the short break for Christmas.

I missed the game.  Francis only played 21 minutes because of foul trouble yet finished with only 3 fouls?

I think his coach was penalizing him for hanging with the JuJu Hounds the night before the game in Portland.