MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

North Park 68
Wheaton 65

Toby Marek: 28 pts, 8 rebs, 4:1 a:to
Cardell Simmons: 12 pts
Veggie Tangen: 12 pts
Matt Szuba: 12 rebs, 4 blks, 6:1 a:to
Kindrel Morris: 6 rebs

Aston Francis: 32 pts (12-32 FG, 5-21 trey), 8 rebs
Kobe Eichelberger: 15 pts, 6 rebs, 3:0 a:to
Anajuwon Spencer: 9 rebs
Tyson Cruikshank: 7 rebs
Luke Peters: 5:0 a:to

Wow. I can't remember a more improbable Vikings victory. The Vikings played with tremendous energy and heart, and more than a little more competence than we've seen from them thus far. Toby Marek was a man possessed; I didn't know he had this kind of a game in him.

Wheaton was flat, in a game in which I thought the Sonic Atmospheric Disturbance would come out rarin' to go after their humiliation by Chicago earlier this week. Way too much of the four-man-stand-around offense from WC, too, as Aston Francis's poor shooting really put Wheaton in a bind.

It was a magnificent, if not particularly masterful, evening of basketball. I blew out my voice in a good cause.

[mr_b]

North Park 68
Wheaton 65

It was a magnificent, if not particularly masterful, evening of basketball. I blew out my voice in a good cause.

I hope you aren't doing a solo in church tomorrow!

Congrats to the Vikings on this well-deserved win.

[kiko]

Elsewhere:

Augustana 68, Carroll 56 in Rock Island
North Central 75, Millikin 64 at the Airplane Hangar
Oshkosh 68, Elmhurst 57 at Faganel

[Mr. Ypsi]

IWU wins in OT over CC 75-67.  An ugly one.  Lucky to come back after playing, shooting so poorly.  Played well in OT.  Rose surely injured. More when I see the box score.

Hope to get that one out of the system.  But, a win is a win, to start the CCIW campaign.  But, that was pretty ugly. 

IWU'70

That may well be, but apparently not as bad as we feared, judging from Brady and his dad.  He played 10 minutes more than any other Titan!  (Reminds me of the 2012 Titan team at the Hope regional.  Jordan Zimmer's grandfather insisted to me that he had no chance of playing the next night against Hope, so I benched him for my fantasy team.  He was in obvious pain, but went off for 28 in a 108-101 double OT win at #1 Hope.  Brady didn't pull a Jordan, but he had a shot that got them to OT.)

[Titan Q]

IWU 75
Carthage 68 (OT)

* Jason Gregoire: 16 pts, 2 reb, 2 assists
* Colin Bonnett: 13 pts, 8 reb, 3 assists
* Grant Wolfe: 12 pts, 3 assists
* Matt Leritz: 9 pts, 15 reb

Carthage played a zone that was very effective.

Brady Rose struggled.

Freshman Matt Leritz was great.

Jason Gregoire was IWU's MVP.

Scott Trost used to say, "Never apologize for a win."

The Titans are 7-0 overall, 1-0 in the CCIW.

[4samuy]

Augustana 68
Carroll       56

Augie took care of business.  Led by 26 with 11 minutes to go in second half.

Wofford 16 pts 5 Reb
Orange 10 pts  3 Reb 4 a 3 steals
Ebel.     10 pts
Elledge. 10 pts. 2 steals
Martin    8 pts. 7 red
Benning 8 pts. 3 Reb.
Ferguson 4 pts 8 Reb

Augie is getting double doubles recently from their post combo of Martin and Ferguson.  That is a good sign and Tough match ups for many teams.  Augie ran their stuff and played real solid defensively.

[iwu70]

7-0, 1-0 so far.  No apologies.  But that was ugly.  Lucky to win shooting those percentages.  The Titans sucked it up in OT and got the W.  No apologies.

Agreed, Jason Gregoire . . . and Grant Wolfe, play well tonight.  Matt Leritz is very skilled, playing well for a freshman.   

Hope Brady recovers quickly, perhaps takes a game off.

Congrats to NPU tonight and their upset win over Wheaton.

IWU'70

[AndOne]

IWU wins in OT over CC 75-67.  An ugly one.  Lucky to come back after playing, shooting so poorly.  Played well in OT.  Rose surely injured. More when I see the box score.

Hope to get that one out of the system.  But, a win is a win, to start the CCIW campaign.  But, that was pretty ugly. 

IWU'70

That may well be, but apparently not as bad as we feared, judging from Brady and his dad.  He played 10 minutes more than any other Titan!  (Reminds me of the 2012 Titan team at the Hope regional.  Jordan Zimmer's grandfather insisted to me that he had no chance of playing the next night against Hope, so I benched him for my fantasy team.  He was in obvious pain, but went off for 28 in a 108-101 double OT win at #1 Hope.  Brady didn't pull a Jordan, but he had a shot that got them to OT.)

Pardon my skepticism, but I seriously doubt whether Brady 🌹, and/or his dad, the coach, are going to be the first ones to publish the degree of injury, particularly if its of a potentially serious nature. 😏

And, should Brady need to sit out a future game to rest a nagging injury, I'd like to suggest the Jan. 9th game. 💉 😉

[AndOne]

North Central 75
Millikin          64

NCC won this game largly by doing more of the "little things" right. Things that don't necessarily jump out of the box score at you. Things like not forcing the action, taking better care of the ball, and making some nifty interior passes. The Cardinals held a 9 point lead at halftime. After a MU three to open the 2nd half, the Cards went on a 20-9 run over the course of about 8 minutes to take a 17 point lead. During that 8 minute stretch, NCC hit 8 of 8 shots from the field. Millikin stayed in the game primarily on the basis of going an excellent 21 of 24 from the line, making 2 more FTs than NCC even attempted.

* Connor Raridon again led the Cardinals with 18 points (7/9, 1/2, 3/4), 3 rebounds, 6 assists, and a block.

* Aiden Chang had 14 points on 6 of 9 FGs, and had 3 assists, and a steal.

* Matt Cappelletti also had 14 points. He just missed a double-double with 9 rebounds, and he added 5 assists.

* Blaise Meredith scored 11 points (3/5, 1/2, 4/4),2 assists, and a block.

* Soph Will Clausel off the bench with 9 points on 4/5 shooting, and 2 assists.

* Millikin was led by Elijah Henry with 16 points. Freshman Jack Marinko displayed a nice shooter's touch (4/5, 3/4, 3/3) to register 14 points.

* My MVP Award goes to Will Clausel. His play off the bench seemed to spark the Cardinals who had seemingly been in somewhat of a cruise control mode previous to his initial appearance of the evening.

[GoPerry]

IWU wins in OT over CC 75-67.  An ugly one.  Lucky to come back after playing, shooting so poorly.  Played well in OT.  Rose surely injured. More when I see the box score.

Hope to get that one out of the system.  But, a win is a win, to start the CCIW campaign.  But, that was pretty ugly. 

IWU'70

That may well be, but apparently not as bad as we feared, judging from Brady and his dad.  He played 10 minutes more than any other Titan!  (Reminds me of the 2012 Titan team at the Hope regional.  Jordan Zimmer's grandfather insisted to me that he had no chance of playing the next night against Hope, so I benched him for my fantasy team.  He was in obvious pain, but went off for 28 in a 108-101 double OT win at #1 Hope.  Brady didn't pull a Jordan, but he had a shot that got them to OT.)

Pardon my skepticism, but I seriously doubt whether Brady 🌹, and/or his dad, the coach, are going to be the first ones to publish the degree of injury, particularly if its of a potentially serious nature. 😏

And, should Brady need to sit out a future game to rest a nagging injury, I'd like to suggest the Jan. 9th game. 💉 😉

For his own safety, it would be perfectly reasonable for Brady to sit out their next game --- who they play is escaping me at the moment . . .

[Titan Q]

I'm not really sure the status of Brady Rose's injury.  He suffered some type of back injury in practice Wednesday and did not practice Thursday or Friday.  I was told yesterday morning he was doubtful to play vs Carthage.  He played last night, and played a ton (42 of 45 minutes), but he certainly didn't look right.  How much of that was the injury vs just a bad game...no way to tell of course.

I'll assume he will be good to Wednesday vs the Thunder.

[Titan Q]

https://www.iwusports.com/boxscore.aspx?id=6751&path=mbball

https://www.pantagraph.com/sports/college/basketball/men/gregoire-finds-redemption-in-no-iwu-s-ot-victory/article_b7ebeb61-23a4-54ff-a074-acc4487ba8a6.html


Carthage's zone gave IWU a lot of problems, which surprised me.  The Titans shoot it so well from beyond the arc and the mid-range that I'd think it'd be really hard to zone this team.  A few opponents have tried to zone the Titans this year and they picked it apart.

I guess the difference is that Carthage has 6-10, crazy long 6-10 Sean Johnson in the middle of that zone.  He is really becoming a player.  Johnson was a defensive force last night.  And then the Red Men have some great length at other places in the zone too.

With a normal shooting performance (including a normal Brady Rose shooting performance), the Titans would have been fine against the Carthage zone - he missed a number of wide open 3-pointers.  But that's sort of what you are betting on when you play zone - let's see if they have a rough night shooting it.  And certainly IWU did about the first 26 minutes of the game.  IWU was also missing Brady Rose's dribble penetration last night - usually he gets into the paint where's he's a fantastic finisher from 15 feet and in.

Jason Gregoire had a terrific 2nd half for the Titans.  He scored all 16 of his points in the 2nd, and really hit some huge shots and made big plays.

IWU has a future star in 6-7 F Matt Leritz.  I can't believe many freshman in the 73-year history of the CCIW have had 15 rebounds in their first-ever league game.  Leritz is a very skilled low post player who just does a lot of things well.  He has to be on the floor a bunch for the Titans the rest of the way.

Carthage really made it hard for the Titans last night.  I give the Titans a lot of credit for grinding that out and finding a way to win.  IWU had a mix of seniors and young guys really step up down the stretch.

[Gregory Sager]

The unsung hero of last night's upset in the crackerbox was Izaiah Sanders. The 5'11 sophomore from Taft, who spent last year playing juco ball at St. Cloud Tech up in Minnesota, drew the onerous task of guarding Aston Francis. While it would seem at first blush that a 32-point performance by the Wheaton star doesn't show well for Sanders' efforts, the shooting stats posted by Francis prove otherwise. Francis was completely prevented from driving to the basket; I think that the only time that he tried it all night came with three minutes and change left and Sanders sitting on the bench. (Cardell Simmons proceeded to pick Francis's pocket on that drive and subsequently hit the trey from the left corner with 3:07 left that put NPU up for good.) Most of Francis's early points came off of weak-side baseline reverse cuts where he was able to get leverage on Sanders and catch a look-in pass for a layup. But in the second half, he didn't even have that going on.

His shot selection was telling. There were a few instances in which he was able to pull up in transition and attempt a trey, and there were a couple of his 28-foot specials as well, but the trey look he attempted the most was a 180-degree-midair-turn catch-and-shoot on the wing after taking the initial pass from Luke Peters. Now, if there was someone I had to choose to take that shot, it'd be Aston Francis. Thing is, though, I would never choose that shot to begin with -- it's very low-percentage. I think that he tried ten or twelve of those -- including the potential game-tying shot with four seconds left -- and he only made one of them. The fact that he was relegated to taking those shots shows how hard and how effectlvely Sanders worked to take him away from more preferable shots.

Francis didn't have a happy night, as he got T'ed up for dropping an F-bomb in front of the scorer's table while walking to the sideline for a timeout. Speaking of which, Kobe Eichelberger at one point came over and pounded the table so hard that he momentarily disrupted what the game staff was doing. Wheaton was the epitome of frustration last night.

Great turnout by the NPU student section, who really made themselves heard in the second half. It caught me by surprise, because it had been so long since I heard that much noise in the crackerbox. I felt like I was at an NPU soccer match.

[AndOne]

I seem to remember a post a few weeks ago predicting the Chicago based Vikings might not win a conference game this season. I think it's safe to say that IF last night's victory is the only conference win they do post this season most, if not all, NPU fans will be glad that W came against the, to use GS's terminology, Sonic Atmospheric Disturbance. ⛹🏼‍♂️ 

An F-bomb? 💥
Other than "fast" and "food," I wasn't aware that any Wheaton student-athletes knew any four letter words beginning with F. 🧛‍♂️

[AndOne]

For comparison's sake;

After last night's games, Massey has IWU 4th, Augie 10th, NCC 13th,  and Wheaton 38th.

It will be interesting to see how this compares with the next D3Hoops poll.