MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Flying Dutch Fan]

Bad game coverage has to hurt your team's recruiting, especially if you're a school that seeks to bring in talent from outside of your region.  And if you're a parent who can't make it to games in person, you're likely going to favor colleges that put effort into broadcasting.

I tried telling this to a certain AD at Carthage who is no longer an AD anywhere after some particularly lackluster efforts by their SID and department. We were spoiled by Steve Marovich at Carthage. Now, instead of an actual game write-up, we are treated to a bullet-point list of "How it Happened". Here are a few samples of memorable moments from current game recaps this season.

• With a good free throw from Emma Thistle, the Firebirds led 16-2 going into the second quarter. (women's game)
• Final score: Carthage 85 - Thiel 66 (Wrong final score)
• Ripon initially held a slim two-point lead early in the first half courtesy of a three-pointer. (who made the shot?)
• Julian Campbell's successful free throws narrowed the deficit to 41-24.(what's with the free throw mentions?)
• Despite the late surge, the home team secured the victory in the closing seconds.(lazy)

If ADs and SIDs don't think that kids are checking out their schools' websites before they arrive, they're just not paying attention.  I realize it's not the only thing kids look at, but it's one of them.

I'm not exactly sure how HEADLINES get picked/posted on the D3Hoops site, but I'm pretty sure if my school just knocked off #1, I'd want to publish something worthy of being front-page news. Just saying...

Well, Bob "Titan Q" Quillman on Twitter said it wasn't even an upset.

He can be wrong on Twitter too

[Gregory Sager]

Good SID's are hard to find.   Makes you appreciate legends like Dave Wrath,  Steve Marovich,  Dave Hilbert, etc.   People who put a genuine interest and detail into their writings.

Yep. And I would add that we still have another great elder statesman (I can't wait to tell him that I've called him that on CCIW Chat) among the CCIW SID ranks in Brett Marhanka at Wheaton. And, while I'm obviously biased, I would add that Tyler Woolbright has really come into his own as North Park's SID, too. And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Clark Teuscher's administrative skills, since as North Central's SID he not only has a very large menu of sports that he has to deal with, he also has to manage more staff than Santa has elves.

[Gregory Sager]

Bad game coverage has to hurt your team's recruiting, especially if you're a school that seeks to bring in talent from outside of your region.  And if you're a parent who can't make it to games in person, you're likely going to favor colleges that put effort into broadcasting.

I tried telling this to a certain AD at Carthage who is no longer an AD anywhere after some particularly lackluster efforts by their SID and department. We were spoiled by Steve Marovich at Carthage. Now, instead of an actual game write-up, we are treated to a bullet-point list of "How it Happened". Here are a few samples of memorable moments from current game recaps this season.

• With a good free throw from Emma Thistle, the Firebirds led 16-2 going into the second quarter. (women's game)
• Final score: Carthage 85 - Thiel 66 (Wrong final score)
• Ripon initially held a slim two-point lead early in the first half courtesy of a three-pointer. (who made the shot?)
• Julian Campbell's successful free throws narrowed the deficit to 41-24.(what's with the free throw mentions?)
• Despite the late surge, the home team secured the victory in the closing seconds.(lazy)

If ADs and SIDs don't think that kids are checking out their schools' websites before they arrive, they're just not paying attention.  I realize it's not the only thing kids look at, but it's one of them.

I'm not exactly sure how HEADLINES get picked/posted on the D3Hoops site, but I'm pretty sure if my school just knocked off #1, I'd want to publish something worthy of being front-page news. Just saying...

Well, Bob "Titan Q" Quillman on Twitter said it wasn't even an upset.

He can be wrong on Twitter too

[lmitzel]

Good SID's are hard to find.   Makes you appreciate legends like Dave Wrath,  Steve Marovich,  Dave Hilbert, etc.   People who put a genuine interest and detail into their writings.

Yep. And I would add that we still have another great elder statesman (I can't wait to tell him that I've called him that on CCIW Chat) among the CCIW SID ranks in Brett Marhanka at Wheaton. And, while I'm obviously biased, I would add that Tyler Woolbright has really come into his own as North Park's SID, too. And I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Clark Teuscher's administrative skills, since as North Central's SID he not only has a very large menu of sports that he has to deal with, he also has to manage more staff than Santa has elves.

I'll echo these praises. It certainly helps that he's got a veritable army (hell, a couple weeks ago pretty much the entire department was booked for the football playoffs and we had to bring in some mercenaries from Illinois Wesleyan... which, other than the fact that I'm pretty sure my vision tinted green for a couple minutes at one point, they were great). He and assistant SID Nick Osterloo are always on top of stuff; I show up at Merner a little before tipoff and there's a nice packet with pronunciation guides, sponsorship/special event reads, and whatever else I need waiting for me. Obviously I need to shout out the rest of the league's Sports Information staff for helping make that possible.

I try to be as prepared as I can for games, but it certainly helps when you've got the support of a team like that.

[iwu70]

Sorry Q, it was an upset.   The CCIW may be stronger than we think this year -- maybe not -- but hardly anyone thought Carthage would win that game.   

IWU'70

[Gregory Sager]

Sorry Q, it was an upset.   The CCIW may be stronger than we think this year -- maybe not -- but hardly anyone thought Carthage would win that game.

He doubled down on his assessment on Twitter X after I disagreed with him. It's not only a very weird take on Bob's part, in my opinion it's an even weirder hill for him to die on.

But ... he's not on d3boards.com anymore, and it feels wrong for me to talk about him over here, so I'll just shut up about it now.

[Gregory Sager]

... which, other than the fact that I'm pretty sure my vision tinted green for a couple minutes at one point,

They have pills for that now, Lucas.

[iwu70]

IWU led in the game at Elmhurst for the first half, then gets blow out by 19 in the second half.  Tale of two periods.   

Final 90-73.   An ugly start to conference play for the Titans.

'70

[Greek Tragedy]

And, of course, NPU goes down to Carroll as well. I went to the Carroll/Greenville game and I didn't think either was that good. Apparently I had to re-calibrate everything.

[lmitzel]

NCC 61
Augie 59

Wasn't a fun first ten minutes as the Cardinals seemed to have trouble with Augie's 3-2 zone I was reminded of the C-C-I-Double-You game from Pat and Greg on Around the Nation a month or two back. Then the Cardinals closed the half on a 21-4 run to go into the break up by six. Naturally, the Vikings fought back in the second half and we were treated to a nail-biting finish... especially the very end, as suddenly I'm not as worried about seeing missed layups in my dreams.

Ethan Helwig: 15 pts, 8 reb
Ken Thomas: 14 pts, 7 reb
Erikas Gurskas: 12 pts, 2 blk
Brian Johnson: 6 pts, 8 reb, 4 ast

Tyler Knuth: 16 pts
Matt Hawkins: 12 pts
Mike Hamilton: 6 pts, 5 reb

North Central travels to Wheaton on Saturday.

[GU1999]

And, of course, NPU goes down to Carroll as well. I went to the Carroll/Greenville game and I didn't think either was that good. Apparently I had to re-calibrate everything.

Tangentially related, GU missed a three at the buzzer and lost at CUC 119-117. The atmosphere at CUC was electric.   

[Gregory Sager]

Carroll 77
North Park 61

Phil Holmes: 18 pts (9-11 FG), 7 rebs, 3 blks
Kyren Gardner: 10 pts

Aaron Wafford: 26 pts (9-12 FG, 5-8 trey, 3-3 FT)
Jacob Naber: 12 pts
Kobe Simpson: 11 pts, 10 rebs, 8 asts, 3 stls
Eckahelo Simpson: 10 pts, 7 rebs

This was a humiliating loss for North Park, no two ways about it. The Vikings were, as Sean Smith put it in the postgame interview, "out-toughed by a team that played like they wanted it, while we played like we didn't." Carroll bossed NPU around to the tune of 42-25 on the boards, and seemingly every loose ball ended up in Pioneer hands in a game that had about two and a half games' worth of loose balls. The Pioneers turned the ball over 24 times, and were barely even fazed by it.

The Vikings continue to shoot the ball at a level that can only be defined as putrid; tonight's shooting line for NPU was .366/.238/.571, with the shooting from the field and from beyond the arc being much lower in the second half than it was in the first. The Vikings continue to look utterly lost in their halfcourt offense, like a group of students who wandered into the wrong classroom and are forced to take a final exam in a course for which they never signed up. And they aren't getting anywhere near enough transition opportunities to make up for their lackluster halfcourt efforts; in fact, they muffed several of the fast breaks that they did have tonight.

I take nothing away from Carroll. The Pioneers are 6-1 for a reason -- with the one loss being a very competitive and very respectable defeat at the hands of UW-Whitewater on the home floor of the Warhawks. Any of the other seven teams in this league who thinks that the Pioneers are going to be an easy W may very well be in for an unpleasant surprise. They play very hard, they are physically as tough as nails, and they have not an inconsiderable amount of skill when it comes to shooting and playing sound defense. Having said that, the Pios aren't world-beaters, either. That's what so galling about the totally lame peformance by NPU tonight. Given the individual talent present on the two teams, this game could've only been a runaway Carroll victory if the Vikings did just about everything wrong. Well, guess what? The Vikings did just about everything wrong.

This team is broken -- really and truly broken -- and I sure hope that Sean and his staff can find a way to fix it before the season gets away from them.

[GoPerry]

Millikin 67
Wheaton 61

Wheaton is just not a good team – at least right now.  Understandable to some degree given graduation and also missing Nick Schiavello and Nate Sock until the last couple games.  So that leaves Connor Braun as the only healthy experienced player on the floor. 

Wheaton has rarely enjoyed an excess of size and height in the lineup.  But it is even more obvious with this group.  Braun, 6'9", is pretty much it but doesn't have the game of a typical big.  As a result, the Thunder are very one-dimensional offensively – through 6 games almost half their shots have been three-pointers which makes you very easy to defend (35 trey attempts out of 62 FGA last night).  And it also means you seldom get to the free throw line (8 FTA and last in the league in FTAs).

To be sure, expectations were not super high given the roster losses.  But was hoping to be a little more competitive. 

[Pat Coleman]

Glad to see that the site is back up, and intact as well.

My short-term plan for patching this through until I can have someone work on it, is to lock it down at the first sign of server trouble. So there might be times where it's locked for a couple hours, or overnight. Thanks to everyone for their patience.

[Pat Coleman]

I'm not exactly sure how HEADLINES get picked/posted on the D3Hoops site...

It's self-serve for a school to post something and have it automatically appear in the list of headlines, and then we can push something to that rotation of main stories. Or, if we have time, we can write something, but we didn't have anyone with time to devote to D3hoops on Tuesday, sorry.