MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[79jaybird]

Mugsy, I hope your Dad is well and gets back to normal soon!
Looking forward to Saturday's game between Elmhurst and Wheaton.  Both teams have shown great strengths and some weaknesses, as well as various intensity levels. 

[usee]

Mugsy, I hope your Dad is well and gets back to normal soon!
Looking forward to Saturday's game between Elmhurst and Wheaton.  Both teams have shown great strengths and some weaknesses, as well as various intensity levels. 

I would love a wheaton win but Augustana is the best team I have seen this season (out of IWU, wheaton and augie) and Elmhurst handled them. Augie would have delivered a beating to either team in King arena tonight. I don't hold much hope for a Thunder win, but I have been really wrong before!!

[Titan Q]

More of the same for IWU tonight -- just no one to handle the basketball.  It's a shame, because Zach Freeman is really a special player.

Kent Raymond is really something.

[tjcummingsfan]

I'm with Rob, I think North Park deserves alot more respect than that.  Poor.

[Gregory Sager]

Man, what a tough loss for the Park tonight. Seven seconds left, the Vikes down by one, they run a perfect play that gets Joe Capalbo an open three-foot bunny ... and he short-rims it. And you can't even get mad at the kid for it, because he played such a terrific game.

Capalbo led NPU in scoring with 18 points, and he also did a fairly good job of keeping the much quicker Brian Lee contained. He did everything Paul Brenegan asked of him, and he did it with a bandaged sore wrist that he further aggravated in the second half. Senior forward Julian Boyd came off of the bench for NPU and had the game of his life, netting 16 points in only 12 minutes of action, while Jay Alexander added 12 and Stephano Jones had 11. Anthony Lenoir had 9 points and led the Vikes with 6 rebounds, but his best contribution was on the defensive end; he held Nick Michael, who has four inches and 20-25 pounds on him, to an 0-6 game from the field (with a little help in the first half from guards doubling down) and only one trip to the line. In fact, despite giving away so much size on the inside, NPU's "big" men actually outscored Elmhurst's, 36-35.

Brent Ruch, who played a game worthy of an All-CCIW first-teamer tonight, scored 24 (17 in the second half) and led all players in rebounds with 12. Ryan Burks was his typically deadly self from outside, scoring 20, while Lee added 13 for the 'jays.

NPU played an outstanding first half of basketball, in spite of a cold start from the floor. The Vikings swarmed to the ball defensively and didn't allow any uncontested shots, and Elmhurst couldn't use its size advantage for anything other than garnering defensive rebounds. As Mr. B said, the Vikes were up by ten, 30-20, and went into the locker room with a 34-28 lead.

Elmhurst closed down the lead and caught the Park five minutes into the second half, and used a 14-2 run to take eight-point leads of 50-42 and 53-45. That's when NPU showed some mettle that really impressed me. Whereas the Vikings of yesteryear would've simply folded their tents and given up at that point, this year's edition clawed back into the game and retook the lead, 56-55, at the 9:55 mark. From that point on it was back-and-forth, with neither team able to build a lead of more than four points.

NPU took its last lead with fifty seconds left in the game on a pair of Jay Alexander FTs. But as 79jaybird said, Elmhurst battled through adversity. They refused to be rattled in crunch time, and continued to go straight to the hot hand of Brent Ruch. The Vikings closed down on Ruch on the next possession, but it left Nick Michael open. His shot rimmed out, but Ruch rebounded it on the weakside and put it back up, giving EC the 77-76 lead with :19 left. A timeout later, the stage was set for Capalbo's heartbreaking miss. The Vikes were forced to foul after Ruch's defensive rebound; two FTs later, the Vikes had one last shot to tie the game, but Capalbo's trey attempt drew iron and the game was over.

Mark Scherer wisely moved his perimeter players farther out in the second half, creating enough space for Ruch to maneuver with the ball in the post without getting doubled. That was huge, since with Stephano Jones (who played like a warrior tonight) in foul trouble the Vikes didn't have anyone who could keep Ruch from muscling his way to the basket. And Burks, as is his wont, knocked down almost every single open look he had from downtown. When Ruch and Burks are doing the inside-outside thing in tandem like that, Elmhurst is extremely difficult to beat. The Vikes did well to come as close as they did.

Kudos to Elmhurst. They didn't take NPU's best roundhouse punch tonight -- the shot selection of the Vikings often left much to be desired in this game -- but they did withstand a very strong effort by the Park, and they found a way to eke out a narrow win on the road. That's the stuff of which champions are made, and at this admittedly early juncture it looks to me as though the 'jays are the odds-on favorite to win the school's second-ever CCIW championship.

As bitter as it must've felt to have the upset of the year slip out of their grasp when Capalbo missed that open bunny, I'm sure that the Vikings still left the gym knowing that they can beat anyone in the league when they come to play the way that they did tonight. Problem is, if they play the way that they played against Wheaton four days ago, they can just as easily lose to anyone in the league. The Park needs to learn how to bring it every night the way that they did tonight, regardless of whether or not the opponent is ranked ninth in the nation.

Great to meet you tonight, ecdubb.

Mugsy, I'll say a prayer for your dad tonight. The NPU community has had a scare of its own this past week with AD and women's basketball coach Jack Surridge in the hospital with heart trouble, so I think we're all a little cognizant right now that there's bigger things going on in life than basketball.

[Gregory Sager]

"Whew!!  All I can say is winning on the road is not easy no matter who you're playing!"

This comment angers me so I choose not to speak about the NPU-EC contest tonight.

I'm with Rob, I think North Park deserves alot more respect than that.  Poor.

Guys, I don't think 79jaybird meant that as a putdown of NPU. I think that the "no matter who you're playing" clause was just a generic reference on his part, not a pointed dig at lowly ol' NPU. I got the gist from his post that he was actually very impressed by the Vikings tonight.

[buck14]

I am not a CCIW expert but tonite was the nite i thought an upset would happen in chicago. I thought EC would get beat, my reason for thinking this......well NPU beat us earlier in the season when we had a last second bunny rim out so i really wanted them to beat my high school team mate's(ryan burks) team so i could say well our teams are evenly matched. But the sophomore duo of burks and ruch represented class A basketball tonite to show hope for all small school basketball players. hahaha kinda corny

[Gregory Sager]

Since NPU isn't playing on Saturday, I now have to decide which game to attend that evening: Augustana @ North Central or Elmhurst @ Wheaton. Either way, since I'm going to be the scorekeeper for Saturday afternoon's women's basketball contest in the crackerbox between North Park and Illinois Wesleyan, this will be the first time that I've ever seen two CCIW games in two different gyms on the same day.

[TitanBacker]

Q or any other Titan Faithful-

Any news on the schedule for Dwyer's return?  He seems like our only hope for a real Point Guard.  No one on JV has stepped up enough to take that role?  Or did IWU recruit a bunch of shooting guards?

Hard to handle another loss.  ZFree and Darius can't win games by themselves.

Not to get ahead of myself, but if Zach is such a special player, does anyone think he may get a look from NBA scouts like Keelan did?

[79jaybird]

"Winning on the road is not easy no matter who you're playing"
I did not mean this as a put down or disrespect to North Park.  No way, no how.  I just meant that getting a W on the road, is no easy task.  I was thoroughly impressed with North Park's tenacity and heart.    I didn't mean to cause a stir.
Greg's review is right on and correct for both teams.  Exciting Basketball tonight at NPU.
Greg on question,  how come Brenegan didn't put Jones back in during that last segment.  EC had trouble with Jones inside most of the night, so why not put your "big guy" in the game, when it is "do or die" time?

[Titan Q]

Q or any other Titan Faithful-

Any news on the schedule for Dwyer's return?  He seems like our only hope for a real Point Guard.  No one on JV has stepped up enough to take that role?  Or did IWU recruit a bunch of shooting guards?

Hard to handle another loss.  ZFree and Darius can't win games by themselves.

Not to get ahead of myself, but if Zach is such a special player, does anyone think he may get a look from NBA scouts like Keelan did?

Unfortunately, and almost unbelievably, Sean Dwyer broke his other foot in practice Tuesday.  Next week he will have the identical surgery he had on the other foot back in November.  He is done for the year.  (With Sean out, there are no point-guards on Illinois Wesleyan's roster.)

Regarding Zach, there just aren't any 6-7 pure low post (back-to-the-basket) players in the NBA.  There is no way he could play the 4 or the 5 at that level, and he doesn't have the skill set to play small forward.  Zach could play in Europe and do very well if he wanted to, but I think he just wants to start his career as a teacher...

http://www.iwuhoops.com/zach.htm

Freeman is as good as any IWU player I've seen in the 17 years I've been around the program, right up there with Jeff Kuehl and Bryan Crabtree.

[TitanBacker]

Tough break for Sean and the Titan team on his loss.  Does the guy have bad bones or what?    Best of luck to him next year.

I saw Zach play for a couple years when i was still in school and he is a very special player.  I wish him and the rest of the senior titans (including Abo) the best in their future endeavors.  I was just curious if he may have a chance.  I'd be lining up to get my Zach Freeman NBA jersey.

[RodneyKnuppel]

Another great win for the Bluejays on the road last night! Congrats to Coach S. and the guys for a great start to the season. I cannot wait to get my 2nd look at this EC squad Feb. 3rd at IWU.

[ecdubb420]

I can't remember a NP-EC game being as talked about as the one last night.  With that being said, everyone who has said something about the game, makes this post even easier to do as giving indepth analysis of the game is not needed.
However, here are some quick notes.
EC is "fully healthy" meaning that every player on their team is active to play.  Besides the flu, which has hampered Michael and Bacon (to name a few players), there is nothing major to report.  
Strzemp played about 4-5 minutes, but I'm getting the idea that was done by Scherer to kick the other players in the ass and get them into the game.  I get this feeling due to the fact that Strzemp was not looking for any contact and seemed to be floating on the outside.  Scherer has also commented on Robert being with the team as a inspirational boost more than anything else.  I hope I'm wrong, but I'd still give Robert 2-3 weeks of rehab time.

Looking at EC's rotation, Brizzolara and Childs have not played a minute in the CCIW.  Matt Ryder has also not scored since his second game in uniform (after scoring 13 in his first two games).  No reason to believe that any of that will change in the near future as the current rotation is working wonders.

Jared Hintzsche played the best game of his career.  Him and Ruch are an exciting combo to watch, on both ends.  One knock on him is that he gets in foul trouble, but is he plays more tentatively, he won't be nearly as effective.  

Back to the grind, so more will likely follow.  Go EC!!

[Sakman 1111]

Very impressed with North Park they are much improved from last year.....looks like they have picked up some juco talent. Think your wrong about Strzemp in talking with him after the game he is ready to go and his offense will be great to have off the bench. Now to see Bluejays win when they really didn't play that great. Ruch is an animal.....