MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Ralph Turner]

Titan Q, actually UT-Dallas won "the whole ASC post-season Tourney".  The Comets got hot at the end of the season and finished tied for 4th in the ASC East.

They continued their "comet-like" streaking thru the ASC West in the first 2 rounds of the tourney at the Mississippi College Golden Dome .  They knocked off ASC-West Tri-Champs McMurry and Sul Ross State and then dismantled the Choctaws on their home floor in unprecedented (to my memory) fashion.  Their 6 point loss at Trinity in the first round was the toughest game for Trinity until the Tiger loss to UW-SP.

UT-Dallas is picked 4th in the ASC-East pre-season poll for the 2005-06 campaign.

Thanks for the report.  UT-D hosts McMurry in opening the ASC season next Saturday!

[devildog29]

Q, I see it didn't take long for you to settle in with your new broadcast partner.  If I didn't know better, I would have never thought it was one of the first games you guys were calling together.  The 3 man booth against the Illini had its growing pains, but last night with the 2 man booth was very smooth.  Now, if you have any pull at WJBC, if you could get them to offer a Windows option for WJBC2 streams similar to the options they have for the regular WJBC.com instead of having to use Quicktime, that would be awesome.  My own 2 cents, even if it's only worth a penny.

[Gregory Sager]

North Central defeated Robert Morris 88-72.

It should be noted that the Robert Morris College that the Cardinals beat was the inferior one, RMC-Springfield rather than RMC-Chicago. Wash U actually came very close to upsetting NAIA-1 powerhouse RMC-Chicago in the opening round of the Wisconsin-Platteville tournament last night before falling, 67-64.

In Millikin's 85-82 win over MacMurray the Big Blue was led by a freshman, Drew Gensler, who scored 20 points. But senior forward Korte Long may have locked up CCIW Player of the Week with his statistical effort, as he came pretty close to booking a double Andrew Jackson: 19 points, 18 rebounds. Lance Brooks added 19 for Millikin.

[Gregory Sager]

I'm still angry about North Park's 68-46 debacle at Benedictine last night, but I've cooled off enough to post about it now.

The Vikings actually started off the night in encouraging fashion, as a Jay Alexander trey and three-point-play on back-to-back possessions gave NPU an early 9-1 lead. From that point on in the first half, however, it was a comedy of errors as neither team proved capable of handling the ball properly or of running a decent play. NPU proved the more inept of the two teams, however, and the half ended with Benedictine holding a 31-23 lead.

In the second half the Vikings came completely unglued. They did absolutely nothing right: They couldn't get the ball inside to score, they couldn't hit anything from downtown, they screened poorly, the rebounding (which had been decent in the first half) faltered, the parade of unforced turnovers continued in grand fashion, and, although the Vikings were getting to the FT line, they made fewer than 50% of their attempts from there, including a bunch of missed 1-and-1 front ends. As bad as the offense looked, the defense was even more discouraging. NPU defenders neglected to stay at home when the Bennies drove to the basket, leading to countless kickouts and easy trey attempts. And they played with less energy than Benedictine at that end of the floor as well, as the hosts got all the loose balls and fought their way to a pile of offensive rebounds. It was only through unforced errors of their own that Benedictine was unable to log a lot of points.

As dysfunctional as the offense looked, NPU did actually manage to claw back from an 18-point deficit to make it a manageable 52-40 margin with about six minutes or so to go. This is where things completely broke down, however, and left me in a state of total disgust. The wheels came completely off at the defensive end, as Benedictine reeled off four or five plays in a row in which a cutter down the lane got an easy basket at the expense of an NPU defender who neglected to stay with him. And at the offensive end, the Vikings just stopped trying; rather than run plays, they all stood around and watched Jason Gordon shoot one off-balanced attempt after another. It was sickening to watch.

[Gregory Sager]

Nobody came off well for North Park. Alexander scored what was a reasonable amount of points, given NPU's incompetence at the offensive end of the floor, but he didn't guard anyone all night and spent a lot of time on the bench as a result. The only other player for the Vikings with extensive experience in an NPU varsity uni, Eric Samuelson, was little more than a fouling machine, picking up five fouls in relatively limited time on the floor. Eric Allen was invisible. The two big freshmen who saw the bulk of playing time inside, Jeremiah Sargent and Mike Ventura, both did some things well and both demonstrated that they have promise, but they also showed their inexperience and the fact that they both still have holes in their games at this point. Devin Burnett, Bjorn Berg, Steve Reynolds, and Ed Whitaker were non-factors.

Sadly, Jason Gordon's evening was the worst nightmare of all. Perhaps he felt pressured to do too much with so many key players sitting on the bench in warmup suits due to injury, but he was completely off all night. He missed much of the first half after picking up two fouls in the first two minutes. He was continuously burned on D by Benedictine's talented senior transfer PG, Alan Fudge. And he forgot that he was supposed to be the point guard rather than a 1-on-5 scoring machine in those last few minutes of the game. Gordon, as talented as he is, has a long, long way to go before he becomes an effective CCIW-level floor general.

NPU can lean on a lot of excuses for last night. Mathisen, Rice, Peterson, and Woodside were all expected to be key ingredients to the 2005-06 Vikings (and, except for Peterson and his torn ACL, they still are), and a certain amount of opening-night jitters can be expected of a rotation that consisted almost entirely of freshmen and sophomores. But the way that the Vikings seemed to just fold the tent at both ends of the floor in the waning minutes of the game was inexcusable. Ineptitude in an inexperienced team can be forgiven. A lack of effort cannot be forgiven of any team.

[Jim Matson]

bully, we knew it was going to be a long season, so we should count Friday's win as a good one.  This is a wildly young team and the first true rebuilding year I've seen at Wheaton since the early 90s.  I am looking forward to tonight's game - winable or not.

April, now that the flurry of playoff soccer has ended for Wheaton and the CCIW, I'll be back hanging around.

When I think about the CCIW over the past 12 months, I am impressed.  We showed up well in women's soccer and women's backetball with 2 national champs.  Men's and women's soccer both were well represented in the post-season this year (North Park, Augie, Wheaton and Wesleyan).  We've got Augie and North Central still playing football.  North Central and Wheaton are running in the cross-country nationals this season.  And Millikin and Wesleyan should do well in this season's hoops post-season.  Good stuff.

[dansand]

Greg,

Is that the same Alan Fudge that played at Robert Morris (Chicago) several years ago?

[wally_wabash]

Great game by IWU today at Chadwick.  Dauksas is The Truth™.  He took over in the second half, especially with Amelionovich (pardon the spelling) having an off game.  I think Wabash made a pretty good showing today.  With the lead at halftime, Little Giant fans were starting to think that this would be one of the best days in Wabash athletics history (with the playoff win and an upset over a #1 hoops team in the same afternoon!), but things settled down, IWU brought out the lockdown defense and ended all happy thoughts with a 21-3 after the game was tied at 53-53. 

Great Titan crowd today...helped make for an awesome atmosphere! 

Good luck to the Titans the rest of the way...you guys will definitely have the bullseye on your backs all season long.  I think you're good enough to handle it. 

[Titan Q]

IWU 79
Wabash 67

* Adam Dauksas: 22 pts, 5 assists
* Zach Freeman: 15 pts, 8 reb
* Cory Jones: 12 pts, 13 reb
* Jason Fisher: 10 pts, 6 reb
* Mike McGraw: 8 pts (3-3 FG)

* Kyle Medeiros: 17 pts
* Adonis Joseph: 10 pts
* Andrew Zimmer: 10 pts, 5 reb

Rebounds: IWU 42 Wabash 25

IWU battled a very solid Wabash team today on their court, and came away with a nice "in region" win.  In the 1st Half, Wabash guard Kyle Medeiros was on fire - 17 points by halftime and most of the shots were difficult ones.  The Little Giants led 35-34 at the break due in large part to Medeiros.

The first 10 minutes or so of the 2nd Half things were tight.  Wabash was charged up playing the #1 ranked team, and their students were too.  (The first "o-ver-rated" chant was during the pregame layup line.)  The longer they stayed in it, the louder it got in there.  I believe it was 50-50 just under 10:00 when Adam Dauksas and Mike McGraw hit back-to-back 3's.  From there, Dauksas took the game over...he was outstanding in the 2nd Half tonight. 

Also of note in the 2nd Half is that IWU held Kyle Medeiros scoreless in the final 20 minutes of the game.

Keelan Amelianovich played 31 minutes with the flu today.   He pulled down 8 boards, but was a non-factor offensively...took just 3 shots.

Cory Jones was great again - 12 points and 13 rebounds.  Cory's 24 rebounds in 2 games is a new Little Giant Tipoff Classic record.

Mike McGraw had his second consecutive nice game.  Mike was perfect from the field and all 3 makes were big ones.

Wabash is a solid team - no stars, but a lot of nice parts that fit well together.   And under veteran Mac Petty the Little Giants are very well coached of course.  I think they'll have a good season.  In the end, IWU was just too big and athletic for Wabash (the rebound total illustrates that...42 to 25) and the Titans had an All-American make All-American type plays in a tough environment.

[carlweathers]

Note to Ralph Turner.  I am guessing that Trinity's OT win over Hanover in the regional semifinals was a closer game than the 6 point game over UT-D. 

[Flying Dutch Fan]

Hope 70  Elmhurst 53

Hope up by 10 at the half - up by 15 points 3 minutes into the second half.  Elmhurst went on a 14-0 run to make it a game.  Game was tied at 47 with 9:33 to go.  Hope finished the game on a 23-6 run.

Both All-americans looked good - Martin had 16 & 6, Phillips 22 & 7.  More details posted in the MIAA site.

Stats available here:

http://www.hope.edu/athletics/livestats/

[Jim Matson]

Wheaton almost pulls out the upset against Aurora in the Pfund Championship game, losing 73-72. The Thunder was ahead by as much as 10 points in the first half and was on fire in the first half. Bollier played one heck of a game!  Stats to follow...

This game was very much like the Wheaton/Calvin game in the playoffs last year.  Tough 1 point loss, but in this case a strong performance by a young Wheaton team early in the season.

[Titan Q]

North Central beat Loras tonight 70-57.  (Loras upset #13 UW-Whitewater yesterday.)  NCC got 33 points out of Daniel Walton tonight after a 32 point effort by Anthony Simmons vs Robert Morris (Sprinfield).


Boxscores from the 4 CCIW games today...

http://www2.noctrl.edu/athlet/basketball_m/05-06/LOR-NCCM.HTM

http://elmhurst.edu/~athletic/Home/M-Basket/stats/2005-2006/melm01.htm

http://www.wheaton.edu/Athletics/mbasketball/stats/MWHE2.HTM

http://www.iwu.edu/~iwunews/sports/mbb2006/tip04.htm

[augie_superfan]

Hey Q, or anyone else that was at the IWU game today, was the reason for Keelan's off game today because of his flu or was there somethng else going on in the game.  I was just curious if Wabash was able to run some sort of defense to stop him or had some matchup working well or if it was just that he wasn't feeling well and didnt have any energy.  Thanks.

[diehardfan]

Thanks Jim and bgbully.

April - I definitely miss calling the games. I'll be in Wheaton a couple of times in December/early January. Perhaps a cameo opportunity will present itself.

I would definitely enjoy and advocate for that! In the meanwhile, if you want to give these guys a few pointers...

Looks like the MVP for the Pfund is now named after Will... it's a nice sentiment... Guys, please keep the Landry family and the Wheaton Community in your prayers, the memorial service for Will tomorrow is going to be hard on everyone.