MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[AndOne]

"We made Tim McCrary look better than he probably is, but we wanted to stop Panner."

Interesting comment from Bosko.  I think McCrary this year is the one to stop.  Wheaton has won this year w/o Panner being the high scorer.   I don't think McCrary's action last night was an indication that Carthage made him look better he is that good.  Apparently he needed to be even better given the lack of support from the other guys. 

Wheels--

Not having seen the game, its still easy to accept your analysis that McCrary is indeed a good player, and quite likely Wheaton's best player. Its not like last night's game was the first good one he has had. Mind games by Bosko?

[AndOne]

The Wheaton team seemed pretty flat last night.  I wonder if part of that can be attributed to the fact their bus broke down on the way to Kenosha.  They had to wait almost  1 1/2 for another one to come.

I think part of it had to do with the Wheaton team wishing the second bus never came. the start of the game was postponed to account for their delayed arrival. I think Wheaton was just scared to play Carthage and their poor new coach was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play.

Steve---

I'm sure those were exactly the reasons for the Wheaton defeat last night.
And you know your ass from a hole in the ground too, don't you? 

[Gregory Sager]

Here's the article from last nights Carthage/Wheaton game.  One observation during the game that had nothing to do with the players or coaches, but was interesting to see.  There were a group of about 7-8 Wheaton fans who were sitting right by the Carthage student section.  It appeared from a distance there was just some good natured ribbing going on, but security came over and asked the Wheaton students to move.  When they refused, and continued to do whatever it is they were doing, they were kicked out of the building.  Again, I don't know exactly what was taking place, just looked like fans having a good time but who knows.

http://www.kenoshanews.com/sports/red_men_open_cciw_with_win_7084007.html

REDMEN---

I think its noteworthy that you, as a Carthage supporter, didn't notice any illegal,  dangerous, or even disruptive activity on the part of the Wheaton contingent, but yet the Carthage authorities chose to have them ejected from the premises.

Perhaps the CC security forces took their que from the Wheaton Gestapo forces who not only had a group of fun loving fans, I believe from North Park, kicked out last year, but called in reinforcements in the form of the local Wheaton constabulary to invoke their decree. Alas, a little of their own medicine for the Wheaties?    

It was actually two years ago that the Carlson Crazies were tossed out of King Arena and the rest of the NPU student section was "locked down" under the watchful eyes of Andy and Barney and the rest of the Wheaton Police Department, but, now that you mention it, it does seem a little like Wheaton got a taste of its own medicine last night.

My first thought, though, was this: Having seen innumerable games at Carthage and at Wheaton (and thus knowing full well the comparable behavior of the two sets of students under normal circumstances), the whole story of the Wheaton students getting tossed out of the Toolshed last night by Carthage security struck me as a "man bites dog" situation.

"We made Tim McCrary look better than he probably is, but we wanted to stop Panner."

Interesting comment from Bosko.  I think McCrary this year is the one to stop.  Wheaton has won this year w/o Panner being the high scorer.   I don't think McCrary's action last night was an indication that Carthage made him look better he is that good.  Apparently he needed to be even better given the lack of support from the other guys.  

Wheels--

Not having seen the game, its still easy to accept your analysis that McCrary is indeed a good player, and quite likely Wheaton's best player. Its not like last night's game was the first good one he has had. Mind games by Bosko?

I've got my money on that, because Wheels is right about McCrary being Wheaton's best weapon.

The Wheaton team seemed pretty flat last night.  I wonder if part of that can be attributed to the fact their bus broke down on the way to Kenosha.  They had to wait almost  1 1/2 for another one to come.

I think part of it had to do with the Wheaton team wishing the second bus never came. the start of the game was postponed to account for their delayed arrival. I think Wheaton was just scared to play Carthage and their poor new coach was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play.

Steve---

I'm sure those were exactly the reasons for the Wheaton defeat last night.
And you know your ass from a hole in the ground too, don't you?  

Yep. That poor new coach for Wheaton was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play, in spite of the fact that he played in the CCIW for four years and served as an assistant coach in it for another seven.

Then again, Mark, the Kenosha newspaper says that "steve d is the man" is a savant and we're not, so maybe we should just take his word for it.

[AndOne]

Nice to start the year off with a road win.  IWU's center platoon did a lot of damage...

Doug Sexauer: 23 pts (11-12 FG)
Ryan Connolly: 10 pts (4-6 FG)

Dan Schouten had 9 big 2nd half points.  Sean Johnson finished with 12, Jordan Zimmer had 10 & 5, and Sean Dwyer dished out 9 assists.  Travis Rosenkranz (9 pts, 3 assists) quietly had a nice game...made 2 FT's and a basket in the final minutes to help close it out.

Sounds like IWU just had too much size and depth for NCC.  Although, it sounded like there were some tough matchups on the defensive end of the floor for the Titans, with NCC being so much smaller and quicker.  Interestingly, IWU shot the ball 10 less times from the field and 10 less times from the FT line...and still led the final 35 minutes or so (and fairly comfortably most of the way).

Wow does Derek Raridon sound good...34 points in his first career CCIW game.  David Twyman had a big game too - 24 points.  Reid Barringer finished with just 5 points.

Unfortunately I have to go shovel to driveway now (although I can't complain since it's the first time I've had to shovel in 2 years in Columbia, Mo.).

Somehow I doubt the 25th ranked team in the country anticipated winning by only a 5 point margin over the team picked to finish 7th in conference. And, while the Titans were taller, deeper, and more experienced that the Cardinals in the middle, the Titan center platoon was not the primary reason for their victory last night in Naperville. If the Cards shoot just 4 of 13 on 3 pointers, Wesleyan loses.

The Cardinal game plan foresaw Doug Sexauer getting about the number of points he garnered. The hope was that he would have to take a few more shots to do so. Also, Ryan Connolly, who I think has an impressively nice touch around the basket to go with his size, was also virtually unstopable. However, Connolly, in scoring right at about his average, was also not part of one of the primary reasons for the Titan victory.
Rather, the 2 main reasons the Wesleyan 5 emerged victorious were.
1. Dan Schouten. While almost all the Titans besides Sexauer, again whose output was expected, scored at or below their averages, Schouten scored 5 points above his average, and 5 points was the difference in the game.
2. An off night shooting for the NCC guards. And, no, the poor shooting wasn't really due to superior defense, but rather a failure to either get, or try to get, to the basket, and just plain poor marksmanship.   

The much taller Titans collected only 3 more rebounds that their vertically challenged hosts, and the smaller, quicker Cardinals were able to force 17 TOs, including 5 by Sean Johnson who appeared quite frustrated in only being able to get off two 3 point shots, neither successfully. The Cardinals received superlative efforts from Derek Raridon, David Twyman, and Brian Evans, all 3 of whom had career high scoring games with 34, 24. and 16 points respectively. For Raridon. it was the 7th game in a row where he has scored more than 20 points. Evans, at only 6'3", going against the Wesleyan sequoias, also had a game high 8 rebounds. Again, these 3 unfortunately got little or no support.

   

[CCIWchamps]

The Wheaton team seemed pretty flat last night.  I wonder if part of that can be attributed to the fact their bus broke down on the way to Kenosha.  They had to wait almost  1 1/2 for another one to come.

I think part of it had to do with the Wheaton team wishing the second bus never came. the start of the game was postponed to account for their delayed arrival. I think Wheaton was just scared to play Carthage and their poor new coach was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play.

Steve---

I'm sure those were exactly the reasons for the Wheaton defeat last night.
And you know your ass from a hole in the ground too, don't you? 

I'm not up to the quota for giving out k yet, but I promise to give you a few for this post right here.  Hilarious, and so well deserved.

[AndOne]

The Wheaton team seemed pretty flat last night.  I wonder if part of that can be attributed to the fact their bus broke down on the way to Kenosha.  They had to wait almost  1 1/2 for another one to come.

I think part of it had to do with the Wheaton team wishing the second bus never came. the start of the game was postponed to account for their delayed arrival. I think Wheaton was just scared to play Carthage and their poor new coach was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play.

Steve---

I'm sure those were exactly the reasons for the Wheaton defeat last night.
And you know your ass from a hole in the ground too, don't you?  

Yep. That poor new coach for Wheaton was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play, in spite of the fact that he played in the CCIW for four years and served as an assistant coach in it for another seven.

Then again, Mark, the Kenosha newspaper says that "steve d is the man" is a savant and we're not, so maybe we should just take his word for it.

Yes, AND bow to his superior knowledge, especially relative to basketball.
I can barely wait to meet the little soothsayer. How exciting.   

[AndOne]

The Wheaton team seemed pretty flat last night.  I wonder if part of that can be attributed to the fact their bus broke down on the way to Kenosha.  They had to wait almost  1 1/2 for another one to come.

I think part of it had to do with the Wheaton team wishing the second bus never came. the start of the game was postponed to account for their delayed arrival. I think Wheaton was just scared to play Carthage and their poor new coach was having difficulty adjusting to CCIW league play.

Steve---

I'm sure those were exactly the reasons for the Wheaton defeat last night.
And you know your ass from a hole in the ground too, don't you? 

I'm not up to the quota for giving out k yet, but I promise to give you a few for this post right here.  Hilarious, and so well deserved.

Thank you Mr. Champs. Much appreciated.
And in the spirit of reciprocity, I'm glad to return the favor now.

[Titan Q]

Somehow I doubt the 25th ranked team in the country anticipated winning by only a 5 point margin over the team picked to finish 7th in conference.    

I can't speak for what fans or others around the league anticipated, but I can tell you that those associated with the IWU team were just hoping to go on the road and grind out any kind of win possible.  Margin of victory was not, and will not be at any point this season, a concern for a team that struggled through a 5-9 season last year.  Believe me.

That said, on NCC's floor...

* IWU led the final 34 minutes of the game
* IWU's average lead was 8 points
* In the final 13 minutes of the game, NCC never had the ball and a chance to tie the game with a 3
* IWU seemed to counter every NCC score down the stretch that cut the lead to 5 or 6 with points

Running score here - http://www.iwusports.com/custompages/MBB/MBB2010/HTML/mbk12.htm


Whatever a "5-point win" means or does not mean, it sure seemed to me that IWU controlled the game.  That's good enough for me.

[sac]

I would venture to guess Wittenberg holds more wins over what are now D1 programs than any other D3 school.

That would be a fun record to have - wins by current D3 teams over current D1 teams.  Per IWU's media guide, here is a list of wins over current D1's:

Arizona – 1
Bradley – 35
Butler – 1
Centenary – 3
Chicago St – 4
Eastern Ill – 15
Evansville – 1
Hawaii – 1
Illinois State – 69
Iona – 3
Iowa – 1
Louisiana Tech – 1
Louisville – 1
Loyola (Chi) – 3
Marquette – 1
Ole Miss – 1
Northern Ill – 17
South Carolina – 1
SE Louisiana – 3
Southern Illinois -4
Southern Miss – 2
Texas Tech – 1
Valparaiso – 3
Western Ill – 4

Total = 176

http://issuu.com/iwusports/docs/mensbasketball?mode=embed&layout=http%3A%2F%2Fskin.issuu.com%2Fv%2Flight%2Flayout.xml&showFlipBtn=true
(Series Records vs Opponents section - 3rd page from the back)

(Although it says, "select Division I foes", so I don't know if all the wins are there.)


I have no idea where that 176 total would rank vs other current D3's.

I counted 186 wins for Wittenberg, but need to verify a couple of opponents as the correct D1 schools such as Georgetown, St. Joseph's, St. Mary's and a few others.

I counted 51 different programs.

[Titan Q]

Is Augie freshman Luke Scarlata injured?  I recently heard he was out for the season, but I have no idea how credible the info is.

[Titan Q]

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=349101&src=289

"The Sexauer kid killed us inside," Derek Raridon said. "He was much more physical than us, and we had a really tough time trying to stop him. It was frustrating because we knew what he was doing every time, but he still scored on us."


Can a freshman call a junior "kid"?  What's the protocol there?

[Gregory Sager]

Is Augie freshman Luke Scarlata injured?  I recently heard he was out for the season, but I have no idea how credible the info is.

Can't tell from the box scores, because he's gradually been phased out of the rotation:

date	opponent	minutes
11/16	Simpson	12
11/18	Beloit	17
11/21	MacMurray	11
11/28	Anderson	15
11/30	Knox	12
12/9	Gonzaga	7
12/12	Washington (MO)	DNP
12/16	Chicago	4
12/20	Monmouth	DNP
12/22	UW-Whitewater	5
1/2	Buena Vista	DNP
1/6	North Park	DNP

Can a freshman call a junior "kid"?  What's the protocol there?

When you're averaging over 21 ppg, you get to create your own protocol.

[Titan Q]

Updated Massey Ratings through Wednesday...

#20 Carthage
#22 Illinois Wesleyan
#43 Augustana
#46 Wheaton
#96 North Central
#123 Elmhurst
#194 Millikin
#221 North Park

http://www.masseyratings.com/rate.php?lg=cb

Tomorrow:

#20 Carthage @ #22 IWU
#43 Augustana @ #123 Elmhurst
#96 North Central @ #46 Wheaton
#194 Millikin @ #221 North Park

[usee]

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=349101&src=289

"The Sexauer kid killed us inside," Derek Raridon said. "He was much more physical than us, and we had a really tough time trying to stop him. It was frustrating because we knew what he was doing every time, but he still scored on us."


Can a freshman call a junior "kid"?  What's the protocol there?

Sounds like synthetic Dad.

[dansand]

Is Augie freshman Luke Scarlata injured?  I recently heard he was out for the season, but I have no idea how credible the info is.

Stress fracture in his foot. 4-6 weeks.