MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Mr. Ypsi]

Augie held on to beat Carthage, 65-58.  Carthage got within 3 in the final minute, but had to resort to fouling and Augie made ALL of their late-game FTs.

[titanfan]

IWU  80
Elmhurst 68

Titans had 6 in double figures (Nelson, Sodemann, Overstreet, Mayberger, Davis, Ziemnik)

[iwu70]

IWU over EC, 80-68. 

Titans scoring, 15, 13, 12, 12, 10 and 10.

Mayberger with 15 and a strong overall game.

Titans shoot 51%, make 9 treys, but shoot FTs poorly, 13-24.

Wuest 19 for EC.

Keep going Titans, keep grinding out the winds, now 18-3, 8-2.

IWU70

[USee]

Wheaton 73
Millikin 48
final

[iwu70]

Overstreet 10 points, 11 assists - double double.

IWU now 18-3, 8-2.


'70

[Titan Q]

IWU 80
Elmhurst 68

http://www.cciw.org/custompages/CCIW_Links/MBasketball/Stats/1314/14iwum21.htm

http://www.pantagraph.com/sports/college/basketball/men/overstreet-mayberger-spark-titans-past-elmhurst/article_dbff993e-84ae-549a-a2ed-2727ea9399f2.html

* Dylan Overstreet: 10 pts, 7 reb, 11 assists
* Mike Mayberger: 15 pts, 4 reb
* Andrew Ziemnik: 13 pts, 7 reb, 4 assists
* Victor Davis: 12 pts, 5 reb
* Jordan Nelson: 12 pts
* Pat Sodemann: 10 pts, 4 reb

* Kyle Wuest: 19 pts, 3 reb
* Taylor Baxter: 14 pts, 4 reb
* Will Nixon: 12 pts, 4 reb


Great crowd at the Shirk Center last night (listed at 2450) for IWU's annual Pink Zone Game - like the women, the men sported some sweet pink unis - http://www.pantagraph.com/gallery/sports/photos-elmhurst-at-illinois-wesleyan-men-s-basketball/collection_f34a49a2-913c-11e3-aaae-0019bb2963f4.html#0.

Tied at 17 with 7:11 to play in the 1st half, the Titans went on a 16-0 run over the next 3:07 that put IWU in control the rest of the way.  Elmhurst had it down to 12 in the final seconds of the half, but Jordan Nelson made a 35-foot 3-pointer at the 1st half buzzer to push the IWU lead back up to 15.

The Titans led by 22 with 12:19 to play in the game, but the Bluejays continued to play very hard to got the deficit all the way down to 8 with 7:25 to play.  The officials turned the game into a foul fest during the 2nd half, which made for bad watching.  IWU settled down and closed it out from there.

A few thoughts...

* IWU has a really good PG in junior Dylan Overstreet (a CCIW 1st Teamer last year).  He's a very good floor general and really does a great job running IWU's offense, but he can also score by hitting the 3, dribble penetration, or posting up a smaller defender.

* Mike Mayberger, who is now a starter, is a very solid and smart player.  Mayberger has no flashiness to his game whatsoever, he just gets the job done.  IWU's new starting lineup, featuring Mayberger, is very dangerous offensively...the Titans start 5 guys who are all very good shooters.

* Ron Rose's rotation is getting tighter here in the stretch.  Last night he played 9 (not 10 or 11), with 6 getting the bulk of the minutes - Overstreet (30), Ziemnik (30), Davis (30), Sodemann (28), Mayberger (25), and Nelson (25).  Those 6 are clearly IWU's nucleus - as a fan, those are definitely the 6 I want in the mix down the stretch in big games. Bryce Dolan does a very good job backing up the point, and 6-8 Mike Marietti and versatile forward Eric Dortch provide nice minutes in the post.

* In CCIW play, the Titans lead the league in points per game (79.9), are second in FG% (.482), and 1st in FG% defense (.412).  IWU is a good team on both ends of the floor.

* Elmhurst has a ton of good, young talent - the Bluejays have a very bright future.

[Titan Q]

I watched most of the Carthage/Augustana 2nd half.  Augie did a nice job making the plays needed to win a big road game.  The Vikings punished Carthage on the boards, out-rebounding the Red Men by 19.  It's just really hard to win a basketball game when you get dominated on the boards to that degree. 

I have watched a lot of Carthage games this year, and from half to half I just never know what I'm going to see from the Red Men.  They are a really hard team to figure out.

[carthage guy]

Carthage lives and dies with how they shoot... They lead the league in fg% yet they are a jumpshooting team. When u make shots it covers a lot of weaknesses. Malcom and marlon at one point after Iwu game were both over 50% from field and 3pt line. The last few games I believe they were under 40%. Big swing. Hence scores in the 50s not 70s. Carthage ideally needs to score in the 70s when there good.

[bopol]

Carthage got killed on the defensive boards last night, too.  That was the deal breaker.  Way too many second chance points for Augie.  Very good job by the Augie big men.

[Gregory Sager]

North Central 83
North Park 62

Juwan Henry: 20 pts, 4:2 a:to
Garrett Gatz: 10 pts

Vince Kmiec: 21 pts, 7 rebs
Landon Gamble: 20 pts, 8 rebs
Tyler Sutton: 13 pts
Jack Burchett: 10 pts, 8 rebs, 5:3 a:to

This game was the far side of ugly. Not so much because of North Central's slowdown style, but because of the way things got out of hand, especially at the end, of a game that was officiated so poorly that there was even an apology at the end of it from one of the refs -- I won't say which -- to NPU coach Tom Slyder.

I realize that most basketball fans don't like to watch the type of plodding, clock-eating offense that North Central plays this season, but give credit to NCC coach Todd Raridon. He knows that his team is offensively challenged but has strength underneath the basket, and his strategy gives his team the best chance it has to win with the material he has available.

And he certainly has more material with which to work than does Tom Slyder, that's for sure. The mismatch down low between Landon Gamble and Jack Burchett on one side and the NPU bigs on the other was obvious, and the Cardinals made hay with it. Most of the night consisted of about twenty seconds of routine movement around the perimeter by NCC, followed by a post entry pass that almost inevitably led to a layup. One aspect of why they're so effective is that they're very physical, which led to a lot of the Vikings' frustration that boiled over late in the game. Gamble in particular got away with a lot of hooks, shoves, and arm-bars that I'm not sure he really needed -- whenever he simply went through one of his various moves in the low post without using his off arm for leverage, he got to the basket just as easily.

The other thing that NPU doesn't have is Vince Kmiec. He's a very streaky shooter, but he always seems to be in "on" mode against NPU from the perimeter. He also did a tremendous defensive job (although he had some help) on Aaron Weaver, who was essentially shut down for the night; Weaver only had seven points on four FG attempts, and he didn't get to the line very often. It was an exasperating night of inactivity for Weaver, coming as it did on the heels of his 35 and 15 performance against Elmhurst.

Juwan Henry carried the Vikings all night, but he paid the price for doing it. Whenever he drove the lane he was met with a solid and physical response from the Cardinals' interior defenders. That's not a North Central thing, though; that's a CCIW thing. This is a very physical league, and if you're a scorer who makes his bread and butter out of driving the lane, you have to expect to be dealt a lot of bruises for your efforts. The problem is that Henry continues to let it get to him emotionally, and last night he simply blew up at the end of the game. With six seconds left on the clock in a game that was already decided, he got shoved from the side by David Robinson as Henry was successfully laying in a putback shot -- it's at 1:48:11 of the game video -- and he slammed the ball down in frustration after it went through the basket. He was immediately T'ed up for a delay-of-game technical, and then he made things worse by exchanging words with a North Central JV player who is even smaller than he is and then engaging in shoves with said Cardinal that led to a second tech for Henry and, thus, an automatic ejection that will force him to miss Wednesday's game against Wheaton, as per NCAA-mandated rules.

The first T could perhaps be written off as a meaningless bout of frustration over a no-call at the end of a game already lost, but the second T was just not smart at all by Henry. NPU had only the slimmest of chances to pull off an upset this coming Wednesday, and now it'll be a matter of Mike Schauer naming whatever final score he likes, as a Henry-less Vikings team is a lost cause before it even takes the floor. Juwan Henry, for all his talent, needs to learn how to govern his temper. Every team in the league now thinks that it can get into his head, and when even JV-level opponents are setting him off, it's obvious that his emotions are his worst enemy. The hope of the NPU coaching staff is that the one-game suspension will have a silver lining in terms of anger management for Juwan Henry. It may make him realize how much he not only hurts himself but his team by not keeping his cool. He's North Park's best player and leading scorer, and he's far too important to the team for him to keep doing this. It's not about the hits in the lane and all the yapping that's being directed at him; it's about his learning how to deal with it properly.

To cap it all off, there was a bench technical assessed to NPU because a balloon popped while NCC"s Tyler Sutton was shooting the first tech FT. (It was Breast Cancer Awareness Night at NPU, so there were lots of pink balloons strewn around the crackerbox.) I've seen more college basketball games over the years than I care to count, and that's the first balloon technical that I've ever seen. The fact that it was assessed with six seconds remaining in a game that had a 20-point margin made it even more farcical.

It was a fun afternoon at the crackerbox, as the NPU women came back from an 18-point deficit to beat North Central, but the evening left a little something to be desired.

[Gregory Sager]

I have watched a lot of Carthage games this year, and from half to half I just never know what I'm going to see from the Red Men.  They are a really hard team to figure out.

It's almost as though they're a character from, oh, I don't know, a Robert Louis Stevenson novella or something.

[sac]

To cap it all off, there was a bench technical assessed to NPU because a balloon popped while NCC"s Tyler Sutton was shooting the first tech FT. (It was Breast Cancer Awareness Night at NPU, so there were lots of pink balloons strewn around the crackerbox.) I've seen more college basketball games over the years than I care to count, and that's the first balloon technical that I've ever seen. The fact that it was assessed with six seconds remaining in a game that had a 20-point margin made it even more farcical.

This paragraph made reading all of that worth it.

[Titan Q]

I believe the first regional rankings come out this week.  Here is how the Midwest Region could look...

(Records are for games vs D3 only through Sun 2/9)

Midwest Region Projection
1. Illinois Wesleyan (CCIW), 18-3 (.857)
2. Washington U. (UAA), 18-2 (.900)
3. St. Norbert (MWC), 17-1 (.944)
4. Rose-Hulman (HCAC), 17-4 (.810)
5. Wheaton (CCIW), 16-6 (.727)
6. Augustana (CCIW), 16-6 (.727)
7. Defiance (HCAC), 16-4 (.800)
8. Milwaukee Engineering (NACC), 18-4 (.818)
---------------
9. Hanover, (HCAC) 14-7 (.667)
10. Grinnell (MWC), 14-4 (.778)
11. Marian (NACC), 15-6 (.714)
12. Lakeland (NACC), 15-5 (.750)
13. Elmhurst (CCIW), 13-7 (.650)
14. Carthage (CCIW), 13-7 (.650)
15. MacMurray (SLIAC), 14-3 (.824)

[AppletonRocks]

North Central 83
North Park 62

Juwan Henry: 20 pts, 4:2 a:to
Garrett Gatz: 10 pts

Vince Kmiec: 21 pts, 7 rebs
Landon Gamble: 20 pts, 8 rebs
Tyler Sutton: 13 pts
Jack Burchett: 10 pts, 8 rebs, 5:3 a:to

This game was the far side of ugly. Not so much because of North Central's slowdown style, but because of the way things got out of hand, especially at the end, of a game that was officiated so poorly that there was even an apology at the end of it from one of the refs -- I won't say which -- to NPU coach Tom Slyder.

I realize that most basketball fans don't like to watch the type of plodding, clock-eating offense that North Central plays this season, but give credit to NCC coach Todd Raridon. He knows that his team is offensively challenged but has strength underneath the basket, and his strategy gives his team the best chance it has to win with the material he has available.

And he certainly has more material with which to work than does Tom Slyder, that's for sure. The mismatch down low between Landon Gamble and Jack Burchett on one side and the NPU bigs on the other was obvious, and the Cardinals made hay with it. Most of the night consisted of about twenty seconds of routine movement around the perimeter by NCC, followed by a post entry pass that almost inevitably led to a layup. One aspect of why they're so effective is that they're very physical, which led to a lot of the Vikings' frustration that boiled over late in the game. Gamble in particular got away with a lot of hooks, shoves, and arm-bars that I'm not sure he really needed -- whenever he simply went through one of his various moves in the low post without using his off arm for leverage, he got to the basket just as easily.

The other thing that NPU doesn't have is Vince Kmiec. He's a very streaky shooter, but he always seems to be in "on" mode against NPU from the perimeter. He also did a tremendous defensive job (although he had some help) on Aaron Weaver, who was essentially shut down for the night; Weaver only had seven points on four FG attempts, and he didn't get to the line very often. It was an exasperating night of inactivity for Weaver, coming as it did on the heels of his 35 and 15 performance against Elmhurst.

Juwan Henry carried the Vikings all night, but he paid the price for doing it. Whenever he drove the lane he was met with a solid and physical response from the Cardinals' interior defenders. That's not a North Central thing, though; that's a CCIW thing. This is a very physical league, and if you're a scorer who makes his bread and butter out of driving the lane, you have to expect to be dealt a lot of bruises for your efforts. The problem is that Henry continues to let it get to him emotionally, and last night he simply blew up at the end of the game. With six seconds left on the clock in a game that was already decided, he got shoved from the side by David Robinson as Henry was successfully laying in a putback shot -- it's at 1:48:11 of the game video -- and he slammed the ball down in frustration after it went through the basket. He was immediately T'ed up for a delay-of-game technical, and then he made things worse by exchanging words with a North Central JV player who is even smaller than he is and then engaging in shoves with said Cardinal that led to a second tech for Henry and, thus, an automatic ejection that will force him to miss Wednesday's game against Wheaton, as per NCAA-mandated rules.

The first T could perhaps be written off as a meaningless bout of frustration over a no-call at the end of a game already lost, but the second T was just not smart at all by Henry. NPU had only the slimmest of chances to pull off an upset this coming Wednesday, and now it'll be a matter of Mike Schauer naming whatever final score he likes, as a Henry-less Vikings team is a lost cause before it even takes the floor. Juwan Henry, for all his talent, needs to learn how to govern his temper. Every team in the league now thinks that it can get into his head, and when even JV-level opponents are setting him off, it's obvious that his emotions are his worst enemy. The hope of the NPU coaching staff is that the one-game suspension will have a silver lining in terms of anger management for Juwan Henry. It may make him realize how much he not only hurts himself but his team by not keeping his cool. He's North Park's best player and leading scorer, and he's far too important to the team for him to keep doing this. It's not about the hits in the lane and all the yapping that's being directed at him; it's about his learning how to deal with it properly.

83 points for a slow plodder.  Whodathunkit.   More "Marcus Smart" going on last night than I thought.

[bopol]

I believe the first regional rankings come out this week.  Here is how the Midwest Region could look...

(Records are for games vs D3 only through Sun 2/9)

Midwest Region Projection
1. Illinois Wesleyan (CCIW), 18-3 (.857)
2. Washington U. (UAA), 18-2 (.900)
3. St. Norbert (MWC), 17-1 (.944)
4. Rose-Hulman (HCAC), 17-4 (.810)
5. Wheaton (CCIW), 16-6 (.727)
6. Augustana (CCIW), 16-6 (.727)
7. Defiance (HCAC), 16-4 (.800)
8. Milwaukee Engineering (NACC), 18-4 (.818)
---------------
9. Hanover, (HCAC) 14-7 (.667)
10. Grinnell (MWC), 14-4 (.778)
11. Marian (NACC), 15-6 (.714)
12. Lakeland (NACC), 15-5 (.750)
13. Elmhurst (CCIW), 13-7 (.650)
14. Carthage (CCIW), 13-7 (.650)
15. MacMurray (SLIAC), 14-3 (.824)

Cathage will be 12-6 (Sliver Lake win and Carthage loss won't be on here).

St. Norbert will be high, but I think the 4 CCIW teams have a much better SOS (maybe enough) to take 4 of the first 6.  Rose-Hulman, Defiance and Milwaukee SOE don't have wins against ranked teams. 

EDIT: I still think Carthage will be ranked.  They have a lot of wins against top teams.