MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Mr. Ypsi]

Now that the All-CCIW awards have been announced, I wanted to clarify to Greg why I dismissed Juwan Henry's chances at this year's MOP honor (personally, I would have voted for him, but they didn't ask me ).  As far as I can tell without undue research (they don't list class year on the CCIW site), only four sophomores (Jack Sikma [1975], Michael Harper[1978], Keelan Amelianovich [2004], and Kent Raymond [2007] have ever won the award.  The first three were all on title-winning teams; Kent Raymond's team only finished third, but, hey, he was Kent Raymond.  Steve Djurickovic won the scoring title all four years of his career, but his first two the team did not finish very high (plus those were Kent Raymond's junior and senior years); he had to wait 'til his junior year for MOP.  Jesse Price probably would have won it as a sophomore (perhaps even as a freshman) except for the technicality that the award didn't exist until his junior year!  For these reasons I fully expected the race to come down to Jr. Hunter Hill of 1st place Augie or Sr. Dylan Overstreet of 2nd place IWU (though I was as surprised as anyone that it ended in a tie).

I remain convinced that Juwan is the preseason front-runner for both of the next two years.

[Gregory Sager]

Since North Park's season is done, I think it's time for me to summarize my thoughts about the 2014-15 Vikings and then step aside to let the discourse about the CCIW tourney begin.

This was a very special year for North Park basketball. On the face of it, the season really doesn't seem very special at all. A 15-10 overall record is nice, but it's not earth-shaking. No D3 program that has any aspirations of big-time success should ever be satisfied with 15-10. And a 6-8 league record is nothing more than mediocre. So anyone looking at NPU's season in the abstract isn't likely to be impressed by it.

But seasons don't simply exist by themselves. They exist within the larger context of the program. And North Park's men's basketball program was seriously broken. It lost its footing 21 years ago when Bosko Djurickovic was let go, fell down completely under Keith Peterson, and never really regained its footing under Rees Johnson. For all his good qualities, Paul Brenegan couldn't keep North Park basketball from sliding even further backwards, and the one-year interregnum of Dylan Howard only served to give the impression that the program was floundering. Tom Slyder inherited a mess: Two good players in Mark Holmes and Mike Gabriel and not much else, and Gabriel went down to a season-ending injury a couple of days into Tom's first preseason as NPU's coach. Needless to say, his first two seasons at Foster & Kedzie were more of the same-old, same-old, as Tom and his staff struggled to get a feel for the league and for the school and tried to figure out what it was going to take to turn things around.

Which brings us back to this year, which I don't really consider to be a turnaround at all. I consider it to be the start of a turnaround. Earlier today, I posted that I felt as though last night's loss was the end of chapter one. NPU reached the point this year in which the rest of the CCIW finally had to take the Vikings seriously, for the first time since the likewise-mediocre '09-'10 team of Nick Williams, Ro Russell, and Emanuel Crosby. Beating everybody in the league except Elmhurst, including three ranked teams, earned that kind of respect. But there's a difference between being taken seriously and being an actual contender -- and North Park's not at that latter point yet. So I'm not posting about a finished product. There's still a ways to go.

But the raw material -- or most of it -- is there. NPU has an absolutely electrifying player who deserves All-American consideration in sophomore Juwan Henry, and another very solid 5'10 sophomore in T.J. Cobbs who is equal parts talent and tenacity. Jordan Robinson is one of the most talented freshmen that this league has seen in a while, and his fellow plebe Colin Lake is a heady, dynamic player who did a lot of great things this year while facing the difficulty of revamping his high-school game. Those four underclassmen are a very solid core, and they all still have plenty of upside. Other guys who filled in around the edges, in particular blue-collar forward Michael Hutchinson, contributed their fair share as well, but it was those four guys who opened some eyes in November and December with that 9-2 non-conference start, and then opened some more after the Vikings picked themselves up off the mat following their 0-6 CCIW start by winning six of their last eight games.

Their handicaps -- youth, lack of size, lack of CCIW-level depth -- were pretty apparent. But they played with surprising poise, great energy, and a lot of heart. After awhile, instead of moaning that Corey Griffin was out for the year with an injury and Mike Gabriel was over in the library (or wherever he's spent his last winter as a North Park undergraduate), I just learned to accept the team for what it was, and I grew to appreciate it. They don't really pass the eye test in the layup line, but when the opening jump gets tossed up they really earn your admiration.

This winter's been great fun for me, thanks to these guys, and it feels like it's only the beginning of something really special. So I want to thank each and every member of the 2014-15 Vikings for bringing me along on a great ride.

With all due respect Greg, I think this post was the end of Chapter 1. Your earlier scribe was just the Forward. 

It's Foreword, not "forward," but ... fair enough. Point taken, Mark.

With regard to Juwan Henry winning POY---I don't know if he is the POY, but to me, he is the MAP. By that, I mean he is the most amazing player I think I saw this year. I say that because he was the player who seemed to be able to do things that I was surprised he was able to do more often than any other player (I hope that is clear enough). The facet of his game I was most impressed with was his ability to score inside as opposed to solely replying on outside shooting.

If he doesn't win, I think there are other very viable candidates besides the player who seems to have drawn the most ink on these pages to date.

Brandon Heyen?

[AppletonRocks]

I think I need to go to the UW Badgers and WIAC boards and warn the business owners that all their CCIW employees must have an awful lot of time to post on the boards this week.      

[Gregory Sager]

After the NPU time out, David Fuller and Brandon White took up the attack. David hit a big 3, and continually drove the lane drawing fouls, and Brandon slithered inside to score a couple of short jumpers and 3 FTs. Both Fuller and White had their best games of the year, each scoring 11 points. Their alternating defensive coverage of Juwan Henry during most of the 2nd half, was largely responsible for Henry's scoring only 4 of his 37 points over the last 12 minutes of the contest.

I don't agree. What held back Juwan's scoring late in the game were the facts that: a) he was passing the ball more; b) he picked up his fourth foul with 8:13 left (as poster NCC said, it wasn't a very good call); and c) he was visibly tiring.

In addition to POY, we will soon be regaled with the name of the Coach of the Year. Unless things have changed, I believe the CCIW basketball COY is automatically the coach of the conference winning team.

However, wouldn't it be nice if things did change? Specifically, if the basketball Coach of the Year was determined by a vote of the head coaches? This is the way the football COY is determined.

I don't think anyone's team exceeded expectations any more than NPU's Tom Slyder. Isn't this the standard by which the COY should be measured?

I agree with your specific point. NPU was picked to finish dead last by all seven opposing head coaches, and yet the Vikings just barely ended up missing the CCIW tournament field. A strong argument could be made based upon the difference between preseason prediction and final finish, as well as upon the dismal performance of the Vikings in the four preceding seasons, that Tom Slyder thus earned the COY award.

I agree with your general point as well. Regardless of which head coach ends up with the most impressive performance, COY really should be determined by vote, rather than automatically handing it to the coach of the champion.

And I must add that Coach Slyder appears to be the newest challenger to Grey Giovanine's title as most animated coach. Last night he was truly a wild man with his gestures, yelling, and invasion of the playing court on several occasions. In voicing his disagreement with one particular call, he ventured at least 10 feet out on to the court and was absolutely vocally blasting two of the refs for close to a minute. It was a miracle he didn't draw a T. A performance worthy of Stomper Giovanine for sure. 

Yeah, Tom's pretty animated. But so is your buddy Todd Raridon, Mark. The "particular call" you mentioned was actually a non-call; it was the play in which Jordan Robinson got walloped in the family jewels, doubling him over in pain and taking him out of the game (fortunately, it didn't turn out to be a serious injury). No foul was called on NCC on the play. Tom did what any head coach worth his salt would've done: He confronted the officials in an attempt to protect his players. Raridon would've done the exact same thing if the positions were reversed.

[blue_jays]

2015 CCIW All-Conference Men's Basketball Team

2015 Fred Young Co-Most Outstanding Player
Hunter Hill - Augustana
Dylan Overstreet - Illinois Wesleyan

2015 CCIW Coach of the Year
Grey Giovanine - Augustana

2015 CCIW Co-Freshman of the Year
Jordan Robinson - North Park
TJ Sims - Millikin

FIRST TEAM            

Jack Burchett            North Central          F    Sr.    Mokena, Ill./Providence Catholic
Juwan Henry                North Park         G    So.    Chicago, Ill./Bogan
Hunter Hill*                   Augustana          G    Jr.    Byron, Ill./H.S.
Dylan Overstreet*        Ill Wesleyan            G    Sr.    Paxton, Ill./Paxton-Buckley-Loda 
Ben Ryan                      Augustana            F      Jr.    Washington, Ill./H.S. 
Kyle Wuest               Elmhurst                 G    Jr.    Edinburgh, Ind./H.S.

SECOND TEAM            

Donte Logan               Carthage            G    Sr.    Evanston, Ill./Niles West
Will Nixon                    Elmhurst            F/C    Jr.    Plainfield, Ill./South
Charles Rosenberg     North Central       F    Sr.    Palatine, Ill./Fremd
Jawan Straughter      Augustana         G    Jr.    Bolingbrook, Ill./Plainfield East
Brayden Teuscher      Wheaton            G    Sr.    Rockford, Ill./Christian

THIRD TEAM            

Bryant Ackerman          Elmhurst            G    Jr.    Loogootee, Ind./H.S.
Tayvian Johnson          Augustana           F    Jr.    East Moline, Ill./United
Jordan Nelson                  Ill Wesleyan    G    Sr.    Lincoln, Ill./H.S.
Jordan Robinson          North Park           F    Fr.    Schaumburg, Ill./Hoffman Estates
TJ Sims                          Millikin             G    Fr.    Bloomington, Ill./H.S.

* Unanimous Selection

Gotta say, I don't agree with the winning teams just getting all the spoils. I prefer that talent win out regardless of a team's record. After all, a player can't play all 5 positions. Juwan Henry looked like the best player in the league, therefore he should have received POY. Similarly, Brayden Teuscher is definitely a First Team talent and should have been on there.

[Gregory Sager]

With all the talk about POY consideration ... a question to those who have been following the CCIW for much longer then I. When is the last time a POY has been awarded to a team that did not finish in the top 4 (i.e. make the conference playoffs post 2006).

First of all, it's not the Player of the Year award. It's the Most Outstanding Player award. I don't think that it's nitpicking to point that out, because I think that the words "Most Outstanding Player" imply something different than either "Player of the Year" or "Most Valuable Player."

This is an argument that one often finds in baseball chat rooms, so I'll just briefly rehash it here. Since the object of the game of basketball is to win, value is thus a function derived from a team's performance with regard to wins and losses. That's not to say that the efforts of, say, T.J. Sims and Brayden Teuscher were completely without value, but their respective value as players is markedly lessened by the fact that they were unable to sufficiently bring about positive outcomes on the scoreboard for Millikin and Wheaton in CCIW play. The same can be said (to a lesser degree) of Juwan Henry, since NPU didn't win enough games to make the CCIW tourney.

It can thus be extrapolated from the words "Most Valuable Player" that there should be a direct connection between the award and win-loss record. The more a team wins, the more the value of that team's players goes up. Thus, even a player who is posting modest statistics -- and I think that we can all agree that Hunter Hill and Dylan Overstreet posted more modest statistics in CCIW play than did Juwan Henry -- gains value simply by being a part of a team that had more wins, and the value increases both as the player contributes more and more on the floor and as the team moves up in the standings.

"Most Outstanding Player," however, implies something completely different. As I posted in response to GoPerry the other day, "outstanding" is simply an alternate way of saying that a player stands out; i.e., his performance as an individual is higher than that of his league peers. Given that, Juwan Henry's a pretty clear choice for the MOP, if the words "Most Outstanding Player" are taken at face value.

However, the coaches don't agree. In essence, they choose to consider the name of the MOP award to be a misnomer; they actually see it as a Most Valuable Player award, and vote that way accordingly. That's their right, of course, but it's really false advertising. Either change the name of the award, or change the way that you vote for it.

("Player of the Year" is kind of a catch-all title. It doesn't really imply anything, one way or the other, in the way that "Most Valuable Player" and "Most Outstanding Player" do.)

Getting back to your question: As far as the last MOP winner coming from a team that didn't finish in the top four is concerned, Steve Djurickovic of Carthage won the MOP in his senior year, 2010-11. Carthage finished in a three-way tie for fourth that season, but lost out on the tiebreakers and thus didn't qualify for the CCIW tournament. Prior to that, you have to go back to 1991-92 when Alonzo Alexander of North Central won the MOP, in a season in which his Cardinals finished in a tie for fifth, two games out of fourth place, to find an MOP winner who didn't play for a top-four team.

The evidence is pretty strong, based upon historical precedent, that the coaches disregard the idea of an MOP award and actually consider it to be an MVP award. I was hoping that they would reverse that trend this year, but my hope was obviously in vain.

I'm not saying that Mr. Henry does not deserve to be named Player of the Year ... however, I think there is something to be said for winning. I know that each year is different... but my contention (without doing the research) would be that should Mr. Henry be named POY --- it would be an anomaly (not that he wouldn't deserve it).

I think that winning is one of the factors that goes into coaches minds when they vote.

I agree, alas. As I said, the trophies that CCIW commish Chris Martin will hand to Hunter Hill and Dylan Overstreet will say "Most Outstanding Player" on them ... but the coaches who voted on those awards were actually voting for a different kind of award altogether.

Also, anyone else extremely confused with the All-CCIW teams?
Straughter and Nixon on second team? huh...?

To the victors go the spoils, which is a whole 'nother argument. I can see the necessity of placing a third Augustana player on the team, and I know that that's not always an easy project, given the fact that Grey Giovanine plays so many players that it's sometimes hard to find that third standout player. Elmhurst had a similiar situation this season. And the coaches seem to abide by a formula in which they have to apportion as many spots on the top two teams to as many players from the top three teams as they can, regardless of actual merit. That's why Jawon Straughter (who is easily the most questionable member of an All-CCIW second team that I've seen in a long time; it's not that he isn't useful, I just don't seem him as being All-CCIW second-team material at all) and Will Nixon made the second team, IMHO. (Personally, I would've gone with Erik Crittenden over Will Nixon as the third EC rep besides Kyle Wuest and Bryant Ackerman.)

I don't think that Straughter should've been on the team at all. Augie should've had three reps, not four. The anomaly here is that Illinois Wesleyan, which finished second, only had two players named to the team. That seems to fly in the face of the coaches' formula.

What I want to know is this: Which CCIW head coach did not vote for Juwan Henry for the first team? Hill and Overstreet were the only unanimous first-team selections.

No Jamie Moten- he's not one of the 16 best in the league?  That's a surprise to me.  But then that would be 3 from NCC so that probably worked against him.  4 Augie, 3 Elmhurst, 2 IWU/NPU/NCC . . . 

Predictably, I would have liked to have seen Brayden Teuscher on the First Team and feel like he deserved to be.  But then again, I understand how the votes fell and I'm hard pressed to single out who of the six he should have replaced.

I agree about Moten.  Perhaps his injury impacted this?

Moten missed three CCIW games. I've seen players make the All-CCIW team who've missed as many as four (in a 14-game sked) or five (in a 16-game sked). But, yeah, I'm guessing that the missed games played at least some kind of role in keeping Moten off of the All-CCIW team.

And I think you would have a pretty strong argument to support Teuscher as one of the top five or six players in the conference.  I can only assume the Thunder's dismal win/loss record took him out of contention.

I agree, unfortunately. The win-loss formula employed by the coaches worked to Teuscher's detriment. We can debate all day about whether individual awards should be impacted by team performance ... but I think that you can make a very strong argument that, in terms of individual ability and performance, Teuscher's better than a mere second-teamer. If I had a vote -- and today I'm painfully aware that I don't -- Brayden Teuscher would've been on my first-team ballot.

Congrats to all who made the list, it is a joy to watch you compete!

Absolutely. Special congrats to NPU's dynamic duo: Juwan Henry, who is the first Viking in 19 seasons to make the All-CCIW first team and the first Viking in 29 years to make the All-CCIW first team as a sophomore; and Co-FOY and third-teamer Jordan Robinson.

Now that the All-CCIW awards have been announced, I wanted to clarify to Greg why I dismissed Juwan Henry's chances at this year's MOP honor (personally, I would have voted for him, but they didn't ask me ).  As far as I can tell without undue research (they don't list class year on the CCIW site), only four sophomores (Jack Sikma [1975], Michael Harper[1978], Keelan Amelianovich [2004], and Kent Raymond [2007] have ever won the award.

There have been five. You forgot Jason Wiertel (1999-00).

The first three were all on title-winning teams; Kent Raymond's team only finished third, but, hey, he was Kent Raymond.  Steve Djurickovic won the scoring title all four years of his career, but his first two the team did not finish very high (plus those were Kent Raymond's junior and senior years); he had to wait 'til his junior year for MOP.  Jesse Price probably would have won it as a sophomore (perhaps even as a freshman) except for the technicality that the award didn't exist until his junior year!  For these reasons I fully expected the race to come down to Jr. Hunter Hill of 1st place Augie or Sr. Dylan Overstreet of 2nd place IWU (though I was as surprised as anyone that it ended in a tie).

Yes, as I posted above, the coaches treat it as if it's an MVP award rather than an MOP award. I held out hope that this year would be different, but I was wrong.

The other factor, Henry's sophomore status, is pertinent, too, as you pointed out -- and as I pointed out on Sunday as well. The coaches are reluctant to give the award to a player who isn't on a top-four team and who isn't an upperclassman.

I remain convinced that Juwan is the preseason front-runner for both of the next two years.

I don't care one bit about next year's awards.

[Titan Q]

I'm happy to see Dylan Overstreet get recognized by the CCIW coaches with the co-Most Outstanding Player nod.  In Overstreet's case, stats tell some of the story (and his stats as a PG are impressive), but certainly not the whole story.  He just does a lot of things from that point guard spot to help IWU win games that don't show up in a boxscore -- including being a tremendous leader and an absolutely fierce competitor.  I'm guessing the CCIW coaches took the "intangible" stuff in mind quite a bit when voting for him as M.O.P.

As IWU's starting point guard, Overstreet's CCIW record is 35-7 (.833).  He was clearly IWU's MVP this year, and a case can easily be made that he was the last two seasons as well. 

There will certainly always be fair debates about what "most outstanding" really means, but as I see it, being a tremendous point guard who does a bunch of things to make his teammates better and help a team win games is pretty outstanding.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Greg, apologies to Jason Wiertel.  Sikma, Harper, and Raymond were obvious, since they went on to win the following two years also, and Keelan, after all, was a Titan.  After a few years I have trouble recalling any non-Titan's school year!  (And sometimes sooner than that - all season I was thinking Hunter Hill was a senior. )

I understand your current sentiment that you don't care one bit about next year's awards.  Especially if a Titan has emerged as an MOP contender (Bryce Dolan? Trevor Seibring?), may I quote you on that about this time next year?!

[Gregory Sager]

Next year is next year, Chuck. The slate gets wiped clean.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Greg, I got a PM earlier this evening suggesting I look at the minutes per game of Henry, Hill, and Overstreet.  Juwan played 5 minutes more per game than Hill, and TEN more minutes than Overstreet.  If you recalculate the stats on a per minute basis, the gap is far less pronounced than it otherwise is.  Why?  Because Augie and IWU are both very good, deep teams who simply didn't NEED the numbers from Hill and Overstreet (except occasionally).  They could be rested with only a small decline in performance by their replacements.

In fact, I think a good case can be made that Juwan Henry might have been BETTER off if the coaches were thinking MVP rather than MOP.  Crazy?  Well think of Ernie Banks winning MVP on losing Cubs teams - how valuable could he have been if they still lost?  As one wit put it, yeah they finished below .500 with him, but without him they would have finished in Double A!  Take away Hill or Overstreet and I think the teams still would have made the tourney.  Take away Henry and the Vikings would have won, what, two conference games?

All three were outstanding in their own ways and in accord with the needs of their teams.  Dylan, for example, had BY FAR the best A/TO ratio in the conference - probably THE key stat for a classic PG.

[Gregory Sager]

Greg, I got a PM earlier this evening suggesting I look at the minutes per game of Henry, Hill, and Overstreet.  Juwan played 5 minutes more per game than Hill, and TEN more minutes than Overstreet.  If you recalculate the stats on a per minute basis, the gap is far less pronounced than it otherwise is.  Why?  Because Augie and IWU are both very good, deep teams who simply didn't NEED the numbers from Hill and Overstreet (except occasionally).  They could be rested with only a small decline in performance by their replacements.

And how, exactly, does that redound to the advantage of Hill and Overstreet in the matter of most outstanding player? First of all, recalculating stats based upon a per-minute basis is misleading and pointless. A big part of the game of basketball is physical attrition -- it's essentially what enabled North Central to pull away from North Park at the end of Saturday's game -- and per-minute recalculations disregard that. A player's performance needs to be considered in toto over the course of a game rather than on a per-minute basis, just as his performance needs to be considered in toto over the course of a season rather than over some selective portion of it. Second, your PM correspondent's thesis lends itself to a reductio ad absurdum argument. If you can find a 30 mpg player whose stats compare more favorably to a 35 mpg player when taken on a per-minute basis, then you can no doubt also find a 25 mpg player whose stats do even better on a per-minute basis ... and a 15 mpg player whose stats do even better than that when considered minute-by-minute ... and so on.

In fact, I think a good case can be made that Juwan Henry might have been BETTER off if the coaches were thinking MVP rather than MOP. Crazy? Well think of Ernie Banks winning MVP on losing Cubs teams - how valuable could he have been if they still lost? As one wit put it, yeah they finished below .500 with him, but without him they would have finished in Double A!

The argument advanced on behalf of Banks in '58 and '59 (and Andre Dawson in '87 as well) does not take into consideration the root meaning of the word "value" in a team sport, which relates to winning games. (No need to get into monetary value as a gate attraction, since this is D3 basketball. ) Where there is no winning, or precious little of it, value is reduced. I've heard that saying about the Cubs finishing in Double A without Banks; it's a hyperbolic jest that holds no real water, since the Cubs finished fifth out of eight NL teams in '58 and '59. It's more accurate when applied to Dawson's MVP season, since the Cubs finished dead last in the NL East in '87. Even so, it's a funny gibe that has no real point to it with regard to the value of winning. Dawson was only fifth among major-league RFs in VORP (value over replacement player) in 1987, showing just how little difference his absence would've made to a really bad team. Last place is last place.

I was a regular in the Wrigley RF bleachers in '87 and did a lot of salaaming in the Hawk's direction during that amazing season of his, and I argued vociferously on his behalf in '87 when the MVP discussion came up. Now, in retrospect, I see that he really shouldn't have won that award. Ozzie Smith, Jack Clark, or Eric Davis should've won it. Dawson was the NL's most outstanding player that year, not the most valuable.

Take away Hill or Overstreet and I think the teams still would have made the tourney. Take away Henry and the Vikings would have won, what, two conference games?

There's a baseline attached here by the coaches in terms of value with regard to W-L. We don't know exactly what it is, but we have every indication that the baseline is fairly high. At minimum, it's making the CCIW tourney, which every MOP has done since the tourney began in 2006, with the exception of Steve Djurickovic in '11 (and we all know that the rules didn't apply where Stevie D. was concerned, as he's on the short list of the greatest players in CCIW history). More accurately, the history of the MOP shows that it's strongly oriented towards being awarded to a player from a team that finishes in the top two. In six out of the eight seasons before this one in which the CCIW has held a tourney, the MOP was won by a player from either the first-place team or the second-place team. (Stevie D.'s '11 season was one exception; Kent Raymond's MOP in '07 for third-place Wheaton was the other.) If you go back through CCIW history prior to the creation of the postseason tourney, you'll find the same thing generally holds true.

In other words, in the eyes of the CCIW coaches, W-L value doesn't really accrue unless something highly notable is accomplished by the player's team with regard to the final standings. Alas, North Park didn't accomplish what was necessary in their eyes for Juwan Henry to accrue the requisite amount of W-L value for his efforts.

All three were outstanding in their own ways and in accord with the needs of their teams.  Dylan, for example, had BY FAR the best A/TO ratio in the conference - probably THE key stat for a classic PG.

As I said the other day, I respect Dylan Overstreet as much as the next guy who doesn't have a closet full of green-colored clothing. I simply do not think that he is the league's most outstanding player. Most valuable player? A case can be made for him for that, based upon the value of winning.

[kiko]

What I want to know is this: Which CCIW head coach did not vote for Juwan Henry for the first team? Hill and Overstreet were the only unanimous first-team selections.

This is exactly what jumped out at me when scanning the list.  It's a far bigger head-scratcher than whether so-and-so made which team IMO.

[Mr. Ypsi]

I think you are moving the goalposts a bit.  IF MVP means 'contributing to winning', I suggest that Henry was MVP (and probably Teuscher was second, but despite his heroics he just could get them across the line).  Augie and IWU were so deep and talented that I believe they would have won nearly as much if Hill and/or Overstreet had gone elsewhere (or decided to major in beer pong ).  NPU IMO won more games above a non-Henry level than any other team won above whoever their best player was.  But you seem to be reluctantly buying in to the coaches' (apparent) definition of MVP (or MOP) as having a floor.  I agree that that IS how the coaches seem to see it, which (along with being a sophomore) is why I predicted Henry would not win.

But MOP is even more subjective than MVP.  Players generally play according to the dictates of their coach and the needs of the team.  IF Augie or IWU had needed Henry-type stats from Hill or Overstreet, my hunch (we will never know, of course) is that they could and would have done it.  Don't insult my intelligence with the reductio ad absurdum argument: Henry played over 36 minutes a game because the Vikings desperately needed every blessed minute he could still move.  Hill and Overstreet were simply not needed that desperately.  That doesn't make them either less valuable or less outstanding; it means they had more high-quality teammates to take up playing time without hurting performance.

[veterancciwfan]

On Friday, if IWU resembles the team that last played at Carver Arena (on Jan. 21 in an 89-84 win), they might be playing again Saturday. In that Jan. game, IWU shot 58.3% FG, 61.5% on 3s and 78.1% FTs with 18 As vs. 9 TOs.

[veterancciwfan]

Sure would be great to see Fritz Larsen in Rock Island Friday. Just kidding Greg!