MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

https://athletics.wheaton.edu/sports/mens-basketball/roster

Three disappointing missing names from the Wheaton roster: Micah Schnyders, Jacob Schauer and Cole Reid

The loss of Schnyders will hurt the most, but it appears that he was able to get back to D1 with a spot on the Eastern Michigan roster.

He was considering North Park for awhile, but it appears as though getting back to D1 was his true desire. (Honestly, he'd be fighting just to get on the court at all for NPU this season.) Given that he didn't start last season at the D3 level and averaged less than four points per game and less than 15 minutes per game for Wheaton in 2022-23, I'm pretty sure that he's at EMU as a walk-on. Best of luck to him. I always root for the D3 guys who transfer to D1, because I figure that their success in D1 makes D3 look better in the eyes of the general basketball public. After all, that general public is pretty skeptical (to say the least) of the quality of ball played at this level.

In what looks like it will be a rebuilding season, Jacob Schauer probably would have been rewarded with a decent amount of playing time for his years spent as a program player. It's a shame that he didn't participate in the Senior Night festivities, but he certainly has plenty of other opportunities to hear compliments from Mike Schauer and I have it on good authority that the highly accomplished young Schauer was offered a dream job.

Cole Reid's minutes decreased a little throughout last season, but he was viewed as a potential future all-conference big man. His absence is concerning because of the makeup of the rest of the roster. I don't know what kind of scheme Wheaton is going to run this season but the roster has only two non-guards listed. Connor Braun is a solid 6' 9" starter, but the only other player listed as a forward has a collegiate stat line of 1 shot attempted and 1 foul in 1 minute over 2 years.  If I'm an opposing coach, I'm going to run the first three or four possessions through Braun to put him on the bench with foul trouble, and then watch my forwards back down all of the 6' Wheaton guards and score a lot of buckets in the paint.  The Thunder better have personnel that can rain threes from everywhere if they're going to counterbalance their size deficit.

It doesn't appear that Mike Schauer added much. He's got the grad student from D2 Western Oregon, R.J. Veiliz (WOU spelled it "Veliz", but I'll put my money on the Wheaton spelling), but he was a bench player there whose minutes, scoring, and shooting line were notably modest. Setting aside for a moment the fact that he is a guard and T.J. Askew was a forward, he doesn't look primed to provide the kind of impact for Wheaton that Askew's arrival did last season. Could be wrong about that, though. But there are no other new transfers indicated on the Wheaton roster, aside from 6'4" Noah Hedrick, who was a steady but unremarkable bench player for Hope two years ago. What's more, Wheaton brought in just three freshmen, two of whom are legacies, -- and legacies always make me wonder if the coaches pursued them or if the kid was already planning to go there (and thus may not have been a recruiting priority for the coaching staff). Still, one of the legacies is the son of former Wheaton assistant coach Paul Ferguson, who (like Mike Schauer) logged a number of years sitting second chair for Bill Harris, and Ferg has already blessed Wheaton with one of his Columbus (IN) North standouts in Nick Schiavello. If Ferg's kid turns out to be in the same ballpark as Schiavello as a player, then Ferg's done his former employer yet another solid.

All told, this looks like a really down year for Wheaton. I hesitate to say that, because Wheaton always plays hard and smart, is always well-conditioned, and because Mike Schauer always seems to have a trick or two up his sleeve. But I'm not really sure where all of the CCIW-level talent is beyond Schiavello and Sock and maybe Veiliz and Hedrick, unless Mike's got four or five guys who've made monster strides in ability while jumping from last season's JV to this season's varsity, and I mean monster strides. (And Braun would really need to make monster strides as well, because he was a negligible factor off of the bench for Wheaton last season.)

How does someone transfer up to Division 1 without playing much at a lower division? I'm sort of at a loss on that one.

My guess is that they liked his g.p.a. and/or his attitude. After all, you can bring in anybody from the student body who's willing to try out for a walk-on spot. But what a D1 coach is probably looking for in a walk-on who is not of the PWO variety (in other words, an end-of-the-bench guy who has no realistic chance to ever see the floor other than in the final minute or two of a blowout) is a positive-attitude guy who will show up at practice every day ready to work hard, won't complain about his lot in life, will vocally support his teammates, always keeps his nose clean, and -- ideally -- will boost the team's collective grade point average.

[Gregory Sager]

Congrats to Mike Schauer, who is now the official athletics director at Wheaton, as well as the head men's basketball coach.

[Greek Tragedy]

Preseason poll is out:

1. North Park (3)	55
2. Carthage (3)	54
3. Elmhurst (3)	53
4. Illinois Wesleyan	51
5. Wheaton	35
6. Millikin	27
7. North Central	23
8t. Augustana	13
8t. Carroll	13

That's as narrow a first-division as I can remember seeing in a CCIW preseason poll.

Last season's preseason poll

IWU (6) - 6th
NCC (1) - 5th
Elmhurst (2) - 4th
Wheaton - 1st
Millikin - 8th
Augustana - 7th
NPU - 2nd
Carthage - 3rd
Carroll - 9th

[Gotberg]

Preseason poll is out:

1. North Park (3)	55
2. Carthage (3)	54
3. Elmhurst (3)	53
4. Illinois Wesleyan	51
5. Wheaton	35
6. Millikin	27
7. North Central	23
8t. Augustana	13
8t. Carroll	13

That's as narrow a first-division as I can remember seeing in a CCIW preseason poll.

Last season's preseason poll

IWU (6) - 6th
NCC (1) - 5th
Elmhurst (2) - 4th
Wheaton - 1st
Millikin - 8th
Augustana - 7th
NPU - 2nd
Carthage - 3rd
Carroll - 9th

It should be an exciting year!  Lots of talented teams with good coaching.

[Gregory Sager]

Preseason poll is out:

1. North Park (3)	55
2. Carthage (3)	54
3. Elmhurst (3)	53
4. Illinois Wesleyan	51
5. Wheaton	35
6. Millikin	27
7. North Central	23
8t. Augustana	13
8t. Carroll	13

That's as narrow a first-division as I can remember seeing in a CCIW preseason poll.

Last season's preseason poll

IWU (6) - 6th
NCC (1) - 5th
Elmhurst (2) - 4th
Wheaton - 1st
Millikin - 8th
Augustana - 7th
NPU - 2nd
Carthage - 3rd
Carroll - 9th

Yep. The coaches are way off some years, but last season they were really way off.

[Gregory Sager]

The D3hoops.com preseason poll is out.

Carthage is #18
North Park is #21

Wheaton (45 pts), Elmhurst (28 pts), and Illinois Wesleyan (6 pts) are in the ORV category.

[Stertorous Thunder]

The D3hoops.com preseason poll is out.

Carthage is #18
North Park is #21

Wheaton (45 pts), Elmhurst (28 pts), and Illinois Wesleyan (6 pts) are in the ORV category.

I'm certain that it's a significant challenge to find the time and the data to be a well-informed D3 poll voter in season.  And I'm sure that it's close to impossible to make a reasonably good preseason list.  So I find it interesting that this list has both items that feel very accurate and others that are obviously ridiculous.

The Good:

• The voters put two CCIW teams in the Top 25, but in the bottom half.  This seems like a safe and automatic choice for a preseason list in any year.
• The voters put a 9-loss Carthage team that had no end-of-season votes last year onto this year's list.  I would say that this is a shockingly good decision by the voters.  Some voters are paying attention to Kenosha and definitely seeing what I'm seeing.  Carthage could be very good.
• The voters put North Park in the Top 25.  North Park retains its top players, has reserves that many programs would covet, and I don't see how Coach Smith and his team would backslide in their second year together.  North Park can probably be legitimately offended that they're not ranked in the single digits, but their inclusion is another good choice by the voters.
• Elmhurst finished off the list, but received some votes.  Elmhurst has the goods to contend for the CCIW title and could supplant one of the other two, but a third ranked team for the conference is unlikely.  Elmhurst in the "others receiving votes" section also feels right at this point in the calendar.
  

The Odd:

• The voters picked North Park lower than where they finished last season (21st vs. 14th).
• The voters ranked North Park lower than Carthage.  I don't necessarily think that North Park is going to run away with a CCIW title, but here at the preseason point I would argue that you have to pick them.

The Ridiculous:
Wheaton's votes are purely based on past performance and reputation.  I will follow them closely and cheer for them and hope that they exceed my expectations, but the 2023-2024 Thunder will be battling to make the CCIW postseason and not appearing on any Top 25 lists this season.

[Stertorous Thunder]

Yep. The coaches are way off some years, but last season they were really way off.

The poll was "way off", but I would argue understandably so.

Carroll, Augustana, and Milliken did what everyone thought they would do, in a bad way.

Elmhurst and NCC did what everyone thought they would do, in a good way.  They just ended up in 4th and 5th instead of 3rd and 2nd.

6th place IWU stumbled and didn't reload like they normally do.  Maybe the coaches should have looked a little closer at the previous season's reserves, but you also can't really be blamed for picking IWU to do well, and on certain nights they were every bit as good as anyone else in the conference.

There was likely no way for opposing coaches to see what the impact of the transfer portal would be for Wheaton and North Park.

I think that the coaches really only missed on Carthage and how much improvement the underclassmen would show.

Man, 2022-2023 was a fun season.  I can't wait for 2023-2024...

[Gregory Sager]

The D3hoops.com preseason poll is out.

Carthage is #18
North Park is #21

Wheaton (45 pts), Elmhurst (28 pts), and Illinois Wesleyan (6 pts) are in the ORV category.

I'm certain that it's a significant challenge to find the time and the data to be a well-informed D3 poll voter in season.  And I'm sure that it's close to impossible to make a reasonably good preseason list.  So I find it interesting that this list has both items that feel very accurate and others that are obviously ridiculous.

The Good:

• The voters put two CCIW teams in the Top 25, but in the bottom half.  This seems like a safe and automatic choice for a preseason list in any year.
• The voters put a 9-loss Carthage team that had no end-of-season votes last year onto this year's list.  I would say that this is a shockingly good decision by the voters.  Some voters are paying attention to Kenosha and definitely seeing what I'm seeing.  Carthage could be very good.
• The voters put North Park in the Top 25.  North Park retains its top players, has reserves that many programs would covet, and I don't see how Coach Smith and his team would backslide in their second year together.  North Park can probably be legitimately offended that they're not ranked in the single digits, but their inclusion is another good choice by the voters.
• Elmhurst finished off the list, but received some votes.  Elmhurst has the goods to contend for the CCIW title and could supplant one of the other two, but a third ranked team for the conference is unlikely.  Elmhurst in the "others receiving votes" section also feels right at this point in the calendar.
  

The Odd:

• The voters picked North Park lower than where they finished last season (21st vs. 14th).
• The voters ranked North Park lower than Carthage.  I don't necessarily think that North Park is going to run away with a CCIW title, but here at the preseason point I would argue that you have to pick them.

The Ridiculous:
Wheaton's votes are purely based on past performance and reputation.  I will follow them closely and cheer for them and hope that they exceed my expectations, but the 2023-2024 Thunder will be battling to make the CCIW postseason and not appearing on any Top 25 lists this season.

Agree with you completely about this.

Yep. The coaches are way off some years, but last season they were really way off.

The poll was "way off", but I would argue understandably so.

Carroll, Augustana, and Milliken did what everyone thought they would do, in a bad way.

Elmhurst and NCC did what everyone thought they would do, in a good way.  They just ended up in 4th and 5th instead of 3rd and 2nd.

6th place IWU stumbled and didn't reload like they normally do.  Maybe the coaches should have looked a little closer at the previous season's reserves, but you also can't really be blamed for picking IWU to do well, and on certain nights they were every bit as good as anyone else in the conference.

There was likely no way for opposing coaches to see what the impact of the transfer portal would be for Wheaton and North Park.

I think that the coaches really only missed on Carthage and how much improvement the underclassmen would show.

Man, 2022-2023 was a fun season.  I can't wait for 2023-2024...

Again, agree completely. If you didn't bleed orange, I'd designate you to be my proxy poster from now on, ST.

[iwu70]

With a crowd of about 6,000 looking on, the Redbirds easily handled the Titans today in the exhibition game.  ISU had both size and speed all over the Titans.  IWU played rather poorly, shooting a poor percentage, making few threes, and of course substituting freely, with perhaps a rotation of 13 today.  Yoder is back and looked good.   Sroka was the leading scorer, but this Titan team is going to be quite challenged offensively, IMHO.   Starting lineup:  Yoder, Hakim Williams, Roper, Sroka and Schneider.

A nice B/N event, but not competitive hoops.  Good support for a local charity and for mental health services at both institutions. 

Lots to work on -- another exhibition vs. D1 Northern in DeKalb on Wednesday. 

Titans open with the Sikma Tournament November 10-11 at The Shirk.

IWU'70

[Gregory Sager]

Reports are in that Elmhurst and Loras scrimmaged to basically a draw in Faganel this evening. The grad student from Boston College, Quinn Pemberton, did not play for the Bluejays.

[Wildcat]

 Correction, Quinn Pemberton did play in the scrimmage last night in Faganal Hall. He was number 24 and he looked very good. He is strong, can shoot , can drive to the hoop, and handles the ball well. Glad he is here and ready to go.

[GU1999]

With a crowd of about 6,000 looking on, the Redbirds easily handled the Titans today in the exhibition game.  ISU had both size and speed all over the Titans.  IWU played rather poorly, shooting a poor percentage, making few threes, and of course substituting freely, with perhaps a rotation of 13 today.  Yoder is back and looked good.   Sroka was the leading scorer, but this Titan team is going to be quite challenged offensively, IMHO.   Starting lineup:  Yoder, Hakim Williams, Roper, Sroka and Schneider.

A nice B/N event, but not competitive hoops.  Good support for a local charity and for mental health services at both institutions. 

Lots to work on -- another exhibition vs. D1 Northern in DeKalb on Wednesday. 

Titans open with the Sikma Tournament November 10-11 at The Shirk.

IWU'70

The last time I watched a d3 team play a game in Redbird arena they managed 108 points on 38.5/25/71.4 shooting.  That one was also not competitive hoops.

[Gregory Sager]

Correction, Quinn Pemberton did play in the scrimmage last night in Faganal Hall. He was number 24 and he looked very good. He is strong, can shoot , can drive to the hoop, and handles the ball well. Glad he is here and ready to go.

OK, then I guess my spy at Faganal must've been looking at the wrong guy. Sorry about that.

[Gregory Sager]

My big focus right now (at least basketball-wise) is on Thursday evening, when, for the first time in the history of the two North Side schools, the men's varsities of North Park and DePaul will tangle. It's an exhibition game, but it won't count only in the eyes of those who are sticklers for such details.

For North Park in particular, this event is a very, very big thing, indeed. For those of us of a certain age, we remember all-too-well the years when our school was winning national championships and yet struggling to get any media attention in our hometown at all, as all the local papers and airwaves could seem to talk about was DePaul, which during that stretch of the decades-long Ray Meyer era was something of a national tease in terms of basketball prowess -- lots of regular-season success, perennial disappointment as soon as March rolled around. Naturally, Meyer refused to schedule North Park (despite all of the howling on the subject from Dick Vitale after the 1980 national championship game at the Carver P.E. Center), because, after all, why should he? What possible upside was there in it for DePaul? For those of us of a more recent vintage, this game is a great tribute to North Park associate head coach Edwind McGhee, a DePaul folk hero in the '10s who walked on to the Blue Demons, worked his way up to a scholarship, and ended his career as a Blue Demons captain. It's also a bit of a belated local coming-out party for the Vikings in the wake of their whirlwind rise to success last season, in anticipation of another season of national prominence at the D3 level, as well as who knows what sort of spin the DePaulites are casting upon it for their own school's purposes.

I'm going to be courtside at Wintrust Arena covering this game for NPU, and I can't wait!