MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[John Gleich]

DP and Cabs,

Your two posts just sparked a question regarding the NAIA and championships.

This will all be merely speculation, but... if the NAIA ran their national tournament like the NCAA runs theirs, how would this have reshaped the nat. championships of the past? (when NAIA was the big dog in small college basketball)

I've thought about this a bit, especially when UWSP won their first Nat Championship... it was 20 years to the day when Dick Bennett and Terry Porter fell just short of an NAIA nat. champ., and I remember Jack Bennett remarking about how different that tournament really is (I'd consider it more shootout style than tournament).

I've also had a couple conversations with a former coach from Embry-Riddle, in Daytona, after they won their title in 2000.  He said that they had had a really good year, but a few exceptional performances put them over the top.

I mean, I think that the verdict is that the winner of the final game in the NCAA tournament is declared the National Champ (even though there may have been a team that dominated the entire year...)  This takes the "whole body of work" argument vs the "short stretch of good games" to an entirely different level, but... we're in the offseason, great time for some debate! 

I'm not going to say I'm by any means a proponent of this... but... the way the CCIW used to work, the regular season champ was declared the CCIW champ (and got the NCAA bid).  There was dissention in the ranks when the CCIDub went to a tournament to declare a champion, because there was a possibility that the reg season champ (i.e. the "winner" over the longhaul) could be unseated by an upstart, or at least get beat and not get a bid (See WIAC tourney in 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005), so the "best" team sat home in March.

... well (and I realize this is a big stretch) if there is a "best" team during the year, they should they, in fact, be dubbed the National Champion?  They have, in fact, played the best basketball for the longest period.  I mean, one thought that comes to my mind is the 2004-2005 University of Illinois team.  They had just one blemish in their regular season record... and yet because they couldn't pull it out on that last night, North Carolina, not U of I, has the banner hanging up in the gym.

... Ok, this is a big stretch, and I don't really think that anyone will go with it... but...

What about the differences in the way the NCAA and NAIA tournaments are run?  Should a champion be declared after playing night after night (like the NAIA) or just several back-to-back nights (like the NCAA)?  Which is a better measure of the "best" team?  Should it be like the NFL, and just have one game per week?  Basketball is a different beast than football, as we all know, and can be played more frequently...

Just a few ideas... what do you guys think?


...Hmm... this post went all over the place, it'll be interesting to see the different types of responses...

[Mr. Ypsi]

PS,

Upon further reflection, I don't thimk IWU stayed in NAIA (for post-season) as long as they did JUST because Jack Horenberger (a 'founding father' of NAIA) was the AD, but also because Kansas City was a total blast!  With due respect to the 'final four', having the final SIXTEEN all together was quite something.  I haven't made it to Salem, but I have trouble believing it could match KC.

On the other hand, having a KC-type finish rewards the hottest and/or deepest team; a more spread-out tourney rewards the 'best' team.  I have no particular preference on which is better.

[Gregory Sager]

Greg: Regarding who is a D3 athlete and who isn't. Since this is the "CCIW Chat" board, can't we simply say Sikma was the greatest CCIW player ever and forget everything else?

No, because that's not a given. Dennis Prikkel probably goes back as far as anyone who posts on CCIW Chat, and he says that Millikin's Jesse Price was the greatest CCIW player he ever saw. And there are probably some old-timers who would opt for Wheaton's Mel Peterson or North Central's Bill Warden over any of those young whippersnappers.

Like most debates here, it probably comes down to semantics to a large degree.  You could word the "best ever" topic a lot of ways and the discussion would change with each.

If one uses post-college basketball success as any measure in determining the "best CCIW player ever", then it is almost impossible to argue against Jack Sikma.  He wasn't only drafted in the NBA...he was the #8 pick overall.  And he wasn't only successful in the NBA...he was a 7-time all-star and a key performer on a championship team.

I never saw Sikma play a CCIW game and I also did not see many of the CCIW greats mentioned here.  I do know that based on the complete basketball body of work, Sikma is one of the best small college players ever.  He selected IWU at the time over Purdue, Illinois, Kansas and other major Division I programs...we won't see that again in the CCIW (and probably not in the small college ranks altogether).



http://www.nba.com/sonics/news/retired_jerseys_sikma.html

http://www.nba.com/sonics/roster/jack_sikma.html

http://www.databasebasketball.com/players/playerpage.htm?ilkid=SIKMAJA01

I don't think that it's really an issue of semantics at all. The consensus here is pretty clear as to what is meant by "greatest CCIW player ever" -- what the player did in the CCIW is what's relevant.  Dennis and Clayton and the rest have responded in that vein. As Pat said, post-collegiate work isn't really germane to the discussion, although I agree with Chuck that Sikma's NBA career tends to obfuscate matters.

I'm not going to say I'm by any means a proponent of this... but... the way the CCIW used to work, the regular season champ was declared the CCIW champ (and got the NCAA bid). There was dissention in the ranks when the CCIDub went to a tournament to declare a champion, because there was a possibility that the reg season champ (i.e. the "winner" over the longhaul) could be unseated by an upstart, or at least get beat and not get a bid (See WIAC tourney in 2001, 2002, 2004, 2005), so the "best" team sat home in March.

That dissension was muted to a large degree by D3's announcement that the tournament would be expanded, with the lion's share of the added bids being slotted for Pool C. Given how well the CCIW champion has always measured up in terms of selection criteria, something that will continue to be true for the foreseeable future as long as the CCIW is one of D3's elite leagues, all those additional Pool C berths in the tourney practically guarantee that the CCIW champion will not be left out in the cold should the champ fail to win the league's postseason tournament. It was with this understanding that the league's athletic directors agreed to establish that postseason tournament, upon expansion of the NCAA tournament. Since last spring marked the debut of the new 59-team NCAA format, it also marked the first-ever CCIW postseason tournament. The two things went hand-in-hand, in other words.

And, BTW, the regular-season champ is still declared the CCIW champ. Augustana has the 2006 CCIW championship trophy to prove it. The league didn't go to a tournament to "declare a champion"; it went to a tournament as a new method to determine the recipient of the league's automatic bid to the big dance, which is a different thing entirely than determining the league championship.

Some leagues may hand over their versions of the big trophy to the winners of their respective postseason tournaments. Ours doesn't. We give the hardware to the team that earned it over the fourteen-game span of the regular season, which to my mind is the way that it should be.

[emeritusprof]

Gobczynski would be mentioned for all-time, all-star CCIW honors if you want someone with the softest touch.  Gobo scored tons against Carthage during the years I saw him, but the remarkable thing is the fact he almost never made a "clean" basket.  No "swish" shots for Gobo.  He'd loft the ball toward the basket and it would slop about for a bit before flopping down in.  But, they counted--even if not very pretty.

Gobo was a scoring machine, but also one who could slow a game.  His shots took eons to go in the basket.

[emeritusprof]

Dennis, I'm not saying his delivery was slow.  Quite the contrary--he could get his shots airborne.

The slowness to which I refer is the time it took for his soft shot to slop around the rim and backboard before it finally went down.

As I indicated, a clean "swish" shot was not in his arensal.  But he certainly did score.

[markerickson]

Is Coon the only player on Dennis' list that played in the CCIW over the last 20 years?  I don't recognize some of the names.  Excluding Thomas and Coon, how many guards are on the list?

Personally, having watched both, I believe Mike Barach was superior to Coon.

I agree with TitanQ that of the players from small colleges, Sikma's overall basketball career is one of the best.  He may be the best.   

[veterancciwfan]

For what it's worth, Jack Horenberger's opinion was, that when he retired as IWU's b'ball coach in 1965, he named Steagall as the best guard and Peterson as the best big man to play against the Titans. I never saw either play.

Regarding Sikma, one thing that is often forgotten is that in his senior year, IWU played 4 D1 teams on the road, naturally, and lost all 4: to Jacksonville by 2, to Florida by 10, to Bradley by 11, and to DePaul by 19. IWU's schedule during the Sikma years was much tougher than it is now. It's hard to compare teams and players from different eras because of various factors that naturally change over time. But certainly the NBA confirmed Sikma's overwhelming dominace during his senior season at IWU.
It would be difficult to believe that any senior on any CCIW team was more dominating and impossible to stop than Sikma was in 1976-1977. And I think the best way to judge a very good college player is how he performs during his senior year.

Using that format, and I only saw him play twice during his senior year, but Mike Barach during those two games was as good as any guard I have ever seen in the league.

[veterancciwfan]

Correction to prior post: My memory is failing me. Horenberger thought Jesse Price was the best non-guard he saw compete against IWU. At least that's how I remember the topic with some more reflection.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Correction to prior post: My memory is failing me. Horenberger thought Jesse Price was the best non-guard he saw compete against IWU. At least that's how I remember the topic with some more reflection.

Quite a compliment, since Price was a freshman when Jack retired!  But probably true!

IF Kent Raymond shows the usual freshman to senior improvement (which, since he took off his sophomore year, remains to be seen), he has the potential to be Dennis' third guard.  I only saw him once (in what turned out to be a statistically sub-par game), but I was nevertheless IMPRESSED!

[Titan Q]

Crabtree is the best I have seen in my 17 seasons around the CCIW.  Bryan played small forward at 6-7 and even brought the ball up the floor often -- he was almost an impossible matchup at the Division III level.  

Crabtree's first 2 1/2 years he was primarily a spot-up 3-point shooter, but during the CCIW portion of his junior year he turned the corner and became a real force.  He started going hard to the basket, which opened everything else up for him.  He could hit the 3, drive and pull up for a 15 footer, or get to the basket and finish.  IWU's first two baskets of the national semifinal game in 1996 vs Rowan were Crabtree dunks.

Some statistics...

* With 1871 points, IWU's 3rd all-time leading scorer behind Jack Sikma (2272) and Blaise Bugajski (2062).

* IWU's all-time leader in FT made (518), 69 more than #2 Korey Coon.

* Senior season averaged: 22.6 points, 6.5 rebounds

* IWU records w/ Bryan Crabtree:

- Fresh ('93-94): 19-8/11-3 (1st) - Sweet 16
- Soph ('94-95): 24-4/13-1 (1st) - Elite 8
- Junior ('95-96): 28-3/12-2 (2nd) - Final 4 (3rd place)
- Senior ('96-97): 29-2/13-1 (1st) - National championship

Total = 100-17 (.855)/49-7 (.875)

Due to his versatility and overall impact on the game, I'd rank Crabtree ahead of the other great CCIW players I've seen.

[Titan Q]

Crabtree's career stats:

Fresh: 10.8 ppg, 4.1 rpg (Sweet 16)
Soph: 13.6 ppg, 4.8 rpg (Elite Eight)
Junior: 17.8 ppg, 5.0 rpg (Final 4, 3rd place)
Senior: 22.6 ppg, 6.5 rpg (National championship)

Zach Freeman's career stats:

Fresh: 11.4 ppg, 7.1 rpg (Sweet 16)
Soph: 14.2 ppg, 6.8 rpg (Sweet 16)
Junior: 16.2 ppg, 7.6 rpg (Final 4, 3rd place)


Freeman enters his senior season with just 41 less points than Crabtree had through his junior year (1152 vs 1193).  Zach currently sits at #30 on IWU's all-time scoring list and #11 in rebounding (595).  He has a chance to pass a whole bunch of people on both in 2006-07.

http://www2.iwu.edu/menssports/basketball/mbbrec01.shtml

While very different players, Freeman also turned that same corner that Crabtree did late in his junior season.  In Zach's final 8 games (CCIW conference tournament and 6 NCAA tournament games) he averaged 20.3 ppg and 7.9 rpg.

Like Crabtree, Freeman comes into his senior year off a national 3rd place finish, but having lost all of his playing partners.  (Crabtree lost Simich, Litwiller, Knight, Posey, Peterson, etc...Freeman lost Dauksas, Amelianovich, Jones, Jones, etc).   Crabtree ended up finding some some pretty good help in 1996-97 - Korey Coon (future M.O.P.), Brent Niebrugge (future M.O.P.), Nathan Hubbard, John Baines, Matt Hoder, etc..  We will see how Andrew Freeman, Darius Gant, Andrew Gilmore, Sean Dwyer, Jordan Morris, Brian Nussbaum, & Co. fare playing with IWU's 6-7 star of 2006-07.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Q, I like the way you think - why the heck can't '07 be a rerun of '97?!

Zach has a real chance of nearing the top on several IWU records. 

In scoring (since Kuehl and Thompson were tied for 8th, all later numbers should be one higher), barring injury (or other disaster), he should pass Dauksas for 10th, has a pretty good chance of passing Amelianovich for 7th, and has an outside chance of passing Crabtree for 3rd.

In rebounding, he should make #4, and has a chance at #2.

In a category you left out, free throws made, he should pass Coon for #2, and has a decent shot at Crabtree for #1.

Now if we can win that title, Zach just may join that 'immortals' list!

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

I guess we're back to this being the IWU chat again.





Not that there's anything wrong with that.

[veterancciwfan]

Without the Jones brothers to provide low post defensive pressure and protection, Zach Freeman will probably find that staying out of foul trouble will be much more difficult in 06/07. Plus he will be double teamed by every opponent. Zach has outstanding talent but it's easier to be dominant when you have 8 seniors in the class ahead of you. Using my naturally pessimistic Cub fan approach, I doubt if the 06/07 IWU season will be a duplication of the 96/97 season.

[Mr. Ypsi]

I certainly don't expect 07 to match '97, but isn't the off-season for dreams?!

Since we have a coaching change, here's hoping '07 is not a rerun of Trost's first year!

Somewhere between those extremes seems likely.