MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[diehardfan]

Titan:

Do you know anything about how those two guys ended up at Elmhurst?  It is very unusual to have that much size in the post.

They grew since arriving, I'm pretty sure... at least Nick did.

[AndOne]

Titan:

Do you know anything about how those two guys ended up at Elmhurst?  It is very unusual to have that much size in the post.

Michael is from West Chicago. IL which is only 17 miles/35 minutes almost straight west of Elmhurst. Certainly within easy recruiting distance.

Ruch went to high school in Farmer City, IL---about 2 1/2 hrs southwest of Elmhurst. Elmhurst Head Coach Scherer went to college at Eureka (Ronald Raegan's school) which is only an hour from Farmer City, so he would be familiar with the area. 

[dansand]

Any word on when and if Oliver Rorer will be back. I think Augie will need him back soon, if they plan to challenge for the championship. Perhaps Dansand, who must be out campaigning for Libertarians, can come back on line and give me a Rorer update.

I wish there were some Libertarians to campaign for.

The last update I heard on Oliver wasn't very optimistic. About two weeks ago I was told he still had the pins in his finger and wasn't scheduled to have it checked again for two weeks. Even after they come out he'll have some recuperating to do. I hate to say it, but I heard "season-ending" as a possibility.

Here's a quick update on Oliver Rorer. The paper says he did get the pins removed, but isn't practicing yet and according to Coach G won't be for a while yet. So...prognosis: negative.

As far as the statistical analysis goes, I'd definitely agree with Greg that assists, in many cases, are a little suspect, especially at the small college level. I think that points per possession and opponents points per possession are really the two best measures of a team's offensive and defensive efficiency.

This is exactly the gospel that Wooster coach Steve Moore preaches.  On gamedays, he can't form two sentences without saying "defensive efficiency ratio" (his name for opponent's points per possession) at least once.  It encompasses all aspects of defense, including but not limited to forcing turnovers.  On offense, he does tend to focus attention on assists over the other things that make up "offensive efficiency ratio."  Even though assists are at the mercy of the statkeeper, they still can be a pretty good proxy for how well the offense is working as a team, while the other aspects of points per possession (turnovers, shooting %, etc.) tend to have a sizeable element of luck.

That coach Moore sounds like a real smart guy.

[Titan Q]

Titan:

Do you know anything about how those two guys ended up at Elmhurst?  It is very unusual to have that much size in the post.

Gordon, I will get a few minor details wrong, but this should be close...

Nick Michael was a 6-6 small forward when Elmhurst recruited him.  He was a good high school player, but exclusively a perimeter player at West Chicago.  Several local Division III schools passed on going after him.  By his sophomore year at Elmhurst he was 6-9 and the coaching staff made him learn how to become a low post player.  It wasn't real pretty at first, but he became a 3rd Team All-CCIW player that season.  By last year Michael was another inch taller (6-10) and a pretty darn good offensive player around the hoop.  He made the 3rd Team again last year.  I saw Elmhurst assistant John Baines recently and he told me how hard of a worker Michael has been.  I believe he said that Michael bench pressed about 165 as a freshman and tested out at about 285 in the preseason this year.

6-9/250 Brent Ruch went to high school about 30 minutes from IWU's campus and was coached by former IWU player Mike Pope, so I definitely remember him at Blue Ridge H.S..  Ruch was a well known Class A player (small school) in Illinois due to his size.  I believe he was his current height (or at least 6-8) as a junior, when he started to receive a lot of attention.  Division I Illinois State here in town started looking at him.  Somewhere along the way his junior year, Ruch tore his ACL for the second time (not sure if the same knee or if he's torn both) and I believe missed the second half of his junior year and a good chunk of his senior year.  When he returned his senior season, he played very well and made some all-state teams...

http://www.illinoisprephoops.com/2005/AllState2005.htm

Basically, all of the Division I schools that had started looking at him backed off when he suffered that second knee injury.  I believe his biggest pursuers were Elmhurst and Augustana of the CCIW...and John Baines played with Ruch's coach Mike Pope at IWU, which certainly helped the Bluejay's cause.  When he commited to Elmhurst, Mark Scherer told the Bloomington Pantagraph, "Brent has an unbelievable combination of size and basketball skill that you just don't see everywhere...Because of the injuries he has sustained, I believe his best basketball is still ahead of him."

Elmhurst ended up with a Division III steal when they landed Ruch.  By the time next year rolls around, I'll bet Division I Illinois State would be able to use a player with Ruch's size and low post skills, and certainly he could play at DI Eastern Illinois.  He's going to be a real star at Elmhurst before he's done.

[petemcb]

To put into perspective how big Elmhurst's starting low post players are, here are the heights/weights of the starting 4/5 players for a few local D1's:


U. of Illinois
Warren Carter 6-9/220
Shaun Pruitt 6-10/245

Illinois State
Greg Dillagard 6-8/230
Levi Dyer 6-11/220

Bradley
Matt Salley 6-7/220
Zach Andrews 6-8/225

Elmhurst goes:

Brent Ruch 6-9/250
Nick Michael 6-10/235


That's a whole bunch of size for a Division III team.

Q, you can add Loyola University and Northern to that list  Should be a tough battle in Elmhurst tonight.  I'm looking forward to it.

[cardinalpride]

Attention CCIW fans:

CCIW native diehardfan has been elected to the Posting Hall of Fame.

Please make a note of it.

Congrats Diehardfan on your HOF Selection!!! 

[ecdubb420]

If Michael was 6-6 when he came to EC, I'd be amazed.  My memory may be a little foggy as those games were very tough to watch (as Slock was throwing his talent away, and the Bosworth/Martin combo was a disaster), but I remember Michael stepping in to play center and act as EC's major interior presence (due to his size) over the CCIW season.
If I were a betting man, I'd say he started the CCIW season 6-8(9) and maybe 200 pounds.  He was pushed around like a rag doll and foul trouble prevented him from doing much in many of the BlueJays games. 
His sophomore season was plagued with inconsistency, but his coming out party had to be over the course of the final stretch of the season when he averaged over 20ppg and was a major player in the BlueJays 2nd place finish.  Since then he has clearly been a major piece of EC's success.
During last season, I remember reading some scouts saying that Michael will be a player that reaches the peak of his basketball skill after his college days are finished, so if his maturation continues and he works as hard as we know he does, his playing days may not be finished once this year concludes.

Ruch on the other hand came to EC as a more complete player than Michael, and a player who has all the tools to be a MOP in this conference.  As stated in an earlier post, though his has struggled to get on track on the offensive end, his game has really matured.  He has developed a knack for finding the loose ball and continues to show off his vastly improved defensive game.  He has the best hands for a big, I have ever seen at EC (going back to the early 90's)  and he is deceptively quick when getting to the loose ball and rotating on defense.  If the Carthage game shows any indication, Scherer is determined to get him the ball and have his shot attempts fall closer to 10-12 than the 5-7 it has been as of late.   
If he stays healthy (as those two knee injuries as still fresh in everyones mind), there are no reasons to believe that he will be the man for EC over the next two seasons. 

Lost in all of the Ruch/Michael talk is Jared Hintzsche who has been a MAJOR part of EC's success.  His maturation continues and with 12 games left this year and all next year too, the great 1-2-(3?) game on the inside will continue for at least one more season.  His offensive game has been tough to watch, but you can see already see how far he has come in half a season.  In addition, he has been a major disruptive force on the defensive end and in many games, has been a more effective big man than the opponents starting center.

Off to watch the Badgers decimate Northwestern, a nice appetizer before the showdown at RA Faganal Hall this evening.  Safe travels to all.

[robberki]

is the NPU-Wheaton game on the radio tonight? If so, what station is that?

[Titan Q]

If Michael was 6-6 when he came to EC, I'd be amazed.  My memory may be a little foggy as those games were very tough to watch (as Slock was throwing his talent away, and the Bosworth/Martin combo was a disaster), but I remember Michael stepping in to play center and act as EC's major interior presence (due to his size) over the CCIW season.
If I were a betting man, I'd say he started the CCIW season 6-8(9) and maybe 200 pounds. 

Very close!  Michael was listed as 6-8/210 as a freshman.  I do believe he was 6-6 as a high school senior though.

[Titan Q]

is the NPU-Wheaton game on the radio tonight? If so, what station is that?

http://www.wheaton.edu/wetn/index.htm

[Titan Q]

Four more great games tonight:

Carthage (9-4, 0-2) @ Augustana (11-3, 2-1)
http://www.broadcastmonsters.com/

Illinois Wesleyan (8-5, 1-1) @ Elmhurst (12-1, 2-0)
http://www.wjbc.com/

North Central (9-4, 1-1) @ Millikin (8-5, 1-1)
http://www.wonc.org/

Wheaton (8-5, 0-2) @ North Park (10-4, 2-1)
http://www.wheaton.edu/wetn/index.htm


Four games that could legitimately go either way.  I'm not sure you can ask any more from a league as a fan...this is good stuff.

Carthage and Wheaton are in real danger of getting in big trouble.  It would be very hard to come back from 0-3. 

[79jaybird]

The Elmhurst/IWU game is on www.wrse.com  or 88.7 FM on the net. 
Two great guys both as players, and even better- as personalities with Ruch and Michael.  The 1,2,3 combo of Ruch, Michael, and Hintzsche has been able to dominate inside and is a real key to Elmhurst success.
This is a true TEAM that doesn't have any individuals trying to glom the spotlight (ala a Randy Moss).
I think this game stays close for 3 quarters, but the 4th quarter EC pulls away.  Zach Freeman is a great ball player, but unfortunately he is somewhat of a 1 man team this year.

[Gregory Sager]

When you have to ask to be included into the Hall of Fame you probably don't deserve to be in.......a.k.a. Ron Santo.....

When has Santo ever asked to be inducted? All he's done is respond to media questions in light of the legions of baseball fans who've been campaigning for him to get into Cooperstown. He's actually been pretty gracious in terms of handling the intrinsically awkward position of being asked about a party to which he hasn't been invited.

[Gregory Sager]

We can't afford to get behind at the crackerbox against a thoroughly hostile crowd. If we play with heart the whole game, we can take this one... easy... NPU improvements and all.

"Easy"? Methinks you're speaking more from the heart than the head, O new inductee. You haven't seen both teams this season. I have. I strongly doubt that this will be an easy win, no matter which team ends up on top. The Vikings are better than you're making them out to be.

Also, I doubt that there will be a "thoroughly hostile crowd" present at the crackerbox tonight. NPU doesn't start spring semester until Tuesday (Monday is MLK Day, so no classes are scheduled), and since the bulk of North Park's resident student undergrads are out-of-staters, it's not very likely that many of them are going to be on campus today -- even though it's possible to re-enter the dorms as of today.

[diehardfan]

Greg.... you totally misconstrued the meaning of my post... I am going to wait till I'm at a comp to explain further, but basically, I think this. #1) I do know that NPU   is vastly improved. #2) If the Wheaton guys play with heart all 40 mins, I am completely confident we will win. If we play with heart for only the second half, or not at all, we are going to get blown out of the water. #3) The score is always close at NPU when we win... I didn't mean "easy" it that way. #4) There could be only one carleton crazy there, and it would be hostile.

And now I am going to go into REI before someone notices that I am sitting outside an outdoor sporting goods store typing messages on my cell phone...