MBB: Northern Athletics Collegiate Conference

[BadgerFan42]

Lot's of moving and shaking last night, CUW plays both Lakeland & Edgewood in the final weeks, going to be interesting

[BadgerFan42]

Picks for tonight:

Aurora continues their push after beating EC and shoots their way past the Cougars
MSOE scores 42 points in a lop sided loss at Rockford
the Eagles put on a strong showing against a defeated Dominican team
Marian gets their bid into the NAC tourny by handling WLC
In the game of the week, CUW pulls out a close one at home in physical rivalry game against Lakeland

Tomorrow night: 
Edgewood takes care of business against MBBC

[Just Bill]

Regional rankings also come out today. Will be interesting to see how the regional advisory committee handles the three NAC teams who are all 16-5.

Head-to-head-to-head EC is 3-0, CUW is 1-1 and LC is 0-3. EC has a win over Lake Forest who will probably in the rankings, while LC lost to LFC. CUW went 3-1 against the WIAC so they're SOS numbers should be strong. even though none of the four teams they played is over .500 in the WIAC. Tough to know which criteria the RAC will weigh more. Or perhaps the numbers will leave all three out.

[Just Bill]

Well, here's our answers...

Midwest
1 Washington U. 15-4 15-5
2 Transylvania 18-1 19-2
3 Lake Forest 17-2 18-2
4 Wheaton (Ill.) 15-4 17-4
5 North Central (Ill.) 14-4 15-6
6 Illinois Wesleyan 14-5 16-5
7 Edgewood 14-5 16-5
8 Concordia (Wis.) 15-4 16-4

Breakdown of the data: http://web1.ncaa.org/champsel_new/exec/pdf/staticpdfrank?doWhat=publicrankings&sportCode=MBB&region=35&division=3

SOS numbers:
WashU - .589
Transy - .499
LFC - .525
Wheaton - .536
NCC - .505
IWU - .558
EC - .516
CUW - .497
-------------------------
LC - .448

Appears that EC's SOS and head-to-head win carried the day over CUW.

[BadgerFan42]

Another clutch performance for CUW senior Luke Doedens last night.  Does conf. POY go to the guy who has better #'s or to the guy that means the most to his team?

If it's the latter, it would be hard denying Luke Doedens that award, guy has done some amazing things for that team this year...especially in crunch time

[RFMichigan]

Another clutch performance for CUW senior Luke Doedens last night.  Does conf. POY go to the guy who has better #'s or to the guy that means the most to his team?

If it's the latter, it would be hard denying Luke Doedens that award, guy has done some amazing things for that team this year...especially in crunch time

Or how about just give it to the guy who's the best, most talented player out there. Okay, that's too subjective, I know.

So how about this. Who are you going to pick first for a 5 on 5 pick-up game if you have the first pick and the pool you're choosing from is the entire conference? (See, I've solved this argument for all time.)  I haven't personally seen the guys from Lakeland or Edgewood, but if I had the first pick I'd go with Doedens the elder.

I've never thought the POY should go to the "big stat" guy. And for some reason I don't necessarily feel good about "the best player on the best team" getting it either.

[BadgerFan42]

After seeing most of the teams in the NAC I would say that Luke Doedens makes CUW the best team in the conference.  Without him they are a team that loses 3-4 more games in conference....plus I would probably pick him first to be on my team in a pick up game.

I don't believe that POY should go to the guy that puts up big #'s, some of these guys are products of their system and typically only play on one end of the floor.  I've only seen a few guys this year that have an impact on both ends like Doedens does.  He is probably the most complete player in the NAC.  Anyone else got thoughts?

[Just Bill]

My top 3 in this order are:

Doedens, CUW
Schwartz, LC
Faurote, EC

[WLCALUM83]

2/11/12 guesses:

Benedictine over Rockford
CUC over MSOE 
CUW over Maranatha
Edgewood over WLC 
Aurora over Dominican
Lakeland over Marian

[Just Bill]

All three CCIW teams in front of EC and CUW in the regional standings went 1-1 this week. Don't know if that will be enough to boost either the Eagles or the Falcons. Of course, it might be a moot point by the time the rankings comeout on Wednesday since they play on Tuesday.

[BadgerFan42]

The final night of regular season play:

The Muskies handle WLC in a blowout
Dominican cruises past MSOE to finish off the season
Maranatha can't quite pull of the upset against Marian
Rockford uses homecourt to their advantage against CUC
Aurora can't stop the the Eagles in quest for a 3rd straight South title

In the game of the night, CUW avenges an early season loss with a close win over Edgewood

[RFMichigan]

Lots of intriguing match-ups with divisional championship and playoff implications tonight.

In the North:
If CUW beats Edgewood, they win the division outright and the #1 seed for the division. CUW will not be denied.

In the South (whoo boy . . .):
Rockford and CUC meet with the winner clinching at least a share of first and a possible outright crown. It's at Rockford, but I'll go with my heart and say CUC.

Benedictine goes to Aurora. If Bennie wins, they gain a share of the divisional championship - they cannot win it outright. Aurora is playing just to get into the playoffs, (but can still qualify even if they lose if MSOE falls as well). Benedictine

Being the top seed is South pretty important because they don't have to play any of the "big 3" of CUW, Lakeland, and Edgewood in the quarters, plus they get to play a semi-final at home if they advance that far.

MSOE is playing for something besides pride, so I'll go with them.

Marian over MBBC

Lakeland over WLC

[Just Bill]

Good one brewing in Mequon. 29-28 CUW over EC at halftime. Zelinski has 11 for the Falcons, Wisniewski 10 for the Eagles.

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/cuw-falcons

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/46422793/XLIVE.HTM

[RFMichigan]

CUW does, in fact, hold on to beat Edgewood by 3.

Now I want someone, ANYONE, who saw the end of the Benedictine - Aurora game in person PLEASE describe what happened in the last 8 seconds. All I could see from the (bouncing/wiggling/semi-scratchy) video was that it seemed as though Green from BU (down by one at the time) drove to the basket and missed a little runner in the lane. Then a Benedictine player somehow corralled the ball and tried to go back up towards the hoop, but the ball seemed to slip out of his hand and go flying crazily up into the air. At that moment, the video froze! About two seconds later, the video went live again with a rather close-up, fuzzy picture of the ball dropping through the basket as the Aurora players were signaling "no good" while the Benedictine players were charging the court!!  What happened? (At first Livestats showed 0:00 on the clock with Aurora up by one, but then it showed Benedictine with a one point "Final" victory.) 

In Rockford, CUC blew out to an 18 point halftime lead en route to a 12 point win over the Regents to earn a share of the division championship with Benedictine. If I read the tie-breaker correctly, Benedictine gets the #1 seed in the south due to a season sweep over MSOE whereas CUC spilt with them.

[BadgerFan42]

CUW not listed in latest regional ranking?