WBB: Landmark Conference

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

Usually I make sure to alert people of who is on Hoopsville prior to the show. Unfortunately, Thursday was a challenge production wise and I was a bit distracted. So, I hope you don't mind finding out after the fact considering you can watch the show On Demand or listen to the podcast(s).

As the season turns from the first to the second half, we are starting to see which teams are doing more than just getting off to good starts. Now conference races are starting to take shape and we get an idea of how the rest of the season may play out.

On Thursday's edition of Hoopsville, Dave chatted with several coaches whose teams are either leading their conferences or in the battle for first place. Are these teams going to still be near the top come late February? What do they have to do to maintain their level of success. Dave even hit the road to Washington, DC to chat with several of his guests.

Dave also talked to a coach who now has the second-most wins in Division III history. Wooster's Steve Moore won his 787th (700th at Wooster) Wednesday night. Moore joined Dave in the NABC Coach's Corner to discuss the incredible milestone and all the milestones along the way.

You can watch Hoopsville On Demand or listen to the podcast by downloading it from SoundCloud and iTunes by clicking here: http://www.d3hoops.com/hoopsville/archives/2016-17/jan12

And don't forget about the Hoopsville Mailbag segment! Email questions you may have to the show at hoopsville@d3hoops.com and we will answer them on a future show.

Guest appearances (in order):
- Steve Moore, Wooster men's coach - NABC Coach's Corner
- Kevin Kovacs, Gallaudet men's coach
- Matt Donohue, Catholic women's coach
- Chuck Winkelman, Calvin women's coach
- Dale Wellman, Nebraska Wesleyan men's coach

You can also tune into the podcast(s) after the show has aired:
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iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/hoopsville/id1059517087

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[ronk]

  Lady Royals cruise on the road over Moravian 76-55. Sarah with a triple double, Alexix, a double-double, and Katie Broderick with 3-4 3-pters, 4 rebs, 3 assists, and a great defensive job on McPherson(5-19). Catholic up next. 

[saratoga]

The Lady Royals looked like they didn't even break a sweat tonight.
Very efficient game plan & the kids executed it perfectly.
Still some very tough games ahead but this was pretty impressive.

[augie]

How many teams can say that two of there players in the same game had a Triple Double( Payonk and a Double Double Roman) in my lifetime and I watched alot of basketball i have never seen it! Congratulationso ladies very impressive.

[ronk]

 According to the recap of tonight's game, Sarah now has half(3 of 6) of the recorded triple-doubles in Lady Royals history. She's been doing it all from her 1st college game when she debuted with back-to-back double-doubles in the tipoff tourney against Montclair St(top 10 team) and Washington College. Even I was unprepared for such a performance, even though I had seen her play 10 AAU games 2 summers previous while evaluating 1 of her teammates(who went D1). Reconsidering, I concluded that the reason was that most of those AAU games were against lower-D1 players.
  The 1st thing I told Coach Woodruff when I met him that September as he was beginning his Scranton coaching career was that he was going to enjoy coaching Sarah; she enables everyone she plays with to play better.

[augie]

 Ronk In your lifetime of watching basketball did you ever witnessed what I did tonight a Moravian (Payonk triple double-Roman double double)on the same team in the same game?So true just watching this team play I thought it was going to be like a really close game.But we won by 21at Moravian.

[ronk]

Ronk In your lifetime of watching basketball did you ever witnessed what I did tonight a Moravian (Payonk triple double-Roman double double)on the same team in the same game?So true just watching this team play I thought it was going to be like a really close game not win by 21at Moravian.

Augie,
  Don't remember any such combo in the past, at least on the same team; usually, rebounds and points by one interfere with a teammate accumulating them, also.

[ronk]

How many teams can say that two of there players in the same game had a Triple Double( Payonk and a Double Double Roman) in my lifetime and I watched alot of basketball i have never seen it! Congratulationso ladies very impressive.

After a booth review of Sarah's 2 previous triple-doubles from last season, the one against Catholic(almost a year ago to the day) also had a double-double by Jackie Gantz and 1 rebound shy of a double-double for Alexix. And, it is strongly believed that Augie was there. I didn't remember it myself before the check.
  There was a quad-double by an NJAC player maybe 2 seasons ago that I found going through box scores at that time but no one made much of it because the fourth double was a negative one(turnovers).

[augie]

Scranton loses at home to Catholic in OT.Differents between the elite teams Amherst, Tufts,Thomas More is when the challenge comes to them they wakeup to the challenge.Congratulations to Catholic out hustled Scranton out Coached them and out performed them bottom line.

[NEPAFAN]

50 regular season wins in a row. Can't win em.all. Time to start a new streak.

[ronk]

 Lady Royals are still a work in progress. They have to learn how to get by when their prime shooter is off or contested like today and that some passes should be avoided against excellent defensive teams. Avoiding turnovers becomes paramount at that level of play. Could have happened 2 weeks ago in E-town when they won by only 1.
Have to give a lot of credit to Catholic in general and DeSantis, Smith, and my 'buddy' Launi, in particular. Bernadette played for my in-town school(Good Counsel) and I interested her in Scranton and was there when she got her letter of acceptance, but she chose Catholic instead and played almost flawlessly today. 

[augie]

Ronk not to be sarcastic 17 games in should not be a work in progress this late in the year!If it is Big Problems then for the Lady Royals.

[ronk]

Augie,
  I'd say it's only been a 2 or 3 game season(today, Susquehanna, maybe Rochester). as far as playing good defenses that one will encounter in the NCAA tourney(think E. Connecticut that upset them 3 years ago or Tufts last year). Still have 2 more such games in the conference 2nd half to tweak the offense.

[saratoga]

A few years back Jay Bilas made the comment that just because a team is shooting well from the outside it doesn't mean that by switching to an active zone will play into that teams hand.

He went on to describe that the reason the guards in that game were so wide open was because they were quicker than the other teams and they were doing two things:

*Driving past the other teams guards and dishing to the wings for wide open looks or

*Driving past the guards on great picks being set & going right in for layups.

Prior to the start of the second half he suggested if the team with the slower guards made the adjustment & went to a 2/3 or a variation of that (2-1-2), it would take away the driving lanes, they couldn't flood one side & then off picks have their quicker guards going one on one for layins & it just might buy the other team a little time to get their legs back under them as they didn't have to chase people quicker than they all over the place.

Moral of the story...the other team did go to a 2/3, it worked & that really solidified to me that if he wasn't having so much fun doing what he's doing as a color analyst, Bilas would probably be one very good coach.

Watching yesterday's game certainly made me think back to that game as the Scranton guards were getting beat off the dribble pretty much all day.
Looked just like the Neuman & Elizabethtown games.

On the other hand, even with the fact that Catholic was quicker & not just first half quicker, they were all game quicker...the Lady Royals still could have won this.

They played bad D at times, kept getting picked off on screens, missed some open shots & had far too many turnovers.

Beyond that, Catholic played probably as great a first half as they are capable of.
Open 3's, they nailed them.
Create a shot with the shot clock nearing zero, done.
Loose balls...theirs.
Second chance shots on rare misses...theirs.
Blow by Scranton's guards for layups...ditto.
Coach Donahue clearly had his kids sold on his game plan & it worked.

On the Scranton side...their kids made a fantastic effort and almost pulled it off considering they were not firing on all systems.
Both Sarah & Alexix made clutch free throws at the end of regulation & I thought when Peden entered the game she was able to match the speed of Catholic's guards & she gave the Lady Royals some very nice minutes & allowed Bridgett to move around to find her spots.

Unfortunate loss because you want to clearly be the best in your Region for the NCAA committee.
Back to the drawing board & just work on getting even better & starting another winning streak...about all you can do unless you just want to feel sorry for yourself.

[ronk]

Saratoga,
   There's food for thought in your words. We'll see what adjustments are made for round 2 in 3 weeks. We could see how quick with their offhand the Cards' guards are if they're overplayed to their strong hand. Or, maybe a box-and-one on DeSantis til Reynolds can show that she can make more than a layup. Smith and Launi can make 3s, so they can't be left alone.
   We're talkin basketball now; hasn't happened in the Landmark in a while.