CCIW

[Gotberg]

Additional comments (language) were shouted at the students. .

If you're wondering about the language, it was probably Swedish.  Seems like have of North Park's student population is from Sweden these days....
















[/quote]

[Gregory Sager]

And what in the hell were police doing at the game.

As the infamous "Wheaton Police Department SWAT team" basketball game of three years ago demonstrated, the good folks in the Wheaton College administration seem convinced that North Park is a school whose students take the whole concept of Vikinghood (i.e., sail into town and rape, plunder, and pillage the locals) a bit too literally. I find the whole thing to be hugely amusing, both because of the epic overkill of Wheaton's reaction and because NPU resident students are perennially nothing more than a bunch of totally harmless kids in desperate search of a sports team identified with their school that doesn't cause them to cringe in humiliation.

I'd much rather deal with a noisy but non-threatening handful of skinny frisbee-playing slackers in blue and yellow face paint than with the football players who constitute Wheaton's main student section behind the east basket at King Arena. Unlike the Carlson Crazies, those Wheaton guys look like they could handle themselves in a melee.

North Park students have been traveling to the Wheaton campus for sporting events for generations, and I've yet to hear of any serious incidents arising from their presence -- unless you consider North Park students eating in the Wheaton dining hall without using utensils, or North Park men's basketball players dressing up in drag and trying to sneak into the Wheaton women's dorm to be "serious incidents."

Note to Wheaton administrators: When North Park students show up on your campus for a sporting event, the NPU on their shirts does not stand for "Nasty Pillagers of the Unwary."

Additional comments (language) were shouted at the students. .

If you're wondering about the language, it was probably Swedish.  Seems like have of North Park's student population is from Sweden these days....

As I said a month ago, I'm counting on the increased population of Swedes on the NPU campus to provide the men's golf team with a shot in the arm as well.

[pad3fan]

Additional comments (language) were shouted at the students. .

If you're wondering about the language, it was probably Swedish.  Seems like have of North Park's student population is from Sweden these days....



I know no Swedish and I fully understood the language and what was said

[/quote]

[thunder38]

The bubble burst on the Thunder....too many losses left them on the outside...good luck to North Park against Hope

[Gregory Sager]

North Park will play Hope this weekend (date and time TBA) up in Oshkosh. The host Titans of UWO will play Carroll in the other match.

Here's the bracket.

The bubble burst on the Thunder....too many losses left them on the outside...good luck to North Park against Hope

Thanks, thunder38illini. With North Park as the league's only representative in the tournament, it doubles my desire to see the Vikings do well. Nobody from the CCIW has ever made any headway in the tournament besides Wheaton; NPU is 0-2, Carthage and Elmhurst are both 0-1, and the other four schools have never even made it into the tournament. A deep run by the Vikings might get the league a bit more respect in D3 soccer circles.

[Jim Matson]

It was a great match on Saturday evening.  North Park was a more skilled team, but ddin't play that advantage very well.  But the rivalry and the students made the match memorable.  And really, the better team won.

I did think that the second North Park goal was really a breakdown on the Wheaton side than anything else - several opportunities to clear, yet the Wheaton backs couldn't get it out of the area.  NP did their job to press and be there when the opportunity presented itself.

Wheaton's first and second goals were neat.  When Wheaton scored their first, they had already come close a few times - they were doing well breaking NP's attempts to hold their line and force an off-sides situation.  But what made the equalizer special (as I was sitting in a North Park section with relatives) was that the Yellowbeards had just started off the typical "Hail North Park" chant when Wheaton broke the line and scored   Wheaton's second goal was more the timing than anything else.  It was a great corner, and it was well placed in the corner, beating the Viking keeper easily.  But to score for the tie in the final minute is just a gerat feeling for any fan.

But the Viking goal to win it was a thing of beauty.  Off another weak clearing attempt from the Wheaton back line, a Viking player took the ball away from the goal and then passed it off to #11, who was moving back towards the box. He took a fairly quick shot from the corner of the box that I thought the Wheaton keeper would easily stop.  But the shot was ideal - he pushed it outside-in with some neat Swedish spin and in a 1' window, he was spot on.  One of the nicer goals I've seen at Wheaton in a number of years.

[thunder38]

But the Viking goal to win it was a thing of beauty.  Off another weak clearing attempt from the Wheaton back line, a Viking player took the ball away from the goal and then passed it off to #11, who was moving back towards the box. He took a fairly quick shot from the corner of the box that I thought the Wheaton keeper would easily stop.  But the shot was ideal - he pushed it outside-in with some neat Swedish spin and in a 1' window, he was spot on.  One of the nicer goals I've seen at Wheaton in a number of years.

The goal was extremely well executed by the Vikings and well placed.  Unfortunately for the Thunder both Seager(keeper) and Weaver(back) could have saved or cleared easily but both looked at the other expecting action and the ball just trickled between them...definitely a heartbreaking way for a season to end but a fitting one for the Thunder as they just had those temporary lapses all season long.

[Gregory Sager]

But the Viking goal to win it was a thing of beauty.  Off another weak clearing attempt from the Wheaton back line, a Viking player took the ball away from the goal and then passed it off to #11, who was moving back towards the box. He took a fairly quick shot from the corner of the box that I thought the Wheaton keeper would easily stop.  But the shot was ideal - he pushed it outside-in with some neat Swedish spin and in a 1' window, he was spot on.  One of the nicer goals I've seen at Wheaton in a number of years.

The goal was extremely well executed by the Vikings and well placed.  Unfortunately for the Thunder both Seager(keeper) and Weaver(back) could have saved or cleared easily but both looked at the other expecting action and the ball just trickled between them...definitely a heartbreaking way for a season to end but a fitting one for the Thunder as they just had those temporary lapses all season long.

Turnabout is fair play, I'd say, since in the first match between the two teams back on October 9 it was NPU's mental errors that spelled the difference in Wheaton's win.

What are your thoughts on the respective futures of the two teams and their chances for dominating the league, Jim? After this season, NPU loses its center midfielder (James Kriticos) and the right and left backs (Greg Domanico and Kyle Connelly). Wheaton loses two forwards, starter Stephen Mesko and reserve Cameron Risma. NPU started three freshmen on Saturday night, Wheaton started four.

Getting back to this season ... is the conference tournament taken into consideration when the coaches pick the All-CCIW team, or is it regular-season conference games only? I have to think that Kris Grahn has a very solid shot at Most Outstanding Player if the tournament is part of the equation. He scored the game-winner in the semi against Carthage, and two goals -- including the golden goal in OT -- in the title game at Wheaton. Heck, even the Wheaton head coach has referred to Grahn as the league's best player. If the tournament's not taken into consideration, though, I have to think that Wheaton's Drew Golz will win the MOP award, as I think that any support for an NPU player might be split among several of them (Grahn, Filip Lindmark, Sehten Hills, etc.), with NPU's Tim Ahlberg and Wheaton's Ryan Seager basically canceling each other out in terms of any keepers being considered for the award.

In the past, the coaches have almost always simply handed the MOP to whichever Wheaton player shined the most. I'd love to see a Viking win it this year; the only North Park player who's ever been selected as MOP was Austin Person back in '05.

[tjcummingsfan]

Hope beat Calvin for the MIAA AQ, which puts both those teams in, probably had a hand n costing Wheaton a shot at the tourney field (that and the month of September).

North Park plays Hope up in Osh Kosh in the first round (UW-O takes on Carroll) Friday, ncaa.com still says TBA for the time. 

I'm hoping/assuming it'll be shown somewhere, is that a reasonable assumption?

[Gregory Sager]

Hope vs. NPU will be Friday at 7:30 pm Central, 6:30 pm local time.

I don't think that it'll be shown anywhere, unless Benj Ecker has an iPhone and makes a conference call with it.

[Gregory Sager]

Congrats to the six Vikings who made the All-CCIW first team (senior James Kriticos, juniors Kris Grahn and Sehten Hills, sophomore Tim Ahlberg, and freshmen Hannes Granlund and Filip Lindmark). Congrats as well to Grahn for winning the league's Most Outstanding Player, and to John Born for winning the Joe Bean Award as the CCIW's Coach of the Year. A pretty good haul of prizes!

Wheaton had four first-teamers, which means that NPU and Wheaton had ten of the thirteen slots on the All-CCIW first team.

[Jim Matson]

That's a great showing for North Park!

[thePietist]

Hope vs. NPU will be Friday at 7:30 pm Central, 6:30 pm local time.

I don't think that it'll be shown anywhere, unless Benj Ecker has an iPhone and makes a conference call with it.

Alas, Benj Ecker neither has an iPhone nor will be at the match.  If only the game were being played on the OTHER side of the lake...

[thePietist]

It was a great match on Saturday evening.  North Park was a more skilled team, but ddin't play that advantage very well.  But the rivalry and the students made the match memorable.  And really, the better team won.

I was surprised to hear this, coming from Jim.  The numbers (SOG, etc) seem to tell a different story.  And, of course, the WETN guys tell a very different story when broadcasting...
Good to know that NP is the real deal.  Perhaps this is the year for a deep run in the tourney by the Vikings.

[Gregory Sager]

It was a great match on Saturday evening.  North Park was a more skilled team, but ddin't play that advantage very well.  But the rivalry and the students made the match memorable.  And really, the better team won.

I was surprised to hear this, coming from Jim.  The numbers (SOG, etc) seem to tell a different story.  And, of course, the WETN guys tell a very different story when broadcasting...

WETN's had some great student broadcasters in the past (Paul Carr, Bryan Holmgren), but the two guys who are on the call now (and were on the call last year) are total homers. At least they don't scream or make up ridiculous Bermanesque nicknames ("Joel Kolmodin Dragon!" "Martin 'the Chicago' Trimiew!"), but you need a crowbar to pry a compliment of an opposing player or play out of them. I think that they referred to NPU's Kris Grahn once as "dangerous," and that was about it. Based upon their call, you never would've had the impression that NPU was capable of scoring on Wheaton, let alone have the lead for most of the match.

Hope vs. NPU will be Friday at 7:30 pm Central, 6:30 pm local time.

I don't think that it'll be shown anywhere, unless Benj Ecker has an iPhone and makes a conference call with it.

Alas, Benj Ecker neither has an iPhone nor will be at the match.  If only the game were being played on the OTHER side of the lake...

I posted that with the assumption that the ferry was still running.