WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

iwu70 · February 27, 2022, 10:53:43 AM

Seeding and the initial pod IWU plays in this coming weekend will be important. Otherwise, they may get the privilege of playing Trine or Hope.

Congrats to MU and IWU for last night's superb CCIW tournament championship game.

IWU'70

Roundball999 · February 27, 2022, 11:22:54 AM

Quote from: iwu70 on February 27, 2022, 10:53:43 AM
Seeding and the initial pod IWU plays in this coming weekend will be important. Otherwise, they may get the privilege of playing Trine or Hope.

Congrats to MU and IWU for last night's superb CCIW tournament championship game.

IWU'70

Likewise. We Hope fans remember too well the last time when underdog on paper IWU came into highly ranked Hope's house

Congrats on winning the AQ. Seems the Titans made great strides during the course of the year.

iwu70 · February 27, 2022, 05:24:48 PM

Eginerd, you were right all along . . . "the Titans will be just fine." Excellent development over the course of the season, playing a tough schedule, a great coaching job by Coach Smith and her assistants, learning to play with the personnel and style that they have. I was wrong and too harsh on them after the 1-4 tough start . . . even saying I doubted they would be a .500 team, saying I doubted they would beat any of the supposed top three CCIW teams: WC, MU and NPU. They went 6-1 against these teams, winning key road games and also going 2-1 against the greatly-improving Carroll. IWU quite fortunate to have few Covid absences and almost no injuries all season.

Roundball999, oh how we would love a re-match vs. Hope at some point, after that last game in the tournament @Hope . . . you know all the feelings, still stuck in our craw, about that one!

But, let's hope if we do meet again, it will be in the Sweet 16 or Elite 8, not the first weekend. Hope and Trine surely the cream of the crop this year. IWU is battle-tested, now playing with a lot of confidence . . . and those three freshmen, along with the three experienced seniors, showing the way. The junior Heller one of the best sixth women in the country. It's a good combination and the future of the program is bright, likely in good hands with Huber, Palmer and Powers . . . and a good recruiting class coming in, as per reports around The Shirk.

Looking forward to the D3 dance.

IWU'70

GoPerry · February 28, 2022, 03:30:49 PM

First round matchups:

IWU (19-8) vs DePauw (23-3) @ Whitewater (23-4, vs Ripon (18-9))

Millikin (21-6) vs Wartburg (21-5) @ Eau Claire (21-7, vs North Central MN (24-4))

Neither team will have it easy. But DePauw is a particularly rough first round draw for IWU albeit not especially unexpected under the circumstances.

Gregory Sager · February 28, 2022, 03:33:43 PM

Illinois Wesleyan is in the lower left section of the bracket, and will go in as a #3 seed in the UW-Whitewater pod, taking on DePauw (23-3) on Friday night. UWW hosts Ripon in the other game in Whitewater. This is a nasty pod, indeed.

Millikin is in the upper right section of the bracket, and will face Wartburg (21-5) up in Eau Claire, WI in what should be one of the best 2/3 games that the D3 women's basketball tourney has to offer on Friday night. The host Blugolds of UWEC will take on (and pound the crap out of) North Central (MN) in the other game up there in west-central Wisconsin.

Gregory Sager · February 28, 2022, 03:54:07 PM

The big question, to me, is whether or not at least one of the CCIW's two representatives can survive the first weekend of the tournament. It hasn't happened since 2014, when Carthage got to the sectional semifinals before falling. That's six straight tournaments in which the CCIW was out of it before the smoke cleared at the end of Pod Weekend -- and of those six straight tournaments, five included two CCIW reps, just like this season's field. The league has gone 3-11 in D3 tourney play since that 2014 run by the since-renamed Lady Reds, and 3-11 is a dismal performance by this league no matter how you slice it.

Some of that speaks to the quality of midwestern D3 women's basketball. But a lot of it speaks to the fact that, unlike the men's side of things, this really isn't a power conference, the two national titles since Y2K notwithstanding. But in that vein it's interesting to note that this is the first time that Millikin has made it to the dance since Lori Kerans and her crew of Ippel, Minott, Conner, etc., cut down the nets at Virginia Wesleyan's Batten Center on the last day of the 2004-05 season.

Gregory Sager · February 28, 2022, 09:47:45 PM

Massey sez:

DePauw 65, Illinois Wesleyan 61 (DePauw 62%, IWU 38%)
Wartburg 71, Millikin 68 (Wartburg 58%, Millikin 42%)

Mr. Ypsi · February 28, 2022, 11:56:03 PM

Final regular season poll is up. Millikin only lost 3 of their points (13 to 10); IWU finally got one point.

RogK · March 01, 2022, 11:11:48 AM

Wartburg per game averages :
3FG : 10.7/30.8 = 32.1 pts/g
2FG : 15.3/33.3 = 30.6 pts/g
FT : 13.5/18.3
They have 5 losses, three of them to Simpson (a nemesis indeed), also Redlands and Dubuque.
Millikin will be Wartburg's first CCIW opponent of the season.

RogK · March 01, 2022, 11:33:43 AM

DePauw per game averages :
3FG : 5.5/15.7 = 16.38 pts/g
2FG : 20.4/45.9 = 40.77 pts/g
FT : 14.38/19.6
They have 3 losses - Messiah, Piedmont, Wittenberg.
Their only CCIW opponent was Millikin, whom they beat 71-55 on Nov 16.

iwu70 · March 01, 2022, 12:48:34 PM

Thanks, RogK, for the data. Yes, seems both IWU and MU got pretty tough first round games. I think both teams are far better than they were earlier in the season, so we'll see. DePauw is an especially tough opponent for a first-round game . . . and then Whitewater, which pounded IWU earlier in the season. Would love to see any CCIW team get out of the first weekend, though I doubt it will happen this year. At least we didn't get Hope or Trine!

'70

RogK · March 01, 2022, 11:00:12 PM

Both Friday games for CCIW teams are set for 5pm Central. Not to mention conflicting with re-runs of Streets of San Francisco and The Addams Family.

iwu70 · March 02, 2022, 08:59:58 AM

Rog, a first world problem!

'70

Gregory Sager · March 02, 2022, 01:48:32 PM

Quote from: RogK on March 01, 2022, 11:00:12 PM
Both Friday games for CCIW teams are set for 5pm Central. Not to mention conflicting with re-runs of Streets of San Francisco and The Addams Family.

Neat! Sweet! Petite!

Gregory Sager · March 02, 2022, 01:58:22 PM

Esther Miller of NPU traded in her basketball jersey for a track singlet immediately after the basketball season ended for the Vikings on Tuesday -- and I mean immediately, as the CCIW's indoor track & field championships were held this past weekend at Carthage.

Esther immediately made her presence felt, finishing third in the league in the triple jump with a jump of 10.85 meters. She was also added to North Park's women's 4 x 400 relay team on late notice, and the team promptly shaved six seconds off of their best time this season.

I'm always impressed when a student-athlete can excel in more than one sport. But I'm doubly impressed when a student-athlete can switch sports on the fly and excel at a second sport in which she or he has not practiced or competed all season long to that point.