WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[keith45]

Having been off-line a few days, I'm a little late with this.
Yes indeed, Sarah Peterson was fabulous Saturday. Among her 5 blocks were at least two deflected 3FG att where she came "out of nowhere." She was a key player advancing the ball up through NC's press. Her very full stat line tells the rest. All this was done with aching knees, it appeared to me.
Kamauria Acree had an extraordinarily strong game, too. What doesn't register among her stats is that she stopped NC's guards from driving to the hoop.
Shaina Yalda was very helpful to the Viking cause, as well, with smart energetic play.
North Central played almost well enough to win. As in the first meeting of these teams, NC seemed to stop doing what was working and altered their style of play in the last few minutes. And a couple of players who were "lights out" from three-land bypassed some open looks in the 2nd half. It looks weird when a "System" team doesn't shoot open threes. Oh well, easy for me to be a critic! The Cardinals better not hold back anything tonight in Decatur.
By the way, when Greg writes "Go Wheaton" he would prefer to add "and don't come back."

not to be overlooked was that NCC played the system with 11 healthy players (Marion B. had some back and hamstring issues, but still played) A few other rotation players are out with injury as well, and while they may not play a ton of minutes, the minutes they play are critical (Tonisha Ellington is one who comes to mind, to spell the post players). I think they played well enough to win but the wide open 3 to Peterson was a killer, as well as the missed free throw. The game felt like 2 evenly matched teams and the season margin of victory says that.  I feel better about tonight with Michelle Todd back in her spot in the rotation.  GO CARDS

[Gregory Sager]

By the way, when Greg writes "Go Wheaton" he would prefer to add "and don't come back."

Indeed. I am very aware of that sentiment, since I am a partially Swedish Wheaton alum working at a Covenant camp and retreat center 

Which one?

[RogK]

keith45, true, NC did not have a full set of healthy players. But, North Park only used 10 and they played at North Central's pace, too.
Anyway, I fully agree about Michelle Todd. If she's not the most important defensive player on North Central, she's number 2 or 3. In CCIW play, she number 8 in defensive rebounds at 5.0 (Cailee Corcoran leads with 7.0) and is number 4 with 2.3 steals per game.
Millikin is ending its season on an upswing, so the Cardinals will have to play 40 good minutes.

[Pat Coleman]

Not unusual for System teams to play 15 players and their opponents to play 9 or 10. They may have played at the System team's pace (it's difficult not to) but they don't press the way the System team does.

[RogK]

Also true, Pat.
NC may or may not have done better with 15 or 16; we can't know. None of that detracts from the fact that North Park came away with a big win.
Good luck to everyone tonight.

[Backseat Driver]

By the way, when Greg writes "Go Wheaton" he would prefer to add "and don't come back."

Indeed. I am very aware of that sentiment, since I am a partially Swedish Wheaton alum working at a Covenant camp and retreat center 

Which one?

Mission Springs in Scotts Valley, CA

[Backseat Driver]

Conference tournament field is set for Friday:

#3 Illinois Wesleyan (18-7, 11-3) vs. #2 Wheaton (21-4, 11-3) @ 5:00
#4 North Central (13-12, 6-8) vs. #1 Carthage (21-4, 12-1) @ 7:00

Also, congratulations to IWU head coach Mia Smith for her 300th career victory, picked up tonight vs. Augie. Yet another impressive milestone for her.

[Backseat Driver]

Wheaton 70
Elmhurst 50

I'll let RogK provide the details, since I spotted him in his customary west-endzone seat at King Arena, but I thought I'd point out Maris Hovee's unique stat line from tonight: 10 rebounds, 5 assists, 4 blocks (0 points). Maris may not score a lot of points, but she is absolutely critical to Wheaton's success because of all of the other things she does well.

[Gregory Sager]

NPU fell to Carthage tonight up in the Toolshed, 69-50. Since North Central overtook Millikin late and beat the Big Blue, that ends the season for the Vikings -- and, sadly, the careers of eight NPU seniors.

I wish it would've turned out differently, but the unfortunate truth is that NPU has to look in the mirror to see who was responsible for the Vikings' missing out on the CCIW tournament. Game after game after game, the Vikings played down to the wire, only to end up losing. Last Saturday's win at NCC was an exception, but by that time the Vikings had really dug themselves so deeply into a hole that their destiny wasn't really in their hands -- not with a win at Carthage required to win the fourth seed rather than have a bunch of tiebreaker possibilities swing their way.

Nevertheless, those eight seniors -- Kamauria Acree, Sarah Peterson, Shaina Yalda, Dana Christensen, Bridgette Gray, and Becca Heimsath in particular, but also Tara Spell and Natalie Steward -- deserve to be commended and applauded for all that they did to bring NPU women's basketball back from the depths and to make the Vikings competitive once again. Their hard work and sacrifice has certainly not gone unnoticed by me or by anybody else. Well done, NPU seniors!

[Gregory Sager]

By the way, when Greg writes "Go Wheaton" he would prefer to add "and don't come back."

Indeed. I am very aware of that sentiment, since I am a partially Swedish Wheaton alum working at a Covenant camp and retreat center 

Which one?

Mission Springs in Scotts Valley, CA

A young man from my church, O'Neal Patrick, used to work there. He still makes his home out there in California.

[RogK]

Backseat Driver, if you saw me on the webcast, you may want to wash the screen!
I don't have a great deal to say about the game. Wheaton played really well in spurts. Brooke Olson and Ellie Zeller tallied 17. As you noted, Maris Hovee had a big impact, including limiting Fiona McMahon to 11 pts.
Wheaton held Elmhurst to 18/63 overall FG shooting. For the 14-game CCIW season, they set a new .304 opponents' FG pct record.
North Central established a couple of conference-play records last night, too. Their team scoring average of 86.1 and total 3FGs made 142 are new highs.
Millikin led 63-62 with 4:19 to go, but NC ended the game on a 16-2 run (Bobbi Johns 8/8 FTs in that stretch). NC made just 4 of 22 3FG att and committed 29 TOs, but pressured Millikin into 41 TOs.
Millikin got 20 pts/7 rebs from Brittany Czaplicki, 16 and 8 from Kelsey Going. Johns and Larynn Shumaker topped NC with 14 pts, Callie Rezin 12 pts, Sophie Newson had 9 and 12r, Emily Murphy grabbed 7 rebs.

[TitanPride]

New Midwest Regional rankings:

1   Cornell 22-1   22-1
2   UW-Whitewater   18-4   20-5
3   Washington U.   18-4   19-5
4   Carthage   18-4   20-4
5   UW-Oshkosh   17-5   20-5
6   Illinois Wesleyan   15-5   17-7
7   Monmouth   18-4   19-4
8   UW-Stevens Point   19-5   20-5

Surprising to see the Titans move in ahead of Wheaton?

[Naperick]

Why is Wheaton left out?  Am I missing something?

[iwu70]

Congrats to Mia Smith on win #300.  Great job!

Also, I think Katy Seibring, with her 14 points in that Augie game wrapped up the CCIW scoring title for the regular season.  Great job, Katy -- truly a breakout season for her.  She, McMahon and Baltes all back next season, so a good core to build on for Mia Smith going beyond 300 victories.  Need a strong recruiting class coming in for future seasons. 

Should be a great tournament this weekend.  Go TITANS!  I'm hoping for another IWU-CC clash in the championship game.

IWU70

[Mr. Ypsi]

Congrats to Mia Smith on win #300.  Great job!

Also, I think Katy Seibring, with her 14 points in that Augie game wrapped up the CCIW scoring title for the regular season.  Great job, Katy -- truly a breakout season for her.  She, McMahon and Baltes all back next season, so a good core to build on for Mia Smith going beyond 300 victories.  Need a strong recruiting class coming in for future seasons. 

Should be a great tournament this weekend.  Go TITANS!  I'm hoping for another IWU-CC clash in the championship game.

IWU70

Yeah, but first we've gotta somehow beat Wheaton.  We lost in Wheaton, and we lost in Bloomington - maybe Kenosha will be our lucky charm!   (Certainly no other CCIW team has the extent of tourney experience that the Titans have.)