WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Roundball999]

Similarly have to give props to Wisconsin Lutheran this year, for inviting WashU and Hope to their inaugural Paul Knueppel tournament this past weekend and playing them both.  They've had great success in their league in recent years and have made the NCAAs, but suffered early exits from the tournament.  Seems clear they decided they needed to strengthen their non-league schedule to better prepare for post season.  They took a couple of losses but they have a very nice team and such experience will help them understand what to expect come NCAA time.

[RogK]

Congratulations to Katie McDaniels, Wheaton freshman, the new CCIW Player of the Week.
http://www.cciw.org/news/2013/11/25/WBB_1125130102.aspx
I had my first look at Wheaton on Friday night and was impressed by McDaniels (among others). The scoring and rebounding mentioned in the article are not the whole story; she's also an excellent dribbler/ballhandler with no shortage of effort and energy. Coach Madsen used a lot of freshmen effectively last year and has definitely found another good one.

[RogK]

Some unusual numbers from the Augie game the other day : Augie had only 4 FT attempts and Blackburn tried only 9.
The composite CCIW record is at 22-9, with 4 contests set for this evening.
Early CCIW stats show Carthage and Elmhurst players doing very well in the Assist/Turnover category : Erin Quinn 12/2, Karen Senette 15/4, Devin Vaughn 21/6, Stephanie Kuzmanic 30/12. Yes, iwu70, Lexi's 22/10 is next and is quite good, too.

[Gregory Sager]

I wouldn't put much stock in stats at this point, Rog. Just look at the point differentials; four CCIW teams have average scoring margins that are up over +21!

[iwu70]

Seems the women in the CCIW are having a much better time of it so far than the men.  Yes, some good players -- veterans and newbies.  Should be a very competitive league race.  IWU plays so many top teams in the next few weeks, doubt they will have much of a point differential as in past years.  They will play a lot of close games, perhaps even be beaten badly by Wash U or DePauw.  We'll see.  They played Point tough, but just one possession or one trey short.  Game with Cornell was also close, hard fought.  IWU is clearly a good team, but also very much a work in progress, with much improvement needed to contend with the very top teams, and with Carthage.  Could happen. 

IWU70

[Gregory Sager]

North Park 103, Illinois Tech 29

Liz Rehberger: 16 pts, 3 stls
Brittany Pittas: 14 pts, 3:0 a:to, 3 stls
Annie Shain: 14 pts (4-4 trey), 4:1 a:to, 4 stls
Soly Roman: 12 pts, 8 rebs
Nicole Kruckman: 11 pts
Amani Davis: 6 rebs, 4:2 a:to, 3 stls
Nikki Przybyslawski: 5:0 a:to

This one went according to form, as the Vikings set a new school winning-margin mark by annihilating the badly-undermanned Scarlet Hawks. All fourteen NPU players who suited up scored, and none of the starters saw more than 16 minutes of action. Given that Amanda Reese Crockett is already using everyone on the roster pretty extensively, it was a bit hard to hold the score down on IIT; it wasn't as though she could put in a JV team or a little-used bunch of reserves from the end of the bench into the game in the second half. And you can't tell the Vikings, who pilfered 23 steals tonight, to stop playing defense.

This ho-hum win will have a very different flavor than what the Vikings will face this weekend in northern Kentucky. NPU will be very sharply tested by #8 Thomas More (3-0) and Centre (4-1), the latter of which has only a double-overtime loss to #1 DePauw as a blot on its record.

[RogK]

The league record improved to 26-9 with yesterday's 4 wins.
Augie topped Clarke 80-60 as Jessica Baids made 8/8 FGs.
Carthage eased past Trine 77-44. Michelle Wenzel had 16 pts (8/13), 7 rebs, 3 blocks while Stephanie Kuzmanic had 15 pts (7/8 FG, 1/2 FT), 9 assists, 0 TOs.
North Central rallied from a 14 pt deficit and defeated Benedictine 102-98. Kimberly Wilson led 'em with 17 pts and DeJa Moore had 7 rebs.
Greg, you forgot about NP's 97-20 win last year, a margin of 77.

[iwu70]

Good luck to the Titans tonight vs. highly-ranked WI-WW up in Cheeseheadland. 

GO TITANS -- bring home a W.

IWU70

[RogK]

I'm surprised that you didn't use the "Come Smell Our Dairy Air" line, iwu70.

[Gregory Sager]

You're right. For some reason I was thinking that NPU won that game over Moody last year by an 87-20 score. Nice catch, Rog.

[iwu70]

I like, prefer the one that Northfield, MN. uses = "Cows, Colleges, and Contentment."

Go TITANS -- tonight in Whitewater.

'70

[mark_reichert]

I've always admired the guts of whichever team joins the IWU/WashU/DePauw tourney.  I haven't attempted to check, but I wonder how many times that team has avoided 4th place?

Three times: Illinois College,  Kalamazoo, Central (Iowa) College.   There's been 14 tournaments, one time there wasn't a 4th team, and 10 times the 4th team has gone 0-2.  IWU has gone 0-2 twice and WashU once.

1999-00 Washington University 2-0, IWU, Depauw 1-1, Beloit 0-2
2000-01 Washington University 2-0, Depauw, Illinois College 1-1, IWU 0-2
2001-02 Washington University 2-0, IWU, Depauw 1-1, Thomas More 0-2
2002-03 Washington University 2-0, IWU, Depauw 1-1, Illinois College 0-2
2003-04 Washington University 2-0, IWU, Depauw 1-1, Illinois College 0-2
2004-05 Washington University 2-0, Depauw, Kalamazoo 1-1, IWU 0-2
2005-06 Washington University 2-0, IWU, Depauw 1-1, Coe College 0-2
2006-07 IWU 2-0, Depauw, Central (Iowa) College 1-1, Washington University 0-2
2007-08 Depauw 2-0, IWU, Washington University 1-1, Olivet 0-2
2008-09 IWU 2-0, Depauw, Washington University 1-1, Central (Iowa) College  0-2     
2009-10 IWU 2-0, Depauw, Washington University 1-1, Central (Iowa) College  0-2

2010-11 IWU, Depauw, Washington University 1-1 (no fourth team, round robin)

2011-12 Depauw 2-0, IWU, Washington University 1-1, Hendrix 0-2
2012-13 Depauw 2-0, IWU, Washington University 1-1, Coe 0-2

The Bears haven't gone 2-0 since the year before Depauw won its first championship, though it was IWU that went 2-0 that year.  Also, the three teams had a history of playing each other before the tournament started.  WashU is listed as playing both at the start of the year the three years prior to the tournament and one or the other for quite a few years before that.

Illinois College is making its fourth appearance this year breaking the tie with Central (Iowa).

[mark_reichert]

Similarly have to give props to Wisconsin Lutheran this year, for inviting WashU and Hope to their inaugural Paul Knueppel tournament this past weekend and playing them both.

The format of that tournament is one way Millikin could avoid playing IWU in the Tip Off tournament, since Hope and WashU only played Wisconsin Lutheran and Hiram, not each other.  You don't insure that there is a single 2-0 team like the usual format, but they didn't get that 2010-2011.

[iwu70]

IWU loses tonight to Whitewater up in Wisconsin, 96-79.  About what I expected.  Titans got back to within 9, but then WW blew it back out in the final minutes, latter portion of the second half. 

Colleen McMahon had 19, other Titans played well.  WW had six players in double figures and outrebounded the smaller Titans.  Titans now 3-2.  WW now 5-0 and clearly a top five team.  WW shot over 60% from the field and over 90% from the charity strip.  Lots of fouls, FT shooting again.  Titans played decent, but just not enough against a team like WW.

Doesn't get any easier for the Titans as they next face another top-five ranked team in Wash U in a tournament this weekend, along with #1 ranked, defending national champions, DePauw.  I expect IWU to go 1-1 this weekend, and come out of the first 7 games at 4-3.  Again, if the Titans finish this first pre-CCIW portion at 7-4 or still better, 8-3, I'd be delighted, amazed.

IWU70

[iwu70]

Good luck to the Titans this weekend -- first up on Saturday, #4 Wash U.  A great match-up.  If the Titans win that one, they likely get #1 DePauw.  A great opportunity to play the best to be the best.  The other team in the tournament is 3-1 Illinois College, also a good team.

GO TITANS!

IWU'70 -- off to Asia tomorrow.  I'll be watching, cheering from the Far Side.

ms