WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[iwu70]

IWU hosts Thomas Moore and Sydney Moss on Dec. 30th, @The Shirk.

IWU'70

[Gregory Sager]

Greg, as to the 'left-handed compliment', shame on you for the slur on lefties!   (Actually, I'm right-handed, but after congratulating you on you generally fine accuracy, I thought I should stick up for my left-handed friends! )  I may have retired at just the right time - I was only getting wikipedia footnotes the last couple of years.  I made it clear that they were NOT acceptable - either cite the source they footnoted, or, if not footnoted, find another source.  (I got a lot of 'blowback' from students, but was solidly backed on this issue by my DH and other administrators.)

That's where wikipedia's true usefulness lies, in the footnotes that link to more definitive sources. If a wiki article asserts something, and the footnote to that assertion is a dead link, I don't cite it.

If being the North Park women's coach at the time of NCC's title qualifies me to chime in on the early CCIW schools and women's sports, I'll try.  The job was handed to me as a way to get a "full time" salary. I was the head men's soccer coach, head women's basketball coach and head men's tennis coach and I was general manager of Tam Tennis Club in Niles which was owned by NP.  That job scope might indicate something about the view of all those jobs.

It does, but it's even more indicative of NPU's perpetual tendency to squeeze every dime. As bad as it is now, it was far worse back in the NPC days. (I notice that you left out your two most high-profile jobs on campus, that of resident advisor at Burgh Hall and p.a. announcer in the crackerbox for men's basketball.)

If nothing else, North Park certainly augmented your résumé quite nicely.

There's no doubt that the women's programs were looked at as the junior junior varsity. Practice times were set around the men's schedule and the games in the Crackerbox were played with only half the bleachers pulled out. When we played a doubleheader at NCC they actually were putting together the floor level seating during the women's game. We at least had decent uniforms and a future NBA ref (Ron Olesiak) calling games. I know that the other coaches were happy when we won but rarely came to our games.  I was used to that from coaching soccer.

I remember thinking during my student days what a shame it was that your Vikings drew so little attention, because my classmate Becky Djurickovic (née Johnson) was so much fun to watch. She was good, and, while Bosko was a decent role player in his own right when he played on the NPC men's team (or so I'm told), I'm pretty sure that Stevie D. (as well as his younger brother, former Carthage football standout Pete Djurickovic) got his athleticism from his mother.

I enjoyed sharing the fact with Steve that, while he holds almost every conceivable scoring and assists record at Carthage, the record for the most assists ever tallied in a game at Tarble Arena wasn't his. It was held by his mother, who tallied 15 dimes for the Vikings in a game at Carthage in '83 (no doubt due to the flawless X's and O's drawn up in the huddle by Coach Hakes ). Alas, Stephanie Kuzmanic broke the gym record by dishing out 17 assists in a home game against North Central two years ago. The problem with having a Grinnell-system team in the CCIW is that no record is safe anymore, gym records as well as strictly women's basketball records.

The NCAA was slow to embrace women's sports and the CCIW leadership was pretty much in line with that.

Very true. We're talking about the time period in which the NCAA, which had fought tooth-and-nail against Title IX and showed little interest in sponsoring women's sports, caught on to the fact that women's sports could actually make money and began to challenge the AIAW for membership. The NCAA ran its first D1 women's basketball national tournament in 1982, and the AIAW, which lacked the TV contracts and the resources to fight back, went defunct a year later.

We really didn't feel that bad about it at the time because at least the women got to play and the games were pretty intense. Looking back we should have been more demanding I suppose but we didn't know it at the time. I really enjoyed the experience and hopefully the players got something out of it. Glad to have been a pioneer with both soccer and women's basketball. Each had a ton more fans than tennis so it's al relative.

One of the things that I find most gratifying about this generation of NPU students is the way that male student-athletes support female student-athletes. The volleyball team drew a lot of supporters in the crackerbox from the football and men's soccer teams, even though the NPU volleyball team struggled mightily this season, and the men's basketball team is always present in force down in the front row to cheer on the women's team. Of course, the fact that they travel together for weekend games in January and February contributes to that cameraderie.

NCC was good in that era but didn't seem like they were unbeatable. The tournament was so low key that I don't know that we knew that they had won the Nationals until some time after the fact. Pre-D3hoops. Actually pre-Internet.

That doesn't surprise me at all, especially since, as I said, it was only the second D3 women's basketball tourney ever held.

[joehakes]

I guess I have tried to forget about being the RD in Burgh Hall. I had never lived in a dorm and my wife was never a college student. But I should be proud of the student development role in producing such fine young men as Mr. Sager. 

[Mr. Ypsi]

I guess I have tried to forget about being the RD in Burgh Hall. I had never lived in a dorm and my wife was never a college student. But I should be proud of the student development role in producing such fine young men as Mr. Sager. 

Don't worry - we won't blame you for how he turned out!

[joehakes]

Gosi, thanks. That burden haunts me constantly.

[Gregory Sager]

There aren't a lot of people standing in line to take credit for my deportment.

I never understood why.

[Gregory Sager]

North Park 64
St. Mary's (IN) 49

Shaylee Sloan: 11 pts, 9 rebs
Gabby Sandoval: 10 pts
Soly Roman: 7 rebs
Nicole Kruckman: 6 rebs
Liz Rehberger: 5 stls

NPU looked great on defense tonight, as the Vikings open the 2015-16 campaign with a home win over the overmatched Belles.

[Mr. Ypsi]

North Park 64
St. Mary's (IN) 49

Shaylee Sloan: 11 pts, 9 rebs
Gabby Sandoval: 10 pts
Soly Roman: 7 rebs
Nicole Kruckman: 6 rebs
Liz Rehberger: 5 stls

NPU looked great on defense tonight, as the Vikings open the 2015-16 campaign with a home win over the overmatched Belles.

Sounds like the Belles need to sneak in a couple of Notre Dame players in drag!  (Son #1 was running an indoor soccer facility in that area for a couple of years; we stayed at the Inn at St. Mary's on one of our visits - VERY nice facility.)

[Gregory Sager]

North Park 78
Anderson 62

Soly Roman: 20 pts (10-11 FG), 6 rebs
Amani Davis: 15 pts, 9 rebs, 5 stls
Liz Rehberger: 13 pts, 7 rebs, 5:1 a:to
Rachel Torres: 4 stls, 3:1 a:to
Nicole Kruckman: 4:1 a:to
Gabby Sandoval: 3:1 a:to

The Vikings scored the first 20 points of the game and never looked back; although the Ravens kept NPU from running away with it, the lead never dipped below double digits. A nice night of work for the Vikings, in spite of the fact that they went 0-11 from downtown.

North Park (2-0) will face Trine (2-0) in the championship game of the Anderson Tipoff Tourney tomorrow afternoon, as the Thunder beat #25 Baldwin Wallace in the other semi.

[iwu70]

IWU opens the season with a good 86-57 win over Oberlin, playing in Michigan @ Adrian tourney.  Starters as expected:  McGraw, Ehresman, Ellsworth, Weber and Holness.  But, some good contributions from the two new post playing freshmen -- getting 6-9 FG and 4-5 FTs from them, and some good rebounding.  This will be key going forward, and I'd expect more minutes for these two in different rotations.  Oberlin had 30 TOs, leading to 27 points, with the margin of victory about the same.  "Run and Jump" doing its dirt.  Titans play the hosts today 3 p.m.  If the Titans shoot it better from 3 and play the tough D, the full court pressure, with the improved rebounding and interior D provided by these two freshmen, this TITAN team could be good.  Time will tell.

IWU'70

IWU women's soccer playing in the D3 tournament Sectional today -- in St. Louis at Wash U, luckily below the snow line.  ISU playing football, their final regular season game today in the driving snow . . .likely 3-4 inches by game time.  I guess WC football is playing in the snow today too.  No thanks.  I'm to the warmth of The Shirk for the men's games -- IWU vs. Wilmington later today.    Weekend tournament.  Games Saturday and Sunday. 

[iwu70]

Correction:  Titans at Albion, playing host Albion today at 3 p.m. (not Adrian). 

'70

[iwu70]

IWU starts the season 2-0 with a 57-54 win over Albion.  Rebekah Ehresman with 19 points, 8 RBs. 

Things looking up for the IWU women's program for this season.

IWU'70

[Gregory Sager]

Double OT final:

North Park 75
Trine 71

Liz Rehberger: 29 pts, 9 rebs
Amani Davis: 16 pts, 7 rebs, 4:1 a:to
Rachel Torres: 13 pts, 6 rebs
Soly Román: 9 rebs
Shaylee Sloan: 6 rebs

NPU won a gut-check contest this afternoon against a really good Trine team to claim the Anderson University Tipoff Tourney title. The Vikings had to fight through weariness and some long scoring droughts in order to do so, but in the end their terrific defense allowed them to prevail.

The Vikings led for most of regulation, building up a lead as big as 12 points at 55-43 with less than seven minutes to go in regulation. But the offense stalled out, and the Thunder went on a 12-0 run over the next three minutes to tie it up. Trine was up by one, 60-59, and was at the FT line with six seconds remaining. The Thunder shooter made the first and missed the second; NPU center Soly Román grabbed the rebound and scored the tying basket at the other end of the floor just before the backboard lit up, forcing overtime.

Neither team was able to get any separation in the first extra session, but in the second the Vikings were able to play off of their defense to win the game. Trine was stifled on all of its final six possessions, with the only good chance to score in that sequence resulting in a pair of missed Thunder FTs. The Vikings, although clearly exhausted, managed to scrape enough points together during that strong defensive stretch to outpace the Thunder.

Although they didn't shoot well -- Trine's 6'2 center gave the Vikings bigs all kinds of headaches and redirected a lot of shots in close that usually go in the basket -- the Vikings played terrific defense for the most part and held Trine even on the boards while forcing five more Thunder turnovers than the Vikes themselves coughed up. Liz Rehberger's 29 points was a career high, as she and Román were named to the All-Tournament team.

The first two NPU wins were solid but not terribly impressive, given that neither St. Mary's (IN) nor Anderson is much of a force. But Trine is very good; the Thunder were picked to finish third in the MIAA, right behind perennial national powers Calvin and Hope, and they were fresh off of a six-point victory over preseason #25 Baldwin Wallace last night. This is a win that the Vikings can build upon.

NPU will next be back in action this coming Saturday in the crackerbox for the NPU Invite Tourney, hosting the Big Red of Denison (2-2). It's a classic-format tourney, since Elmhurst is one of the other participating squads. The 'jays will tangle with Wartburg in the other first-round game.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Greg, was it the Trine women who went System a few years back?  I believe they (or whoever it is I'm thinking of) abandoned it after just a few seasons.

[Gregory Sager]

I don't remember it being Trine. If it was, it was a long time ago.