WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

Wheaton beat North Central, 52-40. Was the Little Brass Bell in the house this afternoon at the airplane hangar? That final score is more like a football score than a basketball score.

[Gregory Sager]

Augie and Carthage going to OT in Tarble Arena.

[Gregory Sager]

Augie and Carthage heading to a second OT. Autumn Kalis of the Lady Reds, who had sent the game into the first overtime by laying in a buzzer-beater, had a right-baseline trey attempt swirl around the rim and drop out with four seconds left.

[Gregory Sager]

Carthage survives at home with a 90-84 double-OT win over Augustana. It was an impressive victory, given that Maggie Berigan left with an ankle injury in the third quarter and never returned. Some great individual performances in this one: Sammie Woodward had 31 points and an impressive 9:2 a:to ratio, and Autumn Kalis had 27 and 7 for the Lady Reds. Amanda Larson, who hit a huge trey late in the second extra stanza, finished with 11 and a fine 4:1 a:to along with 3 steals. Meanwhile, Augie featured Gabriela Loiz's 32 and 7 and Lauren Hall's 15 and 9, while Alexis Jones fouled out late in second overtime with 13 points and 19 (?!) rebounds.

[Ultimate Titan Fan]

Riley Brovelli playing at a great, consistent level.  All-conference level, IMHO. 

Her line today vs. MU:  10 points, 10 rebounds, 3 assists, 5 blocks, 4 steals, 1 TO. 

Let's hope Shanks and Munroe are back soon.  Some flu about it seems.  Munroe injured in the game in TX. -- likely back Wednesday. 

'70

My understanding is Bowan was sick tonight too, but toughed it out and played.

[RogK]

          W - L       road wins minus home losses
NPU     3 - 0       + 2
IWU     3 - 1       + 1
CTG     2 - 1       + 1
AUG     2 - 2        0
WHE    2 - 2        0
ELM     1 - 2        - 1
MIL     1 - 2        - 1
CRL     1 - 3        - 1
NCC    1 - 3        - 1
Bowen was sick or Bowan (sic) was sick.

[RogK]

In that Elmhurst win, Courtney O'Donnell had 19 pts 14 rebs, while Kween Jean added 14 pts 10 rebs.
Some clever coaching by EC's Tethnie Carrillo in the final half-minute. Sophia Lathe was subbed in for Lauren Goff and Lathe quickly hit a three, cutting the deficit from 4 to 1. Then Lathe was replaced by Goff, who got a steal in the waning seconds, followed in short order by Urso's game winning layup. Has to be satisfying for a coach when strategic choices directly yield a win.

[GoPerry]

Wheaton beat North Central, 52-40. Was the Little Brass Bell in the house this afternoon at the airplane hangar? That final score is more like a football score than a basketball score.

This was an un-pretty game by both teams for the most part.  NCC (12/48 25% FG) perhaps could be forgiven since their two leading scores Alanna Newsome and Lyndsay Brennan did not play.  Wheaton's (20/55, 36%) ) excuse might be not having played for 3 weeks and they really looked it.  Hannah Frazier(19 pts, 9 rebs) struggled early but was terrific down the stretch in the 4th quarter when the game was tied and outcome in question.

Second straight game and third in last four where the Thunder have really struggled to score.  The coaches need to find something or a player other than Frazier needs to step up.

[iwu70]

GoPerry, are teams playing WC doubling Frazier ?   Given the struggles with scoring, seems a logical strategy. 

Looking forward to the IWU-WC games and hoping Shanks and Munroe are back.  IWU not that deep, need all hands on deck.

'70

[GoPerry]

GoPerry, are teams playing WC doubling Frazier ?   Given the struggles with scoring, seems a logical strategy. 

Looking forward to the IWU-WC games and hoping Shanks and Munroe are back.  IWU not that deep, need all hands on deck.

'70

I haven't really noticed double teams on Frazier much.  For one thing she has a very good inside and outside game which is tough to double.  Plus you risk her kicking out to a Madsen or Demski for a three where WC has been most proficient this season.

I don't think you see as much double teaming in the Women's game in general.  But that's just my impression.

North Park is obviously in the early cat bird seat.  Ok, very early.  But I'm beginning to wonder about Augustana if they keep putting up 80+ pts/g like their last 6 games.  In that stretch they lost 2 close ones @ Wheaton, @ Carthage.  Also 2 losses to ranked teams in Wash U and UWWhitewater.  On the other hand they're dead last in the league defensively giving up 70+. 

Park and Augie, along with the normal candidates of IWU, WC, Carthage . . .  this is shaping up to be a very interesting race on the Women's side starting on Wednesday with NPU heading to Bloomington.  Getting two road wins @ Wheaton and @ IWU would obviously be huge for those Lady Vikes.

[Gregory Sager]

I haven't really noticed double teams on Frazier much.  For one thing she has a very good inside and outside game which is tough to double.  Plus you risk her kicking out to a Madsen or Demski for a three where WC has been most proficient this season.

I don't think you see as much double teaming in the Women's game in general.  But that's just my impression.

I definitely agree with that. You do see guards drop down and double the low post, but in terms of having two defenders chase a single player around the entire floor, not so much. Halfcourt and sideline traps are another matter, of course.

North Park is obviously in the early cat bird seat.  Ok, very early.

Recordwise, yes. But the Vikings still have to prove themselves, I think. The win at Wheaton got everybody's attention, but NPU is still at the point where the Vikings need to demonstrate that that win at King Arena wasn't just a fluke or the result of a down year for Wheaton. The losses to Hope and Loras, which will make NPU a better team in the long run, showed that the Vikings haven't really reached the next level yet. Thing is, the potential for them to reach it is there. Now they have to go out and achieve it.

I'd like to see North Park establish a reliable second scoring option. Everybody knows that Jayla Johnson can go out and put points on the board. The problem is, she's drawing extra defenders like a magnet draws iron filings every time that she touches the ball inside the FT line extended, because opposing coaches don't think that the Vikings can hurt them with anybody else. Emily Czuhajewski is capable of becoming that reliable alternative; she scored well over a thousand points and was a two-time All-State selection at Taft. But right now she's just a spot-up shooter. Her fellow sophomore Lauren Lee is starting to come on, with 31 points in her last two games, but it's too soon to tell if she's evolved into that second option yet. And, although they're all capable of scoring, Zakiya Newsome, Sinead Molloy, and Lauryn Alba Garner are really more facilitators than scorers.

The Vikings go to IWU on Wednesday, and then after a trip to Faganel to take on an Elmhurst team that they can't overlook they'll finish up the first round-robin with Millikin, Augustana, and Carthage. I think that by the end of that game with the Lady Reds up at Tarble on the 22nd we'll have a good read on just how serious the Vikings are about contending for the CCIW title and a D3 tourney berth this season.

But I'm beginning to wonder about Augustana if they keep putting up 80+ pts/g like their last 6 games.  In that stretch they lost 2 close ones @ Wheaton, @ Carthage.  Also 2 losses to ranked teams in Wash U and UWWhitewater.  On the other hand they're dead last in the league defensively giving up 70+. 

My take is that Mark Beinborn is using the rather static halfcourt nature of the CCIW to his advantage by coaching his players to step on the gas and play uptempo, reasoning that by getting used to that pace they'll make fewer mistakes than their opponents at that speed, and they'll be more likely to wear down those opponents. Statistically, at least, it's borne fruit; Augie has the third-best turnover margin and the second-best a:to ratio in CCIW play. An uptempo pace is going to give up points as well as gain them, so I doubt that Beinborn is concerned much with scoring defense numbers; the question is whether or not Augie is wearing down first-division opponents enough to make up for any gaps in talent level.

Thus far, I'd say that the results are mixed. Augie did come back from an 18-point fourth-quarter deficit at Wheaton to get within three in the final minute, and a week later against Wesleyan the Rock Islanders pushed a four-point lead early in the fourth up to 15 points with less than two minutes left before a flurry of sloppy ballhandling by a team that thought it had the game in its back pocket, combined with a refusal to quit on the part of the Titans, allowed IWU to get the lead down to two possessions -- a rather anomalous ending, I'd say, that probably won't be repeated, because Beinborn won't allow his players to mentally check out like that again. On the other hand, two days ago Augie took on a Carthage team that lost Maggie Berigan in the third quarter to an ankle injury and fellow starter Kelsey Coshun to fouls with 2:33 to go in regulation -- and the Lady Reds not only outlasted Augie by winning in two overtimes, they actually looked a lot less wobbly-legged than did Augie in the second overtime. As is the case with NPU, I think that we're in wait-and-see mode with Augustana as far as the success of its uptempo style is concerned.

Park and Augie, along with the normal candidates of IWU, WC, Carthage . . .  this is shaping up to be a very interesting race on the Women's side starting on Wednesday with NPU heading to Bloomington.  Getting two road wins @ Wheaton and @ IWU would obviously be huge for those Lady Vikes.

Amen to that. As to the larger issue, this league will only get better if it gets deeper. The more battle-tested the teams at the top are by the end of the season, the more likely they are to make annual deep runs in March.

[RogK]

Congrats to Sammie Woodward, first CCIW Player of the Week in the new decade!

[Mr. Ypsi]

New women's poll is finally up (don't know why it is always 6-8 hours later than the men's), and the CCIW got dissed big-time.  The grand total of support was 4 points for NPU.

Though in all honesty, that is probably about right.  Not sure I could put anyone in the top 25 at the moment - IWU and Wheaton have 4 losses (and Millikin) (everyone else except NPU has more than that) and NPU has little past history of success and their only impressive win is Wheaton, and they were eviscerated by Loras.  I retained slight hope that IWU might retain a point or two, but losing them all didn't surprise me.

[Gregory Sager]

That's not good for the league, but, on the other hand, considering the final spread of the Loras game it's four more points than I thought NPU would get.

[Mr. Ypsi]

Yeah, the conference getting completely shut out would have been disappointing, but not that surprising.