WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[lmitzel]

NCC shot 7-14 from deep in the first half en route to a 31-29 halftime lead, and kept the Vikings off the board for the first seven and a half minutes of the third quarter... then it all went to hell, the Cardinals shot 2-20 in the fourth, and Augie escaped with a 57-51 win at Merner.

Lauren Hall led Augie with 10 and 16, Gabriela Lois scored 14, and Hannah Simmer and Kylie Jozwik each scored nine. Jessica Kowalczyk paced NCC with 10.

[RogK]

Millikin's Elyce Knudsen is the new CCIW Player of the Week; congrats to her!

[Gregory Sager]

First poll is out. It was supposed to be only a Top 15, because of the shrunken D3 field and the late start this season. But that batch of first-poll ballots reflected a sense that the pollsters just don't have the info yet that enables them to establish sound fifteen-team ballots with any confidence. So it's been shortened even further to a Top 10, with only Top 10 votes counting.

No CCIW teams made the Top 10, but Millikin did receive six Top 10 points and Wheaton received four. North Park also appeared on a ballot or ballots, but only in the 11-15 range, so NPU is not listed in the Others Receiving Votes category.

[RogK]

The absence of the usual quantity of nonconference games this season surely makes it even more difficult for a voter to compare the accomplishments of all of the teams.
Current NCAA team stats, such as scoring average, show that 138 teams have played at least one game. But quite a few have played just one.
http://stats.ncaa.org/rankings/change_sport_year_div
A Top Ten may be reasonable, although a Top 15 wouldn't be awful, giving recognition to five more teams. It doesn't even have to be a multiple of 5.
I'm glad there was no national pre-season ranking, which I've learned to despise since they are based on 0 games played and could easily give a head start to certain "traditionally strong programs."

[GoPerry]

I'm glad there was no national pre-season ranking, which I've learned to despise since they are based on 0 games played and could easily give a head start to certain "traditionally strong programs."

I don't think I would use "despise" but I'm generally with you on this RogK.  My opinion is that too many voters aren't willing to throw out the pre-season voting soon enough once real results begin to come in. 

[RogK]

Thanks GoPerry. I guess I could tolerate the pre-season vote if it was labelled as a prediction (like the CCIW coaches normally do for conference standings) rather than a ranking. Also I am willing to change verbs, from despise to despic. If something is despicable, one must be allowed to despic it.
I watched about three-fourths of Carroll's easy win at Carthage. Play of the game goes to Kate Christian who blocked a 1st half Carthage 3FG attempt, grabbed the stray ball and drove to the other end for a layup. I see no block for her in the stats, so maybe she was credited with a steal for that play.

[Gregory Sager]

Wow. When's the last time that Carthage lost by 26 points on its own floor? We just haven't seen that kind of result during the Bernero era.

[RogK]

Yeah, Carthage is not getting the ball through the rim very well so far.
Coach Bernero seems to be in the process of determining which players can contribute what.
Much talent lost from last year's team, so lots of opportunity. They had a height disadvantage vs Carroll.
And multiple times, they made the defensive mistake of sagging off Theresa Wichser, who was more than happy to sink 5 of 7 threes.

[Gregory Sager]

Tim's only had two losing seasons in his 17 years at the helm of the Carthage women's program, one of them a 12-14 campaign. He's won two CCIW titles, and a pair of CCIW tourney titles as well. His Lady Reds appeared in four D3 tournaments, amassing a solid 8-4 record in them. In short, he's put together a notable record of success up in Kenosha. So when one of his teams loses on its own floor by 26 to an unheralded Carroll outfit, and sports an 0-3 record after three CCIW games, it's definitely in the "man bites dog" category in terms of newsworthiness.

[Gregory Sager]

Tomorrow night's Carroll @ North Park game has been postponed on account of expected bad weather.

[Gregory Sager]

For those who have not yet heard, D3's winter-sport championship tournaments and meets have been canceled.

Thus, a second year will go by without a national champion crowned in women's basketball.

On the plus side, this might open the door for some more regular-season games -- although the logistics of that, given the start of spring sports and the fact that at least some fragment of fall sports will be piggybacked onto spring sports, makes extending the regular season for women's basketball problematic.

[RogK]

Is it too late to revive the Carroll at North Park game? Looks like only 2-3 inches of snow for Chicago and Milwaukee.

[Gregory Sager]

Is it too late to revive the Carroll at North Park game? Looks like only 2-3 inches of snow for Chicago and Milwaukee.

Yes.

Other schedule changes: Both tonight's game and Saturday's game between Augustana and Millikin have been postponed. And Millikin's game against Carthage has been moved up two days, so the Big Blue and The Team With No Nickname will play at Tarble this Saturday at 2 pm.

[RogK]

And in fact now the four Augustana games set for Feb 4 - 13 are all postponed. Hopefully no serious effects for those who have the virus, be they players or others.

[iwu70]

Apparently IWU's game with NCC postponed due to weather.  Titans will instead host Millikin tonight at The Shirk, 7 p.m.  What a tough opening game for IWU, first game to be played this year. 

Men's game at NCC postponed due to weather, as well.  To be re-scheduled "if possible." 

A wild weather and virus season.

'70