WBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Fawkes316]

Well said, and as a CCIW Women's basketball fan I recognize that we are not where the men are in terms of the depth and tradition across the board. On the other hand, there has been a lot of growth the last few years, and I believe that for the first time in the 10 years that I have been around that all the teams in the league are headed in the right direction and have quality coaches who can build program stability. Women's basketball may never measure up to the history of the men's (how can it, when it's only been around for 20 years), but I think that things are looking good and the future is trending in the right direction.

[Gregory Sager]

I agree. I think that in the long run the conference is on the uptick in this sport, although I also think Rog has a point about the overall talent level of the CCIW being slightly down from what it was three or so seasons ago.

The true test of the overall strength of CCIW women's basketball will be measured, I believe, by three consistent trends seen over an extended period of time:

1) All teams, including those at the bottom of the standings, having winning non-conference records, as opposed to just the teams at the top. This is commonplace in every sport in which the CCIW excels (notably men's basketball), but not in women's basketball. It was starting to trend that way, but the past two seasons have been marked by regression; each has seen three CCIW teams fall short of a .500 non-conference record.

2) Teams going deep into the D3 tournament on a regular basis. Millikin won the national title two years ago, of course, but unfortunately that success was an anomaly. It marks the only Final Four appearance by a CCIW team (North Central won the D3 title in 1983 prior to the CCIW's sanctioning of women's basketball as an official conference sport). The only previous tourney runs of note were an Elite Eight appearance by Millikin in 1997; Sweet Sixteens by Millikin in 1995 and 1996; another Elite Eight appearance by Millikin in 1994; and a Sweet Sixteen appearance by Augustana in 1989. This track record is not the stuff of a power conference.

3) Across-the-board competitiveness for the CCIW title. Unfortunately, the CCIW has belonged to the usual suspects -- Millikin and Wheaton -- throughout most of the conference's two decades of women's basketball. While that may please some Big Blue and Thunder fans, it doesn't speak well for the conference as a whole. The intermittent rise of Illlinois Wesleyan over the past few seasons has been a positive indication of expanding competitiveness, but as long as there are schools that never crack the top half of the league, let alone compete for the title, the overall strength of the conference will continue to lag.

[RogK]

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[Titan Q]

An article on IWU's recruiting class...

http://www.pantagraph.com/articles/2007/05/09/sports/125997.txt

[RogK]

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