CCIW 1-seed comes down to a DH today. Carthage and IWU are tied at 14-4 in league play. IWU beat Carthage yesterday so Carthage needs to win both today to earn the top seed as a split would give IWU the nod by way of the 2-1 series win. DH at IWU today.

Top six seeds gets into the CCIW tourney with a huge logjam for the 4-5-6 seeds as all teams are still alive except Elmhurst. A fun two days of scoreboard watching ahead.

(My biased hope is that Carthage gets to host the tourney in Augie Schmidt's final season as the skipper of the Big Red Machine. CCIW is looking to likely be a one-bid league this season for NCAA Regionals)

Quote from: cubs on April 07, 2025, 11:49:07 AMThrough two weeks of play, I feel like their is a significant gap from the top two teams in the league (Whitewater & La Crosse) to the third team in the league.  In addition, I don't think the gap from 3rd to 4th/5th/6th is even close to the gap from 1st & 2nd to 3rd...

National Contenders-Whitewater & La Crosse
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WIAC Tournament Qualifier-UWO
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WIAC Tournament Qualifier Contenders-Stout, River Falls, Platteville
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Missing WIAC Tournament-Stevens Point
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Struggle Bus-Eau Claire

It would be an incredible feat for UWRF to make the WIAC post-season in their first year in the WIAC. Their proximity to the Twin Cites certainly gives them access to a lot of MN players. 

Whitewater appears to be the real deal. I always feel the middle of the WIAC is still Top 25 territory, but the middle this season seems down a bit.

This seems like a baseball trip to the Hawaiian Islands could be in the future for the Vikings. Would be great for those kids to get to play in front their home state family and friends.

Well... that did NOT go as planned!

Carthage opens their 2025 campaign at noon today vs Centre College in Kentucky, Augie Schmidt's 38th and final season. As usual, I'll be following every pitch as often as I can.

Last ride with The Chief. Let's Go, Boys!

Quote from: cubs on October 01, 2024, 01:47:43 PM

Quote from: BigPoppa on October 01, 2024, 10:58:50 AMKrepline, a Carthage grad, did a fantastic job building the Lawrence program. That area has always been full of incredible baseball talent that often lands at Stevens Point, Whitewater and LaCrosse.

Funny how little of it has managed to make it to UWO over the last ten years....   

You're NOT wrong! UW-O has been a shell of it's former self since university administrators pushed Coach Lechnir out the door.

Augie Schmidt announces his retirement at the end of the season, his 38th at Carthage.

https://athletics.carthage.edu/news/2024/10/1/augie-schmidt-to-retire-as-carthage-baseball-head-coach-following-2025-season.aspx

Krepline, a Carthage grad, did a fantastic job building the Lawrence program. That area has always been full of incredible baseball talent that often lands at Stevens Point, Whitewater and LaCrosse.

Quote from: cubs on May 08, 2024, 10:17:46 AMSo am I assuming correctly that the CIW Student Athlete of the Year is similar to other conference's Offensive Player of the Year?  Or are they not even remotely close?

Also, anyone seen/head from Big Poppa recently?  Miss his contributions to the baseball board....

Ha!. I'm still around. More of a lurker letely. Life gets busy. Carthage is headed in the right direction, but can't seem to close the door in many games.

Truthfully, I NEED to get back on here more often... it's good for my soul.

This seems like a GREAT hire for River Falls.

Quote from: tomt4525 on June 01, 2023, 11:14:26 AM
UWRF is bringing back baseball for the spring of 2025.

Their proximity to the Twin Cities should provide a solid base for recruiting as they re-enter the world of college baseball. I am sure it will take a few seasons to get going, but the right coach/recruiter can make an impact pretty quickly... maybe not in the WIAC right away, but surely in the Twin Cities area with the vast amount of D3 schools in the area.

You would assume they'd hire a coach this fall to get a jump on recruiting for the following year as they'll "go live" in spring of 2025. They have a fantastic turfed stadium in town that seems like a natural fit for their team.

Any thoughts on a potential candidate for the position?

Quote from: cubs on May 04, 2023, 01:51:13 PM

Quote from: mwunder on May 04, 2023, 12:55:42 PM
Not much chat here in CCIW baseball, but I can't help but wonder what's going on in Kenosha?  The team hasn't won 20 games once over the past 4 non-covid seasons.  This season and the last two have produced 25 or more losses.  Since they went 31-12 in 2018, they are 60-101 (29-63 in CCIW).  What happened to the program?

They've stopped getting the Wisconsin kids from the Fox Valley to come to Kenosha and play baseball....  Some may think it's not that simple, but consider this:

When Carthage was competing for CCIW, Regional and World Series titles in the past, the entire lineup was from Wisconsin with just the occasional guy from Illinois.  Looking at their roster this year, they have 14 kids from Wisconsin and over half (8) of those are from Kenosha.  There isn't a single kid from north of Highway 21 (the Fox Valley) which used to be where they got the guys like Muthig, Everts, Winfield and Hallock that built the program into what it used to be.

I'll defer to BigPoppa on just about everything Carthage, but I don't think that it's a mere coincidence...

I am just as frustrated and baffled as the rest... with Carthage's tuition climbing rapidly, they have often been unable to go after those blue-collar Fox Valley kids (like myself) and have been forced to recruit the more-affluent North Suburbs of Chicago. It may be a stereotype, but the North Suburb kids cannot handle Augie's demanding nature in the same way the kids from the Fox Valley could... Brian Mosher, long-time pitching coach at Carthage, left years ago and the program has struggled to recruit the Fox Valley kids since. Mosher was from the Valley and had a lot of ties.

As an alum, it's frustrating knowing how great of a coach Augie truly is and they are simply unable to get the results they need from their arms.

Carthage Redmen (I cannot bring myself to call them Firebirds) split four games in Florida... Return to Kenosha 2-2 with wins over Albion and Anna Maria followed by a pair of losses to Grove City and Fitchburg State. A few things that stand out to me (granted, it's early and likely have not been outside much, if at all):

Hitting .260 as a team (ehhh....)
Allowed 13/18 SBs on the weekend (that's not a good start)
Zuleger hit in the middle of the lineup for the opener with a 3-run bomb and didn't play the rest of the weekend? (Injury?)
Carthage hitters struck out 43 times in 4 games.... that's a ton of unproductive outs.
Pitchers allowed 27 walks in four games ... cannot win many games doing that.

Really hoping they can get it back on track in AZ next week.

Go Big Red!

Can't wait for the season to get rolling!

Any predictions for top 2-3 teams in each region?