Yes, exactly.

Quote from: ziggy on February 27, 2026, 03:20:37 PMI believe at some point the NCAA changed the allowable gameday bench size.

I don't recall D3 ever having a scorebook cap. Trust me, speaking as someone who used to be his alma mater's scorekeeper, there were a lot of nights when I had to draw multiple extra lines in the scorebook to accommodate a lot of guys whom I knew wouldn't see the floor even in a blowout.

Illinois Wesleyan 80
North Park 70

Kolden Vanlandingham: 30 pts, 7 rebs, 5:2 a:to, 6 stls
William Bates: 14 pts
Lazario Cornish: 13 pts, 6 rebs

Karlo Colak: 26 pts
Casen Lawrence, 15 pts, 3 stls
Mason Funk: 13 pts

NPU: 9-21 (.429) from range, 21-22 (.955) from the line (their only miss was their last one)

Winning two games this weekend with their leading scorer too sick to travel was going to be too big an ask for North Park. But the Vikings certainly gave it the legendary "college try" tonight. Without Mike Vuckovic the Vikings managed to hang around for the entire game, trailing by only five within the last two and a half minutes. But they just didn't have the firepower to match Karlo Colak (who was sensational), Casen Lawrence, and Mason Funk, although Kolden Vanlandingham did everything he could to match them. He exited his college career as an absolute warrior, putting the Vikings on his back and allowing them to make a serious game of it.

Can't point at the absence of Vuckovic for this outcome, because basketball is a next-man-up affair. IWU, UWSP, and I'm sure other teams as well have lost major stars, too. The Park didn't quite play well enough to overcome a team that had more weapons than they did. But the Vikings can get back on the bus tonight holding their heads high, because they gave it one heck of a try.

I couldn't be prouder of my guys.

Fingers crossed that the answer is "never".

I think it's less an indicator of indifference and more likely a matter of UMA lacking a sports information director. The school's athletics page is link-free and totally useless. That's one thing that UMA will have to change if the school eventually join D3; in the fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants USCAA, nobody thinks twice about schools being informational wastelands and you thus know nothing about an opponent prior to the opening whistle. And that's not the way it is in D3.

I do look forward to Maine-Augusta joining D3 eventually. The one thing that I did learn about UMA by looking at its website is that the school's teams are called the Moose. Doesn't matter, though, because if UMA joins D3 I shall henceforth be referring to its teams as the Thurmans.

Quote from: mwunder on February 25, 2026, 12:56:02 PMMr Sager...great job on the broadcast last night.

Thanks! Much appreciated. It was loads of fun to call a game that exciting. Kudos to North Park women's volleyball head coach Mike Sopocy for putting on the headset and joining us on short notice with our two usual color commentators unavailable.

Quote from: mwunder on February 25, 2026, 12:56:02 PMSuper atmosphere in the gym that came across on video.

That was probably the loudest crackerbox crowd we've had since the NPU women's volleyball team won their first-ever CCIW tourney title three years ago, and definitely the loudest MBB crowd since the Henry/Robinson/Lake/Cobbs era.

Quote from: mwunder on February 25, 2026, 12:56:02 PMI, for one, have been super pleased with the CCIW network this season.  Aside from the blue tint of the Millikin half court camera, everything else has been remarkably well done.  There are so many more opportunities for students who want to go into video production or broadcasting now than back in the early 90's when I was a student.

Agree on all counts ... including the blue-tinted Millikin halfcourt camera. I feel like I need to take a Dramamine tablet every time that I watch a game from the Griz nowadays.

Quote from: mwunder on February 25, 2026, 12:56:02 PMI am curious as to what consequences two of the NP student body will face after they acted like fools after the game and proceeded to whip the floor with their belts near the Wheaton bench during the handshake line.  I believe Coach Schauer was the first to confront these students and was visibly upset for a few minutes afterwards...following them out of the camera shot from the one baseline camera. It's too bad that incident put a small blemish on this instant classic of a game.

Turns out that they weren't NPU students at all. They were just hanging out in the section inhabited by the Vikings football players. The AD and a couple of other members of the athletics department staff cleared them out and got everybody away from the Wheaton players very quickly.

Carroll is another matter. Lamar Smith, Jacob Naber, and Evan Bland are big losses, especially the first two. Taylor Jannsen will have one of the league's best returning players in the dynamic Michael McNabb, as well as a burgeoning talent in Peyton McKenna (who is a good defender but needs to learn how to do more than just be a spot-up shooter offensively in order to achieve All-CCIW status somewhere down the road), a promising alternate shooter in Lucas Parker, and a solid tough-kid defensive stopper in Dennis Estepp. But, boy, pickings look lean for the Pios in terms of who is going to work in the paint in 2026-27. Smith and Naber were dependable and versatile, if not spectacular, but the depth behind them was invisible. Greg Smith got all of the bench minutes at the big-man spots, and, like most freshman bigs, he was a hacking foul waiting to happen during his brief intervals on the floor. The other two underclassman bigs, Matt Leonhard and Brendan Beaumont, combined for a grand total of five varsity minutes this season. Much more so than Mike Schauer, Jannsen really needs to up the developmental curve on guys like McKenna and Parker while at the same time finding big men who can play in this league, whether it's his young incumbents coming into their own or it's imports.

Quote from: GoPerry on February 25, 2026, 09:26:35 AM

Quote from: Gregory Sager on February 25, 2026, 12:47:30 AMPerhaps the biggest difference in the game was bench points: North Park had 15, Wheaton had none. Mike Schauer kept trying to plug in new people, but none of them were really giving him anything.

This has been a concerning trend over the last 10 games or so.  More specifically, (except for Noah Hedrick who mainly spells Wynja and is not a scorer) those coming off the bench are chiefly 3 point shooters offensively.  And Wheaton's 3 point shooting was poor, a real liability, in their last 10 games.  The fact that they only took 15, well below their average # attempts, (and 2 were garbage clock running out throws) last night might have reflected that realization.

Wheaton fans are excited about their team's potential for 2026-27, as well they should be. Any coach in D3 would love to have a returning core that consists of Soren Richardson, Carson Grier, Kyan VanderWoude, Devin Martin, and Brady Wynja. But next season's edition of Wheaton clearly isn't a finished product here at the end of this season; Mike Schauer not only needs depth, he needs functional depth. Whether it's his returning reserves maturing into useful CCIW-level players, the addition of newbies who can immediately step in and do the job at this level, or a combination of the two, he needs guys who, as you said, can do more than just shoot three-pointers at the offensive end. (And some help at the defensive end certainly wouldn't hurt, either.)

Didn't realize that any of the remaining UMAC schools were in bad shape. I thought that Northland was the only obvious casualty. But you're right that if UW-Superior's hand is forced by the collapse of the UMAC, the Yellowjackets may have to go back to the WIAC folks with cap in hand.

After trailing most of the first half in Elmhurst, the Bluejays pulled out in front in the second stanza and made their not-very-big lead hold up in beating Carroll, 95-85, as both quarterfinals games went chalk. Aidyn Boone had a nearly immaculate shooting game for the 'jays -- 8-9 from the field, 4-4 from beyond the arc, 7-7 from the line -- en route to 27 points, while Dominic Trelenberg and Luke Smith each scored 16 and EJ Marshall pumped in 10 off of the bench. The loss spoiled a great game for Michael McNabb, who tossed in 36 points that included a 6-10 performance from downtown. Lamar Smith had 18 and 7 in his final collegiate game, and fellow senior Jacob Naber chipped in 14 and 7 as well.

So it'll be Elmhurst vs. Carthage in the early game at Shirk on Friday, with North Park squaring off against Illinois Wesleyan in the nightcap.

Double OT final in the crackerbox:

North Park 107
Wheaton 100

Mike Vuckovic: 26 pts, 6:1 a:to
Kolden Vanlandingham: 19 pts, 7 rebs
Lazario Cornish: 17 pts, 8 rebs
William Bates: 16 pts
Marquis Vance: 14 pts, 12 rebs

Soren Richardson: 36 pts, 8 rebs, 6:1 a:to
Devin Martin: 20 pts
Carson Grier: 19 pts, 7 rebs
Kyan VanderWoude: 16 pts, 10 rebs
Brady Wynja: 8 rebs

This was an instant classic. Greek Tragedy was clearly watching some other game, because these two teams worked themselves into a lather trying to win this one. Both sides truly left everything out on the court. There were 17 ties and 13 lead changes, and the final score represented the largest separation between the two teams in terms of points. And it was a well-played contest, too; or at least it was better-played as the game wore on.

NPU outshot Wheaton in all three phases, but that was countered by WC's absolute command of the boards, as Mike Schauer's boys set new CCIW tournament records for most overall rebounds and most offensive rebounds. What was really remarkable is that the Vikings managed to pull off the win despite losing Lazario Cornish and Kolden Vanlandingham to fouls in the first overtime and William Bates to fouls early in the second overtime. They won it mostly because Mike Vuckovic took over the game in the extra sessions, particularly the second overtime, after a quiet start in which he only had three points at the half. It seems remarkable that anybody could take over a game in which Soren Richardson kept doing Soren Richardson things for fifty minutes, but that's exactly what happened. But I'd be remiss if I didn't mention Marquis Vance's performance. He picked his fourth foul with 8:21 to go in regulation, but he finished the game still on the floor. The big thing is that he never let up defensively despite playing with four fouls for the final 14 minutes he was out there, bulldogging both out on the floor and in the paint. Vance was truly remarkable at both ends of the floor.

Perhaps the biggest difference in the game was bench points: North Park had 15, Wheaton had none. Mike Schauer kept trying to plug in new people, but none of them were really giving him anything. NPU got great contributions off of the bench from Julian Campbell and Tyvin Garrison, Jerome Smith provided valuable breathing space for Vanlandingham (although not for Vuckovic, who was on the floor for 48 minutes tonight), and even Harrison Long's cameo was effective.

Wheaton played with heart and passion. For all that Richardson did, he got some heroic contributions from his teammates. As GoPerry said, NPU just made enough plays in the second overtime to push out that very modest lead and make it stick.

I have no idea why the attendance was listed at 300. There were a lot more people than that, probably in the neighborhood of 750-800. It was the noisiest crowd that I've heard in the crackerbox in ages.

On to Bloomington.

Quote from: Kuiper on February 24, 2026, 12:31:51 PMWhile the soccer coaches of some schools that have transitioned from DI or DII to DIII have left in an attempt to stay in those divisions at other schools, APU's coach Dave Blomquist is staying, in part because he himself was a DIII player and All-American at men's soccer powerhouse Wheaton College (IL) from 1992-1995.  This will be his 17th year at Azusa Pacific.

Blomquist is actually the second straight former Wheaton star that APU hired as its men's soccer head coach. Before Blomquist there was Phil Wolf, who was a four-time All-CCIW first-teamer and was named the league's Most Outstanding Player in 1990 and 1991. He coached the Cougars from 2001 through 2008.

Congratulations to Aliyah Hershberger for being named to the All-CCIW second team. I'm not immune to recognizing the difficulty level of that achievement. You can't help but admire how hard she had to work and how often she had to succeed on the court to earn that kind of respect from the other eight head coaches in the league when her team only went 1-15. Despite the pounding she took while fearlessly driving to the basket time after time as one of the league's smaller players (North Park lists her at 5'6", but I doubt that that's accurate), she still managed to lead the CCIW in minutes per game, and she was both a top ten scorer and appeared in some of the shooting categories as well.

Quote from: Stertorous Thunder on February 23, 2026, 04:50:32 PMThe all-conference awards are posted:

https://cciw.org/news/2026/2/23/cciw-reveals-2025-26-mens-basketball-all-conference-selections.aspx

Noah Cleveland wins both awards, the Fred Young CCIW Most Outstanding Student-Athlete and the CCIW First-Year Student-Athlete of the Year.  You can argue with the decision for the second piece of hardware, but it establishes precedent that the award goes to someone in their first year of collegiate basketball.

Yeah, as I said the other day the CCIW's dumb renaming of the award opened it up to interpretation. Now it remains to be seen if giving the award to Cleveland establishes a ruling precedent in going by eligibility year rather than academic year, a decision that shows the lie of the "student-athlete" propaganda behind the renaming that implies that academics defines one's collegiate sports career.

I don't disagree with the player chosen, I just don't like the league's spin on what that award represents. If you're going to call Noah Cleveland a freshman, then of course he deserves both awards.

Quote from: Stertorous Thunder on February 23, 2026, 04:50:32 PMInterestingly, the award for the coach of the year is listed as the "CCIW Coaching Staff of the Year."

No real surprise there, other than that it took the MBB coaches this long to agree to the change from a head-coach award to a coaching-staff award. The other CCIW sports have been moving over to the latter policy for a long time now; heck, CCIW softball made it a coaching-staff award 21 years ago! Kudos to the current MBB braintrust for doing this, as it recognizes the importance of assistant coaches. This award now becomes more of a résumé builder for young assistants -- which is an important career boost for them -- and an acknowledgment of the fact that you can no longer expect to run a successful D3 men's basketball program all by your lonesome in this day and age.

As for the All-CCIW team, I only saw a couple of mild surprises. While I thought that Augustana might get shut out, but probably wouldn't, I was surprised to see North Central get a slot even though NCC finished in last place, a game behind 8th-place Augie. Good on the coaches for not being slaves to the standings as per usual, since they've typically put a premium on where teams finished when slotting the All-CCIW team. Bullock was a more deserving individual than anyone who wore navy blue and gold, so this was a welcome choice in my book.

Picking Grier over his teammate Kyan VanderWoude was a bit of a surprise, but on balance I wouldn't argue it. Their numbers are comparable. I didn't figure on Lamar Smith making the team, but in retrospect he may be the most unsung talent in the entire league. McNabb gets all the points, but the Pioneers really hinge upon what Smith brings to the floor on a night-by-night basis.

Of course, a lot of people are probably wondering how I feel about Mike Vuckovic making first team while Kolden Vanlandingham only made second team. The answer is that I'm fine with it, for two reasons: 1) Mike earned it, as nobody in recent CCIW seasons has better demonstrated how hard off-season work both on the court and in the weight room can dramatically improve one's game; and 2) this will light a fire under Kolden, I'm sure of it.

I also like what Ed McGhee did with North Park's RESPECT Award. I'm sure that the other eight recipients are deserving, but my big fear has always been that the award would become sort of a participation medal for guys who hung around for four years but weren't major contributors. By picking a freshman, Ed showed me that he took the assignment seriously as far as basing it upon the stated conditions* are concerned.

My big takeaway from this slate is that the CCIW head coaching guild has really changed over the past few seasons. They now mostly consist of younger coaches, and the old heads still stalking the sidelines in this league aren't quite as hidebound in their thinking as were their colleagues of yesteryear. These guys think and act differently than their predecessors in a lot of ways, and the manner in which they handle their CCIW awards choices demonstrates that.

* "RESPECT Award recipients have distinguished themselves as an integral member of the team, their institution and community by upholding the values of Responsibility, Enthusiasm, Service, Pride, Excellence, Collaboration and Trust. The RESPECT Award recognizes the intangible traits a student-athlete possesses that exemplify great character and encourages inclusiveness and a positive culture."

Annie Radenkovich is out as North Park's head coach, and her assistant coach Sam Ervin is gone as well. GA Lore Porter is thus minding the store at the moment for NPU WBB as the sole remaining coach.

Sad to see Annie go, as she's a North Park alumna and former Viking and is a terrific person to boot. But three straight 20-loss seasons, with only two CCIW wins in those three seasons, is clearly not acceptable.

I'm very hopeful that John Born can find and hire an excellent candidate to run the NPU WBB program. North Park has had a lot of success in building competitive programs in several other women's sports over the past few years, a couple of which have won CCIW hardware and another of which appears to be on the verge of doing so. There's no reason why North Park women's basketball can't be competitive as well. And the most important step to achieving that is to make a successful hire for the head coaching job.