MBB: College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin

[Gregory Sager]

Wheaton almost spit the bit by giving up all but a single solitary bucket of what had been a 20-point lead at the 12:22 mark against Lake Forest in King Arena, but the Orange and Blue managed to hang tough in the final couple of minutes and eke out a four-point win over the Foresters. Soren Richardson led the way for the victors with 27 and was supported nicely by the Wheaton underclassman corps: Vanderwoude with 14 and 8 (although he was a turnover machine tonight); Martin with a sparkling overall game of 15 points, an 11:4 a:to ratio, and three steals; and Carson Grier with 16 and 6 plus three blocks, while Richardson's fellow old hand Neibch had a dozen. On the other side of the ledger, I'm sure that Wheaton fans are just as happy that they'll never see LFC's Cristian Rodriguez again as are North Park fans.

Elmhurst managed to parlay a 10-24 (.417) effort from downtown into a close win over visiting Hope at Faganel. The 'jays were paced by a starting five that all hit double figures: Boone with a 19 and 13 double-double, Smith with 14, Trelenberg with 11 and 9, and Adjahoungbeta and Blachut with 10 apiece.

In yet another nip-and-tuck affair, Carroll got its first win of the season by staving off a frenzied attack by a hungry Beloit squad. The Buccaneers were up by four with a minute and a half left, but couldn't seal the deal at Van Male. Michael McNabb and Lamar Smith each tallied 19 for the Pios, while Jacob Naber led them in boards with seven.

Millikin was the CCIW team that came closest to having an easy time of it tonight, but even their 14-point win over Concordia (IL) in the Griz was deceptive; the Cougars only trailed by seven with 1:50 to go. Thomann had another big night with 17 and 12, while Straughter matched his 17 points; Tionne Spates double-doubled as well with 12 and 13, while Chris Ketchum chipped in 14 for the Big Blue.

As their most frequent-posting fan warned might happen, North Central took one on the chin tonight in the airplane hangar, as Aurora couldn't pull away but still managed to maintain a minimum two-possession lead throughout the game's final 13 minutes. Tyler Swierczek was the man tonight for NCC in the losing cause, scoring 23, while Alejandro Diaz contributed 11.

[mwunder]

This was a frustrating game to watch online, as the Alma feed kept me on the slow train to Buffertown all night, but the broadcast duo for the Scots made up for it. They're outstanding, the PBP guy in particular. I may have to watch more Alma basketball just to hear his call.

I'm glad it wasn't only me.  My first experience with HUDL and it was unbearable.  I only made it to halftime.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

This was a frustrating game to watch online, as the Alma feed kept me on the slow train to Buffertown all night, but the broadcast duo for the Scots made up for it. They're outstanding, the PBP guy in particular. I may have to watch more Alma basketball just to hear his call.

I'm glad it wasn't only me.  My first experience with HUDL and it was unbearable.  I only made it to halftime.

Since we are reviewing the streaming - Elmhurst's via the CCIW Network was good, and I appreciated the commentary as well.  I do have one suggestion - just because you have replay ability, doesn't mean you have to use it after nearly every made Blue Jays basket.  Doing that, coupled with the lead-in and lead-out graphics every time, meant a lot of missed live action.  Several instances of them returning from replay having missed a basket going the other way.

[Gregory Sager]

This was a frustrating game to watch online, as the Alma feed kept me on the slow train to Buffertown all night, but the broadcast duo for the Scots made up for it. They're outstanding, the PBP guy in particular. I may have to watch more Alma basketball just to hear his call.

I'm glad it wasn't only me.  My first experience with HUDL and it was unbearable.  I only made it to halftime.

Since we are reviewing the streaming - Elmhurst's via the CCIW Network was good, and I appreciated the commentary as well.  I do have one suggestion - just because you have replay ability, doesn't mean you have to use it after nearly every made Blue Jays basket.  Doing that, coupled with the lead-in and lead-out graphics every time, meant a lot of missed live action.  Several instances of them returning from replay having missed a basket going the other way.

Yes, that's been a chronic complaint for several years now from those of us who regularly watch Bluejays home games. You can get away with using automatic replay in football without interrupting live action, but you can't in basketball. EU, or at least the streaming service that EU hires to run its athletics webcasts, obviously pays no heed to viewer feedback.

[markerickson]

Viking Vuckovic scored a grand total of 12 points last year.  He has 62 points this year in two games.

Vanlandingham must be the Vikings' leading scorer by game ten for this team to compete in the conference tourney.  Topping Vuckovich's 38 could come in game nine against Greenville.

[Gregory Sager]

Carroll looked much more impressive than it did the other night against Beloit by blowing out UW-Superior, 96-69, in the first round of UW-Platteville's tourney up at Williams Arena in Lead City. Michael McNabb led the way for the Pios with 20, and he was joined in double figures by Peyton McKenna with 16, Dennis Estepp and Lucas Parker with 14 apiece, and Jacob Naber with 10 and a nice 5:0 a:to. Lamar Smith pulled down seven boards for the Pios, who shot an impressive 34-58 (.586) from the field and 13-21 (.619) from beyond the curve.

[Gregory Sager]

Augustana gave a sit-up-and-take-notice performance in blowing the doors off of Bethel up in the St. Paul suburbs, 87-53. Augie's defense was sterling; BU only shot .321 from the field and .179 from downtown, and the Royals had their pockets picked by Augie 15 times. Andre Klaver had 20 points and three steals for the visitors and Jake Willems scored 14, while Staishaun Kelley had four pilfers.

[Gregory Sager]

Illinois Wesleyan got a bit of late separation in what had been a back-and-forth game and prevailed over a gritty Illinois College squad, 71-67, at Shirk. Mason Funk was the star of the game for IWU, leading the Titans with 17 while shutting down IC star Isayah Kloster at the other end of the floor in the second half. Noah Cleveland had very promising debut for the Greenies with 16 and 13 with three blocks, and Brady Ruggles chipped in 11.

[Gregory Sager]

The CCIW improves to 12-2.

Home: 5-1
Away: 6-1
Neutral: 1-0

vs. MIAA: 2-0
vs. MIAC: 2-0
vs. MWC: 4-0
vs. NACC: 3-1
vs. UAA: 0-1
vs. UMAC: 1-0

Saturday's slate:
Carroll @ UW-Platteville
Carthage @ Alma
Wisconsin Lutheran @ Elmhurst
UW-Oshkosh @ Illinois Wesleyan
Millikin @ Earlham
UW-La Crosse @ North Park
Wheaton @ Hope

[Gregory Sager]

Tomorrow is going to be the acid test of the early part of the season for North Park. After two narrow road wins over teams that aren't terrible but definitely weren't top-drawer competition, NPU gets its home opener against preseason #7 UW-La Crosse, which looked like it was all that and a bag of chips by starting the season with a road trip to Virginia that resulted in a pair of wins over two other preseason Top 25 teams, Hampden-Sydney and Virginia Wesleyan. The Vikings were prone in both of their first two games to bouts of losing the plot at both ends of the floor, enabling opponent runs that put the Vikings behind by double digits in both cases and forcing them to play from behind. NPU most certainly can't afford that against the Eagles tomorrow; the Vikes are going to have to stay focused and disciplined for all 40 minutes against a team this good.

Should be an exciting game. Really looking forward to calling this one.

[iwu70]

Thanks for the summary, Greg, on the IWU win.  It was ragged and could have gone south.  Gritty at the end, with Josh Fridman playing a key part with an amazing 3/4 court pass to Cleveland for a dunk.  Yes, Funk the star of the game.  You were right about Cleveland starting, but not Ruggles.  Lawrence got the start but didn't play very well, especially on defense.  Lots to clean up from this one, if the Titans are to contend with a very big, always rotating in/out team in UW Oshkosh.  Maryville gave Oshkosh a good game, but just too much size and depth at the end.

A very nice video message from Big Jack at the beginning of the game.  Titan Q in the house, and a very large, loud opening night crowd at the Shirk.  Glad to see the season underway for this new edition Titans.  Lots of new faces and new styles of play.  Strange seeing IWU play in the 60s and low 70s.  Maybe it will get better offensively with time. 

IWU'70

[iwu70]

Nathan Boldt still in civies. 

'70

[Gregory Sager]

Augustana gave the most impressive performance of the entire CCIW's week tonight. That defense ... that was straight-up hostile. If Delp's boys can bring it like that on the defensive end every night in CCIW play, well, Augustana will be your dark horse sneaking up around the clubhouse turn in the CCIW this season.

[GoPerry]

Wheaton 75
Hope  76

Carson Grier  24 pts, 12 rebs
Devin Martin  15 pts, 5 asst

Marcus Wourman  22 pts
Parker Hovey  14 pts 9 rebs
Brendan Cargill, 12 pts, 10 rebs


It's too bad.  Wheaton had a 12 pt lead with 4:48 left and, similar to Lake Forest game, controlled the whole game.  But for the second game in a row, the Thunder inexplicably blew a large lead down the stretch due to sloppy defense (plain laziness at times) and lack of offensive discipline  This time it bit them with two treys by Hope's Brendan Cargill with 42 secs left, and then by Marcus Wourman with no time on the clock after a VanderWoude ft miss.  Mike Schauer said after the Lake Forest game that he never really thought Wheaton would lose that one.  I'm sure he felt the same way this afternoon.  We'll see if this young team learns from this.  Fun team to watch but frustrating at the same time.

One huge positive is the play of freshman Grier who had a monster game in the losing cause.  At 6'8" he is pretty quick and mobile for a forward that size and skilled offensively.  Tonight might've been a real coming out for him.

[Gregory Sager]

Carthage won the early bird special by pulling away in the final ten minutes at Alma, 79-60. Ryan Johnson had 22 and 13 in his season debut, Riley Brooks also double-doubled with 17 and 10, Antuan Nesbitt chipped in a dozen, and AJ Johnson had 11 with a 5:1 a:to.

The game tipped off at 10 am, no doubt to accommodate Carthage's ordeal of traveling all that way around the lake and then across the mitten. I'll bet that nobody wishes the Manitowoc-to-Ludington ferry was still operating in November than Steve D.