2016-17 NCC Men's Basketball Preview

Yesterday saw the official start of the NCAA Division III basketball season. It also saw me get a jump on the season with a preview of North Central's women's basketball team. Today, I'm switching my focus over to the men.

Like with the women, the main version of the website contains a standings page for the CCIW for the men over on the right sidebar. If you're viewing the mobile version of Confessions of a Sportscaster, this feature won't be available, so you'll need to scroll to the bottom and click to view the full version of the website. I figured this would be a better feature than just taking screenshots of an Excel spreadsheet like I did last season.

Anyway, now that NCC's roster is up and I have a chance to look things over, let's take a gander at what to expect for the coming winter.


North Central Cardinals
2015-16: 19-8 (12-2), 2nd in CCIW; lost in NCAA Tournament First Round

2015-16 Recap

As I was preparing to write this preview, I didn't want to step on my own toes from last season's recap. I knew the Cardinals had a tough first round exit in the NCAA Tournament, and I thought it was a contentious exit, but reading back through it, damn. I remember watching the replay of this game now and being confused. Hell, reading through the tweets I linked to makes me furious about the apparent miscarriage of justice that occurred up at St. Norbert even though I maintained my theory that officials don't decide the outcome. But enough about last year; I'm sure the team will be carrying a big enough chip on its shoulder about it.

Key Returners

If there's any reason to be incredibly excited about the future of this Cardinal team, it's what they bring back. Junior Alex Sorenson, a 6'8" stretch "5", unanimouns First Team All-CCIW player last year and Preseason First Team All-American this year, brings back his team-leading 15.3 points and 7.7 rebounds per game, and while his field goal shooting is phenomenal (53 percent from the floor, 40 percent from beyond the arc), hopefully he worked on free throw shooting this offseason (53 percent last year). He is joined by sophomore Connor Raridon, a Second Team All-CCIW player and Freshman of the Year last season, as well as an honorary mention Preseason All-American coming into this season. They will be flanked by a pair of returning starters from last year: point guard Jagger Anderson (8.9 points per game, just shy of four assists per game, 40 percent shooting) and swingman Erwin Henry (nine points per game on 53/43/78 shooting splits with 4.3 rebounds per game).

There's plenty of depth coming back too. Aiden Chang scored 5.6 points a game last year and shot 41 percent from beyond the arc in roughly 18 minutes a game. He might figure to be the starting two-guard for this team unless one of the newcomers beats him out. Jaquan Phipps only scored 2.1 points per game, but was a key defensive player off the bench last year and will probably see some more minutes this season. The major returning X-factor though is Jack Bronec. After missing the first half of the season due to injury, he played just 32 minutes in 10 games, but presumably figures to take on many of the minutes that Kevin Honn played last year. The team also adds a little depth in Tommy Koth, a guard who saw just 34 minutes last season.

New Faces

This is where I don't have a lot of information, given the late posting of North Central's roster. The big name I heard during the offseason though was 6'6" Jack Clausel out of Newark. He adds a little depth to the forward position which will need it for when Raridon and Sorenson need breaks. The team has a couple of transfers this season as well. Mike Wisz played in 23 games, starting four, for College of DuPage last year, scoring 2.9 points per game in just over eight minutes per game, but has decent shooting splits (37/38/68). Danny Thomas comes to Naperville from Grinnell College, where he put up 7.1 points per game on 51/31/88 shooting splits, all while bearing in mind that Grinnell runs the system that inspired Michelle Roof to implement a similar style on the women's side here.

I had to dig a little bit to find information about the freshmen recruits coming in. Sam Fehrle, out of Rockford's Boylan Catholic, is 6'7" and appears to have a similar game to Alex Sorenson, though he can probably play either of the two big spots. Clint Koehler is a point guard out of Dunlap who shot about 40 percent as a senior, but what kind of minutes he'll see this season I'm not sure. The other freshmen are 6'1" guard Nick Chambers out of Montini and 6'5" Matt Cappelletti out of Romeoville.

Non Conference Schedule

Unlike the women, the men play a good chunk of their non-conference slate at home. After opening the season with The Battle of Chicago Avenue in Lisle, the Cardinals open their home schedule on my 27th birthday against an Alma team that comes into the season ranked 14th in the country. The rivalry with Aurora University is renewed on Black Friday in Naperville this year (and hopefully on time this year). The team also has a home date with UW-Platteville, a road date at UW-Stevens Point later in December, and their final home game is against Robert Morris a week before Christmas. The team also plays in a tournament down in Fort Lauderdale in the days leading up to Christmas. It's the usually fairly tough non-conference schedule that North Central has been scheduling of late, with the usual non-conference rivalries getting renewed.

CCIW Outlook

A lot of the offseason chatter about the CCIW resulted in a fairly predictable preseason coaches' poll. Carroll University's rejoining the CCIW also adds those couple extra games to the conference slate, which means we will be playing CCIW games in December. However, the move to a much tougher conference for the Pioneers will be interesting in a year where North Central is the odds on favorite to take the crown.

The biggest threat to North Central's shot at an auto bid is an interesting question. Illinois Wesleyan boasts Trevor Seibring, who made the All-CCIW Second Team and may have been shafted in the All American Team selections. They've got a nice veteran core around him with Andy Stempel and Alec Bausch, as well as some intriguing young players. The fact that the Titans finished fourth in the CCIW last season and carry that experience forward might make them the biggest threat to the Cardinals.

Augustana is also an interesting team. Grey Giovanine has been in Rock Island for almost two decades, and the Vikings have never missed the CCIW Tournament. But they graduated all five starters from last year's Elite Eight team. While there are still solid pieces like Chrishawn Orange on the team and the Vikings loaded up on bigs this offseason, they might have a down year this season.

North Park is an interesting case study. They have two All Americans as well, including First Team player Juwan Henry, arguably the best player in the CCIW, while Jordan Robinson almost gets overshadowed despite his status on the All American Fourth Team. Colin Lake is a good point guard and this is overall a pretty talented team, but it's one that I believe you can get into the head of a little bit. With their best players as seniors, I think this is their best shot at finally making the CCIW Tournament.

Things drop off a bit from there. Carroll won 20 games last year before getting ousted by St. Norbert in the Midwest Conference Tournament, and they only have a couple of seniors, most notably Kyle Keranen, but this is a young team and the CCIW is a tougher conference. They'll blend in fine, but it might be a tough adjustment. It will also be a tough adjustment this year for Elmhurst, as they graduated their entire starting five, but still boast some solid contributors like Nathan Rogers, Brandon Auker, and Jalen Loving. They'll need time to rebuild that same level of depth they had last year, but with the size of their roster, they'll get guys to develop and this will be a dangerous team down the road.

The bottom falls out after this. Wheaton has undergone a surprising collapse in recent years and lost a few of their best players in the offseason. Luke Peters and Ricky Samuelson represent a decent core, but there's not a lot around those guys. Carthage lost Jordan Kedrowski, one of their better players and will have to rely on Brad Kruse to carry most of the load this season, but head coach Bosko Djurikovic has brought in some good young talent that may help accelerate Carthage's return to the top. Millikin is picked at the bottom again after a year of largely getting beat up on by the rest of the conference. Much of their core is still fairly young, however, with Tyler Pygon, Nathan Lovekamp, and Leighton Lark all juniors or younger. I just don't think they have enough talent to keep up with the top of the conference.

Final Thoughts

There's no reason to think that this Cardinal team can't eclipse what it accomplished this past year. This is an experienced team, though not a senior-stacked team, so there's still a lot of room for this team to grow. I worry a little bit about slow starts that have plagued this team at times, but this Cardinal team should be right in the mix for the entire season. With a little luck, they can be one of the best teams in the Central Region, host the CCIW Tournament, and maybe some NCAA Tournament games as well.

Prediction: 20-5, 13-3, 1st in CCIW