Category Archives: General

Augie in China: Preparation underway

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Augustana senior Kyle Nelson and his teammates are getting ready to travel to China in early August. He will be blogging regularly on D3hoops.com about the team’s journey.

Nelson’s first installment follows:

For three years I have heard stories from teammates about their tour to China in 2007. Every single story they told, whether it was about a game they played against a Chinese Basketball Association team or if it was about going out at night and experiencing Chinese nightlife, left a great impression on me. When the team went in 2007, I was an incoming freshman and NCAA rules did not allow us to participate in any practices or the trip itself. I am very excited to finally be able to go, in my senior year, and experience all of the excitement that the last trip generated first hand. I know that this trip, shared with coaches, their families and teammates, is going to be a life changing and memorable experience for all of us. Aug. 3, our departure date from O’Hare, cannot get here soon enough.

The past two weekends and also this coming weekend, our team has gathered at the Carver Center to participate in the ten practice days that the NCAA grants to teams going on a foreign tour. The attitude in the gym has been positive and full of excitement. The practices have been very intense and it has been interesting to play with a few different rules that the international game has compared to the NCAA. For example, the ball that we are playing with is slightly smaller than what we are used to here, the lane is much wider, the ball can be hit off the rim when it is still bouncing and finally, maybe the difference that is taking the most adjustment, is that the shot clock is now 24 seconds instead of the usual 35. This has really forced us to work on playing faster and quicker decisions during the game. Playing under these new rules is something unique and these practices are helping us prepare as if it were the beginning of the season.

The most difficult thing thus far during these summer practices has been coping with how hot the Carver Center gets during practice. When were playing, it feels like it is 100 degrees in there and that took a while to get used to. We have had to switch baskets frequently because guys are sweating so much people are slipping everywhere. A few guys have even had to sit out a few drills to shake out some lightheadedness and exhaustion. Even though the heat is extreme, Coach G has insisted that this is great for us because it is just like how it will be in China. Hopefully the heat training pays off and helps against our competition in China and further on down the road.

Once overseas, we will be playing some talented opponents. After a scrimmage against Hong Kong Baptist University, the Vikings will be lining up against the defending CBA champions, the Guangdong Southern Tigers. After these games, we will play three more university teams and one more CBA team. The competition is some of the best that China has to offer and we are all excited to represent Augustana and the United States on the other side of the world.

Next time you hear from me we’ll be getting ready to enjoy a 13 hour flight to China!

— Kyle Nelson

Moving from 3 to 1

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When George Fox head coach Scott Rueck accepted the top post at his alma mater Oregon State, he became the second coach this offseason to make the jump directly from Division III to Division I head coach. Vermont selected Lori Gear McBride of Colby to be its next women’s basketball coach in May.

The contemporary standard bearer for making that jump successfully is UW-Madison coach Bo Ryan. Ryan won four national titles with UW-Platteville and then moved to UW-Milwaukee before taking over the Badgers. At a lower profile Tony Shaver has done a nice job developing the William & Mary program since leaving Hampden-Sydney. Glenn Miller went from Conn College to Brown after leading the Camels to the Division III national semifinals. Miller did well at Brown, winning more games in his first six years there any previous Bears coach. Then he moved to Penn where he got fired after a 0-7 start to last season.

Here’s how some others have fared recently:

* Division I Bucknell likes them some D3 coaches. That’s understandable since Pat Flannery, who took over the Bison program in 1994, won 234 games there. Flannery arrived in Lewisburg after winning the national championship with Lebanon Valley that same year. So when Flannery retired in April 2008, Bucknell picked another Division III coach as his successor, Williams Dave Paulsen. Paulsen hasn’t taken the Bison to the same heights yet. They went 7-23 in Paulsen’s second season and 14-17 in the second.

* Speaking of the Patriot League, Stefanie Pemper left Bowdoin after a long, successful run in Maine for slightly warmer climes in 2008 when she became the head coach at Navy. The Mids have turned things around nicely under her, from 7-23 pre-Pemper in 2007-2008 to 16-15 post-Pemper in 2008-2009. Navy sustained that momentum last season by going 17-14.

* Around the same time as Paulsen’s and Pemper’s moves, Don Friday made the jump from Lycoming to St. Francis (Pa.). He took over a Red Flash program that had won just 18 games in three seasons. St. Francis kept slogging at that pace with a six win campaign in 2008-2009 but nearly doubled the win total last season by going 11-19.

This is far too small a sample to make any generalizations but it does highlight a couple things.

First, has any Division III coach made as big a jump as Rueck? Not to denigrate the Ivy League, Patriot League, American East or NEC, but they aren’t on the same level athletically as the Pac 12, um 10, er whatever. To give you a sense of scale how big the jump is, George Fox spent $81,909 during its undefeated championship run in 2008-2009 according to Federal government data. Oregon State spent five times as much – $419,465 – in a season where the Beavers went 20-12.

How will Rueck’s style translate at that level? Apparently he had the same question before taking the job. According to The Oregonian, Rueck called Oregon State football coach Mike Riley who also coached in the NWC at Linfield. Riley’s words encouraged Rueck to make the jump. An OSU assistant baseball coach who is also a former George Fox coach says, “”If you can coach at D-III you can coach anywhere.”

What happens to the teams these coaches leave behind? It’s a mixed bag. The Williams men reached last year’s national championship game post-Paulsen. The Bowdoin women aren’t as dominant as they used to be, but that may have more to do with GP Gromacki’s arrival at Amherst than Pemper’s departure. UW-Platteville and Hampden-Sydney aren’t as successful as they were under Ryan and Shaver, but they are competitive in really tough leagues. And Conn College has not fared well in the NESCAC since Miller left.

As for George Fox, having a roster with young talent, including freshman phenom Hannah Munger, certainly won’t hurt. Nor will it hurt that Puget Sound, the Bruins closest rival, will be going through a similar process after head coach Suzy Barcomb left for Division II. That’s the recipe for sustaining the success that Rueck established at George Fox over the short term. Choosing the right head coach to replace Rueck will go a long way toward sustaining it over the long term.

Putting a Tiger in the NCAC’s tank

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DePauw announced that it will leave the SCAC and join the NCAC for basketball effective in the 2011-2012 season. It’s still a full season away, but adding the Tigers to NCAC men’s basketball could have a very different impact than adding the Tigers to NCAC women’s basketball.

In men’s basketball, DePauw brings depth to a conference that has been incredibly top heavy. Wooster (7) and Wittenberg (3) have won the last 10 regular season titles and all but one NCAC tournament title. Wooster’s dominance is particularly striking. The Scots are 46-51 against Wittenberg (.474) all time and 688-256 against everyone else (.729). Six NCAC teams – everyone but Wittenberg, Ohio Wesleyan and Wabash – haven’t beaten Wabash in at least 10 seasons.

Maybe DePauw won’t challenge Wooster for the title every year, but it’s hard to imagine the Tigers going 0-for-a-decade against the Scots. DePauw has averaged just under 20 wins over the last four seasons and made consecutive NCAA tournament appearances in 2006 and 2007. And I’ve seen the DePauw’s Neal Fieldhouse when it’s full and loud for a basketball game. A road game against DePauw in mid-February will be a much better gauge of how ready Wooster and other NCAC title contenders are for the NCAA tournament than road games at Earlham who is moving from the NCAC to the HCAC.

On the women’s side, the story will be different, at least in the short term. On a lot of nights, adding DePauw to the NCAC may have the same impact as adding a steamroller to a bumper car rally. The Tigers have won at least 19 games every season since 1995. They have made the NCAA tournament in eight of the last nine years with a national championship (2007) and another Final Four appearance (2002) along the way. Since Ohio Wesleyan reached the 2001 Final Four, the NCAC representative has gone 6-9 in the NCAA tournament and hasn’t survived the first weekend since 2004. DePauw has gone 17-7 over that same period and twice beaten the NCAC rep (Denison both times).

There’s a chance that DePauw does to the NCAC women’s field what Wooster has done to the NCAC men’s field. That would be a shame for all involved. Teams who survive tough conferences in the regular season are better prepared to make deep runs in the postseason. So DePauw will have to continue its aggressive non-conference scheduling since there will be a lot of nights where the Tigers aren’t challenged by NCAC opponents, at least in the short term. But there’s also a chance that DePauw will give the conference a gold standard toward which the other programs can aspire, elevating the whole conference’s quality of play. DePauw gives teams like Denison and Wittenberg, who have played well in conference, a better gauge of what it takes to succeed in the NCAA tournament. As one NCAC message board maven put it, hopefully a rising tide lifts all boats.

The final word on La Sierra

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La Sierra’s long trip through the provisional membership process, trying to become a Division III member, took a wrong turn this past fall and finally has come to an end. The NCAA’s Division III membership committee reported that “In regards to La Sierra University, the institution that was instructed to rejoin the process as a year one institution, it is trying to do the right thing and attempting to understand what it takes to be a Division III institution.”

La Sierra, in Southern California, could have been through the four-year process and become an active member of Division III by now, in a spot of the country that could desperately use more Division III schools. Instead, the school has joined the NAIA, according to a release this week.

It isn’t easy to become a Division III school. Many of the schools that start the process are not fully prepared to do so, especially those that have to add sports, in some cases several, to make the minimum. In this case, La Sierra has finally washed out of the process.

One Last Time

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I am a failure. Ok, I really needed to get that off my chest. When I found out I was going to write this blog I had visions of grandeur. One blog per week, creative ideas, and funny angles that would ultimately lead to a cult following which would land me a spot on Bill Simmons’ podcast to talk about the wonderful things that are division III basketball. Oops. I guess some things were just not meant to be. Alas, I failed miserably on all accounts. And for that I would like to say I am deeply and truly sorry to all of my loyal fans, yes both of you.

As you might have figured, (or should have figured by the title of this blog) our season is over. We finished a fantastic season in the opening round of the NCAA tournament in Middlebury, VT with a 64-57 loss to Middlebury. It was a disappointing ending to one of the most rewarding four years of my life. I don’t want to summarize the whole game, but there are a couple of parts I want to highlight elementary school style, yup with Gold Stars. 13 stars to 8 foot tall Andrew Locke of Middlebury. (Wait a minute, that’s Manute Bol) That is one for every block he had Friday night. I’m serious. For those of you scoring at home, that is one more than Jesus had disciples. He blocked me alone 5 times. Here is an example of what happened Friday night. Unbeliveable performance. Andrew, you will receive your stars in the mail. 12 stars for two time NESCAC defensive player of the year Tim Edwards of Middlebury for the number of misses he forced me into Friday night. That’s right I was 3-15. He is a tremendous defensive player and made life difficult for me all night, hence the 3-15 shooting night. On second thought, he can just share his teammate’s the gold stars. 2 stars for the Gordon College Men’s Basketball team for the number of double digit deficits we fought back from. We battled through a rough first half after being down 12 to enter halftime down by 3. In the second half we found ourselves down 16 only to battle back to a five point game with 2 minutes to play. That shows the kind of character and never say die attitude our gritty little squad has. And finally, 1 Million Gold Stars to The Pit. The Pit is the Gordon student section of about 200 students who made the 4 hour trip to Vermont on their own dime because we were on spring break while this game took place. I can’t explain how much their support means to us and if I had anything other than Gold Stars to give out I would.  We have the best fans in New England, bar none.

It is difficult to put into words what my time at Gordon has meant to me but since I have this blog I am going to try anyways.  I have been blessed to be a part of a TEAM in the truest since. There are many teams around the country but very few TEAMS.  A team is a collection of individuals who come together to try to reach some sort of collective goal. A TEAM is a group of people bonded together with a passion for each other who commit to reaching a goal and do everything they can to attain it. TEAMS are special. The latter is what I have experienced the past four years. I am a part of a special class of people who for four years grew to care more about each other than ourselves as individuals. In order to attempt to quantify how special this class has been I am going to go against my nature and brag a little bit. Our senior class will graduate as the All-Time winningest class in school history, has played in more games than any class in school history, the first class to have back-to-back 20 win seasons, two regular season conference championships, and the first Conference Tournament Championship in school history.  One of the most incredible stats is that in four years, our class has missed a total of 3 games due to injury. That is 6 players and over 600 games between the 6 of us and we have all been healthy for all except 3. Even more in incredible is that one of our seniors who will remain nameless gets infections like it’s his job. (We found a creative solution to this problem) We have had 6 All-Conference selections, the defensive player of the year, the player of the year, the senior scholar athlete of the year, and we even won the sportsmanship award. It has been an extraordinary four years and I could not have asked for a better group of guys to experience it with.

Maybe you can understand if I tell you a little about these guys. First off is the honorary member of our class Ben “Moose” Drake. Moose played for three years, and was unfortunately unable to finish this season with us. However, Moose is as much of a part of our team’s success as anyone I know. He never played many minutes, but in some ways that is the most important member of the team. People will always look at the most veteran player who does not get many minutes to replicate their attitude. I have never met someone with a better one. He is the epitome of a teammate. Always putting others first, working as hard as he can day in and day out, and constantly supporting his teammates. Moose even joined us for a couple of honorary team showers. Can you say “Only team in America”? (For those of you who don’t understand this concept this video may help)To top it all off, when I looked into the crowd on Friday night, guess who I saw in the first row cheering on his teammates. Yep you guessed it, Moose. Next is Jeff Derr, the 6’8” gentle giant, and walking sports encyclopedia who is one of the most unselfish players I have ever played with. As a multi-skilled big man he has willingly sacrificed his own glory for the good of the team throughout his career and placed others above himself and contributed in some major ways along the way. That is the epitome of a team player. Next is Brady Bajema. There may not be a better teammate in the country than Brady Bajema. I have had the privilege of being co-captains with Brady the past two years. I have never played with a person who truly only cared about winning. He is the most competitive person I know and constantly kicked my butt in pick-up games, practice and shooting drills the past four years. Brady could honestly care less how many points he scores or assists he has as long as his team has more at the end of the day. Next is Tim MacDonnell. You really need to see Timmy play to understand what he does for a team. (Think Dennis Rodman minus the tats and funky hair and add rec specs) I am sure a number of coaches have looked at our stats when scouting us and wondered, “why does this guy play so much” only to watch film and end up wishing he had a team full of guys like Tim. For example, in our final game, Tim took more charges than I took the entire season, possibly my career. Yes I am a ninny, but what Tim does for his team is impossible to quantify in numbers other than wins and losses. His teams just win. Tim literally gave his right arm for his teammates. He has played the last two and a half seasons with a torn labrum. Some people would miss an entire season with that sort of injury. Not Tim, he missed one game his entire career. Finally is Ben Gaskill. When I think about how unique our team is, Ben is the poster child. He is 6’9” with red hair, and runs like a deer (seriously, when in shape he can run a sub 5 min mile). In my two years as his roommate I have seen him dress up as Ernie from Sesame Street, a shark eating a person, wear a bed sheet as a cape, rip that same bed sheet on a fire extinguisher, and spend more time in the shower than any human on than planet. Not only that, but Ben turned himself into a defensive and rebounding menace. He was the Defensive Player of the Year in our conference and was the main reason we ended the regular season with the third highest rebounding margin in the country. He took his role, embraced it and thrived in it. Ben could have tried to be our leading scorer, which would bring more recognition. Instead, he found how he could best help our team win, and without that we would never have reached the level of success that we did. I also must mention the outstanding coaches we had during our career. While we did encounter a major coaching change before this season, we could not have asked for two better men to lead our teams over four years. These coaches not only led us on the basketball court but helped teach us what it meant to be men of character.  Coach Murphy, Coach Krass, Coach Whitley, Coach Schauer, and Coach Martin, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

One final note that everyone reading this needs to know. As amazing as this group is, our parents are even more incredible. The six of us are from, Overland Park, KS; Chicago, IL; Columbus, OH; Burlington, VT; Philadelphia, PA; and Worcester, MA and I can count on one had the number of games parents missed this season. The commitment each of our parents made to supporting us is unparalleled. On many occasions my dad described it as “crazy.” While it may have been, it is impossible to express how much the support our parents gave means to each of us. On behalf of all of the seniors, THANK YOU!

I know this is getting long, but you have to be careful to give someone a platform to speak, because they just might use it. Sorry Mr. Coleman. This season has been so rewarding, not because we won so many games and achieved so many program firsts, although we did that a lot. It is because of what we went through to get to where we are. We battled expectations, disappointment, a coaching change, frustration, selfish desires, losses, not to mention our opponents, all to arrive at this point. I have heard the quote, “TEAMS are built through shared challenges.” However they can also be broken through them. We chose to become a TEAM through our challenges. We began this season with a new coach and a 4-3 record; we finished as Conference Champions and a 24-5 record. We began our careers as six strangers from all over the country; we ended it as lifelong friends. Even more than that we helped build a program, just as the classes before us have. While our stated goal was to be the “Best team in Gordon history” the true goal was to leave the program in better shape than we found it. Only time will tell, but if future Gordon teams can become a TEAM like ours, our class will no doubt have been a success, regardless of my failures as a writer.