around the MVC hoops

[talksalot]

As bad as Tuesday was for the valley.. Wednesday was good.  5 wins, including 2 power-5 wins, Kansas State and South Carolina...  and mid major wins over Murray State and old Dominion.

[talksalot]

Regular Season starts tomorrow...

Pick 'em:
Monday
Southern Illinois at Indiana State (Sycs favored by 7.5)

Tuesday:
Northern Iowa at Illinois State
Evansville at Missouri State
Drake at Bradley

I'm thinking the home teams here will be 2-2... 3-2 when you include THE Game.

Looking ahead to Saturday:

3:00pm
Illinois State at Southern Illinois
5:00pm
Indiana State at Drake
6:00pm
Valparaiso at Evansville
7:00pm
Missouri State at Loyola-Chicago
7:00pm- ESPU
Bradley at Northern Iowa

[talksalot]

so I said the home teams would be 3-2 in conference.  pains me to say..  4-1 will be the tally in the first games.  I hear there are 17 more

[valpo64]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

[talksalot]

Looking at the next set of matchups... will the home team continue to roll (present company excepted)...

Tuesday
Missouri State at Illinois State
Indiana State at Northern Iowa
Loyola at Drake
Valpo at Carbondale

Wednesday
Bradley at Evansville

(I'll go 2-3 for the homies on that group)

Saturday 1/11
Illinois State at Indiana State
Region Rats at the ARC
Evansville at Loyola
Northern Iowa at Missouri State
Southern Illinois at Bradley

I'll go 4-1 on this group...

[bbtds]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

They were "red(bird)" hot in that 2nd half and no matter what Northern Iowa was so cold. There are holes in every MVC's teams' games.

[bbtds]

Tuesday
Missouri State at Illinois State
Indiana State at Northern Iowa
Loyola at Drake
Valpo at Carbondale

Wednesday
Bradley at Evansville

I'll go ISUr, UNI, Loyola, Valpo by 3, & Bradley. Could just as easily be 5-0 as I could be 0-5.

Saturday 1/11
Illinois State at Indiana State
Region Rats at the ARC
Evansville at Loyola
Northern Iowa at Missouri State
Southern Illinois at Bradley

I'll just wait.

[valpo64]

"Region Rats"?    I love it!

[wh]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

And, rest assured that no one at Illinois State has mixed feelings over beating the team that has the best chance of making the conference look good in the NCAA tournament. That only happens here.   

[EddieCabot]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

And, rest assured that no one at Illinois State has mixed feelings over beating the team that has the best chance of making the conference look good in the NCAA tournament. That only happens here.

After that loss, Northern Iowa is coming back to the MVC pack a bit in the various rankings.  Latest bracket prediction from Region legend Jerry Palm has Loyola (conference leader) representing the MVC as a 15 seed.  Not ideal.

https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/bracketology/

[vu72]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

And, rest assured that no one at Illinois State has mixed feelings over beating the team that has the best chance of making the conference look good in the NCAA tournament. That only happens here.

After that loss, Northern Iowa is coming back to the MVC pack a bit in the various rankings.  Latest bracket prediction from Region legend Jerry Palm has Loyola (conference leader) representing the MVC as a 15 seed.  Not ideal.

https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/bracketology/

Not sure how that happens (the 15th seed). Right now in the Sagarin's, for example, The Valley is ranked 11th out of 32.  Northern Iowa has the highest individual ranking at 83rd which is higher than the best team in 17 other conference. Add to that that 4 other conference leaders ranked higher than us will certainly drop as they play their conference mates. Three of the four have four teams ranked below 200 while The Valley only has one.

Unless we put up a lower ranked team (big upset) and even if the best team in all those conferences wins out (unlikely) The Valley representative should be a 12--at least by Sagarin's rankings.

[valpo64]

and there is a loooooooooong way to go before  March Madness.

[EddieCabot]

Illinois State, at home,  scores 56 points in the second half to erase a 10 point half-time deficit to beat Northern Iowa 76-70.  Wow!

And, rest assured that no one at Illinois State has mixed feelings over beating the team that has the best chance of making the conference look good in the NCAA tournament. That only happens here.

After that loss, Northern Iowa is coming back to the MVC pack a bit in the various rankings.  Latest bracket prediction from Region legend Jerry Palm has Loyola (conference leader) representing the MVC as a 15 seed.  Not ideal.

https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/bracketology/

Not sure how that happens (the 15th seed). Right now in the Sagarin's, for example, The Valley is ranked 11th out of 32.  Northern Iowa has the highest individual ranking at 83rd which is higher than the best team in 17 other conference. Add to that that 4 other conference leaders ranked higher than us will certainly drop as they play their conference mates. Three of the four have four teams ranked below 200 while The Valley only has one.

Unless we put up a lower ranked team (big upset) and even if the best team in all those conferences wins out (unlikely) The Valley representative should be a 12--at least by Sagarin's rankings.

I took a closer look ... Palm clearly didn't spend much time analyzing the bottom half of the bracket.

[talksalot]

Tuesday
Missouri State at Illinois State - Road Win by 4 for the Bears
Indiana State at Northern Iowa - Home win by 8 for the Panthers
Loyola at Drake - Home win... by a whisker...
Valpo at Carbondale - Home Win...

Wednesday
Bradley at Evansville - 20-point Wardle Win...

Home teams go 3-2.


TEAM   W   L   PCT   W   L   PCT   STRKW   L   W   L   RPI RANK
North Ia   2   1   .667   13   2   .867   W2   9   0   3   1   23
Drake     2   1   .667   12   4   .750   W2   9   0   1   3   94
Bradley   2   1   .667   11   5   .688   W1   9   0   1   4   116
Loyola     2   1   .667   10   6   .625   L1   6   2   2   2   172
Missou St.   2   1   .667   8   8   .500   W1   6   1   1   5   174
S. Illinois   2   1   .667   8   8   .500   W2   7   1   0   5   290
Ind State   1   2   .333   8   6   .571   L2   5   0   1   4   59
Valparaiso   1   2   .333   8   8   .500   L1   4   1   3   4   155
Illinois St.   1   2   .333   6   9   .400   L2   6   2   0   4   243
Evansville   0   3   .000   9   7   .563   L3   5   3   3   2   200

3 games in... we're 1 back.   This Drake game on Saturday is a biggee.

[talksalot]

Saturday 1/11
Illinois State at Indiana State - Sycamores win
Region Rats at the ARC - Home Team comes up big
Evansville at Loyola - Loyola by 34
Northern Iowa at Missouri State- Panthers by 23
Southern Illinois at Bradley... braves come out smoking in the second half... up 4...

3-1 for the home team... so far...

Next Games up:
Wednesday
Evansville at Terre Haute
Bradley at Springfield
Good Guys at Cedar Falls

Thursday
Illinois State at Des Moines
Southern Illinois at Chicago

For those wondering... Drake chartered back to DesMoines... With the weather, they were a little late leaving Porter County Airport, but landed safely at DSM at 7:49pm.    Their plane was late getting in from Denver.   They were on Key Lime Air flight 839.  That's a different charter company than Valpo uses... and a different kind of plane.

THIS is the incoming flight route the plane took.  If you scroll down a bit, you can see it was NOT a comfortable flight ...

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/LYM839/history/20200111/2020Z/KAPA/KVPZ

This is Drake's plane:
https://flightaware.com/photos/view/1054769-f0e7f48ff90d4066cae79346c1aedeab4b92c757/airline/LYM/sort/votes/page/1

[talksalot]

UNI   3-1   14-2
LOY  3-1   11-6
BRA  2-1  11-5
SIU  2-1  8-8
DRA  2-2  12-5
IND  2-2  9-6
VAL  2-2  9-8
MST  2-2  8-9
ILL  1-3  6-10
EVA  0-4  9-8

One of those will be in first place, the other will be in second place...

4 games in...we're 1 game back.

[bbtds]

For those wondering... Drake chartered back to DesMoines... With the weather, they were a little late leaving Porter County Airport, but landed safely at DSM at 7:49pm.    Their plane was late getting in from Denver.   They were on Key Lime Air flight 839.  That's a different charter company than Valpo uses... and a different kind of plane.

THIS is the incoming flight route the plane took.  If you scroll down a bit, you can see it was NOT a comfortable flight ...

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/LYM839/history/20200111/2020Z/KAPA/KVPZ

This is Drake's plane:
https://flightaware.com/photos/view/1054769-f0e7f48ff90d4066cae79346c1aedeab4b92c757/airline/LYM/sort/votes/page/1

Looks like the plane circled around the Orland Park/Tinley Park/Mokena area until they were cleared by the Aurora FAA flight control tower to head for Des Moines. Smaller special charter flights get lower priority from the FAA. I wonder if the FAA were thinking about having them land at Joliet Regional or Lewis University Airport until the snow stormy clouds passed.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Lewis+University+Airport/@41.5647135,-88.0257088,11z/data=!4m8!1m2!2m1!1sairports!3m4!1s0x0:0xb41754ac90d65e96!8m2!3d41.604982!4d-88.091898

[talksalot]

Looks like the plane circled around the Orland Park/Tinley Park/Mokena area until they were cleared by the Aurora FAA flight control tower to head for Des Moines.

That was the INCOMING flight to Valpo that circled the south side...

anyway... Braves win the second half 41-19 and hold court...

Only Missouri State didn't win at home today...