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Notebook

Greg Chandler's
Great Lakes Notebook
Posted Feb. 22, 2000

Just when you thought it was safe to crown Otterbein as the outright regular season champion of the Ohio Athletic Conference, back came preseason favorite Ohio Northern from out of the ashes.

Trailing the Cardinals by two games with a week left in the regular season, the Polar Bears caught Otterbein with a pair of victories last week, while the Cardinals stumbled not once, but twice. Result: ONU, not Otterbein, will be the top seed for this week's OAC conference tournament.

On Wednesday, Ohio Northern got 23 points from Mike Kluse and 18 off the bench from Lee Creager in a 75-54 win over Capital. Meanwhile, Baldwin-Wallace toppled Otterbein 76-64.

Then on Saturday, the Polar Bears found themselves locked in a tussle with familiar foe John Carroll on the road. The Blue Streaks held a 63-59 with 1:22 remaining, but Jeremy Thompson fired in a 3-pointer 16 seconds later to pull Ohio Northern within one.

Then after a stop on the defensive end, ONU dialed up freshman Aaron Fries. His three-point bomb with six seconds to play put the Polar Bears ahead 65-63. A desperation shot by John Carroll missed, and Ohio Northern had gotten the sweep it needed.

However, Otterbein still had to play Saturday night against Muskingum. The Muskies, who have been playing well of late, had another surprise awaiting the Cardinals, knocking off Otterbein 77-73 and denying the Cardinals an outright championship.

Ohio Northern (15-8 overall) and Otterbein (16-8) finished the conference season at 11-5, but the Polar Bears won the tiebreaker to claim the top seed. But in this topsy-turvy OAC season, anything is possible. Do not rule out Marietta (17-7), Muskingum (15-9) or Baldwin-Wallace (13-11) in this week's conference tournament.

Meanwhile, Calvin and Wooster capped off unbeaten conference seasons in the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association and the North Coast Athletic Conference, respectively.

Meanwhile, No. 4 Wooster extended its NCAC winning streak to 31 games with an 83-72 victory against archrival Wittenberg in Springfield, continuing the Tigers' late slide. Wittenberg has now dropped four of its last six.

Wooster (16-0, 22-2) shot 55% from the field in completing its first-ever sweep of Wittenberg (11-5, 17-7) in which it won both games by double-figure margins. Leading the way was sophomore guard Antwyan Reynolds, who scored a career-high 22 points, including four 3-pointers. Nate Gaubatz came off of the bench to add 17 points.

Wabash took advantage of Wittenberg's late slump to take the No. 2 seed for the NCAC tournament. Senior guard Josh Estelle (left) became the Little Giants' all-time scoring leader on Saturday, scoring 19 points in a 74-59 win over Kenyon. With 1,994 points, Estelle moved past Wabash two-sport legend and former NFL tight end Pete Metzelaars (right) as the school's all-time scoring leader.

Earlier in the week, the other half of Wabash's "New Castle Connection," forward Brian Latham, had 27 points, including the game-winning three-pointer with 4.3 seconds left, in a 71-68 escape against Ohio Wesleyan. Estelle, the nation's second-leading scorer at 26 points per game, was held to 12.

Besides Wooster, the hottest team in the NCAC right now are those surprising Quakers of Earlham. After a 1-12 start, Earlham has won nine of its last 11 and is riding into the NCAC tournament on a six-game winning streak, the school's longest in 24 years.

Last Wednesday, Earlham victimized Wittenberg again, beating the Tigers for the second time in two weeks, 71-60, in Springfield. Before those wins, Earlham had lost 31 straight to Witt dating back to the 1973-74 season. It had been even longer since the Quakers had defeated the Tigers in Springfield -- Dec. 2, 1955, to be exact.

Earlham (10-6, 10-14) then finished off the regular season with a 75-50 win over Oberlin on Saturday. It's the first time the Quakers have reached double digits in victories since the 1988-89 season.

Calvin maintained its No. 2 standing in the D3hoops.com poll by taking care of Kalamazoo on Saturday, 85-66. Aaron Winkle, who has been named a finalist for the Jostens Trophy as one of the most outstanding players in Division III, led the Knights with 21 points and 11 rebounds, his 26th career double-double, while Kalamazoo native Jeremy Veenstra added 19 points.

Calvin (22-2 overall) became only the second MIAA school to post a 14-0 record in a season -- a record that is unlikely to be matched anytime soon, since Defiance is leaving the conference at season's end, meaning the MIAA will revert back to a 12-game league schedule.

In the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference, Penn State-Behrend capped off a perfect conference season on Saturday with a 75-65 win against Lake Erie. The Lions have now won 11 in a row and own a 22-2 record heading into the AMCC tournament.

Despite Otterbein's late slump, center Jeff Gibbs has had a terrific season. The nation's leading rebounder, Gibbs has had 18 double-doubles in his last 20 games. On Saturday, he had career highs of 30 points and 20 rebounds against Muskingum. In 20 games, Gibbs has grabbed 260 rebounds this season for an average of 13 a game. He also leads the OAC in field goal percentage (63.6 percent) and blocked shots (2.55 a game).

Mount Union sophomore center Todd Richards set an NCAA Division III mark for consecutive field goals made when he hit his 24th consecutive shot last week. Richards has hit on 28 of his last 29 field-goal attempts for a .966 accuracy.

Defiance's Eric Viney played a huge role off the bench in leading the Yellow Jackets to two important wins and the No. 2 seed for the MIAA tournament. Viney scored 43 points in just 34 minutes of play last week -- 18 points in an 82-65 victory against Kalamazoo Wednesday and a career-high 25 points in a 93-89 triumph over Hope Saturday in a showdown for second place.

Olivet center Bruce Lawrence had a huge game against Adrian, with 24 points and 18 rebounds as the Comets rolled to a 103-81 win against the Bulldogs.

Heidelberg senior center Kory Winkler went over the 1,000-point mark for his career last Wednesday against John Carroll. He currently is 18th on the 'Berg's all-time scoring list with 1,021 career points. In that same game, JCU's Paul Niermann scored a career-high 29 points.

Marietta's 17 victories this season are the most by a Pioneer squad in 25 years. Marietta won 19 games back in the 1974-75 season. Brent Cahill joined the Pioneers' 1,000-point club Saturday with 11 points in an overtime win over Baldwin-Wallace.

Turning to women's hoops, Hope denied Calvin a fifth consecutive MIAA regular season championship last Tuesday, using a suffocating defense to defeat the Lady Knights, 59-36, to claim their first league title since 1995. Hope held Calvin to just 23 percent shooting from the field and held a 54-33 edge in rebounding, almost a complete reversal from the first meeting Jan. 15, when Calvin held a 52-34 advantage on the boards in a 56-54 win.

Amanda Kerkstra led the Flying Dutch with 15 points and 10 rebounds. MIAA scoring leader Robyn Fennema, who was shut out in the first half, was limited to 10 points for Calvin, as was Mindi Andringa.

On Saturday, Calvin bounced back from the Hope loss to defeat Kalamazoo 64-50, avenging a 16-point loss to the Hornets earlier this season. Despite the loss, Kalamazoo finished the regular season at 17-7, its best season in school history. Do not overlook the Hornets in this week's MIAA tournament.

All you need to know about the OAC is that only two schools -- Baldwin-Wallace and Capital -- finished with winning records. B-W (16-0, 23-1) capped off a perfect conference season by thumping Otterbein 98-62 and Marietta 84-62. The Yellow Jackets were led by Jen Nance with 37 points and 18 rebounds in the two games. Nance was nearly perfect, hitting 12-of-14 from the field and all 13 of her free throws.

Capital, meanwhile, won its only game of the week, downing Ohio Northern 64-42 to finish regular season play at 14-2 in the OAC, 21-3 overall. Amy Strine fired in 21 points for the Crusaders, leaving her 17 shy of 1,000 for her career.

In the NCAC, Ohio Wesleyan is on a roll heading into this week's conference tournament. The Battling Bishops extended their winning streak to 10 with wins over Oberlin, 66-46, and Allegheny, 62-55. OWU, which finished 14-2 in league play and is 21-2 overall heading into the tournament, hasn't allowed an opponent to score more than 67 points in a game this season.

In the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference, preseason favorite Wilmington caught Franklin on the final day of the regular season and took the top seed for this week's conference tournament.

On Saturday, Wilmington defeated Mount St. Joseph 77-67 while Bluffton surprised Franklin 67-53. Just two weeks ago, Franklin was unbeaten in conference play and held a two-game lead over Wilmington.

Heather Meranda scored 18 points and Wilmington (10-2 HCAC, 18-6 overall) controlled the boards by a 44-20 margin in its win against MSJ, led by MacKenzie Hammond's 11 rebounds. Meanwhile, Elizabeth Snavely came off the bench to score 27 points and pull down 12 boards in Bluffton's shocker over Franklin (10-2, 15-9). Not a single Grizzlies starter scored in double figures.

Are you kidding me?: To say Alma was on fire from three-point range last Tuesday against Adrian would be a gross understatement. The Lady Scots shot an unbelievable 92% (12 of 13) from long distance in blowing away Adrian, 85-58. Senior Shannon Gross and freshman Janell Twietmeyer led the Alma assault -- Gross nailed all five of her three-point tries on her way to a 28-point performance, while Twietmeyer was four of five on her triple-tries. The 12 three-pointers broke the MIAA record of 11, set by Olivet twice, and the school record of 11, set by the 1992 NCAA D-III champion Lady Scots in a national semifinal win against Luther.

Heidelberg guard Rachael Poland fired in a career-high 31 points last weekend against Mount Union, the 12th time in her career she has scored 25 or more points in a game.

Remembering a miracle: Hope honored its 1990 Division III national championship team on Saturday. The Flying Dutch won the NCAA tournament that year in perhaps the most dramatic finish in tournament history. Trailing by 20 points with nine minutes remaining and 18 with seven minutes left, Hope outscored top-ranked St. John Fisher 25-5 down the stretch to shock the Cardinals 65-63 in Holland. Senior guard Dina Disney capped off the storybook comeback with two free throws with less than a second remaining. Twelve of the 13 players from that team and the entire coaching staff attended a halftime ceremony and postgame banquet.

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