Monday’s games
PORTA vs. Concord Triopia, 5 p.m.
Pittsfield vs. Havana, 6:30 p.m.
Midwest Central vs. Beardstown, 8 p.m.

Tuesday’s games
Havana vs. South Fulton, 5 p.m.
Pittsfield vs. Camp Point Central, 6:30 p.m.
Beardstown vs. PORTA, 8 p.m.

Jan. 29 games
South Fulton vs. Camp Point Central, 5 p.m.
Midwest Central vs. PORTA, 6:30 p.m.
Beardstown vs. Concord Triopia, 8 p.m.

Jan. 30 games
Camp Point Central vs. Havana, 5 p.m.
Concord Triopia vs. Midwest Central, 6:30 p.m.
South Fulton vs. Pittsfield, 8 p.m.

Jan. 31 games
Seventh — Pool A 4th vs. Pool B 4th, 2:30 p.m.
Fifth — Pool A 3rd vs. Pool B 3rd, 4 p.m.
Third — Pool A 2nd vs. Pool B 2nd, 5:30 p.m.
Title — Pool A 1st vs. Pool A 1st, 7 p.m.

It’s always about the money. $$$$$$$

Case in point. Next year Midwest Central will join the field at the Macomb tourney. There they will see only Illini Central and Farmington that is currently on their schedule. they left Williamsville where when they got there, it only had 1 team and now it has five. Macomb will be a good one for the Raiders.

Headed up by former Alwood coach Brad Jackson, the Heat have been putting up numbers unseen in girl’s basketball circles. West Central has scored at least 90 points in four contests this season, including a win over Princeville (99-60) in which they came just a free throw shy of the century mark.

Currently carrying a 14-3 record, the Heat have won both tournaments they have played in. A 4-0 record at the Alwood Thanksgiving Tournament gave them that title, with three victories over Olympic Conference schools (Monmouth-Roseville, Rockridge, & Knoxville). The Heat took their show to Abingdon for the Knoxville/Abingdon Pre-Holiday Tournament and swept through some solid competition. An impressive 79-64 score was the final in the tournament championship over Brimfield.

The three losses are to quite impressive talent. Their first loss of the season came at the heels of a very solid 3A Quincy Notre Dame (90-69), with the Heat’s other losses back-to-back by West Hancock (70-62) and Central/Southeastern (64-55).

The Lincoln Trail Conference is in for some tough competition when Biggsville West Central appears on the schedule. Holding a 5-0 record in LTC play through January 5th, the Heat have racked up an impressive 90 points per game in conference action, with wins over Princeville, Wethersfield, Cambridge, Alwood, and Westmer. In those matchups, West Central has outscored their conference cohorts by an average of almost 45 points per win.

In the Heat’s 14 wins this season, they have outscored their opponents by nearly 32 points per game. This week the Heat host Stark County in LTC play. The Lincoln Trail Conference Tournament will be played starting next week. West Central’s post season route will take them through the Avon or Peoria Heights Regional, ROWVA Sectional, and the potential to play at Illinois College in the 1A Jacksonville Supersectional.

The holiday tourney’s are all wrapped up and we begin to see a clearer picture of the contenders and pretenders in the high school basketball ranks. In the coming days, I will dissect each supersectional complex and project my midway favorites.

The lack of substance lately is due to the playing catch up after the holidays. Many things around the radio station (my full time work) get shelved until January due to the bulk of games I broadcast. I am slowly catching up on getting games burned to CD and digging up more cassette tapes…yes cassette tapes! We’re still behind the curve in one of our studios, that happens to broadcast games.

In the coming days, as I said earlier, I will offer up my mid-season picks in both boy’s and girl’s basketball, and also a feature on the  Heat girl’s basketball team. The Heat have been TORCHING their opponents this season.

Enjoy the second half of the season beginning tonight.

First Session
Abingdon over Hamilton. Low scoring game, despite 18 & 16 points from Nick Andersen and Ryan Thompson, respectively. I expected Hamilton to play Abingdon well, this Cardinal team is much better than the past few years. They could be a big threat in the consolation bracket.

Warsaw/Nauvoo-Colusa over Knoxville. Not even close! Reno Pinkston has the real deal in this team, and could be the team to beat in this tournament. Over the course of the day, I heard many say the Wildcats would have been better off practicing against each other.

Session Two
My 2007 tournament broadcast debut. Unlike the past few years, I have a backup crew at Western Hall. This alleviates much pressure for myself. Monmouth-Roseville dispatched a young Illini Central team. The Cougars are led by a pair of sophomores (Danny Harman & Alex Bradshaw), who saw their first varsity experience on the very same floor a year ago as freshmen. Illini Central could bite some teams this year as they mature at the varsity level. In talking to Coach Chuck Grant, he says his team needs to find some other scoring options besides Ben Gillen (he’s running the point). M-R did so, with Brian Thompson stepping up with 20 points.

Pittsfield over Barry Western. The Saukees took a 19-4 lead after one quarter, but allowed the newly consolidated Western back in, and Pittsfield took this one 43-37. If you would have asked me three weeks ago, I would have said the Saukees would be a top contender for the tournament championship, but after a lopsided loss a couple weeks back to Griggsville-Perry, and an eight-point loss to Carrollton just before the tournament. If I were a betting man, I would have Pittsfield battling it out in the 5th place bracket.

Kewanee over Farmington. The easiest coach to find is sitting on the Boilers bench. The KHS coach stands 7’1″, and I would venture to say he’ll be the tallest man walking Western Hall this week. Tony Ramos went to the University of Iowa on a scholarship from Dr. Tom Davis. That lasted a year as Steve Alford stepped in. Unfortunately, Ramos was gone, and Alford was in. Farmington battled back, but the Boilers and their big man Peter Tanzillo prevailed. Tanzillo scored 16 points, despite playing his first game back from injury. Had a chance to talk to my old buddy Gary Peterson from WKEI in town with the Boilermakers.

Session Three
Macomb over Brown County. The Bombers played an all-around great ball game. Matt Buren had 22 points, 11 rebounds, and electrified the orange clad crowd with a breakaway dunk in the first quarter. Davis Hendrickson was fiesty on both ends of the floor, putting up 15 points, and Ben Pratt, deadly from anywhere on the floor, finished a hot night of shooting with 18 points. Nathan Kunkel and Mark Tracy impressed me with the Hornets. Tracy finished with 21 points.

Lewistown over Illini West. To be honest with you, I expected this to be the best game of the first round. It was just another blow out, with the Indians winning easily. I will say this…the Chargers will be contending for a 2008, 2009, and 2010 Western Holiday Tournament, with a bulk of their talent being freshmen and sophomores.

Pleasant Plains over B-PC/A. Just as advertised, the Cardinals delivered. David Bergschneider made the crowd get excited after a breakaway one hand slam in the first half. The Cardinals are another top team, and face fellow unbeaten Lewistown in the second round.

Random Notes:
Former Wisconsin Badger, and now head coach at Monmouth College Mark Vershaw was in attendance all day long. Flash Flanagan was also in the house. Funniest comment overheard, during the Macomb/Brown County game. Dane Jorgensen (#30) looked to pick up his third foul, but was called on Matt Buren (#32), his second. Bomber coach Danny Watson asked one of the officials if that was right, with the official responding, “Well now they’re even….they both have two (fouls)”.

Abingdon (Ryan Thompson & Nick Andersen)
Brown County (Quinton Bradbury & Caleb Taylor)
B-PC/A (Skylar Van Tine & Logan Lovejoy)
Farmington (Israel Snyder & Tad Chatten)
Hamilton (Caleb Gray & Dylan Morris)
Illini Central (???) (If memory serves correctly…Alex Bradshaw & Landon Frye)
Illini West (Jacob Schmudlach & Cody Carson)
Kewanee (Peter Tanzillo & Zach Saey)
Knoxville (Chris Schmidt & T.J. Cramer)
Lewistown (Clayton Hatfill & Adam Valencia)
Macomb (Matt Buren & Davis Hendrickson)
Monmouth-Roseville (Ben Gillen & Brian Thompson)
Pittsfield (Jake McNulty & Garrett Howland)
Pleasant Plains (David Bergschneider & Evan Baietto)
Warsaw/Nauvoo-Colusa (Ben Kearse & Luke Bavery)
Barry Western (Tyler Harris & ???)

My Wednesday took me to the 26th annual Lady Tiger Classic in Beardstown. Unfortunately, a busy day kept me from watching a days worth of basketball, but I did catch some action. In the first game I watched, B-PC/Avon came back from an eight-point deficit to Brown County to close within one. A couple missed opportunites, and the Hornets took a 50-42 victory, mostly spent at the free throw line in the waning minute.

My broadcast was the Macomb/Carrollton matchup. This was supposed to be one of the better games of the day, the #1 vs. #8 seed in the 20-team field. It looked like a 1/20 matchup, as the Lady Bombers opened up a 21-5 first quarter lead. I counted 10 Carrollton turnovers in the first 2:30 of play. I must credit the Lady Hawks for turning things around and not letting their deficit increase through the game, and also limiting turnovers.

Only caught one more quarter of action, and that was Illini West and Pittsfield. The Chargers built up a first quarter lead on their way to one of many blowouts in the first day at Beardstown. A surprising result, as the Saukee ladies had a 7-2 record heading into the matchup. Many people have discounted this Illini West team with five losses so far on the year, but mind you, many of these losses are to 3A schools….and strong 3A schools to boot.

This write-up is coming to you Thursday morning, a result of my Internet connection going down. I had looked forward to enjoying a little time tuning into online tournament broadcasts Wednesday evening. That’s the way the late afternoon started as I tuned in to the North Lawndale/Nashville game from the Breese Mater Dei tournament. The Phoenix had closed to within four points with 0:18 left when I lost my connection for the night…OH THE INSANITY!

My tournament trail will keep me busy in Macomb at Western Hall over the next three days. I’ll be covering Macomb, Monmouth-Roseville, Brown County, and a little bit of B-PC/A this week, likely causing some hoarseness by week’s end. Tune in to our online broadcasts at www.radiomacomb.com/sports.htm. The games will also be broadcast at the tournaments website, www.holidaybasketball.com.

I saw 7 games today.

7- and in each one the referees did not cheat.

They were consistent.

BUT.

I don’t like it.

In every game all day long the officials did not blow the whistle. they let’em play. And they held, they grabbed, the swatted, tons of loose ball pile-ups and rolling on the floor and the famous Grant Hill hippity hop thru the lane…. and not called.

They game has changed. It is not the game I grew up playing. It is not the game I coached. I don’t like it.

Therefore, I have not changed with the game. I an old fashioned now. Did I mention I don’t like the new game?

Williamsville Toruney Best in my order (whether they won or not)

W-Latham

PORTA

Delavan

Tremont

Illini Bluffs

Heyworth

Mt Pulaski

Williamsville

AC Central

Midwest Central

Woodland

Havana

Greenview

Spfld Lutheran

Argenta

Sangamon Valley

That’s how I saw it today

It’s a few minutes after midnight and the living room is a cluttered mess of Christmas presents, tooooo much candy, and everything else that needs to be picked up…oh for another day! So why am I sitting awake at the computer watching time pass by minute after minute, doing the math in my head of the hours of sleep I won’t be getting. Well…for the simple fact that my mind is racing with the week that will be.

No rest for the weary! After five Christmas Day stops, my mind needs a resting before I begin to think of the holiday tournament trail! I am so fortunate in my current position to be able to cover all our area schools at one tournament (Macomb-Western Holiday Tournament). At my former gig (Geneseo/Galva), I would have a 3:30 AM wake-up call to head to the station, record my local news & sports, then travel to either the State Farm Classic (Geneseo Girls), or the Pekin Tournament (Geneseo Boys). Some days it was a two-fer. In some respects I miss that….in most I don’t!!!

The trail begins for me tomorrow morning. After my live shift, I will make a short trip to Western Hall with my gear to unsettle, as that’s where a bulk of my waking life will be spent the rest of the week. From there, I will trek to Beardstown to cover the Macomb Lady Bomber’s in their tournament opener against Carrollton. Thursday-Saturday I’ll be resting at Western Hall covering Macomb, B-PC/A, Brown County, AND Monmouth-Roseville. And to think….watching great basketball, eating great free food in the hospitality room…and talking to some great basketball minds….they pay ME to do this!!!