A new MVC preview for 2014-15

[tornado]

An interesting read......They have ...


Picked for 10th place: Drake- LINK
..but the guy has made a mistake - he lists Gary Ricks (Drake's 2nd leading scorer) as leaving but Ricks has been granted an extra year and will help Drake a lot

Picked for 9th place: Bradley - LINK
..words such as "pitiful", and "flawed", and "terrible" permeate this preview, and comments like..
"The Braves weren't a horrible team last season, but they would have won a grand total of 5-7 games
without the help of senior leader Walt Lemon Jr, who they will miss dearly in the upcoming season."
..kinda hint at why we are picked 9th - and one correction - Jermaine Morgan is NOT a freshman, he's a juco transfer who is a junior.

Picked for 8th place: Indiana State - LINK
...personally I think they will do a bit better than 8th

Picked for 7th: Illinois State - LINK
..this writer really seems to know the least about ISU..
First he lists Michael Middlebrooks as one of last year's team leaders. Well Middlebrooks only appeared in 4 games then was dismissed, so I probably wouldn't have even mentioned him in this preview.
Then they say Deonte Hawkins played at Wichita and was upset and left "for prep school after seeing little to no playing time."
This is insane - you can't enroll in college and then leave and go back to high school - so what's this writer even thinking?

[RedSeaElite1]

If they have our starting 5 predicted correctly we are definitely headed for another Thursday night. If TS, MS, and at least one of the JuCo guards don't step up and play well this team will struggle

[tornado]

Picked for 6th place: SIU - LINK
I think they could do even better

Picked for 5th place: Missouri State - LINK

Picked for 4th place: Loyola - LINK
Loyola fans are likely shocked & surprised that someone would pick them this high, as so am I.
They have no size at all - they will largely be manning the low post with guys who are 6-4.
...but they guy also has Marlon Jones pencilled in as starting center - but he's not going to be at Loyola this year
I guarantee nobody else who writes an MVC preview will have Loyola this high. That's not saying they can't be good - but there's just nothing to support it right now.

Picked for 3rd place: Evansville - LINK
This one is almost as surprising as Loyola - I know they have some good players but they've had good players before,
like Ballentine & Mockevicius last year and Colt Ryan forever before that - and Marty Simmons still won only 14 games last year and had only one marginal winning season in all those years with Colt Ryan.
Keep in mind that last year Ballentine averaged 22 ppg and a whole lot of his really GREAT scoring performances were wasted - like the 83-66 loss to us and a game where Ballentine scored 43 vs. UNI but they still lost by 14!!!
Sorry Aces, I need to see it before I become a believer.

[tornado]

And these two are not yet published but we know who they are...

Picked for 2nd place: Northern Iowa

Picked for 1st place: Wichita State

...written by a blogger out east ....

[tornado]

Here are the guy's previews for...

#2 UNI - they make no mention of Virginia transfer Paul Jesperson
(also ranked #61 on CSN, and #46 on USA Today)

http://www.hoopspulse.com/home/2014-15-mvc-preview-2nd-place

#1 Wichita State

http://www.hoopspulse.com/home/2014-15-mvc-preview-1st-place

[mvcfan]

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/eye-on-college-basketball/24705384/observations-undervalued-behold-cyclones-hogue-gators-frosh-robinson-

ISU get a mention as a potential sleeper.

[tornado]

Another MVC preview - they have Bradley picked in the bottom three (8-10) with Loyola & Drake
...Wichita, UNI, and ISU are 1-2-3.

http://basketball.realgm.com/article/234896/College-Basketball-Preview-14-15-Missouri-Valley-Conference

This writer also points out that the MVC leads all D-I conferences in juco players and transfers

[tornado]

another interesting preview site that highlights just the smaller schools....

http://davidnevergoliath.wordpress.com/

Here's their preview of Evansville

http://davidnevergoliath.wordpress.com/2014/09/20/player-spotlight-d-j-balentine/

[Da Coach]

FoxNews has a nice profile of UNI senior Seth Tuttle, who will be one of the top players in the MVC this season-
Senior Seth Tuttle set to emerge as a star for resurgent Northern Iowa

http://www.foxnews.com/sports/2014/09/30/senior-seth-tuttle-set-to-emerge-as-star-for-resurgent-northern-iowa/?intcmp=HPBucket

[bigjimmy]

I'm sure Tuttle will be on the preseason 1st team MVC Conference team. Wichita's Fred Van Fleet, who I will guess will be the pre-season MVP in the Valley, is already getting put on some 1st team All American teams.

[Da Coach]

I am already on record with my predictions for this year's preseason All MVC.

I am guessing Tuttle, Van Vleet, Baker, Balentine, and Beane.

Mockevicius and Doyle are also possibilities. I think Josh Cunningham could get some preseason votes for Freshman of the Year, but there are several other good freshmen.

[Da Coach]

Another good article on another of the certain-to-be MVC Preseason ALL-MVC players Fred Van Vleet-
http://www.cbssports.com/collegebask...ll/24732426/fr ed-vanvleet-using-newfound-fame-to-spread-a-positive-message

[Da Coach]

Another good article on Northern Iowa by NBCSports.com-
Northern Iowa will need to improve defensively if they??™re to challenge Wichita State

http://collegebasketballtalk.nbcsports.com/2014/10/05/northern-iowa-will-need-to-improve-defensively-if-theyre-to-challenge-wichita-state/

[mvcfan]

Jon Rothstein is tweeting live from Illinois State today as part of his preseason tour.

[tornado]

wow - the guy is pretty positive and drooling with accolades....
might as well just hand out the trophies now...

"Redbirds are another capable challenger to Wichita State in the MVC."

https://twitter.com/JonRothstein

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/eye-on-college-basketball/24743399/ncaa-tournament-bound-five-mid-majors-to-watch-in-2014-15