Men's Basketball Season Tips Off Saturday

It's not quite the holiday season, but college basketball fans have reason to smile, as the competitive season gets underway on Saturday night with two exhibition games. Detroit hosts Madonna at 7 p.m. ET, while Valparaiso will welcome Hillsdale to the Athletics-Recreation Center at 8:05 p.m. ET.

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After a historic 2010-11 season saw the first three-way tie in the League’s now 33-year history and four teams earn postseason bids, it is a year of transition in the Horizon League.

Not to say that expectations have changed; the League still owns a seven-year winning streak in the NCAA Tournament, the longest among the non-Power 6 conferences. With eight of the 10 players who appeared on the First and Second All-League teams at the end of last year departed, it will be new faces who will emerge throughout the 2011-12 season.

SONG REMAINS THE SAME
For the third straight year, and sixth time in 12 seasons, Butler was tabbed as the preseason favorite in the Horizon League. However, the Bulldogs will be breaking in seven newcomers with a crew of eight returnees.

Among the departed at Butler include Matt Howard, who was just the 12th player in Horizon League history to collect three First Team All-League selections in his four-year career. Joining Howard in the professional ranks was Shelvin Mack, who was the 2010 Horizon League Preseason Player of the Year.

Mack was one of two Horizon League products taken in the 2011 NBA Draft, taken by Washington in the second round.

With the duo representing 45 percent of Butler’s scoring last year, the Bulldogs will turn to its returning cast to fill the void, beginning with center Andrew Smith. A Preseason Second Team selection, Smith averaged 8.5 points per game last year.

In the frontcourt, Smith will team with Khyle Marshall, who steadily grew during his freshman season, blossoming to lead the NCAA Tournament in offensive rebounding  (23 boards).

One of five players with League ties to participate in international competition this summer, Marshall earned a place on the USA Basketball U-19 World Championships team.

Ronald Nored will conclude his career this season, and will once again be relied upon for his leadership and defensive prowess. Coming off the bench during the final third of last year, Nored still finished second on the team in assists and earned All-Defensive Team honors for the second time in his career.

The Challengers
An uneven 17-16 last year, Detroit became the first team in at least 12 years of the League’s preseason poll to place three players on the First Team. Sophomore Ray McCallum led the way, earning Preseason Player of the Year honors.

Averaging 13.5 ppg and 4.9 assists as a freshman point guard last year, McCallum steadily climbed the ladder this offseason, competing at the Deron Williams and LeBron James Skills Academy before becoming the youngest player on USA Basketball’s World University Games roster.

Helping the United States go 7-1, McCallum was then selected to the John R. Wooden Award Preseason Watch List to cap a summer in which he stepped into the national spotlight.

Joining McCallum on the first team were teammates Chase Simon and Eli Holman. The duo forms a formidable inside-outside combination, with Simon averaging 13.5 ppg and Holman nearly posting a double-double with 11.8 ppg and 9.6 rpg.

With every letterwinner from last year’s team back, hopes are high in Detroit that the Titans have assembled the team that can knock Butler from its perch.

THE DEFENDING Co-CHAMPS
Hopes are similarly high at both Cleveland State and Milwaukee. The duo, who tied with Butler for the 2011 regular-season co-championship, both bring back squads that should be challenging for byes in the Horizon League Tournament and postseason berths.

Cleveland State returns four or five starters, depending on the argument. After missing 2010-11 due to an injury, D’Aundray Brown is back in the Viking lineup, joining four starters from last year’s team.

What can’t be argued, however, is that the Vikings will have to replace the production of Norris Cole, the do-everything player who earned 2011 Player of the Year accolades after averaging 21.7 ppg, 5.8 rpg and 5.3 apg. Cole went on to become the No. 28 pick in the NBA Draft, where he will play for the Miami Heat.

Looking to fill that role will be Trevon Harmon, who collected Preseason First Team honors. Last year, Harmon averaged 13.2 ppg and was one of the League’s gunners from long range, attempting 181 three-pointers on the year.

Joining Harmon and Brown will be Jeremy Montgomery, who almost matched Harmon’s output with 11.6 ppg and 171 threes taken, Aaron Pogue (8.2 ppg, 6.8 rpg) and Tim Kamczyc.

In Milwaukee, the Panthers have similarly large shoes to fill in the form of Anthony Hill. The forward controlled the low blocks, earning First Team All-League honors last year.

Still, UWM brings back a combination that bedeviled opponents in 2010-11 in the form of Tony Meier and Kaylon Williams.

Williams, who joined the Milwaukee program as a junior last year, led the League in assists (5.4) and turned in the League’s first triple-double in over a decade (10 points, 10 rebounds, 10 asssists), on Jan. 3, serving notice that the Panthers were not to be taken lightly.

Meier, a 6-foot-8 forward, presented a matchup nightmare for opposing defenses with his ability to shoot from outside. The frequent beneficiary of high pick-and-rolls, Meier knocked down 44.3-percent of his attempted three-pointers last year, the second-best mark in the League.

Both Milwaukee and Cleveland State earned NIT bids in 2011, helping the League match its finest postseason ever with four berths.

New Faces
Valparaiso finished one game out of making the three-way tie for the Horizon League regular season title a four-way tussle last season, and now the Crusaders will be looking to get over the hump with a new voice.

After a 22-year tenure at Valparaiso, Homer Drew retired, handing the reigns of the program over to his son, Bryce, who frequently has appeared as a March Madness highlight during the NCAA Tournament.

The younger Drew takes over a program that brings back just two starters from last year’s CollegeInsider.com Tournament participants. However, one of those returnees also happens to be the League’s top three-point shooter.

Ryan Broekhoff, similar to Meier, presented problems for defenses last year because of his size. 6-foot-6, Broekhoff could mix it up inside and out, hitting 44.8-percent of his attempts from three-point range in averaging 10.3 ppg.

Broekhoff competed at the World University Games for Australia, allong with McCallum and current teammate Richie Edwards, who starred for New Zealand. The Crusaders are optimistic that Edwards can lend a similar scoring touch as he did this summer, when he led the Kiwis with 20.1 ppg at the tournament.

The second coaching change in the League comes at Loyola, where Porter Moser takes charge of the program. Rick Majerus’ top leiutenant at St. Louis in the last four years, Moser inherits a Loyola team that was beat up at times last year. He also inherits a brand new gym, as Gentile Arena was gutted and renovated in the offseason.

On the new court, Moser will look to his front court trio of Ben Averkamp, Walt Gibler and Jordan Hicks to set the tone.

Averkamp earned Preseason Second Team honors after a sophomore season in which he averaged 12.0 ppg and 5.3 rpg. Gibler, hobbled by injuries after a 2010 Sixth Man of the Year season, put up 9.4 ppg and 4.4 rpg.

Hicks may be the missing cog; through his nine games last season, the 6’6” swingman averaged 11.7 ppg and 4.7 rpg. His departure due to a foot injury before League season began in earnest set the Ramblers back, as they went 7-11 in League play.

Youth Is Served
It will be in both Green Bay and at Wright State, as two of the youngest teams in the country this season are guided by two of the youngest coaches in the nation.

Tied as the 13th-youngest squad in Division I, Green Bay is looking to get out and run more in Brian Wardle’s second season. The reason is simple: Alec Brown. The Phoenix want to take adavantage of the center’s athletic prowess, hoping he can beat his man down court and wear him down throughout the game.

After averaging 10.2 ppg and swatting a school-record 67 shots in 2010-11, the rail-thin Brown added 15 pounds to his frame and held his own at the Amar’e Stoudemire Skills Academy, at which he was the only invitee from a non-Power 6 school, this summer.

One of the 12 teams younger than Green Bay resides at Wright State, where Billy Donlon will preside over the sixth-youngest team in the country. Donlon is building his team from the ground up after the departure of the squad’s top four scorers from last year’s 19-14 season.

Working in Donlon’s favor was the scheduled 10-day trip to Italy for the Raiders this summer. Bringing the majority of the roster on the trip, Donlon had a chance to try and bond the freshmen and sophomores together earlier than most coaches are able.

Whether it immediately pays off remains to be seen, but what cannot be ignored is that Wright State brought in a talented group of freshmen, including Reggie Arceneaux and Tavares Sledge.

Playing against older competition, Arceneaux  hadno problem in leading the team in scoring, averaging 11.0 ppg on the four-game trip. For his part, Sledge led the way in rebounding, collecting 7.5 per game.

The Veterans
Amidst all the youth in the League, it’s easy to forget that Youngstown State brings back four of its five starters from last season.

Five of the Penguins’ seven top scorers are back, which resulted in YSU matching its highest place in the preseason poll (seventh) since joining the Horizon League.

Down low, Damian Eargle proved himself to be one of the top big men in the League, earning All-Newcomer honors in 2011 after an 11.3 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 3.0 bpg campgain.

While Eargle will control the post, YSU will turn to the three-guard combination of Kendrick Perry, Ashen Ward and Blake Allen to handle scoring duties.

New Kids on the Block
After taking over the UIC program last August, Howard Moore spent much of his time just getting to know his team. Now, Moore has had all summer to catch up with the nine newcomers on the UIC roster, building the foundation for the reemergence of the program.

Moore quickly established a foothold in his native Chicago, bringing in four recruits from the city and capturing the city’s attention with a thrilling win over then No. 12 Illinois at the United Center.

While growing pains were inevitable in Moore’s first year, optimism is high at UIC despite the abundance of youth on the roster. With so many newcomers, Moore will turn to his two returning starters from last season’s team, seniors Darrin Williams and Paris Carter.

A Decade of Success
Whomever comes out of the Horizon League to reach the NCAA Tournament will be well-tested for the rigors of the 68-team field. In the last decade, Horizon League teams have collectively earned 19 NCAA Tournament wins and are currently on a seven-year tournament winning streak.

During that streak, three different Horizon League programs - Milwaukee, Cleveland State and Butler - have won tournament games, with the Bulldogs culminating the run with consecutive trips to the Final Four and national championship game.

Whether a Horizon League team reaches the last game of the season remains to be seen, but once again the year’s first four months will have the League’s representatives on course to add an eighth straight year of a tournament win to the ledger.