The Daily Dive is your deep dive into the news and notes from around the NAIA Hoops World. Every day we will highlight some of the top headlines, conference updates, player accolades, coaching milestones and more. This used to be our Morning Bullet Points series. We went away from it this year, as others were doing similar things and we didn’t want to step on any toes. At the request of many, we have elected to bring it back for the second half of the season. Feel free to DM us on Twitter (@NAIAHoopsReport) or send an email to naiahoopsreport@gmail.com to recommend stories to be included into this segment.
Recap of Yesterday’s Games of the Day:
RV Saint Francis 87 @ 17 Bethel 82 (Full Recap)
Saint Francis (IN) wins it’s 4th straight and with some help from Bethel, who has now lost 6 of it’s last 7 games, the two teams are tied for 3rd place in the Crossroad Standings with 1 game to play. With 64 teams in the NAIA Tournament this wouldn’t have been an issue, however with the the field being lowered to 48, it is safe to feel a little nervous if you are the 4th place team in the league. The Crossroads Tournament will be huge for both!
Lourdes 67 @ Cornerstone 85 (Full Recap)
Another nice win for Cornerstone as they stay a game back of 1st place in the WHAC Standings. While it’s a shortened WHAC schedule and they may not win the regular season, they are playing for seeding for the WHAC Tournament. A tournament they have won 5 times over the past 10 seasons. Christian Rodrigues also surpassed 500 career assists in this game. He finished the game with 14pts, 5rebs and 8 assits!
Kansas Wesleyan 69 @ Friends 64 (Full Recap)
We misspoke yesterday about this one being a big game for the KCAC Tournament as 12 teams will actually qualify this season. Nonetheless, it was a good game for seeding purposes. Kansas Wesleyan has now won back to back games after a long skid. They were led last night by Gabe Mack with 16pts!
Full Scoreboard:
Conference Tournament Brackets:
– Both the SSAC and the River States Conference released their conference tournament brackets yesterday. We will have more in-depth coverage with our Conference Tournament Preview article that will be out soon!
Shout Outs:
– Congrats to the Assist King himself, Christian Rodriguez on his 500th career assist last night. He is going to have a chance to leave Cornerstone as the all time leader in Assists!
– This time of year you see the NAIA’s best and brightest really shine. Last night we got two BIG time performances from two of the NAIA’s best!
– Kevion Blaylock of William Penn finished with 16pts, 17rebs and 7 assists in the Statesmen win over Missouri Valley.
– Alex Gross of Olivet Nazarene finished with a 21pt, 17reb, 12 assist Triple-Double last night in their win over IU Northwest. Gross also added 5 blocks to his stellar performance!
– We have our first postseason game tipping off today with #4 Lewis-Clark State hosting College of Idaho in the Cascade Collegiate Conference Best of 3 series! While weather is still pushing off some games across the NAIA, still plenty of great action today!
