The American Midwest Conference (AMC) is going to be very interesting this year. Both the defending regular season champion, Lyon, and the defending AMC tournament champions, Central Baptist, have made coaching changes in the past month. Making it three new coaches in the AMC this season. With such late coaching changes, it will be interesting to se what happens with both Central Baptist and Lyon.
While there are a lot of changes on the coaching side of the league, the AMC will return a good share of it’s Top Ten scorers from last season, including AMC Player of the Year Tony Burks of Columbia. Tony, in his first season with Columbia, averaged 18.13ppg on his way to winning the POY and AMC Newcomer of the year awards. He was also a 2nd Team NAIA All-American a season ago. Gone this season are Lyon’s top two scorers, stud Freshman, Cole Anderson and Junior Ray Price. Both will be joining former Lyon Head Coach Chad Tapp at NCAA D2 Arkansas-Monticello. It also appears that 1st Team AMC player, Tedrick Wolfe was left off the original Central Baptist roster that was posted. They have since taken that roster down, so we will see who is left when it gets reposted.
We are still waiting on a few of the final rosters to appear, but one thing is for sure, and that is that the AMC will be ultra competitive again. It is not uncommon for the AMC to go into the final week with 4-5 teams within a game of one another and several more just 2 games back. While everyone in the AMC beats up on one another, it makes the AMC title up for grabs each and every year. Central Baptist is the team that has had the most consistent recent success, but you can bet that there are several hungry teams atop this league that are very capable of winning an AMC title.
2020-21 Champions
Regular Season Champions
AMC Tournament Champion
National Tournament Qualifiers: Central Baptist (Ark), lost 61-73 to Benedictine (KS) in the opening round of the NAIA Championships.
2021-22 Preview
Conference POY Watch List:
Tony Burks, 6’4 Sr., Columbia, 18.3ppg, 5rpg, 2apg. 2020-21 AMC Newcomer and Player of the Year. 2nd Team NAIA All-American.
Deshawn Corprew 6’6 Sr. Central Baptist. Corprew has played in a couple of years, but was the 6th man on the Texas Tech 2019 Final Four team.
Kelvin Robinson, 6’2 Sr. Central Baptist, 14.2ppg, 2020-21 1st Team All-AMC. 2020-21 HM All-American.
John Yeager, 6’4 Sr. Missouri Baptist, 12.8PPG, 7.4RPG 2x All-AMC performer, 20-21 1st Team member.
Shakeel Butters, 6’6 Sr. Williams Baptist, 14.58ppg, 11.58rpg 2x All-AMC performer, 20-21 1st Team All-AMC member. Was a 2017-18 HM All-American.
Top Newcomers:
Deshawn Corprew 6’6 Sr. Central Baptist. Corprew has played in a couple of years, but was the 6th man on the Texas Tech 2019 Final Four team.
Kemryn Jenkins 6’1 Sr. Missouri Baptist. Averaged 16.2ppg on his way to earning 2nd Team All-KCAC honors.
Nathan Schwartze 6’3 So. William Woods. Averaged 9.2ppg last season at North Arkansas CC.
Ray Adams, 6’3 Jr, Missouri Baptist. Adams averaged 10.6ppg in 11games last season for Culver Stockton. The sharp shooter should fit into this offense really well.
Favorites to Win AAC:
Central Baptist (Ark) – They had a roster posted, but then took it down shortly after Coach Gaylean left for Texas Wesleyan. While Twitter had All-American Tedrick Wolfe back, it looked like, based off of that roster, that they lost All-American. It will be interesting to see who is left on the roster when it is released again. For now though, we will go off of the information we have and that is that this CBC team is LOADED with talent again this year. New coach, Sam Kohnke, gets elevated from assistant to head coach, after leaving CBC this summer, then returning to take over the reigns. It’s been a wild last month for the Mustangs, but they should be the early favorite to win the league.
Columbia (Mo)- When you return the AMC Player of the Year, and conference leading scorer, you should be one of the favorites to win the league. Coach Thomas Brock has also brought in elite scorer Kemryn Jenkins from McPherson, who averaged 16.2ppg last season which was good enough to garner him 2nd Team All-KCAC last season. The Cougars have the experience and star power needed to win the AMC this season.
Missouri Baptist – A team that returns every starter and nearly every player from last season also have added a few nice transfer pieces in Kyle Younge Jr. (MO Southern St.), Ray Adams (Culver-Stockton), and RJ Pair (Neb-Kearney). Coach Preston Ingram and his Spartans have the size and depth to make things difficult on opponents. A team that finished 3rd in the standings last season and should have something to say about the AMC Title this year.
Other Contenders:
William Woods (Mo) – This is a team that Coach Charles Belt isn’t afraid to hype up. Heading into year three, they have their main core returning. Makenzie Fessler returns and was the teams only player that averaged double figures last season. Darrius Yohe, the AMC Defensive POY is also back. The Owls bring in transfer guard Nathan Schwartze (North Arkansas CC) who they are super high on as well. The Owls will be battle tested early with their non-conference schedule, but no doubt those games will help prepare them for AMC competition.
Sleeper Teams:
Williams Baptist (Ark.)- Shakeel Butters returns for WBU and that is a very good thing for the Eagles. The AMC’s second leading scorer last season, Butters was an All-American selection in 2017-18. He has been a tough matchup the past couple of seasons. Along side of him, the Eagles also return every other starter from a year ago including double figure scorers, Cortez King and EJ Anderson. Outside of Butters, this is still a fairly young team. Not sure they quite have the fire power to win the AMC, but they are a tough group and Coach Josh Austin is the only coach in Eagles program history to play in an AMC Championship game.
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