Carthage College 2011-12 Women’s Basketball Preview

GENERAL

Name of school	Carthage College
Location	Kenosha, Wis.
Founded	1847
Enrollment	2,530
Nickname	Lady Reds
School colors	Red, white and black
Home arena	Tarble Arena
Capacity	2,385
Affiliation	NCAA Division III
Conference	CCIW
President	F. Gregory Campbell
Athletics director	Robert Bonn
Assistant athletics director	Steve Marovich
Senior woman administrator	Leanne Ulmer
Athletics Phone	262-551-5942

HISTORY

First year of women’s basketball	1901
Overall all-time record	561-457
Years in NCAA/last	2/2010
Last post-season opponent, year	George Fox, 2010
Result	L, 55-48 in the sectional semifinals
CCIW championships	1996

SPORTS INFORMATION

Sports information director	Steve Marovich
SID office phone	262-551-5740
SID home phone	262-551-5547
SID fax	262-551-5926
Athletics fax	262-551-5995
Hotline	262-551-5388
E-mail	stevemarovich@tds.net
Athletics web site	http://athletics.carthage.edu/index.aspx
SID mailing address	2001 Alford Park Drive Kenosha, WI  53140

LOCAL MEDIA

Kenosha News

Dave Marran, Sports Editor

715 58th St./Kenosha, WI  53141

262-656-6290; 262-657-4946 (FAX)

E-Mail:  sports@kenoshanews.com

Racine Journal-Times

Susan Shemanske, Sports Editor

212 4th St./Racine, WI  53403

262-631-1750; 262-631-1780 (FAX)

E-Mail:  racine.sports@lee.net

WLIP-AM Radio (1050)

8500 Green Bay Road

Pleasant Prairie, WI  53158

Karl Wertzler, General Manager

kwertzler@nextmediachicago.com

262-694-1050 (studio)

John Weiser, Play-by-Play Announcer

Carthage College

2001 Alford Park Drive

Kenosha, WI  53140

262-551-5734

jweiser@carthage.edu

COACHING STAFF

Head coach	Tim Bernero
Record at school (years)	130-80 (8 years)
Career record (years)	130-80 (8 years)
Women’s basketball phone	262-551-5713
Best time to reach	10 a.m. – 2 p.m.
E-mail	tbernero@carthage.edu
Interim assistant coach	Brittany Carper
Part-time assistant coach	Katie Jarger
Head athletics trainer	Laurie Jensen

TEAM INFORMATION

	Total	Home	Away	Neutral
2011 overall record	17-9	7-4	9-5	1-0
CCIW record	8-6	4-3	4-3	----
Conference finish		4th
Final ranking last year		N/R
Poll		“D3hoops.com”
Starters returning/lost		3/2
Letterwinners returning/lost		11/4

2011-12 SCHEDULE

DATE	DAY	OPPONENT	TIME	LOCATION
Nov. 5	Sat.	#Marquette	7 p.m.	Milwaukee, Wis.
Nov. 15	Tue.	St. Norbert	7:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
		Wisconsin Lutheran Tournament
Nov. 18	Fri.	Nebraska Wesleyan	5 p.m.	Milwaukee, Wis.
Nov. 19	Sat.	Bethel (Minn.) or Wisconsin Lutheran	1/3 p.m.	Milwaukee, Wis.
Nov. 22	Tue.	Benedictine (Ill.)	6 p.m.	Lisle, Ill.
Nov. 27	Sun.	University of Chicago	3 p.m.	Chicago, Ill.
Nov. 30	Wed.	Clarke	7 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Dec. 7	Wed.	Loras	6 p.m.	Dubuque, Iowa
Dec. 10	Sat.	Coe	4 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Dec.12	Mon.	Beloit	7:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
		“D3hoops.com Classic”
Dec. 28	Wed.	DeSales	3 p.m., PST	Las Vegas, Nev.
Dec. 29	Thu.	Wisconsin-River Falls	9 a.m., PST	Las Vegas, Nev.
Jan. 4	Wed.	*North Central (Ill.)	5 p.m.	Naperville, Ill.
Jan. 7	Sat.	*Millikin	2 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Jan. 11	Wed.	*North Park	7:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Jan. 14	Sat.	*Illinois Wesleyan	5 p.m.	Bloomington, Ill.
Jan. 18	Wed.	*Wheaton (Ill.)	7:30 p.m.	Wheaton, Ill.
Jan. 21	Sat.	*Augustana (Ill.)	5 p.m.	Rock Island, Ill.
Jan. 25	Wed.	*Elmhurst	7:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Jan. 28	Sat.	*North Central (Ill.)	5 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Feb. 1	Wed.	*North Park	7:30 p.m.	Chicago, Ill.
Feb. 4	Sat.	*Millikin	2 p.m.	Decatur, Ill.
Feb. 8	Wed.	*Wheaton (Ill.)	7:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Feb. 11	Sat.	*Illinois Wesleyan	5:30 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Feb. 15	Wed.	*Elmhurst	7:30 p.m.	Elmhurst, Ill.
Feb. 18	Sat.	*Augustana (Ill.)	5 p.m.	Kenosha, Wis.
Feb. 24-25	Fri-Sat.	CCIW Tournament	TBA	TBA

Radio/Internet Broadcasts and “Live Stats”:  Selected Carthage women’s basketball games broadcast on WLIP-AM Radio (1050) and/or available on the Internet at www.wlip.com…“live stats” for all home games are available at http://www.carthage.edu/athleticspages/livestats/xlive.htm

TEAM INFORMATION

R/L	Name	Pos.	Yr.	GP-GS	Scoring	RB	FG Pct.	Honors
L	Heather Gilmore	G	Grad.	26-26	10.3	4.0	.476	First-team All-CCIW
R	Diana Jacklin	C	Sr.	26-26	12.5	6.6	.510	Second-team All-CCIW
R	Cailee Corcoran	G	Jr.	26-26	10.2	5.0	.514
R	Kristi Schmidt	F	So.	26-0	8.4	4.0	.510
R	Dani Ripkey	G	Sr.	26-26	8.1	2.9	.411	38th in NCAA III three-point pct.

CARTHAGE WOMEN’S BASKETBALL NOTES

2011 Season Review

With 13 returning letterwinners and three starters from a team that went 24-5 and reached the NCAA “sweet 16,” the expectations for the 2011 Carthage College women’s basketball team were justifiably high.  Unfortunately, the 2011 team discovered that the road back to the sectional semifinals and national prominence was lined with speed bumps.

The 2011 Lady Reds went 17-9 (8-6, 4th College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin), hardly a down year, but not the season that the team hoped for.  Things started out on a high note, as Carthage went 6-0 to start the season and was ranked fifth nationally in the Dec. 7 “D3hoops.com” poll.  The Lady Reds lost back-to-back games to ranked teams Calvin College and the University of Chicago in mid-December before completing their non-conference schedule with a 9-2 mark.

The first sign of trouble came right out of the chute, as Carthage saw a 14-point second-half lead disappear in a 66-62 loss at Wheaton College (Ill.) on Jan. 5.  The Lady Reds dropped to 0-2 with a 70-60 home loss to Illinois Wesleyan a few days later. 

Carthage won its next three games before losing at Millikin University, 46-44, on Jan. 22.  Back-to-back wins over North Park University and Illinois Wesleyan in late-January gave Carthage a 5-3 record and a chance to get back into the conference race.  The win over the Titans, ranked sixth nationally at the time, was particularly dramatic.  The Lady Reds had a 22-3 lead midway thru the first half and led by 18 points early in the second period.  Illinois Wesleyan scored 16 unanswered points and tied the game halfway thru the second period, but Carthage re-gained control of the contest and won by eight, 63-55.

An 18-point loss at home to Wheaton (Ill.), 68-50, on Feb. 3 killed Carthage’s hopes for a CCIW title.  A second loss to Millikin, 73-70, on Feb. 19 at Tarble Arena left the Lady Reds in fourth place in the final standings.  Carthage gave top-seeded Illinois Wesleyan all the Titans could handle in the semifinals of the CCIW Women’s Basketball Tournament but fell, 77-69.

“We had a good plan for the CCIW-tournament game,” said Carthage coach Tim Bernero (130-80, 8 years).  “We made some adjustments at halftime, but we came out kind of empty in early in the second half.  The ‘want-to’ was there, but Illinois Wesleyan got done what they wanted to do more than we did.  Their people beat our people, and their coach beat our coach.  We were really good in spurts and really inconsistent in others, which was a microcosm of how our season went.”

“We were 17-9--that’s a nice season,” concluded Bernero.  “Maybe we got ahead of ourselves after getting to the NCAA “sweet 16” last year.  Maybe we thought it was our right to go back there again.  It’s frustrating, because you don’t get those opportunities every year.  At the age of our kids, you sometimes forget that there are limited opportunities.  You try to tell your kids that, and I think we could have done a better job of trying to impart that on them.”

“There were three or four games along the way that we just didn’t finish very well,” admitted Bernero.  “We let people hang around in those games, and the law of averages caught up with us.  We played really well at times—we just couldn’t repeat that enough to get to the 20 wins or so that we had as a goal.”

Heather Gilmore (graduated-senior, Des Moines, Iowa/Pleasant Hill-Southeast Polk) was named first-team All-CCIW.  Gilmore was ranked 17th in league scoring (10.1 points per game thru Feb. 24), first in steals (3.36 per game), fourth in assists (3.88 per game), eighth in field-goal percentage (.475) and 14th in free-throw percentage (.663).  Diana Jacklin (Sr., Berwyn, Ill./Morton West) earned second-team all-conference honors.  Jacklin was 12th in scoring (12.4 points per game), first in blocked shots (2.80 per game), second in field-goal percentage (.517), fourth in steals (2.04 per game), ninth in rebounding (6.4 per game) and 11th in free-throw percentage (.709).

2012 Season Preview

Head coach Tim Bernero loses just four-of-15 letterwinners, including two starters, from last year’s 17-9 team.  Lost to graduation are first-team All-CCIW guard Heather Gilmore and starting guard and starting guard Taylor Tondelli (Downers Grove, Ill./South, started all 26 games, 3.7 points per game)  “We’ll miss Heather Gilmore’s athleticism,” admits Bernero, “because it was unique to this level.  We can’t replace Heather with Heather, so we’ll replace her position with a slightly-different style of play.

The three returning starters are second-team all-conference center Diana Jacklin, forward Cailee Corcoran (Jr., Oak Lawn, Ill./Chicago-Marist started all 26 games, 10.2 points per game, 5.0 rebounds, .514 field-goal percentage) and guard Dani Ripkey (Sr., Deerfield, Ill., started all 26 games, 8.1 points per game with a .391 three-point field-goal percentage).

Other returnees include forward Kristi Schmidt (So., Bloomington, Ill./Normal-Community, played in all 26 games, 8.4 points per game, 3.3 rebounds, .510 field-goal percentage), guard Allison Groessl (Sr., Park Ridge, Ill./Maine South, played in all 26 games, 4.5 points per game), guard Haley Stercic (So., Chicago, Ill./Marist, played in 13-of-26 games, 2.5 points per game), guard Stephanie Kuzmanic (Fr., Mount Prospect, Ill./Wheeling, played in all 26 games, 2.5 points per game), guard Drewann Pancratz (Sr., Schaumburg, Ill., played in 18-of-26 games, 2.3 points per game), center Michelle Wenzel (So., Darien, Wis./Delevan-Darien, played in 15-of-26 games, 2.1 points per game), guard Gabby Chapa (So., Barrington, Ill..Lake Zurich, played in 17-of-26 games, 1.4 points per game), guard Kiki Phillips (Sr. Spencer, Wis., played in 10 games, 1.2 points per game), forward Cory Bazany (Sr., Elgin, Ill./Burlington Central, played in 20-of-26 games, 1.1 points per game) and guard Caris Alan (Jr., Elgin, Ill.).

“I expect both Kristi Schmidt and Stephanie Kuzmanic to step up this year,” says Bernero.  “Both of them played well last year.  Kuzmanic has taken a real leadership role, on the court, and I expect both of them to important to our success this year.  Michelle Wenzel is also a strong, athletic player who has shown signs of real improvement.  I think you’ll see her do some things this year that she couldn’t do last year.”

Newcomers include guard Bridget Adams (Fr., Palos Heights, Ill./Palos Hills-Stagg, 2010 and 2011 All-Southwest Suburban Conference and Daily Southtown all-area), forward Morgan Garrett (Fr., Gurnee, Ill./Zion-Benton Township, a four-time All-North Suburban League honoree and part of 2011 Illinois High School Association Class 4A state-championship team), guard Amanda Genge (Fr., Chicago, Ill./St. Benedict, 2010 Illinois Basketball Coaches Association fourth-team all-state and Girls Catholic Athletic Conference “player of the year”), guard Kasey Kleiner (Fr., South Milwaukee, Wis./Somers-Shoreland Lutheran, first-team All-Midwest Classic Conference and Kenosha News first-team All-Kenosha County), guard Erin Quinn (Fr., Island Lake, Ill./Mundelein-Carmel Catholic, Daily Herald honorable mention all-area), guard Allison Riley (Fr., Cudahy, Wis., 2010 second-team All-Woodland Conference) and guard Hilary Watts (Fr., New Haven, Ind./Fort Wayne-Bishop Luers, second-team All-Summit Athletic Conference on an Indiana High School Athletic Association Class 2A state-championship team).

“We have a lot of good freshman,” says Bernero, “but with the makeup of this team, I’m not sure that any of the newcomers will jump off the page right away.  There are certainly roles for a couple of them,  Erin Quinn and Kasey Kleiner could slot in behind Stephanie Kuzmanic at point guard, and I really like Allison Riley from an athletic standpoint.”

Carthage plays a typically-tough non-conference schedule in 2011-12, taking on four defending-conference-champions (St. Norbert College from the Midwest Conference, Wisconsin Lutheran College in the Northern Athletics Conference, the University of Chicago in the University Athletic Association and Coe College from the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference).  Two of those teams, Chicago and Coe, reached last year’s NCAA “Sweet 16.”

Carthage opens the season with a Nov. 5 exhibition game at Marquette University prior to the regular-season opener on Nov. 15 against St. Norbert College at Tarble Arena.  The Lady Reds play in the Nov. 18-19 Wisconsin Lutheran Tournament before taking on Benedictine University (Ill.), Chicago, Clarke College, Loras College, Coe and Beloit College.  Carthage concludes its non-league schedule by playing in the Dec. 28-29 “D3hoops.com Classic” in Las Vegas