The NEW Official Thread of the Augustana Vikings

[MrAugustana]

Congrats to NSIC South Player of the Week Tyler Riemersma:

Tyler Riemersma has been named the NSIC South Division Player of the Week. Riemersma helped lead the Augustana men's basketball team to a weekend sweep over Sioux Falls.

The native of Bloomington, Minnesota, averaged a double-double of 11.5 points and 10 rebounds over the two games. He shot 71.4 percent from the field over the games while also dishing 5.5 assists per outing.

In Augustana's 67-65 win on Friday night, Riemersma totaled 12 points, nine rebounds and a career-best eight assists while going 5-of-7 from the field. In Saturday's nine-point victory, Riemersma totaled 11 points and 11 rebounds while again shooting 5-of-7 from the field.

The Vikings close out the regular season Friday and Saturday inside the Sanford Pentagon against Wayne State. Tipoff on Friday is at 7 p.m. with Saturday's contest slated for 3 p.m. Tickets will go on-sale on Thursday at 10 a.m.

[MrAugustana]

For better or worse, the wins this weekend have given me revitalized hope that the Vikings may still have something in the tank.

Whether they do or don't win both against Wayne to keep their spot in the conference tourney, the two wins against USF were still fun. Here are a few highlights from this weekend in case Augie fans missed them this weekend:

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[MrAugustana]

Cool development for Augie. Midco is giving $1.35 million to "renew and enlarge Midco's athletics sponsorship and create the Midco Media Campus & Production Center on Augustana's campus."

https://goaugie.com/news/2021/1/27/g...niversity.aspx

[AU Vikings]

My bigger concern is that we're looking at 2 straight seasons in which Cartwright has only played roughly 35% of the games (none of them fully healthy either). Seems hard to believe he'll just bounce back next year at 100% without any issues.

That being said, I won't be upset if he ends up resting for 3-6 months and is able to really take the time to get everything straightened out and fixed up and decides he wants to come back and try again. He's a really good player when he's healthy.

Cartwright will be having surgery soon and the plan is for him to play next year but you are right, it will be interesting to see how he comes back after missing big parts of two seasons.

[MrAugustana]

One of the things that's so frustrating as an Augie fan is that he's arguably our "best" player all around in terms of the threat he poses offensively, his length defensively (not saying he's our best defender, but he's not necessarily a straight defensive liability as some other Augie guards have been in the past), and just his general clutch factor when it comes to late game situations, but that sort of just gets overlooked when we're discussing teams as the season goes on. For example, if Augie doesn't finish #1 or #2 in the standings (which, frankly, I don't see happening at this point), people will say it's a letdown of a season because we were preseason #1. Yet, on the flipside, if the Wolves didn't have either Parker Fox or Mason Stark for most of the past two seasons, I don't know that they're finishing at the top of the top like they have been the past couple of years. Maybe they're still up there, but it's a lot harder when you are missing a key difference-maker.

I know Augie has other good players and it's not like I'm saying losing Cartwright justifies last year's record (last year's record was definitely due to more than Cartwright being injured), but I would just love to see what this team looks like mostly or fully healthy for a full season. I feel like we haven't really had that since about 2015-2017 or so, and now I've been spoiled by seeing how well things can go when you're not dealing with injuries all the time.

[MrAugustana]

My bigger concern is that we're looking at 2 straight seasons in which Cartwright has only played roughly 35% of the games (none of them fully healthy either). Seems hard to believe he'll just bounce back next year at 100% without any issues.

That being said, I won't be upset if he ends up resting for 3-6 months and is able to really take the time to get everything straightened out and fixed up and decides he wants to come back and try again. He's a really good player when he's healthy.

[DapperDan]

I imagine a lot of this will come down to resources -- both that of a player's family and of the school's basketball program. I'm sure there will be more than a few kids who wouldn't mind playing another year but are ready to graduate or aren't willing or able to pay for another year of college.

[Blue Ridge Viking]

I imagine a lot of this will come down to resources -- both that of a player's family and of the school's basketball program. I'm sure there will be more than a few kids who wouldn't mind playing another year but are ready to graduate or aren't willing or able to pay for another year of college.

[DapperDan]

If his year is over, then his career is over. That's a shame. After his freshman season, I thought he was going to be an all-timer, especially with Plitzuweit creating scoring opportunities for him.

Ahh, what might have been.

[Blue Ridge Viking]

Sounds like Cartwright is done for the year.

If his year is over, then his career is over. That's a shame. After his freshman season, I thought he was going to be an all-timer, especially with Plitzuweit creating scoring opportunities for him.

Ahh, what might have been.

[Thunder]

Sounds like Cartwright is done for the year.

[MrAugustana]

Sounds like Cartwright is done for the year.

Well...that sucks.

[AU Vikings]

Does anyone have an update on Cartwright and LeBrun?

Sounds like Cartwright is done for the year.

[MrAugustana]

Nice video feature on incoming 2021 recruit Zac Johnson: https://mobile.twitter.com/PrepHoops...54084446867466

[laker]

As I post this, I can hear Lizzo singing the title of this thread. This deals with the supposed announcement about a number of teams joining the WAC for a football conference to start in 2022, but also deals with other possibilities.

Matt Brown
@MattBrownEP1h
* Finally, I've been told by a few folks that one of the DII schools being vetted at the moment is Augustana. Don't think WAC has to rush into any other membership decisions. Any additional invites might take a minute. Lot is changing on the admin side at several schools atm