North Dakota Preps

All-EDC selections and coach of the year?

Well RR's Gregory is the obvious choice for coach of the year, but I think Whapeton's Ralph deserves a look. A team with no real superstars, but play together as a team.

All-Eastern Dakota Conference team

Nathan Mertens, Devils Lake; Brady Syverson, Fargo North; Andrew Kozlowski, Fargo Davies; Brady Jordahl, Fargo Davies; Landon Poss, Fargo South; Todd Nicklaus, Fargo South; Sean Norton, Grand Forks Central; David Olson, Grand Forks Central; Chase Carpenter, Valley City; Jeremy Bontjes, Wahpeton; Brady Rotert, West Fargo; Mack Arvidson, Grand Forks Red River; Mac Kroeplin, Grand Forks Red River; A.J. Jacobson, Fargo Shanley; Patrick Strom, Fargo Shanley.

EDC senior athlete of the year

Mack Arvidson, Grand Forks Red River

EDC coach of the year

Jeff Ralph, Wahpeton

Comments or concerns on who made the team/senior athlete/and coach of the year?

Pretty much went as expected. I do not think there were any major suprises or snubs.

If Syverson healthy he might have been Senior of the Year

Agreed, I also think north would've finished out much better than what they did with him. The stats for both Arvidson and Syverson were very close, so I'd assume the reason for Arvidson getting the award is that he's still playing and had a very good team record. Hats off to both guys along with Bontjes and Norton, they are very good players.

Rotert is a good player, but he does not deserve to make all edc over Farroh from RR. From watching Farroh play throughout this season id say he is the best on ball defender in the state hands down, and he beat Rotert in just about every statistical category. Not to mention he played on the state championship team. I know every team has to get there all edc selections, but i dont believe some average teams should get as many all edc players as the number 1 team. There was definitely a few snubs this year no doubt

If the rules require that each team gets one player on the All-EDC squad, then it's hard to argue with the 15 players selected. However, points-per-game is always weighed much too heavily in selecting these all-star teams, and things like shooting efficiency, rebounds, assists, defense, steals, hitting key shots are to some extent cast aside. Almost anybody can score 18 points-per-game if they shoot 25 times. But can they do it if they only shoot 15 times?

Of all the players left off the All-EDC team, I think that Ricky Farroh was probably the most deserving of a spot on the team. Farroh generally did a good job covering the opponent's best offensive player, for example, AJ Jacobson of Shanley, and also hit key baskets, got rebounds, assists and steals, and just flat played hard. And his team won the EDC regular season and State Tourney.

Some folks' perceptions of the State's top two teams at the end of the year, Red River and Fargo Shanley, was that they were two-man teams. We could all see in the State Tourney that that wasn't entirely true, but that perception kept Red River players like Farroh and John Hoplin, and Shanley players like Thomas Strandemo and Dylan Alderman, well under-the-radar prior to the State Tourney. If they had an All-EDC Underrated Team this year it would probably include the above Red River and Shanley players, Jack Christenson from Wahpeton, and Nathan Rasmus from Davies.

Who would you have taken off of the All-EDC team to make room for Farroh?

balla45 wrote:Who would you have taken off of the All-EDC team to make room for Farroh?

I think he was making a point that Farroh was the best player left off, not that he deserved to be on.

Flip - Yes, that is correct. I am saying that Farroh was the most effective player left off the list, not that he deserved to take the place of somebody on the list, particularly if the list requires that each EDC team have a representative.

Actually, I like the play of West Fargo's Rotert, and Heisler, too, and think their individual skills are somewhat muted by the WF system.

I do not think the EDC requires that every team have an all conference player.

Actually, I think the All-EDC selection committee did a very good job of picking the team this year, even if there is no requirement that each EDC team have a representative player. I might include Farroh on the list ahead of 1-2 players that made the team, but I would never claim that that was anything more than my personal preference in a player, and I really liked Farroh and a couple other unsung EDC players because they made their teams truly special.

One other point - statistics are sometimes misleading, because they don't account for a some very important things like, for example, which player does all the ball-handling under pressure, and which player makes the really key shots? But stats do tell an interesting story about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of certain players. I just think shooting efficiency/percentage if often overlooked when folks start choosing these teams, because again, some players have a good scoring average simply because they take a lot of shots. Take a look at AJ Jacobson's stunning stats for the year and compare them to the rest of the All-EDC Team, and you could probably start ranking the true quality of the players.

Balla - I truly respect your knowledge and player assessments. I don't know if you would want to post such a thing, but if you were going to take 10-12 players from the EDC to a national tourney, who would you take? Thanks.

This is who I would take, in order.

AJ Jacobson
Mac Kroeplin
Mack Arvidson
Brady Syverson
Nathan Mertens
Andrew Kozlowski
Patrick Strom
David Olson
Sean Norton
John Hoplin

This is how I would play them.

PG - Mac Kroeplin
G - Mack Arvidson
G/F - Nathan Mertens
F - AJ Jacobson
F/C - Brady Syverson

Bench

PG - Andrew Kozlowski
G - Patrick Strom
G/F - Sean Norton
F - John Hoplin
F/C - David Olson

I left a few All-EDC players off, as I am huge in to role guys. I think this starting 5 is going to be tough, and they do have two guys that are fairly tall in that line up. Kroeplin has amazing court vision, and everyone in this group can shoot the ball. Mertens on the floor puts me in a situation where I have two guys pretty much playing the point. Off my bench, I have a solid all around guy with Kozlowski, a pure shooter in Strom, a pure scorer in Norton, an athletic shot blocker, and a spread 4/5. I took Hoplin with that last spot, as I needed size, which Bontjes and Poss don't give me. I like Carpenter's game, but I need a rim protector with that second group, and Hoplin runs the floor very well, which should help this team out.

For a western ND guy, you seem to know your stuff about EDC basketball. My feeling this year was that AJ Jacobson, Dexter Werner, Mac Kroeplin, Mack Arvidson, and Dylan Coyle, in that order, were the best players in ND Class A, but I only saw the WDC teams that played in the State Tourney. And I thought Mack Kroeplin was the 2nd most effective player in the EDC this year, too, because he made everybody on the team better.

So I completely agree with all your starting picks and the positions in which you have them playing, and also agree with your sentiments about picking the right role players, and I would definitely include Hoplin on my team because of his defense and length, and he also runs the floor pretty well. With this starting five, a good coach would have to push Arvidson and Mertens to play great defense, and both have the athletic ability to do that, and I think Arvidson will eventually be a terrific defender in DII basketball.

Kozlowski and Strom can be light-em-up scorers, and I like those choices a lot from an offensive standpoint. I would perhaps take Landon Poss over one of the GFC guys, and if I could take 12 players I would add Farroh from Red River and Strandemo from Shanley because I think they bring something special to the table with their athleticism, effort and team-oriented approach.

Actually am a pretty big Poss fan. Amazing shooting percentages. I like Norton more with that group because it is like a double point guard approach. Olson floats too much to be a pure 5, and Hoplin won't command a double team, so I am not sure how many open looks Poss will get. I do like his length though.

I agree with your top 3 in North Dakota. If the Wahpeton incident doesn't happen, I think Kroeplin gets first team all state.

Farroh brings a different level of defensive intensity, but I would assume the defensive intensity of almost every player on this team would improve dramatically as they wouldn't have to expend so much energy on the offensive end. Again, with AJ, Dexter, and Mac, I think we had the best offensive/defensive combo players this year. I really like the way Mertens defends as well.

Anthony Schnabel? Snubbed averaged 14 points 5 rebounds and 5 assists all year, the only ball handler north had.

He did not average that. He averaged 12.4 points, 4.0 rebounds, 4.4 assists, 1.6 steals, 3.9 turnovers, shooting 34.9% from the field and 28.4% from three while only winning five games. Not a snub in any way.

Poss and Norton is a close call. Norton is a whiz ball-handler, and Poss can really score, and they play nicely within the team framework. Both would be nice to have around on an travel team in national competition. As a South fan, of course, I am partial to Poss. And if we could sneak North Star into the EDC, I might like to consider Hagler and Grande, too. They are really skilled.

Good point, too, about the defensive intensity of all players picking up because they don't have to do so much on the offensive end. It's not easy to be a high scorer and defensive stopper at the same time.

I liked Schnabel's play, too, and I thought he might sneak on to the All-EDC team. He's a tough kid, good ball-handler, and very strong driving to the basket. He was one of those on-the-bubble guys, and I am sure that his shooting percentage may have been a factor in him not making the team, although North really struggled to score at times and Syverson and Schnabel got most of the attention from the defense, so not a ton of open shots.

North had a lot of bad luck this year, losing a bunch of close games early-on, losing Stratton for a while, then losing Syverson right before Stratton came back in February. If North would have had Schnabel, Syverson and Stratton back for the EDC tourney, I think they would have had a decent chance to make the State tourney.