JCA 25 SCHEDULE?
- Thread starter lesna
- Start date
Week 2 they just posted @ Glenbard West in a battle of Hilltoppers, which is quite a bit of aggressive scheduling by both programs.
Week 1 still not listed, but the schedule already seems daunting for a team with 5 returning starters. Hoping for an outmatched opponent so there can be at least one game with some breathing room.....
I've been asking for this matchup for some time. Glad it's at GBW too.
Lol where'd that come from. GBW means that the game is on Saturday and I can go to it while not missing my team Friday night.I’m sure you are jca hater….
I love that the hitters want to challenge themselves in the non conference but this is setting up for another season of missing the playoffs. Batavia, JCA, LT and DGN in the first 5 weeks plus York could be 5 losses.
Who needs the playoffs anyways? It gets cold in October. Hilltoppers and Raiders are basketball names now. Heard about the transfer?
I think that will end the Hilltoppers run as a basketball school. Back to boys volleyball as the standard bearer.
Week 1 LT @ Joliet Catholic at Joliet Memorial Stadium.
JC's first 5 weeks are LT, GW, Fenwick, Marist, Naz.
They must feel really good about what they have coming back and coming up the pipeline at JC to schedule that aggressively. Those first 5 weeks are brutal. Then the back half of the schedule still includes MC and PC.
Just a brutal stretch. DLS and maybe ND perhaps the only games the Hill will be favored in. Have to find a way to win those two and steal three more tossups or underdog games.
Either there was nobody beneath a 7A/8A deep playoff team looking to schedule weeks 1 and 2 or JC feels excellent about their ability to matchup with this schedule this year. Hope it is the latter.
JC's first 5 weeks are LT, GW, Fenwick, Marist, Naz.
They must feel really good about what they have coming back and coming up the pipeline at JC to schedule that aggressively. Those first 5 weeks are brutal. Then the back half of the schedule still includes MC and PC.
Just a brutal stretch. DLS and maybe ND perhaps the only games the Hill will be favored in. Have to find a way to win those two and steal three more tossups or underdog games.
Either there was nobody beneath a 7A/8A deep playoff team looking to schedule weeks 1 and 2 or JC feels excellent about their ability to matchup with this schedule this year. Hope it is the latter.
Yikes. Unfortunately, I suspect it's the former. LT was 11-1 last year. Good luck finding 5 wins with that schedule.
I agree 5 wins looks hard to find given how that may be the toughest schedule in the state, or at least among the top handful for sure.
That said, I would have looked far and wide for a few winnable week 1 and 2 games to help find 5 wins. That said, with the bump to 6A and knowing you need to get past ESL in addition to the Naz roadblock they have faced the last few years, I suppose I can't argue if the thought process was "Well, if we want to win a championship, and that is the goal of this program every year, we may as well schedule LT and GW to give us a better chance to learn and be ready to take on an ESL in November. If we can't beat them, or lose closely but learn enough to find 5 other wins on the schedule, we weren't beating ESL or Cary-Grove in November anyway."
I subscribe to the "the CCL-ESCC schedule weeks 3-9 is more than adequate to prepare them for any playoff class" theory and would look for a softer landing spot weeks 1 and 2 to hopefully find 5 wins. But I do understand putting all your chips in the middle and saying "let's see if we're a state title contender this year and, if we're not, we just might miss the playoffs altogether."