City of Basketball Love

Michael Bullock (@thebullp_n)
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(Ed. Note: This article is part of our 2016-17 season coverage, which will run for the six weeks preceding the first official games of the year on Nov. 11. To access all of our high school and college preview content for this season, click here.)

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SELINSGROVE — Crack open the preseason men’s basketball rankings divulged several weeks back by D3hoops.com and tucked in there at No. 25 was … yep, a Susquehanna University squad flush with talent and experience and promise and drive.

Yet …

“I always think the preseason rankings are based on last year’s team, moreso than this year’s team — and that’s kind of what I thought,” said Frank Marcinek, who is entering his 28th season (385-300) at the SU helm. “They look at what we did and we do return a lot, but I’m telling you the two kids we lost are going to be really hard to replace.

“[Josh Miller] was really good and he did so much for us. We don’t have anybody like him, so everybody else’s role is going to change a little bit. But we have good players, they’re a year older and they each need to do a little bit more while the guy that fits into that spot develops. Josh Miller was great. Brandon Hedley was our school’s all-time leading 3-point shooter. Those two both started as freshmen, so they brought a great deal of knowledge, a great deal of experience,” Marcinek continued.

“We have other guys that are smart and experienced, but till the pieces fit together, till the roles are defined. Last year that happened quickly.”

Ah, last year …

Unranked at the start of last season yet opening with 15 consecutive victories, Susquehanna (24-5) established a single-season standard for wins, ascended as high as No. 11 in the national polls and reached the NCAA Division III Tournament for the first time since 1994 as an at-large entry.

“It was a phenomenal experience. We talked about it,” 6-1 senior guard Steven Weidlich said. “Coming in my freshman year was really when the culture change started to occur. And ever since then we’ve been taking big steps, getting better and better and improving more and more. Last year was when we hit the mark where we wanted to be, but we don’t want to plateau. We want to continue to try to build on that.

“That was a great experience, but we’re hoping to have the same experience this year.”

Even with the departures of the 6-4 Miller (17.5 ppg/8.1 rpg/61 treys) and 5-10 Hedley (13.0 ppg/81 treys) — both of whom landed all-Landmark Conference accolades; Miller was City of Basketball Love’s Division III player of the year — six members of Marcinek’s eight-man rotation are back and ready for more. Much, much more.

There’s also an influx of quality first-year players that Marcinek termed “the best recruiting class we’ve ever had,” so the River Hawks do possess the talent needed to have the same experience Weidlich talked about so candidly.

So, checking in at No. 25 is merely a starting point.

“To me that stuff doesn’t really matter much. I’d say for other guys, I hope that it makes them hungrier to break that barrier,” added Weidlich, the two-time Landmark all-league selection with the impeccable shooting technique who last season averaged 16.1 ppg and canned 78 treys. “We also want to break top 10. I want to break top 10 once while I’m here, so that’s something we want to climb and get to.

“I know a lot of other guys are hungry to be better than what we were last year,” Weidlich continued. “For us to come in at 25, that’s kind of a knockdown from where we finished last year. I know we lost some key guys, but still.”

That preseason No. 25 also super-sized the already prominent maroon-and-orange targets attached to the backs of River Hawks players, made them large enough to cover much of the central Pennsylvania outline where they go to school.

“We’re gonna have everyone coming at our backs, but that’s the way we like it,” 6-7 junior forward Ryan Traub admitted. “Even though we have a target on our backs, we feel like underdogs and that just fuels us. We’re ready to go.”

And they are.

While Weidlich, 6-0 senior guard Dalton Reichard (4.3 ppg) and 6-6 senior forward Danny Weiss (10.6 ppg/5.2 rpg) started alongside Miller and Hedley, 5-10 sophomore guard Tyler Hoagland (4.8 ppg), 6-3 forward Jason Dietrich (3.2 ppg) and Traub (7.2 ppg) filled the remaining spots in Marcinek’s dependable eight-man rotations.

Barring injury or illness, Weidlich (1,186 career points) could finish his Susquehanna career ranked third on the school’s all-time scoring list. That would put him one spot above his former teammate Hedley (1,563 points).

Reichard (Eastern York), Hoagland (Cedar Cliff) and Dietrich (Donegal) have District 3 backgrounds, while the other veterans hail from New Jersey.

With Weiss nursing a knee injury, Traub may be in the starting lineup next week when Susquehanna opens at home against Misericordia. Jeff Dzierzawiec and Adam Dizbon, a pair of juniors, also are vying for playing time as preseason draws to a close.

Although Marcinek is hoping to bring his freshmen along slowly, 6-8 Jacob Walsh (Sanford, Del.), 6-7 Zach Knecht and 6-1 Isaiah Reiprish are just part of Susquehanna’s dandy recruiting haul. All of them could surface before league play begins.

“It’s definitely phenomenal,” Weidlich said of having an experienced group on hand. “Last year you look at us and you’d say we were a veteran team. And this year, you could still look at us and say we’re a veteran team.

“We’re not coming in and putting in all new pieces. There are a couple new guys that will come into our rotation, but it’ll be easy for them to pick it up when you already have six guys that have been doing this for two-plus years. That’s definitely nice.”

Especially since Marcinek has assembled a grueling nonleague collection full of hammers that neatly complements a Landmark Conference schedule featuring returning NCAA participants Catholic and Scranton. He’s got his reasons.

“As for the four years I’ve been here, this is the most difficult schedule — and I love it,” Weidlich remarked. “That’s how I’d want to go out. I don’t think it would be really motivating for me if we came out here and we played teams that we know we can beat by 25. Even if you do get the win, it doesn’t matter in rankings.

“For us to come out and play these teams early especially and have such a strong non-league schedule is just only beneficial for us, especially down the road.”

“We’ve loaded it,” Marcinek said of a non-league card that includes Lycoming, Trinity (Conn.), LaGrange (Ga.), Lancaster Bible, Dickinson and possibly Gwynedd Mercy. “There’s no Sisters of the Poor on our schedule. Our strength of schedule should be very good. If we win enough games and don’t win our league, we still hope to get an at-large.

“That’s one of our goals, but ultimately our goal is to win the Landmark Conference.”

And winning the Landmark Conference was the one glaring item on last season’s to-do list that went unaccomplished. Marcinek’s Crusaders reached the final for the second time in three seasons — the school changed its mascot during the offseason, adopting River Hawks — but lost in the title game at Catholic.

“Personally, we had a great season last year, but we didn’t win anything,” Traub said. “I feel like we came out with a loss because we wanted the championship.”

So put capturing a Landmark Conference crown right at the top of Susquehanna’s lengthy agenda heading into the 2016-17 campaign, above such items as remaining in the national rankings, compiling a sparkling record and returning to postseason play.

“For all the seniors – we have four and they’re all great kids — I’d like nothing more than for Steve and this crew to be rewarded,” Marcinek said.

And Weidlich already has a suggestion concerning that reward.

“Everyone knows the only thing I’ve really talked about is getting a ring,” admitted Weidlich, who has started 80 of a possible 81 games. “That’s one thing that we really haven’t done and it’s been on our mind, a championship from the Landmark.

“A return to the NCAAs would be great. Those kinds of things are a lot more community building and everybody kind of loves that, but personally for me and Dan, the only two guys that have been here for four years, we’re starving just to get a ring,” Weidlich said.

“We’d finish off what the other guys before us did and hopefully we get our ring and pass down the same kind of legacy for the next class to follow.”

Marcinek, the winningest coach in Susquehanna history, agrees wholeheartedly.

While his 2015-16 bunch made the sixth NCAA Tournament appearance since Susquehanna began playing basketball in 1901-02, they last captured a Landmark title in 2007-08, the sixth regular-season crown claimed on Marcinek’s watch.

So, hanging another banner in O.W. Houts Gymnasium — and soon — seems like an appropriate way to send out a group that’s been part of so much.

“This has been my home,” said Marcinek, who spent five seasons as an assistant coach at Susquehanna before taking over in 1989-90. He’s also worked as an assistant athletic director since 2003. “I love it. I love the kids and everything about it.

“I’d love to cut down the nets here. We’re due.”