Six Missouri Valley Christmas Wishes – URGENT UPDATE – CHILDS OUT!

Valley Hoops Insider Wants A Full Stocking

(St. Louis, MO) – It’s not too late to send in your Christmas wishes. If Santa is at the mall on Christmas Eve, the middle of December is plenty of time make your desires known. So we at ValleyHoopsInsider.com are letting you know what we want.

Our ‘Six Missouri Valley Christmas Wishes’ are about health, prosperity, realizing potential and shining stars.

Wish Number One – Health

We want Valparaiso’s Ryan Fazekas healthy! The young man hasn’t been able to catch a break and if he was healthy and in the Crusader lineup they would be a dangerous Valley team. Already Javon Freeman-Liberty is vieing for ‘Player of the Year’ honors and the supporting cast of Nick Robinson, Daniel Sackey and Donovan Clay is playing well.

If you dropped the 6’8 sharp-shooting Fazekas into that lineup, you could have something significant. Matt Lottich deserves to have this proven commodity back in his rotation and playing at a high level. I hear he is traveling with the team on the current road trip.

Wish Number Two – A Shining Star

I truly want Evansville’s DeAndre Williams to be a dominant offensive star. I mean Doug McDermott, Hersey Hawkins, Antoine Carr level offensive star. Our league needs a player that starts turning heads nationally. We need teams to have some great non-conference records, but we could use a player or two that are rattling off 25 points per night to catch some national attention. Williams and Valpo’s Freeman-Liberty seem to be players that could pull that off. But if our first wish comes true, Freeman-Liberty won’t have such a scoring weight on his back.

C’mon DeAndre, go crazy the second half of the season. We know you can do it! Williams averaged 17.2 points per game and is shooting an amazing and league leading .716 from the field.

Wish Number Three – Prosperity

We want Indiana State to be good enough for Greg Lansing to gain some job security. No one has told me, he’s on that proverbial ‘hot seat’, but you read it enough places, that it makes one nervous. Lansing is truly one of the good guys in the coaching business and is greatly admired by his peers. His players love him and they graduate.

The Sycamores have had a couple of tough seasons, but Lansing’s team play with grit and after winning five straight and two of their losses coming by the narrowest of margins against elite teams, this wish might be more realistic than some believe. Based on my research, Lansing and his coaching staff are amongst the lowest paid in the Valley.

The University is investing in the facilities, perhaps now they could also invest in coach Lansing and his staff. Lansing’s coaching record is 153-146.

Wish Number Four – Realized Potential

Every prediction everywhere announced the coronation of Missouri State as the next big thing in the Valley. I was beating that same drum. We truly wish the uber talented Bears find the right rotation, style of play and load management for Gaige Prim to realize their great potential.

The Valley needs a couple of teams to win 14 to 16 conference games and become the talk of the league and rack up a significant win total. MSU has that kind of talent. Tulio Da Silva, Lamont West, Prim and those freshmen are talented enough to reel off 10 or 12 wins in-a-row, but coach Dana Ford says his team still has to find some internal leadership.

The Bears are 6-6.

Wish Number Five – Tradition Restored

Northern Iowa has had the league’s best non-conference success. We need the Panthers to maintain that success level and restore some tradition to our tradition-rich league. UNI needs to be that other team that wins 14 to 16 league games.

Since the end of the Greg McDermott era and this 14-year run for coach Ben Jacobson, the Panthers have been one of the MVC’s standard bearers. They are a known name nationally. Given their superior non-conference record (10-1), they are the one Valley team that could receive a decent NCAA Tournament seed as the Arch Madness champion, or possibly gain an at-large bid if they don’t win the league’s closing festival.

Wish Number Six – Prophecy Fulfilled

I honestly believe Elijah Childs can be the best player in the league. We wrote about in the preseason and we’re holding to it. We’re wishing for him to become a double-double machine. He has produced three of those so far, but it’s time for Childs to become a ‘man amongst boys’.

We’re looking for 17 and ten every night. With a few blocks thrown in he too could be the ‘Player of the Year’ winner. If he’ll do that, the rest of that sneaky, defensive minded Bradley team could jump in the mix for the regular season title.

Here is the story on Elijah Childs’ injury.

 

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Bradley’s top scorer and rebounder Elijah Childs is out 3-6 weeks after a right hand injury suffered in a fall during Saturday’s win over Georgia Southern. Big blow for the Braves, but if all goes well, he should be back for much of the Valley season.

— Dave Reynolds (@DaveReynolds2) December 16, 2019

 

Now this Christmas wish includes a speedy and complete recovery for Elijah Childs.

Some Christmas Wishes That Almost Made the List

We want Drake’s Noah Thomas to play more! I’ll admit it, I’m jealous of the flow!

We want Drake’s Murphy brothers to change uniforms one night and see if anyone notices.

Cam Cameron Krutwig please get a triple double? That would be special.

Bradley’s Brian Wardle ought to wear the red shoes at every home game and all through Arch Madness.

As an unabashed St. Louis apologist, I want Indiana State’s Jordan Barnes to score 35 points some night and Southern Illinois’ Ronnie Suggs to have some kind of defining moment this season.

We want to see the Keith Fisher we thought Illinois State had arriving. It seems like he’s still finding his way.

What is your Christmas wish?

Serious Christmas Wish

We at ValleyHoopsInsider.com wish you the merriest of Christmases where the baby in manger becomes more than a song we sing or a Hallmark movie attachment. We have been promoting a way to give gifts to your loved ones by purchasing life-saving services for orphans in Africa. Watch the video below. If that appeals to you, click here. I have seen the work of the Wendpouire Project with my own eyes. They can accomplish miraculous the things for a relatively small amount of money.

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