After nearly 50 seasons of running the Yarnell Invitational, hackerhog is handing it off to me to run for a while. For those that have had the chance to participate in the various types of non-conf tournaments in different worlds over the years, I hope you'd agree that it is one of the cooler things in HD, and I appreciate hackerhog putting forth the effort to conceive of and run this tournament for so long. We certainly didn't want to see this one end since this has been running it continually for so many seasons, I think starting in season 42. Anyway, season 92 will be the first season I'll be running it, and below is the description of the tourney hackerhog has given in the past with an edit for the host. Plans are to keep running this pretty much the same way as it has been over the last 5 decades of Iba years.

This is the Yarnell Invitational (named after Yarnell Ice Cream in Searcy, AR). As always, it'll be a 6 team round-robin tournament that will occur in weeks 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the non-conference schedule. Harding University has been the tournament host, and it will now be New Mexico Highlands University. The defending champ from the previous year is an automatic qualifier. The remainder of the field is invitation only.

Note, since we skipped a season during the transition and had to get caught up, we have two previous champs from seasons 89 and 90.

Defending Champ: Lander [PeachBelt - 89], Incarnate Word [Heartland - 90]
Host: New Mexico Highlands [NorthernSun]

FORMAT: 5 games, Round Robin
Game #5: DC90 @ Host, #2 @ #DC89, #4 @ #3
Game #6: Host @ #4, #DC89 @ DC90, #2 @ #3
Game #7: #3 @ Host, #DC89 @ #4, DC90 @ #2
Game #8: Host @ #2, #3 @ #DC89, #4 @ DC90
Game #9: #DC89 @ Host, #2 @ #4, #3 @ DC90

SCHEDULE
FORMAT: 5 games, Round Robin
GAME 5: Incarnate Word @ NMHU, Concord @ Lander, Harding @ Pfeiffer
GAME 6: NMHU @ Harding, Lander @ Incranate Word, Concord @ Pfeiffer
GAME 7: Pfeiffer @ NMHU, Lander @ Harding, Incarnate Word @ Concord
GAME 8: NMHU @ Concord, Pfeiffer @ Lander, Harding @ Incarnate Word
GAME 9: Lander @ NMHU, Concord@ Harding, Pfeiffer @ Incarnate Word

PRESEASON RANKINGS
#3 Incarnate Word
#11 Lander
#13 Pfeiffer
#22 NMHU
#23 Harding
NR Concord

PLAYERS TO WATCH
Miro Ivankovic - PF, Lander, 2nd Team All-American
Leslie Reynolds - PG, Handing, Honorable Mention All-American
Roberto Torres - SG, Lander, Honorable Mention All-American
Dennis Shelley - PF, Incarnate Word, Honorable Mention, All-American

ROUND ONE
#17 Incarnate Word (2-2) Pickem @ #7 NMHU (3-1)
Concord (3-1) +18 @ #3 Lander (4-0)
#15 Harding (3-1) -2 @ Pfeiffer (3-1)

Looks good @long_ge. My kids decided to only play a half at Pfeiffer.

STANDINGS
Incarnate Word 1-0
Lander 1-0
Pfeiffer 1-0
Harding 0-1
Concord 0-1
NMHU 0-1

ROUND TWO
#16 NMHU (3-2) Pickem @ Harding (3-2)
#3 Lander (5-0) -1 @ #13 Incranate Word (3-2)
Concord (3-2) +9 @ #18 Pfeiffer (4-1)

ROUND ONE RESULTS
Incarnate Word 79, @ NMHU 76
IW- C Leblanc 27 (POG), D Shelley 24
NMHU - C Rabb 16, D Manns 15

Concord 67, @ Lander 68
LU - M Ivankovic 20/11R (POG), E Rossi 16
CC - A Showman 16


Harding 63, @ Pfeiffer 78
PU - M Swift 25 (POG), J Lanctot 13/9R
HU - D Chisom 17, L Reynolds 16

Just realized I had Dominican player is the 'Players to Watch' segment. So I guess that's a spoiler for next season.

STANDINGS
Incarnate Word 2-0
Pfeiffer 2-0
Lander 1-1
NMHU 1-1
Harding 0-2
Concord 0-2

ROUND THREE
#17 Pfeiffer (5-1) Pickem @ #14 NMHU (4-2)
#13 Lander (5-1) -5 @ Harding (3-3)
#11 Incarnate Word (4-2) -16 @ Concord (3-3)

ROUND TWO RESULTS
NMHU 95 @ Harding 79
NMHU - M Kang 14 (POG), R Lewis 15
HU - L Reynolds 18, N Keys 14

Lander 58 @ Incarnate Word 61
IW - C Leblanc 14 (POG), G Avera 12
LU - M Ivankovic 18, E Rossi 15

Concord 73 @ Pfeiffer 79
PU - M Swift 25 (POG), D Smith 19/10R
CC - A Showman 15, Willits 10

Thanks Long, I was hoping this thread was back.

I appreciate it Dave. Hope we can get it back to where it was when hackerhog was running it. Probably folks aren't yet back in the habit of checking the boards just yet.

STANDINGS
Incarnate Word 3-0
Pfeiffer 2-1
Lander 2-1
NMHU 2-1
Harding 0-3
Concord 0-3

ROUND FOUR
#9 NMHU (5-2) -20 @ Concord (3-4)
Pfeiffer (5-2) @ #11 Lander (6-1)
Harding (3-4) +8 @ #7 Incarnate Word (5-2)

ROUND THREE RESULTS
Pfeiffer 65 @ NMHU 77
NMHU - C Rabb 21 (POG), F O'Neal 15/4S
PU - D Smith 17, M Swift 16

Lander 63 @ Harding 60
LU - L Torres 20 (POG), E Rossi 14
HU - L Reynolds 19, S Noonan 15

Incarnate Word 81 @ Concord 63
IW - C Leblanc 30 (POG), G Avera 14
CC - D Bowen 9, A Wells 9

yeah. I'd like to see the season thread come back too. This team of mine is so hard to figure out. Juco transfers just take so long to fit in but I got to give them PT. This team should be good at end of season when their IQ's get up.

A few seasons back when the season thread was running and active, that was pretty awesome. It would be good to see those pre-season projections for each conference.

With last night's games, the result of the Yarnell is very much still in the air. A lot depends on the Pfeiffer @ Incarnate Word match-up. If Incarnate Word wins tonight's game, they would be Yarnell champs again, due to their earlier win against NMHU and owning any potential tie-breaker. If Pfeiffer prevails, it would depend on the Lander @ NMHU game. A Pfeiffer win and NMHU loss would make Pfeiifer the champ, while a Pfeiffer win and NMHU win would result in a tie at 4-1 for both teams, with NMHU owning the tie-breaker.

STANDINGS
Incarnate Word 3-1
Pfeiffer 3-1
NMHU 3-1
Lander 2-2
Harding 1-3
Concord 0-4

FINAL ROUND
#17 Lander (6-2) +1 @ #4 NMHU (6-2)
Concord (3-5) +9 @ Harding (4-4)
#23 Pfeiffer (6-2) Pickem @ #15 Incarnate Word (5-3)

ROUND FOUR RESULTS
NMHU 108 @ Concord 85
NMHU -David Manns 23 (POG), C Rabb 16
CC- A Showman 16, D Bownen 13

Pfeiffer 66 @ Lander 58
PU -M Swift 19, J Lanctot 14/11R (POG)
LU- M Ivankovic 15, E Rossi 15

Harding 75 @ Incarnate Word 71
HU- L Reynolds 25 (POG), N Keys 15/4A/4S
IW - C Leblanc 30, G Avera 13/4A

I will never be able to explain Harding's success vs Incarnate Word over the years.

By virtue of the the 79-76 win in the first round over NMHU, Incarnate Word owns the tie-breaker and wins the Yarnell for season 92. Congrats, and Dave gets an automatic bid in the Yarnell for season 94.

FINAL STANDINGS
Incarnate Word 4-1
NMHU 4-1
Pfeiffer 3-2
Lander 2-3
Harding 2-3
Concord 0-5

FINAL ROUND RESULTS
Lander 74 @ NMHU 76 OT
NMHU - F O'Neal 16/4S (POG), C Rabb 16
LU - M Ivankovic 25/17R, R Torres 15

Concord 58 @ Harding 68
HU - L Reynolds 21 (POG), N Keys 12
CC- D Wright 9, C Fitch 8

Pfeiffer 60 @ Incarnate Word 67
IW - C Leblanc 24 (POG), D Shelley 12/12R
PU - M Swift 14, M Lanctot 14

Thanks to everyone for participating.

Thanks Long, enjoyed it. And I agree, it would be good to get the season thread going again.
I know the Yarnell thread has always been different, but would it make sense to combine the two? Have the Yarnell within the season thread?
I differ to you and hackerhog on that. The Yarnell has tradition (and I respect that) but just trying to brainstorm ways of a more active season thread. If you're not in the Yarnell, you might not contribute here.

Hacker, I don't know how, but you absolutely own me. Green hawks absolutely owned me when he was at Bellarmine, but you are a very close second.

We can think about that. I'm not sure of the pros and cons, so hacker could probably weigh in...but yeah, if we could get a few of the conference that are halfway full at least having those conference previews again, it would be cool. Even with all the changes and turnover, a lot of the same folks who were driving it before are still around.

Need separate threads but promote Yarnell in season thread. The problem is Iba forum is so hard to find now. Sucks we don't have a season thread going this season as this NT is wide open. Tons of good teams including all 6 that played this tournament. All alive in round of 32.