Carthage College Athletics

The 2009 Carthage men’s basketball team (15-10, 7-7 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin) got off to a strong start, both in its non-conference schedule and in CCIW play, but the end of the league schedule saw the Red Men on the outside, looking in at the CCIW Men’s Basketball Tournament.

Playing as road warriors while the beautiful new Tarble Arena was under construction, Carthage went 8-3 over its non-conference schedule. Carthage opened Tarble Arena with a non-conference game against Trinity International University (Ill.) on Jan. 5, 2009. The all-new facility, on the site of the former Carthage Physical Education Center, features a parquet floor, arena seating for 2,385 fans with all red seats and theatre-style chairs on one side, a giant video board and state-of-the-art sound and lighting equipment. The video board and the ability to darken the house during pre-game introductions added a level of excitement unique to NCAA Division III arenas.

Carthage won its first two CCIW games, defeating Millikin University on the road and Augustana College (Ill.) at home before losing to Illinois Wesleyan University, 73-70, at home on Jan. 15. The Red Men rebounded with back-to-back road wins at North Park University and Wheaton College (Ill.), the latter ranked No. 1 at the time. The two road wins gave Carthage a 4-1 mark in the league, and with a third of the conference season over, a first-ever berth in the conference tournament seemed like a reachable goal. Unfortunately, the Red Men lost their next two games, four of their next six and six of their final nine contests to finish fifth with a 7-7 league mark. The top-four teams qualify for the conference tournament.

For the second year in a row, one of the bright spots was the play of guard Steve Djurickovic (So., Pleasant Prairie, Wis./Kenosha-Bradford). Djurickovic, the son of head coach Bosko Djurickovic, was named “D3hoops.com” third-team All-America and first-team All-Midwest Regional, as well as first-team All-CCIW for the second-straight year. led the CCIW in scoring (27.6 points per game), assists (6.36 per game) and minutes played (37.04 per game), while ranked fourth in three-point field-goal percentage (.432), eighth in free-throw percentage (.833), 13th in rebounding (4.7 per game), 13th in steals (0.96 per game) and 14th in field-goal percentage (.497).

In only his second season, Djurickovic began his assault on the Carthage record book. He begins his junior year ranked 16th on the all-time Carthage scoring list with 1,271 points, second for made free throws (425), fourth for free-throw attempts (521) and fifth in assists (266). Djurickovic set Carthage season records with 691 points, a 27.6 scoring average,, 239 made free throws, 287 free-throw attempts and 159 assists.

Guard Sean Fendley (Sr., Elmhurst, Ill./York) had a solid season and was named third-team All-CCIW. He was ranked 10th in CCIW scoring (14.0 points per game), seventh in minutes played (31.83 per game), seventh in three-point field-goal percentage (.410) and 16th in rebounding (4.3 per game).

“I keep saying this,” said Carthage coach Djurickovic at the end of the season, “but basketball is a game where if you have one great player and can surround him with a couple more good ones, you have a chance to be very successful. While I think we’ll start next season as one of the top-two teams in the league, we have to find some better recruits to fill in the holes. We have to get bigger, and we have to have some other good players. Going 7-7 is a good year for a lot of teams but not for us. We’ll be better next year. We have the best-returning player and a lot of other good returning players. This was a good group to coach. They were hard workers and resilient. They gave me what they had. The results are my fault. The name of the game is recruiting, and that’s what we have to do every day from now until August.”