Butler 1st, YSU 7th in preseason poll

By Joe Scalzo (Contact)

Published October 18, 2011

The Youngstown State men's basketball team didn't get a lot of love from its conference brethren in this year's preseason rankings.

Coming off back-to-back 2-16 seasons in the league, the Penguins were picked to finish seventh out of 10 teams in the Horizon League preseason poll.

The ranking is actually the team's best since joining the Horizon a decade ago. I gave them a sixth-place vote in my poll, so you can't really complain about seventh.

What you can complain about is the preseason all-league team. Neither Junior forward Damian Eargle nor sophomore guard Kendrick Perry made the list.

I gave Eargle a first team vote and Perry a second team vote. Perry probably needs another year of production before he can generate preseason accolades, but I think Eargle has a right to be disappointed.

Detroit guard Ray MaCallum was chosen as the preseason player of the year. He got my vote too.

Here's the complete poll, with first-place votes in parantheses:

1. Butler (28) 468

2. Detroit (19) 453

3. Cleveland State (2) 388

4. Milwaukee (1) 356

5. Valparaiso 255

6. Green Bay 247

7. Youngstown State 195

8. Wright State 157

9. Loyola 145

10. UIC 86

Here's how I voted:

1. Butler

2. Cleveland State

3. Detroit

4. Milwaukee

5. Valparaiso

6. YSU

7. Green Bay

8. Loyola

9. Wright State

10. UIC

Here's the all-league picks

First Team

Ray McCallum, G – Detroit

Trevon Harmon, G – Cleveland State

Eli Holman, F/C – Detroit

Chase Simon, G – Detroit

Kaylon Williams, G – Milwaukee

Second Team

Tony Meier, F – Milwaukee

Alec Brown, C – Green Bay

Andrew Smith, C – Butler

Ben Averkamp, F – Loyola

Ryan Broekhoff, G - Valparaiso

Here's how I voted:

First team: McCallum, Holman, Butler guard Ronald Nored, Cleveland State forward D'Aundray Brown, YSU forward Damian Eargle.

Second team: Butler forward Khyle Marshall, Williams, Harmon, Brown, YSU guard Kendrick Perry.