Hope earned their win today.  Kudos to the Flying Dutchmen.  Although I had the feeling if the game had gone another three minutes Calvin might have been up by six.    Of course three minutes later Hope would have had the lead again.  It was just one of those see-saw games with monster runs by both teams at critical moments.

Hard in a game that intense to point to particular key moments but Griffin had a three go halfway down with Calvin up 48-38.  I wondered at the time if that miss might come back to hurt the Knights.  Hard to say for sure but it would have been nice if it had dropped.  

Dustin Smith was pretty good for the Knights I thought.  Caleb forced the issue a little more than I would have liked, and maybe could have gotten his teammates a little more involved.

In the end Hope's seniors all came up pretty big.  Even DVS, after a marginal first half, played a pretty solid second stanza.

Despite the Hope win I like Calvin's chances come February.  The Knights have the potential to be a pretty dangerous squad come MIAA tourney time ...

Quote from: Flying Dutch Fan on February 26, 2007, 09:38:28 AM

Quote from: almcguirejr on February 26, 2007, 09:01:21 AM

Quote from: CalvinChelseaMom on February 25, 2007, 01:33:13 PM

Quote from: sac on February 25, 2007, 12:55:19 PM
So KVS is a genious again I see.......

Takes a real great coach to have Derek Griffen take and hit a bomb from 28 feet. 

Sorry but I don't see a great coaching effort from KVS this year, Calvin should have been right in the MIAA race and they played themselves out of it and were completely uncompetitive against good teams like Carthage, Wheaton, Lax, Wooster and once vs Hope.  Despite the great win last night, thats still mostly a 1 on 1 team, without Derek Griffen's fortunate transfer to Calvin the Knights have a miserable season by Calvin standards.


That is just how I see it.

Sac, once again your frustration seems to turn into sarcasm and putting words into other people's mouths.   

CCMom - truer words were never spoken.

I would suggest that before you accuse sac of those things, you look at the post he was responding to:

Quote from: wizardry on February 25, 2007, 08:12:02 AM
Maybe we can soon end the talk about how many miles separates the Illinois and the Michigan teams.  A good coach knows the sure way to get in is by being prepared for the automatic bid from a conference tournament championship.  That's the way KVS played it and now, of course, we all know it worked.  He had a young team that needed to be patiently guided to learn the system and be ready to play good ball in February.  Last night it was clear that one team improved greatly as the season went on and one not so much.  KVS proved once again he is MIAA coach of the year.  After the game, a Holland local was asking me some things about Calvin College and then he mentioned "that's a well coached outfit".  I couldn't agree more.

wizardry seems to be saying that KVS had it planned all along that his team would just win the conference tournament and his entire coaching strategy for the year was focused on that.  Yeah right - he's telling them to not worry about losing games to Adrian, Tri-State, and Albion, it's all part of the strategy.  And it was all strategy when KVS spent entire timeouts getting after his team to just put forth the effort (I'm paraphrasing a post from a Calvin supporter mid-season) and him questioning his own coaching abillity on the radio.

sac is absolutely right - and I'll bet the house KVS would agree, that this has not been one of his better years and that this years team (while they may have improved immensly) took most of the year to get to the level of play that was expected out of the gate.

I think they're both good coaches.  Did Calvin struggle at times this season?  Yep.  Some new faces, some adjustments in various areas.  I felt all along Calvin would be a far better team in February than they were in November and I think they are.  And I credit KVS *and* the players for that.  I think Hope's potential gap between November and February was a lot smaller, so the improvement Calvin has made should not have been expected on Hope's part.  Hope was pretty darn good in November and Hope in February is still a terffic team, despite Saturday's loss.  For me the evidence of that is how little I would want to play them on Saturday, were Calvin fortunate enough to get by Aurora.  :-)    I think SAC's post was probably a good reminder to all of us D3 fans to not get too down on our coaches or deify them too much either.

Quote from: Stinger on November 27, 2006, 08:28:00 AM
The Hornets had finally put one in the win column last night with a win against Benedictine.  This, like Heidelberg, was a game they should win, and this time they took care of business. Clancy led the way with 23, 4-6 from 3 pt territory.   Henry McCain had a very good game with 14 and 12, including two very nice dunks.  All in all a nice non-conference win for the Hornets. Finals week this week, and then have a few days to get ready for Manchester.

Joppe did the K game last night. I used to really enjoy when Cooper would line up Joppe and Schipp on the same team. Schipp's a very good official, Id say the best in the league.  I may be mistaken, but didnt Schipper play his freshman year at Hope and then transfer to Calvin?  Guess he saw the light, unlike countless others.

Geerlings, Hope grad himself, should just stick with college football and spare us the screw jobs.

Yep Schipper started at Hope and transferred to Calvin as a freshman.  If memory serves me correctly he did so at mid-season.  :-)  I could be mistaken on that score but I think he spent the fall semester at Hope and transferred at Xmas break.  I concur with Stinger:  I think Skip is a top-notch official.  Joppe is excellent too.  Geerlings?  Not so much.  Wish I could have been at the Calvin-Hope game Saturday night.  I had the Red Wings game on with the sound off and WFUR on and at one point the Wings were down 6-1 and Calvin was down 20!  I think Calvin will take some good lessons away from this game though and I also believe Calvin in January/February will be a better team than they are now.  Kudos to Hope for an impressive win!

Saw today that Jay Smith resigned up at Central Michigan University.  Not a D3 topic but perhaps of interest to this board b/c of Jay's prior 1-year stint at Grand Valley.  He was at CMU for nine years.

The CMU AD said it was a "unique" time of year to be searching for a new coach.

"We need to move quickly," he said, adding that recruits had been contacted and are still planning on attending CMU. "We'll keep the position open until the right candidate comes along. We'll evaluate as we go."

Names that have surfaced include former University of Michigan player and current San Diego State assistant coach Mark Hughes, whom Smith coached as a Wolverines assistant, and Michigan State assistant coach Mark Montgomery.

Quote from: sac on April 05, 2006, 03:40:25 PM

Quote from: Outnthewoodsman on April 05, 2006, 09:16:33 AM


  INSIGHT:  I have heard that the financial aid packages at Hope are overall LOWER than competing MIAA schools.

That is correct, Hope's average financial aide to athletes was less than Albion, Kalamazoo, Calvin.  Their total endowment also ranks behind these schools.  Its way back in the early November archives if anyone wants to look it up.

They key word is AVERAGE.

Sac ... Hope's endowment is much bigger than Calvin's - both in terms of total size and in terms of endowment dollars per student.  I'm also doubtful about the financial aid package to athletes being lower at Hope than Calvin, although Hope's student body is wealthier than Calvin's so I can't say that stat is wrong.  But the endowment thing is wrong ....

Quote from: sac on March 24, 2006, 01:45:52 PM
Speaking of small worlds..........kcrest, I believe I've played golf with Mr Hoogewind a number of times in my Kent County Amateur tournament days.  Nice guy and a very good player.

One year his alignment was so screwed up he was literally puting the club on the ground to align himself on every shot.......not something you see much even in amateur golf tournaments.  I had no idea he was a former Calvin hooper, ........of course with all the dutch names around GR I suppose it not entirely impossible there is more than one Mark Hoogewind.

I also was paired up with a Calvin player from the early 90's who's name escapes me.........I knew his face and name were familiar but I couldn't place him........and finally asked, when he mentioned he played at Calvin we of course had much to discuss........, he had just moved back to GR after finishing medical school.


.......and I'm retired from amateur golf competition. 

Yep that's the same guy (as Oldknight said).  Hoogewind is a pretty good stick.  Nice guy but intense on the golf course.  Not sure who the early 90s guy who went to med school might have been.  Maybe Boyd Kroeze?  he played varsity tennis at Calvin.  Not sure if he played golf.  Ricky Shilts is a good golfer too.  As you well know Sac for a time in the MIAA almost all of the men's golf coaches were also either varsity basketball coaches or varsity assistants.  Those guys had some fun sitting in the clubhouse, drinking coffee and talking hoops!

Quote from: sac on March 23, 2006, 05:12:47 PM

Quote from: almcguirejr on March 22, 2006, 10:32:56 PM

Quote from: sac on March 22, 2006, 10:22:30 PM

Quote from: formerd3db on March 22, 2006, 05:14:27 PM
Don't forget Dan Stolz of Alma either, current Okemos H.S. Head Coach who's team may be headed for a State Class A championship this weekend.

Dan Stolz..........wasn't he the guy  coaching Okemos when I was 11.    He's been there awhile.........if I'm not mistaken he was at the helm when Okemos won a couple back to back titles in the early 80's.  They've always been good.

Stan Stolz was the coach at Okemos back in the 80's if my memory serves me correctly.
I think Stan's brother Denny was the football coach at MSU in the seventy's before some recruiting irregularities cropped up.

I don't know if Dan is related to either Stan or Denny.

I stand corrected........Stan and Dan are too close in sound.......no wonder I thought they were the same guy.





My Klunder story..........as a Freshman at Hope I ended up in a pickup game with many guys who I did not know were players on the Hope team.........how nieve.   I remember Dan Klunder pulling up from about 28 feet on me and swishing it.       Pretty much knew then I was out of my league.

I also remember being on a 2 on 0 fast break with Wade Gugino and despite being in front of him I tossed it back to let him dunk it. 

I didn't want to show up the new Freshman stud. 

I played pick-up ball one time as a Calvin student against Mark Hoogewind (played with Mark Veenstra and was first-team All-MIAA in 1975).  Hoogewind was probably 27 or 28 at the time - an old guy.     First time down he pulled from about 25 feet or so.  Nothing but net.  Okay, I figure, old guy can shoot a little.  Better get up on him.  Next time down I pick him up at 30 feet and he blows by me for a lay-up.  Yikes.  From there to 15 baskets he alternated hitting 25-footers, making lay-ups and dishing to teammates for easy hoops.  Later on someone told me who I was "guarding" and I felt a little better.   

Quote from: goodknight on March 21, 2006, 11:38:20 PM
Final D3Hoops.com poll has Hope at #6, Calvin at #14 and Albion at #23.
Final Massey ratings has Hope at #3, Calvin at #11 and Albion at #20.

Sac, I like your suggestion about a charity game.  Maybe we could get a posters' exhibition going between the doubleheader games.  Kcrest and Oldknight still have a little left .

I resemble that remark!

A charity game is a good idea, but having the over 30 crowd play could be a little depressing.  Although I imagine Steve Honderd would still be fun to watch!  I second hopefan's post about Matt Neil, Todd Schuilling, ect. Those games were good.  Matt Neil was a hoss and Gustad could throw down with the best of them.

Quote from: realist on March 21, 2006, 04:57:31 PM
Gosh Jeff, you are 100 % correct.  Must be you don't have much to do during spring break.  Nice to see you know what is being dscussed on this board.  I think many of the newcomers don't really appreciate what the MIAA was before the 80's or 90's.  Today's players may be better athletes, but when it comes to the fundamentals (of the game of b-ball) few of them hold a ghost of a chance against guys from the 50-70's.  Think of this past year without the 3 point shot (or when dunks were outlawed)  when M. Phelps scored 56 points in one game or the above mentioned game where Floyd Brady had 33 in the first half.   Those guys were awesome, and they didn't carry the ball, or palm the ball, or flop, or whine, or wear baggy shorts etc. etc. etc.

Not sure what baggy shorts has to do with anything.  I sort of prefer them to the old, tight shorts of the 80s.  Yikes.  Watcging old Celtics footage still makes me cringe.  I do think that the athlete factor you describe is pretty accurate.  But also that the defenses of today sometimes make the offenses look worse than they really are.  I was watching Calvin in the 80s and we were pretty bad back then so I can't really say how the teams from the 80s, 70s, 60s, etc would compare to today's MIAA.

Quote from: goodknight on March 21, 2006, 04:52:19 PM
That 1973 Unity Christian team was unbelievably talented throughout the starting lineup, but they were totally outcoached that day by Mr. Promise Keeper.

Not even unity can top a divine child ...

Hard to argue with Holstege too.  It was nice to see him graduate.   

Quote from: jfebus on March 21, 2006, 04:15:19 PM
Trivia Time

Mark Veenstra's High School team lost the State Championship in 1973.  The opposing team was coached by someone who later won a DI national championship in football.  Who was the Coach?

That would be Bill McCartney of Dearborn Divine Child who later served as the D. Coordinator for the U. of Michigan football team and then as the head football coach at the U. of Colorado where he won a national title. Our friend Good Knight had a front-row seat for that 1973 tournament game between Unity Christian and Divine Child.

Wow.  Got the one of the best SIDs in the country weighing in on d3hoops trivia!    Nice work Mr. Febus. I'm not sure what your prize is though.  I like the three pics for the team so far too - hard to argue with M Veenstra, S Honderd and F Brady.  I will make a pitch for Randy Morrison of Olivet to be considered.  He didn't play four years for his dad at the sweet O though so maybe that eliminates him.  But that kid could play.  Wow.  He started at MSU on a full ride and then left to play for Gary.

Quote from: Flying Dutch Fan on March 15, 2006, 01:53:45 PM
For those of you just joining us - welcome to the CRC...


that's the Calvin Recruiting Center   

Nice.     I'd give you karma but I'm pretty sure I can't.  Plus every time I post I lose it (karma that is). 

In re to the 6-8 kid, maybe he's not top 100 in the state of Denver, but he's 6-8.   

And sometimes 6-8 kids are late bloomers.  I think Duane Bosma would be an example of that.  Sometimes they don't improve a ton but all things being equal I'll take as many 6-8 kids as I can get.

One story I read noted that Schusters put up 17 with 7 boards against a 6-9 center who is going to Colorado on a football scholarship.  So that's a nice day's work.

Bottom line is the kid will get a great education at a Christian college and be part of a solid basketball program headed up by a great coach who gets the most out of his players.

Quote from: sac on March 12, 2006, 09:10:31 PM
Since the season's over I can now comfortably divulge my thoughts of Hope's true weakness without giving any scouting tips away.

Plain and simple it was far too easy to make Hope a perimeter team.......and Hope is not a great perimeter shooting team.  They were able to cover up this deficiency in a couple games earlier in the year when they had good shooting nights  but it was most blatantly obvious in their 3 losses.  Albion, Calvin and Wittenberg, each took the inside easy stuff away and made Hope shoot from the outside.

I think their inexplicable struggles to score in the final minutes of tight ballgames goes back to not having a strong inside post game.  They could never reliably pound it inside and get points or fouls in crucial situations.  Think back to 96 and 98 teams........when it got tough the ball went down low to Bosma, Muhlenberg or Merrit.

This is not a slam on their current frontline, its just the kind of players Hope has right now.......perimeter oriented forwards, slashers if you will.

So if your tall, have good post moves, a Sr in HS or a willing transfer  ..........I think they'll welcome you with open arms in Holland.

I agree completely with your summary Sac.  In fact, on March 5 I said: "The other thing I worry about with Hope is the inside game.  Voisin seems to be unsure about whether or not he wants to be a 5 or a 3.  In my experience at the Final Four - and I've been to four of them with Calvin - you need a strong post player to win it all.  Come crunch time it's not a luxury, but a necessity to be able to get the ball deep and get the tough inside hoop.  So, time will tell whether Hope can muster up something from the 5 spot or whether they defy the odds and go all the way with a 5 who likes to spot up and hit the 3-ball."

Guess we now know the answer to whether Hope could win it all without a post player.

Also, do Hope fans think cutting Peter Overbeek was premature?  Him in the post next year as a 6-6 senior maybe wouldn't have been all bad?

Finally, Alan Babbitt has an interesting Holland Sentinel column today that I think is pretty accurate.  Provocative read to be sure but he makes some good points.  See
http://hollandsentinel.com/stories/031306/localsports_20060313037.shtml?p

Quote from: DCHopeNut on March 10, 2006, 09:03:52 PM
I just said this on the Witt sectional board but I will throw it out here to show the Calvin faithful how objective I am. I want to be the first to start wondering out loud how good this Hope team would be if KVS or Brian Morehouse (Hope Women's coach) had been in charge of this talent all year. They do much more without a lot less talent each year. And I am now convinced they are far superior X's and O's coaches than GVW. Oh and they try this thing called in game adjustments.

GVW is a great guy and amazing recruiter but with the talent of the last 5 years the fact all Hope has is 2 NCAA appearances and one Sweet 16 appearance is embarassing.

I've been convinced all year Hope had enough talent to win it all.  Not sure if KVS would have taken this team further or not.  Pretty tough question to answer.  But he took Calvin a lot further than they had a right to go.  Hope fans will have to decide where this loss came from.

And it's a disappointing loss for Hope for sure.  I can't wait to hear from those who were there b/c the live scoreboard showed some really odd stats.  For example, VanSolkema with 10 points in four minutes!?  Can that be right?  

And Hope seemed to go with their starters for too many minutes again.  Course Witt pretty much went with the iron 5 too.  Still Immink played 36, Cramer 36, Phillips 36, Marcus 30 and Voisin 35 (with no points and no rebounds).  Maybe more use of the bench would have paid off?  Kcrest wondered earlier this week if Hope could win it all without a post game.  Apparently the answer tonight was no.  A goosegg for Voisin?  Not good.

Tough, tough way to end the season ....