Brendan Cargill 5-11 G Forest Hills Central will attend Hope

Tucker Walther 6-4 G  Schoolcraft will attend Hope

Vincent Salmon 6-8 C Brighton will attend Albion  (some say 6-9)

Missed a good chunk of his Sr season to a foot injury.  Was top 100 pre-season by the Detroit Free Press.



I've watch East Lansing a couple times the last 2 weeks and came away very confident Albion committ Cam Essell will contribute to their program right away.   But I am also pretty terrible at predicting such things. <shrugs>

Its always hard when a guy is pretty good but plays on such a talented team, EL has 1 D1 committ, a future D1 committ, both sons of MSU Spartans and 2 college football guys and probably a couple other future college bballers.  But Cam just seems to settle them sometimes, strong Luka Ressler type vibes with him. 


 

Quote from: wiz on March 03, 2025, 02:00:58 PMSuperor coaching confirmed

https://calvinknights.com/news/2025/3/3/calvins-bill-sall-named-miaa-mens-basketball-coach-of-the-year.aspx

Now they both have one.

Quote from: calvin_grad on March 02, 2025, 01:24:06 PMNot a D3 guru by any stretch. What are the chances Calvin will host the first weekend?

Illinois Wesleyan cannot host, so this part of the country will need a replacement, however there are about 3 teams rated higher in the latest NPI that could easily host.

Slim, but its out there.

Quote from: wiz on March 01, 2025, 10:25:34 PMComing from behind and controlling the second half is an indicator of superior coaching.

"Superior coaching" is now 7-8 overall and 1-3 vs Hope in the MIAA Tournament while being the favorite 3 times. 



Have fun in the tournament, well deserved.  Calvin had a great conference season. 

Great moments in d3boards history

Quote from: ChickenHoops on November 19, 2024, 08:20:52 PMIs the Calvin coach on the hot seat?

There's a formula out there called non-steal turnovers.  Very basic, your turnovers minus opp steals divided by possessions.

Percentage of possessions that result in non-steal turnover.

Since we've been discussing defense, here's everyone's defensive numbers, think of it as 10.9% of possessions against Trine result in a non-steal turnover

Trine    10.9
Adrian    8.9
Hope      7.8
Calvin    7.6
Kalmazoo  7.6
Olivet    7.5
Albion    7.3
Alma      5.9

7 point something'ish seems like a normal number.  You can probably infer the kind of pressure you face might have something to do with these numbers.

Trine and Calvin have very different opponent turnover rates.  Calvin's is roughly 18%, Trine 25%, those are both good, Trine's is outstanding and probably top 10 nationally.

Calvin has 192 steals vs Trine's 182


Calvin is holding opponents to 37% FG shooting, Trine 38.5%, yet Trine is holding opponents to 2 pts fewer per game.   Ie, create more turnovers which equals fewer opportunities to score thus fewer points.


Personally the differences seem negligible long term, playing both teams you're going to be forced into making difficult shots with varying levels of pressure at different points on the floor. 

Its not a fun time for most teams.

1st team
Uchenna Egekeze, Calvin  MVP
Owen Varnado, Calvin
Drew Moore, Trine
Nate Tucker, Trine
Parker Hovey, Hope
Nick Seifert, Adrian

2nd team
Gabe Quillan, Hope
Nate Richardson, Olivet
Conner Schipper, Olivet
Porter Kretchman, Olivet
Lucas Broadsword, Kalamazoo
Manny Megnanglo, Trine

I have Nick Seifert as the most productive player in the league by a whisker over Egekeze with fancy stats.  On a per minute basis its Parker Hovey.

I'm thinking one of the Olivet guys gets left out and the last spot is Lucchesi, Wourman or Winkle.

Broadsword and/or Megnanglo being left off would not suprise me,  Lucchesi, Wourman and Winkle are basically neck and neck in the fancy stats.

I have 23 seasons of MIAA efficiency, this years Alma squad finished dead last in offensive efficiency out of those 150+ teams.

Overall this Alma team comes in rated 4th lowest, and that probably only happened because they pulled a couple defensive rabbits out of their kilts against Kzoo and Adrian late in the year.

That gives Alma 4 of the 6 lowest rated teams in that time frame and 6 of the 9 lowest, Olivet has the other three.

There is a caveat that I think the most recent 3pt line change has made teams slightly less efficient on offense and slightly better on defensive.  There are simply more missed 3 point shots and the bar for "average" has lowered.  A timeline comparison is really not a great comparison anymore.  But I'm still gonna do it.


2003 Alma remains the gold standard of lowest efficiency MIAA squads by .... A LOT.

With Albion's loss and Kzoo's win over Adrian Wed's pairings will be

Adrian at Hope 7pm ...winner vs Trine Fri at Calvin
Albion at Olivet ...winner vs Calvin Fri at Calvin

I don't have a time for Albion/Olivet but I assume 7pm

Quote from: pointlem on February 22, 2025, 08:17:28 PMA fun day at DeVos, as Hope reversed their loss at Albion with an 81 to 56 win before 2325 fans.

The really fun part—-for fans and for their ecstatic, supportive teammates-—was having seniors Josh Decker, Ben Wagar, and Zach Hawes move into the senior-honoring starting lineup, and promptly draining 5 of 5 3-point shots in the first 2 minutes and 40 seconds.

They ended the game having played a combined 35 minutes, and scoring 38 points, including 10 of 13 triples. So cool . . . and for the team (shooting 53% and with only 9 turnovers) quite the turnaround from the dismal prior game at Olivet.

Probably one of the most fun Sr's minutes I can recall.  I wish someone had a picture of Coach Mitch on Zach Hawes ridiculous throw down in the first half, utterly speechless.  Very few have left DeVos buzzing like that one.


Also a quick tidbit, Hope went from its worst turnover rate of the season 30% vs Olivet, to its best 14% vs Albion.

Reading an old message today reminds me I need a Thad Shymanski rec league update, is he dominating?

Derek Sanders 6-5 G  Brooklyn Columbia Central will attend Hope

Olivet has made a nice transformation from the team that played in DeVos back in December.  Their 66-52 win is not deserving of their efforts, they were better all night and should have won by 25+ couldn't make any 3's until mid 2nd half finally got a couple to open a gap.


Hope turned the ball over on 30% of their possessions tonight.  Then shot 22% in the 2nd half.  They will not be in Grand Rapids next Friday with another Wednesday effort like that.




MIAA Tournament
1. Calvin
2. Trine
----
3. Hope
4. Olivet
5/6  Adrian/Albion


Was told tonight Hope would win the tiebreaker over Olivet.

Albion would win a tiebreaker over Adrian




General league observation, if you asked me to make an all-star team of Sr's/Jr's vs Soph/Fr I might be inclined to take the Soph/Fr team.   Every program has some really nice looking young players.