MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[Roughrider]

All is well in MIAA-land tonight.  Maybe I can chill out with some Hudsonville Ice Cream.   


RR

[HopeConvert]

I think FDF got tonight's game exactly right. To me, the best news was to see Tanis stroking the ball like he did last year. His shot was on, and if he can keep that up I think Hope becomes dangerous. One thing I like about Krombeen is the confidence with which he plays the point. I'm not sold on his shot, but I like his attitude. Carter I'm less sold on. He missed some defensive rotations and I thought struggled at the point. I'm not sure how much playing time he'll be seeing if he keeps this up. Osburn showed tremendous hustle. Overall, an encouraging performance.

I was riveted watching Davenport's Tyler Ybema during warm-ups. He was flushing behind the head two-handed dunks with ease, and getting about 2 feet off the floor on his jump shots. I figured he was going to be a handful. Imagine my surprise when he finished the game with five more fouls than points.

[Pat Coleman]

I learned a long time ago that everyone's name is important, and that I needed to do my homework to properly prepare for a broadcast. 

Good call. Couldn't agree more.

[sac]

Really?

Yes, really, Hope flew everywhere back in the day..........why do you think they call them the Flying Dutchmen, they used to be just Dutchmen.

Nice catch on the photo sac. It's good to see what the Hope coaching staff looked like before issuance of the blue blazers.

I would pay money to see the current Hope staff and team show up to any game wearing those outfits.

Which reminds me what a great treat it was to see the Traverse City St. Francis team all sitting watching the games Saturday in their matching blue blazer, khaki pants and yellow ties.  You just don't see that in high school much.

He even butchered some of the opponents names.  He repeatedly referred to Davenport's Matt Braczak as Barzak, and Kaha Urigashvili (listed as coming from Moscow, Russia) as simply KU, and just laughed it off, totally disrespecting this young man's name. 

Those guys are what they are, nothing more you can say about them.   The guest announcer I think (way not positive) was the gentlemen who did play-by-play on the FM station that used to cover Hope as well as WHTC back when they still felt Hope athletics fit their format (whatever that meant).

As for the Barczak calls, in their defense its Barczak on the Davenport website, it was listed as Brazak on the live stats board, and I assume they were using the roster handed to them which probably came from the Davenport website.

http://dupanthers.cstv.com/sports/m-baskbl/mtt/dave-m-baskbl-mtt.html

One thing I like about Krombeen is the confidence with which he plays the point. I'm not sold on his shot, but I like his attitude. Carter I'm less sold on. He missed some defensive rotations and I thought struggled at the point. I'm not sure how much playing time he'll be seeing if he keeps this up.

PG is all about taking care of the ball. Through tonight 
Krombeen:  21 assists, 9 turnovers. 
Carter:  8 assists 10 turnovers.
Bunn:  25 assists 24 turnovers
Bosch:  9 assists 2 turnovers

I realize Bunn hasn't played point the whole time, but if Carters' minutes start diminishing in favor of Bosch............the answers clear as to why.  And its also pretty clear why Krombeen was moved to point in favor over Bunn.

All is well in MIAA-land tonight.  Maybe I can chill out with some Hudsonville Ice Cream.  

Holy crud, the league went 4-0 tonight

Calvin 91, Geneva, Pa. 65
Albion 89, Aurora, Ill. 80
Trine 71, St. Joseph's-Brooklyn, N.Y. 55
Hope 94, Davenport 61

Trine wins the Tournament of Heroes on Staten Island.

on Tuesday
Albion will play for the Cactus Jam Championship vs UW-Superior
Hope plays for the Russ DeVette Classic Championship vs Judson
Calvin plays for the Purple and Gold Financial Championship vs surprising Rockford
Olivet plays Northwood

[Gregory Sager]

He even butchered some of the opponents names.  He repeatedly referred to Davenport's Matt Braczak as Barzak, and Kaha Urigashvili (listed as coming from Moscow, Russia) as simply KU, and just laughed it off, totally disrespecting this young man's name. 

Those guys are what they are, nothing more you can say about them.   The guest announcer I think (way not positive) was the gentlemen who did play-by-play on the FM station that used to cover Hope as well as WHTC back when they still felt Hope athletics fit their format (whatever that meant).

As for the Barczak calls, in their defense its Barczak on the Davenport website, it was listed as Brazak on the live stats board, and I assume they were using the roster handed to them which probably came from the Davenport website.

I'm with Roughrider and Pat on this one. It doesn't take a whole lot of work for an announcer or broadcaster to walk up to one of the coaches before the game and politely ask him how to pronounce some of the more problematic names on the roster. It's part of the pregame preparation for any good college sports announcer or broadcaster. There's no excuse for not only butchering the names, but laughing it off on the air while doing so.

[sac]

Lets not make mountains out of mole hills Greg, 

The point I was making was the announcers were pronouncing Barczak correctly on the air........if you were following the live stats it was misspelled as Braczak, easy to think they were mispronouncing that, RR is incorrect in this instance.

As far as laughing off pronouncing someone's name, if you heard the broadcast (which I seriously doubt) its so amazingly minor its really not worth mentioning.  Might have taken up about 10 seconds of air time and was hardly demeaning.  This is D3, not the NBA, these are every day people who enjoy broadcasting D3 athletics because they want to, not because they get paid gobs of money to be perfect.............and Greg how do you know they didn't ask how to pronounce those names and still couldn't get it right?  You don't! 

That conversation would have taken place almost 2 hours before their names came up in the action.  The player in question was a reserve who played all of 6 minutes, most in the waning seconds.



I do agree with RR that the crew needs to work on pronunciation of their own teams players (Krombeen and Osburn), but to be honest I've never heard these two kids pronounce their names for me, so for all I know they're doing it correctly and the way I would pronounce them is wrong.

I had an aquintance in college who's name was VanVliet, it was pronounced VanFleet..........that Greg, is the Dutch.

[goodknight]

I had an aquintance in college who's name was VanVliet, it was pronounced VanFleet..........that Greg, is the Dutch.

Actually, sac, that's the Hope College Dutch.
The real Dutch would pronounce that name FunFleet, which sounds like a competitor to the Carnival Cruise Line. 

[gohope]

I had an aquintance in college who's name was VanVliet, it was pronounced VanFleet..........that Greg, is the Dutch.

Actually, sac, that's the Hope College Dutch.
The real Dutch would pronounce that name FunFleet, which sounds like a competitor to the Carnival Cruise Line. 

And for us Michiganders one of my favorite moments had to be the announcers during March Madness a few years ago try to pronounce MSU player Matt Stegenga's name!  Many of them went with Steh-ging-ga. All I wanted to do was quickly ship them some Hudsonville Ice Cream or some Dutch Rusk so that they might get a little "Dutch" in them!!  But I was pretty sure they still wouldn't get it!! 

Glad to hear about the Dutchmen's good game last evening. I had to stay home for some extended family holiday festivities!! (as FDF stated, related to the rain, sleet, snow, hail, winds - you'd think that if mail carriers could get through it, so could family members!!)

Go Hope!

[wiz]

I learned a long time ago that everyone's name is important, and that I needed to do my homework to properly prepare for a broadcast. 

Good call. Couldn't agree more.

You guys are right on.  Respect for people's names has no boundaries.  Whether it is division I, II, or III or whether the announcers are paid or volunteers, student-athletes deserve the respect of their names being pronounced properly.  Just as we would expect the officials to know the rules before they officiate a game, we would expect an announcer to knwo the names.  That's their job.  And, on that note, it is also not an announcers job to belittle a player's performance as Doug Wentworth did again last night.

[section7]

I'll add my two cents to the WHTC announcers (Ron Wetherbee and Jerry Klomparens) -

My favorite for Wetherbee was in 2007 during the Hope baseball regionals versus Wooster (note: Hope upset the #1 team in the nation at the time), WHTC was doing a Hope baseball game for the 1st time in ages and Wetherbee was doing the game by himself.  Hope had a 2B, who was one of their best players and I believe a multi-time all-MIAA player and batting title champion, named Mike Vandervelde.  For the first four innings, Wetherbee called him Mike VanderHeide.  Guess he was still thinking about the deep run the Flying Dutchmen and Marcus VanderHeide had had in the NCAA basketball tourney.  I got so disgusted after the 9th or 10th time of the error, I called WHTC myself and told them to have Wetherbee correct it.  Guess they did, because Mike Vandervelde singled his next time up.

I agree time for a new team, we ridded ourselves of Greg Chandler last year, let's hope for a new tandem in 2009

He even butchered some of the opponents names.  He repeatedly referred to Davenport's Matt Braczak as Barzak, and Kaha Urigashvili (listed as coming from Moscow, Russia) as simply KU, and just laughed it off, totally disrespecting this young man's name. 

Those guys are what they are, nothing more you can say about them.   The guest announcer I think (way not positive) was the gentlemen who did play-by-play on the FM station that used to cover Hope as well as WHTC back when they still felt Hope athletics fit their format (whatever that meant).

As for the Barczak calls, in their defense its Barczak on the Davenport website, it was listed as Brazak on the live stats board, and I assume they were using the roster handed to them which probably came from the Davenport website.

I'm with Roughrider and Pat on this one. It doesn't take a whole lot of work for an announcer or broadcaster to walk up to one of the coaches before the game and politely ask him how to pronounce some of the more problematic names on the roster. It's part of the pregame preparation for any good college sports announcer or broadcaster. There's no excuse for not only butchering the names, but laughing it off on the air while doing so.

[Roughrider]

The point I was making was the announcers were pronouncing Barczak correctly on the air........if you were following the live stats it was misspelled as Braczak, easy to think they were mispronouncing that, RR is incorrect in this instance.

Sac, thanks for pointing out my error, and the source of the problem.  I stand corrected on the spelling and pronunciation of Matt Barczak's name.  Shame on me for trusting Live Stats for accuracy.   

And while I'm at it, I publicly apologize for mis-spelling Ron Weatherbee's name in my initial post.  Shows even RR is not perfect in living up to the lofty standards he espouses.  But when he's wrong, he'll admit it.   

As far as laughing off pronouncing someone's name, if you heard the broadcast (which I seriously doubt) its so amazingly minor its really not worth mentioning.  Might have taken up about 10 seconds of air time and was hardly demeaning.

My point was not that it was really demeaning, just disrespectful, and unprofessional, regardless of how little air time was devoted to it.  I stand by my original point here.

I do agree with RR that the crew needs to work on pronunciation of their own teams players (Krombeen and Osburn), but to be honest I've never heard these two kids pronounce their names for me, so for all I know they're doing it correctly and the way I would pronounce them is wrong.

I've heard the pronunciation of the names of these Dutchmen personally from several on the coaching staff.  I trust their knowledge of the subject.


RR

[northb]

I learned a long time ago that everyone's name is important, and that I needed to do my homework to properly prepare for a broadcast. 

Good call. Couldn't agree more.

You guys are right on.  Respect for people's names has no boundaries.  Whether it is division I, II, or III or whether the announcers are paid or volunteers, student-athletes deserve the respect of their names being pronounced properly.  Just as we would expect the officials to know the rules before they officiate a game, we would expect an announcer to knwo the names.  That's their job.  And, on that note, it is also not an announcers job to belittle a player's performance as Doug Wentworth did again last night.

What did ol' Dougie-fresh say?

[wiz]

I learned a long time ago that everyone's name is important, and that I needed to do my homework to properly prepare for a broadcast. 

Good call. Couldn't agree more.

You guys are right on.  Respect for people's names has no boundaries.  Whether it is division I, II, or III or whether the announcers are paid or volunteers, student-athletes deserve the respect of their names being pronounced properly.  Just as we would expect the officials to know the rules before they officiate a game, we would expect an announcer to knwo the names.  That's their job.  And, on that note, it is also not an announcers job to belittle a player's performance as Doug Wentworth did again last night.

What did ol' Dougie-fresh say?

I won't repeat it because it was demeaning to the player.  But, it was along the lines of previous year's comments when he would say such things as "(player's name) couldn't throw the ball into the ocean" or "(player's name) has hands of steel, he can't catch anything".  He also took a shot at the scorekeepers last night saying they had the rookie crew because they didn't have enough points on the scoreboard after Dustin Smith's apparent 3 pointer.  Then a few minutes later he admitted it may have been a 2 pointer.  It's just a theory but as we're having difficulty with West Michigan announcers, is it possible there is something in that Hudsonville Ice Cream that could be causing these slurs?  I've been told that both Moose Trax and Peppermint can cause some debiliation.  Just a thought.

[OC_SID]

On the subject of names, a head coach or an assistant coach may not even know the correct way to say a student-athlete's name ... I won't say the coach, athlete or sport for Olivet, but a coach told me the way to say an athlete's name, so I assumed that was the way ... The day that we did Senior Night stuff, the athlete came up and asked me to correctly announce his last name. I told him his coach was the one that had given me the incorrect way.

[hoopdreams]

back in the day, when I felt necessary to do everything possible to impress the "important people"- principal, super, etc... I took on the task of announcing some games.  There was ALWAYS a challenging dutch, polish, sweedish, you get the picture.  Made the mistake of asking the opponents official scorekeeper.  Made the mistake of asking an assistant or even the head coach.  One would think they would know their own players names. After being called out by a parent, during the game, I vowed to go directly to the player in question, and only him/her.  Ask them multiple times if needed.  Not only is it slightly disrespectful to the player (although I personally could have cared less if it were me, there are more important things to be focusing on), but it displays a lack of professionalism.  As my dad always used to say "go the extra mile".

As well as hope played, I was extremely dissappointed by Davenport.  Their best player was injured, but they displayed little fire, which had to have been frustrating for Coach Paddock because he is such a competitive person.  I'm a big fan of his. 

Rebounding and keeping out of foul trouble will be the 2 keys to success for Hope tonight.