MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[Flying Dutch Fan]

A couple thoughts on Hope's win at UW Platteville on Saturday:

- TJ McKenzie Jr in the starting lineup and proving he belongs there.  Great game by TJ with 23 & 6 and shooting 5-12 from 3 (he's now at 14-30 this season).  That coupled with his typical out-hustle everyone attitude was huge for the Dutchmen!
- Hope's 2nd half D was impressive.  UWP shot 48% from the floor & 46% from 3 in the first half.  Hope held them to 25% from the floor & 13% from 3 in the second. 
- Really love some good, clutch FT shooting.  Hope was 14-16 from the line, inclduing 4 big makes late (2 by Quillan and 2 by Wourman) to seal the win.   
- Gotta be happy going 3-1 versus the WIAC (2-0 in Wisconsin) for this team.

[HOPEful]

A couple thoughts on Hope's win at UW Platteville on Saturday:

- TJ McKenzie Jr in the starting lineup and proving he belongs there.  Great game by TJ with 23 & 6 and shooting 5-12 from 3 (he's now at 14-30 this season).  That coupled with his typical out-hustle everyone attitude was huge for the Dutchmen!
- Hope's 2nd half D was impressive.  UWP shot 48% from the floor & 46% from 3 in the first half.  Hope held them to 25% from the floor & 13% from 3 in the second. 
- Really love some good, clutch FT shooting.  Hope was 14-16 from the line, inclduing 4 big makes late (2 by Quillan and 2 by Wourman) to seal the win.   
- Gotta be happy going 3-1 versus the WIAC (2-0 in Wisconsin) for this team.

Saturday was my wife's birthday and we had plans that involved things other than livestreaming Hope. In other words, this was the first Hope game this season I missed entirely. I was very happy to see TJ's stat line and the final score. I optimistically wonder if Hope's offensive identity will actually be better when Evan comes back than it would have been without his injury. A game in which Clayton, Marcus, TJ, Evan, Tanner, and Gabe are all in sync offensively would be a spectacle for sure. That team would be extremely hard to beat.

[TUAngola]

Trine is picking up an Alma transfer for 2023/24, Cole Mieske a 5'10 G, Corunna MI.  Played his freshman year in 2021/22 but only got into 15 games and averaged 1 point a game.  I believe he did not play basketball for Alma this season and will be transferring in January/second semester to Trine.   

[HOPEful]

Conference play will not be helping Hope, Calvin, and Trine's SOS this year. Olivet losing at Defiance last night just further distanced the gap between the top three and the bottom five. According to Massey, Calvin, Trine, and Hope are sitting at 15, 29, and 38 respectively. Everyone else is over 200...

[ziggy]

Conference play will not be helping Hope, Calvin, and Trine's SOS this year. Olivet losing at Defiance last night just further distanced the gap between the top three and the bottom five. According to Massey, Calvin, Trine, and Hope are sitting at 15, 29, and 38 respectively. Everyone else is over 200...

The league was already a donut last year and it's just growing this year. Anyone have insight into what is going on with Albion? They have played a decent schedule but not overly difficult. Big disappointment for them to be sitting at 1-6 right now.

Edit: Maybe there is a frog in the pot scenario going on with Albion and I just now noticed. Looking back, this looks like year four of a downward trend...

[sac]

Admittedly have not watched much of Albion or anyone this year but the Britons typically play tight games regardless of opponent and that goes way back into the Mike Turner days.  In most years they're able to keep their record around .500 in those games, throw in 2 or 3 gimme wins and head into conference play with 6, 7 or 8 wins.  So far this year they've been in 5 games that you would say "came down to the wire" and they've lost all 5 and got their gimme with Muskingum who is truly bad.   Heidelberg was to much for them, which may or may not be viewed as a warning sign against top level competition.

This weekend they get Mt. St. Joseph and Lawrence, two teams that are 2-6 and 4-5 and they should typically handle, but both games will likely be tight and come down the final 10 minutes and finish as toss-ups.  Despite the mediocre records both have a better win and similar or better results against like opponents.   After Christmas they get Wooster and Carnegie-Mellon, two teams that thus far have been much better than Albion.  Then its right into conference play with Calvin, Trine and Hope in the first two weeks.  Could be rough.


Looking at the roster, Albion lost 4 starters from a team that relied pretty heavily on its starting 5 for scoring last year.  And those 4 guys were all big parts of their last 3 or 4 years of successful teams.   The bench seems pretty unsettled with quite a few missed games which can be injury, illness or coaches decision.

Here's the weird part, statistically they're a little better than last year and have managed to outshoot their opponents on the season.   But they're giving up 5+ more 3's per game and shooting under 65% at the FT stripe.  Two small differences that make a big difference when every game is close.

[TUAngola]

Albion and Trine with 2 games each this weekend in Angola at the St. Andrews Products Classic.  Albion kicks off schedule at 7pm tonight against MSJ.  Tomorrow has Trine against MSJ at 2pm then Albion against Lawrence at 4pm.  Tournament concludes on Sunday with Trine against Lawrence at 2pm.

[Greek Tragedy]

Aside from Hope and Calvin, I'll probably keep an eye on Trine. Point beat them and then Trine upset La Crosse, so in terms of SOS, Regionally Ranked Opponents and Pool C, I'll be cheering for Trine. It's way too early, but could the MIAA be in line for 3 bids? Probably not in their region, unfortunately.

[sac]

Hope 76 Wittenberg 65  F
Albion 70 Mt. St. Joseph 57 F

[TUAngola]

I caught the Albion game against MSJ last night at the MTI Center.  Albion with a comfortable win 70-57.  Brits led by 20 with a few minutes to go in the first half and then held serve the rest of the way.  MSJ did cut the lead down to 5 midway through the second half but Albion quickly jumped the lead back out.  Don't count the Brits out in the MIAA, Garland and Thomas are very good and they have a couple good bench guys in Mayes and Willems who are both freshmen.

Before I headed over to the game last night I watched some of Hope's game against Wittenberg on video.  If you can find a link, see if you can search for TJ McKenzie's dunk in the first half.  It was one of those 'oh no he didn't' type dunks in which he rose up over a Witt player and slammed it in his face.  TJ did stare down the poor Witt guy on the floor after the dunk which rightfully drew a technical foul, but I can't blame him.

[maroonandgold]

Hope 76 Wittenberg 65  F
Albion 70 Mt. St. Joseph 57 F

What really impresses me is how well Hope is playing without their top scorer.  They will really be tough in league games at full strength!  Their big guy has really developed into a scorer.

[sac]

Manchester 90 Hope 79  F

Hard to win games when you turn it over more than twice almost three times as much as your opponents.   

Manchester started the year 0-4 with 3 of those losses to Trine, Kzoo and Adrian.  They've now won 5 in row.


Trine 65  Mt. St. Joseph 48  F


Bluffton 63  Kalamazoo 62 F


Albion 68 Lawrence 60  F

[TUAngola]

Trine wins their first game of two this weekend over MSJ 65-48.  The final score doesn't reflect that it was a close for 3/4ths of the game.  MSJ definitely played better as a team today than last night against Albion.  They were hitting their 3 pointers.  Nate Carbaugh was huge for us when we needed it.  We had a 1 point lead with 10 minutes to go and he had a conventional bucket and a 3pointer that put us up 6 that gave us a big momentum boost as MSJ had us on our heels.  Then we pulled away from there.  It was nice to get our full complement of players back as Awls and Preston gave us some good minutes even though you won't see it in the box score.

Trine: Cox 16, Megnanglo 13, Smylie 11, Jones 10, Carbaugh 10   

[TUAngola]

Trine finishes up the St. Andrews Products Classic with a 71-56 win over Lawrence.  Similar script to yesterday's game.  Close game most of the way and then Grant Pahl hits a couple big 3's in latter part of the second half to stretch the lead out.  Grant with by far the best game of his career, finishing with 3 triples and 15 pts.  Connor Jones also had a good shooting night with 4 triples on the way to a career best 24 points.  Our bigs, Cox and Megnanglo, had their struggles today as Lawrence has some really strong guys inside and when they did catch the ball on the block Lawrence would instantly double and triple team them.  We seemed to lack the 'juice' we normally have today, small crowd and no students led to a very quiet MTI Center.  Cox did finish with 16 but on only 5-15 shooting. One more game at BW on the 29th and then the MIAA grind begins in January.

[KnightSlappy]

Calvin handles Augsburg easily, 75-52. Defense was quite good and the offense was maybe only so-so, although much more balanced than has been typical.

Overway game high 14
Varnado 11
Ambrose 10
Egekeze a double-double with 10 pts and 11 rebs

Hopefully they weren't taxed too much and can show up fresh for tomorrow when they get the winner of Wooster-Emerson.