MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[sac]

Twenty years ago, Tony Gugino plays for Hope.  20 years ago David Kool plays for Calvin.

Indeed, its a different era.

[Civic Minded]

Twenty years ago, Tony Gugino plays for Hope.  20 years ago David Kool plays for Calvin.

Indeed, its a different era.

Exactly.  I thought it was bad 6-7 years ago, but our current economic climate has made the situation measurably worse.  Time to face facts and adjust (our expectations), I'd say...

[Dark Knight]

Van Noord has roughly the same number of seats as the old gym.  (in fact I think its a couple dozen less)

The new arena is a little larger. This box score shows attendance of 4632. I think I've also seen 4700 though I didn't bother to dig through all the box scores to find it. The old arena had a nominal capacity of 4500 and that was the listed attendance when sold out, but I doubt that many were ever packed in there for a game, given a few no-shows.

[wiz]

Wizzy- how did I get thrown into this?  Other can commenting on poor interior defense (factual and spoken of by the coaching staff), I've been pretty upbeat and positive about Hope's team.  Haven't spread any "rumors" about players, injuries, off the court incidents, etc...If you're referring to my recent comments about Coach Hammer and his program, prove me wrong or go back and paste any recent comments that were overboard, uncalled for, or out of line. 

For the record, I don't drink, and hardly need any assistance getting a date. Besides, my better half would probably object to that.

Thank you for your response.  It was really good.

[almcguirejr]

The following is totally fake

Rumors of its existence have persisted for months, and on this cool morning across Lake Macatawa appears the sails of the legendary ship....The Flying Dutchmen.  As the ship pulls up to the docks the townspeople gather, strangely all dressed in orange and blue.  Over the past weeks ships had returned to port one by one, each more optimistic about their new crews than the last.  But the tiny port of Holland knew almost nothing of the fate of their beloved ship and crew.  Today...(or Tuesday) it had returned and its captain stepped to the dock.


Sac:  Who are you?
Capatin Neil: I'm Captain Neil   <hands on hips, proundly sticking out his chest>

It's a great honor for Matt Neil to have 2 sons in the Hope program.  I'm suggesting a marketing slogan of ....






wait for it...


The "Captain and 2Neil"   

[calvinite]

It has resulted in apathy of the program in the Calvin community as I'm sure anyone who is paying any attention will notice as alumni and students stay away in mass for all game other than Hope.  It has really been sad for this hoops watcher to witness.

I have to believe the attendance is down, but I have not taken the time to check this out. I do know, however, that in the past few years Calvin is far more stingy about handing out free passes. At one time, every HS and MS AD, ever CRC pastor and retired CRC pastor, every donor of moderate size and the like received free passes. I used to use some of these passes which were passed on to me. Several of those folks have told me that they don't get the passes any more. Given how many of these passes were 'passed' around, I have to believe this is at least a little bit of a factor in the (what I believe to be) decreased attendance at Calvin games.

[David Collinge]

So, what you're saying is that the time for the passing out of passes that got passed around has passed?

The "Captain and 2Neil"   

[Dark Knight]

Maybe we'd have better perceived depth if we could play the Nathcon, Midwest and SLIAC as often as the CCIW.

oh nevermind!

I think part of the problem is that there isn't much nationwide familiarity with the level of non-D3 basketball around West Michigan. Replace Hope's losses against Cornerstone, Davenport, and Grace Bible with UW-River Falls, Wooster, and VA Wesleyan -- all weaker teams, according to Massey -- and Hope would look a lot different in many eyes.

That bias toward familiar teams isn't going to change. It just means that strength of schedule is hard to estimate for people like d3hoops.com pollsters or even CICW coaches.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

I think, with the permission of esteemed commissioner FDF, we should include Massey's as a participant in our pick 'em league. He even includes confidence.

My guess is that he doesn't win, but does beat the group average by a fair amount.

Go for it.  Submit Massey's picks and we'll see how it?? performs against the vast knowledge of our regular pickers.

[KnightSlappy]

It has resulted in apathy of the program in the Calvin community as I'm sure anyone who is paying any attention will notice as alumni and students stay away in mass for all game other than Hope.  It has really been sad for this hoops watcher to witness.

Calvin Attendance

Year	Attend.	Games	AVG	w/o Hope Games
'01-02	37736	14	2695.4	2403.9
'02-03	22843	12	1903.6	1667.5
'03-04	26184	13	2014.2	1807.0
'04-05	23147	11	2104.3	1864.7
'05-06	29252	14	2089.4	1904.0
'06-07	24576	13	1890.5	1529.4
'07-08	17856	13	1373.5	1279.7
'08-09	31037	12	2586.4	2022.6
'09-10	36298	17	2135.2	1887.1
'10-11	2898	2	1449.0	1449.0
Total	251827	121	2081.2	1815.0

The last two (full) seasons have been less apathetic than the ten year average, buy maybe the real apathy began before the ten years.

There was a big dip between '01-02 and '02-03. I blame ziggy for that.

[sflzman]

Calvin's attendance looks worse because it plays in such a large arena (which is in part a testament to the fact they can fill it at least once a year , sorry, I had to do that) so the place may look empty even though the number in attendance is quite high as evidenced by Calvin's annual spot in the top 3 of attendance.

Van Noord has roughly the same number of seats as the old gym.  (in fact I think its a couple dozen less)

Don't even get started with this Blah Blah Blah about Calvin's arena looking empty...how do you think a 3031-seat arena in Alma looks when just over 400 show up???

[Happy Calvin Guy]

It has resulted in apathy of the program in the Calvin community as I'm sure anyone who is paying any attention will notice as alumni and students stay away in mass for all game other than Hope.  It has really been sad for this hoops watcher to witness.

Calvin Attendance

Year	Attend.	Games	AVG	w/o Hope Games
'01-02	37736	14	2695.4	2403.9
'02-03	22843	12	1903.6	1667.5
'03-04	26184	13	2014.2	1807.0
'04-05	23147	11	2104.3	1864.7
'05-06	29252	14	2089.4	1904.0
'06-07	24576	13	1890.5	1529.4
'07-08	17856	13	1373.5	1279.7
'08-09	31037	12	2586.4	2022.6
'09-10	36298	17	2135.2	1887.1
'10-11	2898	2	1449.0	1449.0
Total	251827	121	2081.2	1815.0

The last two (full) seasons have been less apathetic than the ten year average, buy maybe the real apathy began before the ten years.

There was a big dip between '01-02 and '02-03. I blame ziggy for that.

There was still a bit of the national championship euphoria left in '01-'02, and the new arena bump in '08-'09.  Other than that, last year was the best attendance year in the past decade.  I'd be interested to see what the attendance looked like in the decade of the 90's too to see if there are any long term trends.  I definitely feel a dropoff in student section support now vs 15-20 yrs ago.  I hate to admit it but the Dew Crew puts Calvin's student section to shame and it's not even close.   

[KnightSlappy]

There was still a bit of the national championship euphoria left in '01-'02, and the new arena bump in '08-'09.  Other than that, last year was the best attendance year in the past decade.  I'd be interested to see what the attendance looked like in the decade of the 90's too to see if there are any long term trends.  I definitely feel a dropoff in student section support now vs 15-20 yrs ago.  I hate to admit it but the Dew Crew puts Calvin's student section to shame and it's not even close.   

I think a lot of the students still show up, but they are very very quiet. Dew Crew definitely puts them to shame. No bones about that.

[realist]

When you look at the Calvin attendance figures one needs to factor in what was going on.  Attendance fell off once the old gym was shut down, and games moved to other sites.  Notice the drop of nearly 500/game in 07-08.  The next year the attendance spiked thanks to the "new arena", but that appears to have worn off.  I think some "fans" just got out of the habit of going to games, and for some others the closing of the circle drive, and the loss of close in parking spaces just made it more of a hassle to attend.  
IMHO winning some games early in the season would have a tremendous impact in fostering the idea it is worth one's time to go watch Calvin play.  By the time conference play begins most people have made the decision Calvin has a rather mediocre product offering.   For the kool-aid drinkers that means winning games early would fill the seats.  Until this, combined with beating Hope regularly, occurs whining about attendance is futile.  

[wiz]

There was still a bit of the national championship euphoria left in '01-'02, and the new arena bump in '08-'09.  Other than that, last year was the best attendance year in the past decade.  I'd be interested to see what the attendance looked like in the decade of the 90's too to see if there are any long term trends.  I definitely feel a dropoff in student section support now vs 15-20 yrs ago.  I hate to admit it but the Dew Crew puts Calvin's student section to shame and it's not even close.   

I think a lot of the students still show up, but they are very very quiet. Dew Crew definitely puts them to shame. No bones about that.

I was at the home opener this year and was surprised to see that the student section was nearly full.  Normally, Calvin studends don't start to show up untill after interim, February.  So, maybe we have a new trend being established.  With five freshmen on the varsity perhaps some new interest evolved with underclassmen.