MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[GoKnights68]

The Bill Sall era begins on a promising note with a win on the road at the Shirk Center.

Calvin 89
IWU 83

Derrick DeVries with 28 and 10 boards.
Thad Shymanski with 20 points
Alex Box with 18 points
Emmett Warners with 12 points

Titan Coach Ron Rose said DeVries posed a vexing match up problem for IWU, creating chaos for their defensive scheme.

Good night for Grand Rapids Christian graduates

[Jameswys]

Albion 72  Ohio Wesleyan 70  F

Jamzelle Davis hit a jumper with :01 to go for the margin.

Link found here:  http://athletics.capital.edu/sports/mbkb/mbb-webcast    Game is archived at bottom of screen, winning shot sequence at 1:46:00.  The announcers seem oblivious to anything happening on the court.

That dude is a clutch shooter.

Glad to see Albion got a win tonight after what had to be an emotional week for them.

[Jameswys]

Taken from the Olivet Athletics page, this is coach's thoughts on the game last night.


"Great Lakes Christian's length and athleticism really gave us fits on both ends tonight," said Sam Hargraves, who was in his debut as the Comets' head coach. "Not to take anything away from them, but if we would played with the same energy the entire game as we did in the last 15 minutes or so, we would be feeling a lot better right now. As we did in both of our exhibition games, we did not go away. We kept fighting. Tonight's game was a good thing to build on."

[realist]

Night and day difference for Calvin.  One can't help but note that the 5 guys that carried the load for Calvin last night were there all last year.
The only real change was at head coach.    you get the idea!

[ziggy]

Night and day difference for Calvin.  One can't help but note that the 5 guys that carried the load for Calvin last night were there all last year.
The only real change was at head coach.    you get the idea!

Certainly a difference in substituting players with Bos going the full 40 and three other starters playing 36. We'll see how sustainable that is but getting a season opening win at Illinois Wesleyan is not the time to worry about that.

[Grutte Dirk]

Glad to see Albion got a win tonight after what had to be an emotional week for them.

Agreed. Hard to imagine how these young men work through this.

[calvinite]

Night and day difference for Calvin.  One can't help but note that the 5 guys that carried the load for Calvin last night were there all last year.
The only real change was at head coach.    you get the idea!

The five guys carrying the load for Calvin may have all been there last year, but the guys carrying the load for IWU last year certainly weren't. Bonnet and Rose graduated after starting all 27 games for IWU last year. Gregoire also graduated last year after starting 26 of 27 games, and Baker started 1/2 of the games last year as a senior.  IWU not only lost the bulk of their team to graduation, but they are a very young team staring 2 juniors and 3 sophomores.

Nevertheless, I've been impressed with Calvin's offense. The defense and rebounding are still big questions for me.

[iwumichigander]

Calvinite has a good analysis of IWU with the starting five being role players or reliable backups.  The junior/sophomore talent is talented together with what seems to be a really good freshmen class.

Calvin got a solid win. There is some work to be done.  What impressed me - the lack of predictable offense/defense.

  What I mean by that - under your old coach you could anticipate what the team or he was going to do the  entire game but particularly the last five minutes of each half.

[HOPEful]

Still in November, and I already feel like my pre-season rankings have been shuffled significantly.

Albion's crushing 71-52 loss to Mount Union to start the season made me question them a little.
Calvin's impressive showings against IWU and Augustana has me thinking they're the team to beat this season.
Trine struggled through all three games they've played and Hope has been more impressive than I would have thought, in large part due to freshman Evan Thomas.

If I were to re-rank the top 4 today, I'd probably go...

1. Calvin
2. Hope
3. Albion
4. Trine

Looking like it should be a fun season.

[ziggy]

I'm still not sure what to make of Calvin for this season but I'm gaining in confidence after what is now a four game sample if you're willing to factor in the exhibitions. League results overall seem more encouraging overall compared to recent years.

[maroonandgold]

In the Calvin and MIAA schedule it lists the game between Calvin and Aquinas as being in "Grand Rapids ."  That is a bit general.  Is it at Cornerstone as the first game in Hall of Fame tournament?

[wiz]

Great start to the season for Calvin University's Derrick DeVries.
https://www.calvinknights.com/sports/mxc/2019-20/releases/20191118nrx9e6

[scottiedawg]

Massey Ratings of Olivet's next 5 opponents:
20
23
50
16
58

Very rough stretch.

Caveat: Masey Ratings move around A LOT this early in the year.

[Jameswys]

For those of you interested in such things, Mt. Union has a minor YouTube star (53k followers and a video with over half a million views) on their varsity team. His name is D'Vontay Friga. He posts a lot of D3 sports (MBB specifically) videos. I just found this out tonight while on YouTube and I figured I'd share since Mt. Union is playing both Adrian and Trine this weekend. He has said he is doing travel vlogs on the games this weekend.

[KnightSlappy]

Disgusting loss for Calvin at Anderson. Did not feel to me like the Ravens were the better team but Calvin allowed themselves to be taken out of the game and distracted by officiating when they simply could have taken care of business.