MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[Gregory Sager]

Last night's attendance of 3,986 is larger than any home game for Western Michigan this season.

It was also the largest attendance for any game @Calvin in over five years, not to mention any home game @Hope ever.

It's nice of Hope to help you get close to 80% capacity once every 5 years.

I love this. The Rivalry never returns to the back burner until tipoff of the next MIAA game day.

[almcguirejr]

Last night's attendance of 3,986 is larger than any home game for Western Michigan this season.

It was also the largest attendance for any game @Calvin in over five years, not to mention any home game @Hope ever.

In 2019, a high school quarterfinal game between Unity Christian and South Christian had a crowd of over 4500.

[sac]

Last night's attendance of 3,986 is larger than any home game for Western Michigan this season.

It was also the largest attendance for any game @Calvin in over five years, not to mention any home game @Hope ever.

In 2019, a high school quarterfinal game between Unity Christian and South Christian had a crowd of over 4500.

That could happen this year to, or something similar.  You seem destined to get a  South Christian/GR Christian/Catholic Central/Benton Harbor QF this year in Div 2.   South Christian is the QF host, that will almost certainly get moved to Calvin if the gym is available.

[FyteOnne]

Olivet has clinched the #4 seed in the MIAA Tournament. I believe Alma has been eliminated.

Adrian, Albion, and Kalamazoo are all still alive and all in contention for the #5 seed.

Tiebreaker stuff:
Albion, Kalamazoo, and Adrian all split.
Adrian is 2-0 vs. Alma.
Adrian has not beaten any of the top 4.
Albion's win over Hope is good unless Kalamazoo also gets a win over Hope in which case Kalamazoo's win over Olivet is good.

Did I sit in the hallway of the Cutler Center on Wednesday night watching the livestats for Adrian vs. Alma trying to go through these scenarios?  Yes, I did.  Glad to see I was at least close.

Go Brits!

That's the spirit!  As always, Go Brits!

[TUAngola]

Trine 86 Adrian 48

Trine raced out to a 30-2 lead with suffocating defense that had Adrian either turning the ball over or forcing heavily contested shots.  Score was tied at 2-2 with Trine scoring the next 28.  It was nice to see Trine shooting well in the 1st half, shot at a 70% clip.  It it wasn't for 5'5" Jonathan Duvall's 11 points in the 1st half Adrian would not have even broken double digits.  Second half wasn't as intense with Trine going deep into their bench.  Just a great effort by the Thunder to wrap up a terrific 12-2 MIAA slate and 22-3 overall record.  Seniors Brent Cox, Connor Jones and Nate Carbaugh playing their final regular season game at MTI.  They all had terrific years.  Especially proud of Nate who didn't get much playing time until this year, he just works so hard, one of those glue guys you need on your roster.  Unfortunately for Trine they aren't in the top 7 regionally ranked teams in Region 7 so getting a Pool C bid is doubtful.  They really deserve a bid, it would be their first as an NCAA team.  Gonna have to find a way to win the conference tournament to get in.

Trine:  Cox 26, Jones 12, Pahl 10
Adrian:  Duvall 11 

[oldknight]

Calvin wraps up a 13-1 regular season championship with a 77-58 win at Albion. Knights shot the rock very well the opening half while Albion was sloppy (13 turnovers the opening 20 minutes) leading to a 46-25 Calvin lead the opening frame. The second half was unremarkable with both squads just waiting for the final horn. Ressler led Calvin with 20, going 8-8 from the floor and 1-1 at the stripe. Overway and Bult added 15 and 12. Thomas led the Brits with 16.

[almcguirejr]

The Albion play by play guy said that Albion would be at Hope on Wednesday. Is that correct?

[sac]

The Albion play by play guy said that Albion would be at Hope on Wednesday. Is that correct?

Not if they do tiebreakers correctly.  But we didn't last year. So idk.

Albion/Adrian split, next tie-breaker should be go down the standings.  Albion and Adrian did not beat Calvin or Trine.  Albion beat Hope, Adrian did not so Albion should get #5 seed.

But last year we broke a 3-way tie using the standings going bottom up and not rewarding the team with the best win, if that happened Adrian gets #5 by beating Kzoo twice, Albion beat Kzo once.

[sac]

Hope 77 Kzoo 62  F

Kzoo put up a good fight in Holland today.  Good start from Hope saw them lead 17-5 including a 14-0 run, around 8 minutes of no K fg's.  Then the Hornets started chipping away.  Josh Decker finally got loose a few times and by halftime K was within 5 at 34-29.  Strong second half start by K brought it down to 2, that was as close as the Hornets would get.  But Hope sort of pulled away gradually.

With about 10 min to go the margin was 5, a building momentum swing to K's side and I fully expected Kzoo to really battle right to the end but Hope had other ideas and kind of shut the Hornets down for the remainder of the game.   Justice Mims came up with some big plays, a nice bucket followed by a pair of FT's pushed Hope up 9, Decker answered with a 3 and again it felt like Kzoo had a chance then Mims hit an answering 3, on the next few successive possession Hope came up with big defensive steals from Dykhouse each leading to beautiful fast break dunks one by Thomas one by Schoonveld.  By 2 min to play Hope had run out to a 17 point lead.  Inside that little run were a couple more steals and blocks.  A really nice stretch of good defense to shut the door.


Hope:  Thomas 14, Mims 12, Quillan 11
Kzoo:  Decker 17, Horky 16, Broadsword 11


Hope will be home Wednesday night (I think to face Adrian), I'm told all tickets will be through hometown ticket for the entire tournament.  There will be plenty of good seats available.

I was also told both semi-final games will be at Calvin, I am however skeptical of this.

[sac]

I believe Josh Decker broke Kalamazoo's single season 3-point record this week.  He has 75, old record 69 by Mark Ghafari in 2013

The career record is 210 by Dirk Rhinehart and Decker already has 138 with two years left.  I don't know the MIAA record for total or league games but he's going to be close to setting it if he stays healthy.

[Dutchfan]

I believe Josh Decker broke Kalamazoo's single season 3-point record this week.  He has 75, old record 69 by Mark Ghafari in 2013

The career record is 210 by Dirk Rhinehart and Decker already has 138 with two years left.  I don't know the MIAA record for total or league games but he's going to be close to setting it if he stays healthy.

I believe the record for 3-pointers in a single season in MIAA games is 56, set last year by Bryce Williams of Trine. He holds the record for 3-pointers per game in league play in a season at 4.0 and it shows him having 56 of them in league games last year.

Josh Decker has 44 3-pointers in league games this year.

[almcguirejr]

Here's the link to the men's MIAA tournament schedule:

https://www.miaa.org/sports/mbkb/2022-23/releases/TournamentCentral

[HOPEful]

I am just not a fan of going back to one site for the semis. Trine is the co-champion on the women's side and finished 2 games over Hope on the men's side. They shouldn't have to travel to Hope and Calvin respectively to play neutral games against likely Calvin and Hope.

At least this season the host school isn't the same for both men and women. 1:30 and 3:30 Friday semis on a neutral court are poorly attended and a horrible way to showcase your #2 and #3 teams. Even still, I'd prefer to see Trine hosting those semi-final games. Those should be electric, playoff atmospheres and they just won't be at Van Noord and DeVos.

[TUAngola]

I am just not a fan of going back to one site for the semis. Trine is the co-champion on the women's side and finished 2 games over Hope on the men's side. They shouldn't have to travel to Hope and Calvin respectively to play neutral games against likely Calvin and Hope.

At least this season the host school isn't the same for both men and women. 1:30 and 3:30 Friday semis on a neutral court are poorly attended and a horrible way to showcase your #2 and #3 teams. Even still, I'd prefer to see Trine hosting those semi-final games. Those should be electric, playoff atmospheres and they just won't be at Van Noord and DeVos.

Agreed!!  I had already assumed both WBB & MBB semi final games were going to be played at Trine.  Didn't realize the schedule change until yesterday.  Assuming Hope MBB and Calvin WBB both win their quarterfinal games, it's a real advantage for Hope to take a short drive to Van Noord for the semi's and Calvin to take the short drive to DeVos for the semi's over Trine having to travel 2+ hours.  Yes, you are playing one less game than your opponent, but I'm not sure that really matters at this time of year.  Even that one year in 2019 when Trine hosted the semi's for both WBB and MBB it wasn't fair to the fans of the other teams to play in a nearly empty neutral court gym.   

[Flying Dutch Fan]

I am just not a fan of going back to one site for the semis. Trine is the co-champion on the women's side and finished 2 games over Hope on the men's side. They shouldn't have to travel to Hope and Calvin respectively to play neutral games against likely Calvin and Hope.

At least this season the host school isn't the same for both men and women. 1:30 and 3:30 Friday semis on a neutral court are poorly attended and a horrible way to showcase your #2 and #3 teams. Even still, I'd prefer to see Trine hosting those semi-final games. Those should be electric, playoff atmospheres and they just won't be at Van Noord and DeVos.

Agreed!!  I had already assumed both WBB & MBB semi final games were going to be played at Trine.  Didn't realize the schedule change until yesterday.  Assuming Hope MBB and Calvin WBB both win their quarterfinal games, it's a real advantage for Hope to take a short drive to Van Noord for the semi's and Calvin to take the short drive to DeVos for the semi's over Trine having to travel 2+ hours.  Yes, you are playing one less game than your opponent, but I'm not sure that really matters at this time of year.  Even that one year in 2019 when Trine hosted the semi's for both WBB and MBB it wasn't fair to the fans of the other teams to play in a nearly empty neutral court gym.   

Posted this reply on the women's board - sharing here as well:

Respectfully, but COMPLETELY disagree.  The semi's and final in a single location literally prepares the winning team (or teams if a Pool C selections happen) for the NCAA tournament.  It's also a great atmosphere for the games to be back to back - there is more energy and excitement, for both the fans and the players.  Playing individual games at seperate locations just feels like an extension of the league season - which at this point the players are ready to be done with.

I also think the impact on attendance is not as you might be expecting:

WOMENS
Last season the semi's were hosted as you prefer.  Hope hosted Calvin, and Trine hosted Alma.  Hope had 1650 attend, Trine had 638.

In the 19-20 season (last time the semi's were hosted at a single location), Hope hosted - Trine vs Albion followed by Hope vs Calvin.  The Trine/Albion game had an attendance of 650 - while Trine's avg home attendance that season was 330.    The Hope/Calvin game had 2079 attend - while Hope's avg attendance was 1038.

MENS
Last season at separate locations for the semis.  Hope hosted Albion and Calvin hosted Trine.  Hope had 1684 attend (home avg Hope=1906), Calvin had 553 (home avg Calvin=865).

19-20 (semis both @ Albion) - Adrian/Calvin had 254 attend (home avg Calvin=1467), Trine/Albion had 607 (home avg Albion=624).  Not great for Calvin.
18-19 (semis both @ Trine) -Olivet/Albion had 353 attend (home avg Albion=311), Calvin/Trine had 1133(home avg Trine=428).