MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[devossed]

all hope kids mentioned are in...except montana, who decided to remain enrolled there and didn't arrive on campus as expected.

[realist]

Took a tour of the new facilities at Calvin last week.  Very nice.

How is the new laundry room?

According to the information I have Calvin's  laundry facilities are not being replaced or moved per the master plan.   Some fall sport athletes are on campus already, but most of Calvin's students don't come until next week.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

all hope kids mentioned are in...except montana, who decided to remain enrolled there and didn't arrive on campus as expected.

Thanks for that update. 

I guess I can go back home now which is great, beacuse the bugs were really starting to bite back behind those bushes   

[hoopdreams]

I just noticed that Hope's additional game was added to their schedule.  Nov.20 against Indiana-South Bend.  If memory serves correct, they are an NAIA program

[sac]

I just noticed that Hope's additional game was added to their schedule.  Nov.20 against Indiana-South Bend.  If memory serves correct, they are an NAIA program

They are NAIA I, as opposed to AQ and C'stone who are NAIA II, slightly higher level.  They play in the Chicagoland Athletic conference and went 17-16 last season.

Some curious wins, and curious losses from last season.  http://www.iusb.edu/~sbathlet/mbbsched.shtml

12 underclassman a year ago, including 9 Freshman.  They call their gym SAC, which can't be half bad.

I wouldn't call this the easiest opener for a team that will need name tags for a few practices.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

So much for playing a DI school, but at least CM will be happy to have the season opener for a birthday present.

IUSB is indeed NAIA, and in the same conference (CCAC) as 3 other Hope opponents:

Trinity Christian on Nov 22
Purdue N Central (potentially on Dec 13 in the Holland Sentinel Tournament)
Judson (potentially on Dec 30 in the Russ DeVette Tournament)

[sac]

IUSB is indeed NAIA, and in the same conference (CCAC) as 3 other Hope opponents:

Trinity Christian on Nov 22
Purdue N Central (potentially on Dec 13 in the Holland Sentinel Tournament)
Judson (potentially on Dec 30 in the Russ DeVette Tournament)

Kind of.......

.....different divisions, and would only get 1 crack at IUSB a season, and those games don't count towards the final conference standings I guess.


Last time Hope played a team from the CCAC  was 2000 when they lost at home to St. Xavier, who I'd put in my top 10 opponents to come to Holland and kick tail list.

[Civic Minded]

I just noticed that Hope's additional game was added to their schedule.  Nov.20 against Indiana-South Bend.  If memory serves correct, they are an NAIA program

Happy Birthday to me, cha-cha-cha...   No better present than a Hope basketball game!  Get one a day after our anniversary and on Valentine's Day too.  FDF won't have to shop at all this year. 

[Titan Q]

IUSB is indeed NAIA, and in the same conference (CCAC) as 3 other Hope opponents:

Trinity Christian on Nov 22
Purdue N Central (potentially on Dec 13 in the Holland Sentinel Tournament)
Judson (potentially on Dec 30 in the Russ DeVette Tournament)

Kind of.......

.....different divisions, and would only get 1 crack at IUSB a season, and those games don't count towards the final conference standings I guess.


Last time Hope played a team from the CCAC  was 2000 when they lost at home to St. Xavier, who I'd put in my top 10 opponents to come to Holland and kick tail list.

Generally in the CCAC Division I, Robert Morris (Chicago) is a consistent national powerhouse (top 5 NAIA D1 team) and St. Xavier and Olivet Nazarene are perennial Top 25 teams.  Robert Morris would typically be favored over the best NCAA D3 team while SXU and ONU are usually on par with the CCIW's title contenders.  IWU has played ONU every year for the last 17 or 18 seasons and has played SXU 3 times in the last 7 years, so I'm pretty familiar with these two.  Most seasons, the other 3 teams (IIT, Indiana - South Bend, and St. Francis) are not competitive with a Top 25 D3 team as far as I know.

The Division II side of the CCAC is a mixed bag, but generally its best teams are not anywhere near St. Xavier and Olivet Nazarene (and certainly not in the ballpark with Robert Morris).  I will say though that Trinity Christian is working hard to build a good program.  This year, the Trolls landed a 6-7 kid from Macomb, IL (Matt Buren) who was recruited very hard by some CCIW schools, including regular contender Elmhurst.  And every now and then, Trinity Christian lands a kid Hope and Calvin wanted...like Kevin Koeman ('02), who was really a stud.

[goodknight]

Took a tour of the new facilities at Calvin last week.  Very nice.

How is the new laundry room?

Looks like they're conserving space.

Some dare call it intimate.

[sac]

Today's lesson is about how you shouldn't make comments about having a list.......like say one's about teams kicking tail and not actually have that list.

So I was tasked to come up with one.......its not scientific, definately done quickly and prone to errors and certainly is not definitive because all Hope teams are not created equal (ie. some require more effort to "kick tail").  But here's the best attempt I could come up with.

These are the 11 teams that have come to Holland and beaten Hope by double-digits in the last 18 years.  Why 18? because the chances I saw the game are pretty high (I actually did see them all), and I got tired.  St. Xavier won by 9 but I included them anyway.

1992 Calvin 81-69
1994 Tri-State 92-79
1994 Calvin 72-53
1994 Alma 99-87
1996 Cornerstone 83-72
1998 Kalamazoo 76-58
2000 St. Xavier  96-87
2000 Calvin  78-68
2000 Defiance 96-85
2002 Huntington 91-80
2004 Albion 76-60
2005 Augustana  82-64

Some not so brief comments about some of these games and teams.

1992  Calvin was National Champion, and Hope really wasn't that far behind.  Hope finished 23-6, 3 losses to Calvin, 1 to Central Michigan.  This same Hope team gave Calvin one of its tougher tournaments games next to Gustavus Adolphus.  Probably the best team to visit the Lakeshore in my time.

1994  Not one of Hope's better teams, might even rank last in the past 2 decades.  Just blah.  Finished 16-10 and lost to Olivet........twice!

1996 Hope made the Final Four, this Cornerstone team was one of the early good teams of the "Cornerstone has been pretty solid" era.  Took some effort to kick this Hope teams tail.

1998  Jebbers another Hope Final Four team.  Terrific Hope team, but the one Kzoo played was in total mental disarray at the time.  Still they came to Holland and dominated the Dutchmen and snapped a 27 game MIAA win streak.  Probably in my top 3 kicking Hope's tail team.  (there I go makeing lists again)  PS.  Hope hasn't lost to Kzoo since.

2000  Another of those blah teams for Hope.  15-11 but could have been better or worse.  Calvin was National Champion and Defiance pushed hope around more physically than any other opponent I'd seen at the time.  Not the toughest Hope tail to kick.

2002 Hope was on the beginning of an upswing and went 20-9, Huntington was pretty good and tall if I'm remembering right.

2004  Hope was maybe as good as any other Hope team of the past decade.  Albion really kind of dominated that game like very few Hope teams have been dominated.  I think this might be #2

2005 "The lost season" I like to call it, suspensions, freak injuries, it all started going downhill in November before a ball was even tipped.  Augustana was way out of Hope's league given what Hope had to work with.


An interesting list, a couple noteworthy items........

1) the largest margin is 18, you have to go back to 1977 when Calvin crushed Hope by 33 to find one bigger on Hope soil.  Glad I was 6 and didn't care about basketball.

2)  Despite the lowest margin on the list, I still think St. Xavier was one of the better teams of the 12, maybe the top 5 (no more lists)

3)  The most amazing thing about this list is that Alma is even on it.

[gohope]

Creak, creak, creak....

Awfully quiet in here lately.

BUT..... got my bball season tickets the other day!!! So life is looking a LOT better!! 

[sac]

I'm filing this one under completely random encounters with people you'd never thought you'd meet.  Its off-topic, but still basketball related anyway.


Saturday the bro and I were in Ann Arbor as early as we've ever been for a football game.  We wandered over to Crisler Arena and caught maybe the last 5 or 10 minutes of a pick-up game with the men's team.  Small, best describes the Wolverines, in fact I believe Amherst in Salem was taller, exageration I'm sure.  Quite a few players I'd never seen before, but it was easy to pick out Brian Puls' little brother Eric.......since he was the tallest player, Michigan has a couple other bigger guys but they weren't there, or maybe just weren't in the game at the time.  Puls looks like he might contribute this year.

On the way out the tunnel, my brother points up the tunnel and says "Hey, thats John Beilein.  John waves, and says "hey guys how are you doing"......like we knew him or something.  Then he proceeded into the Michigan lockeroom.   We both kind of looked at each other and said that was weird.

Outside we were waiting along the wall to the tunnel (in the only shade we could find) for the football team to walk by.  I had my back turned when I hear a friendly voice behind me introducing himself to everyone around me........so I turn and its John Beilein (again) standing literally face to face with me holding his hand out.  He shakes everyone's hand (including my sun screen greased one) and makes polite conversation with everyone.   Answers all the questions politely, talks a little strategy, just basketball talk really.  Very cool!

I wanted to ask him about Puls, but unfortunately we had one of "those fans" who dominated the proceedings and asked the horrifying question to the mans face........."The last coach didn't leave you much did he?" along with this gem "Your going to turn it around finally aren't you coach?".   To the first question John simply paused, and said "I'm not going to answer that, but I like the kids we have coming in this year, they can play".........so basically Yes without saying Yes.  Very diplomatic.

To summarize John thinks the team will still struggle alot, but he believes this year is another step up (can't go down can they?).  He particularly likes the two kids from Indiana, Stu Douglas and Zack Novak......as he said "they can shoot".

He was asked about the new 3 point line, he doesn't think it will make a big difference, although he did admit he thinks you'll see fewer big guys shooting from out there.  Maybe I zoned out at this point in the conversation (possible heatstroke), but he also doesn't think teams will press much or play pressure defense because of the new line.....which I found odd, and its why I think I zoned out a bit because it didn't make much sense.  I'm thinking I missed the question.

So after a good 5 or 10 minutes he said his goodbyes, again to everyone listening, paused for few pictures and moved on..........and proceeded to do the same thing with another group further down the line.  What an ordeal those days must be for D1 coaches.  As he left he asked, seemingly to me, "So are you ready for West Virginia part two?".........at which point it was my turn to be silent and diplomatic.


The team soon filed out of Crisler, and once again I'm amazed Manny Harris doesn't get clobbered in Big 10 play.  The kid is rail thin.   As they came out, some of the members of the women's team filed in.  This only underscores just how far behind UM basketball really is.  The fact that both men's and women's teams have to practice in their own arena and can't do it at the same time.  Heck, even Hope can have multiple practices at once.


It was a big recruiting day for UM, and later as we were down at field level inside the big construction site inspecting the troops (better, but not there yet), a number of recruits walked by, football, baseball, basketball.  No hockey that I could see, but then its probably a wise idea to avoid 85 degree days with Canadians.  One recruit caught my eye and that was Colin Voss of East Grand Rapids who was there on a visit for basketball I assume.  Interesting to say the least.


So that was what I can only assume would be my one and only encounter with John Beilein.

[sac]

On the subject of the new 3-point line, Michigan has a nice new floor design that will take some getting used to, but I think it helps make the new line standout much more than just simply painting a new line.

http://flickr.com/photos/26274482@N03/sets/72157606734131261/show/

The light blue is obviously tape, but you can see pretty clearly there's good contrast on this area of the floor.  I've never been a big fan of two-toned stained floors, or even paited ones but this one looks pretty good and at least looks functional.

But then I got to thinking.........the new floor looks an awful lot like the floor at......



........yep, WVU Coliseum in Morgantown.

[gohope]

Ahhhhhhh.....

So nice to have SAC back among the living.

Does this mean that he's left "Exile?"