MIAA/CCIW Challenge and weekend preview

Year 9!

Nov 30/Dec 1
MIAA/CCIW Challenge, King Arena, Wheaton College
Hope, Calvin, Wheaton, Carthage
Hope plays at 6pm CST Fri vs Carthage/3pm CST Sat vs Wheaton

This challenge was put together a full decade ago now and its gone so well we're starting a third rotation through the four schools and by 2015 it will be 12 years that Hope, Calvin, Wheaton and Carthage have met on the first weekend in December.  It's been good.  We've played 32 games now and 18 of those have been decided by a single-digit margin, including 9 of the last 12.  Only 8 games over 20 points, Hope owns 4 of those wins.

Here's the results: courtesy hope.edu
MIAA: 14-18
CCIW: 18-14
Wheaton: 10-6
Carthage: 8-8
Hope: 8-8
Calvin: 6-10
The full MIAA/CCIW Challenge history

The only reason this thing isn't closer is because Calvin can't beat Wheaton for some reason, 1-7 in the series, lost 6 in a row.

Calvin/Wheaton 1-7
Calvin/Carthage 5-3
Hope/Wheaton 5-3
Hope/Carthage 3-5

One pattern that has emerged after these 8 seasons is that the host conferences have owned their own gyms. 
Home sweet home:
CCIW at Wheaton 7-1
CCIW at Carthage 7-1
MIAA at Hope 6-2
MIAA at Calvin 6-2

I'm not sure there's any great reason for this.  To me its always felt like the years Wheaton/Carthage were better they happened to be hosting, the years Hope/Calvin were better they were hosting.  It's been kind of an odd thing that way.  Which brings us to this year.

Carthage 3-2

Buena Vista 63-56
Carroll 74-75
Lake Forest 69-57
Iowa Wesleyan 85-73
Wis-Whitewater 69-74

Carthage has played two teams that went to last year's NCAA tournament including the big enchilada winner and lost both games by 1 and 5 points.  I really don't know much about the other teams, Buena Vista and Lake Forest have been at least equals recently, Iowa Wesleyan is transitioning to D3 where they'll join the SLIAC.

Carthage will start:
G Donte Logan 5-11 So.
G Reese Herth 6-2 So.
F Marlon Senior 6-5 Jr.
F Tyler Pierce 6-5 Sr.
C Luke Johnson 6-9 Jr.

Johnson, Logan and Herth are the leading scorers.  I'll be honest I don't recognize most of the names on their roster, Logan, Herth and Senior came off the bench last year, two of them barely played in last years Hope game, which was a Carthage debacle.  The biggest name missing is Malcolm Kelly, he was a CCIW MVP type player, without him this is a vastly different team.  At least so far it doesn't appear to have affected them much, the long haul will probably be much different.  Obviously the most impressive thing they've done thus far is lose to two NCAA teams in close games.  (which is actually kind of what Hope's done)

When they play Hope
Carthage will shoot a lot of three's as they always have, expect lots of inside outside passes to the open shooters.  Luke Johnson had 17 points in 24 minutes vs Hope last year,  he and Malcolm Kelly are the only two Red Men who could even be mildly pleased with their performances.  Last years game was pretty ugly and kept getting worse before the buzzer finally sounded on a 30 point Hope win.  At that point in the season, Carthage was just out of their league last year.

Carthage doesn't have a lot of height and this area appears to be a clear advantage to Hope, how well the Red Men compete on the inside will probably dictate how this game plays out.  Thus far they've competed just fine with two of last year's NCAA teams.  If Hope has the advantage and gets some easy baskets, it could be a long afternoon for Carthage.  If Carthage is going to beat Hope they'll need a big day from Johnson and a big scoring day from their guards.

This one should be close, or at least much, much closer than last years game.  Carthage has played 5 pretty close games and stood up well to a couple of last years good teams.  I imagine they'll stick right with Hope for the 40 minutes and it will be won or lost in the last 5 minutes.

Here's a fun fact for you:  Hope has not beaten Carthage on the other side of Lake Michigan.  Its one of those quirky things in this challenge but I think its relevant since this Hope squad feels a little like the 2005 and 2009 Hope teams coming off big years and having to replace good chunks of their previous years teams.   Both of those teams lost to Carthage in Wheaton's gym.

Wheaton  4-0

Its been an impressive start to the season for Wheaton.  For the second straight year they enter this little get-together unbeaten. 

Capital 80-45
Alma 76-49
Loras 90-63
Chicago 64-52

Beating demolishing Capital, the OAC favorite, in the opening game was pretty impressive.  Capital has gone on to lose to Wittenberg and Ohio Wesleyan by 'only' 12.  Alma we know about, they'll be battling for the 5th or 6th spot in the MIAA.  Wheaton always beats Loras.....usually bad.  Chicago is pretty young and maybe heading for a top half UAA season.  The biggest thing is they're 4-0 and have apparently been impressive in doing it.  At the least Wheaton appears to be a top 40 quality team and much better than anticipated by some.

Wheaton will start:
G  Brayden Teuscher  6-3 So.
G  Tyler Peters 6-4 Jr
F  Peter Smith 6-6 So.
F  Nathan Haynes 6-6 Jr.
F  Michael Berg  6-6 Fr.*
* Berg has started the last two games

Hope will be looking at a team who's guards look more Hope-like than themselves.  Tyler Peters was an impressive looking Sophomore last year and this year he appears to have taken his game up a notch.  He's scored 24 and 32 in the last two games and leading them in scoring.  Brayden Teuscher tranferred in from Washington-St. Louis and is the second leading scorer.  Guard Michael Kvam is coming off the bench as the third leading scorer.  Through these 4 games Wheaton is getting over half its points from the guard spots.

When they play Hope
Neither one of these teams has really played enough games to establish any interesting trends or statistical analysis.  So far Wheaton's played what looks like good defense in its games while Hope's been reasonably good twice and really bad once. Offensively Wheaton has been outstanding but haven't been challenged by their opponents the way Hope has in two of its three games.

I'm not sure comparing these teams to last year is fair or even relevant, both lost a lot of good players.  I think most felt this was probably a little bigger rebuilding job for Wheaton but it certainly looks and feels like its Hope struggling with its roster changes a little more.  But a lot like last year this looks like a game where the guard play will dictate the outcome.  Obviously Hope will need good defensive efforts from Overway, Seiler and Parisi.  It will be interesting to see what happens when both teams go to 3 guard sets, last year that was probably Hope's advantage, this year maybe not.

Wheaton seems like they have a lot of guys they can throw at Hope's frontline, how well they stay with Hope on the glass might dictate the outcome.  Hope should have an advantage, but it seems like sometimes they need to be reminded that they're tall.  These have traditionally been good battles in the past. 

Another fun fact:   Hope has not won a basketball game played at Wheaton since 1998, and in the last 20 years have only won two games at Wheaton, 1992 and 1998.  No surprise because those were two of Hope best squads in the last 20 years.  Its a small sample of about 5 games including a ridiculous miss-seeded NCAA game with UW-Platteville, but still.....yeesh!

Conclusion or prediction?

I wish I had a better idea of where Hope is right now, this is not like last year at all where it took about 5 minutes of watching them vs Spring Arbor to see they were more than a legit top 10 team.  Last weekend didn't do anything for me to say Hope's got their answers, I think they're still looking and still figuring out what exactly they have.  That's not the greatest place to be when you're playing solid programs like Carthage and Wheaton.  They can be a good team and I think they'll get there eventually and this is one of those weekends where they may find out just how good they are or how good they need to be.

It gnaws at me that Hope has had so much trouble winning on the road in this challenge, but that's how these have gone.  I think Hope might be the slight favorite against Carthage but I think I'd make them the underdog vs Wheaton at Wheaton.  A 1-1 weekend wouldn't be too untolerable, 0-2 wouldn't surprise me and would make me sigh heavily repeatedly.  A 2-0 would obviously be reason to feel pretty good.  In short it would be a good year to get that win in Wheaton's gym, any win.  I'm kind of leaning towards 1-1.


and Calvin?

There's quit a bit of evidence that Calvin's a pretty good team, defensively they've been very good in all 6 of their games.  I'm not crazy about their schedule, so far they've played one team that will even sniff the post-season in Cornerstone, they won that game.  I really feel good about have accepted Calvin's chances of winning both games this weekend.  They kind of need to make a statement and this weekend is really their best chance before the MIAA season ramps up.


Big League Weekend

This weekend's seven in-region games:
North Central @ Trine
Hope @ Wheaton
Adrian @ Carnegie-Mellon
Chicago @ Kalamazoo
Baldwin-Wallace @ Alma
Elmhurst @ Albion
North Central @ Kalamazoo

Probably only Adrian is a favorite with Albion/Elmhurst a probably toss-up but Elmhurst beat them by double-digits last year.  So far the league is 12-11 in these games.  I'm figuring on a 1-6 weekend which takes the in-region record to 13-17.  Its still possible to get above .500 and really important since strength of schedule is an important component of getting an at-large birth.  Right now Adrian and Calvin should have great in-region records, Hope might get there but I think its pretty likely the league will have at least one really good looking Pool C candidate this year.  The better the in-region record the better that teams chances.

You can go ahead and beat Wheaton, it would help.

Cornerstone 87 Hope 80, plus other Hall of Fame thoughts

Box Score  a box score full of deception

Hope started Overway, Seiler, Snuggerud, Byers, Van Arendonk.  Seiler returns to the starting 5, Byers is probably the starter until Whittenbach is ready to go (maybe see some minutes next weekend?).  Hope ended up playing everyone available, including the odd inclusion of 4 guys into the second half who hadn't played in the first half, in the middle of a competitive game.  Not sure what exactly but the Hope staff was searching for something, as you'll see later, probably defense.

Game Recap:

Of the 3 games I've had a chance to see this year this was easily the most well played and entertaining, also the first involving Hope.  Cornerstone has a very good team and I suspect when the dust settles on 2013 their season probably comes to an end sometime in the NAIA Tournament in Branson, Missouri.  Coming off a close 6 point loss to Davenport on Tuesday it was pretty clear the Eagles were ready to play some good basketball this weekend.

Cornerstone pressed for most of the game though it was mostly passive, attacking the in-bounds before dropping off.  Unfortunately Hope made a couple too many careless passes which led to easy points for the Eagles, ultimately those points proved costly.  Otherwise the entire first half was played to a margin of under 5 points, mostly under 4 actually with the teams trading baskets and the lead a few times.  Neither team had much of an obvious advantage and it was statistically pretty much a draw, so the 40-38 halftime score seemed very appropriate.

Early in the 2nd half Hope subbed in Matt Parisi for Caleb Byers, I can only believe this was to counter a smaller Cornerstone lineup.  Soon after Billy Seiler picked up two quick fouls sending him to the bench, on came Alex Eidson for his first action.  For the most part I think Hope stuck with 3 guards in the second half.

The half itself was pretty much like the first, back and forth with lots of good offensive play.  With about 10 1/2 minutes to play Cornerstone finally broke the 5 point barrier to grab a very brief 6 point lead.  Hope came right back and brought it back to one point.  But over the next 2 minutes Cornerstone hit 3 straight three's from Wes Hudson, Alex Lyle and Hudson again to take a 1 point game to 9, a couple of those were pretty long ones.

Hope stayed in it though getting the ball inside on its next several possessions closing the lead to 1 point again before Cornerstone turned to its big man Jake Plight who hit two big shots in close in the final moments to keep the Eagles in command.  They finally iced the game at the line.  In the end it was a very good game with lots of key moments to ponder but what a deceptive score.  For the whole game I think there was something just under 2 minutes played with a margin of more than 6 points.

Given the quality of play and the date on the calender it was hard be irritated with this one.  Both teams will be left with some frustrations about defense but in the end I think both teams played a great offensive game, sometimes you just can't stop the other guy.

It would be easy to be frustrated or get down on Hope's 0-2 record (not counting Faith, nor will I) but you have to remember Hope still has a lineup full of the first year players and they're still getting their feet under them and they've played two very good small college basketball teams.  It was pretty obvious given the substitutions in this game and some of the weird minutes that Hope is still searching for the right lineups or trying different things out.  This will probably continue for most of the non-conference season.



Scoring and Interesting Stats:

I haven't been handed too many boxscores as perplexing and confusing as this one.  When you shoot 57% to the other guys 50% you should win, especially when you shoot 64% in one half.  But that didn't happen.  Ultimately the difference was those handful of back-court turnovers resulting in easy points, and as you'll see Hope did a pretty poor job on the boards.

Coltan Overway: 16 points, 7 assists......pretty good all-around game from Coltan, you'll be pretty hard pressed to find an opponent left on Hope's schedule with guards as good as Cornerstone's.

Nate Snuggerud:  19 points......probably needed to be more active on the boards, he sure looks nearly unstoppable sometimes.

After that the scoring was really spread out and no one really stood out, a lot of the team had some really good minutes mixed with some bad ones as well.  The biggest culprit for being subbed out was defense or turnovers.

Efficiency:

Estimated Possessions:  Hope 70  Cornerstone 69

That's as normal as normal gets.

Offensive  Efficiency:  114.0
That's pretty good, well above average for most D3 teams.  For the most part Hope maximized its possessions, strip out the back-court turnovers and convert those to offensive points at the same rate and Hope probably wins this one.

Defensive Efficiency:  125.63
After mulling over the boxscore and not finding many answers I decided it must be in the efficiency and here it is.  This is awful, awful, awful.  The worst two games Hope played last year were 113's, Western Michigan and Illinois Wesleyan.  One of the more frustrating parts was Hope not being able to play defense without fouling leading to the substantial FT advantage.  There just weren't many times down the floor Cornerstone didn't get something for their trouble.


Rebounding Efficiency:
Hope: 30.5% of available offensive rebounds
C'stone: 45.2% of available offensive rebounds

I'd prefer if those number were flipped.  I don't have second chance points but I bet it was enough in Cornerstone's favor to cover the margin.  There weren't a lot of misses in this one and any offensive rebound was big, giving up 14 was just way too many.

Backcourt turnovers and offensive rebounds, that was enough, and more, to make up for Hope's slightly better FG%.  A little frustrating to lose a game that way against a really good team.

Moment or Play of the game:

The two minute stretch with about 9 minutes to play where  Cornerstone hit 3 straight 3 point shots.  I felt Hope might be turning the game at that point, than all of the sudden the margin was its biggest as it had been.  Hope was still able to climb back to 1 again but one or two of those shots really changed the momentum.

My game ball goes to:

Coltan Overway, played a really solid game against good guards.  He hit two or three pretty big shots at key points to stem some Cornerstone momentum.  Played kind of like you expect a Sr. point guard to play.

Standings
Snuggerud - 1
Byers - 1 
Overway - 1
DeMaagd - 1   (see below) 

Some thoughts on the whole weekend:

I watched the Calvin/Aquinas game Friday.  I figured like most Calvin would cruise to an easy win but it was anything but easy.  In what will probably be one of the most passive defensive games I see this year that ends up being a defensive score, Calvin scored just enough points to beat a game Aquinas team 58-55.  Calvin plays some good defense, just not very physical and mostly because they really don't give up anything easy, also tallness.   There can be little doubt the 3 guys who missed most of last season make them a better team.  Calvin will enter MIAA play a very good team with a very good record, next week is just as big for them as it is for Hope (except for that in-region game nonsense).

On Saturday Calvin beat Cornerstone in a game that was much more defensive than the Hope/C'stone game (actually a lot more).   Calvin led by just over 5 points most of the game but had to hold off an Eagle rally at the end to win it.  Between Hope/Calvin/Cornerstone there doesn't appear to be much difference in overall talent and ability, for now the difference is in execution. 

Once upon a time I knew Aquinas' rosters almost as good as most MIAA ones but not anymore.  Aquinas left this weekend 1-8 on the season after Hope pulled out a 66-63 game on Saturday.  It makes no sense of course but that seems to be the Aquinas we see in this tournament most years.  I guess you just have give AQ some credit for playing as well as they did on the weekend.  A second look at their season results shows most of their games have been close losses.  I really think they're heading for a tough year in the WHAC, we'll see.

Hope 66 Aquinas 63

I had family over Saturday so I wasn't able to follow much of the Hope/Aquinas game.  I pretty much knew it would be closer than it should be because aren't they always.  I tuned in just in time to hear Chase DeMaagd rescue the Dutchmen with 2 three's, 2 big rebounds and a couple of clutch FT's to give Hope the win in the last 6 minutes.   So Chase gets the mythical game ball.

Estimated possessions:   Hope 67 Aquinas 66

A little below average but not bad

Offensive Efficiency:  98.54
Given that Aquinas did pretty much the same thing to Calvin you have to maybe tip your hat to the Saints defense on the weekend or maybe their ability to slow down the pace of play to something they can manage.

Defensive Efficiency:   95.49
Quite a turnaround from the night before, even if Aquinas is a significant step down from Cornerstone in offensive ability this had to be a better effort.   It couldn't have been worse.

Rebounding Efficiency:
Hope: 37.8% of available offensive rebounds
Aquinas: 13.8% of available offensive rebounds

<ahem>, I think this may have talked about a little after the Cornerstone game.  Probably the primary reason Hope had 20 more shots than Aquinas.  For the day the offense wasn't as sharp as it appeared to be the day before.  After losing the game on the glass against Cornerstone, they probably won this one on the glass.

Going Forward:

Hope lost a tough close game with a good Cornerstone team and eeked out a close win over an Aquinas program I will never, ever understand.  The team is still getting its legs under them, still working on finding the right combinations, still putting their collective skills together.  Its a puzzle with a lot of pieces still laying around.  Its been a couple years since Hope's had to build a team like this so it probably feels weird, for now the caution tape is still flapping in the wind around DeVos Fieldhouse.  Next week will be two more good challenges with Carthage and Wheaton

Up Next:  Friday Nov 30, vs Carthage at Wheaton College
              Saturday Dec 1, @ Wheaton

We start the third rotation (year 9) of the MIAA/CCIW Challenge with Hope, Calvin, Wheaton, Carthage.

Milk Jug: Adrian 62 Siena Heights 40

Box Score

When I finally arrived about 5 minutes before the tip at Siena I was greeted with a near full parking lot at the generically named Siena Heights Gymnasium.  Once inside it was apparent that yeah, this was probably a big deal to these people.  A nice section of maybe 100 Siena students wore white t-shirts with the words "Our Town" written on them.  While there were lots of Adrian students and fans there they sat all over the place and didn't coordinate to make any sort of opposing fan section.

The setting was kind of cozy, with all four sides surrounded by bleachers,  I would estimate the crowd at between 1000 and 1200 with many people standing in the corners.  There were open seats, I had no trouble finding one at mid-court even being late,  but not many,  I guess they prefer standing.  For the most part though they'd probably consider this full.

The game itself tipped with Adrian and Siena trading missed shots, it was apparent early that both teams came to play defense and that scoring would be difficult.  Adrian finally scored with an Adam Meier jumper 3 minutes into the game, they would never relinquish that lead.  Adrian set a strong defensive tone and despite being a touch smaller began dominating the glass.

The rest of the first half had its moments of good play but it was mostly ragged and sometimes a little ugly.  Had Adrian shot the ball just a little bit better it would have been no contest, but with a 3 pointer at the first half buzzer for Siena there was at least a small glimmer of hope for the Saints.

Siena hung on for a couple possessions in the second half before Adrian slammed the door with 3 straight baskets to go up 10, Siena would only get it under 10 one more time.   With a combination of stifling defense and terrific rebounding  Adrian just kept building the lead and it was pretty apparent with 10 minutes to play this wasn't happening for Siena.  Adrian was just plain better at everything.

Rivalry?
Yes I'm sure.  You can't share the same small town without being rivals of some kind.   I probably just attended the least competitive Siena/Adrian game in the last 10 years.  Here's the last few results:

• Adrian 77 Siena Heights 67
• Siena Heights 71 Adrian 65
• Siena Heights 48 Adrian 45
• Siena Heights 78 Adrian 71
• Siena Heights 72 Adrian 67

All of those look pretty close and were probably good games right to the finish.  Last night was not.  Adrian was just superior in every facet of the game, except maybe looking like a better 3 point shooting team but Adrian even ended up better than Siena at that.

Siena and Adrian are two programs on different plains of existence.  Mark White is in year 4, with kids he recruited and a team that has established a tough defensive identity, they are looking to win the MIAA.  Siena Heights is in year one of the Joe Pechota era and have been a struggling  WHAC program for the better part of the last decade.  They are a long way from the WHAC Championship teams of the 90's and early 2000's.  This year they're heading for the bottom half of that conference again and that's a pretty ugly neighborhood to be hanging around in.

I left being a bit disappointed in the total lack of crowd interaction but I'm sure the score had much to do with that, it was really 1100 people watching this thing going on in front of them with almost total indifference.  It was weird.  About the only moment of the game that brought sparks was when Siena's Donovan Campbell, who plays tight-end on the football team, body checked Adrian's Cody Barnes into, on top of and over the scorer's table earning himself a well earned technical foul.  Other than the refs, no one seemed to see it or what led up to that moment.  It was really the only time in the game with any hint of animosity.

At the end I expected at least some kind of joyous Adrian celebration but it was really the team just sort of sauntering to center court after the handshakes where they were presented with the Milk Jug, the traveling trophy awarded to the winner of this game.  They posed for a couple team pictures and that was it, off to the locker room lugging that thing on Sean Gallant's shoulders.

 Last years Milk Jug game

So, Adrian?

I think they are good.  This team won at Wooster on Saturday, Wooster went out and kind of validated that win by beating one of the OAC favorites Baldwin-Wallace.  For a team with 10 Freshmen, several who play quite a bit, they play Mark White's defense as if they've played it forever.  I'm sure Mark would disagree.

Daryl Flemister and Sheldon Clay are almost clones to the departed Delano Collins and Dennis Mason from last year.  Drew Torey brings good quickness and a nice 3 point shot, Ricky Jackson, Brad Hohman add depth on the blocks.  They won't wow you, but they all seem to fit nicely into what Mark White is trying to do.

Offensively everything will go through Cody Barnes, Eric Lewis and Adam Meier.  To me all 3 look improved from year ago and if Barnes and Lewis get loose the ball is likely going in the basket or at least towards the basket.  As the year goes on I would think they'll try and establish more offense from some of the other guys, for now about 60% of the shots and 75% of the points are coming from these 3 guys.  An off night or well defended night for any of the three will make things difficult but those 3 are going to carry this team as far as they can.

Defensively they looked in mid-season form, they just get it and always seem to be in good position.  No shot ever seems to be uncontested and if it is the guilty party is coming out of the game quick.  They dominated this team on the glass to the tune of 53-34 with 19 offensive rebounds on 41 misses.  Holding any team to 40 points isn't all that easy, even bad offensive teams like Siena, you still have to be doing something good at that end of the floor to get there.

Between now and January Adrian has a bunch of games just like this.  Teams they will be better than, teams they can defensively impose their will against, teams they should beat.  I fully expect the crew I saw last night to be 11-0 or at worst 9-2 when they make their MIAA opening night trip to Calvin on Jan. 3.  By then Calvin will likely be a top 20 team and will easily be the best opponent they've played outside of maybe Wooster.   Two days latter they host Hope, those two games will define how involved the Bulldogs will be in the MIAA race.  Come tournament time, yeah, these guys are going to be a pain in the neck again.

Week in Review: Week 1

I'm going to do this every couple weeks but thought I'd throw this out there this week. 

For the week the MIAA went 6-8, maybe an extra loss that shouldn't have been, the Wooster win cancels out the Wabash loss.  Not a bad week but the opponent strength probably wasn't the greatest and yet NCAA tournament teams Capital, North Central, Wheaton and Wooster were 4 of the opponents.  I didn't count the Hope win.

In-region:  4-6
vs OAC     1-2
vs NCAC  1-1
vs PAC      0-1
vs HCAC  1-0
vs CCIW   1-2
other D3   
NAIA
other          2-0
D1             0-1

Adrian   2-0

Adrian 61 Otterbein 49
Adrian 57 Wooster 56

Adrian's week started out with a roster reveal last Monday that most of us thought was a roster explosion that couldn't possibly keep Adrian in the mix for the MIAA title.  Then they went out and beat Wooster, and the rest of us stare blankly into space..but, but, but......  Last second shot or not, that's kind of impressive and something to take note.   Video link:  1:45:00 is about the moment of Adrian glory, I'd go back and watch the last full 2 or 3 minutes to get the full experience.  It was a pretty good ending to a game.

Its way too early to tell just how good Wooster is or isn't, but past history leans on this being a big time signature win for the Bulldogs.  Not many teams come out of Wooster with an away win, at least those not named Wittenberg.

This week:  @ Sienna Heights(milk jug), @ Marygrove
Next week:  UM-Dearborn, Mt. Union, @ Carnegie-Mellon

Albion 1-1

Albion 78 Manchester 63
Wabash 53 Albion 51

Friday Albion took care of a pretty young Manchester team with ease.  Sunday I expected Albion to do the same with Wabash (who lost to Manchester) but it didn't happen.  Yours truly was there and I kept waiting for Albion to pull comfortably enough ahead to say it was safe, but I was really thinking Wabash is going to steal this.  Sure enough they did.  Albion let that that game get away and it was really a poor final 7 or 8 minutes that did them in.

The team without Kolin Kazen had trouble scoring  Sunday, that same team had no trouble scoring  Friday.  There really aren't any roster additions for Albion other than Fr. Jordan Herron who played well but got himself into a little foul trouble.  Everyone's just a year older.  This is much the same team as last but without Kazen they could struggle some.  Most likely this won't be the same roster that competes in the MIAA.

This week:   vs Franklin, vs Purdue-North Central or DePauw @ DePauw
Next week:  vs Elmhurst

Alma  0-2

Capital 83 Alma 73
Wheaton 76 Alma 49

These were expected losses, what wasn't expected was Wheaton thrashing OAC favorite Capital so thoroughly on Thursday night.  It's a little hard to make anything of the Capital/Alma score, consider  Alma stayed competitive with last year's OAC co-champ John Carroll as well.  At the moment, I'm getting pretty pessimistic about the OAC and what results vs them really mean.  The Wheaton game was a demolition,  Alma had 32 points on the board with 5 minutes to play.

Alma gave significant playing time to four Freshmen, starting Ivy Johnson.

This week:  vs Ohio Northern, vs Heidelberg
Next week:  @ Defiance, Baldwin-Wallace

Calvin 2-0

Calvin 84 Grace Bible 53
Calvin 83 North Park 54
(these results are some sort of weird numbers bingo aren't they?)

Calvin hosted its own tournament and did what good teams are supposed to do, thrash opponents of this caliber.  Grace Bible doesn't appear to be the nuisance Grace Bible of the last 4 years and North Park has been struggling in the CCIW of late(forever) and they didn't have their best player.

The next couple weekends will tell much more about Calvin than this past weekend and I think everyone realizes that.  Still, the last couple of years with basically the same cast Calvin has sort of kind of struggled with these kinds of teams.

This week:  vs Anderson, vs Aquinas and vs Cornerstone @ Hope
Next week:  @ Manchester, @ Wheaton vs Carthage @ Wheaton

Hope 0-1

North Central 60 Hope 49  Game Recap

Friday never happened.  Saturday Hope went on the road and dropped a tough one with CCIW favorite North Central.  Overall I think it was an ok to good performance given the circumstances.

This week:   vs Cornerstone, vs Aquinas
Next week:  vs Carthage vs Wheaton @ Wheaton

Kalamazoo 0-0

The Hornets finally debut with new head coach Eric Dougle this week.  It occurred to me that Kzoo's entire 11 game non-conference schedule is compressed into 28 days.

This week:  vs Manchester and Earlham @ Earlham
Next week:  @ Oberlin, vs Chicago, vs North Central


Olivet 0-3

Central Michigan 76 Olivet 62
Mount St. Joseph 88 Olivet 57
Thomas More 90 Olivet 62

This road trip was never going to go well, but I thought the  D3 part might at least be competitive.  It wasn't.  Winnable games are ahead but this was a foreboding kind of weekend, its looking like a long season in Olivet.

Garner Small the 6-7 transfer from Goshen has been a bright spot, so far he's had games of 20 and 16 but somehow had 0 against MSJ.  I'm reaching, wins will come soon...I think, just not many of them.

This week:  @ Union, Ky, Purdue-Calumet
Next week:  no games

Trine 1-1

Heidelberg 80 Trine 77
Trine 100 Akron-Wayne 75

The Heidelberg result wasn't what I was anticipating from a team I expected to be a little better this year.  Maybe Heidelberg is a lot better, but I doubt it.  Trine gave 3 or 4 Fr. some significant playing time on Friday.  I don't remember 6-7 Todd Watkins from last year, I imagine he plays the Tim Pearcy role this year.

Nick Tatu played only a few seconds in the first game, then went out and went 7-9 from 3 in the second game.  Expect more Tatu in the future maybe.

This week:  @ Earlham, vs Manchester @ Earlham
Next week:  North Central

For this upcoming week the MIAA has several delicious snaky cake games, 10 wins seems almost pessimistic.  I guess the real key will be the Hope and Calvin encounters with Cornerstone, and hoping that somehow Aquinas doesn't remember how to play good basketball.  I'm kind of assuming Kzoo, Olivet and Alma can find one win apiece.  The week after is much more difficult and may really define how well the league performs on the year.

The Neighbors

OAC

Last week the league went 10-9.  I don't know what to think of this.  Thursday the OAC favorite went out and got blitzed by Wheaton.  Wheaton might be really good and win the CCIW but it was a  surprising margin of victory.  The league went 2-4 against the PAC and Marietta was blown out by Ohio Wesleyan.  The bright spot I guess was Baldwin-Wallace beating defending PAC champ Bethany.

In the coming two weeks the league has several opportunities for perception redeeming wins, including games with Wooster, Wittenberg, Ohio Wesleyan and Washington U.

in-region 7-8
vs NCAC  0-2
vs PAC     2-4
vs MIAA  2-1

NCAC

The league went 12-7 last week, the highlight was probably Ohio Wesleyan debuting with a thumping win over Marietta.  Wooster suffered a last second home defeat to Adrian, Wabash won on a late tip-in at Albion.  Otherwise there weren't a lot of great match-ups.

in-region  8-6
vs OAC   2-0
vs PAC    1-1
vs MIAA 1-1

PAC

10-10 overall record and it was a really good week for the PAC which included a combined 6-2 record against its Great Lakes Region conference neighbors.  Thomas More beat DePauw, this was probably the only win against a team that will finish in the top half of its league.  Bethany lost to Baldwin-Wallace.

in-region  8-8
vs OAC    4-2
vs NCAC 1-1
vs MIAA  1-0


In the future I'll probably try and pull-off some kind of Great Lakes ranking but since we're one week in that seems kind of fruitless.  I do think the main teams to focus on probably hasn't changed:   Hope, Calvin, Adrian, Wooster, Wittenberg, Ohio Wesleyan, Capital, Baldwin-Wallace, Thiel, Bethany and maybe Thomas More.  There just really isn't enough data on anyone else, or really anyone.

North Central 60 Hope 49

Box Score

Hope started Overway, Parisi, Snuggerud, Byers, Van Arendonk.  Most likely this lineup was used to counter the very formidable NCC frontline.  As far as minutes distribution Byers and Van Arendonk logged a few extra because of foul trouble.  Parisi maybe because of defense.   Billy Seiler was questionable going in, but was inserted into the rotation midway-ish through the first half, unlikely 100%.  Chris Ray didn't play and is probably not ready to play in a game like this one yet.

Game Recap:

Hey guess what, its really hard to write a recap about a game you didn't see.   

The bottom line about this game for both teams was this was a tough ask this early in the season.  I think if you had quizzed both coaches and they were honest they'd say they would rather play this game 3 weeks from now.  No question 3 months from now both teams will look quite different.

The talking point of this one probably centers around Nate Snuggerud picking up 4 first half fouls, very little doubt this impacted the game.   Matt Neil gambled that his all-american candidate, Sr. forward could keep himself out of trouble when he re-inserted him midway through the first half sitting on two fouls.  Unfortunately Matt lost that gamble this time, one of dozens of decisions a coach has to make on the fly during a game.  It was simply incredible miss-fortune Nate picks up foul #4 with his sub at the table.  In twenty plus years of watching games at his level, I bet I've seen that one other time.  I imagine given the reports of the physical nature of the game, Matt felt he needed him out there, so he rolled the dice.  Two things probably come out of this 1) Hope will be more careful with foul trouble in the future  2) Nate Snuggerud will learn a very good and very hard early lesson.  Better now than latter. 

Meanwhile what I think what might be missed is how well Hope competed without their best player for three-quarters of the game.  Picture this roster without Caleb Byers and Brock Benson......now sit Snuggerud.  Hope has a big problem vs North Central then, right?  Caleb Byers' and Brock Bensons' value to this team showed up in its very first (real) game.  Hope could start bigger to combat NCC's front line and when Snuggerud had to sit, Hope could still compete with NCC, otherwise they were probably a sitting duck. 

Derek Raridon and Landon Gamble, NCC's all-american forwards, played 39 and 25 minutes, Hope's all-american Nate Snuggerud played 10.....and Hope lost by 11.  It was a 5 point game with a little under 5 to play.  Yeah, it mattered.

As far as the game itself, it seemed to get off to a torrid pace and then grind to a standstill.  Listening to the last few minutes was like watching kids throw darts at each other, I cringed every time a shot was missed but I knew eventually someone was going to get hurt...unfortunately it was Hope when Derek Raridon hit a 3 with about 6 minutes remaining to put NCC up 8.  It was as good as a dagger(dart?). 

A couple concerns popped up in this one.

Between Parisi, Seiler and McMahon, Hope was 1-16 from the floor and 0-10 from triple for 8 points from the 2/3 guard spot.  Yikes!  One day after not worrying its hard not to.  To be fair, it was an awful night for everyone shooting 3's, combined  the two teams went 5-33 and a mind numbing 1-23 in the second half.  Had I seen this in person, I might have desired poking my eyes out.  Matt Parisi may never go 0-8 again from 3 again in his career.  Inconsistency might be the norm from out there and it might cost them a game or two along the way.

Free-Throws:  This is where you picture me being the zookeeper burying his head in the bushes at the 1:24 mark (awesome movie by the way, Scavenger Hunt(1979))...

The internet is one awesome place sometimes

 

Sometimes its not that you miss free throws as much as when you miss them.  Down 8 with 6 minutes to play, Hope holds NCC 3 straight posessions and gets FT's at the other end.  Hope makes one, misses one each time, make them all and its a 2 point game with 4:42 to play, totally different game ending, instead of a parade of FT's you make NCC have to score, which given the way the last 10 minutes played out was not a certainty for either team.  We've been down this road too many times, in too many important situations.

So that was it, a tough opening night loss to what will probably be a very good CCIW team that by the end of the year will be looking at winning trophies and making March travel plans.  Hardly something to be too worried about.  I was hoping Hope would compete and maybe be in a position late to take the win, and really I think you can say they were.  Its a tough loss but I wouldn't call it a bad loss or even one to feel bad about, only its circumstances.
 


Scoring and Interesting Stats:

All the stats were close to even across the board.  Hope was a little light on the assists, but then they were a little light on the FG's.  Second half shooting for both teams was, well, atrocious.

When you shoot 18.5% for a half you really don't deserve to win, on the other hand they held a team to 26.9% at the same time.  Its either knock-out defense or terrible offense, most likely a little of both.

Coltan Overway: 12 points, 7 rebounds......played 36 minutes which might be the most he's played in his career.  In a foul-fest game he stayed out of that trouble.

Nate Snuggerud:  9 points......10 minutes

Caleb Byers:  8 points........33 minutes, all valuable cover for Nate's foul trouble

Nate Van Arendonk:  7 points, 7 rebounds........managed to stay out of foul trouble himself which was important as were his 31 minutes.

Efficiency:

Estimated Possessions:  Hope 61  NCC 64

That's a slow grinding paced game, and considering how quickly it started, the last 30 minutes of this thing was probably played in the 50's.  Hello Wisconsin!

Offensive  Efficiency:  80.49
This isn't efficient, not at all.  In the previous 'games' write-up I mentioned anything under 85 starts to measure offensive ineptness.  Yeah, that.  But North Central surely played some outstanding defense to get there.

Deffensive Efficiency:  94.01
This is pretty good vs what will likely prove to be a good team.  The only bad thing is you held a good team to this number and you didn't win because you were being held to an even lower number.


Rebounding Efficiency:
Hope: 24.1% of available offensive rebounds
NCC: 33.3% of available offensive rebounds

The difference is 3 offensive rebounds for NCC on one possession which resulted in a turnover, take away those 3 and this battle was dead even.  Ideally both teams would like this to be in the high 30's or better.  In the end both teams probably did a good job rebounding all those misses or to put it another way, the advantage in this one didn't come from rebounding.

Moment or Play of the game:

Nate Snuggerud picking up foul #4 at the 10:25 mark of the first half. You can manage a player having 3 with 30 minutes to play but 4 is another story.  That really changed everything.   I also remember a long NCC possession midway through the 2nd half where they rebounded 3 or 4 misses in a row, it ended up being a long defensive possession.  Also Derek Raridon's  three with 6 or so to play, essentially iced the game, but not quite.

My game ball goes to:

I thought the re-cap was hard.  Shot in the dark and I'll go with Caleb Byers.  I heard his name a lot and he stepped in for Snuggerud's absense and apparently did very well.

Standings
Snuggerud - 1
Byers - 1

Going Forward:

Hope challenged itself right off the bat with the two-time defending CCIW champs and Sweet 16 team from a year ago on the road.  They didn't win, and that's about it.  I know of no other NCAA tournament team that did that.   Its great competition to start the season and there will be just a ton of coachable moments from this one and compared to other teams who have yet to play schools with a pulse, they know where they are and where they have to go.

Up Next:  Friday Nov 23, vs Cornerstone at DeVos Fieldhouse

Hope hosts the Hall of Fame Classic with Calvin, Aquinas and Cornerstone this year.  Cornerstone will be a good test again.

Hope 118 College of Faith 20

Box Score

Hope played without starters Billy Seiler and Stephen Whittenbach.  Hope went with Overway, McMahon, DeMaagd, Snuggerud, Van Arendonk as the starting 5 and substituted liberally resulting in everyone playing double-digit minutes and only Matt Parisi eeking out 20.

The opening tip went to Coltan Overway, he dunked it, and that was pretty much it.  This one shouldn't count anyway so the game recap is this.....

Game Recap: Red Velvet Cupcakes

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
• 1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons red food coloring
• 1 teaspoon white distilled vinegar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:

• 1 pound cream cheese, softened
• 2 sticks butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
• Chopped pecans and fresh raspberries or strawberries, for garnish

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line 2 (12-cup) muffin pans with cupcake papers.
In a medium mixing bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder. In a large bowl gently beat together the oil, buttermilk, eggs, food coloring, vinegar, and vanilla with a handheld electric mixer. Add the sifted dry ingredients to the wet and mix until smooth and thoroughly combined.

Divide the batter evenly among the cupcake tins about 2/3 filled. Bake in oven for about 20 to 22 minutes, turning the pans once, half way through. Test the cupcakes with a toothpick for doneness. Remove from oven and cool completely before frosting.

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:
In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, butter and vanilla together until smooth. Add the sugar and on low speed, beat until incorporated. Increase the speed to high and mix until very light and fluffy.  Garnish with chopped pecans and a fresh raspberry or strawberry.

Cook's Note: Frost the cupcakes with a butter knife or pipe it on with a big star tip.


Scoring and Interesting Stats:

Hope won every statistical category possible, even FT shooting.  Everyone was awesome!

Nate Snuggerud:  29 points,  11 rebounds, 13-13 from the floor, leading 3-point shooter with 2-2 (this can't happen often).....he did this in 17 minutes of action, did he even sweat?

Caleb Byers: 19 points on 8-9 shooting, he did this in 12 minutes....I might have a man crush problem this year

Coltan Overway: 11 points, 7 assists, 5 blocks......leading the team in blocks probably says it all

Matt Parisi:  10 points, hopefully some quality minutes.

For the game College of Faith had zero assists, not even one by accident.  Points in the paint was an absurd 72-2 advantage to Hope.

One thing I pointed to before this game was the 3 point shooting, Hope went 7-16, not bad but there's no knowledge of the actual difficulty of these shots.  Corey McMahon went 0-4 in a tough night shooting it, so the rest of the team went 7-12.  I don't think this is going to be the problem I thought, just individually streaky.  All the wrong streaky's coming together on the same night could be a problem.

Efficiency:

Estimated Possessions:  Hope 91  CofF 86

This is a lot of possessions and will be the fastest paced game Hope plays this year, probably by a lot.  A typical game will be somewhat just above 140 combined, this was 37 over that.

Offensive  Efficiency:  129.63
This isn't astronomical but its up there, I genuinely think Hope made a strong effort to keep the scoring down.  Hope hovered around shooting 60 to 70 percent from the floor the whole game.

Deffensive Efficiency:  23.15
This looks like a number I made up because I was too lazy to figure it out, but its not, its real.  In about 10 years of doing this I've come to expect under 85 to be a pretty bad number at this level.  Ever seeing a number this low just never crossed my mind.  Nobody really plays defense at a level below the high eighties consistently, anything below that starts measuring offensive ineptness.  Hope's not this good on defense, really they aren't.

Moment or Play of the game:

I don't know, the tip maybe?  Keeping it under 100?

My game ball goes to:

It has to be Nate Snuggerud, he put up video game numbers in 17 minutes, even taking into account the level of competition that is game ball material.

Going Forward:

I guess we wait on official word if this game even counts, as it stands it really shouldn't so Hope's either 1-0 or 0-0.  The real game is tomorrow night.

I don't think you can take anything from this game, except maybe all the extra minutes some of the first year players played, good experience.....maybe.   This really was nothing like any game Hope will play this year or has played in probably many decades.   Hopefully Hope will never play an opponent so over-matched as this one.

Preview?

I've thought a little bit about whether I wanted to commit myself to doing previews and the answer is no I don't.  These will be somewhat scattered depending on my time commitments and my game interest as the season goes on....or I may end up doing one for every game.  Right now I'm tired of looking at schedule's, rosters and last years data.  I'd just like to see some games from this season so things can start to make some sense.

Hope's weekend involves a trip to beautiful Naperville, Illinois a place I've been once and wish I could be there Saturday.  However, its still football season and I still have 1 more Michigan game to attend, hoping miracles won't be necessary.  This is a combined "tournament" with 4 women's programs in a two day basketball pallooza.  On the women's side MIAA'ers Alma and Olivet will be there playing North Central and St. Mary's, Mn.  The other men's programs are North Central, College of Faith and Illinois Tech.

North Central Tournament Website

Friday:
Hope vs College of Faith, Ark or Tn.......but mostly cyber-space
3:30pm EST, 2:30 CST,  Gregory Arena at North Central College

There is a good chance that by 3:40 you can kick back with your victory cigar and favorite beverage of choice to celebrate a Hope victory.  A victory that may not be because this game shouldn't count.  College of Faith is a online school in Memphis with no roster and a schedule that doesn't meet the NCAA requirement for counting.  They played one game about 3 weeks ago against a JV squad from Victory University, results never reported and lost to history.  It likely didn't go well.

What to watch for
3 possible things could happen in this game.

1. CofF brings what amounts to a intramural team, Hope wins big
2. CofF brings a somewhat competitive squad, Hope wins
3. CofF brings a bunch of dudes who left Memphis and Arkansas D1 programs who all want to be ministers and enrolled in College of Faith, Hope loses big

I'd go with 1.  I've already written more about this game than should probably be previewed.  Hope should probably get lots of time for their first year players, which isn't really a bad thing.  I fully expect this won't be a contest, if it is than the review should be interesting.  But this is pretty much an exhibition game.


Saturday:
Hope @ North Central, Ill
8:30pm EST, 7:30 CST, Gregory Arena

The meat and potatoes game of the trip.  Both are favored to win their respective conferences by their coaches and both are two time defending champions of their conferences.  Both are ranked in the top 10 D3hoops.com poll, #6 for North Central, #7 for Hope.  Looking at the rosters both lost some significant contributors and return significant core's of last years teams.  Nearly mirror images of each other really.  Both teams have roughly half their squads as new faces.

What to Watch For:

1. Nate Snuggerud and NCC's Derek Raridon both received pre-season all-american accolades.  I would think they might match-up together a little bit.
2. Hope's 3 point shooting.   What's returning isn't much, Hope will need the younger guys to really hit some key shots in this one.  Could be a very long day if they have to rely on just 2 point baskets in close. 
3. North Central has struggled in the non-conference part of their last two seasons for various reasons, mostly injuries and illness. They appear to be healthy, but if there's an opening its this.

Neither team should be challenged much Friday so any advantage you might think Hope gets by playing a cupcake is nullified because Illinois Tech is only a slightly smaller less delicious cupcake.  Both should be rested and ready for some challenging basketball.  Hope is down at least one,  possibly two starters.  I think you have to make NCC a pretty solid favorite but something tells me Hope might stay in this one and be in a position to take it late.  If not they probably get beaten sort of handily.

Why

November is the worst for me.  There isn't much about the whole month I even like.  Its colorless, dark and sometimes more miserably cold than even January or February, or at least it sometimes feels that way to me.  The only things that make it tolerable is the end of the football season and the changeover to basketball.  I'm convinced football is at its best in November, but that might be the mid-western kid in me who's spent most of his life watching the Big Ten and believing those old mantra's about November football.  Bo and Woody forever.

One of the last things my dad did before he passed away was put his cherished Michigan season tickets in my name.  I still kind of laugh at his hesitance to do so, I guess he thought I wouldn't let him use them or something but I made sure he knew I considered them his and if he wanted to take me to a couple games a year that would be cool with me.  Back then I lived in Holland and going to Michigan games was a little more of a chore, almost 6 hours of driving for me, depending on game times it wasn't uncommon for me to get home at 11pm.  So I wasn't interested in going all the time.

This year marked 40 years that someone from my family has sat in those same seats.  I can tell you the best coaches and best eye sights in the stadium are 85 rows up, its magnificent.   I talk with the people around me as if I've known them forever, even though I don't even know their names or anything more about them.  I only know they're there every cotton picken' maize and blue Saturday.

A few years ago the people in front of me asked about my Hope hat, turned out they had a son at Hope around the same time as me, and I knew him.  Smallest of small worlds  The man behind me has always had a beautiful voice and everyone around just lets him sing the National Anthem for us because trying to sing over that just wouldn't seem right.   His kids are roughly my age, and now his son sits in the 2 seats next to me and brings his kids, damn if we aren't all grown up.  On the other side is a couple from Wheaton, Illinois and I had a nice conversation with them about Wheaton athletics once upon a time.

Last year November gave me games with Nebraska and Ohio State to look forward too, I mean come on that's some kind of childhood dream.  This year, Northwestern and Iowa.  Talk about sucking the life out of you.  Those who know me, know I've grumbled about this years ticket package to no end, its probably been the worst I can remember.  The best team on the whole slate was Northwestern and everyone else is either not going to a bowl game or just barely.

It could be argued the marquee game was Michigan State and I won't disagree, but I hate that game and everything about it.  Its 3 and half hours of pure misery for me, even if they win I hate myself.  That's the growing up being a Michigan fan in Spartan territory in me.  They can never win by enough, and if they lose its just pure hating life for 12 months.

Hope Scrimmage and Attempted Depth Chart

 At this point things probably take a right turn and will become a little more Hope centric.


This past Friday I had a chance to attend the Hope scrimmage with St. Clair Community College from Port Huron.    St. Clair is known as the Skippers.

Yeah, that was my first thought.

Sorry buddy.


This was Hope's second and final scrimmage of the year, the first being the week before at Bethel College.  That didn't go well.  If you like message boards about teams you don't care about you can read what little was written about it here:  Go Bethel!   Not much to go on, but indeed also confirmed from people actually there.....ball handling was an issue.  Bethel won its first official game 121-63 over Holy Cross College, lost its second to Rio Grande 71-72 a couple days after the Hope scrimmage.  Bethel was at least a week ahead in the practice time department, probably 2 or 3 and about 2 days away from starting their season.   Not exactly an even fight.

The object of a scrimmage is of course to get some game action for your team and take a look at your personnel running your offense and defense against someone other than yourselves.  Winning is not important, or even scoring, but I kept score and broke it down into 5 minute segments which roughly matched the substitutions.  I didn't pay much attention to SCCC's lineup or rotations but they seemed to play the same 8-10 guys the majority of the time.

This particular scrimmage was two 20 minute halves with as normal of a game clock as possible, shot clock, 3 referees.  The only thing abnormal was the teams shot only one FT on foul shots to save some time.  The final session was 10 minutes with a running clock, Matt Neil chose to play mostly first year players during that time.

 A couple personnel notes:
Josh Holwerda 6-8 Sr.  did not play much, still recovering from finger injury
Chris Ray 6-5 Sr. did not play much, still recovering from foot surgery
Grant Neil 6-3 Jr.  did not play, just joined the team with the end of soccer season
Coltan Overway was probably not 100% recovering from illness

A Not So Brief Rundown of the Scrimmage

Hope started:
Coltan Overway  6-0  Sr.
Billy Seiler 6-2  Sr.
Stephen Whittenbach 6-4  So.
Nate Snuggerud 6-5  Sr.
Nate VanArendonk 6-10  Jr.

Whittenbach didn't play a lot of minutes last year and is new to the overall rotations, if you were asked to look on the floor to pick the new guy you really might have had a hard time picking one.  Stephen fit in quite well and looked very comfortable out there.  I would say I'm very comfortable with this lineup if it is the starting line-up Hope chooses to go with.

These five played almost all of the first 5 minutes together, it wasn't a rout but it was a we are comfortably much better than St. Clair period.  Hope 'won' it 18-7, St. Clair couldn't guard Snuggerud and couldn't handle Hope's height advantage for the most part.  The finishing around the basket wasn't the greatest.  Naturally, Nate VanArendonk picked up his first foul 1 minute 30 seconds into the proceedings, but no worries he did not pick up another one that I recall.

Substitutions in order of appearance:
Matt Parisi  5-11 So. for Whittenbach
Ben Gardner 5-11 Fr. for Overway
Brock Benson 6-8 Fr. for Van Arendonk
Caleb Byers 6-5 Jr. for Snuggerud
Corey McMahon 6-1 So. for Seiler

None of these guys were on Hope's roster a year ago.  These 5 came on the floor over a 1 minute or so period and played the majority of the next 5 minutes together which was, delicately put, ugly.  Positioning on the floor was exactly man-for-man substitutions.  Hope actually 'lost' this stretch 4-6, mostly because they had trouble making shots.  

The next 5 minutes the starting 5 returned with a brief mixing of players.  This was a rout, Hope 'won' it 16-1 mostly due to stronger defensive play and some great transition opportunities.

The final 5 was decidedly Hope's at 12-4.  Fr. Jordan Denham, Fr. Alex Eidson and Sr. Chase Demaagd made their first appearances during this stretch.  There really was no difference in play with the first time the non-starters played, they just made a few more shots.

After a brief break, the second half played much the same way as the first in terms of 'segments' with the exception the starting 5 only played the first 5 minutes, then it was different combinations of the other guys with Sr. Chris Ray and Sr. Josh Holwerda making short appearances.

The first 5 minutes of the 2nd half were probably not very pleasing to Matt Neil, a segment Hope struggled to score. He sent the starting 5 back on the floor for the final 5 minutes which they 'won' 14-3.   The energy was up and the fast break points happened quick.  Hope played a little zone defense for the first time, everything up to that point had been man-to-man from both teams.

The 10 minute running clock segment consisted of Hope using 3 different lineups, they were:

Group 1
Gardner
McMahon
Seiler
Benson
Van Arendonk

Group 2
Gardner
McMahon
Eidson
Ray
Benson

Group 3
Gardner
Denham
Parisi
DeMaagd
Byers

By this point everyone was pretty tired, including me so my recollection of the events isn't very clear though I was intrigued by the prospects of each group, particularly the first group.  The scoring for each group went 5-4, 4-4 and 8-4 before they shut things down for the day.  A pretty positive day for Hope I'd say or at least one where they felt a whole lot better than the week before.

Scoring broken down roughly by 5 minute intervals

18-7
4-6
16-1
12-4
50-18

5-4
14-7
14-10
14-3
47-24

Hope 97  St. Clair 42   Woo!

Individual Scoring
Snuggerud            16  -man among boys really
Seiler                    14  -tough baskets in close, couple 3's
Whittenbach          9  - fits
VanArendonk        8   -struggled to finish a little
Overway               6   -didn't quite look 100%

McMahon            15  -really good day shooting the ball, probably 4-5 from 3
Byers                     8  -good looking player, athletic, not an easy match-up at this level
Eidson                   6  
Gardner                 6  -probably going to shoot a lot of FT's in his Hope career
Denham                3
DeMaagd              3  -marriage hasn't killed his effort and will.....yet
Parisi                     2  -scored 8 in the final 10 minute running clock segment
Holwerda              2
Benson                  1  -showed a couple nice moves, just didn't finish, took 3 charges on defense
This adds up to    99  -it was my first scrimmage


Depth Charts and Stuff

The following was written over the course of 2 or 3 days, since its finishing Steve Whittenbach went down with a broken foot or ankle.  Obviously he'll be out for an extended time, at least January I imagine.  This is a blow because from all accounts and observations Steve had really worked himself into a good position to be a starter and a big contributor to this team.   What it does to the depth chart and starting line-up is not quite clear.  Hope probably just plugs McMahon or Parisi into the starting slot but I think they might give a bigger lineup a serious look.  Alex Eidson probably takes the final varsity slot.  Hope just lost one of its key top 6 or 7 players for an extended time which is never good.

 

Point Guard:
Coltan Overway  6-0 Sr.
Ben Gardner 6-0  Fr.
Jordan Denham 6-0 Fr.

Obviously Coltan's the guy here and will probably see 30 minutes per game, maybe even 35 if the two kids struggle a little bit.  I think Hope would prefer if they could give him some frequent rests for the long haul.  Given the ball handling troubles of the first scrimmage I wouldn't be surprised if both Gardner and Denham were instructed to watch their ball-handling in this game.  Neither made much of an offensive impression, mostly because between them there was probably only a couple jumpers taken and a couple layups.  Gardner looked most comfortable in traffic and getting to the lane, Denham seemed a little more passive on this day.  I've watched a little video of both and know they can shoot, it just wasn't on display in this setting.  You can tell both have been well coached to this point in their basketball lives, probably not the best opponent to make defensive judgements but it didn't worry me.

I'm sure they will each get a chance to solidify themselves as the #2 by league play, but honestly there doesn't appear to be much separation and it really could just come down to who plays with the most confidence.  Actual minutes played between now and January will vary based on opponent and how well Coltan keeps himself on the floor.


Two-guard, shooting guard, wandering base-line hermits:
Billy Seiler 6-2 Sr.
Steve Whittenbach 6-4 So.
Matt Parisi 5-11 So.
Corey McMahon 6-1 So.
Alex Eidson 6-2 Fr.

Seiler and Whittenbach are clearly the starters to me.  Whittenbach looked good out there, mobile, confident and played like a veteran to these eyes.  At 6-4 he has small forward height with a little guard mobility.  Billy Seiler has a 24 hour pass to the Hope weight room and uses it.  He looks like an OAC guard these days, plays physical like one.  Both of these two will be relied upon for some 3 point shooting and Seiler will probably get the tough defensive assignment every night.

It looked to me like Hope ran 3 guard sets almost exclusively with the 2nd and 3rd guards being pretty much interchangeable.   So all of these guys will probably play both spots.

McMahon and Parisi are both good 3 point shooters, on this day McMahon had the better day.  But I bet if you watched them for a week a different guy would be better each day.  They are very close.  McMahon has a very quick release, Parisi probably has a little better range.  I'm not sure either will supplant the other and probably both will see equal playing time.  Alex Eidson is probably going to be a varsity/JV guy and will be up and down as the schedule dictates.  He might have just been up with the varsity with Neil playing soccer but I could see him fitting on this roster if there was space.   I didn't get enough of a read defensively to know where any of these 3 stand but there were no obvious defensive breakdowns that I saw.


Small Forward or the three, when they don't go w/3 guards
Chris Ray 6-6 Sr.
Grant Neil 6-3 Jr.
Chase DeMaagd 6-3 Sr.

Chase was the only one who really played much in the scrimmage.  He will probably still get spotty minutes as the situations and circumstances dictate.  Chris Ray was an important 10-15 minutes guy before he broke his foot at the end of the year.  His length and mid-range jumper was quite valuable, I'd really like to see him get back to 100%.  All 3 can probably play the 4 if Hope wished to go small.


Power Forward or the four
Nate Snuggerud 6-5 Sr.
Caleb Byers 6-5 Jr.

There is five pounds difference between these two, Caleb being a slightly more athletic build and athletic player.  Caleb comes over from Spring Arbor University where he was a pretty solid player.  I think as the season goes on Hope fans may come to love his presence on this team.

What a nice option to give Snuggerud a little rest.  Last year Hope lost 20 to 30 lbs in bulk when Nate went out of the game, that won't happen much this year.  Honestly I can see moments when Matt Neil would be tempted to play both on opposite blocks with or without a center and him laughing maniacally in approval.  This is probably the one spot on the roster Hope might be a touch thin, some creativity might be in order if fouls become a problem.

For the most part though, I'd expect man for man substitutions.  I don't think it will take long for Caleb to get settled into this team.


Center
Nate Van Arendonk  6-10, Jr.
Josh Holwerda  6-8, Sr.
Brock Benson  6-8, Fr.

Nate Van Arendonk is the firm starter and he needs to stay on the floor as much as possible.  His height and bulk is just immense at this level.  With the other Nate probably getting a little more defensive attention this Nate is going to get a few more offensive opportunities I would imagine.

Behind Nate is Josh Holwerda who really played well at the end of last season, if that can carry over to this season Hope's in business in the post.  Brock will get a chance to play and could provide valuable cover for Nate's foul trouble, which will happen at some point.  Brock has a nice frame already, he'll be a fun one to watch as he gets more comfortable with this level. He is certainly going to play for this team.  In the scrimmage he took 3 nice charges, made 2 or 3 good post moves but just didn't finish the play and also seemed to have a good eye for rebounding.   The best thing for Brock is he can kind of grow slowly into the position as Hope won't be forcing him to "be the man" like he might have had to at other D3 programs.  Look for moments when he slides down to the four when Hope wants to go 'big'.

The prospect of being able to play 40 minutes with a capable 6-8 or bigger center on the floor at all times is very exciting.  Its not often a D3 team can go 6-10, 6-8 at center and then get deeper in the off-season but Hope managed this.  Certainly though there will be times when Hope will want to go small for defensive purposes.

What to take away from all of this

Well for one thing the depth chart looks a whole lot better to me now that I've seen everyone in person.  Coach Neil has legitimately got 15 guys he could play, so options abound.  From those they'll be able to pair things down to a more manageable 10, 11 or so come conference play.  Here in early November its just really difficult to see or know how that will work out.  It seems kind of weird to say but with so many players being so equal at the guard spots and Hope adding one player at each of the post positions, Hope could actually end up being a little deeper than last years team.  Exciting right?

Really when you look at it, Hope has to feel pretty good about its starting five and then its a matter of building some depth around that.  The key will be getting all of those guys the right minutes and experience.  That will take time.

My biggest concern with this team is 3-point shooting, while the scrimmage helped allay those fears a little, I'm sure there will be times of inconsistency as there always is with young players.  But wow, being able to stretch a defense just a little with Hope's front line could be deadly. 

Defensively there just isn't anything to take away from this game, St. Clair is a community college, its just not great competition for any D3 squad or at least shouldn't be.  St. Clair's offense just looked kind of pointless to me, either they were massively intimidated by Hope, just didn't have much of a clue what they were doing or were just totally over-matched.  A vote for all 3 maybe.  We won't know much about the younger players defensively until probably through the Hall of Fame Classic or Wheaton/Carthage games.


The Grain of Salt

Very easy to let things get to rose colored when you club a team by 50, but I came away pretty pleased with what I saw.  There is still a ton of work to do and I'm quite sure this team will look completely different 2 months from now and that is part of the excitement of a new season.

On Allen Iverson's list of game importance, a scrimmage ranks just above practice.  Which Allen is not fond of discussing.

1.  Games I score a lot of points
2.  Games I play in
3.  Games I don't play in
4.  Exhibition Games
5.  Scrimmage
6.  Practice

I still love this clip

So yeah, grains of salt