Hope Tournament Review

Chaos

My only plan for watching the Hope Tournament was to head over to Holland if Illinois Wesleyan were to play Hope.  The best laid plans were thrown aside when a winter storm blew through the Great Lakes and made travel around me pretty dangerous or at least risky.  NOAA gives names to its winter storms now and I have no idea what this one was called but around me it might have been  "damn the power is out again".  I live near what turned out to be the northern fringes of the heaviest of the freezing rain and icing.  I spent my Saturday night listening to the forest in the back yard crash to the ground and watching the man made lightning show of power transformers blowing up light up the sky.   I and a few dozen of my neighbors were the lucky ones who really didn't lose power except for a brief 30 minutes on Sunday as they "untangled some lines" as I was told.

The affects on me personally were pretty minimal in the greater scope of what has been going on around me for the past week other than missing a much anticipated basketball game.  I still have power and most importantly heat.  Others as close as within a very short walking distance have been without power and heat for the entire weak.   Simple things like going to the store, restaurant or even crossing town became epic adventures of chaos and patience.  The usual long lines, frayed nerves of the last few days before Christmas were compounded by last weekends storm.  Its the worst I can recall since my early childhood and that's what the local "experts" are saying as well.

The result of all of the icy mess is I've spent a week neglecting to finish these write-ups, if you want to call them that.   By now most of my immediate thoughts following those games have disappeared from my head so this 'review' will be mostly of the stats variety.  (heads-up:  a lot of them will be like that this year)


Friday:  Hope 78  Lake Forest 66

Lake Forest came into this weekend 3-4 on the season with wins over 0-10 Dominican, 5-3 Ripon and 1-9 Monmouth.  They are at least as young or younger than Hope.

Efficiency:

Estimated number of possessions:  Hope 69  Lake Forest 71


Offensively Efficiency:  112.47

I would take this all year. 

Defensive Efficiency:  93.25

I would also take this.  Keeping in mind Lake Forest hit two pretty meaningless 3's in the games waning moments, without those this would be under 90, which is excellent.  Lake Forest is no world beater, probably heading to the bottom half of the Midwest Conference but isn't this exactly what you would expect a good Hope team to do against this kind of opponent?

Rebounding Efficiency:

Hope:  40.5% of available offensive rebounds
Lake Forest: 28.1% of available offensive rebounds

A pretty significant advantage and led to an 11-4 advantage on the scoreboard in 2nd chance points.  Without looking I think this is Hope's best effort of the year.

Game Score:

3rd star-  Jordan Gipson, Lake Forest 9.0

2nd star-  Grant Neil, Hope 9.1
Early second half scoring was the catalyst to Hope building a commanding lead

1st star-   Josh Irving, Lake Forest  16.4

In all, this was not a game in which individual efforts stood out especially from Hope's side which turned in a very balanced scoring sheet.  I would like to have been there to see if my personal observation meshed with this statistical one.   Hope's McMahon, Eidson, Blackledge, Benson and Lake Forest's Torey Davis score just over 8's.



Saturday:  Illinois Wesleyan 91  Hope 83

Illinois Wesleyan came into this one 8-1 with a whole slew of convincing wins and just the one curious road loss at Loras.  The Titans were ranked #3 in the latest D3hoops.com poll.  Prior to this one the closest win IWU had had was 9 points the night before over Wilmington.

Efficiency:

Estimated number of possessions:  Hope 76  Illinois Wesleyan 74

This was a pretty uptempo game, at least as far as number of possessions is concerned

Offensively Efficiency:  108.64

Considering the opponent I think this is pretty good.  I neglected to check what IWU had allowed prior to this game on a game-by-game basis.  From the score alone it was probably pretty close to the highest.  I think Hope has played 5 really good teams so far, UWSP, UWW, Cornerstone, Wheaton, IWU.  This was Hope's best offensive performance thus far against these 5 teams.

Defensive Efficiency:  122.72

Eventually to beat teams of IWU's caliber you have to be better at providing defensive resistance.  Against those same 5 teams as above this is actually right in the middle of the 5 performances but its well over the 90-95 you get from the best defensive teams, getting this down to 100 gives you a chance to win these games.  IWU is a very good shooting team at over 50% from the floor for the season.  Typically those kinds of teams have very strong front lines that kind of pad the numbers a bit with a lot of easy layups, in IWU's case its just a team full of guys who can shoot the basketball very well.  Their 12-26 performance from the arc testifies to that and against Hope's 3-15 effort was the clearest difference in the game.

Rebounding Efficiency:

Hope:  26.3% of available offensive rebounds
Lake Forest: 23.1% of available offensive rebounds

Pretty even on the glass with regards to offensive rebounding with Hope holding an 8-3 second chance points advantage.  For the game IWU was +5 in rebounding overall mostly because Hope took 17 more shots from the floor.  But, at halftime Hope was +5 in rebounding which means IWU enjoyed a substantial +10 on the glass in the second half, no doubt a big reason a tie game at halftime went to a one time 11 point lead for the Titans.

Game Score:

3rd star-  Victor Davis, Illinois Wesleyan 13.7

2nd star-  Ben Gardner, Hope 14.4

1st star-   Andrew Ziemik, Illinois Wesleyan  21.6
21 points, 14 rebounds, 5 assists.  No player in the game had a bigger influence.

Hope's Caleb Byers saw his first real significant action of the season contributing 14 points in a very good effort.  Hopefully Caleb has recovered enough from his foot injury that this kind of production becomes consistent.  I think Hope's missed him a little more than we might think.  Look for Caleb to possibly crack into the starting 5 before the MIAA season begins with Blackledge becoming one of the first subs.

Going Forward: 

With 8 games in the books Hope is 3-5 with 5 losses to teams that about 95% of Division 3 would also have 5 losses against.  It gets significantly easier from here though with the only ranked opponents remaining being Calvin and possibly at some point Centre.   What we do know is that Hope isn't one of D3's elite and that's probably not a shocker.  We also know a very young Hope team has shown it can compete with some of D3's best for the majority of games......and that gets you a 3-5 record.  After these 8 games you'd like to see some improvement and I think its there, it just might be difficult to see.

Hope heads to Crestview Hills, KY on Monday/Tuesday to play Centre and Thomas More.  Centre is a fringe top 25 program with numerous tournament appearances over the years.  This year they look like that same kind of program and will face Hope with a 6-2 record against teams I know little about.  Thomas More you may remember from last year as having a sparkling record and being the team that blocked others with better resumes from being considered for the D3 tournament.  Thomas More has a new coach and new scheduling idea that has pitted them against some of the best programs in the Great Lakes Region.  They are 2-7 and probably just as good as last year.

In the grand scheme of NCAA tournament selection things, these are must win games for Hope.  In the grander scheme of Hope becoming a better team and program these are also the kinds of games you'd like to see Hope win and pick up a little momentum for the MIAA season.

Up Next:   Me vs I spent my holidays with power and heat guilt

Dec 30  vs Centre College at Thomas More, KY
Dec 31  @ Thomas More, KY

A peak at Efficiencies

(it occurred to me later I never mentioned this was a look at just the Great Lake Region teams.)

We're just about a quarter of the way through the regular season already so I thought I'd bust out the efficiency calculations.  There is some 'noise' in these numbers for a few more weeks.  The 'noise' referring to teams that have played fewer games than others, teams that have played significantly tough or weak schedules, huge blowouts tend to inflate numbers a bit more early in the season etc.

Top 5 offensive teams:
1.  Calvin                    121.14
2.  Wittenberg             120.19
3.  Marietta                 117.71
4.  St. Vincent             115.04
5.  Kalamazoo              113.75

These will come down some as the season progresses.   MIAA fans might be interested to know Adrian ranks dead last in the region and its not even close.  Adrian's current 82.94 offensive efficiency rating would be the lowest in the last 11 years of data from the league.  More on them later.


Top 5 defensive teams:
1.  Bethany                   88.12
2.  DePauw                   90.2
3.  PSU-Behrend            90.64
4.  Carnegie-Mellon        90.70
5.  Wooster                   91.93

I'm not sure I totally buy these.  Bethany, Behrend and Carnegie have played pretty weak schedules.  I can sort of buy DePauw but they've lost to 3 of the 4 good teams they've played.  I don't think these numbers are truly representative of those 4 teams.

more ratings after you click read more

MIAA/CCIW Challenge: and the challenge to make sense of it all

Friday:
Wheaton 80  Hope 61
Carthage 74  Calvin  68

....then the world turned upside down, water flowed uphill, hot was cold, left was right, Michigan State went to the Rose Bowl

Saturday:
Hope 80  Carthage 58
Calvin 78  Wheaton 51

We've done this 10 times now and I think in most years all 4 of these squads came in with some question marks and in most years we left with a pretty clear or at least a more clear understanding where they all stood.  This year, I don't know, did we really learn anything other than if you play well you win, if you don't, you lose?

This same kind of 4 way split happened in 2009-10, those games were quite a bit closer with only one decided by more than a few possessions.  I don't remember what the overall conclusion was but it couldn't have been as perplexing as this past weekend.

What I think I saw was 4 pretty talented basketball teams in various stages of development.  Two of these teams had disappointing efforts on Friday and came out determined to play better on Saturday.  Two of these teams are probably going to the post-season without much trouble. Two others will spend large parts of this year with the dreaded "lots of potential" tag that at some point they'd like to reach.  None of these teams should have blown anyone out but 3 of them did, none of them should have been blown out but 3 of them were.  None of them should have worn 8 year old uniforms but one of them did.   

The MIAA fanboy in me can't help but feel a little relieved that something was salvaged from what was looking like a pretty rough weekend that definitively was saying to the league, 'you guys suck'.  We might still suck as a league, but it sure feels a lot better after Saturday than it might have.

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Hall of Fame Review

I watched a football game.  Hope basketball was the furthest thing from my mind.

Yep. You and me both Devin.

Hope  69  Aquinas  67
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Hope registered their first win with a 7-point come from behind rally in the last 6 minutes of this game on Friday.  Hope trailed for most it, struggled to shoot the ball well for all but about 2 minutes of it.  Aquinas really only had one chance to push the lead higher than 8, most of it was played in the less than 5 point range.   Both teams made plays down the stretch and the likely difference was AQ's three turnovers in the last few 4 minutes.  One allowed Hope to close a 4 point gap to 1, one allowed Hope to take the lead, one thwarted a last chance to win.   Critical miscue's or great plays in a close game.

click for the math

Four Things

This was part of a larger project I had in mind that I scraped a couple times over the summer.  I believe these are 4 areas that kept Hope from being a little better team a year ago. 


Four Things To Watch:

Starting 5:

A year ago Hope used 11 different starters not counting 2 more for Senior Day, 8 different combinations and only using the same lineup consecutively 6 times in a 27 game schedule.  Only one player logged more than 20 starts.  You could say continuity was a problem.  Some was injury or illness related, some performance and a lot of it was sorting through a lineup that seemed to refuse to separate itself.  Hope really never found a consistency here until almost February then had to start over when Colton Overway went down to injury.

In the Grand Valley exhibition two weeks ago Hope used Gardner, McMahon, Eidsen, Blackledge, VanArendonk.  I would be perfectly content with this lineup all year.  Most likely Caleb Byers will return in Blackledge's place and unless Nate VanArendonk can stay out of foul trouble I wouldn't be too surprised if Benson took over the starting spot at some point.

I've never been too convinced that a starting 5 is really all that important as opposed to finding a best 5 overall, best 5 offense, best 5 defense.  But having a consistent starting 5 certainly would lead you to believe there's a consistency to the lineups, substitutions and rotations.  If you're constantly juggling your starting 5, you probably aren't very sure of the rest of your lineup either.


Fouls:

Hope likes to foul.  There its been said.  Last year Hope racked up 536 personal fouls, that was good for #357 in D3 out of 406 teams.  The previous two years Hope ranked 268 and 267.  Well above the D3 average in all 3 years.  Its hard to quantify this in wins and losses terms and it may not make a difference at all.  For Hope its been the stubborness, in a good way, of being reluctant to give up easy shots in the paint.  Hope seems perfectly content to make you earn it from the stripe.

I think this is a fine philosophy as long as your team is getting its fair share of fouls and free-throws at the other end.  Last year they totaled 703 attempts, or 124 more than opponents, nearly 6 more per game.  That was the most attempts since 1998 and on a per game basis probably the most in at least 2 or 3 decades.  The NCAA doesn't keep stats or rankings on how many FT's you give up but it was 579 attempts for Hope opponents.  I'm sure that would be up there.  When Hope's propensity to foul could hurt them is if these frequencies flip and Hope shoots fewer ft's than their opponents, that's only happened once in the last 13 seasons and 3 in the last 20.

With this years rule changes we'll probably see more fouls and more free-throws.  I think with Hope's seemingly increased front line depth and a PG that enjoys driving the lane the FT advantage should still be comfortably in Hope's favor.  More than likely though, Hope's going to be facing foul trouble for someone in nearly every game.

Actual FT Percentage:

Hope had 10 games last year where they shot below the D3 average at the line.  Shooting the D3 average probably nets you one more win and an overtime game with Wheaton.

Last year Hope shot 70.7%, this is above average......and repeat that 100 times.  Hope was a good FT shooting team last year, good, not great, just good.  I'm reasonably optimistic Hope will be a very good FT shooting team this winter.  Of the guys who return from last years team they collectively shot 83%, even taking into account the addition of the new players I think this still stays well above 70%.


Turnovers:

Last year Hope was #8 in the MIAA in turnovers per game, on the national level that was tied for #220 or right about in the middle of D3.  For whatever reason MIAA teams really don't turn the ball over  with 7 of 8 teams ranked in the top half of D3.   Within its league, Hope could be better but it might have only resulted in one more win last year.

One thing Hope has always seemed to be good at is creating turnovers.  Unfortunately the NCAA doesn't keep track of your opponents turnovers.    All we have is turnover margin where Hope was a +1.59 per game which was good for #103 in D3.  More than likely Hope was a top 75 or better turnover creating team. 

Even taking into consideration pace of play, Hope's turnovers rate was 20% or 1 in 5 possessions resulted in a turnover.  I think that's a little high.  Trine had the best turnover rate in the league at 15% or 1 in 6.  I'm not sure how much improvement is necessary to move the win needle, but I'd like to see Hope close that 5% gap between themselves and Trine.


3 point shooting:

The elephant in the room.  Hope was not a good 3-point shooting team last season.  They ranked solidly in the bottom half of D3 in both number of 3's made and percentage.  Their 32.4% from beyond the line was the teams lowest since the introduction of the shot in 1987.  Their 129 made 3's was the 2nd fewest since the early 90's when teams were much more selective in the 3-point attempts.  Hope's two fewest 3-points shots made years have come in the last two years.

The 3-point shot has been at its current length since 2009, certainly part of the decline can be attributed to that.  But even moving the line back another foot has only resulted in a 1/2 made 3 decline per game across D3.  Hope's been under the 6.3 made 3's average now two years running, after years of being above it.

Last season Hope had 10 games where they shot below 30% from beyond the arc.  Collectively those 10 games resulted in shooting 18%.  Dreadful!  Hope was a pretty solid 41.1% in its other games.  I'm sure most teams break down to something similar, but I think even shooting a still below average 30% in those other ten games gets you 3 more wins.

The other side of this coin is 3-point shooting defense.  Hope wasn't very good there either giving up the 3 at a 37.3% clip.  That ranked #374 in D3 out of 406 teams, slightly ahead of Finlandia.  The resulting difference on offense and defense was a margin of -39 3-point shots, almost 120 points on the season.

I think Hope has more options from beyond the arc than last year.  Blackledge, Stuive and Brushwyler are all capable 3-point shooters.  Those are tall guys that can shoot the 3 and Hope hasn't really had that in their arsenal for a few years now.  The guards Gardner, McMahon, Eidsen, Otto and Denham have to improve on their collective 31.5% average from last season.  What might be more important is Hope improving their perimeter defense and closing that -39 margin to something positive.

The Wisconsin Double

Hope tackled one of the toughest road trips you could even think up this weekend traveling to Wisconsin for games with UW-Whitewater and UW-Stevens Point on back-to-back nights.  Both of those teams are nationally ranked, and will probably remain so through the season.  They were certainly heavy underdogs on both nights and the final scores probably played out about as you would expect.

Whitewater 83  Hope 70
Stevens Point 82  Hope 62

In both cases Hope played good, maybe even great first halves.  As the second halves played out both nights the Dutchmen seemed to crumble under the weight of little things like foul trouble, rebounding, turnovers at the wrong times and probably a healthy lack of defense.  Both games featured a short spurt of time in which the opponent asserted themselves and grabbed what turned into insurmountable leads.  Against Whitewater it was a 4 point deficit at 6 minutes that was 11 less than 3 minutes later.  Against Point it was a 6 point game with 14 to play that 2 minutes later was 12, and a further 2 minutes was 18.  In each case Hope wasn't able to mount any kind of comeback once control had been established.

One of the things I learned last year doing this blog is that its really hard to write a game recap on a game you didn't see and only marginally easier for one you saw on video.  So this is all I have for the game rundown.

for efficiencies and stuff, click

GVSU 90 Hope 84

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First Impressions:

Looking at rosters and concocting all sorts of crazy ways to measure a teams youth and experience is one thing,  but there is no substitute for seeing first hand just how young of a team Hope really is.  It should be stated the Dutchmen played this one without two Sr's where at least one would likely start and contribute significant chunks of minutes and a third Sr. spent 27 of 40 sitting on the bench with foul trouble, and actually 9 of those 13 played in foul trouble.  It was Jr. Corey McMahon and his merry bunch of underclassmen going toe to toe with a pretty decent if not good D2 squad.  Afterwards they had a juice box, cookies and a long nap.

Putting youth aside for a minute, the Dutchmen can play or at least they can on nights when they shoot the ball well like this one.  If you bother to read the local sports write-ups or watch Allan Babbit's post-game interview (a nice addition to the Hope website) you'll hear Coach Neil say some form of the word compete about a half-dozen times.  Compete they did, and fight to the bitter end.

If you walked in on this game without knowing it was Nov 14 or that it was an exhibition you would swear you were watching a mid-season contest.  It played with that kind of energy and intensity and substitution wise, exactly like you'd expect a regular season game to play out, from both sides.  I could come up with all sorts of tidbits to drive that point home but nothing does it more for me than GVSU's best player Ryan Sabin logging 39 minutes.  That doesn't happen in a normal exhibition.

This isn't to say this was a barn burner all the way, far from it.  GVSU had a couple of opportunities to lay the hammer blow down but failed to do so.  Twice they squandered big leads letting Hope back into the contest, which not by coincidence happen to be the moments Hope played their best at both ends of the floor.  In the end I think 6 points is a little bit of a blushing score for Hope, it didn't feel that close, or look that close.  Hope made some steals and shots down the stretch to narrow the margin.  But........

..with 5 minutes left down 6, Ben Gardner launches a 3 from the right wing that looks good all the way and rattles out, GVSU comes down runs their offense and PG Rob Woodson nails a 3 from just about the same spot on the floor, then the Lakers steal the ball on Hope's next possession and after a timeout run a simple play for an easy 2.  In a little over a minute a game heading for 3 points went to 11.    So yes there was a small chance for something special.

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2014 MIAA Schedules

A look at this years MIAA schedules

A couple things to note.  Asterisks represent "in-region" games as defined by Great Lakes Region teams, Administrative Region or the 200 mile rule.

The point scale is using massey ratings from last year and a super secret weighting system I cannot divulge.  Its the same as I used last year and is open to the flawed logic of applying last years results to this years teams.   Its not meant to be accurate, just give a general idea of schedule strength.


Adrian

Nov 15  vs John Carroll* @ Allegheny
Nov 16  @ Allegheny*
Nov 20  @ Franklin*
Nov 26  Siena Heights
Nov 30  Marygrove
Dec  1   @ UM-Dearborn
Dec  7   Carnegie Mellon*
Dec 18  @ Concordia, MI
Dec 21  Lawrence Tech
Dec 28  @ Mount Union*
Dec 29  vs Hiram* at Mt. Union

Best Opponent and Why:  Mt. Union, the Purple Raiders are coming off a 11-15 season that saw them come a heartbreaking loss away from winning the OAC Tournament Championship.  They would do well to crack the OAC top 4 and are probably the posh pick to do so.  They may not live up to those expectations but should still be within the middle few places of the OAC.  A close second here would be John Carroll who have similar expectations to Mt. Union.

Worst Opponent and Why:  Lawrence Tech.  The Blue Devils went 3-27 last year in their first year back from 40 years of non-existence.  This year they have 11 players on the roster all of them underclassmen and are choosing to red-shirt their only 2 returning Sr's.   Believe it or not UM-Dearborn is picked below LTU in the WHAC poll.  I find that hard to believe so I've gone with the Blue Devils, but really you could pick any of Adrian's WHAClicious opponents and probably be in the ballpark.

Overall impression:  This schedule isn't much different than last season minus a top program like Wooster.  None of these teams will win their conference or make their respective national post-season tournaments unless lightning strikes and they win their AQ.  JCU, Franklin, Mt. Union, Hiram have been no better than middle of their conference programs the last couple years with Allegheny, Carnegie solidly in the bottom of theirs.  For the second year in a row Adrian is going to tackle the likely bottom four teams from the WHAC and receive not much of a challenge in doing so. Regardless of graduation losses or attrition this is a schedule Adrian should do well against, its just probably not going to tell you much about them as a team.  Very weak and to me not befitting of a program with Adrian's ambitions.

On my scale of 100,  43.6
2013:  52.7
2012:  58

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Hope Roster Reveal

Hope revealed its 2013-14 roster on Thursday:
http://athletics.hope.edu/sports/mbkb/2013-14/roster

There were 6 roster spots open from graduation and a chance that a couple of others wouldn't return, which left the Dutchmen up to 8 spots to fill.   They chose to leave 2 potential spots open which could mean 1 of 2 things.  1)  There is still competition for the final two spots among a couple of the JV players  2)  Hope opts for a smaller bench which isn't a bad thing considering the difficulty they had sorting out last years bench.  I tend to think #1 is the answer, though I have nothing to back that up.

The "Knowns":

G  Ben Gardner--captain
G  Alex Eidsen
G  Jordan Denham
G  Corey McMahon
F  Grant Neil--captain
F  Caleb Byers--captain
C  Nate VanArendonk--captain
C  Brock Bensen

Collectively this group makes up 6 of last years top 9 in the rotation.  The exceptions are Denhem and McMahon who saw minutes in spots but really never became parts of the regular rotations.  Both saw increased minutes after Colton Overway's injury, but I think there isn't much body of work between them to make any guesses on their contributions this season.  For now I think the 6 of Gardner, Eidsen, Neil, Byers, VanArendonk, Bensen will make up the core of this team. 

The "Unknowns":

G  Chad Carlson
G  Cody Campbell
F  Sam Otto
F  Cody Stuive
F  Keith Brushwyler
F  Harrison Blackledge

Sam Otto, from about 2 years ago

Hope brings in 5 guys new to the varsity this season which is actually 2 less first year players than a year ago.  I've got Cody Campbell here since he wasn't on last years team and played so little on the 2012 team.  Sam Otto comes up from the JV and its here that I really wish I could offer up some observation other than he's your prototypical long, lean Hope guard (even though he's listed as a F).

Keith Brushwyler

Chad Carlson, who I will likely call Jeff at least a hundred times

Chad Carlson and Keith Brushwyler were both fairly highly rated high school Sr's within the State of Michigan and if you believe the recruiting rumors both were getting attention from schools that hand out scholarships.  Both were a part of high school teams that played for State Championships in different divisions as high school Juniors.   Carlson in Class A, Brushwyler in Class B.  Both earned all-state honors as Seniors.

Harrison Blackledge

Harrison Blackledge is Hope's first Ohio varsity player in a couple decades, he was Third Team All-Ohio in Division I and First Team All-Ohio in academics.  The equivalent basketball award in Michigan would be Third Team Class A, I'm not sure there's ever been an MIAA player with that honor from Class A.  Cody Stuive is a somewhat unknown to me from Hudsonville but looks to be your typical long, lean West Michigan Dutch kid, and according to the roster has grown a couple inches this summer.


Who didn't return:

G  Matt Parisi, JR --  Matt was one of the 3 guys vying for playing time last season at the 2 guard spot.  Early in the year he played some but that quickly dwindled once Eidsen established himself and saw very few minutes in league play

G/F  Steve Wittenbach, JR --  Steve was getting quite a bit of hype last fall and then suffered a severe ankle sprain before the season began.  He never fully recovered and his minutes were spotty at best as the team struggled to find themselves.  However his absence is still a surprise.

Surprise addition:

G  Cody Campbell, SR --  Cody played JV his Freshmen year and made the varsity squad in 2012 appearing in 16 games, mostly in mop up minutes.  I don't recall exactly but injury or illness played a part in both his low playing time in 2012 and absence from last years team.

Surprise JV'ers:

F Ryan Skowronek and G Sasha Yonov --  both were JV players last year and are again listed on the JV this year along with 2 other Sophomores who are new to Hope.  These two with Otto seemed the most likely to get a look at varsity and with the other 2 Sophomores on the JV roster it gives me reason to think maybe there's still some competition for a final spot or two.  But again I have nothing but my instincts to base that on.  I think there's a chance one of these two will sit on the bench for various varsity games.


Arm Twisting Starting 5 and depth chart:

Starting 5 would likely be Gardner, Eidsen, Neil, Byers, VanArendonk.  I am 100% positive it will not be that. This "depth chart" is really just guesses since I haven't actually seen many of these guys play yet.

Point Guards:  Gardner, Denham, Carlson, Campbell
I'm not sure about Campbell here and honestly Denham and Gardner can both play the 2.  Either Denham, Carlson or Campbell could see extended PG minutes if Hope uses a lot of 3 guard sets and moves Gardner over.

Two Guards:  Eidsen, McMahon, Otto
Even though Otto is listed as a F, he could play here as a big guard or the 3 in my estimation.  Hope will certainly utilize Gardner as the two guard at times and I think Denham could probably play here a little as well.  This is the greatest position of production need, particularly from behind the arc.

Three:   Neil, Eidsen, Otto maybe McMahon
Neil probably starts here with the interchange likely being between he and Otto.  Eidsen plays here in 3 guard looks.  I could see Hope going real small and moving either Otto or Neil to the four with both on the floor or in the 3 guard sets.

Four:  Byers, Brushwyler, Blackledge, Stuive.  Small lineups include Neil and Otto here.
While lacking in experience its nice to see good depth here.  Not enough info to know how versatile any of these guys can be but if both Van Arendonk and Bensen can't go at the 5, Brushwyler or Blackledge could slide down.  It would be wonderful if one of these guys could play the 3 and Hope go with a "big" lineup.

Five:  VanArendonk, Bensen
Its pretty much these two or go "small", but most likely one of these two is on the floor for 25 to 30 minutes between them.

Freshmen:

Below is all of the Freshmen who've made Hope's varsity roster since 1993.  You might notice a high concentration within the last couple years.  Hope is carrying 8 varsity Freshmen over these two years the most at any time in the last 20+ years by a lot.

14  Blackledge, Brushwyler, Carlson, Stuive
13  Benson, Gardner, Eidsen, Denham
12  Wittenbach
11  ---
10  Snugeruud, Holwerda, Mysliwiec

09  Krombeen, King
08  Bowser, Tanis, Carter, Sharples
07  Kratz
06  Reimink
05  ---
04  Cramer, Richardson, P. Overbeek
03  J. Carlson, Phillips
02  Griffeth, Immink, Veldt, Spaman, Kleersnyder
01  Taylor
00  C. Carlson, Bauman, Hoogewind

99  Doty
98  Sporck
97  Canaan, Bray
96  Davelaar, Stegeman, Vander Slice
95  Holstege
94  Whitford, Brown, Gortsema, Muhlenberg
93  Bosma

How Young?

Pretty young.  Nine underclassmen.  There are 11 guys on this team with 1 year or less of varsity college basketball.   

There a several ways to represent the age or experience of your squad.  I'll use 4 different ways here:

Average class

This is simply assigning a numerical value to class.  4=Sr.  3=Jr  2=So  1=Fr and dividing by the number of roster players.  This years Hope team comes in at 2.36

As you'll see below this lands the 2014 Dutchmen as Hope's youngest team by class in the last decade.  The years in bold were regular season MIAA Championship teams.  I'll carry that through on all the charts below.  For the record I have the 2014 team as the 2nd youngest by this measure in the last 20 years behind only Hope's 2002 team which averaged out at 2.21

2014	2.36
2010	2.43
2009	2.53
2013	2.69
2006	2.75
2008	2.80
2005	2.81
2011	2.87
2012	2.87
2007	2.93

Average number of letters returning

This is the total number of letters won by returning players divided by the roster.  For instance Grant Neil has 2 letters, Brock Benson 1 and so on.  This 2014 team returns 11 total letters won for an average of .787

2009	0.67
2010	0.71
2014	0.79
2007	0.87
2008	0.93
2006	0.94
2013	1.06
2012	1.20
2011	1.27
2005	1.31

Its not the least experienced, but its right there with the '09 and '10 teams.  The least experience in terms of letters returning in the last 20 years was again the 2002 team with just 9 letters won on a roster of 14.

Percentage of the roster with letters

This is the number of players who've earned a letter divided by total number on the roster.  The 2014 team has 9 players or .643 of the team has a letter

2006	0.438
2009	0.467
2013	0.563
2010	0.571
2007	0.600
2008	0.600
2005	0.625
2014	0.643
2012	0.667
2011	0.733

Despite the overall youth of the team it has a relatively high number of players with varsity experience.  I would consider that a positive.  The team at the top of this list strangely had the lowest percentage of varsity players with letters.  You might remember despite being very good the '06 team had a number of transfers.  I only counted letters won at Hope, that was certainly a more experienced team than these numbers represent.


Percentage of underclassmen

Number of underclassmen divided by roster size.  This 2014 team has 9 underclassmen for a percentage of .643

2014	0.643
2009	0.533
2005	0.500
2010	0.500
2011	0.467
2006	0.438
2013	0.438
2008	0.353
2012	0.333
2007	0.267

2014 is also the second highest number in the last 20 years.  Only the 2001 team that had 10 underclassmen had a higher ratio.

Conclusion to draw:

By just about any measure not related to varsity experience its a young team, one you might even be able to categorize as very young.  For its overall youth though it does return a high level of varsity experience that most teams of equal youth probably wouldn't have.  But, you have my permission to call the 2014 Dutchmen a very young basketball team and one of its youngest in the last couple decades. 

Everything in perspective though, this probably won't even be the youngest team in this years MIAA.

First Week

Where are we?

A wonderful summertime destination

The appropriate snarky answer to this is always 'Earth', the more immediate and subject matter relevant answer is about 2 days into a new season of basketball.  Since I left you last spring I haven't done much or really felt like doing much with this blog.  I tried writing a couple things but they ended up virtually crumpled up in the virtual waste basket.  When I started this idea about 18 months ago I really was only committing to trying it for one year.  I did that, it went ok.  What I've found is a new level of respect for people who do this on a daily basis.  It can be, and was at times, pretty draining even to the point where you wonder if what you're doing is really worth the efforts.

I am not a writer by trade or education, it is something I found along the way that made it easier for me to both organize my thoughts and remember them.  I am actually not very good at either of those things, a picture of my brain might look something like this:

that could be my monitor, sadly I am not exaggerating

Writing this blog revealed a few things about me that I didn't particularly like.  One is the number of just ridiculously simple spelling and grammatical errors I catch myself making.  It is often times something I can't control or stop from happening, it is simply the continued deterioration of a brain I will have to learn to deal with.  Believe me I don't enjoy editing something 4 times and still finding errors that I didn't see the first 4 times anymore than you like finding them (unless you're a Calvin grad then you probably do like finding them).


None of the many things I can think of sound like a good enough reason to just shut things down completely.  I do like having a place to compose thoughts and other non-sense away from the clutter of what is a less and less enjoyable message board experience.

Where are we going? 

setting course in a general...that way direction

I'm not sure I've completely decided how I will handle this year on this blog.  By the end of last season I was pretty tired and worn out, I don't necessarily blame blogging for that but it was probably a contributing factor given some extra games attended and some later nights that otherwise wouldn't have been.  I'd like to avoid the affects of my annual 'spring crash' as much as possible.

In the meantime I'll put out a schedule analysis sometime soon and a couple other things before the season starts.  From there I'll just contribute when and where I can, I really have no desire to see and write about as many games as I did a year ago.

First practice picture of the year comes to us from the Hope women's team:

If I lived closer you'd hear about them more

It's really here already isn't it.

 

2013 Season in Review: Calvin

2013  26-4,  13-1  1st
2012  13-13,  8-6  3rd tie

win that made you raise an eyebrow:  Calvin 67, at UW-Stevens Point 58
loss that made you raise an eyebrow:  Carthage 74, Calvin 63

Seniors:  Tom Snikkers, Bryan Powell, Dave Rietema, Matt DeBoer

Coming off an injury riddled 2012 in which Calvin struggled to reach .500 the Knights were picked to finish 3rd way back in November.  That seemed a bit ridiculous then and even more ridiculous now.  But it made sense until it didn't make sense anymore which was sometime around the time Calvin was busy drubbing Hope in the middle of January.

Backtracking on the non-conference a little, Calvin killed everyone except the only someone's they played.  Those someone's were Wheaton and Carthage.  That particular bad weekend of basketball hurt their perceptions within the D3 world and it was a long slow climb up the polls.  Somewhere on this blog I said something along the lines that Calvin's non-conference schedule should show the improvement over last season, and it did.  By the time January rolled around I think Calvin was probably an even favorite with Adrian.

Tyler Kruis, Calvin's first MVP in 9 years?

Calvin's had a bit of a hex when it came to beating Adrian the last couple years so their early MIAA win over the Bulldogs was probably both a positive sign and just a relief.  An escape from Kresge followed by easy work of Kalamazoo and Alma set up the big showdown with Hope where Calvin dismantled the Dutchmen is every way possible.  Mid-January and all signs pointed to Calvin winning the league and maybe rather easily.  Its never like that though as they won on a late Bryan Powell three pointer at Adrian, took a close hard fought loss to Hope and survived a Trine rally just  one game later, then put the finishing touches on their outright crown by beating Olivet.

Where this Calvin team really shined was in the post-season.  In the MIAA Tournament they flattened Adrian and Hope spending most of those two games leading by, or close, to double-digits.  The relief in winning the MIAA Tournament and gaining a first NCAA bid in 6 years was palpable.  The Knights went on the road in the first round of NCAA Tournament and beat an equally good defensive Rose-Hulman team by 20 points.  The following week saw them beat D3 powerhouse UW-Stevens Point on their home floor.  In the Sweet 16, their first in 8 seasons, Calvin lost to pre-tournament favorite and #1 ranked St. Thomas with a valiant late come back that fell one point short.

The difference between Calvin of 2013 and Calvin of the last couple years was winning the close games.  By my estimation Calvin won 3 close MIAA contests that in the last couple years they probably would not have won.  Ultimately they avoided defeat to anyone besides Hope and this played a large factor in their holding the MIAA trophy by themselves.  They were also kind of good.


Statistics Corner

Calvin's season is pretty easy to define, they were hard to score against.  On the D3 statistics scene the Knights show up highly ranked in a lot of good defensive categories most notably scoring defense at #6, scoring margin at #3, FG% defense at #2, and rebound margin at #3.  These are a lot of good statistics to be in the top ten and being really good at these led to a lot of easy wins.

Just in case you thought Calvin was all about defense, the Knights also put up a top 100 ranking in just about all of the offensive statistics and were in the top 50 in FG%,  assists, blocked shots.  The two dings in Calvin's armor are really just annoying scratches you really can't even see.  They ranked #235 in 3 pointers made, and #204 in steals per game.  In short Calvin was a really good team at both ends of the floor, their overall record and post-season performance should not have surprised anyone.

Thing they did better than anyone else in the league:  anything that involved rebounding and defense
Thing they did worse than anyone in the league:  ?

Calvin's league championship was won on the back of good sound defense and near complete domination of the boards.  When the dust settled they had escaped the pitfalls of recent seasons,  and when the chips were down at the end Calvin reached another level of competency that only the #1 ranked team in D3 at the time could take down.  A different tournament draw and it might have been Calvin in Salem vying for Atlanta.

Efficiency:

Offense:  110.14   Defense:  85.22   Total Eff Rating:  224.92

Team rank out of last 10 years:  #1
League rank out of last 10 years  #1

Offense and defense were both top team rankings for Calvin in the past decade.  Offense ranks right in the middle of most of the MIAA Championship and NCAA teams while defensively they performed at the highest level of any MIAA team edging out Hope's terrific 2006 defense.

Overall Calvin also edges out Hope's 2008 team that went to the Final Four by a narrow few tenths of points.  Given the same bracketing Hope had that year, Calvin wouldn't have played St. Thomas until the final four instead of the Sweet 16.  In essence they were very similar teams.  2013 ends up ranked well ahead of the 2005 Calvin outfit that went to Salem.  It's at this point that I bring in the schedule, it was poor and I don't think there's anyway around saying that.  The numbers above are a little inflated but not enough that it probably makes much of a difference in team rank and only a slot or two in league rank.  Either way this was a good team statistically and performed very well on D3 basketball's biggest stage.


2013-2014

Key Returnees:  Tyler Kruis, Mickey DeVries, Tyler Dykstra, Jordan Brink, Daniel Stout, Mitch Vallie and others

Probably going to look like that again

Calvin returns 3 starters in Brink, Kruis, Dykstra and I'm slotting DeVries as a 4th starter.  I would be shocked if Tyler Kruis doesn't end up the main focus of Calvin's offense.  While he's been a bit passive for my tastes at times, he possesses all the skills necessary to become a league MVP type player.  For the first time in his career at Calvin he won't be taking a back seat to anyone on his team in the pecking order of who takes the big shots.  Spelling Kruis will be Daniel Stout who turned into a pretty good 10 minutes per game guy with solid offensive and rebounding numbers.  Calvin's pretty set in the middle of the paint.

Along side Kruis will be Tyler Dykstra and Mickey DeVries, two guys who at times looked to be just itching to break out into being really good D3 basketball players.  Both of these guys shot over 50% but only had less than 1/2 the chances of their other main weapons.  Each played significant roles on the boards and in Calvin being exceptionally good on the glass, stepping up the offensive part of the game is the next step.  Backing these guys up will be Mitch Vallie and Jordan Mast.  Depth isn't a problem on the front-line which will be tall, probably control the paint and the glass much like last year.

Mickey DeVries, enjoying a Toni Basil song?

Jordan Brink is the only guard with significant experience returning.  Brink shot slightly under 40% from 3 and received limiting minutes because his teammate Bryan Powell had such fine season.  Next season I think Brink figures to be option #2 in the offense and should get both more opportunities and more minutes.  Calvin has better options than people probably think in backing up Brink such as Jordan Daley and one or two JV guys.  Depth isn't apparent but its Calvin, they'll reload.

Point guard is at the moment nobody.  If worse came to worse I'm sure Jordan Brink could pick up the slack here without much trouble.  I'm sure Calvin doesn't want to have to do that though but its an option that's available.   Ryan Nadeau was on the roster but played in mostly mop-up minutes so its difficult to see where he fits in here.  After that you're looking at a JV call-up or a Freshmen.  Honestly neither should be too bad of an option with so much experience and depth already on the floor.

Jordan Brink

has a twin that plays baseball for Fresno State with the same name.

Calvin should be good again and it should mainly be because of their formidable front line.  It will hard to score easy baskets on them and hard to rebound again.  Its a good formula, especially when it works.  The Knights were 11 deep consistently last year and even moving guys up the ladder a couple spots leaves them with plenty of returning depth and experience to expect another good season.

Range of Finish:   I think you have to make them the very early favorites.  The only two drawbacks I see are no established returning point guard and losing 4 quality Seniors that provided great leadership.  I might actually be underselling their value to the team a little.   If those things can be replaced even a little though this returning group of players should be a good team again.  Maybe a step back from a top 10 D3 team, but still good enough to win the MIAA.  1st.  2nd if the leadership isn't there and they lose those close ones they won this year.

2013 Season in Review: Hope

2013  18-9,  12-2  2nd *
2012  27-2,  14-0  1st
*  I've relented in my pursuit to have the College of Faith game not count.  People like their cupcakes, that can't be denied.

win that made you raise an eyebrow:  Hope 73 Calvin 70
loss that made you raise an eyebrow:  Olivet 68 Hope 65

Seniors:  Nate Snuggerud, Colton Overway, Billy Seiler, Chase DeMaagd, Chris Ray, Josh Holwerda

Your view of Hope's 2013 season probably depends on what your expectations were coming in.  I seemed to be more cautious than others as I laid out last spring,  again a few days later and reiterated in October.  I didn't expect Hope to win the MIAA nor did I expect them to not be a factor, in hindsight it went about as expected, sort of.

Despite feasting on the greatest cupcake to end all cupcakes, Hope's non-conference schedule contained 4 NCAA Tournament teams including 4 of the top 5 CCIW teams.  It was pretty challenging.  It was hard to be critical of  their early losses at North Central or Wheaton or even at home to Cornerstone.  The question marks really appeared with a home loss to Spring Arbor, despite Spring Arbor having a fine season finishing 21-12 and finishing 4th in the always competitive Crossroads league, this was probably viewed as a game they should have won.  A couple weeks later Hope suffered a disappointing trip to Florida taking losses against Mississippi College and Illinois Wesleyan, in a game they led by 18.

Brock Benson's coming out party at Adrian

When MIAA play opened Hope was probably a distant third with Adrian and Calvin tearing through their non-conference schedules.  There was a little optimism when Hope left nationally ranked Adrian with a 9 point, yet more comfortable feeling win.  Escaping Kresge and clubbing Kalamazoo set up the first Hope/Calvin clash as a battle for first place.   Everything pretty much came crashing down in one horrible week of basketball where they lost by 26 (but really 56) at Calvin and then lost on nearly the last play of the game at Olivet.  Seventeen games into the season, 9-8, a disappointing truth that was hard to ignore.

When Colton Overway went down with a season ending injury two games later it was hard to imagine Hope would finish the season as strong as they did.  Led by a resurgent Nate Snuggerud, Nate VanArendonk and the emergence of Ben Gardner, Hope strung together 9 consecutive wins all but 2 by double-digits.  The high point was a gladiatorial like victory over rival Calvin in Holland.  When the dust finally settled Hope was comfortably in second place just one game back of their arch rival lamenting one bad week of league basketball.  It would have been an upset had Hope beaten Calvin in the MIAA Tournament but a lot like the first match-up Hope wasn't up to the challenge of beating a team nearing its peak.

I suppose this season can be thought of as bridge between Hope's past and its future.  Six graduating Seniors are the last remnants of players who were in the Hope program when Glen VanWieren was the head coach.  The emergence of Freshmen like Ben Gardner, Brock Benson and Alex Eidson gives a positive view of the future.  2013 probably didn't end the way Hope was expecting and the route to get there was filled with many twists and turns.  When everything was done though this team probably finished about where I thought they would.

Statistics Corner

A lot of people would probably be surprised that when it comes to stats vs their D3 counterparts Hope actually ranked exceptionally well in a number of categories.  Even more surprising would probably be Hope ranked very well in a number of defensive categories including #7 in blocked shots with steals per game and rebounding margins both solidly in the top 40.  Offensively Hope was top 50 in scoring, scoring margin and assists.  The only stat categories where Hope wasn't above average or perfectly acceptable would have been fouls per game, 3-pt fg percentage and 3-pt fg percentage defense. Turnovers was dead average but probably needed to be better in a league that really does well at not turning the ball over.

things they did better than anyone in the league:   Scoring, FG %, Assists, Steals
things they did worse than anyone in the league:  defend the 3

Hope wasn't very good at defending 3's to the point they had a whopping -39 margin between 3's made and 3's given up in league play.  That's almost 3 per game or 9 points that had to be made up during the course of a game.  Ultimately the one thing they weren't very good at cost them a share of the MIAA Championship when they were beaten by a late 3 by the best team in the league at making 3's, Olivet.  One other thing Hope was not particularly good at was fouling, or maybe they were very good at fouling.  Hope logged 536 personal fouls on the year more than any other team in the league and good for #352 in D3.


Efficiency

Offense:   107.27   Defense:   94.66   Total Eff Rating:  212.16
* The cupcake game still affects these strongly, subtract 1 on offense, add 3 on defense and subtract 4 for the total to get a more accurate number if cupcakes make you nauseous.

Team rank out of the last 10 years:  #7
League rank out of the last 10 years:  #12

Hope has some tough compares but this years team nestles in nicely between 2009 and 2010 or about where I expected.  Offensively this is one of the lower numbers Hope's registered, consider they had led the league in offensive efficiency each year since 2007.  Yet they still led the league in scoring.  Its a little disappointing and quit a bit off what we've come to expect from a Hope offense, which should be around or over the 110 mark.  Defensively Hope ends up perfectly acceptable but really nowhere near what I would call elite.

That league rank bothers me a little and I think the reason it looks high is because of that stupid 118-20 internet school game which produced so many ridiculous stats it really skews everything.  I feel much more comfortable pulling those numbers out which gives us these numbers:
Offense  106.18,  Defense  97.77,  Total Eff  208.41

This adjustment puts Hope at #9 as a team and #20 in the league, this ranks ahead of only Hope's 2005 team.  Probably matches the eyes and mind a little better.  (All 10 of Hope's last 10 teams rank within the top 24 of the league the last 10 years, like I said tough compares)

Statistically at least its not that hard to conclude Hope was probably one of the dozen or so best teams to be left out of the NCAA Tournament.  Not where anyone wants to be but at least from this angle they weren't far off.  From the actual NCAA Tournament criteria angle though it was a little more of a leap.


2013-2014

Key Returnees:  Nate VanArendonk, Ben Gardner, Alex Eidson, Brock Benson, Caleb Byers, Grant Neil and 3 others

Nate VanArendonk, please do lots of this

At the core of next year's team is a decent combination of youth with experience and experience.  Hope graduates 3 Senior starters and some depth that rightfully should give you pause on next season's prospects.  The starting 5 should be ok with VanArendonk, Gardner and Eidson likely starters with Benson, Neil and Byers figuring in the mix somehow with a pretty solid bet a Fr or JV call-up could grab one of the remaining spots as well.  Hope's 2/3 guard spot is still a weakness in terms of depth with really nothing proven behind Eidson.  Matt Parisi and Corey McMahon will probably get a shot again but given a shot this past season neither was able to seize many minutes.  Steve Whittenbach figures in here somewhere, just where is difficult to pin down.

The interior looks relatively set with VanArendonk and Benson your two centers, with the graduation of Nate Snuggerud these two are going to be counted on for a larger share of the offense.  There were times when VanArendonk was nearly Hope's best player late in the season, carrying that kind of effort over to an entire season is the next step.  The 4 spot looks like the biggest opening, Caleb Byers looked the heir apparent but dwindling production and dwindling minutes cut into those expectations.  There's an opening here for a Freshmen or JV call-up.  Grant Neil will figure into the 3/4 spot as well, hopefully with a more healthy knee.  A word of warning, though I never did the research I intended, it was visibly obvious that when Nate Snuggerud was not on the floor Hope was not a very good offensive team, or at least it looked that way.  Nate Snuggerud will not be on the floor next winter, keep that in mind.

Ben Gardner! America, basketball, Indiana in one shot

If there is a position Hope shouldn't be worried about its point guard, this sounds completely ludicrous considering Colton Overway is graduating and the terrific season he was having before his injury.  But then Ben Gardner's finish to the 2013 season was pretty close to completely ludicrous when he scored 108 points, shot 54.7% in the last 7 wins of the season before Calvin had to actually game plan to stop him.  Point guard is set and Hope fans probably have great reasons to be optimistic about the kid from Indiana.  Behind Ben is Jordan Denham.  Jordan didn't get a lot of minutes this season but there's been a noticeable difference in his physical appearance from November to March.  He looks like a kid who just needs minutes, hopefully he'll get a shot at more next season.

Six roster spots is a lot to fill for most teams and that could get up to 8 or 9.  Hope's going to enter 2013-14 a lot like last year with a large number of first year players and as many as 4 or 5 Freshmen.  Given that I think Hope will be playing at least a similar if not more difficult non-conference schedule to this past season, they could find themselves in the same kind of position heading into conference play next year.  I think they'll be very similar in ability and talent but bettering 18-9 might become a little bit of a challenge especially if the league ends up better than I think.  But next year really hinges on how well they develop a bench and how quickly players distinguish themselves over others.  This past season that took almost the full season, hopefully only a few games next year.

Range of Finish:   I'm kind of all over the park on my optimism and pessimism with these guys.  I think they could be really good if the right things fall into place.  I think they could really struggle if Nate Snuggerud's presence made as much of a difference as I think it did and they really do lose a lot of minutes and experience.  To reach the level of success they enjoyed from 2006 almost all the way to 2012 requires solid improvements on both ends of the court.   A solid 2nd seems right with 3rd or 4th a possibility if someone behind them really puts something together and Hope never quite puts it together.  1st is really never out of the question.

2013 Season in Review: Trine

2013  14-12,  7-7  3rd tie
2012  15-11,  8-6  3rd

win that made you raise an eyebrow:  Adrian 64-46
loss that made you raise an eyebrow:  at Albion 73-68 OT

Seniors:  Ian Jackson, Scott Rogers, Neil Smith

The internet is way short on Ian Jackson photos, Jr year maybe?

Trine opened this season with a non-conference schedule that didn't excite me.  Going 7-4 excited me less with one win over a team with a winning record, Penn St-Behrend.  It was pretty apparent even early in the season the Thunder were heavily reliant on production from Ian Jackson and Scott Rogers.  The MIAA portion of the schedule went about as expected with a split with Adrian and 4 losses to Hope and Calvin.  Trine's season finished with a whimper though as they lost their last five with Scott Rogers absent and clearly not 100% when he did return from illness.  The ending marred what could have been a pretty good season. 

Sprinkled into the lineup was promising Freshmen like Jared Holmquist, Nick Tatu and Tarvis Malone.   The Thunder returned a little younger and a little less experienced than anticipated but overall really close to the team I was expecting to see last spring.   2013 kind of solidified for me the thought that Trine is going to be a good program in the coming years with a chance to qualify for the MIAA Tournament every year.

Ian Jackson was voted the league's MVP at the end of the season.  He finishes as one of the more prolific scorers in recent league history and solidified himself as the best player in Trine's D3/MIAA era and among the best players to play for the school.

Statistics Corner

I marveled about Trine's ability to protect the basketball all season long.  At the end the Thunder finished #8 in D3 in turnovers per game and #17 in turnover margin.  Combine those with their #17 showing in FT% and you conclude the Thunder just didn't beat themselves or make it easy for anyone to beat them.  On offense and defense Trine finished comfortably in the top half of most statistical categories with two notable exceptions.   Rebounding margin and 3-point shots made.  Rebounding was in the bottom quarter while 3-point shooting was #398.

things they did better than anyone in the league:  FT %, turnover margin
thing they did worse than anyone in the league:  not really anything

For a team with so few turnovers Trine did have a relatively low A/FG of .49, only Adrian was lower in the league.  The go to play for Trine was isolation for Ian Jackson or high ball screens, the result was quite a few more one-on-one plays than you might expect, and thus fewer assists.  Overall though I found their offense pleasing to watch.  Rebounding was a problem against the really good opponents such as North Central, Calvin and even Hope.  The overall margin of a little over -3 wasn't terrible and was actually probably positive without these 6 games.  But right now one of the most glaring things keeping Trine from making the next leap is competing on the glass with the 'big boys'.

Efficiency

Offense  103.61    Defense   98.67   Total Eff Rating     204.94

Team rank out of the last 10 years:  #1
League rank out of the last 10 years:  #28

Trine's offensive efficiency is what I would call average or maybe slightly above average for D3, and defensively average or maybe just a touch below average.   They finish mere fractions ahead of last years performance.  I think its important to note 3 of Trine's 4 best teams in the last 10 years are their last 3 teams.

Like Adrian they're knocking at the door of the best teams in the league over the past decade but not quite there.  Both their offense and defensive efficiency need to be a little better to really take that next step in the league hierarchy.  This program seems to be on a good foundation but still a step or two away from competing for a title.  If Brooks Miller can pull in similar Freshmen talent next fall there would be good reason to believe Trine will be a solid program to contend with in the years to come.


2013-2014

Key Returnees:   Todd Watkins, Jared Holmquist, Nick Tatu, Tarvis Malone, Dustin Hall, Tyler Good, Jake Bagley

Jared Holquist playing defense

No one in the league loses two guys who produced a higher percentage of their offense than Trine with Ian Jackson and Scott Rogers, .  What remains becomes what will probably be a transition year of sorts with the core of next years team being Sophomore's.  After Jackson and Rogers the next 2 leading scorers were Freshmen, with Jared Holmquist looking an awful lot like a Freshmen version of Hope's Nate Snuggerud and Nick Tatu being their one true 3-point threat.

Next year's finish for Trine is really going to depend on what the teams behind them do.  For the moment they appear to have more overall talent returning and probably enough to keep them among the top 4.  A really good Freshmen class like last years could lift them into the second place range.  For now though I think its a little too much youth, not enough top line offensive players to consider them a league title contender.

Nick Tatu in high school, someone at Trine please buy a camera.

Trine's on the edge, but in the MIAA that edge seems to be a giant leap to the next step of knocking Calvin or Hope off the throne.  Losing high quality scorers like Ian Jackson and Scott Rogers will be very hard to replace and its what gives me a little pause to think things might not go that well next season especially if someone behind them puts together a really good season.  They went 0-5 to finish the season without Scott Rogers, next year they lose both Rogers and Jackson.  Red flag if there ever was one.  Off season development and maybe a touch of good recruiting is going to be the key for Trine's success next season.


Range of Finish:  3rd or 4th, possibly lower if they don't add to the team through recruiting, someone leaves or someone behind puts together a really good season.

2013 Season in Review: Adrian

2013:  18-8,  7-7  3rd tie
2012:  17-9,  9-5  2nd

win that made you raise an eyebrow:   at Wooster 57-56
loss that made you raise an eyebrow:  at Olivet 52-49, at Kalamazoo 70-62

Seniors:  Cody Barnes, Sean Gallant

When Adrian released its roster at the last minute in November it elicited responses like 'when do they release the varsity roster'.  Five key players who were expected to return, or able, did not.  So Adrian was left with a roster that contained around 9 Freshmen and a bunch of question marks.  It wasn't long before people realized that Adrian was pretty good and a 1 point last second win at Wooster confirmed that the Bulldogs shouldn't be taken lightly.  The non-conference portion of the schedule was poor and the Bulldogs thrived on winning games that they should have won.  By the time MIAA play opened Adrian was 11-0, ranked just outside the top 10 and stories about the 'best Adrian team since the 50's' floated around.

Then aliens came and took their point guard and all of their depth, what was left was this........

pretty much, right?  --maybe a little harsh too?

Right around Christmas time it was obvious the Adrian roster was written on an etch-a-sketch with players coming and going, Brandon Romain did both in the span of about 3 weeks.  I lost track of who was there when and who left, who went missing.  The important part was Adrian had a pretty young team, with little offensive punch, and little depth.  They still had enough to make them competitive and with Mark White pulling the defensive strings anything was still possible.  The early schedule didn't help them as they opened with what must have been terribly frustrating losses to Calvin and Hope.  A two point escape at home over Trine set up a trip to Olivet where the Comets won on a last second shot.  The MIAA title was already out of reach by the second Saturday of league play.

The second time around Calvin's Bryan Powell hit a last second three which permanently buried the Bulldogs title hopes before they headed to Holland and lost again.  They kept their heads above water and were probably pushing to get on their lifeboat in the MIAA Tournament.  When Adam Meier went down with a season ending knee injury the bulkheads gave way and it was game over.  A loss at Kalamazoo almost kept them out of the tournament and about 10 minutes into the MIAA semi-final at Calvin they probably wish they hadn't made it as they ended up losing 71-44.

How many times was this re-shot?

I kind of warned about not getting too excited about Adrian's non-conference performance.  I just didn't think Adrian would be almost a completely different team by the time the league rolled around. I saw that team the first part of the season and it certainly would have finished better than 7-7 in the league, though truthfully they still would have struggled on offense.  Even what was left though salvaged a season that with a couple different results in some close ones could have put them right in the fight for the 2nd or 3rd spots.  On the other hand, it could have gone a lot worse as well.  Each time I saw this team the chemistry and general 'vibe' seemed to get more and more negative.  2013 will forever be a season of 'what if' for the Bulldogs.

A pretty downer of a recap for an 18-8 team especially when 18-8 is the best record for an Adrian team since 1955. 

Statistics Corner

It was all about defense for Adrian again this season finishing with the #5 defense for points allowed and appearances within the top 100 in the NCAA statistics for just about all of the other defensive categories.  Offensively.....not so much.  The two that really stand out to me are ranked #365 in scoring and #407 in assists.  Adrian was a one-on-one team and not very good at it.

thing they did better than anyone in the league:  3-pt FG% defense, scoring defense
thing they did worse than anyone in the league:  assist baskets, scoring offense

Adrian had a frighteningly low number of assists, either they have a tendency to play in front of stingy scoring tables a lot or they play a lot of one-on-one basketball.  Observation says one-on-one.   Every team in the league recorded an assist on 49% or higher of their fg's.  Adrian recorded an assist on just 38%.  Ouch!


Efficiency

Offense:   95.47   Defense:  87.58   Total Eff Rating:   207.89

Team rank out of the last 10 years:   #2
League rank out of the last 10 years:  #22

This years team performed at almost exactly the same rate as last years team with the slight difference in offensive and defensive performance.  Better defense, worse offense.   Last year is the only Adrian team that ranks higher and only by a fraction, they were essentially the same although I think this years non-conference schedule was probably weaker.  As far as the league, #22 is pretty good since most of those teams above them are Hope/Calvin/Albion teams and a lot of those either won the MIAA or went to the NCAA tournament.  Performance wise, Adrian is getting pretty close to kicking in the door.

Defensively they turn in the 3rd best defensive performance in the past decade behind only Hope's 2006 team and some other team we'll get to in a later review.  I should be gushing about this more but I guess its what I've come to expect from Adrian.  Offensively, gack!  For a team that won 18 games they were in my estimation incredibly poor at scoring.  The final  efficiency number says 95.47 but this team wasn't performing at that level the last half of the season.  It was really a steady decline in production from around the time Brandon Romain decided he'd had enough right to the end of the season.  If they were just even an average D3 offensive team they probably would have been close to making the NCAA tournament as an at-large selection instead of holding on to the last spot in the MIAA Tournament for dear life.


2013-2014

Key returnees:  Eric Lewis, Adam Meier(?), Drew Torrey and 9 others

Would you fault me if I put question marks next to all the others?  What Adrian finished with was a pretty young roster of bit players that were used to surround Cody Barnes, Sean Gallant, Eric Lewis and Adam Meier.  Those four guys accounted for 72% of the shots and 75% of the points........two graduate, one is a question mark because of injury.  Adrian wasn't all that great on offense and 3/4's of it might not be back next year.  Eric Lewis might have to be a one man band.

Jr. to be Eric Lewis

The offensive prospects are pretty grim looking and even if Adam Meier can return to some form of his former self, it looks like next year might be another struggle on that end of the floor.  The good news is that as long as Mark White is sitting in the head coaches seat (which he never actually does) Adrian will play good, sound defense because he demands it. That means they'll have a lot of chances to win ball games that teams of equal offensive ineptness would not have.

I suspect we'll see a lot of unfamiliar faces again next fall so its pretty difficult to know exactly what Adrian will have returning.  Based just off the last roster its a young team with very little offense returning and frankly its questionable whether any of those returning guys can step right in and fill the void.  Ben Rodak and Rickey Jackson looked the most capable, but they certainly aren't a Barnes and Gallant.  

A lot is going to depend on what Mark White is able to bring into the fold, regardless this is likely to be a pretty young team.  How well they blend into some kind of offensive unit is going to dictate a lot about how next season is going to go.  Defense they will play, offense remains to be seen, but its the defense that convinces me Adrian isn't going to stray to far from being an MIAA Tournament team each season.


Range of finish:   Despite my negative outlook on their offense I don't think Adrian drops much if at all.  It's too good of a program with too many good recruiting connections to not have a good class of Freshmen or transfers arrive next fall.  Adrian has been in the top half of the MIAA for most of the last decade and really no worse than 5th only once.   Next year they look a little further away from an MIAA Championship than this year but still in the ball park, that defense will still carry them a long way.  3rd or 4th.  5th or lower if they fail to find some guys who can score.