2014 Season in Review: Hope

(This was half written when Hope filled its vacant coaching position last week, rather than change what I'd already written, I just went with it)

2014  20-8,  13-1  1st
2013  18-9,  12-2  2nd
2012  27-2,  14-0  1st

Best win of the year:  @ Calvin 71-63
Worst loss of the year:  Calvin 53-78 MIAA Tournament Championship


Seniors:   Nate VanArendonk, Caleb Byers, Grant Neil, Cody Campbell


" 1st is really never out of the question."

That was the last sentence of my Hope review for 2013 previewing 2014.  Writing that was easier than believing those words as Hope struggled to find their footing against a very difficult non-conference schedule.

As Alex Eidson went, so went Hope, sort of.

By the time Christmas rolled around Hope was 3-5 with pretty convincing losses to Whitewater, Stevens Point, Wheaton and Illinois Wesleyan on the ledger.  It would be easy to say Hope's season turned at the tournament at Thomas More where they beat NCAA bound Centre and rallied to beat Thomas More in the final minutes.  A few days later a win at home over Edgewood gave Hope a 6-5 record and just enough confidence to tackle the MIAA.

Hope's MIAA season was somewhat simplistic. They caught Calvin early and shocked them on their floor by 8 which felt like more and validated that by beating them in Holland 3 weeks later by 18 which felt like a lot more.  In between and after Hope rolled up 9 double digit wins, suffering just one loss at Albion and held off Calvin by a single game to capture the MIAA Championship.

The season ended somewhat abruptly with Hope being taken to overtime by Trine in the MIAA semi-finals and being manhandled by Calvin in the Championship.  Hope received an at-large bid and hosted the first round of the NCAA Tournament where they lost to PSU-Behrend in overtime.

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Hope Makes Its Choice

Hope made its choice and selected Greg Mitchell to take the helm as the 11th men's basketball coach in its history and just about the 11th Hope grad to do so.   The clicks on my counter tell me people have been checking this page to see what I have to say.  Unfortunately, I haven't much to say as I wasn't really prepared for this even though I should have been.  So shame on me.

In the meantime the media outlets have been busy copy and pasting Hope's press release into something that can't be considered plagiarism.   That's a joke btw, as I'm sure most of these media guys were well into their July 4th weekend anyway, at least mentally, and even the ones who probably knew something was coming figured next week.  Like myself.

Hope Press Release
D3hoops.com
Holland Sentinel
MLive
Lansing State Journal -  Easily the most interesting of the five

I'll have something  next week or so, in the meantime enjoy your holiday weekend and be thankful we can put this behind us.  Hope hired themselves a good one.

2014 Season in Review: Calvin

2014  24-6,  12-2  2nd
2013  26-4,  13-1  1st
2012  13-13,  8-6  3rd tie

Best win of the year:  @ Washington Univ  83-75  NCAA 2nd Round
Worst loss of the year:  @ Hope 65-83

Seniors:  Tyler Kruis, Mickey DeVries, Jordan Mast


Coming off a double MIAA Championship 2013 and sweet 16 appearance, 2014's expectations for the Knights were understandably high.  After a confusing loss to Carthage the Knights delivered on their promise with a convincing win over Wheaton the next night.  A split of their trip to Redlands and Clarmont-MS didn't really rattle too many thoughts that Calvin was the prohibitive favorite to win the MIAA.

Try not to read too much into it

The MIAA was really mostly a waltz for Calvin save for a late game heroic win at Trine and two very important and crucial losses to Hope.  The first was stunning as Hope beat them on their own floor, the second was sucking on a lemon, if you're Calvin.  The Knights kept the pressure on Hope throughout the conference season but those two losses meant a disappointing 2nd place finish.

Tyler Kruis delivered Calvin's first league MVP since Jeremy Veenstra in 2002 and he probably beat out his own teammate Jordan Brink for the honor.  These two led Calvin's late season push which saw them hand Hope the bowl of lemons in the MIAA Tournament and for the second straight year march to the Sweet 16 with impressive wins over Wittenberg and Washington.  Only Final Four bound Illinois Wesleyan was able to stand between the Knights and a deeper run.

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2014 Season in Review: Albion

(For some reason this didn't post so this will appear out of order.  I didn't intentionally skip the Britons)


2014:  14-12, 8-6  3rd place tie
2013:  6-19, 2-12  8th place
2012:  11-15, 7-7  5th place


Best Win of the year:  Albion 67 Hope 49,  hon. men.  83-76 No. Michigan
Worst Loss of the year:  vs Alma 71 Albion 69

Senior:  Lawrence Ridgell

I Put This Here For No Reason

Albion bounced back from a 2013 that could be politely described as a disaster.  The young Britons of 2013 who took their lumps and racked up more losses than any previous year since the early seventies matured into a better representation of what Albion has been for the better part of the last 3 decades.  This past season began with a win over admittedly struggling D2 program Northern Michigan, but it potentially served notice this season would be different.  However this years Britons were still young and did what young teams do and lost a number of close games early in the season.

In the MIAA the Britons were part of the story early as they jumped out to a 5-1 record behind a dominating 18 point win at Kresge over Hope.  After losing what amounted to a first place showdown to Calvin by 19 the Britons lost their next 3 and fell off the title pace but rebounded to comfortably finish 3rd and qualify for the MIAA Tournament after a 2 year absence.


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2014 Season in Review: Trine

(I'm trine to finish these, between 'mutual separation gate' and life, its been a tough slog to get through these)

2014  15-11,  8-6  3rd tie
2013  14-12,  7-7  3rd tie
2012  15-11,  8-6  3rd

Best Win of the year:  no wins against a team with a winning record
Worst Loss of the year:  vs Manchester 61-67

Senior:  Todd Watkins
(while writing this I learned Jr. to be G Nick Tatu is transferring to Rochester College near his home)

What Hope and Calvin must look like to Trine sometimes.

Given that Trine overall is a pretty young squad I think the Thunder had a good year for Coach Brooks Miller in his 3rd season.  The non-conference was a pedestrian 7-4 given its softness, those 4 losses came to Manchester, Heidelberg, Elmhurst and Wabash. Only Elmhurst finished above the .500 mark on the season.  Six of those 7 wins weren't all that spectacular either but they finished strong with a win over OAC Ohio Northern who finished just 13-14.

In the MIAA, Trine was the most perfectly placed team in the standings with an 0-6 record against the three teams above them (Hope, Calvin, Albion) and 8-0 against everyone else.  Given that Trine lost Ian Jackson and Scott Rogers to graduation coming into this year, the fact they didn't go backwards in the standings is fairly significant and I think points to a positive future as this young team matures.   The real revelation of the season was the development of Tyler Good from a 11 minutes and 2 point per game Sophomore to a 35 minute, 15.2 pts per game Junior.  That's one of the biggest improvements from one year to the next I can remember.  The addition of Freshmen guard  Will Dixon added a quick, hard to handle point guard with the ability to give teams fits.  He was the catalyst behind Trine's near upset of Hope in the MIAA Tournament.

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2014 Season in Review: Alma

2014:  7-18,  6-8    5th place
2013:  9-16,  4-10  7th place
2012:  9-16,  5-9  6th place


Best Win of the year:  at Albion 71-69, Albion 82-71
Worst Loss of the year:  Olivet 80-87

Seniors: Isiah Law, Brandon Krause, Jake Murawske, Kyle Aho

I don't know man.

Through the non-conference portion of the season Alma looked like one of the more disappointing teams in the league.  While it was a tough schedule, 1-10 it probably shouldn't have been with losses to North Park and Allegheny.   Other than their MIAA opening night shock of Albion however the Scots weren't as much of a factor in the race as their record or finish suggests.

Of their 8 league losses 6 were by double-digits, though you never really had the feeling they were really out of any contest.  A strong push the last two weeks of the season saw them nearly get a shock win at Hope, losing by 3 and winning their last 3 contests.  This pulled them up to 5th in the league, by tie-breaker technically and ust 2 games out of an MIAA Tournament spot.  By the last weekend I'm not sure there was a team anyone of the top 4 wanted to see less than Alma.

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2014 Season in Review: Kalamazoo

2014:  10-15,  5-9  6th place
2013:  8-17,  5-9  6th place
2012:  8-17,  3-11  7th place

Best win of the year:  at Albion 60-58
Worst loss of the year:  Olivet 79-82

Seniors:  Mark Ghafari, Keaton Adams, Grant Carey

Mark Ghafari had an excellent Senior season

Kalamazoo had a pretty good year and the guy in that photo was the main reason.  Ghafari scored over 40 points three times on the year and over 30 three other times, becoming the first Hornet to lead the MIAA in scoring since 1991 (Ron Barczak).  The Hornets were right in the thick of the MIAA Tournament chase until Ghafari went down with a knee injury against Hope on Feb. 3.  He missed the next 3 games, all losses, and finished out the season at less than 100% with the team dropping 6 of their last 7 games.

They weren't that far from being a .500 club dropping 5 very winnable games by less than 5 points and combined with the late season slide its not far fetched to think Kzoo could have won 14 or 15 games.   


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