CKSR (Men's Basketball Defeats Alma - Remains in MIAA Lead/Calvin-Hope Documentary to Air Sunday at Noon on WOOD-TV 8/Women's Basketball Defeated by Hope - Five-Game Win Streak Snapped)

CALVIN KNIGHT SPORTS REPORT FOR FEBRUARY 1, 2014

Men's Basketball Defeats Alma - Remains in MIAA Lead / Calvin-Hope Documentary to Air Sunday at Noon on WOOD-TV 8;
Women's Basketball Defeated by Hope - Five-Game Win Streak Snapped

MEN'S BASKETBALL
Calvin 78, Alma 67
By Mark DeHaan

The Calvin men's basketball team hosted the Scots of Alma on Saturday afternoon, looking to extend its win streak to six games. The Knights came into the game at 14-4 overall and 6-1 in conference while Alma was 3-14 and 2-4 in the MIAA.
After trailing by two at halftime, Calvin outscored the Scots by 13 in the second half to claim a 78-67 win, the 350th win at Calvin for head coach Kevin Vande Streek.

Alma came out and held early leads at 9-6 and 11-8, with each time the Knights tying the game.

Calvin regained the lead with 8:43 remaining as sophomore Jordan Daley hit a corner three for a 16-13 Knights advantage.

With 3:13 left in the first half, Calvin took its largest lead of the first half at 23-19. But, with just over a minute to go, back-to-back threes from the Scots gave the advantage back to Alma.

At halftime, Alma held a 29-27 edge.

Junior Jordan Brink (Dyer, IN/Illiana Christian HS) led the Knights with 9 points at the half while senior Mickey DeVries (Lansing/Lansing Christian HS) added six.

Out of the break, senior Tyler Kruis (Grand Rapids/Calvin Christian HS) hit the first basket of the second half for the 1000th point of his career.

Kruis continued to play strong in the post, and through five and a half minutes of second half play, he had 10 points in the second half, giving Calvin a 43-39 edge.

The Scots responded by hitting three of their next four three-point attempts to take a 50-48 advantage.
A 12-0 run the Knights, capped by back-to-back threes from Brink and sophomore Austin Parks, then gave Calvin its first double-digit lead of the game at 60-50 with 9:20 remaining.

After holding as much as a 12 point lead at 66-54, Alma came back to cut Calvin's lead to 68-62 with 3:47 left.

That was as close as the Scots would come, though, as the Knights iced the game at the free throw line and closed out a 78-67 victory.

The Knights shot 67% in the second half, including 5-of-7 from behind the three-point arc. Calvin outrebounded Alma 33-29 for the game, while also forcing the Scots into 13 turnovers.

Brink led Calvin with 21 points while Kruis added 18 and six rebounds. Daley (Grand Rapids/Grand Rapids Christian HS) tied a career-high with 17 points. Kruis's 18 moves him into 21st on the Calvin career scoring list with 1011 points.

For the Scots, DJ Beckman led all scorers with 31 points. Isiah Law was the only other Alma player in double figures, scoring 19.

"Two things I have grown to expect in conference play: one, it is never easy, and two, we are going to get everybody's best game, that is just the way it is. I loved our mentality. We just kept our nose to the grindstone, made a few shots in the second half, and did a nice job down the stretch," said head coach Kevin Vande Streek. "That's a really neat thing (for Kruis to score 1000 points). It takes a long and successful career. And, it's no coincidence that in the second half he started making shots and we pulled away."

Calvin improves to 15-4 and holds on to first place in the MIAA with a 7-1 conference record. Alma drops to 3-15 and 2-5 in league-play.

The Knights now look forward to Wednesday when they travel to Holland and the DeVos Fieldhouse for the second rivalry matchup of the season against Hope College. Wednesday's game against the Flying Dutchmen is scheduled to tipoff at 8 p.m.

MIAA MEN'S BASKETBALL STANDINGS THROUGH 2-1-14 GAMES

Calvin 7-1
Hope 6-1
Albion 5-3
Kalamazoo 4-3
Trine 4-4
Alma 2-5
Olivet 1-6
Adrian 1-7

MEN'S BASKETBALL REMINDER

The Calvin/Hope men's basketball rivalry will be the subject of a documentary produced by Calvin alumn Ryan Terpstra. The documentary is scheduled to air on February 2 on WOOD-TV 8 in West Michigan at noon (EST). It will also re-air on cable outlets throughout the state of Michigan after the initial February 2 launch.

WOMEN'S BASKETBALL
Hope 78, Calvin 47

HOLLAND - While round one of the Calvin-Hope women's basketball rivalry this season featured an offensive explosion, round two featured much more of a defensive theme. Unfortunately for Calvin, the defensive theme was dictated by Hope as the Flying Dutch held Calvin to its lowest scoring output of the season in a 78-47 victory Saturday afternoon at Hope's DeVos Fieldhouse.

In the first meeting of the year played back on November 19 in Grand Rapids, the two teams combined for the highest scoring total in a Calvin-Hope women's basketball game with the Flying Dutch pulling out an 88-81 win behind a second half comeback.

On Saturday, Hope (18-0 overall, 10-0 MIAA) jumped out to a 37-21 halftime lead as the Flying Dutch limited the Knights to just eight first half field goals. Calvin's first half scoring total was its lowest in a half this season. Calvin had entered Saturday's game averaging 85.0 points a game over its previous five contests.

Turnovers also proved to be a problem as Calvin (12-6 overall, 7-3 MIAA) committed 13 turnovers in the first half and 14 more in the second half after commiting only 15 turnovers in the entire game back on November 19.

"We were never comfortable today," said Calvin women's basketball coach John Ross. "We wanted to play this at a full-court pace but Hope was able to break our press and force this into a half-court game. We did not want to play a half-court game but Hope was able to dictate the tempo and that was the difference in the game."

Calvin was led in scoring by junior Kayla Engelhard (Unionville/Saginaw Valley Lutheran HS) who had 15 points and seven rebounds to stretch her double-figure scoring streak to five games. Junior Breanna Verkaik (Holland/Holland Christian HS) had nine points and seven rebounds while battling foul trouble.

Hope received 22 points and 10 rebounds from sophomore Maura McAfee while freshman Angelique Gaddy had 15 points.

Hope held a 44-35 rebound advantage and shot 41.5 percent from the field. Calvin shot 31.5 percent overall.

The loss drops Calvin into a tie for third place in the MIAA standing with Kalamazoo. Calvin has a makeup game with Trine scheduled for next Monday at 7 p.m. at Van Noord Arena and will then host Saint Mary's next Wednesday at 7:30 p.m.

MIAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL STANDINGS THROUGH FEB. 1, 2014

Hope 10-0
Olivet 9-2
Calvin 7-3
Kalamazoo 7-3
Adrian 6-5
Saint Mary's 4-6
Albion 2-9
Trine 1-8
Alma 0-10
Received on Sat Feb 1 22:57:37 2014