If your home/family life is like mine, then you're probably better off getting games on the calendar well in advance. That way, your wife can't spring some bogus dinner, or something of the like, on you at the last minute forcing you to miss a sporting event. If she still won't let you go to a game that you want to attend, just start a blog on the subject and then say you "have to." Works every time.
In that vein, here are a couple of local "D-III quality" early season college basketball games that you may be interesting in scheduling/attending.
Saturday November 6 - Davenport Tournament Championship - Davenport University - 3:00 PM
The preliminary games on Friday feature Grace Bible vs. Kuyper College and Davenport vs. Great Lakes Christian College. I fully expect both Grace and DU to win snoozers, so expect them to match up with each other in the tournament final (but check the interwebs on Friday night or Saturday morning for scores before you assume). The hook? These are the first two (regular season) opponents that Calvin will face, so you'll be able to get some advanced scouting in.
Tuesday November 9 - Cornerstone at Grace Bible - 7:00 PM
Grace knocked off Cornerstone a year ago (it wasn't just Calvin, so don't feel too bad). It's the second year in a row that C'stone travels to Grace for a game, which seems odd to me. I always thought of them (until last year) as one of those cupcake type schools that always traveled when they played the "big boys." Perhaps not. Either way, I don't think Grace will be as good as they were last year, but they are to be taken seriously from now on. Cornerstone, meanwhile, is a potential second-day matchup for the Knights in the Grand Rapids Hall of Fame Tournament.
The three teams above (Davenport, Cornerstone, and Grace) should serve as a good early season barometer for the Knights. Even if they don’t end up playing Cornerstone head to head they’ll end up playing three common opponents, so we should be able to determine some sort of relative ability.
I got the wife to sign off on the Grace-Davenport game last night (I have a Tuesday night Bible study, so no dice for me on the Cornerstone game), so I'll be able to provide a write up (with video?) later that day (or the next day, or the next day after that). Anyhoo, this is still all well into the future, but I tend to get overly excited about such things.
