Arms and games.
This was a really disappointing result. Not that I expected the Knights to win, but to get utterly dominated like this is very discouraging. Injuries, yes. First game after a long break, yes. Lots of travel, yes. But none of that can excuse away a 25 point shellacking.
Whitworth didn't shoot all that well -- just over 41% for the game -- but they destroyed Calvin on the glass. Most disappointing of all, Calvin allowed Whitworth to collect 22 offensive rebounds (49%) while grabbing only nine themselves (26%). That's really how Whitworth was able to turn this game into a laugher. They didn't really shoot much better than the Knights did, but they were able to shoot the ball 21 more times. That will turn into lots of points all by itself.
Bullets
- Tyler Kruis only attempted one shot. I don't think Calvin is going to win many games without his presence being established. He got into early foul trouble which took him out of the game*, so that didn't help things either.
- Zero turnovers from either Rietema or Powell is a good thing.
- The playing rotation will be even more patchwork for a while with Vallie out. It looks like Tyler Dykstra will be the primary beneficiary of his minutes. Probably a few more for Mast and Haverdink now too.
- No idea where points are going to come from. I'm probably overreacting though.
*I don't understand why coaches need to pull players after recording their third foul in the first half. Kruis only played five or six minutes in the first half because of his foul trouble, and only ended up with 16 minutes for the game. Why not just keep the normal rotation? Three things could happen: (1) leave him in and he doesn't get further into foul trouble -- roughly 26 minutes (2) leave him in and he fouls out early -- roughly15 minutes (3) sit him down so he doesn't foul out early -- 16 minutes. The way I see it, by pulling players, you're pretty much guaranteeing the foul-out penalty.
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