Brandon Johns and E Lansing go down to West Ottawa in state tournament
Brandon led East Lansing with 19, but not enough to overcome the defense, rebounding, and balanced scoring of West Ottawa. Was hoping to see Brandon do well, but kind of fun to see my hometown Panthers make it to the semi's. They've never in their history even won a regional championship. Lead WO scorer was Xavier Wade, headed to Ferris for football and basketball.
Alwys suprised how much their athletic programs struggled in the past its a huge school
We were good in soccer in the 90s, but horrible in Football and basketball. Had very close to 2,000 students and a huge dutch population, it was surprising that we were so bad in both sports. Pretty sure coaches weren't good at the time. Almost went over to play football instead of soccer my junior year with my buddy, because our soccer coach was being a huge dbag.
Love to see them do well. I think the student population is way bigger than when I was there with the two high schools and two middle schools.
WO class of 02 checking in. Played soccer, must not have had the same coach. Our coach was great. We had a very talented team, too many egos to go deep in the playoffs though.
March 21st, 2018 at 11:16 PM ^
A little more than 2300 students right now at the HS. There are two buildings on campus, but it's still all one high school (even in sports, unlike Zeeland East/West)
March 20th, 2018 at 10:22 PM ^
Is he not strong enough to take on the double team?
Izzo should be available shortly to coach EL. He won't even have to sell his house.
March 21st, 2018 at 11:05 AM ^
To say West Ottawa has no size is not completely true. They are all 6'2' 0r 6'3" with long arms and athletic. Bosma is 6'6" with long arms. Obviously not as big as Johns, but that is pretty good for a Zone D. I teach in that district and have seen them do this same thing to Flint Carmen Ainsworth and GR Catholic Central--both teams with big guys. East Lansing had the best player, but West Ottawa is the better team. Also, Johns doesn't seem to like to play with his back to the basket and use that size. That played to our advantage last night.
HHS Alumnus myself. Go Dutch!
They won their last game by making 12/12 free throws in OT. Hoping that holds up this weekend too
March 20th, 2018 at 10:23 PM ^
Let's go WO!! As a student there it's been really fun to watch this team over the past few years. Last year our season ended on the wrong end of a Poole-esque three at the buzzer in the regional finals so it's nice to see them get farther this year.
We'll need to see your I.D. No one under 18 permitted to post (or drink) on this site.
March 21st, 2018 at 12:04 PM ^
Well darn. Maybe I'll be 18 when we figure out how to drink through the site
Yep :)
March 20th, 2018 at 10:35 PM ^
March 20th, 2018 at 10:52 PM ^
March 21st, 2018 at 12:36 PM ^
I graduated in 2014. Baseball and basketball. It's hard to beat the Holland area with everything it has to offer so I understand why you miss it.
Not nearly as many as you would think, but it seems like all the holland area schools are taking pride in WO's run because we rarely get nice things outside of Swimming and the occasional soccer run. WO's coach was my old coach at Holland, definitely pulling for them as he is a good guy who has worked hard to get WO to where they are.
March 21st, 2018 at 11:24 PM ^
Sounds like the group of athletes in that school is deep.
West Ottawa - Home of the Fighting Desmond Morgan's!
Less than a month ago. Some shenanigans with an overinvolved parent and disagreement with the AD:
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/high-school/2018/02/26/steve-f…
I'm guessing that didn't help.
March 21st, 2018 at 11:51 AM ^
Anyone at Calihan Hall for Belleville Novi? First time seeing Gabe Brown (Izzo commit) in person and I don't see how he plays. Skinny kid, just shot 3s. Was a game he should have taken over but is a headcase when a call goes against him (Izzo?).
Dantonio commit, Davion Williams, tied it up with 12 seconds to go only to lose on a buzzer beater runner in the lane. Novi couldn't miss.
Would have loved to see Brown vs. Johns at Breslin. Oh well, we will soon enough.
Brown isn't an instant impact type of player in my opinion, especially at Michigan State. He'll need to add 20 pounds of muscle mass to compete physically and he'll need to develop his ballhandling/shot creation ability in terms of skill.
Gabe is a high-upside prospect that has good physical measurements and athleticism. As of right now though, he's pretty much a catch and shoot prospect that can score in transition as well. He has ideal measurements and skill to be the prototype 3 & D player that is very much coveted at this point.
Don't see an instant impact player for them either. That Bingham is skinny as a rail, but has high upside. Brown is a high upside guy who is almost 6-9 with really long arms, but is skinny and will need at least a year to be a factor. That Loyer is hard to figure, best shooter I've seen in a long time, but he's barely 5-11, he's either Andrew Dakich or Bobby Hurley, no idea which. There other guys are a kid who didn't play this year and a kid from Indiana I don't know anything about.
I think we have instant impact kids comoing in with Johns and Brazdeikis and then a few other kids who will take a little while to develop.
East Lansing plays very poor competition in the Lansing area. I frankly don't put any stock into his HS numbers because the comp level just doesn't allow one to take anything away from it.
Zion absolutely dominated on a shoe circuit (adidas) and the Adidas Nation event matched up against top notch HS players from both the US and around the world. Not exactly an apples to apples comparison.
Johns, while having a strong Spring/Summer last year, had nowhere near the impact that Zion did. Frankly, those two aren't even in the same stratoshpere in terms of prospect level.
In all honesty, HS basketball is pretty much meaningless with respect to evaluation unless we're dealing with LA, Chicago, DC, Dallas, Orlando and a few more cities.