Win #250

Want to take just a moment to talk about my feelings of winning #250.  It truly is just a number to me, but it also allows you to take a step back and evaluate how lucky I have been.  My son, Jayson, had went on the trip with the team, and it was great to have him there.  I honestly had forgotten about the record until after the game, Jayson came up to me, hugged me and congratulated me.  You know when I started at BVU, Jayson was one year old.  Now he is 13.  My family has changed a lot during the last 12 years, and things keep moving in our household.  So it does make you take a step back and realize how fun this has been.   I met up with two of my friends at church the next morning, Steve Berg and Mike Sharar, and those two guys talked about all the good players I have had, and I agreed.  But this is what I think about.  Everyone talks about Adam Jones, Scott Weber, Eric Wiebers, Chris Petersen, Landon Roth, Brett Smith, Nick Dentlinger, Aaron Bloom, and Casey Pelzer.  Those are just a few.  I think about Brad Nelson, who graduated in 1999.  Brad never played for us, but was big into lifting.  And when he was a senior, he wanted to take a freshman by the name of Adam Jones under his wing and get him to work hard in the weight room.  Brad made him work hard, and understand the value of lifting.  Brad gave himself up for the betterment of the program.  I think about Bryan Toft, who graduated in 2003.  In 2003, everyone talked about Scott Weber, Chris Petersen, and Robby Beyer, who were great post players.  But Bryan Toft was the guys in practice who worked those guys over everyday, and never got a real opportunity in games.  He gave himself up for the betterment of the program.  I think about Adam Arndorfer and Adam Friedrichsen, who are seniors on our team right now.  I am so happy for these two guys.  They are back up post players, and they have done everything for this program, and I can not be more happy for these guys, as they are playing great and helping this program.  On top of that, those two guys are happy.  They will always feel good about their careers and the program, and that is what it is all about.  I am leaving out many other players, but those are the reasons I coach.  I coach because I have a chance to make a difference in these young guys lives.  I coach because these guys make me feel young, as this 42 year old man gets older and older.  I coach, not to be self-serving, but to serve these guys.  And no matter what happens with wins and losses, I will always be grateful for everything these guys have given the program and to me.   I can’t even begin to exclaim how important these guys have been to me.

The game at Cornell was one of our better games we have played in Mount Vernon in a long time.  We have struggled from time to time at Cornell, but this game went well.  We had good execution and got great shots all night.  Our posts had real good games.  Matt Cleveland was solid as a rock, and Fog and Freddy were real good also.  Our defense was just ok in this game.  We have to be better defensively.  We gave up too many easy shots, however, we did turn them over 23 times.  So we did a nice job with pressure, but at times we broke down, and got screed too many times.

Tonight we play Simpson at home.  We got real lucky at Simpson a few weeks ago.  We should have lost.  In fact, I think it was one of our worst fundamental games we have played this year.  But we were tough, and came up with some big plays late, which is a great trait of a real good team like our team.  We hope to come out and get after it tonight and be a little better fundamentally.  We have spent a lot of time in the last two days working on the fundamentals of the game, and I hope we continue to improve in that area over the last couple of weeks.

This has been a real fun year.  These guys are great.  It has been so much fun coming to work everyday.  I have no idea how this will all work out, but I believe in our guys, and it will be fun to see how it all works out. 

Go Beavers!!

Coach VH