The 42nd annual Hope/Holland Community Day football game on Saturday, Sept. 8 will feature Hope's Flying Dutchmen (0-1) against the Central, Iowa Dutch (1-0) in a night game at Holland Municipal Stadium.
The 42nd annual Hope/Holland Community Day football game on Saturday, Sept. 8 will feature Hope's Flying Dutchmen (0-1) against the Central, Iowa Dutch (1-0) in a night game at Holland Municipal Stadium.
Kickoff will be 7 p.m. ET.
The game will be broadcast by WHTC-AM (1450) and WFUR-FM (102.9). The WHTC broadcast will be streamed on the internet.
GAME NOTES
· The teams will be meeting for the second time. In 2006 Central came back from a 13-3 halftime deficit to defeat Hope 24-13.
· Hope and Central are both affiliated with the Reformed Church in America, the oldest mainline Protestant denomination in the United States. Hope has an enrollment of 3,200 students and Central has a student body of 1,600.
· The Flying Dutchmen will be going after their first victory of the season while the Central Dutch will be seeking to extend their regular season winning streak to 19 games. Last Saturday Hope bowed to UW-RiverFalls 54-24 while Central was defeating St. Thomas, Minn. 35-10.
· Hope quarterback Jake Manning (junior from Schoolcraft) threw a career-best three touchdown passes against UW-RiverFalls. He also did not throw an interception in 38 pass attempts. He has gone four games without giving up a pick, a string of 120 pass attempts. A year ago he had been intercepted 17 times through the first six games.
· In the season opener, tight end Kevin VandenBosch (senior from Grandville) tied his career high for catches in a game with six. He caught six his sophomore year against Wisconsin Lutheran. With at least one reception in 25 of the 28 games he has appeared, VandenBosch has 81 career catches.
· This will be Hope's third night game since moving to Holland Municipal Stadium in 1979. The first game under the lights was a 27-0 victory over Benedictine, Ill. in 1997 and the second was a 20-7 loss to Valparaiso in 2000.
· There was an interesting tale of the stats in the season openers for these teams last Saturday. Hope collected 344 yards of total offense (116 rushing and 228 passing) in a 30-point loss while Central had 175 yards of total offense (93 rushing and 82 passing) in a 25-point victory. The difference for Central was its defense which returned a fumble recovery 52 yards for a touchdown, ran back a pass interception 82 yards for a score and blocked two punts. Hope, meanwhile, allowed UW-River Falls 505 yards of total offense, yielding 7.8 yards per play.