COLLEGE

Van Dyke played college basketball at Texas El Paso from the 1988-89 season through 1991-92, finishing his four-year career as one of the program’s most impactful interior defenders under head coach Don Haskins.

As a freshman in 1988-89, Van Dyke entered the UTEP rotation right away and averaged 5.6 points, 4.0 rebounds, and 0.2 assists per game while establishing his shot-blocking presence early, including multiple seven-block games that season and a first-year high of seven blocks against Fort Lewis on November 26, 1988 and again versus Alcorn State on December 2, 1988.

In his 1989-90 sophomore season, Van Dyke averaged 4.9 points, 2.9 rebounds, and 0.4 assists per game while continuing to anchor the paint defensively, highlighted by a six-block game against South Carolina during the year as he remained part of a frontcourt group that included Marlon Maxey, Antonio Davis, and Greg Foster.

Van Dyke’s junior year came in 1990-91, when he took a larger role in the offense and posted 9.4 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 0.9 assists per game, and he entered Western Athletic Conference play as one of UTEP’s key scoring options alongside Mark McCall while the Miners’ front line relied on his rim protection to set the team’s defensive identity.

As a senior in 1991-92, Van Dyke became a featured scorer and interior stopper on a UTEP team that finished 27-7, tied for first in the WAC at 12-4, and surged to a 16-1 start that carried the Miners into the Associated Press top 25, with Van Dyke averaging 13.9 points and 6.2 rebounds per game as one of the team’s three senior leaders alongside Marlon Maxey and Prince Stewart.

That 1991-92 season also produced one of the most prolific shot-blocking years in school history, as Van Dyke set a UTEP single-season record with 116 blocks, an average of 3.52 blocks per game, and he added an eight-block performance against San Diego State on January 18, 1992 to tie the program’s single-game record for blocks in a game.

UTEP’s conference tournament ended in dramatic fashion on March 14, 1992, when BYU’s Kevin Nixon hit a 54-foot buzzer-beater to win the WAC Tournament championship game 73-71, with Van Dyke involved in the final defensive possession as UTEP tried multiple late-game alignments before the long-range finish decided the title.

The Miners responded by making a deep NCAA Tournament run, opening the 1992 bracket in Dayton with a 55-50 win over Evansville, then upsetting top-seeded Kansas 66-60 to reach the Sweet 16 for the final time under Haskins, before falling 69-67 to Cincinnati in the regional semifinal.

Across those three NCAA Tournament games in 1992, Van Dyke totaled 11 blocks, which works out to 3.7 blocks per game, and he finished that postseason run as a centerpiece of a defense-first group that leaned on his rim protection while UTEP controlled tempo and kept opponents from getting easy finishes at the basket.

Van Dyke’s 1991-92 impact also included recognition as an All-WAC selection, and he was the interior presence on a team that set a UTEP single-season record with 217 total blocks while pairing his back-line shot blocking with perimeter pressure from a veteran guard group led by Stewart and junior college addition Eddie Rivera.

Beyond conference and NCAA Tournament play, Van Dyke delivered a notable tournament performance at the WestStar Bank Don Haskins Sun Bowl Invitational, where he was named the event’s MVP and earned all-tournament recognition as UTEP captured the championship and he helped set the tone defensively over the multi-game stretch.

By the time his UTEP career ended in 1992, Van Dyke had produced 336 career blocks to stand as the program’s career leader in the category, and his shot-blocking volume and season-by-season consistency made him one of the defining defensive big men of the Haskins era at Texas El Paso.

AWARDS

- 1x All-NBL Second Team
- 1x NBL Blocks Leader