Guess what fuckers? I may be back. I may also not be back. I am unsure. However since I can't quite get in the mood to care about college basketball this year, maybe writing up some basic stuff will get me motivated again. Who knows. And what better way than to write a Big Ten Preview, using a magazine as my sole source of information? This should be terrible.
1. INDIANA HOOSIERS. Don't worry, there's no doubt Tom Crean will screw everything else and the Hoosiers will underachieve because that's just what he does, but I like the team in general. They have a super nice little big man/guard combo in James Blackmon and Thomas Bryant, and any time you have two players on the same team that make me think how sweet that team would be on NBA Jam you know I'm going to overrate them. Plus I think I read somewhere that this Anunoby guy is suppose to like, make a leap or something. If Crean didn't screw him all up already.
2. WISCONSIN BADGERS. Ugh. Gross. The entire team is back from last year to be boring and white, but they weren't terrible so I suppose they're probably the favorite to win the conference. At least Greg Gard doesn't seem nearly as loathsome as Bo Ryan was. Still pretty loathsome though. Just like that traitor Illlikainenen. I confess that I do like watching Nigel Hayes though. I actually kind of hope he finally has a three point shot figured out, because that would be fun to watch. I feel icky. 80% of this team is voting for Trump.
3. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES. I actually already put down a long shot future wager on them to win the NCAA title at like 66-1, so I gotta stick with it. Yeah, it's probably a dumb bet but that's why it's a longshot. But here's the thing I like. Remember year after year after year, Thad Matta somehow manages to pull in one of the best classes in the country. Like every year. And the really good guys like D'Angelo Russell and DeShaun Thomas eventually leave early for the draft. But all those other guys stick around, and now they're sophomores and juniors and seniors. There's a whole group of pretty good players here. If one (or more!) can step up a bit and become an actually like, super good player this could end up a really good team. Or I'm a big fat idiot.
4. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS. Last year they had three big fat tall guys and things went alright. This year they have two big fat tall guys and that might even work out better since Caleb Swanigen and Isaac Haas (too many As!!) can ball. But they still don't have a backcourt and I don't think they have since Lewis Jackson, who couldn't shoot. But they have Spike Albrecht you say? I still don't get why this is/was a big deal because, spoiler alert, Albrecht sucks. He had one good half against Louisville on national tv and suddenly he's good? He's terrible. A benchwarmer who got hot, went back to warming benches, and then transferred since his coach knew he sucked. Now he's going to suck for a new team. What a huge story!
5. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS. This is a weird team for Izzo. He has a killer recruiting class and he's going to need it since there's nothing else here. He has Tum Tum Nairn, who wouldn't shoot the ball if you paid him, and Eron Harris, who wouldn't stop shooting if you cut his arms off, and then like, a bunch of supposedly good freshman. I know putting them fifth is just me falling for the hype of POTENTIAL and UPSIDE, but every other team in this league freaking sucks. I'm serious. Every team after this one is just terrible.
6. MARYLAND TERRAPINS. You know who doesn't suck though? Melo Trimble. He's going to be on a bad team, but he's good enough to pull them up this high. I expect him to shoot approximately one zillion times this year. That is all I can write about Maryland because nobody knows anything else about any of these guys and if they say they do they're lying.
7. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI. Malcolm Hill also doesn't suck, and also will be in the player of the year hunt. The difference between he and Trimble is that Hill has a few players back that I'm familiar with. So why are they below Maryland? Because I'm tremendously inconsistent. Looking at this roster Tracy Abrams is probably already hurt again, I liked this Mike Thorne guy before he got hurt, and Maverick Morgan has always been a player who existed. They have Leron Black too, who I remember was supposed to be a stud but obviously that hasn't worked out too well at this point, but like Nickelback says "It's never too late."
8. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES. They could be higher if they managed to not get anybody hurt, which seems unlikely. Caris LeVert basically missed his last two seasons here, and Gary Walton was hurt for what seemed like the entire year two seasons ago and I know this because I had him on my fantasy team. Zak Irvin hasn't missed as much time as those guys, but he's been absolutely atrocious and I remember reading it had to do with some injury. Look, I'm not saying Jon Beilein is intentionally hurting his players, but I'm not NOT saying it either.
9. MINNESOTA GOPHERS. This is far more optimistic than most predictions out there, but it's my blog so I can do whatever I want. Once you get down here most of these teams are terrible. Like really terrible, so it wouldn't be hard for one of them to jump up and get as high as 8 or 9 and why not the Gopehrs? They have more experience coming back then the majority of the teams below them, a better recruiting class, and a couple supposedly impact transfers. So there's upside. I think a lot of this season depends on Pitino's coaching. The first year he came here he did a lot of interesting things, particularly on offense, that were refreshing after watching Tubby's teams run nothing but flex over and over again. Then, for some reason, that died and I couldn't ascertain if they were running any set play at all on most of the possessions. That works when you have a loaded, athletic, smart team. Even though I like most of this team, they certainly aren't that. So let's run some plays! Have some fun! Finish ninth!
10. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS. I have no doubt one year soon Northwestern will finally break through and make the NCAA Tournament, but I'll believe when I see it. Every time they get close they blow it. And since they wear purple might as well make the ole Vikings comparison here. But there's no doubt they've risen above perennial bottom feeder status. The big recruiting splash guy Vic Law looked good his freshman year before missing last year with an injury and I assume he's back. They probably have a big doofy foreign big guy I can make fun of/fall in love with, and Bryant McIntosh is somehow a really, really good player. He's so punchable he probably should have gone to Duke, but he's really good.
11. IOWA HAWKEYES. If you were a reader of this blog, you may remember at once point I was going to do a thing where I kept track of the best chuckers in the country. That, and everything really, fell by the wayside, but I've always remember Peter Jok because he popped up on my list because he had a pretty insane usage rate for a bench player while not being a very good shooter. Well guess what? Everyone is gone from Iowa except for him. Now, last year he kept a pretty high shot rate but was actually an excellent shooter, but with nobody else out there to draw defensive attention I'm predicting he goes back to crappy. Crappy, but high volume. Buckle up.
12. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS. The only thing I know about Penn State this year is that their best player is Shep Garner, and that makes me smile because his name is Shep. You know who else's name was Shep? The weirdo creepy security guard from Above the Rim who played basketball against air with no ball because he once accidentally killed his best friend. But how can you go against someone who can do this?
You can't! And he's in work clothes! Man, Penn State should really go get this guy.
13. RUTGERS SCARLET KNIGHTS. Rutgers was bad last year. Like really, really bad. Except of course when they spanked the Gophers, which was a really fun game to watch. They have a large chunk of the team back, which is one hand is good because in theory players get better from year to year, but on the other hand is bad because they were really, really bad last season. At least they're interesting. Interesting in that they are wildly inefficient and technically horrible and making baskets, but at the same time play at a really fast pace and put up a whole bunch of shots, while also playing zero defense and if they do manage to make the opponent miss they very rarely get the rebound! In other words, it's fun to watch other teams light them up. Not the Gophers, of course, but other teams.
14. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS. Thank god Petteway and Shields are gone and the Huskers can go back to sucking like they're supposed to. We didn't invite Nebraska to the Big Ten to be mildly competitive at basketball, we invited them to be good at football and fight to not be in last place in basketball every year. I was getting pretty sick of them not being completely dreadful and going after many of the same recruits the Gophers were. Now the natural order of things can be restored. Also pretty sick of Tim Miles at this point.
Well there you have it. My completely accurate and well researched predictions for the big ten this season. As far as this blog, I have no idea how often I'll be posting. Maybe after most games. Maybe never again. NOBODY KNOWS!
Showing posts with label Illinois. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Illinois. Show all posts
Thursday, November 3, 2016
Saturday, November 1, 2014
Big Ten Basketball Preview: #5 Illinois Fighting Illini
If you collect athletes, as John Groce has been doing since he got the Illinois job, at some point simply through their sheer numbers they'll put it altogether and have a pretty good season. Groce now has a whole bunch of top flight athletes, a lead dog in Rayvonte Rice who can be the big man on campus, and caught a big break with Tracy Abrams going down for the year with a knee injury because he is terrible. Rice is a better point guard, as are two transfer combo guards coming in from Oregon State and Seton Hall. Abrams has been the point guard for four years simply because Groce has continued on with Bruce Weber's tradition of refusing to ever sign a good, true point guard. With Abrams out the Illinois should end up with a more free flowing, faster offense that fits their athletic roster to a T (tee?).
Here's who is on the Illini's roster and their rank by 247sports when they were incoming freshmen: senior center Nganna Egwu #81, sophomores Kendrick Nunn #56, Malcolm Hill #103, Austin Colbert #98, Maverick Morgan #180, and Jaylon Tate #130, and freshmen Leron Black #43. Add in guys who transferred in with Rayvonte Rice, who led Illinois in scoring last season at 15.9 per game and also led in rebounding despite being just 6-4, Aaron Cosby (Seton Hall guy, averaged 13 points and 3 assists), and Ahmad Starks (Oregon State, averaged 10 and 2.3). I mean really, that's a shitload of talent. If Weber was here I'd say big whoop he's going to screw it all up anyway, but with Groce they should be ok and get to the NCAA Tournament, assuming they end up figuring out the PG situation.
And they should, because it should be pretty simple. Rice, Cosby, and Starks can all handle the ball, as can Tate. Rice is better off the ball, I think, and the transfers give him a chance to do just that the majority of the time. The Wing spot is in good shape as well, as any of those guys can play the #2 and add in Hill and Nunn and you've got plenty of options on the perimeter. Illinois does have a history of standing around and launching way too many horrible three-pointers and they could fall into that trap again - no returnee cracked 39% last season. The good news is Starks and Cosby both hit 40% last season, so there's another need those two transfers help fill. Pretty much perfect guys to transfer in, really.
Front court is pretty good shape as well, even if Egwu is the only returnee who averaged more than 7.1 minutes per game last season (7pts/6rebs/2blks in 30 mpg). Maverick Morgan is a monster at 6-10, 250 lbs. He didn't do much last year and he strikes me as a defense and rebounding type, but that's all this team will need from him. Another highly rated recruit who hasn't gotten much run is Austin Colbert, and he'll get his shot this year, but the real jewel here (other than Egwu who I seem to be glossing over but who is really quite a good player) is freshman Leron Black, ESPN's #44 recruit in the country. He's another incredible athlete Illinois can add to their surplus, but he's already got a polished offensive game with a decent mid-range jumper. He's my pick for freshman of the year if that's an award they give.
John Groce is a good coach, and there was little doubt he'd get the Illini turned around especially with a built in recruiting base of Chicago. He's been crushing the Chicago market and has built up two great classes in a row with a third on the way, and leveraged that with a lucrative transfer market where he's had a lot of success already. Illinois, however, has always seemed to have a talented and athletic squad, but it seems it's always been an issue getting them to really meld together and have sustained success, at least since the Deron Williams/Dee Brown team. Good chance Groce is the guy to do it, which means the Illini might be on the verge of becoming a Big Ten power. Yay.
OTHER PREVIEWS
#6 MICHIGAN
#7 MICHIGAN STATE
#8 IOWA HAWKEYES
#9 MARYLAND TERRAPINS
#10 INDIANA HOOSIERS
#11 PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS
#12 NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS
#13 PURDUE BOILERMAKERS
#14 RUTGERS SCARLET KNIGHTS
Here's who is on the Illini's roster and their rank by 247sports when they were incoming freshmen: senior center Nganna Egwu #81, sophomores Kendrick Nunn #56, Malcolm Hill #103, Austin Colbert #98, Maverick Morgan #180, and Jaylon Tate #130, and freshmen Leron Black #43. Add in guys who transferred in with Rayvonte Rice, who led Illinois in scoring last season at 15.9 per game and also led in rebounding despite being just 6-4, Aaron Cosby (Seton Hall guy, averaged 13 points and 3 assists), and Ahmad Starks (Oregon State, averaged 10 and 2.3). I mean really, that's a shitload of talent. If Weber was here I'd say big whoop he's going to screw it all up anyway, but with Groce they should be ok and get to the NCAA Tournament, assuming they end up figuring out the PG situation.
And they should, because it should be pretty simple. Rice, Cosby, and Starks can all handle the ball, as can Tate. Rice is better off the ball, I think, and the transfers give him a chance to do just that the majority of the time. The Wing spot is in good shape as well, as any of those guys can play the #2 and add in Hill and Nunn and you've got plenty of options on the perimeter. Illinois does have a history of standing around and launching way too many horrible three-pointers and they could fall into that trap again - no returnee cracked 39% last season. The good news is Starks and Cosby both hit 40% last season, so there's another need those two transfers help fill. Pretty much perfect guys to transfer in, really.
Front court is pretty good shape as well, even if Egwu is the only returnee who averaged more than 7.1 minutes per game last season (7pts/6rebs/2blks in 30 mpg). Maverick Morgan is a monster at 6-10, 250 lbs. He didn't do much last year and he strikes me as a defense and rebounding type, but that's all this team will need from him. Another highly rated recruit who hasn't gotten much run is Austin Colbert, and he'll get his shot this year, but the real jewel here (other than Egwu who I seem to be glossing over but who is really quite a good player) is freshman Leron Black, ESPN's #44 recruit in the country. He's another incredible athlete Illinois can add to their surplus, but he's already got a polished offensive game with a decent mid-range jumper. He's my pick for freshman of the year if that's an award they give.
John Groce is a good coach, and there was little doubt he'd get the Illini turned around especially with a built in recruiting base of Chicago. He's been crushing the Chicago market and has built up two great classes in a row with a third on the way, and leveraged that with a lucrative transfer market where he's had a lot of success already. Illinois, however, has always seemed to have a talented and athletic squad, but it seems it's always been an issue getting them to really meld together and have sustained success, at least since the Deron Williams/Dee Brown team. Good chance Groce is the guy to do it, which means the Illini might be on the verge of becoming a Big Ten power. Yay.
OTHER PREVIEWS
#6 MICHIGAN
#7 MICHIGAN STATE
#8 IOWA HAWKEYES
#9 MARYLAND TERRAPINS
#10 INDIANA HOOSIERS
#11 PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS
#12 NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS
#13 PURDUE BOILERMAKERS
#14 RUTGERS SCARLET KNIGHTS
Thursday, February 20, 2014
Illinois 62, Minnesota 49
Ok, whatever, I'm over it. I'm surprising myself here by actually writing about this game, but I guess I'm so numb to disappointment as a Gopher fan that like, no big whoop. So here are 10 things I liked and didn't like about the Illinois game.
1. First off, the defense was fine. There are plenty of ugly stretches you can blame on the Gophers' defense this year, but last night wasn't one of them. Kendrck Nunn torched them and the Illini hit 8 of 13 threes, and giving up 1.09 points per possession isn't ideal, but then again giving up 1.09 ppp to a team that hit 62% of it's threes isn't bad. Minnesota held Illinois to 34% on 2-pointers and created a turnover on a respectable 19% of the Illini's possessions. And, contrary to brain dead Shon Morris's contention, most of those threes were tough shots. One or two might have come from a defensive breakdown (I remember one by Mo in the corner) but in general Illinois was hitting tough shots from deep. Sucks.
2. The Gopher offense was horrendous. Obvious enough to anybody watching, but Illinois played the same style defense the Gophers did, sagging in the paint to take away the drive and daring the Gophers to shoot. And boy did they fall for it. They hit a very nice 58% from 2, but took 25 freaking three pointers, hitting just four, and turned the ball over 26% of the time leading to a disastrous 0.86 points per possession which will never, ever win a game. This was one of the ugliest games I can remember watching in quite a while.
3. The whole team was embarrassingly flat last night and just totally out of it. How many balls went through hands? How many passes were off the mark? How many loose balls did the Gophers come up with? Most importantly, how the hell do you get called twice for not stepping all the way out of bounds to throw the ball in after a made Illini bucket? Twice! It rarely happens at all. The refs generally give a generous amount of leeway on that play, but the two called on the Gophers last night were so egregious the refs had no choice but to call them. I'm not even sure Eliason had one foot out of bounds on the one they called on him, let alone two. Just an embarrassing game in every respect.
4. Has Andre Hollins lost his point guard skills? I know DeAndre Mathieu is definitely the #1 point guard with Hollins the shooting guard, but wasn't the plan for Hollins to be the PG when Matheiu is on the bench? His assist numbers are drastically down, and last night he became Malik Smith, putting up 13 shots with 11 of them coming from three. Maybe it's an ankle issue, but he's looked fine the last two games, at least in that respect. The Gophers have two players who can create their own shot and create shots for others, and when one of them becomes a stand still jump shooter there are going to be problems.
5. Maybe we should do away with the autosit in the first half with two fouls. It's clear at this point that Mathieu is the team's most important player and per my previous point the offense stagnates when he's not on the floor, so maybe playing an entire 12 minutes stretch without him isn't the best thing to do. The Gophers led 14-3 when he went out with his second foul. There is nothing worse to me than sticking to dumb, rigid rules. It was clear the Gophers needed Mathieu back in before Illinois crawled all the way back, but because "the book" says to sit 'em the first half if he has two fouls he never got back off the bench. Stupid.
6. Mo Walker is becoming unstoppable. Last night 5-7 shooting for 10 points, and one of the prettiest moves I can remember seeing from any Gopher post man in quite some time. Against Maverick Morgan he was able to use his size and strength to just bull his way to the rim, and against Egwu he used great footwork, footwork I didn't know he had, to get his shots. Walker needs to become a focal point, if not the focal point, of this offense going forward, and I don't mean as the screener on pick-and-rolls. The PF picking Walker's man on one block to spring him going across the lane and establishing position on the other block needs to be a staple for this team for the next two years.
7. I started the year hating Joey King, but I seem to find myself writing positive things about him every time I write lately. His offensive game continues to blossom week-by-week as he understands more and more that the team needs him to be a power forward and not just a three point specialist. He's added a little bit of a post game, which I wrote about last time, and in this game he did a really nice job passing the ball out of the high post, even totaling what I assume is a career high 4 assists. The one thing he does that is killing me is when he pump fakes at the three point line and gets his man to leave his feet - and then does nothing or just passes it off. Freaking put the ball on the ground and move, man! Even if it's just to side step and shoot a three do something! You've gained an advantage, don't squander it.
8. King's counterpart, however, was pretty much ignored and invisible. If you watched last night the Gophers ran several pick and rolls with Oto as the screener, and none of them came close to working on any level because Illinois didn't care what Oto did. Every time he'd pop out to the wing, but Illinois's defense would just double the ball handler and force him the other way. Oto would do the right thing and cut baseline to the opposite corner, but it was such an aggressive double team I think they managed to find him exactly once for a possible shot, which ended up either a turnover or a missed shot I don't remember. Might have been nice to actually roll towards the basket and see if that opened something up elsewhere, because the way they ran this with Oto it was worthless.
9. Daquein McNeil is going to be really good. If nothing else he's going to be a heady, smart guard and a plus defender. I don't think he's ever going to be a really dynamic scorer or distributor, but he should develop into the kind of off guard who can knock down the open shot, drive if it's there, and limit his mistakes. Take that along with his tremendous defense already, which should just get better, and he's got real potential. We've seen him play good defense in spurts, and he did a great job against Drew Crawford in the Northwestern game, but now he's getting more consistent with it. I noticed last night that he does a thing Aaron Craft is really good at in that he can sneak between his man and a ball screen, reducing the need for any kind of hedge while at the same time avoiding going under the screen and giving up a possible open jumper. It's a valuable skill, and McNeil already seems to have it.
10. Now we can relax. There certainly isn't a bright side to this loss, but if you stretch far enough to can at least talk yourself into thinking you'll enjoy the games more now that you can watch the rest of the games stress free. There's now zero reason to expect the Gophers to make the NCAA Tournament this year, and the really sad thing is it's not their performance against the top tier teams that's keeping them out, but a combined 2-4 against Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue, and Illinois. With a very difficult schedule the rest of the way just sit back and enjoy the ride, and enjoy speculating on what teams we might get to see at the Barn in the NIT/CBI/CIT.
It's going to be nice for me to not worry too much about it the next couple of weeks because I'm going to be on a bit of a whirlwind. Next week I will be in New Mexico for the entire week (hopefully I'll get up to some drunk posting like old times), then I'm back for half a week and off to Florida for vacation for a week and a half. So it'll be nice to not be obsessing over the Gophers. Expect posts from New Mexico for sure, and probably one or two at least from Florida, just don't expect them to be 100% Gopher stuff. Kind of liberating.
1. First off, the defense was fine. There are plenty of ugly stretches you can blame on the Gophers' defense this year, but last night wasn't one of them. Kendrck Nunn torched them and the Illini hit 8 of 13 threes, and giving up 1.09 points per possession isn't ideal, but then again giving up 1.09 ppp to a team that hit 62% of it's threes isn't bad. Minnesota held Illinois to 34% on 2-pointers and created a turnover on a respectable 19% of the Illini's possessions. And, contrary to brain dead Shon Morris's contention, most of those threes were tough shots. One or two might have come from a defensive breakdown (I remember one by Mo in the corner) but in general Illinois was hitting tough shots from deep. Sucks.
2. The Gopher offense was horrendous. Obvious enough to anybody watching, but Illinois played the same style defense the Gophers did, sagging in the paint to take away the drive and daring the Gophers to shoot. And boy did they fall for it. They hit a very nice 58% from 2, but took 25 freaking three pointers, hitting just four, and turned the ball over 26% of the time leading to a disastrous 0.86 points per possession which will never, ever win a game. This was one of the ugliest games I can remember watching in quite a while.
3. The whole team was embarrassingly flat last night and just totally out of it. How many balls went through hands? How many passes were off the mark? How many loose balls did the Gophers come up with? Most importantly, how the hell do you get called twice for not stepping all the way out of bounds to throw the ball in after a made Illini bucket? Twice! It rarely happens at all. The refs generally give a generous amount of leeway on that play, but the two called on the Gophers last night were so egregious the refs had no choice but to call them. I'm not even sure Eliason had one foot out of bounds on the one they called on him, let alone two. Just an embarrassing game in every respect.
4. Has Andre Hollins lost his point guard skills? I know DeAndre Mathieu is definitely the #1 point guard with Hollins the shooting guard, but wasn't the plan for Hollins to be the PG when Matheiu is on the bench? His assist numbers are drastically down, and last night he became Malik Smith, putting up 13 shots with 11 of them coming from three. Maybe it's an ankle issue, but he's looked fine the last two games, at least in that respect. The Gophers have two players who can create their own shot and create shots for others, and when one of them becomes a stand still jump shooter there are going to be problems.
5. Maybe we should do away with the autosit in the first half with two fouls. It's clear at this point that Mathieu is the team's most important player and per my previous point the offense stagnates when he's not on the floor, so maybe playing an entire 12 minutes stretch without him isn't the best thing to do. The Gophers led 14-3 when he went out with his second foul. There is nothing worse to me than sticking to dumb, rigid rules. It was clear the Gophers needed Mathieu back in before Illinois crawled all the way back, but because "the book" says to sit 'em the first half if he has two fouls he never got back off the bench. Stupid.
6. Mo Walker is becoming unstoppable. Last night 5-7 shooting for 10 points, and one of the prettiest moves I can remember seeing from any Gopher post man in quite some time. Against Maverick Morgan he was able to use his size and strength to just bull his way to the rim, and against Egwu he used great footwork, footwork I didn't know he had, to get his shots. Walker needs to become a focal point, if not the focal point, of this offense going forward, and I don't mean as the screener on pick-and-rolls. The PF picking Walker's man on one block to spring him going across the lane and establishing position on the other block needs to be a staple for this team for the next two years.
7. I started the year hating Joey King, but I seem to find myself writing positive things about him every time I write lately. His offensive game continues to blossom week-by-week as he understands more and more that the team needs him to be a power forward and not just a three point specialist. He's added a little bit of a post game, which I wrote about last time, and in this game he did a really nice job passing the ball out of the high post, even totaling what I assume is a career high 4 assists. The one thing he does that is killing me is when he pump fakes at the three point line and gets his man to leave his feet - and then does nothing or just passes it off. Freaking put the ball on the ground and move, man! Even if it's just to side step and shoot a three do something! You've gained an advantage, don't squander it.
8. King's counterpart, however, was pretty much ignored and invisible. If you watched last night the Gophers ran several pick and rolls with Oto as the screener, and none of them came close to working on any level because Illinois didn't care what Oto did. Every time he'd pop out to the wing, but Illinois's defense would just double the ball handler and force him the other way. Oto would do the right thing and cut baseline to the opposite corner, but it was such an aggressive double team I think they managed to find him exactly once for a possible shot, which ended up either a turnover or a missed shot I don't remember. Might have been nice to actually roll towards the basket and see if that opened something up elsewhere, because the way they ran this with Oto it was worthless.
9. Daquein McNeil is going to be really good. If nothing else he's going to be a heady, smart guard and a plus defender. I don't think he's ever going to be a really dynamic scorer or distributor, but he should develop into the kind of off guard who can knock down the open shot, drive if it's there, and limit his mistakes. Take that along with his tremendous defense already, which should just get better, and he's got real potential. We've seen him play good defense in spurts, and he did a great job against Drew Crawford in the Northwestern game, but now he's getting more consistent with it. I noticed last night that he does a thing Aaron Craft is really good at in that he can sneak between his man and a ball screen, reducing the need for any kind of hedge while at the same time avoiding going under the screen and giving up a possible open jumper. It's a valuable skill, and McNeil already seems to have it.
10. Now we can relax. There certainly isn't a bright side to this loss, but if you stretch far enough to can at least talk yourself into thinking you'll enjoy the games more now that you can watch the rest of the games stress free. There's now zero reason to expect the Gophers to make the NCAA Tournament this year, and the really sad thing is it's not their performance against the top tier teams that's keeping them out, but a combined 2-4 against Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue, and Illinois. With a very difficult schedule the rest of the way just sit back and enjoy the ride, and enjoy speculating on what teams we might get to see at the Barn in the NIT/CBI/CIT.
It's going to be nice for me to not worry too much about it the next couple of weeks because I'm going to be on a bit of a whirlwind. Next week I will be in New Mexico for the entire week (hopefully I'll get up to some drunk posting like old times), then I'm back for half a week and off to Florida for vacation for a week and a half. So it'll be nice to not be obsessing over the Gophers. Expect posts from New Mexico for sure, and probably one or two at least from Florida, just don't expect them to be 100% Gopher stuff. Kind of liberating.
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Game Preview: Gophers vs. Illinois
Huge sigh of relief. I've been terrified of that Northwestern game ever since it morphed into a must win thanks to that three game losing streak. I know I usually like to do the 10 things post after the game and get all nerdy and stuff, but there was a little bit of a Sunday Fun Day going on and with the game not being until five I didn't really super pay attention. I know Jershon Cobb hit everything, Drew Crawford hit nothing, the Gophers and their turnovers are going to be the death of me, and DeAndre Mathieu is maybe the greatest Gopher of all time.
Up next is Illinois, another must win game. The good news is that Illinois is terrible. They've gone 3-10 in the Big Ten, and they started out 2-0 which, if my math is right, means they're 1-10 in the last eleven games. They did beat UNLV and Missouri in non-conference play and were even ranked in the Top 25 at one point, but a once promising season has gone completely off the rails and I really see no need for the Gophers to do anything to allow any life to seep back into the Illini. Kill them and kill them now.
Illinois's biggest problem is on offense, where they rank 11th in the Big Ten and 201st in the country in offensive efficiency. Their problem, and this seems like an Illinois tradition at this point, is that they do nothing but shoot jumpers. They take only 28% of their field goal attempts at the rim, a full 10% lower than the national average. And they don't even replace these attempts with valuable 3-point attempts, but with 2-point jumpers (10% more than the national average here too). This is a poor strategy no matter what, but it's even worse when you can't shoot. They rank dead last in the conference in 3-point shooting (28%) and 2-point shooting (41%) and being that bad at both is pretty impressive. Since they never drive to the paint they also rarely get to the line (335th in the country) so sometimes it gets awfully difficult for the Illini to find points.
If they're going to score, it's most likely going to come from 6-4 senior guard Rayvonte Rice, their leading scorer (16.6 per game) and one of a few players who might occasionally drive to the rim. He's probably their best three point shooter (33% on 5 attempts per game) but he's also very tough inside (5.9 rpg) and can use his strength and driving to get to the line (four games with 10+ FTAs this season, including 2 of the last 4), and is a big reason the Illini can play four guards as often as they do. He can score in bunches and has eclipsed twenty points four times in Big Ten play including 3 of the last 6 games. Most of his damage comes against teams who struggle to contain guard penetration, so it's imperative the Gophers keep him contained out to the perimeter.
Running the offense will be "point guard" Tracy Abrams who is continuing the Illini tradition of never having a good point guard (the curse of Chester Frazier) averaging just 3 assists per game (his assist percentage is ok, in fairness) and he's just a terrible shooter at 35% on twos and 27% on threes. He's actually their second leading scorer at 11.2 per game, but did most of his damage outside conference play and has hit double figures in just 7 Big Ten games, and one of the last four.
The other two guards will likely be a couple of highly regarded freshmen in 6-2 shooting guard Kendrick Nunn and 6-6 wing Malcolm Hill, both of whom were ranking in the 60s as incoming freshmen by ESPN. Neither has put up monster stats this year, but Nunn is started to get more involved having played 30+ minutes in each of the last three games and scoring 19 against Penn State. Nunn had a rep as a shooter coming in, and although he's only hitting 33% this year you just never know with these highly ranked freshmen - they could nothing all year and then just explode, but hopefully he got that out of his system against Penn State. Hill starts, but generally gives up most of his minutes to senior sixth man Joseph Bertrand.
The super athletic Bertrand kind of scares me because if the Gophers do that thing where they let guards drive into the paint over and over again he could have a monster game. He's usually much better in a free flowing game, so hopefully the Gophers can play that lock down defense they break out from time to time. I expect them to play zone given the Illini's difficulty throwing the ball into the basket, so expect Bertrand to try to exploit the gaps. If the Gophers lose, Bertrand will have a big part in it.
In the front court Illinois goes with 6-11 league leader in Ns in his name Nnanna Egwu as their lone foward quite often. Egwu is the super athletic jump around guy who blocks a lot of shots (2.2 per game) and can grab some rebounds (5.9 per game) but is pretty limited on offense (6.7 ppg on 41% shooting which is horrendous for someone 6-11). Their two back up bigs are 6-7 senior Jon Ekey and 6-10 freshman Maverick Morgan. Ekey is your float around the perimeter three point shooter guy (35% on 5 attempts per game), but for a three point specialist he's in the middle of a horrendous slump (5-21 last 6 games). If Bertrand and Rice can find the gaps in the zone he's the one they'll be looking for spotting up behind the arc. Morgan averages only about 8 minutes per game, but he'll likely see the floor a bit considering the Gophers will generally always have either Mo Walker or Elliot Eliason in the game, Egwu can't play all 40 minutes, and there is no way in hell Ekey can guard either of them.
Despite their record and everything I've written so far Illinois really isn't a pushover. They're a terrible shooting team, yes, and they didn't break 40 points in their last game and have only scored over 70 points once in their last 11, but they also play good defense. Not great, but good. I expect the Gophers to keep Illinois to around 60 points, despite all the holes in the Gopher defense I don't think Illini can exploit them to score much more than that. So the question is, can the Gophers score more than that? I think yes.
Minnesota 74, Illinois 60.
Up next is Illinois, another must win game. The good news is that Illinois is terrible. They've gone 3-10 in the Big Ten, and they started out 2-0 which, if my math is right, means they're 1-10 in the last eleven games. They did beat UNLV and Missouri in non-conference play and were even ranked in the Top 25 at one point, but a once promising season has gone completely off the rails and I really see no need for the Gophers to do anything to allow any life to seep back into the Illini. Kill them and kill them now.
Illinois's biggest problem is on offense, where they rank 11th in the Big Ten and 201st in the country in offensive efficiency. Their problem, and this seems like an Illinois tradition at this point, is that they do nothing but shoot jumpers. They take only 28% of their field goal attempts at the rim, a full 10% lower than the national average. And they don't even replace these attempts with valuable 3-point attempts, but with 2-point jumpers (10% more than the national average here too). This is a poor strategy no matter what, but it's even worse when you can't shoot. They rank dead last in the conference in 3-point shooting (28%) and 2-point shooting (41%) and being that bad at both is pretty impressive. Since they never drive to the paint they also rarely get to the line (335th in the country) so sometimes it gets awfully difficult for the Illini to find points.
If they're going to score, it's most likely going to come from 6-4 senior guard Rayvonte Rice, their leading scorer (16.6 per game) and one of a few players who might occasionally drive to the rim. He's probably their best three point shooter (33% on 5 attempts per game) but he's also very tough inside (5.9 rpg) and can use his strength and driving to get to the line (four games with 10+ FTAs this season, including 2 of the last 4), and is a big reason the Illini can play four guards as often as they do. He can score in bunches and has eclipsed twenty points four times in Big Ten play including 3 of the last 6 games. Most of his damage comes against teams who struggle to contain guard penetration, so it's imperative the Gophers keep him contained out to the perimeter.
Running the offense will be "point guard" Tracy Abrams who is continuing the Illini tradition of never having a good point guard (the curse of Chester Frazier) averaging just 3 assists per game (his assist percentage is ok, in fairness) and he's just a terrible shooter at 35% on twos and 27% on threes. He's actually their second leading scorer at 11.2 per game, but did most of his damage outside conference play and has hit double figures in just 7 Big Ten games, and one of the last four.
The other two guards will likely be a couple of highly regarded freshmen in 6-2 shooting guard Kendrick Nunn and 6-6 wing Malcolm Hill, both of whom were ranking in the 60s as incoming freshmen by ESPN. Neither has put up monster stats this year, but Nunn is started to get more involved having played 30+ minutes in each of the last three games and scoring 19 against Penn State. Nunn had a rep as a shooter coming in, and although he's only hitting 33% this year you just never know with these highly ranked freshmen - they could nothing all year and then just explode, but hopefully he got that out of his system against Penn State. Hill starts, but generally gives up most of his minutes to senior sixth man Joseph Bertrand.
The super athletic Bertrand kind of scares me because if the Gophers do that thing where they let guards drive into the paint over and over again he could have a monster game. He's usually much better in a free flowing game, so hopefully the Gophers can play that lock down defense they break out from time to time. I expect them to play zone given the Illini's difficulty throwing the ball into the basket, so expect Bertrand to try to exploit the gaps. If the Gophers lose, Bertrand will have a big part in it.
In the front court Illinois goes with 6-11 league leader in Ns in his name Nnanna Egwu as their lone foward quite often. Egwu is the super athletic jump around guy who blocks a lot of shots (2.2 per game) and can grab some rebounds (5.9 per game) but is pretty limited on offense (6.7 ppg on 41% shooting which is horrendous for someone 6-11). Their two back up bigs are 6-7 senior Jon Ekey and 6-10 freshman Maverick Morgan. Ekey is your float around the perimeter three point shooter guy (35% on 5 attempts per game), but for a three point specialist he's in the middle of a horrendous slump (5-21 last 6 games). If Bertrand and Rice can find the gaps in the zone he's the one they'll be looking for spotting up behind the arc. Morgan averages only about 8 minutes per game, but he'll likely see the floor a bit considering the Gophers will generally always have either Mo Walker or Elliot Eliason in the game, Egwu can't play all 40 minutes, and there is no way in hell Ekey can guard either of them.
Despite their record and everything I've written so far Illinois really isn't a pushover. They're a terrible shooting team, yes, and they didn't break 40 points in their last game and have only scored over 70 points once in their last 11, but they also play good defense. Not great, but good. I expect the Gophers to keep Illinois to around 60 points, despite all the holes in the Gopher defense I don't think Illini can exploit them to score much more than that. So the question is, can the Gophers score more than that? I think yes.
Minnesota 74, Illinois 60.
Sunday, January 12, 2014
Michigan State 87, Minnesota 75 (OT)
I suppose I'm so supposed to write about this game, but I really don't think I can. Part of it is it's just too hard to right about a game that goes down like this, a game where you don't think your team has a chance and have no expectations. Then they play so incredibly well, you find yourself believing they have a chance, but you still don't quite let yourself think it could happen. Then something happens, like say a whipped pass from Dre Hollins to Mo Walker to give your team a 10 point lead, and you can't help it but you're all in. Then the bottom falls out, but wait there's hope, and then you get curb stomped. Too hard to write anything. Plus I missed the entire last 10 minutes (listened on the radio at least) and all of overtime because I was stupid and made plans to take my damn wiener kids to the aquarium. I did manage to pull up the game on btn2go on my phone, but once I got it started the Gophers were already down 9 in the OT and frankly looking at sharks just seemed more appealing.
I could probably cobble together the usual 10 things I liked and didn't like (I do have some notes I made since I'm a huge nerd), but honestly I just don't think I have it in me. Plus, Aaron Paul didn't win the Golden Globe and I've been watching Illinois and Northwestern so really, it's a pretty rough weekend. I guess I went with the kids to the shark thing and then on Sunday I got to go see the new Hobbit movie which pretty much rules so it wasn't a completely lost weekend, but man the basketball part sucked. The gambling part was pretty bad too. Mostly because I suck.
I could probably cobble together the usual 10 things I liked and didn't like (I do have some notes I made since I'm a huge nerd), but honestly I just don't think I have it in me. Plus, Aaron Paul didn't win the Golden Globe and I've been watching Illinois and Northwestern so really, it's a pretty rough weekend. I guess I went with the kids to the shark thing and then on Sunday I got to go see the new Hobbit movie which pretty much rules so it wasn't a completely lost weekend, but man the basketball part sucked. The gambling part was pretty bad too. Mostly because I suck.
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
Minnesota 68, Penn State 65
After the Purdue game I wrote "a win is a win." After this game, I'll say a road win in the Big Ten is a road win in the Big Ten. Despite one of the worst stretches of the season since the Arkansas game, the Gophers played a little better down the stretch, took advantage of some luck with Penn State's two best players fouling out, and got a conference road win. I'll take it. Mostly because I don't exactly have a choice. Anyway, here are 10 things I liked and didn't like about the Penn State game:
1. No matter how ugly the game was, the Gophers made the plays they needed to down the stretch. And yes, it was crazy ugly, but they did what they needed too. Malik Smith nailing four key free throws after not hitting a thing all day. DeAndre Mathieu with a huge steal and a huge tip in after struggling to score most of the first half. Austin Hollins, having maybe his worst game as a Gopher which is hard to envision after how he played against Michigan, coming up with an absolute monster steal right when the Gophers needed it. Maybe it doesn't get to that point if Frazier and Newbill don't foul out, and maybe none of those plays get made and Penn State coasts to a W. But guess what? They did, they didn't, and the Gophers did what they needed to win. It probably seems a bit Pollyanna-ish, which is generally against my character, but screw it, this is most likely a lost year between coaches anyway, so I'm gonna take what I can get.
2. Nobody, and I mean nobody, could stop Tim Frazier. Mathieu tried, both Hollinses tried, even Ahanmisi tried and it didn't matter, because Frazier could get into the lane whenever he wanted - and he wanted to a lot. And I don't know if it was by design as an overreaction to the end of the Purdue game, but it seemed like every time Frazier (or one of their crappy guards, even) got into the lane the Gopher help hung back, giving Frazier floater after floater after floater as the world's worst announcing team was happy to tell you over and over and over again. Luckily he fouled out right as we were getting down to it, and I don't think the Gophers win that game if he's still on the floor because, like I said, the Gophers had zero ability to stop his dribble penetration.
That's now three straight Big Ten games and dribble penetration has been a major, major issue in all three, and most of it is coming off ball screens. Early in the game, when the Gophers had control, the big men were hedging well and pushing the ball handler out until the screened man could recover and all was well. Then it all went to shit. The Gopher bigs started hedging too early or too late, and when Penn State started doing the double pick at the top of the key for Frazier the Gophers basically started committing four players to dealing with it, which meant there were skip passes available. I'm starting to think the Gophers just don't have the personnel to handle most Big Ten teams defensively, and that's no good for anyone.
3. Elliott can kind of control the paint. Another double double with four blocks, and it looked early like the Gopher game plan was going to force feed him the ball on the block and it was working. Even when Mo was in getting him the ball down low was working offensively. Then the Gophers decided to go completely away from that strategy and become a jump shooting team again. Do you know that Eliason only had two field goal attempts in the second half, and one of them came on a tip in? Not that he should be getting a ton of FGAs, but when he's demonstrated already that Penn State struggles to guard him I wouldn't mind seeing a touch or two, you know? And I'm not even sure Walker played in the second half. I can't believe I'm saying this, but against most teams Elliott needs to be an offensive focal point, just for variety's sake. Not against Michigan State.
3. I've always been an Oto defender, but he's just lost out there far too often. He has no idea where to go on defense, and that goes for both his positioning as well as things like hedging on screens and help defense. These things aren't new, but as his playing time becomes more and more high profile they just stand out more and more. Then he does things like, let's a pass go through his legs five hole style and then falls down trying to go after it which leads to a Penn State lay-up, or he let's himself get pushed under the basket on a Penn State free throw leading to a Nittany Lion rebound in a big, big, big spot. And it's not like it's just this game, you can point to at least 2-3 mistakes of his each game, easy. I think he's got some offensive ability as the jump shot seems to have come back as Pitino's given him more confidence to take open shots, and he brilliantly slipped a screen at one point and then nailed the 18 footer, but I really don't know if he can offset his piss poor defense with his mediocre offense. Then again, the only other choice at the 4 spot is a Joey King who completely panics any time he has the ball in a non scoring position, so really Pitino is pretty well screwed here.
4. Speaking of things that are horrible, Stephen Bardo is just the worst announcer ever. Repetitious, stating the obvious, creating a narrative and sticking with it no matter what, repetitious, infatuated with anyone banking in a shot, and he tends to repeat the same thing over and over again. Honestly, how many times did you hear that the Gophers were the best free throw shooting team in the Big Ten but were having a bad game? Or that it was a miracle Penn State was winning even though Newbill was barely playing due to foul trouble? How about him trying to sell the fact that bad free throw shooting is contagious. Seriously, once I noticed how horrible he was I kept waiting to see if he'd bring any insight at all to the broadcast, and he did - once. When Oto slipped that screen mentioned above, Bardo made sure to point it out and even explain it. But that was it. There was literally not one single other word he uttered that added to the broadcast. Someone should light his car on fire.
5. I'm all for consistency and installing a system, but if it's not working I'm not sure sticking with it makes sense. Naturally I'm talking about the press, which wasn't working and was creating easy buckets for Penn State who kept beating the Gophers down the floor and creating odd man rush situations and wasn't creating any turnovers or easy baskets for Minnesota. I suppose I shouldn't have expected it, given that he never backed off when Arkansas was shredding the Gophers. Normally I would say you need to adapt your system to your personnel and if it's not working it's not working, but in this case I think I'm ok with it. Pitino likely knows his ceiling is an NCAA bid this year and next and it's not likely either team will have much of any chance to go further, so it's all about building his brand for the class of 2015 and beyond. Let those kids see how Minnesota basketball is balls to the wall and fun fun fun for 40 minutes and hope it pays dividends. It's going to cause some ugly situations, like tonight, but it should pay off down the road. I hope. Please.
6. Penn State doubled on a lot of ball screens, and neither team took advantage. The point of doubling on a ball screen of course, is to create turnovers, and although the Gophers turned it over an uncomfortable 14 times I can't remember even one coming off of a Penn State double. If you're not turning it over on a double, that means you should be able to find an open man and unless the defensive rotations are very tight you should be able to get an open shot. That didn't happen either. And it wasn't because Penn State's rotations were so great, more that the Gophers were slow to swing the ball, or hesitant to drive the ball, or just couldn't make the right pass. Overall the Gopher offense was pretty rough tonight, and getting a win on a night when things just aren't working properly is probably a good sign. Or not. I don't know. This team is frustrating.
7. Malik Smith has proven himself to be a very valuable Gopher, but I'm not exactly sure he should be driving the paint. I love a lot of what he brings, and my buddy, "The Bear" has taken to calling him J.R. after J.R. Smith which is pretty much perfect, but when he puts the ball on the floor and drives it's an adventure. As with all true chuckers, which Malik most definitely is even though he has toned it down a bit from his FIU days, once he has the ball in the paint he's damn sure he's going to be able to score which leads to some, um, creative moves. And creative can work, just look at Mathieu and Dre Hollins when they get into the lane, but that's not exactly something that's in his skill set. When he puts his head down and heads to the hole it's kind of like Mav bringing the ball up against the press - just hope things don't go too terribly wrong and somebody gets lucky.
8. Dre Mathieu's gambling finally paid off. Dre has a habit of going after a steal, and I don't mean jumping passing lanes, I mean he tries to pick pockets all the freaking time. He loves both not moving his feet and swiping at the ball in front of him and trying to sneak around behind a ball handler and poke the ball out from behind. I can't actually remember any of this working for him this year, although with a steal rate in the top 70 of the country it must have happened, but I remember plenty of times he put himself completely out of proper defensive position. Tonight, however, he managed to poke the ball away from whoever it was that's Penn State's third ball handler is in one of the biggest spots of the game and, I guess, the season so far. I've said I like my point guard a little bit reckless, and that includes defense when you're as fast with hands as quick as Mathieu's, so I'm ok with all this, I'm just happy to see it pay off in a big, big way.
9. Speaking of the Honey Gopher, he just doesn't quit and I love it. Mathieu's best move is to drive way into the lane, probably too far truth be told, and then figure out what he's doing from there. At just 5-9 and against Big Ten big men, both in size and ability, this can lead to some really ugly shots and/or turnovers - and it has, no doubt. But in a situation where that wasn't working many less confident players would change their game and start playing differently, but Honey Gopher just kept pounding away and it paid off huge for Minnesota with him scoring the team's last four field goals including two absolute monsters. He's proven himself to be a huge late get for Pitino, and he's perfect for what Pitino wants to do on both sides of the court. I am a big, big fan.
10. Illinois is ranked?!??!?! How can this be? I'm watching the game and all of a sudden the flash up "Next, #23 Illinois takes on #4 Wisconsin" and I was like, wait, Illinois is ranked? The same team who lost to Georgia freaking Tech? The same team who almost lost to UIC, IPFW, and Dartmouth? The team whose best win was a lucky one over Missouri? Sorry folks, but Illinois is terrible. Completely terrible. Fact. And losing to Wisconsin by like, a hundred or something just proves I'm right. You watch, the Gophers will lose by less at Wisconsin than Illinois, and that's a guarantee I would have made before tonight, too.
Alright so I admit most of these things sound negative even though they won, but seriously that was a really ugly win. There is, and I'm not saying anything you don't know, a whole lot of major flaws with this team and right now it's really difficult to envision them upsetting any of the top tier Big Ten teams. Right now I can come up with 6 maybe 7 more games they really should win, but 3 of those are on the road so it's hard to think they can take all 3 down. They're going to need to win the games they should and steal at least 1, two depending on how many the drop where they shouldn't. It's going to be awfully tough to get an NCAA bid, but hey, what the hell, right? I'll just enjoy the ride. Until I end up throwing the remote at my TV. But if I didn't do it tonight, maybe I'm actually a level headed fan? Seems unlikely, but hey, on Boy Meets World Eric goes from a girl obsessed but mostly normal teenager to a completely ditzy buffoon of a college kid, so I guess anything is possible.
1. No matter how ugly the game was, the Gophers made the plays they needed to down the stretch. And yes, it was crazy ugly, but they did what they needed too. Malik Smith nailing four key free throws after not hitting a thing all day. DeAndre Mathieu with a huge steal and a huge tip in after struggling to score most of the first half. Austin Hollins, having maybe his worst game as a Gopher which is hard to envision after how he played against Michigan, coming up with an absolute monster steal right when the Gophers needed it. Maybe it doesn't get to that point if Frazier and Newbill don't foul out, and maybe none of those plays get made and Penn State coasts to a W. But guess what? They did, they didn't, and the Gophers did what they needed to win. It probably seems a bit Pollyanna-ish, which is generally against my character, but screw it, this is most likely a lost year between coaches anyway, so I'm gonna take what I can get.
2. Nobody, and I mean nobody, could stop Tim Frazier. Mathieu tried, both Hollinses tried, even Ahanmisi tried and it didn't matter, because Frazier could get into the lane whenever he wanted - and he wanted to a lot. And I don't know if it was by design as an overreaction to the end of the Purdue game, but it seemed like every time Frazier (or one of their crappy guards, even) got into the lane the Gopher help hung back, giving Frazier floater after floater after floater as the world's worst announcing team was happy to tell you over and over and over again. Luckily he fouled out right as we were getting down to it, and I don't think the Gophers win that game if he's still on the floor because, like I said, the Gophers had zero ability to stop his dribble penetration.
That's now three straight Big Ten games and dribble penetration has been a major, major issue in all three, and most of it is coming off ball screens. Early in the game, when the Gophers had control, the big men were hedging well and pushing the ball handler out until the screened man could recover and all was well. Then it all went to shit. The Gopher bigs started hedging too early or too late, and when Penn State started doing the double pick at the top of the key for Frazier the Gophers basically started committing four players to dealing with it, which meant there were skip passes available. I'm starting to think the Gophers just don't have the personnel to handle most Big Ten teams defensively, and that's no good for anyone.
3. Elliott can kind of control the paint. Another double double with four blocks, and it looked early like the Gopher game plan was going to force feed him the ball on the block and it was working. Even when Mo was in getting him the ball down low was working offensively. Then the Gophers decided to go completely away from that strategy and become a jump shooting team again. Do you know that Eliason only had two field goal attempts in the second half, and one of them came on a tip in? Not that he should be getting a ton of FGAs, but when he's demonstrated already that Penn State struggles to guard him I wouldn't mind seeing a touch or two, you know? And I'm not even sure Walker played in the second half. I can't believe I'm saying this, but against most teams Elliott needs to be an offensive focal point, just for variety's sake. Not against Michigan State.
3. I've always been an Oto defender, but he's just lost out there far too often. He has no idea where to go on defense, and that goes for both his positioning as well as things like hedging on screens and help defense. These things aren't new, but as his playing time becomes more and more high profile they just stand out more and more. Then he does things like, let's a pass go through his legs five hole style and then falls down trying to go after it which leads to a Penn State lay-up, or he let's himself get pushed under the basket on a Penn State free throw leading to a Nittany Lion rebound in a big, big, big spot. And it's not like it's just this game, you can point to at least 2-3 mistakes of his each game, easy. I think he's got some offensive ability as the jump shot seems to have come back as Pitino's given him more confidence to take open shots, and he brilliantly slipped a screen at one point and then nailed the 18 footer, but I really don't know if he can offset his piss poor defense with his mediocre offense. Then again, the only other choice at the 4 spot is a Joey King who completely panics any time he has the ball in a non scoring position, so really Pitino is pretty well screwed here.
4. Speaking of things that are horrible, Stephen Bardo is just the worst announcer ever. Repetitious, stating the obvious, creating a narrative and sticking with it no matter what, repetitious, infatuated with anyone banking in a shot, and he tends to repeat the same thing over and over again. Honestly, how many times did you hear that the Gophers were the best free throw shooting team in the Big Ten but were having a bad game? Or that it was a miracle Penn State was winning even though Newbill was barely playing due to foul trouble? How about him trying to sell the fact that bad free throw shooting is contagious. Seriously, once I noticed how horrible he was I kept waiting to see if he'd bring any insight at all to the broadcast, and he did - once. When Oto slipped that screen mentioned above, Bardo made sure to point it out and even explain it. But that was it. There was literally not one single other word he uttered that added to the broadcast. Someone should light his car on fire.
5. I'm all for consistency and installing a system, but if it's not working I'm not sure sticking with it makes sense. Naturally I'm talking about the press, which wasn't working and was creating easy buckets for Penn State who kept beating the Gophers down the floor and creating odd man rush situations and wasn't creating any turnovers or easy baskets for Minnesota. I suppose I shouldn't have expected it, given that he never backed off when Arkansas was shredding the Gophers. Normally I would say you need to adapt your system to your personnel and if it's not working it's not working, but in this case I think I'm ok with it. Pitino likely knows his ceiling is an NCAA bid this year and next and it's not likely either team will have much of any chance to go further, so it's all about building his brand for the class of 2015 and beyond. Let those kids see how Minnesota basketball is balls to the wall and fun fun fun for 40 minutes and hope it pays dividends. It's going to cause some ugly situations, like tonight, but it should pay off down the road. I hope. Please.
6. Penn State doubled on a lot of ball screens, and neither team took advantage. The point of doubling on a ball screen of course, is to create turnovers, and although the Gophers turned it over an uncomfortable 14 times I can't remember even one coming off of a Penn State double. If you're not turning it over on a double, that means you should be able to find an open man and unless the defensive rotations are very tight you should be able to get an open shot. That didn't happen either. And it wasn't because Penn State's rotations were so great, more that the Gophers were slow to swing the ball, or hesitant to drive the ball, or just couldn't make the right pass. Overall the Gopher offense was pretty rough tonight, and getting a win on a night when things just aren't working properly is probably a good sign. Or not. I don't know. This team is frustrating.
7. Malik Smith has proven himself to be a very valuable Gopher, but I'm not exactly sure he should be driving the paint. I love a lot of what he brings, and my buddy, "The Bear" has taken to calling him J.R. after J.R. Smith which is pretty much perfect, but when he puts the ball on the floor and drives it's an adventure. As with all true chuckers, which Malik most definitely is even though he has toned it down a bit from his FIU days, once he has the ball in the paint he's damn sure he's going to be able to score which leads to some, um, creative moves. And creative can work, just look at Mathieu and Dre Hollins when they get into the lane, but that's not exactly something that's in his skill set. When he puts his head down and heads to the hole it's kind of like Mav bringing the ball up against the press - just hope things don't go too terribly wrong and somebody gets lucky.
8. Dre Mathieu's gambling finally paid off. Dre has a habit of going after a steal, and I don't mean jumping passing lanes, I mean he tries to pick pockets all the freaking time. He loves both not moving his feet and swiping at the ball in front of him and trying to sneak around behind a ball handler and poke the ball out from behind. I can't actually remember any of this working for him this year, although with a steal rate in the top 70 of the country it must have happened, but I remember plenty of times he put himself completely out of proper defensive position. Tonight, however, he managed to poke the ball away from whoever it was that's Penn State's third ball handler is in one of the biggest spots of the game and, I guess, the season so far. I've said I like my point guard a little bit reckless, and that includes defense when you're as fast with hands as quick as Mathieu's, so I'm ok with all this, I'm just happy to see it pay off in a big, big way.
9. Speaking of the Honey Gopher, he just doesn't quit and I love it. Mathieu's best move is to drive way into the lane, probably too far truth be told, and then figure out what he's doing from there. At just 5-9 and against Big Ten big men, both in size and ability, this can lead to some really ugly shots and/or turnovers - and it has, no doubt. But in a situation where that wasn't working many less confident players would change their game and start playing differently, but Honey Gopher just kept pounding away and it paid off huge for Minnesota with him scoring the team's last four field goals including two absolute monsters. He's proven himself to be a huge late get for Pitino, and he's perfect for what Pitino wants to do on both sides of the court. I am a big, big fan.
10. Illinois is ranked?!??!?! How can this be? I'm watching the game and all of a sudden the flash up "Next, #23 Illinois takes on #4 Wisconsin" and I was like, wait, Illinois is ranked? The same team who lost to Georgia freaking Tech? The same team who almost lost to UIC, IPFW, and Dartmouth? The team whose best win was a lucky one over Missouri? Sorry folks, but Illinois is terrible. Completely terrible. Fact. And losing to Wisconsin by like, a hundred or something just proves I'm right. You watch, the Gophers will lose by less at Wisconsin than Illinois, and that's a guarantee I would have made before tonight, too.
Alright so I admit most of these things sound negative even though they won, but seriously that was a really ugly win. There is, and I'm not saying anything you don't know, a whole lot of major flaws with this team and right now it's really difficult to envision them upsetting any of the top tier Big Ten teams. Right now I can come up with 6 maybe 7 more games they really should win, but 3 of those are on the road so it's hard to think they can take all 3 down. They're going to need to win the games they should and steal at least 1, two depending on how many the drop where they shouldn't. It's going to be awfully tough to get an NCAA bid, but hey, what the hell, right? I'll just enjoy the ride. Until I end up throwing the remote at my TV. But if I didn't do it tonight, maybe I'm actually a level headed fan? Seems unlikely, but hey, on Boy Meets World Eric goes from a girl obsessed but mostly normal teenager to a completely ditzy buffoon of a college kid, so I guess anything is possible.
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Big Ten Hoops So Far
With the Holiday tournaments and B10/ACC Challenge behind us this a nice time to take a look around the league and see what's happened so far, and what we think we know about these teams. So let's do this, power ranking style of course because we are on the internet after all. As usual, all stats per kenpom.com.
1. WISCONSIN BADGERS. I told you dopes that as much as it pained me to say that Wisconsin would be really good this year, and it appears I may have actually underrated them. 10-0 right now with wins over top 100 kenpom teams St. Johns (67), Florida (13), Green Bay (87), Saint Louis (28), West Virginia (60), Virginia (19), and Marquette (45). That is freaking impressive and easily the best list of anybody in the Big Ten and maybe the nation but it's a lot of work to double check that so let's just run with it. At this point kenpom projects them to win every game the rest of the year other than @Michigan and @Iowa (they don't travel to Columbus or East Lansing), so we're looking at a possible 29-2 with a ton of good wins - a #1 seed for the Badgers?
It's the same formula they use every year - super slow pace of play, good defense, good rebounding, and efficient shooting. Frank Kaminsky is the newest big dumb slow fat white guy who has suddenly blossomed into a star under Bo Ryan and Sam Dekker has been as good as advertised. The one problem they might have is they aren't very deep with the five starters all playing 28+ minutes and no bench guys playing more than 15, and their big time reliance offensively on the three pointer. I suppose that's been their MO, so no need to worry too much. This is a really good Badger team and it sucks.
Shout out to #1 Badger fan Matty Wisconsin. Big fan, Yao Ming jersey wearer, and fastest beer chugger I've ever seen. And he's on twitter! @strykerpks. Check it. He follows @spaghettios and is a big fan of the Beer Stars.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES. At 7-0 with two good wins (Maryland, Marquette) and two decent wins (Ohio, Wyoming) the Buckeyes haven't been seriously challenged (all wins by 10+) and they're doing it, no surprise, with their defense. OSU ranks #1 in total defensive efficiency, #3 in opponents effective field goal %, and #10 in turning their opponent over. Basically they will force turnovers all the time and when they don't it's really hard to make a shot against them.
Of course everyone expected Ohio State to be elite defensively, but the big question was how the Buckeyes would fare on offense with the loss of DeShaun Thomas. Everyone wondered who would step up, and although nobody has really stepped into his place is hasn't mattered because everybody has upped their game just a bit and they're doing it by committee - six players average between 9.0 and 11.4 points per game. It's weird to look at their stats because they only play nine guys - like, literally nine guys as only one other guy has played at all and only two games - and they all play 13+ minutes and all contribute.
I thought Ohio State would struggle this year on the offensive end and that would knock them down a peg, but they're doing just fine as a collective group. There may end up being some rebounding issues that could do them in, and they haven't played a truly great team (and won't until January) so there are still plenty of questions, but I'm impressed so far. Great coaching job by Thad Matta, and I probably should have seen that coming.
3. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS. I still think Sparty will probably end up the best team in this conference, but horrendous effort against North Carolina, particularly at home. When was the last time Michigan State was out rebounded that badly (49-38)? It helped that they shot so poorly, of course, and that's another good point because shooting just 40% from 2 is so bad you almost have to try to do that poorly, which would actually explain a lot about that game.
Obviously a loss to North Carolina doesn't wipe out all the good that the early win over Kentucky did, but they've struggled to pull away from teams all year and it's the kind of thing that could bite them in the ass come March. Letting Oklahoma, Columbia, and Portland hang around is really not great considering those are the exact type of teams that Michigan State is likely to face in the first round of the tournament. Of course, it's Tom Izzo here, so the team is likely to get better as the season goes on and I can't imagine an Izzo team ever getting bounced in the first round unless it's already happened and I don't remember and if it has don't remind me - I want to remember Izzo as I remember him, not all mixed up with facts and stuff. That's for nerds.
4. IOWA HAWKEYES. They were everybody's sleeper for this year, and they've more than lived up to that billing. Wins over Drake (#98), Xavier (#65), Notre Dame (#74), and an absolute stomping of UTEP (#90) make up a pretty good resume this early in the season, but Iowa's most impressive outing may have been their overtime loss to Villanova (#5). The Hawkeyes had a double digit lead well into the second half before Nova got white hot to go up 7 with four minute left before Iowa clawed back to tie it up.
Roy Marble looks like he's going to be one of the top players in the conference this year, Aaron White has suddenly morphed into a complete player, and transfer Jarrod Uthoff is way, way better than I ever expected. Those three have plenty of room to operate too, because the team's two point guards (Anthony Clemmons and Mike Gesell) both hate shooting and they don't really have a center. Well they have three, but they're all pretty horrible and are basically the poster children for not developing past your freshman year (seriously they may as well have been coached by Tubby). The Hawkeyes still don't shoot the ball very accurately, but they've done everything else so well this year that it's covered up that issue. Interested to see what happens down the road.
5. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES. This is probably the hardest team to evaluate. They have three losses, but all are explainable (the neutral court loss to Charlotte is a little head scratching, but it's not like they're a bad team). Because of those losses (the other two were @Duke and @Iowa State) the only good win they have is against Florida State in overtime, and the rest are against scrubs. Granted, they've taken care of business against said scrubs and their advanced metrics look good (ranked #27 overall), but there's nothing truly impressive at all in the results, so I mostly have them at #5 based on the belief that they'll come around.
I expect they will mainly because they haven't struggled the way I expected after losing Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway, in that they're taking care of the ball just fine (14th best in TO%). They're still missing out on that driving ability Burke and Hardaway had, although Nik Stauskas is doing his best to fill that role. Right now they only have three real offensive threats, and Glen Robinson seems to be regressing and I have trouble believing Caris LeVert is for real (mainly because of that terrible name). I expect Michigan to end up a Top 25 team, but I won't be shocked if they don't.
6. MINNESOTA GOPHERS. I believe I had them at seven when I did my preseason rankings, so this says I'm impressed enough to move them up a spot, which I suppose is a good thing. I still have one jillion questions about this team, and unfortunately none of them are going to be answered until conference play starts in January because the next three opponents are pretty much worthless as a measuring tool. The rebounding and interior defense will likely continue to be an issue, but Drizzy Matheiu is better than I could have hoped and the guards are going to keep them in a bunch of games and maybe even manage to sneak out and upset or two. I still don't think this is quite an NCAA Tournament team, but it's getting closer. That win over Florida State impressed me. Looking forward to Big Ten play.
7. INDIANA HOOSIERS. I get this impression that people think Indiana is good and guess what? They really aren't. What have they done besides show everyone how big a chucker supposed "point guard" Yogi Ferrell really is? Ok, sure they played a great game against UCONN that went down to the wire. Ok, I'll give you that one. But then they got crushed by Syracuse and they have nothing else on the resume. The win against Washington sounds good, but the Huskies are absolutely terrible. The win over Stony Brook is probably their best win. I actually think the Hoosiers are less likely to bomb out than Michigan, but there are plenty of questions here.
Basically with so many players suddenly thrust into new roles with everything they lost last year the team is struggling with who fits where and how to play together. Thus they're turning the ball over at an alarming rate (21.5% of possessions, ranks 310th) and just not sharing the ball well (328th in assists per field goal). It probably does help when your point guard shoots all the time, but he's also their most efficient player so what do you do? They're very talented and very deep, so a great coach like Tom Crean I'm sure will eventually get this all straightened out.
Ha ha just kidding Crean sucks and is a terrible person and I hope he burns the program to the ground.
8. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI. Illinois has a nice shiny 8-1 record, but it's a completely empty 8-1 record. There isn't a single good win on that resume. A win over UNLV sounds good, until you realize that UNLV is a shitbox this year, and Valpo is the only other win they have that's even close to going to matter at the end of the year. They had a good chance at a quality win on the road against a somewhat frisky Georgia Tech team, but they let the Yellow Jackets finish the game on a 19-4 run so Illinois lost by three.
Despite a new coach and a whole new group of players they're still doing the traditional Illinois thing where they like to sit around and shoot jump shots. And, also a tradition at Illinois, they're not very good at having those jump shots go in. Luckily, thus far, they've been extremely good at rebounding their own misses, something that is unlikely to continue once we get into Big Ten play. They don't create turnovers at all, either, which means their only means of getting extra possessions is by those offensive boards, and, like I said earlier if you were paying attention, I doubt that keeps up against Big Ten teams.
9. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS. I don't know what it is about my attraction to Penn State but I can't stop being infatuated. I'm like Freddie Prinze looking at Jessica Biel. No wait that one made sense. More like I'm some handsome devil like Ryan Gosling and I ended up falling in love with that lumpy chick from Girls. Penn State has all kinds of flaws and I shouldn't be attracted to their fat ass and busted teeth, but there are enough good things here that I keep overlooking those flaws and fixating on that great personality, sense of humor, and alcoholism.
Ok that was a pretty tortuous analogy, but the point is that Penn State is probably horrible but I love them anyway. A couple of really good guards including maybe the best one in the conference, a team that never turns the ball over and shoots well, a patchwork front court that fits together just well enough to be dangerous, and a horrible defense that ensures their games are going to entertaining. Then they get a sharp shooting transfer from Pitt eligible in the second semester. They haven't necessarily done anything impressive, but they do have wins over St. John's and LaSalle. I dunno, I'm rooting for them. WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME!??!?!
10. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS. Nebraska has actually been a pleasant surprise this year. Pleasant as in I, and many others, expected them to be completely horrible, while instead they've been somewhat competent. Wins over Miami and Georgia aren't great, but they're solid enough, and they've been competitive against good teams like Creighton, UAB, and UMass. The advanced metrics aren't great as they're the only Big 10 team outside the top 100 in both offensive and defensive efficiency (a near loss to Northern Illinois and they're 305 ranking doesn't help things), but they are looking better than they have the last couple of years.
Tai Webster, the much heralded freshman point guard from New Zealand, hasn't worked out as well as hoped yet as he struggles with his shot and turns the ball over far too frequently, but those are problems most freshman point guards deal with so there's no reason to panic. The Huskers have gotten solid play from their transfers, with Terran Petteway (Texas Tech), Deverell Biggs (Juco, reshirted last year), and Walter Pitchford (Florida) all in the team's top four in scoring and rebounding. Perhaps Nebraska is taking a page out of Iowa State's and becoming transfer U. No just kidding.
11. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS. Purdue beat Boston College 88-67 in the Big 10/ACC Challenge, and I feel confident in saying that's the first good thing they've done all year. Really. Despite being 8-2, before beating BC and following that up by beating Eastern Michigan this weekend, the Boilers wins were all over teams outside the Top 208 with four of those wins by less than double figures. One loss was fine (to Oklahoma State) but the other was pretty wretched (to Washington State).
What's gone wrong? They're just thoroughly mediocre as Matt Painter has been unable to bring in top tier talent lately. Nine of the twelve Big 10 teams could be consider elite offensively or defensively, but Purdue (along with Northwestern and Nebraska) is just blah. The Boilers are playing at a lightning quick pace, their fastest ever under Painter, perhaps due to their overall lack of size, but it's not translating to easy baskets, and they're giving up way too many easy ones on the other end. Purdue is going to miss the NCAA Tournament for the second straight year. They're really bad.
12. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS. I cannot think of a single good thing to say about Northwestern this year other than that they probably have a really good combined IQ. They've basically been crushed by every single decent team they've played so far while sneaking wins against crap teams. This is how it's going: Northwestern is ranked #140 overall by kenpom's advanced metrics. The next worst team in the Big Ten is Nebraska all the way up at #92. There isn't a worse team in the ACC. There's just one worse in the Pac-12 and Big 12, and two worse in the Big East. They've been one of the worst teams in major conference basketball.
They're the worst team in the conference in offensive efficiency, and the second worst in defensive efficiency. I thought the return of Drew Crawford would mean this team would have an outside chance to rise to the level of competitive, and he's been fine, but the rest of the team has been crap. Dave Sobolewski has been absolute garbage, Alex Olah is putting up embarrassing rebounding numbers for a seven footer, and Tre Demps is still a terrible chucker. Chris Collins will likely find a way to make the program more competitive, and he's already got a nice recruiting class for next season coming in, but this year is the kind of year where a team with tournament aspirations needs to sweep Northwestern. Which, as you know, means the Gophers are headed to splitsville. Come on Pitino, break that curse that I just made up.
So that's where we stand with just a few short weeks to go until conference play. I see three teams with a shot at a #1 seed, two others who are almost certain to get bids, and then a small group of teams who will be around the bubble. I think the Gophers and Indiana are a step ahead of teams like Illinois and Penn State, but as usual it's going to come down to who defends home court and who can steal some games. I'm happy to say I see the Gophers right in the mix for a bid at this point, so hopefully that keeps up. Should be a pretty entertaining league this year with a lot of teams very close together in talent and skill level. Avoiding losses to the bottom three teams will be key.
1. WISCONSIN BADGERS. I told you dopes that as much as it pained me to say that Wisconsin would be really good this year, and it appears I may have actually underrated them. 10-0 right now with wins over top 100 kenpom teams St. Johns (67), Florida (13), Green Bay (87), Saint Louis (28), West Virginia (60), Virginia (19), and Marquette (45). That is freaking impressive and easily the best list of anybody in the Big Ten and maybe the nation but it's a lot of work to double check that so let's just run with it. At this point kenpom projects them to win every game the rest of the year other than @Michigan and @Iowa (they don't travel to Columbus or East Lansing), so we're looking at a possible 29-2 with a ton of good wins - a #1 seed for the Badgers?
It's the same formula they use every year - super slow pace of play, good defense, good rebounding, and efficient shooting. Frank Kaminsky is the newest big dumb slow fat white guy who has suddenly blossomed into a star under Bo Ryan and Sam Dekker has been as good as advertised. The one problem they might have is they aren't very deep with the five starters all playing 28+ minutes and no bench guys playing more than 15, and their big time reliance offensively on the three pointer. I suppose that's been their MO, so no need to worry too much. This is a really good Badger team and it sucks.
Shout out to #1 Badger fan Matty Wisconsin. Big fan, Yao Ming jersey wearer, and fastest beer chugger I've ever seen. And he's on twitter! @strykerpks. Check it. He follows @spaghettios and is a big fan of the Beer Stars.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES. At 7-0 with two good wins (Maryland, Marquette) and two decent wins (Ohio, Wyoming) the Buckeyes haven't been seriously challenged (all wins by 10+) and they're doing it, no surprise, with their defense. OSU ranks #1 in total defensive efficiency, #3 in opponents effective field goal %, and #10 in turning their opponent over. Basically they will force turnovers all the time and when they don't it's really hard to make a shot against them.
Of course everyone expected Ohio State to be elite defensively, but the big question was how the Buckeyes would fare on offense with the loss of DeShaun Thomas. Everyone wondered who would step up, and although nobody has really stepped into his place is hasn't mattered because everybody has upped their game just a bit and they're doing it by committee - six players average between 9.0 and 11.4 points per game. It's weird to look at their stats because they only play nine guys - like, literally nine guys as only one other guy has played at all and only two games - and they all play 13+ minutes and all contribute.
I thought Ohio State would struggle this year on the offensive end and that would knock them down a peg, but they're doing just fine as a collective group. There may end up being some rebounding issues that could do them in, and they haven't played a truly great team (and won't until January) so there are still plenty of questions, but I'm impressed so far. Great coaching job by Thad Matta, and I probably should have seen that coming.
3. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS. I still think Sparty will probably end up the best team in this conference, but horrendous effort against North Carolina, particularly at home. When was the last time Michigan State was out rebounded that badly (49-38)? It helped that they shot so poorly, of course, and that's another good point because shooting just 40% from 2 is so bad you almost have to try to do that poorly, which would actually explain a lot about that game.
Obviously a loss to North Carolina doesn't wipe out all the good that the early win over Kentucky did, but they've struggled to pull away from teams all year and it's the kind of thing that could bite them in the ass come March. Letting Oklahoma, Columbia, and Portland hang around is really not great considering those are the exact type of teams that Michigan State is likely to face in the first round of the tournament. Of course, it's Tom Izzo here, so the team is likely to get better as the season goes on and I can't imagine an Izzo team ever getting bounced in the first round unless it's already happened and I don't remember and if it has don't remind me - I want to remember Izzo as I remember him, not all mixed up with facts and stuff. That's for nerds.
4. IOWA HAWKEYES. They were everybody's sleeper for this year, and they've more than lived up to that billing. Wins over Drake (#98), Xavier (#65), Notre Dame (#74), and an absolute stomping of UTEP (#90) make up a pretty good resume this early in the season, but Iowa's most impressive outing may have been their overtime loss to Villanova (#5). The Hawkeyes had a double digit lead well into the second half before Nova got white hot to go up 7 with four minute left before Iowa clawed back to tie it up.
Roy Marble looks like he's going to be one of the top players in the conference this year, Aaron White has suddenly morphed into a complete player, and transfer Jarrod Uthoff is way, way better than I ever expected. Those three have plenty of room to operate too, because the team's two point guards (Anthony Clemmons and Mike Gesell) both hate shooting and they don't really have a center. Well they have three, but they're all pretty horrible and are basically the poster children for not developing past your freshman year (seriously they may as well have been coached by Tubby). The Hawkeyes still don't shoot the ball very accurately, but they've done everything else so well this year that it's covered up that issue. Interested to see what happens down the road.
5. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES. This is probably the hardest team to evaluate. They have three losses, but all are explainable (the neutral court loss to Charlotte is a little head scratching, but it's not like they're a bad team). Because of those losses (the other two were @Duke and @Iowa State) the only good win they have is against Florida State in overtime, and the rest are against scrubs. Granted, they've taken care of business against said scrubs and their advanced metrics look good (ranked #27 overall), but there's nothing truly impressive at all in the results, so I mostly have them at #5 based on the belief that they'll come around.
I expect they will mainly because they haven't struggled the way I expected after losing Trey Burke and Tim Hardaway, in that they're taking care of the ball just fine (14th best in TO%). They're still missing out on that driving ability Burke and Hardaway had, although Nik Stauskas is doing his best to fill that role. Right now they only have three real offensive threats, and Glen Robinson seems to be regressing and I have trouble believing Caris LeVert is for real (mainly because of that terrible name). I expect Michigan to end up a Top 25 team, but I won't be shocked if they don't.
6. MINNESOTA GOPHERS. I believe I had them at seven when I did my preseason rankings, so this says I'm impressed enough to move them up a spot, which I suppose is a good thing. I still have one jillion questions about this team, and unfortunately none of them are going to be answered until conference play starts in January because the next three opponents are pretty much worthless as a measuring tool. The rebounding and interior defense will likely continue to be an issue, but Drizzy Matheiu is better than I could have hoped and the guards are going to keep them in a bunch of games and maybe even manage to sneak out and upset or two. I still don't think this is quite an NCAA Tournament team, but it's getting closer. That win over Florida State impressed me. Looking forward to Big Ten play.
7. INDIANA HOOSIERS. I get this impression that people think Indiana is good and guess what? They really aren't. What have they done besides show everyone how big a chucker supposed "point guard" Yogi Ferrell really is? Ok, sure they played a great game against UCONN that went down to the wire. Ok, I'll give you that one. But then they got crushed by Syracuse and they have nothing else on the resume. The win against Washington sounds good, but the Huskies are absolutely terrible. The win over Stony Brook is probably their best win. I actually think the Hoosiers are less likely to bomb out than Michigan, but there are plenty of questions here.
Basically with so many players suddenly thrust into new roles with everything they lost last year the team is struggling with who fits where and how to play together. Thus they're turning the ball over at an alarming rate (21.5% of possessions, ranks 310th) and just not sharing the ball well (328th in assists per field goal). It probably does help when your point guard shoots all the time, but he's also their most efficient player so what do you do? They're very talented and very deep, so a great coach like Tom Crean I'm sure will eventually get this all straightened out.
Ha ha just kidding Crean sucks and is a terrible person and I hope he burns the program to the ground.
8. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI. Illinois has a nice shiny 8-1 record, but it's a completely empty 8-1 record. There isn't a single good win on that resume. A win over UNLV sounds good, until you realize that UNLV is a shitbox this year, and Valpo is the only other win they have that's even close to going to matter at the end of the year. They had a good chance at a quality win on the road against a somewhat frisky Georgia Tech team, but they let the Yellow Jackets finish the game on a 19-4 run so Illinois lost by three.
Despite a new coach and a whole new group of players they're still doing the traditional Illinois thing where they like to sit around and shoot jump shots. And, also a tradition at Illinois, they're not very good at having those jump shots go in. Luckily, thus far, they've been extremely good at rebounding their own misses, something that is unlikely to continue once we get into Big Ten play. They don't create turnovers at all, either, which means their only means of getting extra possessions is by those offensive boards, and, like I said earlier if you were paying attention, I doubt that keeps up against Big Ten teams.
9. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS. I don't know what it is about my attraction to Penn State but I can't stop being infatuated. I'm like Freddie Prinze looking at Jessica Biel. No wait that one made sense. More like I'm some handsome devil like Ryan Gosling and I ended up falling in love with that lumpy chick from Girls. Penn State has all kinds of flaws and I shouldn't be attracted to their fat ass and busted teeth, but there are enough good things here that I keep overlooking those flaws and fixating on that great personality, sense of humor, and alcoholism.
Ok that was a pretty tortuous analogy, but the point is that Penn State is probably horrible but I love them anyway. A couple of really good guards including maybe the best one in the conference, a team that never turns the ball over and shoots well, a patchwork front court that fits together just well enough to be dangerous, and a horrible defense that ensures their games are going to entertaining. Then they get a sharp shooting transfer from Pitt eligible in the second semester. They haven't necessarily done anything impressive, but they do have wins over St. John's and LaSalle. I dunno, I'm rooting for them. WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME!??!?!
10. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS. Nebraska has actually been a pleasant surprise this year. Pleasant as in I, and many others, expected them to be completely horrible, while instead they've been somewhat competent. Wins over Miami and Georgia aren't great, but they're solid enough, and they've been competitive against good teams like Creighton, UAB, and UMass. The advanced metrics aren't great as they're the only Big 10 team outside the top 100 in both offensive and defensive efficiency (a near loss to Northern Illinois and they're 305 ranking doesn't help things), but they are looking better than they have the last couple of years.
Tai Webster, the much heralded freshman point guard from New Zealand, hasn't worked out as well as hoped yet as he struggles with his shot and turns the ball over far too frequently, but those are problems most freshman point guards deal with so there's no reason to panic. The Huskers have gotten solid play from their transfers, with Terran Petteway (Texas Tech), Deverell Biggs (Juco, reshirted last year), and Walter Pitchford (Florida) all in the team's top four in scoring and rebounding. Perhaps Nebraska is taking a page out of Iowa State's and becoming transfer U. No just kidding.
11. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS. Purdue beat Boston College 88-67 in the Big 10/ACC Challenge, and I feel confident in saying that's the first good thing they've done all year. Really. Despite being 8-2, before beating BC and following that up by beating Eastern Michigan this weekend, the Boilers wins were all over teams outside the Top 208 with four of those wins by less than double figures. One loss was fine (to Oklahoma State) but the other was pretty wretched (to Washington State).
What's gone wrong? They're just thoroughly mediocre as Matt Painter has been unable to bring in top tier talent lately. Nine of the twelve Big 10 teams could be consider elite offensively or defensively, but Purdue (along with Northwestern and Nebraska) is just blah. The Boilers are playing at a lightning quick pace, their fastest ever under Painter, perhaps due to their overall lack of size, but it's not translating to easy baskets, and they're giving up way too many easy ones on the other end. Purdue is going to miss the NCAA Tournament for the second straight year. They're really bad.
12. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS. I cannot think of a single good thing to say about Northwestern this year other than that they probably have a really good combined IQ. They've basically been crushed by every single decent team they've played so far while sneaking wins against crap teams. This is how it's going: Northwestern is ranked #140 overall by kenpom's advanced metrics. The next worst team in the Big Ten is Nebraska all the way up at #92. There isn't a worse team in the ACC. There's just one worse in the Pac-12 and Big 12, and two worse in the Big East. They've been one of the worst teams in major conference basketball.
They're the worst team in the conference in offensive efficiency, and the second worst in defensive efficiency. I thought the return of Drew Crawford would mean this team would have an outside chance to rise to the level of competitive, and he's been fine, but the rest of the team has been crap. Dave Sobolewski has been absolute garbage, Alex Olah is putting up embarrassing rebounding numbers for a seven footer, and Tre Demps is still a terrible chucker. Chris Collins will likely find a way to make the program more competitive, and he's already got a nice recruiting class for next season coming in, but this year is the kind of year where a team with tournament aspirations needs to sweep Northwestern. Which, as you know, means the Gophers are headed to splitsville. Come on Pitino, break that curse that I just made up.
So that's where we stand with just a few short weeks to go until conference play. I see three teams with a shot at a #1 seed, two others who are almost certain to get bids, and then a small group of teams who will be around the bubble. I think the Gophers and Indiana are a step ahead of teams like Illinois and Penn State, but as usual it's going to come down to who defends home court and who can steal some games. I'm happy to say I see the Gophers right in the mix for a bid at this point, so hopefully that keeps up. Should be a pretty entertaining league this year with a lot of teams very close together in talent and skill level. Avoiding losses to the bottom three teams will be key.
Thursday, October 31, 2013
Big Ten Preview
Here we are on the eve of the Gophers kicking off their exhibition season. Given that, here is a bunch of words that will serve as my official Big Ten preview. I already talked about the Big Ten like a hundred years ago, and here's a post where I kind of talk about NCAA basketball this year in general, so this will be the capper on the trilogy of posts that form my NCAA preview this year. Man, I feel like I'm writing an epic or something. Everybody knows the best things come in trilogies. I dare you to find something other than Twilight that proves this wrong. Indiana Jones tried to make a fourth something and it bombed. Trilogies are the best, ergo, I am the best. Here are my thoughts, teams in order of my predicted finish.
1. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS. It's almost unfair. The Spartans return Keith Appling, Gary Harris, Denzel Valentine, Branden Dawson, and Adreian Payne this year. That's at least three NBA players. For me, Michigan State is the top team in the Big Ten by a pretty wide margin, and I think they're the second best team in the entire country (behind Louisville).
If you check out kenpom.com, you'll see the Spartans finished as the ninth best team last year according to his metrics. Every team in front of them is experiencing some pretty major roster turnover from last season (with the exception of Louisville), while Sparty loses only Derrick Nix and conveniently still have Payne to just stick right in there. Plus what was Nix's main contributions? Rebounding on both ends of the floor and making high percentage shots. Well Michigan State as a team is great at rebounding and makes a high percentage of their shots, so it's not like they're losing somebody who single-handedly changed their team like DeShaun Thomas. Plus with Izzo as their coach you know they'll just get better as the year goes on. It's just not fair. Of course, Keith Appling is the kind of player who can burn down a season pretty much by himself so I guess we have that going for us. Which is nice.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES. Even though the Buckeyes only lose one player from last season (unless you count Evan Ravenel as a person, which I don't) but at the same time you could argue that they lost more than any other team in the conference because DeShaun Thomas. Not only did he take a ton of his team's shots (30th most of any player in D-1 by percentage) but he was very efficient as well, leading the team in offensive rating by a pretty good amount. Now he's gone, possibly in the NBA but I couldn't be bothered to look it up, but in any case he gone.
So now Ohio State is made up of a ton of formerly highly rated recruits who have been deferring to Thomas, two new freshman (both top 65 recruits by ESPN of course, this is Ohio State after all not some shit box program), and the Wes Ellsbury Eckstein Welker Punto of college basketball Aaron Craft. Seriously, who is going to lead the team in scoring this year? Any of Craft, Lenzelle Smith, Sam Thompson, LaQuinton Ross, Shannon Scott, Amir Williams, or Kameron Williams could end up leading the team and it wouldn't be a surprise. Actually, watch Kameron Williams because he's basically the new DeShaun Thomas but shorter and skinnier. He's definitely never seen a shot he didn't like. Plus look at this guy, tell me he doesn't look like a chucker:
Doesn't he kind of look like Pauly D.? Come on, you know you see it. And Pauly D. would definitely be a chucker if he was a basketball player. I'm also going to assume J-Woww is still hot even though I haven't watched that show in like 3 years.
I can't wait to watch this guy. I love chuckers when they aren't on my team.
3. WISCONSIN BADGERS. I've written too much about Wisconsin already, which you can see if you click on the two links above, but I can't help but be really high on them this year as much as it pains me. I think their starting guards are absolutely perfect for Bo's system this year. His boring, boring system of boring opponents to death by being so boring. Then add in Sam Dekker, who brings a level of athleticism and ability the Badgers haven't had since, geez, maybe Devin Harris, and there's a whole new wrinkle to the offense. The biggest knock on the Badger offense, besides being so boring, is they get over reliant on the 3-point shot and don't penetrate the lane at times. Well Dekker can solve all that by being unguardable.
Yes, there are a million questions about the front court, but if Bo Ryan is good at anything, besides being boring and looking ugly and acting like a baby, it's getting seldom used, little regarded big white guys to suddenly be productive and efficient when needed. Plus Nigel Hayes may be in position to contribute as a freshman, and he led the team in rebounding in their exhibition against UW-Platteville. Yes, I hated writing every word of this.
4. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES. People seem to think Michigan is going to be really, really good this year and I suppose that might end up being true, but I think they're more of a good not great team. I mean, it's a pretty big deal to lose your two starting guards to the NBA, especially when they pretty much dominated the ball all the time. Going from Tre Burke to one of Spike Albrecht, Caris LeVert, or a freshman is going to be a bit startling, even if Derrick Walton is one of the top PGs incoming this year.
I know there's some good talent back but is this really a top 10 team? Nik Stauskas is just a shooter (a very good one) and Mitch McGary is a rebounder/dunker guy (a very good one). Where's the playmaker who makes this an elite team gonna come from? If Glenn Robinson makes that leap or freshman SF Zak Irvin is a game changer right away (and the PG situation works out) they could certainly end up meeting these preseason expectations, but that's too many unknown variables for me to be really confident in Michigan this year. So yeah. I'm also guessing that off all this predictions this is the one that's going to make me look really stupid at the end of the year. Possibly Penn State too. You'll see why.
5. IOWA HAWKEYES. The trendy pick for not just Big Ten sleeper but national sleeper, and why not seeing as how they basically have the same team from last year and they were very, very good the second half of the season making it all the way to the NIT Championship game. Last year Iowa was pretty good at just about everything except shooting where they were just dreadful, ranking 308th in the NCAA in 3-point percentage. That's pretty much going to decide just how good they can be, and with the same team back things don't look great, but they do everything else well enough that I think 5th is just about right.
One major problem from last year, and the reason they didn't make the NCAA tournament most likely, is their non-conference schedule was shit. It left their RPI somewhere in the 70s and it's awfully damn hard to get an at-large bid with an RPI up there (and a SoS somewhere in the mid-100s). Well, they went ahead and made the exact same screw-up. They have their typical game against Iowa State, play Notre Dame in the B10/ACC Challenge, and they play in the Battle 4 Atlantis where they could pick up some good games, so none of that sounds too bad. Their mistake lies in scheduling way too many schools that could be in the 300s for RPI and zero other teams that have even an outside shot to crack the top 100. And yes, if this sounds familiar it should because the Gophers did the same damn exact thing and I don't want to talk about it.
One semi-helpful thing with looking at the Hawkeyes is they've already played six exhibition games this season thanks to their August trip to Europe (they went 5-1 with a loss to the great Hyeres-Toulon Basket team. I found box scores for five of the games, and they shot 32% for the trip from three, which is a slight uptick from last year but at the same time they were playing exhibition games against Europeans who were probably plucked from the local YMCA if they have those in Europe. Also this Peter Jok guy? The one newcomer this year for Iowa? Holy cow what a gunner. He took 31 threes in the five games to lead the team, and was either hot (4-8 and 4-7) or really not (1-4, 1-5, 1-7). Pretty ballsy for a freshman, but he and Josh Oglesby might be the keys for Iowa as the guys most likely to provide the outside shooting they need. Either way one thing is for certain: Iowa smells like shit.
6. INDIANA HOOSIERS. Indiana, like Michigan, is another team I feel is getting a little bit too much national love based on how gutted they are to last season. They do bring in a hell of a recruiting class (four ESPN Top 100 guys) and they actually complement what they bring back, but I guess, again like Michigan, I'm just hesitant to throw my opinion behind a team with so many questions. Besides the four new guys you've got Yogi Ferrell who can't shoot, Will Sheehey who is kind of a spaz, and a bunch of guys who played very limited minutes last year.
Obviously Tom Crean's hair is recruiting it's ass off so it's probably stupid to dismiss this team with that many ESPN Top 100 guys still hanging around. Along with those new 4 and Ferrell there are two others from last year, so yeah this team is talented I guess. The good news though is they seem to be losing out on recruits all of a sudden. Top 100 guy James Blackmon Jr. had committed but backed out, and they've lost out at the last minute on Top 100s Theo Pinson, Goodluck Okonoboh, and Devin Robinson. Hopefully this means that recruits are figuring out what a huge piece of crap Tom Crean is. Because it's true. [After I wrote this part Blackmon re-committed to Indiana. I stand by my theory that Tom Crean sucks as a human.]
7. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS. This is the team,
outside the Gophers, I'm having the hardest time ranking, and I think,
like the Gophers, it's because my emotions keep getting in the way.
See, I love guys like Tim Frazier and want them to do well. When Talor
Battle was at Penn State (and no, this is not some kind of Penn State
phenomenon) I desperately wanted him to do well and carry his team to
the NCAA tournament - which he did only to be beaten by some Temple
jerks. Obviously putting them 7th, and I think this is pretty much
their ceiling, means I don't think Frazier is going to make it, but if
he's 100% back and everything gels perfectly they could do it.
It would have helped if that jerk Jermaine Marshall wouldn't have transferred and deserted Frazier, but with him (Frazier) out all of last season with that knee injury at least that meant everybody else who is back got to gain some valuable experience scoring the ball, mostly D.J. Newbill, but overall there just isn't enough here outside of Frazier to really have faith in this team. Ross Travis is a heck of a rebounder and the Gophers could definitely use him, but hopefully they'll end up with a different Travis instead (Reid Travis announces Nov 8 with a final three of Duke, Stanford, and Minnesota - have faith).
8. MINNESOTA GOPHERS. I'm honestly a little concerned I have them too high - yes, too high - but what can I say optimism is flowing through my veins right now (and it's a really weird feeling, like that one time I woke up not hungover). But of course that optimism is tinged by reality and pessimism that I cannot escape, and I just don't think there's enough in the front court here to really be even a middle-tier Big Ten team this year.
You've got three guys who are more perimeter guys, a high jumper who is probably way too small to pull it off, and a guy who yes, lost a bunch of weight, but has dealt with knee issues so who knows what you're going to get? Eliason is the only known commodity, and I think he's just fine as a Big Ten center, but if he's in foul trouble who knows what you're going to get? Not to mention you still need to find a starting 4 man out of this group of unknowns, and I don't have a particularly good feeling about any of them. The guard play should be top notch and that alone will keep them in a lot of games, and you just know there's a night here where all the 3-pointers are dropping and they shoot like 14-24 and knock off one of the top teams, but that's not going to be reliable enough to count on night after night. I hope I'm wrong, but I see the upside here as a bubble team. Here's hoping they make it.
9. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI. Hey you know what's cool about Illinois? Besides nothing? They're another team who has already played an exhibition game this season, and since there are tons of questions about how the team's going to shake out maybe we can learn a little something from that box score. Such as how Tracy Abrams, the point guard, led the team in shot attempts. Oh what an Illinois thing. Seriously, Chester Frazier must be rolling in his grave looking at the line of shoot first point guards who have populated that back court since he graduated. Well the line is just two, but they've both been extra annoying so it seems longer.
This was going to be a rough year in Illinois either way, but losing out on Ahmad Starks (transfer from Oregon State, going for the ole "closer to home" waiver - denied) is going to hurt since he averaged 10 pts per game last season. It's always tough to figure out how a team will shake out with so many newcomers (I count 2 transfers (+Starks) and five freshmen) but I'm pretty sure most of these guys suck. Could they make some noise later in the season after they've had time to play together for a while? No.
10. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS. This is a team that for some reason, probably because I like the dudes at Sippin' on Purple, I kept wanting to rank higher but then I slapped myself in the face and looked closer and was like gross. After being right on the verge of that elusive first ever NCAA bid for a couple years, they took a step back last season (a Drew Crawford injury will do that) and finished 13-19 (4-14 in conference) and finally fired their coach. Oh, what's that? You didn't know Northwestern has a new basketball coach well you should since he's a former Dukie which means it's all anybody can talk about.
But I don't want to talk about that even though it's kind of interesting that we should see Northwestern playing in a whole new way. I'm more interested in wondering how good their back court might be if Crawford is fully healed and all good again and stuff. The one good thing about his injury last year was it allowed Reggie Hearn to step forward and thrive, and he actually put up nearly identical numbers to what Crawford did before he got hurt. Should be a pretty dynamic back court, plus they have that little lesbian still running around running point.
11. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS. Well, Purdue has A.J. Hammons, a guy named Basil Smotherman, and a guy (Travis Carroll) whose nickname is "Tacos" because of an auto-correct mistake on a scoreboard. That's pretty much all the positives. Maybe this freshman Kendall Stephens could end up being pretty good. And I suppose they do have two guys with the last name Johnson which means they could nickname themselves Johnson & Johnson, which is catchy. Not Tacos catchy, but still catchy.
I'm not really sure what's going on here with Purdue lately. If this season goes the way I'm expecting that'll make a second straight sub-par season and a second straight year missing the NCAA Tournament after making it six straight years (2 Sweet Sixteens). Looking at this year's freshman class and who is on the hook for 2014 there isn't really much of an impact here. In fact, Painter hasn't brought in anything resembling an impact class since that crazy Moore/Johnson/Hummel/Martin quartet, and that was back in 2007. Does this mean we're witnessing the slow death of Purdue basketball? Yes.
12. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS. I wrote about 11 teams, took my kids trick-r-treating, and boy am I tired. Yet here is Nebraska staring me right in my stupid face. I think we all believe that at some point Tim Miles will get Nebraska turned around and at least making them competitive. This is not that year.
After finishing 5-13 last season they return just two starters and I wouldn't exactly say the "Nebraska recruiting hot bed thing" hasn't started yet so ouch. Top returner is mad bomber Ray Gallegos (no relation to Mike Gallego) who led the Big Ten with 271 three-point attempts, but made just 30.6% of them. Remember how Gallegos went 6-9 from three against the Gophers at the Barn? Yeah, that didn't happen all that often. This Shavon Shields guy might be ok and they have a bunch of transfers coming in, most notably Terran Petteway from Texas Tech (that's the opposite of exciting), Florida transfer Walter Pitchford (whose name reminds me of Kevin Pickford who was that cool guy who was gonna throw the party in Dazed and Confused so I already like him) and guard Tai Webster out of New Zealand. According to some Webster would have been a top 50 type recruit if he came up through the AAU system and is an absolute steal for Miles. So maybe Nebraska will provide some excitement this year. Beyond just when we kicked their football asses!!!! SKI U MAH!!!!!
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| Big fan of this behavior |
1. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS. It's almost unfair. The Spartans return Keith Appling, Gary Harris, Denzel Valentine, Branden Dawson, and Adreian Payne this year. That's at least three NBA players. For me, Michigan State is the top team in the Big Ten by a pretty wide margin, and I think they're the second best team in the entire country (behind Louisville).
If you check out kenpom.com, you'll see the Spartans finished as the ninth best team last year according to his metrics. Every team in front of them is experiencing some pretty major roster turnover from last season (with the exception of Louisville), while Sparty loses only Derrick Nix and conveniently still have Payne to just stick right in there. Plus what was Nix's main contributions? Rebounding on both ends of the floor and making high percentage shots. Well Michigan State as a team is great at rebounding and makes a high percentage of their shots, so it's not like they're losing somebody who single-handedly changed their team like DeShaun Thomas. Plus with Izzo as their coach you know they'll just get better as the year goes on. It's just not fair. Of course, Keith Appling is the kind of player who can burn down a season pretty much by himself so I guess we have that going for us. Which is nice.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES. Even though the Buckeyes only lose one player from last season (unless you count Evan Ravenel as a person, which I don't) but at the same time you could argue that they lost more than any other team in the conference because DeShaun Thomas. Not only did he take a ton of his team's shots (30th most of any player in D-1 by percentage) but he was very efficient as well, leading the team in offensive rating by a pretty good amount. Now he's gone, possibly in the NBA but I couldn't be bothered to look it up, but in any case he gone.
So now Ohio State is made up of a ton of formerly highly rated recruits who have been deferring to Thomas, two new freshman (both top 65 recruits by ESPN of course, this is Ohio State after all not some shit box program), and the Wes Ellsbury Eckstein Welker Punto of college basketball Aaron Craft. Seriously, who is going to lead the team in scoring this year? Any of Craft, Lenzelle Smith, Sam Thompson, LaQuinton Ross, Shannon Scott, Amir Williams, or Kameron Williams could end up leading the team and it wouldn't be a surprise. Actually, watch Kameron Williams because he's basically the new DeShaun Thomas but shorter and skinnier. He's definitely never seen a shot he didn't like. Plus look at this guy, tell me he doesn't look like a chucker:
Doesn't he kind of look like Pauly D.? Come on, you know you see it. And Pauly D. would definitely be a chucker if he was a basketball player. I'm also going to assume J-Woww is still hot even though I haven't watched that show in like 3 years.
I can't wait to watch this guy. I love chuckers when they aren't on my team.
 |
| That's a beer bong coming in from the right side there. |
Yes, there are a million questions about the front court, but if Bo Ryan is good at anything, besides being boring and looking ugly and acting like a baby, it's getting seldom used, little regarded big white guys to suddenly be productive and efficient when needed. Plus Nigel Hayes may be in position to contribute as a freshman, and he led the team in rebounding in their exhibition against UW-Platteville. Yes, I hated writing every word of this.
 |
| This seems like a lot of teeth. |
I know there's some good talent back but is this really a top 10 team? Nik Stauskas is just a shooter (a very good one) and Mitch McGary is a rebounder/dunker guy (a very good one). Where's the playmaker who makes this an elite team gonna come from? If Glenn Robinson makes that leap or freshman SF Zak Irvin is a game changer right away (and the PG situation works out) they could certainly end up meeting these preseason expectations, but that's too many unknown variables for me to be really confident in Michigan this year. So yeah. I'm also guessing that off all this predictions this is the one that's going to make me look really stupid at the end of the year. Possibly Penn State too. You'll see why.
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| I still hate Iowa, but this is a good argument it it's favor |
One major problem from last year, and the reason they didn't make the NCAA tournament most likely, is their non-conference schedule was shit. It left their RPI somewhere in the 70s and it's awfully damn hard to get an at-large bid with an RPI up there (and a SoS somewhere in the mid-100s). Well, they went ahead and made the exact same screw-up. They have their typical game against Iowa State, play Notre Dame in the B10/ACC Challenge, and they play in the Battle 4 Atlantis where they could pick up some good games, so none of that sounds too bad. Their mistake lies in scheduling way too many schools that could be in the 300s for RPI and zero other teams that have even an outside shot to crack the top 100. And yes, if this sounds familiar it should because the Gophers did the same damn exact thing and I don't want to talk about it.
One semi-helpful thing with looking at the Hawkeyes is they've already played six exhibition games this season thanks to their August trip to Europe (they went 5-1 with a loss to the great Hyeres-Toulon Basket team. I found box scores for five of the games, and they shot 32% for the trip from three, which is a slight uptick from last year but at the same time they were playing exhibition games against Europeans who were probably plucked from the local YMCA if they have those in Europe. Also this Peter Jok guy? The one newcomer this year for Iowa? Holy cow what a gunner. He took 31 threes in the five games to lead the team, and was either hot (4-8 and 4-7) or really not (1-4, 1-5, 1-7). Pretty ballsy for a freshman, but he and Josh Oglesby might be the keys for Iowa as the guys most likely to provide the outside shooting they need. Either way one thing is for certain: Iowa smells like shit.
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| Indiana was surprisingly lacking in pictures. |
Obviously Tom Crean's hair is recruiting it's ass off so it's probably stupid to dismiss this team with that many ESPN Top 100 guys still hanging around. Along with those new 4 and Ferrell there are two others from last year, so yeah this team is talented I guess. The good news though is they seem to be losing out on recruits all of a sudden. Top 100 guy James Blackmon Jr. had committed but backed out, and they've lost out at the last minute on Top 100s Theo Pinson, Goodluck Okonoboh, and Devin Robinson. Hopefully this means that recruits are figuring out what a huge piece of crap Tom Crean is. Because it's true. [After I wrote this part Blackmon re-committed to Indiana. I stand by my theory that Tom Crean sucks as a human.]
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| I like her she seems smart. |
It would have helped if that jerk Jermaine Marshall wouldn't have transferred and deserted Frazier, but with him (Frazier) out all of last season with that knee injury at least that meant everybody else who is back got to gain some valuable experience scoring the ball, mostly D.J. Newbill, but overall there just isn't enough here outside of Frazier to really have faith in this team. Ross Travis is a heck of a rebounder and the Gophers could definitely use him, but hopefully they'll end up with a different Travis instead (Reid Travis announces Nov 8 with a final three of Duke, Stanford, and Minnesota - have faith).
8. MINNESOTA GOPHERS. I'm honestly a little concerned I have them too high - yes, too high - but what can I say optimism is flowing through my veins right now (and it's a really weird feeling, like that one time I woke up not hungover). But of course that optimism is tinged by reality and pessimism that I cannot escape, and I just don't think there's enough in the front court here to really be even a middle-tier Big Ten team this year.
You've got three guys who are more perimeter guys, a high jumper who is probably way too small to pull it off, and a guy who yes, lost a bunch of weight, but has dealt with knee issues so who knows what you're going to get? Eliason is the only known commodity, and I think he's just fine as a Big Ten center, but if he's in foul trouble who knows what you're going to get? Not to mention you still need to find a starting 4 man out of this group of unknowns, and I don't have a particularly good feeling about any of them. The guard play should be top notch and that alone will keep them in a lot of games, and you just know there's a night here where all the 3-pointers are dropping and they shoot like 14-24 and knock off one of the top teams, but that's not going to be reliable enough to count on night after night. I hope I'm wrong, but I see the upside here as a bubble team. Here's hoping they make it.
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| The pillow says Illinois. Nice microwave. |
This was going to be a rough year in Illinois either way, but losing out on Ahmad Starks (transfer from Oregon State, going for the ole "closer to home" waiver - denied) is going to hurt since he averaged 10 pts per game last season. It's always tough to figure out how a team will shake out with so many newcomers (I count 2 transfers (+Starks) and five freshmen) but I'm pretty sure most of these guys suck. Could they make some noise later in the season after they've had time to play together for a while? No.
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| The website said these were Northwestern girls. Good enough for me. |
But I don't want to talk about that even though it's kind of interesting that we should see Northwestern playing in a whole new way. I'm more interested in wondering how good their back court might be if Crawford is fully healed and all good again and stuff. The one good thing about his injury last year was it allowed Reggie Hearn to step forward and thrive, and he actually put up nearly identical numbers to what Crawford did before he got hurt. Should be a pretty dynamic back court, plus they have that little lesbian still running around running point.
11. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS. Well, Purdue has A.J. Hammons, a guy named Basil Smotherman, and a guy (Travis Carroll) whose nickname is "Tacos" because of an auto-correct mistake on a scoreboard. That's pretty much all the positives. Maybe this freshman Kendall Stephens could end up being pretty good. And I suppose they do have two guys with the last name Johnson which means they could nickname themselves Johnson & Johnson, which is catchy. Not Tacos catchy, but still catchy.
I'm not really sure what's going on here with Purdue lately. If this season goes the way I'm expecting that'll make a second straight sub-par season and a second straight year missing the NCAA Tournament after making it six straight years (2 Sweet Sixteens). Looking at this year's freshman class and who is on the hook for 2014 there isn't really much of an impact here. In fact, Painter hasn't brought in anything resembling an impact class since that crazy Moore/Johnson/Hummel/Martin quartet, and that was back in 2007. Does this mean we're witnessing the slow death of Purdue basketball? Yes.
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| Bottom. |
After finishing 5-13 last season they return just two starters and I wouldn't exactly say the "Nebraska recruiting hot bed thing" hasn't started yet so ouch. Top returner is mad bomber Ray Gallegos (no relation to Mike Gallego) who led the Big Ten with 271 three-point attempts, but made just 30.6% of them. Remember how Gallegos went 6-9 from three against the Gophers at the Barn? Yeah, that didn't happen all that often. This Shavon Shields guy might be ok and they have a bunch of transfers coming in, most notably Terran Petteway from Texas Tech (that's the opposite of exciting), Florida transfer Walter Pitchford (whose name reminds me of Kevin Pickford who was that cool guy who was gonna throw the party in Dazed and Confused so I already like him) and guard Tai Webster out of New Zealand. According to some Webster would have been a top 50 type recruit if he came up through the AAU system and is an absolute steal for Miles. So maybe Nebraska will provide some excitement this year. Beyond just when we kicked their football asses!!!! SKI U MAH!!!!!
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
A Super Early Big Ten Hoops Preview for 2013-2014
You know what it's way too early for? College Basketball previews. You know what I'm thinking about a lot lately? College Basketball. As such, here is a way, way, way too early preview of Big Ten Hoops next year, keeping in mind that there are no "official previews" or anything out there to work off of, so a lot of the player movement is only coming from my own research and as much as I tried to stay on top of it I'm sure there are some things I missed. Sue me. If you don't like it, don't read it, ass.
1. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS
- LOSSES: C Derrick Nix
- ADDS: SG Alvin Ellis, C Gavin Schilling
- LINEUP:
PG - Keith Appling
SG - Gary Harris
SF - Denzel Valentine
PF - Branden Dawson,
C - Adreian Payne
- OVERVIEW: That is simply not fair. Not fair at all. Look at that returnee lineup and consider none of those guys are freshman so they bring back a ton of experience to go along with all that talent. About the only good news is they are pretty weak in terms of playing time behind the starters with only Travis Trice showing good production in quality minutes last year and the recruiting class isn't great (funny that they were both Tubby recruits and would have been considered "awesome gets") at least in so far as immediate impact goes. Still, Izzo shouldn't need much from his bench looking at how good everybody else is. An absolute National Title Contender right here.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES
- LOSSES: F Deshaun Thomas, F Evan Ravenel
- ADDS: SG Kameron Williams (ESPN #68), SF Marc Loving (ESPN #62)
- LINEUP:
PG - Aaron Craft
SG - Lenzelle Smith
SF - LaQuinton Ross
PF - Sam Thompson
C - Amir Williams
- OVERVIEW: Another absolutely loaded team, they may lack the individual star power of some of the Spartans but this team is extremely deep. That lineup posted above is pretty much a guess, because they can also go smaller with Shannon Scott or one of the freshmen could slip in there - and Loving is a 6-8 small forward so they have even more flexibility. They may have some issues earlier figuring out who is going to replace the huge amount of ball usage Thomas took up the last couple years, but I'm sure with Matta still in charge they'll get it figure out quickly.
3. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES
- LOSSES: PG Trey Burke, SG Tim Hardaway
- ADDS: PG Derrick Walton (ESPN #30), SF Zak Irvin (ESPN #22), PF Mark Donnal (ESPN #89), PG Andrew Dakich
- LINEUP:
PG - Derrick Walton
SG - Nik Stauskas
SF - Zak Irvin
PF - Glenn Robinson
C - Mitch McGary
- OVERVIEW: Losing your starting backcourt, especially as talented one as Burke and Hardaway, would probably be a killer for most teams, but Michigan caught a break with both Glenn Robinson and Mitch McGary deciding to stay in school and have an awesome starting class coming in that could yield two starters in Walton and Irvin. If things don't completely work out with the freshmen Michigan has the depth to absorb some of those issues as well, but more in the front court (Robinson can play PF or SF, Jordan Morgan and Jon Horford are still around) than in the back court where Caris LeVert and Final Four almost hero Spike Albrecht are your depth. Really the biggest key to the season is Walton, but the Wolverines have enough talent to be in contention even if he struggles.
4. IOWA HAWKEYES
- LOSSES: SF Eric May (5.2ppg, 3.7rpg)
- ADDS: SF Peter Jok, transfer F Jarrod Uthoff (from Wisconsin)
- LINEUP:
PG - Mike Gesell
SG - Roy Marble
SF - Aaron White
PF - Melsahn Basabe
C - Adam Woodbury
- OVERVIEW: It kills me to think Iowa might be good this year as much as it kills you, but the ingredients are all there. Almost the entire team is returning from last year's team that finished out both the regular and postseason on a nice run, finishing second in the NIT. They are an experienced squad, but also have some nice young players who could seriously blossom, and they have two guys who are already poised to be stars. Roy Marble lit it up at the end of the year and scored 20+ in four of the Hawkeyes' five NIT games, and Aaron White not only made Team USA for the World University Games but has played pretty well. Add in the transfer of Uthoff and Iowa could even finish as high as third. Kill me.
5. INDIANA HOOSIERS
- LOSSES: C Cody Zeller, PF Christian Watford, SG Victor Oladipo, PG Jordan Hulls, SG Maurice Creek, SG Remy Abell
- ADDS: SG Evan Gordon (transfer from Ariz State), PF Noah Vonleh (ESPN #13), C Luke Fischer (ESPN #34), SF Troy Williams (ESPN #54), SF Stanford Robinson (ESPN #99), SF Devin Davis, SF Collin Hartman
- LINEUP:
PG - Yogi Ferrell
SG - Evan Gordon
SF - Will Sheehy
PF - Noah Vonleh
PF - Hanner Mosquera-Perea
- OVERVIEW: Nobody else in the conference loses anywhere near what the Hoosiers do from last season, but they've been stockpiling talent long enough (and this year's class is no exception once again) that they should end up just fine, particularly by getting a well timed, and immediately eligible thanks to the grad school loophole, transfer in Evan Gordon. Although Indiana has some good depth in the front court (Derek Elston, etc.) they were looking shaky on the perimeter (notice not a single guard in the much heralded recruiting class (though it sounds like Robinson is more SG/SF than pure SF) so Gordon's ability to handle both guard spots is going to be huge for Indiana. Because they definitely deserve more breaks. Tom Crean is an asshat.
6. WISCONSIN BADGERS
- LOSSES: PF Mike Bruesewitz, C Jared Berggren, SF Ryan Evans
- ADDS: PF Nigel Hayes (ESPN #83), PG Bronson Koenig, SG Riley Dearring, SG Jordan Hill, PF Vitto Brown
- LINEUP:
PG - Traevon Jackson
SG - Josh Gasser
SG - Ben Brust
F - Sam Dekker
PF - Frank Kaminsky
- OVERVIEW: Same as it ever was. Wisconsin loses enough from the prior year that you assume they'll struggle and they'll probably end up all good and stuff. Really though, this year it won't surprise me if they outperform my expectations (again) because Gasser/Brust/Dekker are a pretty solid little nucleus, and I think Dekker has the kind of ability to be an All-Conference player this season already. Once again, the bench looks empty and you'd think they'll struggle but whatever man, can we just stop talking about this? I hate stupid Wisconsin and I hate the way they always overperform where every stupid Minnesota sport underachieves over and over again. I'm sick of it. They don't even deserve it. They don't do anything over there. Have you ever been to Wisconsin outside of Madison or Milwaukee? It's fucking terrible, man. Just terrible. Their idea of culture is cheese curds which are admittedly delicious but still, erect a museum or something. The more time I spend over there the more I think Carl Gerbschmidt is real. If it wasn't for Minnesota's stupid no buying alcohol on Sunday thing I'd seriously start looking into one of those domes from Under the Dome to drop on that state.
7. MINNESOTA GOPHERS
- LOSSES: PF Trevor Mbakwe, PF Rodney Williams, G Joe Coleman
- ADDS: PG Dre Mathieu (JuCo), PG Daquein McNeil, SG Malik Smith (transfer from FIU), PF Joey King (transfer from Drake, probably will be eligible this year), PF Rakeem Buckles (rumored)
- LINEUP:
PG - Dre Hollins
SG - Malik Smith
SF - Austin Hollins
PF - Joey King
C - Elliot Eliason
- OVERVIEW: If you're reading this you're either hopelessly lost (just click the red X, man) or you already know plenty about the Gophers. Actually, despite being the team I know the most about this was the hardest team to peg including the starting lineup (or maybe because I know them so well). Will Charles Buggs start at the 4? Where will Dre Mathieu fit in? Mo Walker? Just so many questions right now, including who will even be on the roster come season start (King/Buckles questions). With this many questions, including a new coach with a new style and a new system, it's hard to figure where to peg this team, but the rest of the conference should be pretty weak this year (I'd put the Gophers in this tier with Penn State, Purdue, and Wisconsin) so somewhere in this neighborhood feels right, although I have to admit I can't seem them finishing any higher than here, but I can certainly see them going lower.
8. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS
- LOSSES: F Jermaine Marshall, G Nick Colella, PF Jon Graham, PF Sasha Borovnjak, PF Patrick Ackerman
- ADDS: PG Tim Frazier (back from injury), PG Graham Woodward, PG Geno Thorpe, C Julian Moore, SF Payton Banks, SG John Johnson (transfer from Pitt), SG Allen Roberts (transfer from Miami-OH)
- LINEUP:
PG - Tim Frazier
SG - Allen Roberts
SF - D.J. Newbill
PF - Brandon Taylor
PF - Ross Travis
- OVERVIEW: It's really too bad Jermaine Marshall transferred out because otherwise Penn State might be really interesting. Frazier is one of the best players in the league, Newbill got valuable experience helping carry the offense without Frazier last year, Roberts averaged double digit points per game last year at Miami (OH), and Brandon Taylor and Ross Travis form a surprisingly effective inside duo. Even John Johnson, the transfer from Pitt, should help off the bench quite a bit once eligible in February - he shot 38% from deep while with the Panthers, which would have been tops on the Nittany Lions last year. It's a collection of intriguing parts led by a star, assuming Frazier is back at 100% this season. Talor Battle was able to drag a similarly constructed team to the NCAA Tournament in his final year at PSU - can Frazier do the same? I don't think so, but they're a lot closer than you think they are. Trust me, I'm smarter than you.
9. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS
- LOSSES: F D.J. Byrd, PF Sandi Marcius, G Anthony Johnson
- ADDS: SG Kendall Stephens (ESPN #65), SF Basil Smotherman, SG Bryson Scott, SG Sterling Carter (transfer from Seattle), PF Errick Peck (transfer from Cornell)
- LINEUP:
PG - Ronnie Johnson
SG - Terone Johnson
F - Travis Carroll
F - Donnie Hale
C - A.J. Hammons
- OVERVIEW: Purdue may have a ton of question marks, and they do, but they also have one of the biggest upside players in the conference in sophomore A.J. Hammons, who at seven feet tall and 280 pounds is already a complete monster. He averaged 11 points, 6 boards, and 2 blocks per game despite playing just 23 minutes, and as his conditioning improves and his minutes go up those numbers will continue to climb (top block % in the conference among returning players and #3 in offensive rebounding % and #6 in Def. rebounding %). Purdue's biggest problem is everybody else, and they have zero shooters to surround Hammons with (their only reliable one last year was Byrd) so he can expect plenty of double teams, although Seattle transfer Sterling Carter (39% last year) could be the guy. Where have you gone, Ryne Smith?
10. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS
- LOSSES: G Jaren Sina (highly rated freshman this year who opted out after the coaching change), G Reggie Hearn, G Alex Marcotullio, F Jared Swopshire
- ADDS: SF Nate Taphorn
- LINEUP:
PG - Dave Sobolewski
SG - Tre Demps
SF - Drew Crawford
PF - Mike Turner
C - Alex Olah
- OVERVIEW: Drew Crawford is back for Northwestern, and that's awesome for them, but these days instead of his running mates being Michael "Juice" Thompson and John Shurna he has Dave "Lesbian" Sobolewski and Alex Olah and that's just not enough help. Chris Collins is, in my opinion, a great hire for them and it's already paying off with the Wildcats nabbing their first ESPN Top 100 recruit in history (SF Victor Law, #66 in the class of 2014), but it's going to be a long road ahead. Still, between Crawford and the outside shooting of Sobolewski and Kale Abrahamson they'll no doubt end up with a nice upset or two, especially if Collins decides to stick with their stupid passive 1-3-1 which he absolutely, positively, should not do.
11. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI
- LOSSES: SG Brandon Paul, SF D.J. Richardson, PF Tyler Griffey, PF Mike Shaw, PF Sam McLaurin, SF Devin Langford
- ADDS: PF Jon Ekey (transfer from Illinois State), SG Rayvonte Rice (transfer from Drake), G Ahmad Starks (transfer from Oregon State, may or may not be eligible next year), SG Kendrick Nunn (ESPN #61), SG Malcolm Hill (ESPN #66), PF Austin Colbert, C Maverick Morgan, PG Jaylon Tate
- LINEUP:
PG - Tracy Abrams
SG - Rayvonte Rice
SF - Joseph Bertrand
PF - Jon Ekey
C - Nnanna Egwu
- OVERVIEW: I'm always extra hard on the Illinois for some reason (probably Demetri McCamey's stupid face) but it's because the teams are always so stupidly constructed or play really really dumb. I'm sure Groce will get it figured out eventually because he's too good not two, but the whole Bruce Weber (a top 3 worst coach of all-time) dug him is going to take some time to get out of. He's going with the transfer route here which is a tried and true method to aspire to mediocrity, and that's probably where the Illini's ceiling lies this year. Simply put - I don't think Abrams is a good enough point guard to lift this team, I don't think Egwu is a quality Big 10 center, and I have a feeling Bertrand is going to go straight up chucker this year. So yeah, not optimistic.
12. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS
- LOSSES: C Andre Almeida, PF Brandon Ubel, SG Dylan Talley
- ADDS: PF Walter Pitchford (transfer from Florida), SF Terran Petteway (transfer from Texas Tech), PG Deverell Biggs (Juco), SF Nick Fuller, PG Tai Webster, SG Nathan Hawkins, PF Leslee Smith (Juco)
- LINEUP:
PG - Deverell Biggs (suspended indefinitely)/Benny Parker
SG - Ray Gallegos
SF - Shavon Shields
PF - David Rivers
PF - Walter Pitchford
- OVERVIEW: I have no doubt Nebraska will at least spend some time being a factor in the middle of the league at some point, it's just not going to be this year. There are some good signs as both Nick Fuller and Tai Webster are a better class of recruit than Nebraska usually gets and the transfer from Florida, Pitchford, obviously has significant upside if Billy Donovan signed him on. Overall though, the talent level just isn't there yet, especially considering the Huskers lost three starters off of last year's squad. Deverell Biggs should be a big upgrade over Benny Parker at the point, but he's suspended indefinitely after a DUI this December, and I suspect Tim Miles is smart enough to keep the missed games to a minimum. The good news for Nebraska is that Rutgers joins the Big Ten next year (2014-15) and they'll likely be a good ways ahead of the Scarlet Knights by then.
Well there you have it. Michigan State and Ohio State look to be on a whole different level than the rest of the conference, with Michigan a small step behind. There seems to be a pretty clear bottom three as well with Northwestern, Illinois, and Nebraska with everybody else jumbled in the middle. It really seems wide open to beyond #3, and I really wouldn't be surprised to see just about anybody at #4 and #5 - can you imagine Iowa and Penn State finishing 4th and 5th? It could happen. It would kind of suck for everyone because Iowa smells like poop, but it could happen. Seriously I'm already excited for next year. I'm such a dork.
1. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS
- LOSSES: C Derrick Nix
- ADDS: SG Alvin Ellis, C Gavin Schilling
- LINEUP:
PG - Keith Appling
SG - Gary Harris
SF - Denzel Valentine
PF - Branden Dawson,
C - Adreian Payne
- OVERVIEW: That is simply not fair. Not fair at all. Look at that returnee lineup and consider none of those guys are freshman so they bring back a ton of experience to go along with all that talent. About the only good news is they are pretty weak in terms of playing time behind the starters with only Travis Trice showing good production in quality minutes last year and the recruiting class isn't great (funny that they were both Tubby recruits and would have been considered "awesome gets") at least in so far as immediate impact goes. Still, Izzo shouldn't need much from his bench looking at how good everybody else is. An absolute National Title Contender right here.
2. OHIO STATE BUCKEYES
- LOSSES: F Deshaun Thomas, F Evan Ravenel
- ADDS: SG Kameron Williams (ESPN #68), SF Marc Loving (ESPN #62)
- LINEUP:
PG - Aaron Craft
SG - Lenzelle Smith
SF - LaQuinton Ross
PF - Sam Thompson
C - Amir Williams
- OVERVIEW: Another absolutely loaded team, they may lack the individual star power of some of the Spartans but this team is extremely deep. That lineup posted above is pretty much a guess, because they can also go smaller with Shannon Scott or one of the freshmen could slip in there - and Loving is a 6-8 small forward so they have even more flexibility. They may have some issues earlier figuring out who is going to replace the huge amount of ball usage Thomas took up the last couple years, but I'm sure with Matta still in charge they'll get it figure out quickly.
3. MICHIGAN WOLVERINES
- LOSSES: PG Trey Burke, SG Tim Hardaway
- ADDS: PG Derrick Walton (ESPN #30), SF Zak Irvin (ESPN #22), PF Mark Donnal (ESPN #89), PG Andrew Dakich
- LINEUP:
PG - Derrick Walton
SG - Nik Stauskas
SF - Zak Irvin
PF - Glenn Robinson
C - Mitch McGary
- OVERVIEW: Losing your starting backcourt, especially as talented one as Burke and Hardaway, would probably be a killer for most teams, but Michigan caught a break with both Glenn Robinson and Mitch McGary deciding to stay in school and have an awesome starting class coming in that could yield two starters in Walton and Irvin. If things don't completely work out with the freshmen Michigan has the depth to absorb some of those issues as well, but more in the front court (Robinson can play PF or SF, Jordan Morgan and Jon Horford are still around) than in the back court where Caris LeVert and Final Four almost hero Spike Albrecht are your depth. Really the biggest key to the season is Walton, but the Wolverines have enough talent to be in contention even if he struggles.
4. IOWA HAWKEYES
- LOSSES: SF Eric May (5.2ppg, 3.7rpg)
- ADDS: SF Peter Jok, transfer F Jarrod Uthoff (from Wisconsin)
- LINEUP:
PG - Mike Gesell
SG - Roy Marble
SF - Aaron White
PF - Melsahn Basabe
C - Adam Woodbury
- OVERVIEW: It kills me to think Iowa might be good this year as much as it kills you, but the ingredients are all there. Almost the entire team is returning from last year's team that finished out both the regular and postseason on a nice run, finishing second in the NIT. They are an experienced squad, but also have some nice young players who could seriously blossom, and they have two guys who are already poised to be stars. Roy Marble lit it up at the end of the year and scored 20+ in four of the Hawkeyes' five NIT games, and Aaron White not only made Team USA for the World University Games but has played pretty well. Add in the transfer of Uthoff and Iowa could even finish as high as third. Kill me.
5. INDIANA HOOSIERS
- LOSSES: C Cody Zeller, PF Christian Watford, SG Victor Oladipo, PG Jordan Hulls, SG Maurice Creek, SG Remy Abell
- ADDS: SG Evan Gordon (transfer from Ariz State), PF Noah Vonleh (ESPN #13), C Luke Fischer (ESPN #34), SF Troy Williams (ESPN #54), SF Stanford Robinson (ESPN #99), SF Devin Davis, SF Collin Hartman
- LINEUP:
PG - Yogi Ferrell
SG - Evan Gordon
SF - Will Sheehy
PF - Noah Vonleh
PF - Hanner Mosquera-Perea
- OVERVIEW: Nobody else in the conference loses anywhere near what the Hoosiers do from last season, but they've been stockpiling talent long enough (and this year's class is no exception once again) that they should end up just fine, particularly by getting a well timed, and immediately eligible thanks to the grad school loophole, transfer in Evan Gordon. Although Indiana has some good depth in the front court (Derek Elston, etc.) they were looking shaky on the perimeter (notice not a single guard in the much heralded recruiting class (though it sounds like Robinson is more SG/SF than pure SF) so Gordon's ability to handle both guard spots is going to be huge for Indiana. Because they definitely deserve more breaks. Tom Crean is an asshat.
6. WISCONSIN BADGERS
- LOSSES: PF Mike Bruesewitz, C Jared Berggren, SF Ryan Evans
- ADDS: PF Nigel Hayes (ESPN #83), PG Bronson Koenig, SG Riley Dearring, SG Jordan Hill, PF Vitto Brown
- LINEUP:
PG - Traevon Jackson
SG - Josh Gasser
SG - Ben Brust
F - Sam Dekker
PF - Frank Kaminsky
- OVERVIEW: Same as it ever was. Wisconsin loses enough from the prior year that you assume they'll struggle and they'll probably end up all good and stuff. Really though, this year it won't surprise me if they outperform my expectations (again) because Gasser/Brust/Dekker are a pretty solid little nucleus, and I think Dekker has the kind of ability to be an All-Conference player this season already. Once again, the bench looks empty and you'd think they'll struggle but whatever man, can we just stop talking about this? I hate stupid Wisconsin and I hate the way they always overperform where every stupid Minnesota sport underachieves over and over again. I'm sick of it. They don't even deserve it. They don't do anything over there. Have you ever been to Wisconsin outside of Madison or Milwaukee? It's fucking terrible, man. Just terrible. Their idea of culture is cheese curds which are admittedly delicious but still, erect a museum or something. The more time I spend over there the more I think Carl Gerbschmidt is real. If it wasn't for Minnesota's stupid no buying alcohol on Sunday thing I'd seriously start looking into one of those domes from Under the Dome to drop on that state.
7. MINNESOTA GOPHERS
- LOSSES: PF Trevor Mbakwe, PF Rodney Williams, G Joe Coleman
- ADDS: PG Dre Mathieu (JuCo), PG Daquein McNeil, SG Malik Smith (transfer from FIU), PF Joey King (transfer from Drake, probably will be eligible this year), PF Rakeem Buckles (rumored)
- LINEUP:
PG - Dre Hollins
SG - Malik Smith
SF - Austin Hollins
PF - Joey King
C - Elliot Eliason
- OVERVIEW: If you're reading this you're either hopelessly lost (just click the red X, man) or you already know plenty about the Gophers. Actually, despite being the team I know the most about this was the hardest team to peg including the starting lineup (or maybe because I know them so well). Will Charles Buggs start at the 4? Where will Dre Mathieu fit in? Mo Walker? Just so many questions right now, including who will even be on the roster come season start (King/Buckles questions). With this many questions, including a new coach with a new style and a new system, it's hard to figure where to peg this team, but the rest of the conference should be pretty weak this year (I'd put the Gophers in this tier with Penn State, Purdue, and Wisconsin) so somewhere in this neighborhood feels right, although I have to admit I can't seem them finishing any higher than here, but I can certainly see them going lower.
8. PENN STATE NITTANY LIONS
- LOSSES: F Jermaine Marshall, G Nick Colella, PF Jon Graham, PF Sasha Borovnjak, PF Patrick Ackerman
- ADDS: PG Tim Frazier (back from injury), PG Graham Woodward, PG Geno Thorpe, C Julian Moore, SF Payton Banks, SG John Johnson (transfer from Pitt), SG Allen Roberts (transfer from Miami-OH)
- LINEUP:
PG - Tim Frazier
SG - Allen Roberts
SF - D.J. Newbill
PF - Brandon Taylor
PF - Ross Travis
- OVERVIEW: It's really too bad Jermaine Marshall transferred out because otherwise Penn State might be really interesting. Frazier is one of the best players in the league, Newbill got valuable experience helping carry the offense without Frazier last year, Roberts averaged double digit points per game last year at Miami (OH), and Brandon Taylor and Ross Travis form a surprisingly effective inside duo. Even John Johnson, the transfer from Pitt, should help off the bench quite a bit once eligible in February - he shot 38% from deep while with the Panthers, which would have been tops on the Nittany Lions last year. It's a collection of intriguing parts led by a star, assuming Frazier is back at 100% this season. Talor Battle was able to drag a similarly constructed team to the NCAA Tournament in his final year at PSU - can Frazier do the same? I don't think so, but they're a lot closer than you think they are. Trust me, I'm smarter than you.
9. PURDUE BOILERMAKERS
- LOSSES: F D.J. Byrd, PF Sandi Marcius, G Anthony Johnson
- ADDS: SG Kendall Stephens (ESPN #65), SF Basil Smotherman, SG Bryson Scott, SG Sterling Carter (transfer from Seattle), PF Errick Peck (transfer from Cornell)
- LINEUP:
PG - Ronnie Johnson
SG - Terone Johnson
F - Travis Carroll
F - Donnie Hale
C - A.J. Hammons
- OVERVIEW: Purdue may have a ton of question marks, and they do, but they also have one of the biggest upside players in the conference in sophomore A.J. Hammons, who at seven feet tall and 280 pounds is already a complete monster. He averaged 11 points, 6 boards, and 2 blocks per game despite playing just 23 minutes, and as his conditioning improves and his minutes go up those numbers will continue to climb (top block % in the conference among returning players and #3 in offensive rebounding % and #6 in Def. rebounding %). Purdue's biggest problem is everybody else, and they have zero shooters to surround Hammons with (their only reliable one last year was Byrd) so he can expect plenty of double teams, although Seattle transfer Sterling Carter (39% last year) could be the guy. Where have you gone, Ryne Smith?
10. NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS
- LOSSES: G Jaren Sina (highly rated freshman this year who opted out after the coaching change), G Reggie Hearn, G Alex Marcotullio, F Jared Swopshire
- ADDS: SF Nate Taphorn
- LINEUP:
PG - Dave Sobolewski
SG - Tre Demps
SF - Drew Crawford
PF - Mike Turner
C - Alex Olah
- OVERVIEW: Drew Crawford is back for Northwestern, and that's awesome for them, but these days instead of his running mates being Michael "Juice" Thompson and John Shurna he has Dave "Lesbian" Sobolewski and Alex Olah and that's just not enough help. Chris Collins is, in my opinion, a great hire for them and it's already paying off with the Wildcats nabbing their first ESPN Top 100 recruit in history (SF Victor Law, #66 in the class of 2014), but it's going to be a long road ahead. Still, between Crawford and the outside shooting of Sobolewski and Kale Abrahamson they'll no doubt end up with a nice upset or two, especially if Collins decides to stick with their stupid passive 1-3-1 which he absolutely, positively, should not do.
11. ILLINOIS FIGHTING ILLINI
- LOSSES: SG Brandon Paul, SF D.J. Richardson, PF Tyler Griffey, PF Mike Shaw, PF Sam McLaurin, SF Devin Langford
- ADDS: PF Jon Ekey (transfer from Illinois State), SG Rayvonte Rice (transfer from Drake), G Ahmad Starks (transfer from Oregon State, may or may not be eligible next year), SG Kendrick Nunn (ESPN #61), SG Malcolm Hill (ESPN #66), PF Austin Colbert, C Maverick Morgan, PG Jaylon Tate
- LINEUP:
PG - Tracy Abrams
SG - Rayvonte Rice
SF - Joseph Bertrand
PF - Jon Ekey
C - Nnanna Egwu
- OVERVIEW: I'm always extra hard on the Illinois for some reason (probably Demetri McCamey's stupid face) but it's because the teams are always so stupidly constructed or play really really dumb. I'm sure Groce will get it figured out eventually because he's too good not two, but the whole Bruce Weber (a top 3 worst coach of all-time) dug him is going to take some time to get out of. He's going with the transfer route here which is a tried and true method to aspire to mediocrity, and that's probably where the Illini's ceiling lies this year. Simply put - I don't think Abrams is a good enough point guard to lift this team, I don't think Egwu is a quality Big 10 center, and I have a feeling Bertrand is going to go straight up chucker this year. So yeah, not optimistic.
12. NEBRASKA CORNHUSKERS
- LOSSES: C Andre Almeida, PF Brandon Ubel, SG Dylan Talley
- ADDS: PF Walter Pitchford (transfer from Florida), SF Terran Petteway (transfer from Texas Tech), PG Deverell Biggs (Juco), SF Nick Fuller, PG Tai Webster, SG Nathan Hawkins, PF Leslee Smith (Juco)
- LINEUP:
PG - Deverell Biggs (suspended indefinitely)/Benny Parker
SG - Ray Gallegos
SF - Shavon Shields
PF - David Rivers
PF - Walter Pitchford
- OVERVIEW: I have no doubt Nebraska will at least spend some time being a factor in the middle of the league at some point, it's just not going to be this year. There are some good signs as both Nick Fuller and Tai Webster are a better class of recruit than Nebraska usually gets and the transfer from Florida, Pitchford, obviously has significant upside if Billy Donovan signed him on. Overall though, the talent level just isn't there yet, especially considering the Huskers lost three starters off of last year's squad. Deverell Biggs should be a big upgrade over Benny Parker at the point, but he's suspended indefinitely after a DUI this December, and I suspect Tim Miles is smart enough to keep the missed games to a minimum. The good news for Nebraska is that Rutgers joins the Big Ten next year (2014-15) and they'll likely be a good ways ahead of the Scarlet Knights by then.
Well there you have it. Michigan State and Ohio State look to be on a whole different level than the rest of the conference, with Michigan a small step behind. There seems to be a pretty clear bottom three as well with Northwestern, Illinois, and Nebraska with everybody else jumbled in the middle. It really seems wide open to beyond #3, and I really wouldn't be surprised to see just about anybody at #4 and #5 - can you imagine Iowa and Penn State finishing 4th and 5th? It could happen. It would kind of suck for everyone because Iowa smells like poop, but it could happen. Seriously I'm already excited for next year. I'm such a dork.
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