MBB: Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference

[John Gleich]

1.)  Carrie hates shopping, even though she always seems to buy stuff.  No "up scale" girl here.  She's fine at the local Goodwill. 

2.)  I actually tolerate chick flicks more than she does. 

3.)  It looks like WE are going.  There was just a situation we needed to take care of and it looks like we got the "go ahead".

4.)  How long does "newlyweds" last?  Two years? 

Glad to hear Frodotwo is going.  See ya out there!  Point Special?  Any chance?  Carrie wants to know!

Nope, not going... I don't have any vacation left at work after being in Florida last week.

[badgerwarhawk]

4.)  How long does "newlyweds" last?  Two years? 

As long as you let it.   

[badgerwarhawk]

The D3hoops.com All Region teams have been announced and the WIAC is well represented on the West Region team.  Curt Hanson and DJ Marsh were named to the first team.  Dustin Mitchell and Matt Moses to the second team and Tony Mane and Jake Smith made the third team.

http://d3hoops.com/all-region/10/westmen.htm

[Mr. Ypsi]

4.)  How long does "newlyweds" last?  Two years? 

As long as you let it.   

Right you are!  One neighborhood 'wit' (in his 80s) still refers to my wife as my 'child bride' - she's now 55, we've been married almost 33 years, but I AM her elder by 6 years!

[Just Bill]

Maybe it's a generational thing, but I find few phrases creepier than "child bride".

[Pat Coleman]

I would say, first off, he of course had to be nominated by his coach. I am not privy to the list of nominees.

Secondly, they took just two players per region, aside from the Final Four teams.

[The Roop]

Was the consolation game so unpopular that an annual roster debate is a better alternative ??

[hasanova]

Was the consolation game so unpopular that an annual roster debate is a better alternative ??

Well said!  +1  

PS Bring back the 3rd place game!

[Pat Coleman]

Do we not already debate who the best players are?

[John Gleich]

Repost from the ODAC board:

I'm going to refer to some of these numbers, so I might as well put them all together!

Ya know, the whole argument of "Williams would have had more losses if they played in the ODAC" might be true... but it might not be true either.

Let's take a look at the final four teams in terms of S.O.S.

Team	SOS Rank	Win %	OWP	OOWP	SOS
UWSP:	11	.846	.588	.559	.578
Randy Mac:	20	.727	.578	.530	.562
Guilford:	127	.929	.522	.530	.525
Williams:	170	1.000	.508	.545	.520

In one sense, one could say that Williams, because they didn't lose* may be the best team in the country, even if they didn't play the best schedule.  No one* beat them... so it can't be said that they would have lose if they played a different schedule.  I made that same argument for teams like Anderson, St. Norbert, etc, who had gaudy records but didn't have gaudy SOS's.  They matriculated up in what has been dubbed the St. Peter Principle after Gustavus Adolphus (of St. Peter, MN) from a few years ago when teams above them lost and they kept rising in the polls.  They really weren't that good... but because others above them lost, they seemed better, even though they weren't playing the greatest competition.  At a certain point, they should have just stopped rising in the polls (the argument I made for Anderson and St. Norbert was at about 15, or so) until they were challenged by a top team.  That argument (up to 15) holds because both those teams had lost a game or two at that point, and not to a top team.  Now, each team can have an off night and lose a game they should win (such as Whitworth losing to Pomona-Pitzer, in my opinion) but if it's two such losses, then it casts skepticism on if their record is really representative of how good they are... when they don't have a great SOS.  If, however, they lose just 1 game to an average team, than that might have been an off night... but I don't think they should matriculate higher than about 15.

All that is to say that Williams is undefeated* so they really might be that great, no matter what their S.O.S.  Now, one might add that they haven't truly been tested by tough competition... so when the rubber meets the road, they won't be as prepared as a team that has played a tough schedule.  Furthermore, if they haven't lost, then they haven't gone through the maturity and learning that a loss provides, such as weaknesses that would otherwise not come to light.


*Of course, however, Williams isn't undefeated... they've actually lost to Randy Mac, so this string of logic doesn't flow fully, though one might be able to say that this victory was, perhaps, aided by RMC's home court advantage.  I'm not necessarily going to take this line myself, but I don't have a dog in that particular fight...  the WIAC had an .80 win percentage this year and the ODAC would have struggled there too!   

Here are some numbers comparisons of the teams:

Team	Off Eff	Def Eff	Avg Poss/Gm	Off PPG	Def PPG
Point	114.6	92.4	129.0	74.0	59.5
R-M	105.1	90.7	141.7	74.6	64.1
Guil	115.8	95.5	140.1	81.7	66.5
Will	122.8	93.2	138.6	85.2	64.5

The Off/Def efficiency takes Points/100 possessions and the possessions are compiled by this algorithm:

Poss = FGA - ORB + T.O. + (.475*FTA)

The possession numbers per game above are the offensive possessions plus defensive possessions and can be used to see the pace at which teams like to play.

Here's another rubric... it looks at FG%, 3P%, 2P%, % of makes and attempts that are 2's and 3's:

Offensive

Team	FG%	3P%	2P%	%A3P	%A2P	%M3P	%M2P
Point	49.5%	36.4%	53.9%	25.1%	74.9%	18.4%	81.6%
R-M	47.7%	37.0%	53.2%	34.3%	65.7%	26.7%	73.3%
Guil	47.3%	37.9%	51.7%	31.6%	68.4%	25.3%	74.7%
Will	52.7%	45.8%	56.9%	38.4%	61.6%	33.4%	66.6%

Defensive

Team	FG%	3P%	2P%	%A3P	%A2P	%M3P	%M2P
Point	41.1%	31.9%	45.9%	34.3%	65.7%	26.6%	73.4%
R-M	40.3%	30.8%	44.2%	29.3%	70.7%	22.4%	77.6%
Guil	40.0%	32.5%	45.7%	43.2%	56.8%	35.1%	64.9%
Will	39.3%	32.5%	42.4%	31.3%	68.7%	25.9%	74.1%

I don't have time for any analysis right now of these numbers... but the SOS DOES need to be taken into account when looking at these.

Alright, as promised, here are some more stats.  This time, it's a break down of how many points per game come from 3's, 2's, and FT's and the percentage of the overall points this is.  First set of numbers are offensive, second are defensive.


   

UWSP	3Pt's	2Pt's	Ft's
PPG from:	15.4	45.4	13.2
% of points:	20.8%	61.4%	17.8%
PPG from:	17.1	31.5	10.9
% of points:	28.8%	52.9%	18.4%

   

R-M	3Pt's	2Pt's	Ft's
PPG from:	21.4	39.2	14.1
% of points:	28.6%	52.5%	18.8%
PPG from:	15.5	35.8	12.9
% of points:	24.1%	55.8%	20.1%

   

Guilford	3Pt's	2Pt's	Ft's
PPG from:	22.0	43.4	16.2
% of points:	27.0%	53.2%	19.8%
PPG from:	25.8	31.8	8.9
% of points:	38.8%	47.8%	13.4%

   

Williams	3Pt's	2Pt's	Ft's
PPG from:	29.4	39.1	16.8
% of points:	34.5%	45.8%	19.7%
PPG from:	18.8	35.9	9.8
% of points:	29.1%	55.7%	15.1%

These numbers should be paired with the other numbers I posted... and it's going to give us more of a clear idea what these teams rely on and do well.

I think the two semi-final games are going to be very different.  In the Williams/Guilford game, you have two pretty potent offenses.  In Williams, you have a pretty unique situation... not only are they the best 3 point shooting team in the country (in terms of 3 point percentage), they also have the best overall shooting percentage too.  They shoot 45.8% from 3 and 56.9% from 2.  That's efficient!  And it isn't like they don't shoot a lot of 3's... they do.  Fully 1/3 of their made shots are 3's.  Of course, going back to the discussion from earlier, Williams hasn't played as difficult a schedule as the other 3 final four teams... but those numbers are still pretty darn impressive.

Interestingly, likely due to Guilford's size inside, of the last 4 teams standing, they have the highest percentage of shots against that are 3's (43.2%).  And they have held teams to 32.5% shooting from downtown... So of the three possible opponents for Williams, they very well might meet their greatest test against Guilford in terms of attacking a defense because of how teams have attacked Guilford throughout the year.

Interestingly, both Point and Randy Mac played even tougher schedules than Guilford and have higher rated defenses!  So while it's true that Guilford is used to defending a lot of 3's, both Point and Randy Mac are better at it!

I think that the Guilford/Williams game is going to be a game that is in the low 80's.  This is a bit of a change for Williams... they have only had one game in which they let up more than 70 points and didn't score more than 90, and that was against Randy Mac.  On many levels, Williams should have won that game... they were up double digits in the second half and outshot and outrebounded RMC.  But Williams turned the ball over 13 times to just 6 for RMC and they took 6 and made 5 fewer free throws... and that was all she wrote.


Here are some more numbers, this time with assists and turnovers.  To be honest, I'm not too concerned with the assist numbers... I'm more concerned with the turnover numbers and with the forced turnovers.  Again, offensive numbers are first, defensive numbers are second.


   

UWSP	Assists	TO's	A/TO
Total	410	305	1.34
Per Gm	13.2	9.8
Total	285	401	0.71
Per Gm	9.2	12.9

   

R-M	Assists	TO's	A/TO
Total	470	530	0.89
Per Gm	14.7	16.6
Total	293	476	0.62
Per Gm	9.2	14.9

   

Guilford	Assists	TO's	A/TO
Total	453	414	1.09
Per Gm	14.2	12.9
Total	405	400	1.01
Per Gm	12.7	12.5

   

Williams	Assists	TO's	A/TO
Total	468	348	1.34
Per Gm	15.6	11.6
Total	281	317	0.89
Per Gm	9.4	10.6

Point is the only team with a positive turnover ratio.  All of the other teams turn the ball over more than their opponents.  This could become important... Playoff basketball is possession-by-possession basketball and if you can eliminate your mistakes and maximize those of your opponent, then you put yourself in a very good position to win. 

I noticed with my last post that Randy Mac had the highest possession-per-game average of the final 4 teams (it isn't as significant an increase over Williams or Guilford, but it is there).  What I found interesting about this is that they aren't converting on the offensive end (thus their offensive efficiency number is the worst of the 4).  However, they have the best defensive efficiency because, even though there are more possessions, they have the second-best points-against average. 

I don't really know anything about how RMC plays, but many teams who let up few points do so by limiting the number of possessions that their opponents have to score.  But it seems to me that RMC isn't limiting their opponents' chances... they're just preventing them from scoring in an effective manner.  Part of this may be that, of the 4 teams, RMC's opponents haven't taken as many 3's as the other 3 teams' opponents have.  If you can limit the number of 3 attempts (and, thus, makes), then you're effectively improving your defense.  Now, of course, the shooting percentage matters.  If a team shoots 90% from 2 and 10% from 3, I'm going to let them shoot 50 3's and 10 2's (15 points from 3, 18 points from 2 for a total of 33 points) as opposed to 10 3's and 50 2's (3 points from 3 and 90 points from 2 for a total of 93 points).  This, of course, is a very exaggerated example but even if the shooting percentages are equal, say, for example's sake, .333 and you shoot 9 shots inside the arc and 9 shots outside... inside, you'll score 6 points, outside you'll score 9.

Anyway... that's all to say that I wonder how the RMC/UWSP game will go.  I have a feeling that the game will likely be more of a defensive battle, probably in the 60's.  RMC has what appears to be a more efficient defense, so Point could have some dififculty scoring...

But when you look at the average turnovers for both teams, that might shed some light on what could happen.

RMC turns the ball over an average of 16.6 times and their opponents turn it over an average of 14.9 times.  That's a total of 31.7 turnovers per game.  On the other hand, Point turns it over 9.8 times per game, and their opponents turn it over 12.9 times for a total of 22.7.  So RMC games average 12.7 more possessions per game... but those games also average 9 more turnovers per game.  So really, there's just about 3 more scoring possessions per game.  Point shoots a better percentage from the field, so I think that may be the tipping point.

Now, again, I don't know RMC's style.  I guess I'm making the assumption that it's conventional and not a gimmick... Because that could throw a wrench in things either way... either in RMC's favor if that gimmick works or in Point's favor if it doesn't. 

[The Roop]

Do we not already debate who the best players are?

I never got involved with any of that. At least in the pre-All Star game days the debate could continue on an equal level and end on it's own in a reasonable amount of time. Now there will be bickering until June because of whom did not make it.

I just don't see the point to the game, especially at this level. If the guys are good enough to compete at another level, whatever league that may be, the scouts will find them; All-Star game or not. Trust me, this won't generate enough interest to have to clear the gym between games on Saturday.

Cheaper to buy 4 trophies than to essentially bring in a 5th team.

[Pat Coleman]

They aren't going to clear the gym, Roop, so don't worry your pretty little head about that.

Here's a way to take deserving kids and get them some recognition at the Final Four, to give people  who normally would only be interested in the title game on Saturday something more attractive to bring them to the gym. But more importantly, it's a chance for a bunch of seniors who normally wouldn't have one more game to have that one last chance to play intercollegiate basketball.

I've liked this concept ever since it was first brought up six or seven years ago. I'm looking forward to seeing what it's like. And after seeing enough semifinal losers come out disinterested on Saturday afternoon, I'm ready for a change.

[The Roop]

Fit it in at the D1 Final Four then. Somewhere between the 3 point shooting and slam dunk contests would work fine. And it would create more exposure for the players.

[Greek Tragedy]

I'll agree with Pat here.  Back when we played Williams in the Final, Williams and Amherst had a great semi-final game.  Amherst, of course, lost.  I think it took so much out of them, they didn't even care about the 3rd place game.  And to be honest, I bet a lot of Amherst fans went home and didn't even bother watching that game.  

I'd like to see some "all-stars" play!  Of course, with that said, Evan Sweeney could be playing in that game!  Let's hope not because that would obviously mean Point loses on Friday.

[The Roop]

Indianapolis, not Salem, makes more dollars and cents.