MBB: Old Dominion Athletic Conference

[algernon]

In-conference games are 6 on 6, Mr. Ypsi.  That provides more playing time, which helps to get ODAC players ready for the NCAA Tournament.  (The conference does cut back to 5 on 5 for the ODAC tournament games in Salem, to comply with some sort of NCAA regulation.)

[algernon]

Colton Hunt will be a unanimous POY?  That would surprise me.  Having seen him play 7-8 games over his career, I'd agree that he is a force to be reckoned with ... and that he is an ODAC first-teamer.  He scored the most points in the ODAC this year.  However, if I were picking players for my team, he would never be my first choice of players, despite his skills and his admirable hustle for 35 minutes/game.  My first choice would be Harrison George.  (My second choice might  be Astorga or Woodmore or Williamson.) 

Keeping Hunt on the floor for 35 minutes or so when HSC played at the Randolph "gym" may have been Randolph's best hope of a win, and it definitely provided Hunt with the opportunity to score a lot of points, but it didn't get Randolph within even 15 points of a win.  Hunt was 9 for 21 in that game (1 for 7 from behind the arc), while George was 9 for 11 (0 for 1 from three).

The decision re POY is always based on a number of factors.  In 2000, Ron Yuhasz of VWC was 2nd in the ODAC in scoring with 18.8 pts/g, and led the conference in rebounds with 9.1 reb/g.  He was a solid candidate for POY.  However, Yuhasz, a big post player, only hit 52.8% of his shots.  The POY award went to T.J. Grimes, who scored only 15.0 pts/g, but played on a team that was undefeated in the regular season (24-0), and he contributed to the team's play with 3.5 assists/g, a league-leading 2.16 A/TO ratio, and hit 42% of his 3-pointers.

Hunt gets 34.6 minutes/game, which must be close to a league record.  He leads the league in points scored, steals (2.9/g), and FT%.  He hits 51% of his shots ... 37% from behind the arc ... and has a 1.3 A/TO ratio.

George only plays 23.2 minutes/game.  He's second to Hunt in Pts/40min (27.8 for George, 29.8 for Hunt) only because the Tigers have multiple weapons (!) and don't rely on him in the same way at all.  (Kodie Critzer leads the league in 3ptFG%, Greg Lewis plays more at that position and hits over 40% behind the arc, and Khobi Williamson is a huge Tiger threat under the basket, leading the ODAC in FG%.). George is hitting 62% of his shots, second in the ODAC only to Khobi's 65% FG%.  His numbers are virtually identical to Hunt's in Assists/40 (3.4/40min), Steals/40 (3.2/40min) and A/TO ratio (1.2).

Numbers are just a way to attach some objective data to a player's performance.  I'm not sure how the numbers would justify the selection of D.J. Woodmore as POY last year, and they don't need to.  Both Hunt and George have excellent numbers, but I would much rather have Harrison George playing for the Tigers than Hunt.  Actually, if I was Clay Nunley, I'd rather have George as a Wildcat and on the court for 35 minutes/game than Hunt.

[algernon]

Dee Vick will be the ODAC COY.  He inherited a Tiger team with an 8-10 ODAC record the year before he arrived and turned it around into a team that is 21-2 and ranked #11 in the nation.

[algernon]

For Tiger fans ... Harrison George has 1706 career points and is 34 points behind All-American T.J. Grimes in the HSC record book.  If he continues to contribute as a team member with 16 points/game, he should finish his career with another 100-175 points, depending more than anything on how many games the Tigers win in the NCAAs and how long they can extend their season.  I expect he will finish at 3rd or 4th in career scoring, scoring more points than any HSC player since Russ Turner (1988-1992).

[hasanova]

Hasa

How does HSC match up with VWC ?

Quite well.  I see them as pretty evenly matched.  Neither team is relying on one player and that makes it tougher defensively.  Both are quick and athletic. 

[Seatfiller]

on to post season talk... Who are the front runners for player of the year as well as freshmen of the year and the all ODAC teams... I think the player of the year will be unanimous with Colton Hunt winning that. FOY will be interesting, names that come to mind are Sedric Nady (VWC), Zeb Richardson (GC) and mike murray (HSC). Any other names that should be considered? Coach of the year will either go to Dee Vick of HSC or Clay Nunley of Randolph. My all-odac Teams looks like this:
First Team
Colton Hunt(Randolph)POY
Harrison George(HSC)
Josh Pittman (GC)
Chris Astorga(VWC)
DJ Woodmore(VWC)
Khobi Williamson (HSC)

Second Team
Kwasi Amponsah (roanoke)
Manny Hernandez (LC)
Andrew Thorne(EMU)
RJ Sims (EMU)
Chris Teasley (VWC)
Austin Chilemi (LC)

And since Colton Hunt won Scholar athlete of the year last year i would assume the same this year!

I like Colton Hunt as player of the year too without him Randolph is maybe a .500 team but thats pretty doubtful

[algernon]

I like Colton Hunt as player of the year too without him Randolph is maybe a .500 team but thats pretty doubtful

Maybe that's true. 

How do you think Randolph would be doing this year if they were without Hunt, but had Harrison George as their star player instead?  What would be their record if they traded Hunt for George?

[tigerfanalso]

we are not making that trade !!!!

[algernon]

I think that Randolph would be smart to trade Colton Hunt for Harrison George.  If they traded for him, I suppose that Harrison would have to take as many shots as Colton does ... and then Harrison would be the player scoring 26 points/game.

I don't think there is any Tiger fan who would make that trade.

[Seatfiller]

I like Colton Hunt as player of the year too without him Randolph is maybe a .500 team but thats pretty doubtful

Maybe that's true. 

How do you think Randolph would be doing this year if they were without Hunt, but had Harrison George as their star player instead?  What would be their record if they traded Hunt for George?

Honestly I don't think their record would be any better with George, Hunt does everything for Randolph and guards the other teams best guard,the only category hes not in is blocks

1st in ppg 25.8 (while being their only legit scorer that you have to worry about)
6th in rpg
9th in field goal pct
6th in apg
1st in FT pct
1st in spg
8th in 3pts made
7th in assist to turnover ratio
1st in minutes played

[marlinpg10]

Plain and simple harrison george will not win POY.. ODAC coaches do not like him because of things he does on the court. They played VWC 3 times last year and he didnt shake hands with them one time. Not saying this is right by the coaches but this is what will happen. Lets rewind back to about 5 years ago when va wesleyan dealt with this same scenario. Coaches in the ODAC did not like ton ton balenga because of his on the court antics thus never voting him for first team all-odac. Was he deserving of first team absolutely 2 out of his 4 years but odac coaches will not reward players who display certain antics on the court. And as far as george on randolph. He would have left the team by now.. don't see clay nunley dealing with his antics and think that they would have went there seperate ways. Think colton hunt is definitely a lock for POY

[marlinpg10]

Lets look at it this way... IF you take Astorga off the marlins, George off the tigers and Hunt off the wildcats how do these teams fair. I used these 3 because i think they are at the top of the list for POY. The marlins would still be near the top of the ODAC without Astorga and so would the tigers without George, Not saying they would be having the same season but it would still be a successful one. Without Hunt i think randolph goes from 3rd in the ODAC to somewhere around 7-9th. He has just had a great year this year and think that he is a lock for POY and will most likely be on one of the All-American Teams.

[algernon]

Some good points, marlin faithful ...

However, whatever you are referring to when you speak of George's antics haven't kept the coaches from giving him his due so far.  They voted him the Freshman of the Year his freshman year and First-Team All ODAC in his sophomore and junior years.

I don't agree that Ton Ton deserved to be First Team in any of his four years.

It's pure speculation that Harrison George would have left Randolph by now.  I sure am glad that he hasn't left Hampden-Sydney for a DI institution.

Whether or not a team would continue to do well if it was without it's star is not the normal criteria for a POY selection.  How would we know how the team would do without its star before he was gone?  It would be really quite speculative.  I suppose we could look at how the team does when the player is on the floor and how it does when he is off.  There's no doubt that the Tigers are a much better team when Harrison George is on the court, and I've cited some numbers about that over the past couple of weeks.

I remember that T.J. Grimes won the POY in 2000, and then the Tigers lost T.J. and their other 3 top players to graduation, and the Tigers came back to win the ODAC Championship again in 2001.  Similarly, Jared Mills won the POY in 2003 and graduated, but the Yellow Jackets had a tremendous year again the next year.  The criteria of whether or not a team would continue to do well without it's top player ... It's only speculation about how dependent that team is upon the player.  There's no doubt that Randolph is pretty dependent upon Hunt! 

On the other hand, was Colton Hunt the ODAC player who performed the best ... the Player of the Year?  I don't think his performance this year was as impressive as Harrison George's.

[FISHTANKFAN]

My thoughts on Wednesdays' big game.  If ALL the Marlins step up and play the way they are capable of playing, they will beat HSC.  Not a doubt in my mind.  They won't win if ONLY Astorga comes to play. DJ, Teasley, Ford, Batson, Heard, Nady, Owens and everyone else have to step up too.  Macedo will show them how to beat the Tigers, whether they execute is up to them.  I've never bet against the Marlins and Macedo, and I refuse to count them out now.  Hopefully they will get to play HSC twice, once on Wednesday and once in the ODAC tournament.  It will be an incredible game, and IF the Marlins win, it will be because they made fewer mistakes, played with discipline and wanted it more.  This year has been a frustrating one for the Marlins but they can put all their critics to rest with a win.  HSC MAY have a better team, but IF the Marlins win they won't consider it an upset, just that they played better Wednesday night.  GO MARLINS!!

[algernon]

The following stats are not so connected to how many minutes a game a coach needs to put a player on the court. 

Coach Nunley's best chance at victory is apparently to use Colton Hunt 34.6 minutes a game, whereas Coach Vick's best chance at victory involves putting no one on the floor for more than the 23.2 minutes/game that Harrison George plays.  Nunley actually has 4 players who get more playing time than Harrison George, who gets more playing time than any other Tiger.

Points per 40 minutes:  Hunt = 29.8      George = 27.8
Field Goals/ 40 min:      George = 11.9       Hunt = 9.8
Rebounds per 40 min:   George = 10.7  Hunt = 8.3
FG%:                           George = 62.0%  Hunt = 51.2%
Assists / 40 minutes:    Hunt = 3.6       George = 3.4
FT%                              Hunt = 85.4%    George = 58.2%
Steals per 40 minutes:  Hunt = 3.4       George = 3.2
3Pts per 40 minutes:     Hunt = 2.3       George = NA
Assist/TO:                      Hunt = 1.3       George = 1.2
Blocks per 40 minutes:  George = 1.5       Hunt = NA