MBB: NESCAC

[pick and roll]

Getting a little too personal on this board.  Sports is supposed to be fun - especially DIII sports.  Let's not try to make something out of nothing - I think we were comparing playing styles.

[nescac1]

Pretty solid list, Walzy.  Panthernation and Middhoops, HUH?   I have NO IDEA where you get the racist thing.  Honestly, where is that coming from?  All Walzy did is compare (like I did) players based on style of play.  How is that in any way racist?  I really don't get it.  As for JJ Barea, I seriously doubt Walzy knows anything about his time at Northeastern.  His reputation as a thug is certainly news to me, at least.   Rather, like Kizel, he is a guy who is extremely crafty at creating off the dribble and getting into the lane and finishing, plus can also hit the occasional three.  I think it's a pretty fair comparison, in terms of style of play.  Your reactions are really cryptic.

I really don't see Rose / Toomey.  Rose is a guy who is all about his otherworldly athleticism.  Toomey relies less on athletic ability than on superior shooting touch, great moves, ball-handling and creativity.  After thinking on it, I'd go with Mark Price as a much better comparison (for you young guys who never saw him play, you can find clips on YouTube).  Fredette is not a bad comparison either, but he's closer to purely a shooter and Toomey is a driver/shooter in equal measure. 

Another I'd add to the list: John Botti and early Detroit Pistons-era Dennis Rodman (back when Rodman wasn't so uni-dimensional as a player).  Walzy also used Payton for two guys ... I'll go with Iguodala instead for Harper.  Williamson and Vince Carter is dead-on, as is Sha Brown and Iverson. 

[Old Guy]

Here is a list to get folks started, going back to the mid-90's:

Mike Mayer -- Kevin McHale (per sonofhixon)
Mike Nogelo -- Larry Bird (easy)
Jamal Wilson -- Kobe Bryant
Andrew Olson -- Steve Nash (another easy one)
Willy Workman -- Lamar Odam (per JeffCast)
Andrew Locke -- Dikembe Mutombo
Mike Crotty -- John Stockton
Troy Whittington -- Dwight Howard

Having more trouble for recent stars like Toomey, Coffin, Sharry, Rudin, Rhoten, Wang, Schultz, Kizell ...

In the spirit of the exercise:

Kizel - Scott Skiles
Sharry - Dirk Nowitski

Off the top of my head: Rhoten - Bill Bradley; Schultze - Ray Allen; Toomey - Tony Parker, Isiah Thomas; Coffin - (a finesse big guy: some combination of Olajuwon, David Robinson, Cowans, Garnett); Wang - Nash;

I'll work on Rudin: big points, big assists, strong physically, great breaking the press, hard to the hoop, great in the lane, the classic "Oh no! Nice shot!" offensive weapon. Maybe Mateen Cleaves (MSU, nat'l champs 2000)? Great college player, not so much in the pros.

[survive and advance]

Long time reader, first time poster. The NESCAC/NBA player comparisons caught my attention and drew me in, and I wanted to throw some names out there. Some of nescac1 and walzy's comparisons I like, for others, I think there are more accurate playing style comparisons.
Hypothetical "poor man" NBA player comparison discussions is one of my favorite activities (I should put that on my match.com profile), so I enjoyed brainstorming on some of these guys. Here's my list, with some carry over and some differences of opinion, and a few additions.

Toomey- Steph Curry
Sharry- Tim Duncan
Rudin- Nick van Exel
Wang- Isiah Thomas
Schultz- Reggie Miller
Kizel- Mark Price

And a few others ..

Jon Pierce- Carmelo Anthony
Charles Stone- Charles Barkley
Drew Weitzen- Oliver Miller/Glen Davis (but way more Glen Davis)
Drew Cohen- Pervis Ellison (c. 1989 Louisville)
Demetrius Porter- Josh Smith
Chris Geohegan- Marc Gasol
Fletcher Walters- Dirk Nowitzki
Zak Ray- Kemba Walker
Rob Stockwell- Brandon Bass
Connor Meehan- Manu Ginobili
Chris Rose- Danilo Galinari
Aaron Smith- Al Jefferson
Andrew Harris- JJ Redick
Tim Edwards- Bruce Bowen
Chris Shalvoy- Jose Calderon
Adam Choice- Kevin Durant
Mike Russell- Nate Thurmond

[nescac1]

Wow, impressive, survive and advance ... although I'm not sure how many ladies are going to be excited by your hoops analogizing expertise, alas (Mrs. Nescac1 remains a bit perplexed by my hoops obsession, certainly). 

Tony Parker is another good one for Toomey, I could see either him or Price, and Curry also works.  Price -- Kizell is also a fair comparison.  Mateen Cleaves and Rudin, another good comparison.

Folks are all over the map on Sharry: Duncan, Nowitzki, Love are all pretty different guys.  Of those three, I think that Love is the closest.  Duncan, that i really don't see.  I do like the (Joe) Geoghegan -- Marc Gasol comp. 

One more Eph comparison: Adrian Dantley is the best I could come up with for Taylor Epley.  Two guys with unusual skill sets, both a bit undersized for their position. 

[Bucket]

I'm showing my age and ACC bias:

Ben Rudin: Randolph Childress
Joey Kizel: John Crotty (a fellow New Jerseyite!)
Jake Wolfin: Bobby Hurley (also a fellow Jerseyite!)
Aaron Toomy: Kenny Anderson
Ryan Sharry: Joe Smith
Aaron Smith: Horace/Harvey Grant
Troy Whittington: Vince Carter


Love Sha Brown as Iverson, but if I've sticking with my ACC theme: Stephon Marbury

[Old Guy]

Long time reader, first time poster. The NESCAC/NBA player comparisons caught my attention and drew me in, and I wanted to throw some names out there. Some of nescac1 and walzy's comparisons I like, for others, I think there are more accurate playing style comparisons.
Hypothetical "poor man" NBA player comparison discussions is one of my favorite activities (I should put that on my match.com profile), so I enjoyed brainstorming on some of these guys. Here's my list, with some carry over and some differences of opinion, and a few additions.

Toomey- Steph Curry
Sharry- Tim Duncan
Rudin- Nick van Exel
Wang- Isiah Thomas
Schultz- Reggie Miller
Kizel- Mark Price

And a few others ..

Jon Pierce- Carmelo Anthony
Charles Stone- Charles Barkley
Drew Weitzen- Oliver Miller/Glen Davis (but way more Glen Davis)
Drew Cohen- Pervis Ellison (c. 1989 Louisville)
Demetrius Porter- Josh Smith
Chris Geohegan- Marc Gasol
Fletcher Walters- Dirk Nowitzki
Zak Ray- Kemba Walker
Rob Stockwell- Brandon Bass
Connor Meehan- Manu Ginobili
Chris Rose- Danilo Galinari
Aaron Smith- Al Jefferson
Andrew Harris- JJ Redick
Tim Edwards- Bruce Bowen
Chris Shalvoy- Jose Calderon
Adam Choice- Kevin Durant
Mike Russell- Nate Thurmond
Survive and advance

Outstanding, top to bottom! As the Car Talk guys would say, historic and folkloric. Bringing in all of NESCAC. Wonderful post. Hope you will make more contributions. Clearly someone whose interest in NESCAC is league-wide, not parochial. Knows his hoops. Thanks!

[Panthernation]

Pretty solid list, Walzy.  Panthernation and Middhoops, HUH?   I have NO IDEA where you get the racist thing.  Honestly, where is that coming from?  All Walzy did is compare (like I did) players based on style of play.  How is that in any way racist?  I really don't get it.  As for JJ Barea, I seriously doubt Walzy knows anything about his time at Northeastern.  His reputation as a thug is certainly news to me, at least.   Rather, like Kizel, he is a guy who is extremely crafty at creating off the dribble and getting into the lane and finishing, plus can also hit the occasional three.  I think it's a pretty fair comparison, in terms of style of play.  Your reactions are really cryptic.

I think the "borderline racist" comment is pretty straightforward. There's very little that Jeremy Lin and James Wang share in common besides a position, the first letter of their first name and their ethnicity. When Wang played at Middlebury last year during the height of Linsanity, people kept calling him the NESCAC version of Jeremy Lin, which I thought then and now is a racial comparison more than anything else. When you qualify your Wang as Lin comparison as "easy" I think it further confirms that the way the players look rather than play is dictating this pick.

Before Wang got hurt here were his career shooting splits as the best guard, and maybe the best player, in the NESCAC: 51.5% FG, 47.1% 3PT.

In his first three years in the NBA, Jeremy Lin is a career 43.9% shooter who makes 32% of his three-point attempts. An appropriate James Wang comparison is Chris Paul. Wang was the best guard two years running in the NESCAC and it wasn't particularly close. To compare him to a player who A) is an above-average player at his position at best and B) bears very little statistical or stylistic resemblance to James Wang is wrong. Calling James Wang the Jeremy Lin of the NESCAC is akin to calling him the JJ Barea of the NESCAC (when Lin was an FA Barea was the player he was most consistently compared to).

Barea statistically and visually is a very similar player to Lin. Barea's career numbers are 42.5% FG and 35.7% 3PT.

Yet I think we'd all find it egregious if we compared Wang to Barea. It is far worse, however, when the Wang-Lin comparison is described as "easy" at which point it becomes a borderline racist comment.

[nescac1]

I think that Jeremy Lin is actually closer in style to Wang than Chris Paul is, although Wang is kind of a hybrid (at the NESCAC level) of Paul's shooting efficiency plus the rest of Lin's game.  Jeremy Lin is a penetrating, score-first point guard who is known for fearless, athletic drives into the paint plus the ability to use his strength and athletic ability to finish with panache on the interior over bigger guys.  Wang, while also a very good three point shooter, was still primarily a guy who employed a similar style ... a penetrating, shoot-first point guard known for aggressive drives ending with acrobatic finishes in the lane.  Paul is much more of a pure point guard / distributor than either of those players.  Lin and Wang also have some of the same weaknesses, in particular, a propensity to try to do a bit too much at times, leading to turnovers.  I think the commonality between their games goes well beyond race ... and let's face it, most players who are compared to Larry Bird are white, most who are compared to Lebron James or Michael Jordan are black, but that doesn't make those comparisons "racist."

I imagine Walzy feels a bit like the ref at 3:05 of this clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-n3p6KSVcN8

[ron doney]

Midd may be the best whole-greater-than-sum-of-parts team I've ever seen. Not that lots of the parts aren't superb, but what's better about basketball than seeing how a genius "team" can maximize its talents? Those guys will never forget the feeling of what it was like to play together.

Indeed, what a ride it has been for the Midd seniors.

To date: A composite 104-13 record (that's not a typo), four consecutive trips to the dance, a conference championship, two Elite Eight trips in three years, a Final Four berth. And the season is still alive.

There's not another current DIII player in the country who can say the same.

Remarkable.

You are right, no one else with that exact record.  I'd rather be a senior at the University of St Thomas though.  104 wins as well.  A national title. And conference titles.

And if you go back a fifth year.....the best record in D3. 

Oh and hot Norwegian/Scandanavian blonde coeds (that's not a typo).

[Panthernation]

I think that Jeremy Lin is actually closer in style to Wang than Chris Paul is, although Wang is kind of a hybrid (at the NESCAC level) of Paul's shooting efficiency plus the rest of Lin's game.  Jeremy Lin is a penetrating, score-first point guard who is known for fearless, athletic drives into the paint plus the ability to use his strength and athletic ability to finish with panache on the interior over bigger guys.  Wang, while also a very good three point shooter, was still primarily a guy who employed a similar style ... a penetrating, shoot-first point guard known for aggressive drives ending with acrobatic finishes in the lane.  Paul is much more of a pure point guard / distributor than either of those players.  Lin and Wang also have some of the same weaknesses, in particular, a propensity to try to do a bit too much at times, leading to turnovers.  I think the commonality between their games goes well beyond race ... and let's face it, most players who are compared to Larry Bird are white, most who are compared to Lebron James or Michael Jordan are black, but that doesn't make those comparisons "racist."

Every point you made about Jeremy Lin applies equally to JJ Barea. And I think it's funny that you completely discount Wang's three-point shooting ability in order to make the comparison work. Isaiah Thomas is also a fearless scorer who's a shoot-first point guard who has a propensity to do too much. There are lots of those kinds of players. Walzy could have chosen from any number of different guys who have those traits (even ones who can shoot threes) and yet not only did he pick Lin it was an obvious selection in his mind.

If you're not swayed by the stats and the logic, then maybe this piece written by Grantland's Jay Kaspian Kang in December of last year will illuminate how often dynamic Asian basketball players are compared to Jeremy Lin (and only Jeremy Lin), which gets back to the point that I made earlier. Since the beginning of Linsanity, all I've heard is how Wang reminds people of Lin. The differences in their games, in my mind, are enormous. But again, if that doesn't sway you, here's a telling excerpt from Kang's piece (as well as the link to the full article).

This piece details how the perception of Chris Tang, a talented prep school player from China, changed after the emergence of Jeremy Lin. I think you'll find the parallels interesting:

"Then, on February 4, 2012, Linsanity began at Madison Square Garden. Chris Tang's life began to get weird.

On January 14, 2011, Chris Tang scored 41 points in a loss against Highland of Warrenton, Virginia. Ten days later, he went 18-for-21 from the field and scored 42 against Bishop Sullivan Catholic of Virginia Beach. If you read the newspaper reports and watch the local sportscast footage after those games, there's no mention of Jeremy Lin. But if you skip just two weeks forward in time, past the start of Linsanity, you'll never see Chris Tang's name again without its conjoined twin. Interestingly enough, even Tang can't quite keep the events straight in his own head. He told me that people started calling him Jeremy Lin right after his 41- and 42-point games. In late January, Chris Tang, scoring dynamo and prep superstar, most likely did not remind anyone of a reserve buried deep on the Knicks' bench who hadn't had a relevant moment in two NBA seasons. But after February 4, those two late-January games and the entire phenomenon of a 6-foot-3 Asian point guard who scored a ton of points was absorbed into a new, monolithic context...

Chris doesn't have much of an opinion on Linsanity. He told me he likes Jeremy Lin, but mostly because Lin plays for the Rockets. And although Tang understands why someone would compare him to another Asian basketball player, the asymmetry — basketball-wise — bugs him. "I wish they would call me Dwyane Wade," Tang said, cracking a smile. "I want to play like Wade. An athletic guard who gets to the rim...

But an athlete's public profile is mostly reverse-engineered and pieced together with scraps of what's already familiar. Chris Tang was dominating Virginia Beach high school basketball before Jeremy Lin scored 25 against the Nets, but all his accomplishments and the actual narrative of his journey through the United States will now be filtered through Linsanity. Internet time at Oak Hill is strictly monitored and cell phones are not allowed, but Tang has already found some of the Chinese articles that refer to him as the next Great Asian Hope. There have been news stories in China of all types, some which even reprimand him for heading off to America instead of playing for a Chinese club team, but even the Chinese press won't mention Chris Tang without evoking Jeremy Lin.

The reason for the endless comparisons is patently simple and unavoidable: Without Linsanity, Chris Tang, 16-year-old combo guard for the Oak Hill Academy Warriors and one of the top prospects in the state of Virginia, is not a story. He's just another international student who came to an American prep school to improve his chances of playing college basketball in the United States."

(Link to the full article: http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/8740666/oak-hill-academy-chris-tang-pressures-being-great-asian-hope)

While certain parts of Chris Tang's experience are exaggerated comparatively due to his visibility as a top high-school-basketball prospect, the situation is eerily familiar. Chris Tang is described as a "combo guard" "reckless" and who "could take the ball hard to the rim." All of those things describe James Wang, and yes, Jeremy Lin. But it also describes a host of other players and yet Wang and other Asian players are consistently compared to Jeremy Lin with ease, when other players are not. Do you not see the problem?

[Panthernation]

Midd may be the best whole-greater-than-sum-of-parts team I’ve ever seen. Not that lots of the parts aren’t superb, but what’s better about basketball than seeing how a genius “team” can maximize its talents? Those guys will never forget the feeling of what it was like to play together.

Indeed, what a ride it has been for the Midd seniors.

To date: A composite 104-13 record (that's not a typo), four consecutive trips to the dance, a conference championship, two Elite Eight trips in three years, a Final Four berth. And the season is still alive.

There's not another current DIII player in the country who can say the same.

Remarkable.

You are right, no one else with that exact record.  I'd rather be a senior at the University of St Thomas though.  104 wins as well.  A national title. And conference titles.

And if you go back a fifth year.....the best record in D3. 

Oh and hot Norwegian/Scandanavian blonde coeds (that's not a typo).

Cabrini quietly has put together an incredible run in the postseason the last three years. Their finishes go Sweet 16, National Championship Game, Elite Eight (and still alive).

[survive and advance]

Thanks for compliment, Old Guy and nescac1. I picked my comparisons for the top 7 on each of the 3 'CAC teams headed to Salem.

Williams
Nate Robertson- Shaun Livingston/George Gervin
James Klemm- Kyle Korver
Daniel Wohl- Gordon Hayward
Taylor Epley- Paul Pierce/Jeff Green
Michael Mayer- Kevin McHale
John Weinheimer- Tayshaun Prince
Sean Hoffman- Josh McRoberts/Vince Carter (he gets a VC drop, because, as the kids say, Sean has "stupid hops")

Middlebury
Jake Wolfin- Ricky Rubio/Jamal/Jordan Crawford
Joey Kizel- Mark Price
Nolan Thompson- Thabo Sefolosha/Gary Payton
Peter Lynch- Zach Randolph
Jack Roberts- Luke Longley
James Jenson- John Henson
Hunter Merryman- Ryan Anderson

Amherst
Aaron Toomie- Steph Curry
Tom Killian- Jared Dudley
Allen Williamson- Vince Carter
Willy Workman- Michael Kidd-Gilchrist/Lamar Odom (Odom during a good year)
Peter Kaasila- Kendrick Perkins/Shaquille O'Neal (like, sort of on the Shaq half)
Connor Green- J.R. Smith (get your ink game right, Connor!)
David Kalema-Nate Robinson

It is sure to be an exciting weekend in Salem. I'm Hoping that after the weekend in Salem, the games result in a NESCAC school in the title game in Atlanta, or, even better, 2 'CAC teams. But, as any coach would tell you, every team has work to do in Salem before they can even begin to think about ATL. But, as a fan, I can daydream without guilt of the prospects of 2 NESCAC teams competing for the National Championship on a national stage during arguably the biggest American "basketball weekend" of the year. And that would be really cool. May the best team win. 3 more...

[madzillagd]

Sharry = Schremp

[Vandy74]

Midd may be the best whole-greater-than-sum-of-parts team I've ever seen. Not that lots of the parts aren't superb, but what's better about basketball than seeing how a genius "team" can maximize its talents? Those guys will never forget the feeling of what it was like to play together.

AncientSonOfHixon,
Well put.  The Panthers are a team of no egos, just a fierce desire to win and a complete confidence in finding a way to do it.  The Ithaca game was just the most recent example of that.  Wolfin's shooting eye has been frustratingly inconsistent at times this season, but when Ithaca opted to leave him uncovered he didn't hesitate to remind them why he is a 1000+ point scorer.  He and Thompson were red hot from trey land so Kizel concentrated on the other parts of his game, saving the best for last as usual.  Lynch couldn't make most of his shots fall that day but he still went 4-4 from the charity stripe and dished out 5 assists even though he only averages 1.2 a game otherwise.  And let's not forget the first man off the bench who averages 21 game minutes and does whatever is needed, James Jensen.  He's a good enough perimeter defender to take over Thompson's assignment for most of a half against Curry.  He supplements the inside scoring attack as needed.  His stats rarely jump off the page at you but if you saw the game you always remember some of them being exactly what had to be done at the time.   Perhaps most important, it's obvious that he has put in a great deal of practice time on his free throw shooting.  He shot 51% last season.   This season it's 73%.   He has been 13-15 in the last 3 games.  Against Cortland he went 7-7 included in his 13 points along with a team high 11 rebounds.  Against Ithaca, 3-6 from the floor, 3-4 from the line including a clutch 2-2 following a huge rebound in the closing minutes of the game.  You don't have the sum of the parts without him.


The seniors will be missed.  How often does a freshman class include two starters like Thompson and Wolfin?  There is no replacement for Peter Lynch on next year's roster.  We may not see a player quite like him for a while.  The 2013-14 Panthers will be a very good team by season's end but they will have a different look from what we've become accustomed to.   

But back to unfinished business.  3 NESCAC teams in the Final Four certainly has an appealing ring to it.  Is this message board up to handling the volume of activity that would create?  How about a 4OT Middlebury-Amherst rematch just to show those folks in Salem how the game is really played.