MBB: Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association

[sac]

Defiance 70  Alma 68

Scots drop a tough one to what I think will end up being a pretty good Defiance team (win total in the high teens maybe).  Made even tougher because they led the game for 28 minutes and by 11 points as late as 15 minutes to play.  Another where the MIAA team gets heavily out-shot from the FT line, DC could have won this one a little easier by shooting better than 58% from the stripe.

Krause 22, Law 14

[oldknight]

Prince Fielder traded for Ian Kinsler?! Wow! Double wow! The Motor City Bengals guy didn't give me a headsup on that one.

[goodknight]

Prince Fielder traded for Ian Kinsler?! Wow! Double wow! The Motor City Bengals guy didn't give me a headsup on that one.

I'd imagine that a few wheelbarrows full of cash will go from DET to TX to help the Rangers absorb the crushing weight of Fielder's princely salary.

[oldknight]

Prince Fielder traded for Ian Kinsler?! Wow! Double wow! The Motor City Bengals guy didn't give me a headsup on that one.

I'd imagine that a few wheelbarrows full of cash will go from DET to TX to help the Rangers absorb the crushing weight of Fielder's princely salary.

How many wheelbarrows are required to carry $30 million?

[KnightSlappy]

Prince Fielder traded for Ian Kinsler?! Wow! Double wow! The Motor City Bengals guy didn't give me a headsup on that one.

Wasn't written by me, but on the site from the 4th of this month: http://motorcitybengals.com/2013/11/04/detroit-tigers-trade-partner-texas-rangers/

What's the line on the COF vs Grace game this weekend?

Grace won by 10 when they played two weeks ago (at Grace). This will be CoF's third (?) weekend in a row in Michigan.

[ziggy]

Please forgive me for going off topic but based on win probabilities obtained from Massey, there is a 67.9% chance Calvin and Hope will be playing for a national championship in volleyball on Saturday. Just thought I would throw that out there with quarterfinal play beginning today.

[knightvision]

I just noticed our friends from Finlandia open their season at Grinnell on Nov. 15.

What may be even more interesting is when our friends from the College of Faith travel to Grinnell in early January.

Saturday morning, ESPN radio announced the score to the Finlandia/Grinnell game with a lead that went something close to, "Remember when that guy from Grinnell scored 11-billion points in a game last year..."  I immediately thought it was the CoF game and they tried their "have 1 guy score all the points routine" again.  Thankfully, it was Finlandia and he ONLY scored 70 points. 

Grinnell will try it again when they play CoF, won't they?  It just makes me shake my head...

Talk about shaking your head--this article should cure anyone from giving these clowns the time of day:    http://t.co/YsCfSvuEc6   
     

[knightvision]

Hard to find many negatives in the box score for Calvin. Turnovers were a bit high, but I still really like the Jordan Daley-as-starting-PG thing.

Two-thirds of Calvin's shot attempts were classified as layups in the box score play-by-play data. They'll be tough to beat if teams let them shoot from up close.

Nitpicking here, but Tyler Kruis needs to cut it out with the mid range jump shots. I don't mind an occasional three ball from him, but the two-point jumpers aren't going to be a net positive for the offense.

I'm a bit surprised by that thought KS.  Tyler's got a pretty nice stroke (he's shot 53% and 51% the last two years, inclusive of his mid range shots-- and his being 4-17 from 3  ), he's forcing an opposing big to guard him out in space, and he's also opening things up a bit for the other bigs to have some room to operate/offensive rebound inside.  I don't suspect anyone wants him to fall in love with spending too much time on the perimeter (anyone else recalling KVS imploring Mr. Mantel to go post up?), but anytime a big can play in and out effectively it's most often a net positive.  I suspect that I should be preparing myself for statistical proof of your position  , but with Calvin's obvious strength in the front court, anything the Knights can do to keep teams from packing it in against them will serve them well. 

[KnightSlappy]

Hard to find many negatives in the box score for Calvin. Turnovers were a bit high, but I still really like the Jordan Daley-as-starting-PG thing.

Two-thirds of Calvin's shot attempts were classified as layups in the box score play-by-play data. They'll be tough to beat if teams let them shoot from up close.

Nitpicking here, but Tyler Kruis needs to cut it out with the mid range jump shots. I don't mind an occasional three ball from him, but the two-point jumpers aren't going to be a net positive for the offense.

I'm a bit surprised by that thought KS.  Tyler's got a pretty nice stroke (he's shot 53% and 51% the last two years, inclusive of his mid range shots-- and his being 4-17 from 3  ), he's forcing an opposing big to guard him out in space, and he's also opening things up a bit for the other bigs to have some room to operate/offensive rebound inside.  I don't suspect anyone wants him to fall in love with spending too much time on the perimeter (anyone else recalling KVS imploring Mr. Mantel to go post up?), but anytime a big can play in and out effectively it's most often a net positive.  I suspect that I should be preparing myself for statistical proof of your position  , but with Calvin's obvious strength in the front court, anything the Knights can do to keep teams from packing it in against them will serve them well.

Mostly it's my feeling that the mid range game should only very, very rarely be used in the flow of you "normal" offense. I singled out Kruis because he was the only one, other than Jordan Brink, to take more than one two-point jump shot (and Jordan made two of three).

I've failed to compile the complete data set from last year, but through the first 21 games of the season, Kruis shot just 41% on shots classified as "jumpers" in the box score (that is excluding 'layups' and three pointers). His three pointers weren't very good either, and probably worse, but we're talking 83 total attempts vs. 14 (or 4 two-point jump shots vs. less than one three-point attempt per game). Only Tom Snikkers shot more two-point jump shots in the sample.

In the 21 game sample, Kruis effectively shot 62% on layups (excellent!), 41% on two-point 'jumpers (poor!), and 32% on three pointers (poor!). It's too simplistic to say "only shoot layups," because duh, that's what they're trying to do, but if Kruis (et al) aren't scoring down low, then they should be looking to get three point attempts for others.

Team total effective field goal percentages in the 21 game sample were: .568 on layups (671 FGA), .406 on 2-pt jumpers (443 FGA), .554 on 3-pt jumpers (409 FGA). Which one of these is not like the other!

The only Calvin player to shoot better than 50% in the sample on two-point 'jumpers' was Tyler Dykstra (.541!). I'll go back in the coming days and hopefully gather the data from the rest of the season.

[knightvision]

Hard to find many negatives in the box score for Calvin. Turnovers were a bit high, but I still really like the Jordan Daley-as-starting-PG thing.

Two-thirds of Calvin's shot attempts were classified as layups in the box score play-by-play data. They'll be tough to beat if teams let them shoot from up close.

Nitpicking here, but Tyler Kruis needs to cut it out with the mid range jump shots. I don't mind an occasional three ball from him, but the two-point jumpers aren't going to be a net positive for the offense.

I'm a bit surprised by that thought KS.  Tyler's got a pretty nice stroke (he's shot 53% and 51% the last two years, inclusive of his mid range shots-- and his being 4-17 from 3  ), he's forcing an opposing big to guard him out in space, and he's also opening things up a bit for the other bigs to have some room to operate/offensive rebound inside.  I don't suspect anyone wants him to fall in love with spending too much time on the perimeter (anyone else recalling KVS imploring Mr. Mantel to go post up?), but anytime a big can play in and out effectively it's most often a net positive.  I suspect that I should be preparing myself for statistical proof of your position  , but with Calvin's obvious strength in the front court, anything the Knights can do to keep teams from packing it in against them will serve them well.

Mostly it's my feeling that the mid range game should only very, very rarely be used in the flow of you "normal" offense. I singled out Kruis because he was the only one, other than Jordan Brink, to take more than one two-point jump shot (and Jordan made two of three).

I've failed to compile the complete data set from last year, but through the first 21 games of the season, Kruis shot just 41% on shots classified as "jumpers" in the box score (that is excluding 'layups' and three pointers). His three pointers weren't very good either, and probably worse, but we're talking 83 total attempts vs. 14 (or 4 two-point jump shots vs. less than one three-point attempt per game). Only Tom Snikkers shot more two-point jump shots in the sample.

In the 21 game sample, Kruis effectively shot 62% on layups (excellent!), 41% on two-point 'jumpers (poor!), and 32% on three pointers (poor!). It's too simplistic to say "only shoot layups," because duh, that's what they're trying to do, but if Kruis (et al) aren't scoring down low, then they should be looking to get three point attempts for others.

Team total effective field goal percentages in the 21 game sample were: .568 on layups (671 FGA), .406 on 2-pt jumpers (443 FGA), .554 on 3-pt jumpers (409 FGA). Which one of these is not like the other!

The only Calvin player to shoot better than 50% in the sample on two-point 'jumpers' was Tyler Dykstra (.541!). I'll go back in the coming days and hopefully gather the data from the rest of the season.

Well, you didn't disappoint! 

I'd probably put myself somewhere in the middle when it comes to reliance on statistical analysis for decisions about who to play, how to play, who should shoot (and where a team should be shooting from ).  Your stats clearly underscore the reason why teams do shoot lots of 3's, but there are some things that statistics can't capture.  And just maybe I am one of those old school guys who lament what seems to be the lost art of the aforementioned mid range jump shot! 

[KnightSlappy]

I'd probably put myself somewhere in the middle when it comes to reliance on statistical analysis for decisions about who to play, how to play, who should shoot (and where a team should be shooting from ).  Your stats clearly underscore the reason why teams do shoot lots of 3's, but there are some things that statistics can't capture.  And just maybe I am one of those old school guys who lament what seems to be the lost art of the aforementioned mid range jump shot!

There's almost certainly a game theory aspect that I haven't addressed. You at least want your opponent to think you're reasonably likely to both (1) shoot and (2) make a long two-pointer in order to "stretch the defense", but I think teams should be keeping these shots to a minimum (and hopefully using the three-point shot to stretch the defense instead).

As ziggy pointed out to me offline, Kruis was actually better than the team average on mid range shots -- so he's good at them in a sense -- but really no one (or very few) is good enough at them to make them high percentage shots. Caveat: perhaps the most open of open looks, but even then I'm not sure. If a player is even marginally contested out there, the defense has probably already been sufficiently "stretched".

[oldknight]

I'd probably put myself somewhere in the middle when it comes to reliance on statistical analysis for decisions about who to play, how to play, who should shoot (and where a team should be shooting from ).  Your stats clearly underscore the reason why teams do shoot lots of 3's, but there are some things that statistics can't capture.  And just maybe I am one of those old school guys who lament what seems to be the lost art of the aforementioned mid range jump shot!

There's almost certainly a game theory aspect that I haven't addressed. You at least want your opponent to think you're reasonably likely to both (1) shoot and (2) make a long two-pointer in order to "stretch the defense", but I think teams should be keeping these shots to a minimum (and hopefully using the three-point shot to stretch the defense instead).

As ziggy pointed out to me offline, Kruis was actually better than the team average on mid range shots -- so he's good at them in a sense -- but really no one (or very few) is good enough at them to make them high percentage shots. Caveat: perhaps the most open of open looks, but even then I'm not sure. If a player is even marginally contested out there, the defense has probably already been sufficiently "stretched".

Keeping track of data points, and analyzing them, are an important element in determining how a player should play in order to maximize his value to his team, and in determining what adjustments need to be made. I'm thankful to KS for his contributions in doing that for us. I assume all would concede that there are limitations with data and that the human (subjective) element should also be a part of analysis.

An illustration from baseball might be helpful. No amount of sabermetrics has ever been able to convince me that Mike Trout was a more worthy choice than Miguel Cabrera for MVP in 2012, yet that's what the raw data seems to indicate. Cabrera's impact on his team--and the opposition--was something the objective information didn't seem to adequately address. In 2013 we saw how ordinary Detroit's offense became the last six weeks of the season once opponents saw Cabrera trying to continue to play on just one healthy leg.

The data might suggest that Tyler Kruis should ditch the mid-range jumper but that just doesn't pass the oldknight eye-chart test. Data is dynamic and once defenses sense Kruis won't take that shot, it changes how the game is played. To my eyes, Kruis is reliable enough with the 15 footer, doesn't overuse it, and should continue to take it within the context of Calvin's offense.

[KnightSlappy]

I'd probably put myself somewhere in the middle when it comes to reliance on statistical analysis for decisions about who to play, how to play, who should shoot (and where a team should be shooting from ).  Your stats clearly underscore the reason why teams do shoot lots of 3's, but there are some things that statistics can't capture.  And just maybe I am one of those old school guys who lament what seems to be the lost art of the aforementioned mid range jump shot!

There's almost certainly a game theory aspect that I haven't addressed. You at least want your opponent to think you're reasonably likely to both (1) shoot and (2) make a long two-pointer in order to "stretch the defense", but I think teams should be keeping these shots to a minimum (and hopefully using the three-point shot to stretch the defense instead).

As ziggy pointed out to me offline, Kruis was actually better than the team average on mid range shots -- so he's good at them in a sense -- but really no one (or very few) is good enough at them to make them high percentage shots. Caveat: perhaps the most open of open looks, but even then I'm not sure. If a player is even marginally contested out there, the defense has probably already been sufficiently "stretched".

Keeping track of data points, and analyzing them, are an important element in determining how a player should play in order to maximize his value to his team, and in determining what adjustments need to be made. I'm thankful to KS for his contributions in doing that for us. I assume all would concede that there are limitations with data and that the human (subjective) element should also be a part of analysis.

An illustration from baseball might be helpful. No amount of sabermetrics has ever been able to convince me that Mike Trout was a more worthy choice than Miguel Cabrera for MVP in 2012, yet that's what the raw data seems to indicate. Cabrera's impact on his team--and the opposition--was something the objective information didn't seem to adequately address. In 2013 we saw how ordinary Detroit's offense became the last six weeks of the season once opponents saw Cabrera trying to continue to play on just one healthy leg.

The data might suggest that Tyler Kruis should ditch the mid-range jumper but that just doesn't pass the oldknight eye-chart test. Data is dynamic and once defenses sense Kruis won't take that shot, it changes how the game is played. To my eyes, Kruis is reliable enough with the 15 footer, doesn't overuse it, and should continue to take it within the context of Calvin's offense.

Right, and that's the game theory aspect at work. It would be sub-optimal for Calvin if defenses could ignore him altogether when he's up high*, but, of all the players that took more than 50 field goal attempts last year (I've added up through the MIAA season), Kruis (38%) was second only to DeBoer (54%) in percentage of attempts classified as two-point jump shots (team average was 35%). Obviously this is a very large bucket that stretches from, say, 5 feet to (basically) 20 feet and there's a big difference in the potential range of quality there.

So I guess, given game theory concerns, I wouldn't advocate for him cutting it out altogether, but we could probably stand to cut that percentage down closer to 30%.

*if this statement is true, then it means it would be optimal for Calvin to (somewhat) ignore all but the best shooters of their opposition when they (i.e. the opposition) possess the ball away from the basket

[sac]

Kalamazoo 93  Manchester 87

Kzoo comes back from 17 down midway through the first half, actually led by 10 late in the game.  Mark Ghafari dropped in a cool 42 points to lead the way, including 6-9 from trey.

Ghafari 42, Peters 23

Manchester was picked 8th in the HCAC and drops to 0-4.

[calvin_grad]

Please forgive me for going off topic but based on win probabilities obtained from Massey, there is a 67.9% chance Calvin and Hope will be playing for a national championship in volleyball on Saturday. Just thought I would throw that out there with quarterfinal play beginning today.

Hope loses in 3 sets.  Massey's 67.9% chance isn't happening unfortunately.