2017-2018 Consolidated Hoops Thread

Started by bayonetbrant, October 06, 2017, 11:04:08 AM

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airboy

#60
Unfortunately, Auburn's starting Center (only 6'7") is probably out for the rest of the year.  Their leading scorer and defender is nursing a shoulder injury.

Just one of those things.  Happens to lots of teams.  It is still disappointing.  This team has played up to their potential better than almost any college team that I've followed, including Dean Smith's teams.  I hate it for the kids since they have played with such good intensity and have improved so much.

Unfortunately, injuries are part of the game. 

On the bright side, it was a beautiful day in Auburn and I saw 5 innings of the baseball opening series.  AU lead 16-0 when I left.  One of my students is a current starter.

bayonetbrant

The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

airboy

Auburn is down to 7 scholarship players.  The injured center had surgery for a broken leg and multiple torn ligaments and will be out 6 months.  Best scorer and defender is day-to-day.  They may not win 2 of their last 4 to clinch the regular SEC season.

This is really sad for a group of kids who played together so well and maxed their potential.

OJsDad

Ohio State crashed and burned this last week with road losses at Penn State and Michigan. 
'Here at NASA we all pee the same color.'  Al Harrison from the movie Hidden Figures.

bayonetbrant

http://www.espn.com/espn/feature/story/_/id/22467698/how-kinston-north-carolina-became-greatest-producer-nba-talent-america

QuoteAbout 3 out of every 10,000 high school basketball players go on to play in the NBA. But since the 1972-73 season, 1 out of every 52.7 players to suit up for Kinston High School's varsity squad has reached the league, meaning the odds to do so in Kinston are, since the early 1970s, about 63 times greater than the national average.
The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

bayonetbrant

More reasons to love Mark Titus

https://www.theringer.com/2018/2/16/17019206/college-basketball-power-rankings-michigan-state-texas-tech

(fwiw, Titus played on Ohio St's Final Four teams 10 years ago)
Quote11. Ohio State (22–6)
I have no idea what I did to make Penn State's Tony Carr so angry, but the man is hell-bent on ruining my life and I would greatly appreciate it if he'd show even the slightest bit of mercy. This concludes my thoughts relating to the Ohio State men's basketball team. Thank you for your time.

and

Quote8. Auburn (23–3)
I don't think it's any secret that Auburn has traditionally been bad at basketball. Ask the average college basketball fan to tell you something about the program that doesn't involve Charles Barkley, and chances are they'll just make something up ("Didn't Willis Reed play there?") and hope you don't catch it. With Auburn having won seven of its past eight games and coming to the precipice of winning an SEC regular-season title for the first time this millennium, though, I think it's worth reminding everyone just how bad the Tigers have been.

Auburn is a charter member of the SEC, which is to say it's been in the conference since the league was formed all the way back in 1932. Since then, the Tigers have won exactly two regular-season SEC titles and only one SEC tournament. That's three conference trophies in 84 seasons of basketball! By comparison, Kentucky has won four SEC trophies in the past two seasons alone. So yeah, the numbers confirm that Auburn has, in fact, been a historically lousy program.

I bring this up as a way of emphasizing that what's happening at Auburn this season is in a completely different stratosphere than virtually every other surprising story of the 2017–18 campaign (except maybe the rise of Texas Tech), such as Tony Bennett leading Virginia to a no. 1 ranking in the AP poll or those two weeks in December when America thought Arizona State was great. It completely boggles the mind how Bruce Pearl is doing this. The only other time that Auburn has been anywhere close to this good since the mid-1980s was when Chris Porter led the Tigers to an SEC title and the Sweet 16 in 1998–99. But what Pearl is accomplishing is much more impressive considering that the Porter-era Tigers were cut down by NCAA violations involving a player receiving illicit benefits. Something like that would most certainly never happen under Pearl's watch.

and later...

Quote4. Texas Tech (22–4)

I mean no disrespect to Texas Tech when I say this, but holy hell, is it going to be hilarious if the Red Raiders are the program that snaps Kansas's Big 12 regular-season title streak. Oklahoma's Trae Young seems like a lock to become the fourth national player of the year to come out of a non-Kansas Big 12 program since the streak began in 2004–05, and if projections hold true and Young and Texas's Mo Bamba are taken in the top 10 of the 2018 NBA draft, they'll become the ninth and 10th non-Kansas top-10 picks to come from the Big 12 since the streak started. In other words, there has been a TON of individual talent in the conference in the past 15 years, and all of it has come up short against the Jayhawks. So you'll have to excuse me if I think it's hysterical that Kevin Durant and Blake Griffin couldn't snap the streak, but a program so desolate that it hired Tubby Smith to be its savior five years ago can.

I mean, imagine if someone would have told you after the 2011–12 season — when Billy Gillispie coached the Red Raiders to an 8–23 record — that Kansas's streak would be snapped in 2018. Imagine if that person then asked you to name the program that would end it. Where would Texas Tech have fallen on your list? I'm not even joking when I say that I would have listed Wichita State and Creighton above the Red Raiders on the off chance that either ended up joining the Big 12.

and still...

Quote2. Virginia (24–2)
Ty Jerome is 11-of-39 (28.2 percent) from the 3-point line in Virginia's last 10 games. I used 10 games as the cutoff for my sample because if you add in the game before that — when the Cavaliers defeated Syracuse 68–61 and Jerome went 3-of-10 from deep — it weakens my point since his percentage actually goes up. That's right: A 3-of-10 outing represents an improvement over what Jerome has done lately. Meanwhile, Kyle Guy, who leads the Hoos in scoring at 15.2 points per game, has shot 25-of-78 (32.1 percent) from beyond the 3-point line in his past 10 games. I don't want to tell Tony Bennett how to coach his team, but when you build an offense around three guards who are supposedly great shooters (Devon Hall being the other) and two of those guards suddenly forget how to shoot, what you have is an offense built around one great shooter. And that is not a good offense at all.

Despite Virginia's offensive problems, though, the Hoos entered this week sitting atop the AP poll for the first time in more than 35 years. This has me wondering whether maybe — just maybe — Virginia's strength comes on the other end of the floor. I'll have to study more film to be sure, but the vibe I'm getting is that the Wahoos are so good because they play great team defense. What's that? They're playing historically great defense? Like, Virginia is literally playing a level of defense that rivals anything college basketball has seen in the past decade? Oh.

Well in that case, who cares whether Guy and Jerome aren't hitting from deep? Virginia shouldn't even bother playing offense anyway. What I'm most interested in finding out is how few points the Cavaliers can score and still win a game. With Pitt on the schedule next Saturday, I have a feeling we're about to discover that the answer is somewhere in the neighborhood of 12.

I just love that bit at the end of the Virginia entry...  :)
The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

airboy

Auburn beat Alabama last night with only 7 scholarship players, down two starters, and a third starter had a gimpy ankle.

Heron the #2 scorer was scratched 30 minutes before game time with a stomach bug.  He was hospitalized and on IV fluids.  This left 7 scholarship players against an Alabama team that was much taller and played 10 people.

And Auburn outrebounded them and won by 19.  Auburn just wanted the win a lot more than Alabama did.  They played a lot harder, especially on the boards.  And they really did this with 6 people since Horace Spencer was in serious foul trouble the entire game.  Honestly, Alabama should have easily won this game except they did not play as a team, did not hustle, and did not really fight for rebounds.  I would have been angry if I was a Bama fan and lost the opportunity to sweep Auburn.

Auburn only needs to win one of their last 3 games to clinch the regular season.  This has been one of the most enjoyable seasons of Mens BB that I've followed closely during my lifetime - and that includes a ton of the UNC teams going back to 1980.

Teams cannot exceed their potential, but they almost never play up to their potential.  This year Auburn did - even if they lose the rest of their games because they are so thin.

bayonetbrant

The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

airboy


bayonetbrant

Quote from: airboy on February 23, 2018, 10:49:14 AM
Amazingly, nobody from Auburn.

yet... 



and I'm waiting for Rodney Purvis from NC State to show up on a list somewhere, given the shadiness of his recruitment and his high school record, along with his defection to UConn.
The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

airboy

Quote from: bayonetbrant on February 23, 2018, 11:06:10 AM
Quote from: airboy on February 23, 2018, 10:49:14 AM
Amazingly, nobody from Auburn.

yet... 



and I'm waiting for Rodney Purvis from NC State to show up on a list somewhere, given the shadiness of his recruitment and his high school record, along with his defection to UConn.

^ You are being Debby Downer again.

bayonetbrant

I've been a State fan for too long to really be much else
The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

OJsDad

Browsing through the list, no Ohio State. No wonder they havent been very the last 10 years or so.  ;D
'Here at NASA we all pee the same color.'  Al Harrison from the movie Hidden Figures.

bayonetbrant

The key to surviving this site is to not say something which ends up as someone's tag line - Steelgrave

"their citizens (all of them counted as such) glorified their mythology of 'rights'...and lost track of their duties. No nation, so constituted, can endure." Robert Heinlein, Starship Troopers

airboy

According to ESPN, this is a massive scandal.