West Liberty Hilltopper Basketball

[IUPbigINDIANS]

They also played Virginia State, Bowie State and Lemoyne in 18-19 and went to Lemoyne in 19-20.

And a home and home sweep of Fairmont State (including giving them a beating in Joe Retton).

[Chuck Norris]

Joe of old, yea, it is. But it seems after 2017-18 were he scheduled Findlay, Ferris and Bowie in three of its first four games, losing all three and missing the NCAA tourney, he learned his lesson. Since then he has started the season with Concord, and WV Wesleyan the last two seasons and scheduled other such luminaries as D3 Westminster among their first four games. Chalking up these early season W's the last two years against less than stellar competition, were was IUP seeded come NCAA tourney time??

They also played Virginia State, Bowie State and Lemoyne in 18-19 and went to Lemoyne in 19-20.

[boatcapt]

That's a Joe-type schedule. Certainly different than the Crutch non-con slates.

Joe of old, yea, it is. But it seems after 2017-18 were he scheduled Findlay, Ferris and Bowie in three of its first four games, losing all three and missing the NCAA tourney, he learned his lesson. Since then he has started the season with Concord, and WV Wesleyan the last two seasons and scheduled other such luminaries as D3 Westminster among their first four games. Chalking up these early season W's the last two years against less than stellar competition, were was IUP seeded come NCAA tourney time??

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Not much to say. Clearly Ben has drank the hard schedule cool aid. Real chance of going 0-3 to start the season and still having to play Fairmont and UC (twice) and Daimen as well as always tough Bowie, Concord and WVS (twice).

That's a Joe-type schedule. Certainly different than the Crutch non-con slates.

[Columbuseer]

Not much to say. Clearly Ben has drank the hard schedule cool aid. Real chance of going 0-3 to start the season and still having to play Fairmont and UC (twice) and Daimen as well as always tough Bowie, Concord and WVS (twice).

If they build on the Hillsdale game and continue to pass the ball quickly for a good shot and play half court D like that game, they should be OK. IMHO you only get better by playing teams that can beat you. I have heard that guys have been hitting the weights hard and that it shows. Would not be surprised to see folks bounce off of Patrick Robinson III.

[Columbuseer]

Garrett Denbow is a gifted shooter with a high motor. Probably around 6-5.
He might be one of the best shooters on the WLU team, based on the stats below (which came from his former team).
As with all new players, it takes a while to adjust to the pace of the game as well as the emphasis on ball movement rather than one-on-one, dribble drive style.
The variation in athletic ability among the 15 players is the smallest I have seen on a WLU roster in the last 10 years.
Everyone is capable of contributing on Day 1. The issue is that there may not be enough minutes.

Here is the definition from basketball-reference.com:

• eFG% - Effective Field Goal Percentage; the formula is (FG + 0.5 * 3P) / FGA. This statistic adjusts for the fact that a 3-point field goal is worth one more point than a 2-point field goal. For example, suppose Player A goes 4 for 10 with 2 threes, while Player B goes 5 for 10 with 0 threes. Each player would have 10 points from field goals, and thus would have the same effective field goal percentage (50%)
• TS% - True Shooting Percentage; the formula is PTS / (2 * TSA). True shooting percentage is a measure of shooting efficiency that takes into account field goals, 3-point field goals, and free throws.

• TSA - True Shooting Attempts; the formula is FGA + 0.44 * FTA.

Player	AvgMin	FG	FGA	FGPct	3FG	3FGA	3FGPct	FT	FTA	FFTPct	3FGA per All FGA	3FG%	True Shot Att	EFGPct	True Shot Pct
Garrett Denbow	11	16	34	0.471	10	23	0.435	12	12	1	61.8%	43.5%	39.28	61.8%	68.7%
Viktor Kovacevic	30.4	51	91	0.56	16	33	0.485	35	52	0.673	36.3%	48.5%	113.88	64.8%	67.2%
Dalton Bolon	27.8	171	334	.512	68	153	.444	80	89	.899	45.8%	44.4%	373.16	61.4%	65.7%
Will Yoakum	23.8	73	130	.562	15	45	.333	37	49	.755	34.6%	33.3%	151.56	61.9%	65.3%
Malik Mckinney	19.0	64	124	.516	12	34	.353	69	82	.841	27.4%	35.3%	160.08	56.5%	65.3%
Zach Rasile	15.0	55	116	.474	39	93	.419	8	12	.667	80.2%	41.9%	121.28	64.2%	64.7%
Pat Robinson III	26.9	171	319	.536	37	99	.374	90	118	.763	31.0%	37.4%	370.92	59.4%	63.2%
Ben Sarson	7.6	20	44	.455	7	23	.304	11	12	.917	52.3%	30.4%	49.28	53.4%	58.8%
Bryce Butler	24.2	96	193	.497	24	58	.414	32	49	.653	30.1%	41.4%	214.56	56.0%	57.8%
Owen Hazelbaker	13.5	44	99	.444	18	54	.333	12	22	.545	54.5%	33.3%	108.68	53.5%	54.3%
Luke Dyer	24.5	46	109	.422	24	70	.343	5	14	.357	64.2%	34.3%	115.16	53.2%	52.5%
Cmont Montague	34.6	76	187	0.406	32	96	0.333	28	36	0.778	51.3%	33.3%	202.84	49.2%	52.3%
Elijah Watson	11.3	35	74	.473	1	10	.100	14	30	.467	13.5%	10.0%	87.2	48.0%	48.7%
Marlon Moore Jr.	17.3	62	152	.408	6	39	.154	31	43	.721	25.7%	15.4%	170.92	42.8%	47.1%

[unc4life]

Anyone got any intel on the Denbow kid who seems to have left the Charleston team two years ago and is now verbally committed to WLU (at least according to VC)? I haven't really heard anything about the signing.

Just hope its a two for one deal with his brother Luke. Garrett is a very good basketball player, his brother is a star.

[boatcapt]

WLU releases basketball schedule.
let the comments begin!

https://hilltoppersports.com/news/20...-schedule.aspx

Not much to say. Clearly Ben has drank the hard schedule cool aid. Real chance of going 0-3 to start the season and still having to play Fairmont and UC (twice) and Daimen as well as always tough Bowie, Concord and WVS (twice).

[Columbuseer]

WLU releases basketball schedule.
let the comments begin!

https://hilltoppersports.com/news/20...-schedule.aspx

[Columbuseer]

WLU has a huge gap to fill with Luke Dyer leaving in many areas. One of these areas is steals.



His stats are otherworldly and are listed below. He would have been #1 in the NBA is three different steal statistics.
He will be missed.


FYI

Basketball teams are using data analytics to gain insights into the best winning strategy and the contributions of individual players.
Topic: Steal Percentage for WLU Players 20-21 season

Although steals have long been part of the standard box score, it has significant limitations, for it does not consider the following important factors:

• The minutes that a player was on the floor. One player might get 2 steals in 10 minutes of play, while another gets 4 steals in 35 minutes.

The statistic Steal Percentage attempts to correct some of these limitations.

• For example, if a player got 2 steals while playing 10 minutes, that extrapolates to 8 steals in 40 minutes of play. (40-minute game / 10 minutes the player played). If the opponent had 80 possessions, then the block percentage is 8/80 = 0.1, or 10%.

Here are the Steal Percentage for WLU players in 2020-2021

Player	Minutes Played	Avg Min Per Game	PF	Stl	Steals per Min Played	StealsPerFoul	STLPct	Comments
Luke Dyer	564	24.5	57	51	0.090	0.895	4.56%	1. Steals per Minute Played - Luke (.090) would rank 1st in NBA ahed of Matisse Thybulle (.08) of the 76ers 2. Steals per Game (51/23 = 2.21) would rank 1st in NBA ahead of Jimmy Butler at 2.02, even though NBA is 48 mins and Luke only averages 24.5 minutes per game) 3. Steal Percentage (4.56%) would rank 1st in NBA ahead of TJ McConnell at 3.4% 4 Steal Per Foul would rank Luke 7th in NBA, just after Jrue Holiday at .911
Owen Hazelbaker	310	13.5	44	16	0.052	0.364	2.60%	Tied for 6th in NBA with Ricky Rubio
Malik Mckinney	436	19.0	63	22	0.050	0.349	2.55%	Tied for 7th in NBA with Draymond Green
Pat Robinson III	619	26.9	38	30	0.048	0.789	2.45%	Tied for 8th in NBA with Kent Bazemore
Evan Conley	65	5.9	8	3	0.046	0.375	2.33%	Tied for 12th in NBA with Lonzo Ball
Marlon Moore Jr.	398	17.3	62	18	0.045	0.290	2.28%	Tied for 18th in NBA with OG Anunoby
Will Yoakum	286	23.8	31	12	0.042	0.387	2.12%	Tied for 24nd in NBA with Kyle Anderson
Dalton Bolon	639	27.8	47	23	0.036	0.489	1.82%
Elijah Watson	259	11.3	43	8	0.031	0.186	1.56%
Zach Rasile	345	15.0	31	10	0.029	0.323	1.46%
Bryce Butler	556	24.2	49	14	0.025	0.286	1.27%
Ben Sarson	122	7.6	22	3	0.025	0.136	1.24%

Limitations of the Statistic: Steal percentage can be skewed for players who play limited minutes.
Here is definition from https://www.basketball-reference.com.../glossary.html

• STL% - Steal Percentage (available since the 1973-74 season in the NBA); the formula is 100 * (STL * (Tm MP / 5)) / (MP * Opp Poss). Steal Percentage is an estimate of the percentage of opponent possessions that end with a steal by the player while he was on the floor.

[boatcapt]

So what kind of player do you think that we need that we don't already have in Marlon, Elijah, Ben, Viktor and Aiden? What skills are missing?
At 6-5, Marlon just shut down 3 all region bigs in the regional. The wlu style tires out bigs and our 3 point shooting offsets their inside game

It more how they use the bigs not necessarily who they bring in.

Again, not advocating for a dramatic whole-sale change in how WLU plays, just develop a tershiary offensive style that fully utilzes the skill set of our current players and gives us a counter. I mean, we have players that seem to be more than willing to unilatterally break into iso-ball without the coaches instruction and I would assume no practice...Imagine how quickly they could master a low post motion offense with 5 or 10 minutes of practice every day and some in-game time in the numerous blow outs we have. With our athletes, that shouldn't be too heavy of a lift.

[Columbuseer]

Yes winning a DII national championship is hard...only 42 different teams have done it. And stats are great and indicative of a really good team. But at the end of the day, seasons are measured by wins and losses relative to expectations. Many teams would be over the moon happy with WLU's one season success or even success over a 4 or 5 year span. But when you have sustained success as much as WLU has, it breeds higher expectations.

I think I've made it pretty clear that I don't expect or even want WLU to bring in a lumbering big. I've also hope I've been clear that I would not be in favor of changing WLU's style in a dramatic way. All I've said is that WLU should invest a degree of time and perhaps one roster spot to developing some sort of alternative style that they can use on those rare nights and in those situations when either the other team has our number OR when we aren't shooting well.

So what kind of player do you think that we need that we don't already have in Marlon, Elijah, Ben, Viktor and Aiden? What skills are missing?
At 6-5, Marlon just shut down 3 all region bigs in the regional. The wlu style tires out bigs and our 3 point shooting offsets their inside game

[boatcapt]

Yes winning a DII national championship is hard...only 42 different teams have done it. And stats are great and indicative of a really good team. But at the end of the day, seasons are measured by wins and losses relative to expectations. Many teams would be over the moon happy with WLU's one season success or even success over a 4 or 5 year span. But when you have sustained success as much as WLU has, it breeds higher expectations.

I think I've made it pretty clear that I don't expect or even want WLU to bring in a lumbering big. I've also hope I've been clear that I would not be in favor of changing WLU's style in a dramatic way. All I've said is that WLU should invest a degree of time and perhaps one roster spot to developing some sort of alternative style that they can use on those rare nights and in those situations when either the other team has our number OR when we aren't shooting well.

[Columbuseer]

My long standing desire for WLU to establish some sort of inside game is not due to in season or even in the MEC tourney need. Their success there argues that they don't need to worry much about that. My long standing concern is in the NCAA tourney were we always seem to get beat by a team that is capable of either shutting our style down or that has a dominant big that shreds us. Seems like we don't really ever have a true answer for that other than to "try harder." When teams are equipped to shut down our outside offense and have ball handlers that can break our Press consistently, we don't seem to have an answer. Again, you don't run into teams like that very often in the regular season...but in the tourney, seems to happen every year.

The days of being happy making the tourney and being happy with a deep run should be over in Topper land!

WLU typically has the highest Points per Possession of any D1 or D2 team (with the exception of this era's NW Missouri State), which is a measure of offensive efficiency, regardless of whether you play fast or slow, or whether you play big or small. So whatever style one chooses to play, you want a very high points per possession.

WLU has been elevating their recruiting to get bigs who can play the WLU style AND defend the opponent's bigs in the paint.
Just look at how Marlon Moore, Jr. defended McManus from Charleston, All-Region Patrick Cartier 6-8 from Hillsdale, and Marcus Ernst 6-7 from Malone.
I think you will see dramatic improvement in Elijah Watson 6-7 and Ben Sarson 6-6 this year on defense. Viktor 6-8 is a serious shot blocker. Aiden 6-7 with very long arms is a serious young defender too.

They can also defend mobile big men too.

I am impressed with WLU's ability to find big men who can fit the WLU style. I always thought they were only in Europe or in D1.

Regarding the NCAA tourney:

1. WLU handily defeated Hilldale who was 23-2 and they had three 6-8 starters. They only committed 13 turnovers (the same as WLU). It was our defense that won the game. The coach said no one had played Cartier like Marlon. In addition, 6-8 Hamilton trying to guard Patrick Robinson III was a total fail. Patrick was scoring layups and was going to foul him out and forced him from the game. So loading up on bigs is a double edged sword.

2. No way of conclusively proving it, but in IMHO, WLU was the 2nd best team in the Elite 8. The trouble was that NWMSU was at an entirely different level. One of their players (Ryan Hawkins 6-7. 2000 pts) just transferred after the season to D1 Creighton. Heck, after they won their last national championship with the same players, they lost to Duke by 4 in exhibition! They also had time to prepare for WLU. The Hillsdale coach stated that WLU is very hard to prepare for if you just have a day.


IMHO to win the national title:
1. You cannot have a bad game. A bad shooting night can eliminate even the most talented teams, regardless of style.
2. In the first round, you want a team that is not superior athletically, for they will have a week to prepare for the pressure. I am sure that helped NWMSU.
3. You have to avoid injury. WLU was playing without Will Yoakum and went to the Elite 8! Among coaches, opinions vary about WLU's best player - is it Patrick, Dalton or Will?
4. There will be one or more opponents, where the stars have aligned for once in a coaching career roster. Hillsdale might be an example - it might have been their first regional in a long time.
5. You have to have 2 or 3 D1 level athletes on the team (at least). At this level, all the coaches are good. It comes down often to whether you can stay in front of your man enough to win the game. WLU is getting those type of players. All of the recruits had D1 interest, and at least 2 had definite D1 offers.
6. You may need to make a pressure shot at the buzzer (like Malik against Glenville). Many will argue that the national championship game was NWMSU defeating Northern in the Regional by hitting a 30 ft contested shot at the end of regulation to force overtime.

If you recruit lumbering bigs, you are throwing the baby out with the bath water, for you no longer have the position-less basketball concept, and the points per possession will drop.

WLU is dramatically upgrading its athletic ability from top to bottom of the roster. A former coach on one of the broadcasts said it was the most athletic team he can remember.

No matter the style, winning the national championship is no gimme and there is no magic elixir.

[boatcapt]

Good question about Luke. My guesses for pg are either Malik, Bryce or Cmont Montague. Each brings something different to the table. It may take a while for Cmont to adapt. Zach has a high basketball iq but we would have to give up his corner 3 for him at the pg position.

Have watched some of Viktor's highlights. He is the classic Serbian player. Complete fundamental skill set who just happens to be 6-8 and is a great fit for the current wlu style. Imho no need to change the style, for the data analytics favor the style. Think of Viktor as a bigger version of Will Yoakum. He is a matchup nightmare in the open court. 48.6% from three and can do rim runs for dunks. Will pull opponents' big men away from goal. Open issue is how quick he can adjust.

My long standing desire for WLU to establish some sort of inside game is not due to in season or even in the MEC tourney need. Their success there argues that they don't need to worry much about that. My long standing concern is in the NCAA tourney were we always seem to get beat by a team that is capable of either shutting our style down or that has a dominant big that shreds us. Seems like we don't really ever have a true answer for that other than to "try harder." When teams are equipped to shut down our outside offense and have ball handlers that can break our Press consistently, we don't seem to have an answer. Again, you don't run into teams like that very often in the regular season...but in the tourney, seems to happen every year.

The days of being happy making the tourney and being happy with a deep run should be over in Topper land!