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.
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Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
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.Leave a comment:
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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.Originally posted by Columbuseer View Post
The days of being happy making the tourney and being happy with a deep run should be over in Topper land!Leave a comment:
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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.Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
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.Leave a comment:
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I'm very interested in how the 21-22 Toppers evolve. Losing Bolon is huge but WLU has weathered similar storms before. What I'm most interested in is how we replace Luke? He was a great PG but more importantly, he was such a calming force on the floor. He really was like having a coach on the floor. I'm sure we will have a PG who can equal his production, but they will probably struggle being that calming on court leader.
Beyond the incoming freshmen who seem, as aground, to be the most talented we've had in a while, im really interested in the transfer big who's coming in. While he ticks all the blocks for a traditional WLU big, he seems to have other skills that our big from the past haven't had. Do we utilize and accent those skills or do we only accent the traditional WLU big skills? I would like to see us develop some inside game that takes advantage of those skills...not saying abandon the WLU style just broaden it a bit and make us a little less predictable in our half court sets.Leave a comment:
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FYI
Senior highlights Aiden Satterfield!
He is ultra talented, long arms, very good fundamental skill set. Good enough to play as a freshman if there are minutes available. He was MVP for his team in wv all star game.
https://twitter.com/aidensatt1/statu...368583686?s=20
Last edited by Columbuseer; 06-20-2021, 07:48 AM.Leave a comment:
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With Dalton and Luke leaving, there are big shoes to fill in offensive rebounding!
(Note: I had an error in earlier post on Block % stats. I have edited that post with a correction.)
FYI
Topic: Offensive Rebound % for WLU Players 20-21 season
rd in D1 for 2020-2021 season!Team Offensive Rebounding Percentage Formula1 Houston 40.2% 2 N Carolina 39.5% 3 CS Bakersfld 37.1%
For individuals, one prorates their offensive rebounds according to their proportion of minutes played.
Here is the definition from basketball-reference.com:- ORB% - Offensive Rebound Percentage (available since the 1970-71 season in the NBA); the formula is 100 * (ORB * (Tm MP / 5)) / (MP * (Tm ORB + Opp DRB)). Offensive rebound percentage is an estimate of the percentage of available offensive rebounds a player grabbed while he was on the floor.
WEST Lib Stats 2020-2021 Offensive rebound % Rating Marlon Moore Jr 11.54% Outstanding Elijah Watson 10.03% Outstanding Ben Sarson 9.82% Outstanding owen hazelbaker 7.73% Outstanding Will yoakum 7.68% Outstanding Bryce butler 7.18% Outstanding Dalton bolon 7.03% Outstanding Patrick Robinson III 6.61% Outstanding Malik mckinney 4.35% Luke dyer 3.36% Viktor Kovacevi? (Quincy Stats) 2.80% Zach rasile 2.32% Cmont Montague (Walsh stats) 1.20% Garrett Denbow (UC stats 2019-20) 1.00% Evan Conley 0 Leave a comment:
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CORRECTION: There was a copy and paste error in Quincy stats. Root cause was I assumed that box score column order was standardized, but quincy was an exception.
Viktor's Block % is 3.6%, which is very good, but not 10.6%.
Quincy transfer Viktor Kovacevi? has the potential to be a major disruptive force on both offense and defense at 6-8 with his handles in the open court!
On offense, he has an Effective FG% of 64.8%, 48.5% from three.
On defense, he has a very good block % of 3.6%!
Let's hope that he can adapt quickly to the WLU style from the much slower, deliberate Quincy style!
I have updated the Block % stats to include the transfers.WEST Lib Stats 2020-2021 Block% Rating Marlon Moore Jr. 6.11% Outstanding Will Yoakum 4.25% Outstanding Viktor Kovacevi? (Quincy Stats) 3.60% Very Good Ben Sarson 3.32% Very Good Owen Hazelbaker 2.94% Very Good Elijah Watson 2.35% Very Good Dalton Bolon 0.95% Bryce Butler 0.91% Pat Robinson III 0.82% Garrett Denbow (UC stats 2019-20) 0.80% Luke Dyer 0.72% Malik Mckinney 0.70% Zach Rasile 0.29% Cmont Montague (from Walsh stats) 0.20% Evan Conley 0.00% Last edited by Columbuseer; 06-17-2021, 04:26 PM.Leave a comment:
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FYI Topic: Effective Field Goal Percentage for WLU Players 20-21 season
The 3-pt shot has allowed more players of smaller stature to be effective players, which has increased competition among basketball teams. A tall center is no longer a prerequisite for success.
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%)
WEST Lib Stats 2020-2021 Effective FG% FG% Rating Viktor Kovacevi? (Quincy Stats) 64.8% 56.0% Outstanding Zach Rasile 64.2% 47.4% Outstanding Will Yoakum 61.9% 56.2% Outstanding Garrett Denbow (UC 2019-20 stats) 61.7% 47.1% Outstanding Dalton Bolon 61.4% 51.2% Outstanding Pat Robinson III 59.4% 53.6% Outstanding Malik Mckinney 56.5% 51.6% Very Good Bryce Butler 56.0% 49.7% Very Good Owen Hazelbaker 53.5% 44.4% Very Good Ben Sarson 53.4% 45.5% Very Good Luke Dyer 53.2% 42.2% Very Good 49.2% 40.6% Elijah Watson 48.0% 47.3% Marlon Moore Jr. 42.8% 40.8% Evan Conley 33.3% 33.3% NBA Highest Season FG% FG% Comments 1. Wilt Chamberlain, 1967-68 Philly 59.5% 2.LeBron James 2012-13 Miami 56.5% 3. Michael Jordan 1990-91 Chicago 53.9% NBA Highest Effective FG% Effective FG% Comments 1.LeBron James 2012-13 Miami 60.3% 2. Wilt Chamberlain, 1967-68 Philly 59.5% No 3 pt line; however, former teammates said Wilt typically won long distance shooting contests in practice, so he had the ability to make threes. 3. Michael Jordan 1990-91 Chicago 54.7% Last edited by Columbuseer; 06-13-2021, 10:24 AM.Leave a comment:
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Topic: Block Percentage for WLU Players 20-21 seasonBlock Percentage attempts to correct some of these limitations.
Here are the Block Percentage for WLU players in 2020-2021th on NBA career leaders, just after Rudy Gobert at 6.15%.WEST Lib Stats 2020-2021 Block% Rating Marlon Moore Jr. 6.11% Outstanding Will Yoakum 4.25% Outstanding Ben Sarson 3.32% Very Good Owen Hazelbaker 2.94% Very Good Elijah Watson 2.35% Very Good Dalton Bolon 0.95% Good for outside players Bryce Butler 0.91% Good for outside players Pat Robinson III 0.82% Good for outside players Luke Dyer 0.72% Good for outside players Malik McKinney 0.70% Good for outside players Zach Rasile 0.29% Evan Conley 0.00%
https://www.basketball-reference.com...ct_career.htmlhttps://youtu.be/8RFeBW9WdEs
No one has dominated like Wilt. Basketball's 8th wonder of the world
https://youtu.be/uJGCySdvlPo
Limitations of the Statistichttps://www.basketball-reference.com.../glossary.htmlLast edited by Columbuseer; 06-10-2021, 01:27 PM.Leave a comment:
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Wv state plays at Millersville on the same day wed Nov 17 as wlu and upj.Leave a comment:
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UPJ is very sound. They play very mistake-free and methodical.
IUP and UPJ are so overly familiar with one another that the games are almost always close. UPJ only has one win in the series since joining the PSAC (and IUP was without Malik Miller that game). But, there have been a ton of single-digit wins for IUP. They come to both IUP tournaments every year, etc., so they watch each other play constantly.
Bob Rukavina runs an old-school program. They don't take transfers. Players stay all four years. They have two really strong bigs who will both be juniors this year. Their star of the past half decade (Josh Wise) is finally gone.
Playing at UPJ is essentially playing in an empty gym so there's no qualms playing a road game there. Most IUP games up there are de facto IUP home games as we usually take more fans up there than they have show up.
WL will be favored in that game but UPJ isn't an easy out. You like that old school basketball style so you should enjoy watching them. You'll see all the pick-n-rolls, picket fences, etc. They are also very tough in that building.Leave a comment:
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Thanks. Good find. Upj was 22-9 in 2019 and lost to iup by 7 in one game.Originally posted by IUPbigINDIANS View Post
it should be a serious test for wlu with bolon and dyer gone this early in the season.Leave a comment:
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Yea...He has the chops to be a productive WLU player. Good size, good with the ball in his hands, good size. He will go as far as his work ethic carries him. I'd look for him to be a 14+ minute guy and average 8'ish PPG his first year.Originally posted by Columbuseer View Post
As you point out, moving the 3 point line will probably not effect WLU a whole lot as many/most of their 3 attempts are already beyond the 3 line. Now it COULD effect teams that rely largely on one player as their 3 point sniper. On the other hand, these teams are not getting a lot of "extra" points by shooting 3's as opposed to 2'sLeave a comment:
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