West Liberty Hilltopper Basketball

[IUPbigINDIANS]

I'm sure Huggy Bear knows what he is doing. He's been doing this for decades.

Grand Valley State HC just left a Top 3 D2 football job to be the special teams coach at Wisconsin.


Never know. Money talks.

[IUPalum]

If you're going to run a press, it takes a full commitment to recruiting for it as a coach. At our level, West Liberty and East Stroudsburg have obviously had a good deal of success doing just that. But it only works if you usually have talent and speed at least the equivalent of your opponent and probably superior depth as well. Meet an opponent with experienced guards and overall quickness, and the press can get exposed very quickly.

I'm sure Huggy Bear knows what he is doing. He's been doing this for decades.

[Columbuseer]

If you're going to run a press, it takes a full commitment to recruiting for it as a coach. At our level, West Liberty and East Stroudsburg have obviously had a good deal of success doing just that. But it only works if you usually have talent and speed at least the equivalent of your opponent and probably superior depth as well. Meet an opponent with experienced guards and overall quickness, and the press can get exposed very quickly.

Great points. For that reason, imho if d2 coach in this style moves to D1, it has to be as a head coach and not as an assistant.

[Ship69]

Huggy's biggest problem right now is that he's not much of an offensive minded coach. He needs a half court offense since he doesn't have the bodies for his press. This all started downward when he lost Oscar.

If you're going to run a press, it takes a full commitment to recruiting for it as a coach. At our level, West Liberty and East Stroudsburg have obviously had a good deal of success doing just that. But it only works if you usually have talent and speed at least the equivalent of your opponent and probably superior depth as well. Meet an opponent with experienced guards and overall quickness, and the press can get exposed very quickly.

[IUPalum]

Only slightly kidding about the open WVU job but WVU hasn’t had much success in the Big 12 without the press. I’d definitely add him if I were Huggs and he wanted to. But as a selfish WL fan I hope not

Unlike Crutch I do think Howlett has D1 aspirations eventually. Too young to stay D2 forever with that much success

Huggy's biggest problem right now is that he's not much of an offensive minded coach. He needs a half court offense since he doesn't have the bodies for his press. This all started downward when he lost Oscar.

[Layton]

Only slightly kidding about the open WVU job but WVU hasn’t had much success in the Big 12 without the press. I’d definitely add him if I were Huggs and he wanted to. But as a selfish WL fan I hope not

Unlike Crutch I do think Howlett has D1 aspirations eventually. Too young to stay D2 forever with that much success

[Columbuseer]

But another thing I noticed from the box score--and your recap didn't necessarily mention this, Columbuseer--is that their assists were way down yesterday as well. Against Frostburg they had assists at some absurd rate (something like 30 assists on 45 made buckets). Against Fairmont, they had what I presume to be a season low 15 assists. They were on the wrong side of the Assist-to-Turnover ratio for the first time all season. I have to assume this means they were not moving the ball well and got sucked into one-on-one AAU hero ball. I can't confirm this--as I mentioned, I was unable to watch the game. But the season low in assists is bothersome and might, in fact, impact the wild swings in shooting percentage. When the ball moves, the shooter is more open. When the shooter shoots uncontested he makes at a higher rate. It might be that simple, Boat. It might not be that they're streaky shooters; it might be that when they stick to the system and move the ball, shooters are more open and shoot for higher percentage. When they don't move the ball and take contested shots, the percentages go down.

Good points on assist to TO ratio. Many of our assists are either catch and shoot threes or interior passes. Zach is our only player who maintains accuracy on quick catch and shoot.( like sanders and parris). Our other shooters need more of an open look. They disrupted both by slowing down ball movement around perimeter, thus preventing the open look. They also collapsed inside and deflected interior passes.

[boatcapt]

But another thing I noticed from the box score--and your recap didn't necessarily mention this, Columbuseer--is that their assists were way down yesterday as well. Against Frostburg they had assists at some absurd rate (something like 30 assists on 45 made buckets). Against Fairmont, they had what I presume to be a season low 15 assists. They were on the wrong side of the Assist-to-Turnover ratio for the first time all season. I have to assume this means they were not moving the ball well and got sucked into one-on-one AAU hero ball. I can't confirm this--as I mentioned, I was unable to watch the game. But the season low in assists is bothersome and might, in fact, impact the wild swings in shooting percentage. When the ball moves, the shooter is more open. When the shooter shoots uncontested he makes at a higher rate. It might be that simple, Boat. It might not be that they're streaky shooters; it might be that when they stick to the system and move the ball, shooters are more open and shoot for higher percentage. When they don't move the ball and take contested shots, the percentages go down.

Could be. But whatever is making it happen, it's clear that it is a thing. As March ticks closer and the level of competition ramps up, we need to eliminate these massive shooting swings. A WLU team that shoots 41% from three with a 3 or 4 percentage swing from night to night would be extremely hard to beat...A WLU team shooting 41% from 3 but with a 23% swing from night to night becomes much more beatable.

[Scrub]

But another thing I noticed from the box score--and your recap didn't necessarily mention this, Columbuseer--is that their assists were way down yesterday as well. Against Frostburg they had assists at some absurd rate (something like 30 assists on 45 made buckets). Against Fairmont, they had what I presume to be a season low 15 assists. They were on the wrong side of the Assist-to-Turnover ratio for the first time all season. I have to assume this means they were not moving the ball well and got sucked into one-on-one AAU hero ball. I can't confirm this--as I mentioned, I was unable to watch the game. But the season low in assists is bothersome and might, in fact, impact the wild swings in shooting percentage. When the ball moves, the shooter is more open. When the shooter shoots uncontested he makes at a higher rate. It might be that simple, Boat. It might not be that they're streaky shooters; it might be that when they stick to the system and move the ball, shooters are more open and shoot for higher percentage. When they don't move the ball and take contested shots, the percentages go down.

[boatcapt]

This team is so hot and cold shooting. Huge variance between nights when they are on and nights when they are off. They have massive swings...ex. Sore to 53% from 3 against Concord to 30% against Glenville to 43% against Frostburg and slam back down to 30% against Fairmont. A 23% variance in a 10 day period over four games! Over those same four games, WLU is shooting 41% from 3...makes you think that WLU is scorching the nets but clearly from a game-to-game/consistency stand point, they are NOT scorching the nets!! Also worth noting that on most nights, most teams don't have the ability to stop Butler and on our "off" shooting nights we can ride him to a W...but clearly, SOME teams do have the horses to limit Butler.

[Columbuseer]

I'll keep this short as it is cold and windy on this high-rise window ledge.

Fairmont had great game plan.

• put sanders and/or parris in offense corner against press. When they broke press with 3 on 2, sanders was unguarded in corner. Hit 7-10 from 3. Parris was 5-11. Hale 3-5, Dobbs 1-2.
• They were not going to let Bryce beat them. Collapsed on him inside forcing kickout pass. First 10 mins, we were hitting 3s and had leads.
• Bigs provided help defense when guards entered lane.
• Limit turnover margin

they generally succeeded:

• After first 10 mins, press did not trouble them. Turnovers even at 16.
• They hit 61% 3s in 2nd half to 16% for wl.
• They played passing lanes very well, slowing our offensive ball rotation around the perimeter, which restricted open looks.
• They have equally great shooters, equally great dribble drive guards, but more experienced bigs.
• In general they had better, less difficult shot selection.
• Their bigger guards gave our guards trouble.
• Deadly FT shooting

Perfect storm if you have a below average shooting night and a good team is red hot.

[Columbuseer]

Yikes looks like Howlett had his eyes set on the WVU assistant job this week

Are you serious? Evidence? Not all coaches think D1 is Shangri-la.

[IUPbigINDIANS]

West Liberty shot only 36% to Fairmont’s 53%. That a pretty wide margin. Sometimes it’s just the building and once things start slipping away it can totally get away from a team when confidence is lost. The margin of victory is a bit surprising, but I’d just chalk it up to a bad day at the office and that’s going to happen on occasion.

Well, I'd add I think everybody who actually pays attention knew FSU was much better than its record. They had a lot of talented imports this year. That takes time to mesh. Looks like it sure meshed today. And, they are very well-coached.

[Scrub]

West Liberty shot only 36% to Fairmont’s 53%. That a pretty wide margin. Sometimes it’s just the building and once things start slipping away it can totally get away from a team when confidence is lost. The margin of victory is a bit surprising, but I’d just chalk it up to a bad day at the office and that’s going to happen on occasion.

Yes, that shooting percentage is pretty ugly. And FSU's was over 60% in the second half (including over 60% from behind the arc). It seems like it was one of those perfect storm kinda nights at Retton. Unfortunately, those seem to happen a lot in that building.

I have a feeling Alderson Broaddus won't know what hit them on Wednesday. They are going to run into a motivated WLU team, I suspect.

I was worried about the sloppiness of the Frostburg game creating a kind of hangover in Fairmont today. In fact, I think I told another poster in a PM that I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to drop one today at Retton. I just didn't think it would be a behind-the-woodshed kind of L.

Tough day. Gotta learn from it.

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Yikes looks like Howlett had his eyes set on the WVU assistant job this week

Reality is it's a matter of time. He's young and people notice. I'd love to see him at a Duquesne type just to see what happens. I didn't think you'd still have him this year (let alone next year). Although I do have serious doubts if the WL style would work in (major) D1.