Nice defense on the last Charlotte attempt.

Way to go Owls!

Nice effort over a decent Charlotte (12-6 entering the game) team that earlier had beaten Kansas State and Michigan (when they were 12th in the country).

Obviously we finally shot the 3's at a nice percentage (12 of 24 I believe) but the key to me wasn't the 3-point shooting but the fact that we actually played strong defense for the most part for the entire game. Having a healthy Washington, Jackson and Guercy together is nice, and that's something that hasn't happened a ton this season.

We still may struggle to win many more games this year but if the effort is there like it was tonight, we will be in most of them too and who knows what happens? At the very least, they can now say they have more wins this year than last season.

good win tonight. Needed that.

(01-25-2014 10:57 PM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  We still may struggle to win many more games this year but if the effort is there like it was tonight, we will be in most of them too and who knows what happens? At the very least, they can now say they have more wins this year than last season.

FBO, haven't you written elsewhere that you believe this team to be better than last year's team?

Here are our minutes played tonight by class

senior--29
junior--30
soph--70
frosh--71

Wow

We're absolutely better but we don't have a scorer like Tamir to generate offense even against good defensive teams. So overall the win-loss record is about the same since we tend to fade down the stretch. Last year, we played a few tight conference games but we did have 6 losses within the conference by at least 20 points. This year, it's just one so far. Of course, we had one nice conference win last year (over UH) and didn't win again after that but I do think the conference is not as strong this year as last year.

Hopefully this game and a few other wins will keep the team excited and motivated to keep the effort strong the rest of the year. The two guys we've signed for next year are having pretty nice senior years and are at positions we need more bodies (shooting guard, small forward) so the trend should continue to improve but probably not at the pace we'd all like to see.

The start of a Bailiff 2012 winning streak? Right as everyone is finally jumping ship on Coach XXX, a win streak commences and we are lead to the promised land...

(01-26-2014 01:30 AM)mrbig Wrote:  The start of a Bailiff 2012 winning streak? Right as everyone is finally jumping ship on Coach XXX, a win streak commences and we are lead to the promised land...

Nice win tonight but as someone said Friday or so that when 3's drop (as they did tonight), we might steal a win. My over under is back to 1.5

i guess what is frustrating to me is that while there are limits to the transitive property, we have a huge number of losses to teams that are clearly not as good as Charlotte.

fwiw, Charlotte fell 20 spots in Sagarin with the loss.

Here are teams we have lost to that are 50 or more Sagarin spots below Charlotte:

SE Louisiana
HBU
FAU
FIU
Tulane
Marshall

In that same population, we have (the narrowest possible) wins against TAMCC and South Alabama. Before last night Santa Clara was by far our best win, at least per Sagarin.


Here are teams left on our schedule that are more than 50 Sagarin spots below Charlotte

UTSA
East Carolina

(01-26-2014 01:25 AM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  The two guys we've signed for next year are having pretty nice senior years and are at positions we need more bodies (shooting guard, small forward) so the trend should continue to improve but probably not at the pace we'd all like to see.

What is an adjective to describe rate of programmatic improvement which is clearly faster than glacial but clearly slower than Bailiff-esque

It is year 6 for Braun, and we are (edit) 4-7 against teams ranked 150 or below in Sagarin. (yes, I'm excluding the two wins against NAIA teams. Last time I talked to Todd Smith, he had 1.5 scholarships for his MBB program).

We are 0-6 against the top 150, with 4 of the 6 losses by double digits.

(01-26-2014 10:59 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  fwiw, Charlotte fell 20 spots in Sagarin with the loss.

I'm not sure how many spots Rice rose with the win but right now we are at 300. The next opponent UTSA is 319th.

(01-26-2014 11:22 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  What is an adjective to describe rate of programmatic improvement which is clearly faster than glacial but clearly slower than Bailiff-esque

Languid, perhaps?

(A better word might the one I can't recall that describes the flow, if you can call it that, of water in a bayou.)

Just tuned in to everyone's comments - - I'm shocked!
Fantastic win Owls!!

(01-26-2014 11:22 AM)MemOwl Wrote:  Last time I talked to Todd Smith, he had 1.5 scholarships for his MBB program).

and let us not forget that we lost to them badly last year........

(01-26-2014 01:25 AM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  We're absolutely better but we don't have a scorer like Tamir to generate offense even against good defensive teams.

(01-26-2014 01:25 AM)Fort Bend Owl Wrote:  Hopefully this game and a few other wins will keep the team excited and motivated to keep the effort strong the rest of the year. The two guys we've signed for next year are having pretty nice senior years and are at positions we need more bodies (shooting guard, small forward) so the trend should continue to improve but probably not at the pace we'd all like to see.

FBO, checking back in after double digit losses to the bottom of CUSA.

I guess I'm worried we aren't getting better. It starts with basic talent level.

In the Braun era, I believe we have had two players with enough talent to be contributors to tournament quality teams--Kazemi and Ennis. Unfortunately, as much discussed, the tournament teams they contributed to were/are Oregon and Villanova.

The shooting percentages of the current team are so low that I struggle to discern improvement (ie, if you are shooting 32% from the field, it is irrelevant if it is higher than last year--it is so far below that needed to be competitive that trajectory means nothing).

Obi has promise. Maybe the freshman who got hurt in Canada would have been good. Ramjak shoots 41% of 3s so he is weapon as a role player. He is a senior, and is our leading scorer.

Guercy has great assist to turnover ratio, but he shoots 32%. Washington shoots 42% but has more turnovers than assists. Jackson shoots 32%; Bender 35%; Wilson 36%. Kapic 37%.

Drone is over 50% but only plays 11 minutes per game.

But I don't see much indication that any player who is getting minutes has the base talent level to earn minutes on a good team, apart from Obi and Ramjak

What am I missing?

EDIT: We are 10th in the country in 3 pt FG attempts and 217th in 3 pt FG percentage. We are 192nd in scoring defense, which is partly a result of our severe struggles to score. We are 306th (ie, VERY close to last) in scoring offense and 312th in FG percentage. This is of course in part a function of the density and futility of three point shooting.

To add to that, there are only 2 teams in Division 1 that take more 3-pointers as a percentage of their total shot attempts - Princeton and San Jose State.

SOURCE: http://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketb...point-rate

Given the rate of making them, this is not a good stat. Though given the completion percentage on 2-point attempts, the expected return is higher on the 3-point shots. So maybe just keep gunning away. But this may explain partially why offensive rebounding rate is the 4th worst in Division 1.

http://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketb...unding-pct

And their rebounding rate is so low - not a good stat. Though look at the last column - Rice's rebounding rate last year was scary bad. Like worse than anyone this year by a lot.

http://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketb...percentage

It's fun to look at these numbers, but depressing too.