General MBB 2023-24 thread

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

1 hour ago, Blounge said:

CAA refs are so bad the coach freaked out and had to be escorted out of the gym over a 51-9 free throw discrepancy 

CAA refs aren’t CAA refs. They are east coast/mid Atlantic crews that work games in all the leagues.  Now some are better than others, and that’s why the Thursday-Saturday model worked well as we got decent refs of Thursday as the acc and a10 don’t typically have games then…

1 hour ago, Blounge said:

The “weak this year” CAA had a day yesterday! We are in BIG trouble without Tarke 

League is still weak but yes, yesterday was one of the better days since the VA3 left 

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

281 in first NET rankings.  5 other caa teams below us with 4 sub 315.  Hofstra, no shock, highest at 67

[Tiger93 299]

3 hours ago, TuTigers2012 said:

281 in first NET rankings.  5 other caa teams below us with 4 sub 315.  Hofstra, no shock, highest at 67

You beat me to it.

On the good end of things, the CAA is one of only six non-Power Conference leagues to have two or more teams ranked in the top 100 (Sun Belt 2, SoCon 2, Missouri Valley 7, Ivy 3, Conference USA 2, CAA 2). UNC-Wilmington and Drexel should only be helped by their wins this weekend against Kentucky and Villanova respectively. 

On the bad end, the CAA joins seven conferences with seven or more teams sitting at 250 or worse (SWAC 9, Patriot 8, NEC 8, CAA 7, OVC 7, Southland 7, Sun Belt 7). As was stated above, we are one of those teams and that is unacceptable. 

Our losses have come against some pretty solid teams (Colorado 54, Wake 133, Houston 1, North Texas 104, South Dakota State 164). 

Our wins have been against some very lowly ranked teams (Robert Morris 302, Coppin State 358, Morgan State 356)

Our remaining non-conference looks like this: UMass 94, UMBC 309, Bryant 156 (even after beating FAU), Nicholls 199)

Overall, our conference has rankings of Hofstra 67, Delaware 98, UNC-W 120, Drexel 123, College of Charleston 132, Monmouth 145, Northeastern 177, Elon 255, Towson 281, William & Mary 297, Campbell 315, Stony Brook 320, Hampton 334, NC A&T 355. 

At some point in January, I will do average conference ranking for my own amusement. 

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

1 minute ago, Tiger93 said:

You beat me to it.

On the good end of things, the CAA is one of only six non-Power Conference leagues to have two or more teams ranked in the top 100 (Sun Belt 2, SoCon 2, Missouri Valley 7, Ivy 3, Conference USA 2, CAA 2). UNC-Wilmington and Drexel should only be helped by their wins this weekend against Kentucky and Villanova respectively. 

On the bad end, the CAA joins seven conferences with seven or more teams sitting at 250 or worse (SWAC 9, Patriot 8, NEC 8, CAA 7, OVC 7, Southland 7, Sun Belt 7). As was stated above, we are one of those teams and that is unacceptable. 

Our losses have come against some pretty solid teams (Colorado 54, Wake 133, Houston 1, North Texas 104, South Dakota State 164). 

Our wins have been against some very lowly ranked teams (Robert Morris 302, Coppin State 358, Morgan State 356)

Our remaining non-conference looks like this: UMass 94, UMBC 309, Bryant 156 (even after beating FAU), Nicholls 199)

Overall, our conference has rankings of Hofstra 67, Delaware 98, UNC-W 120, Drexel 123, College of Charleston 132, Monmouth 145, Northeastern 177, Elon 255, Towson 281, William & Mary 297, Campbell 315, Stony Brook 320, Hampton 334, NC A&T 355. 

At some point in January, I will do average conference ranking for my own amusement. 

The top 5 will be an interesting battle again. Then we have some slop. And following that we have lots of bad. Not good when you have 6 teams ranked in the bottom 81 in the sport.  (Yes it’s early and not a perfect metric but gives us something to talk about). 

Love what the SBC and MAC are doing with the late season second part of their challenge based off ranking.  Like the old bracket busters.  Must be nice to be a forward thinking league. But hey! It’s only 8 games and it’s not like “our offense can be worse!” (It can 😂)

[Tiger93 299]

On 12/3/2023 at 10:10 AM, TuTigers2012 said:

League is still weak but yes, yesterday was one of the better days since the VA3 left 

Bottom is very weak. The top is actually pretty solid. Monmouth looks like they are heading in the right direction to supplement the UNC-W, Hofstra, College of Charleston, Drexel group. Delaware also looks solid. Even Northeastern looks decent.

I don't know where that leaves us, but we have a lot of work to do before conference play starts. Talent is there from an athletic standpoint as is the defensive effort, but the offense is unwatchable so far.

I know we played some tough teams, but if we are going to have the least amount of offensive possession per game in the nation (362nd per KenPom), we can't also shoot 38% from the field (28.9% three-point land), turn the ball over 13 (13.3) times a game (I believe that means we are turning it over on nearly 22% of our possessions), and only make 10 more free throws than our opponents this is going to be a rough season. The rebounding has been good mostly, and is our calling card, but we need a lot more than that. 

[Tiger93 299]

7 minutes ago, TuTigers2012 said:

The top 5 will be an interesting battle again. Then we have some slop. And following that we have lots of bad. Not good when you have 6 teams ranked in the bottom 81 in the sport.  (Yes it’s early and not a perfect metric but gives us something to talk about). 

Love what the SBC and MAC are doing with the late season second part of their challenge based off ranking.  Like the old bracket busters.  Must be nice to be a forward thinking league. But hey! It’s only 8 games and it’s not like “our offense can be worse!” (It can 😂)

I am not sure the offense can be worse. I went to the SDSU game, and it felt like a football team with a really good defense, who eventually gives up points because it is exhausted from trying to make up for the offense. Obviously, the big difference is the same people are playing offense and defense.

I expect the offense get a little better because it can't get much worse, and there are lot of young guys making inexperienced mistakes (of course there are many being made by experience players too). However, it needs to get a way better for us to even be a decent team in conference play. 

[Blounge 521]

UMASS has some big white boys in Cross and Cohen that look about 6'10 225lbs each. Charlie Thokpson can battle one of them but idk if prime time Chase Parr can hang with Matt Cross' quickness 

I think my strategy of bet the under holds true in this one. Strong defense and rebounding on both teams is gonna make it tough to score. Especially tough to score in Tiger Arena with those stiff rims!

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

24 minutes ago, Blounge said:

UMASS has some big white boys in Cross and Cohen that look about 6'10 225lbs each. Charlie Thokpson can battle one of them but idk if prime time Chase Parr can hang with Matt Cross' quickness 

I think my strategy of bet the under holds true in this one. Strong defense and rebounding on both teams is gonna make it tough to score. Especially tough to score in Tiger Arena with those stiff rims!

They are A pretty good offensive team.  And looks like they can rebound. It is their first game out of Mullins on the year 

[Tiger93 299]

1 minute ago, TuTigers2012 said:

They are A pretty good offensive team.  And looks like they can rebound. It is their first game out of Mullins on the year 

I know people will roll their eyes at this, but this is a good game to get a sense of where we really are right now as a team. Our losses have been to two really good teams (Houston and Colorado), one very solid one (North Texas, by far our worst effort), and one major conference team (Wake Forest) that we could have beaten if our offense was a tick better that day (I am not trying to claim a moral victory, just putting forth a realistic assessment of the game). South Dakota State is also a better team than us. I am not sure I would say they are really good, but even if we played well that would have been a tough game to win (and we didn't play well).

Our wins have been against the dregs, as Robert Morris, Coppin State and Morgan State are holding down 300+ NET rankings. So, we really didn't discover much from those games.

With the UMass matchup, we get to play a very solid team in the comforts of SECU, who probably wants to deal out some revenge for last year.

I would imagine UMass would be favored by somewhere in the neighborhood of 7-8 points. I think the effort level (which was questionable at times during this same stretch last year) has been good so far this year. However, the execution needs to get much better. I think we will get a focused and solid effort on Wednesday. What that yields, I have no idea. Which is why I am interested in this game. 

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

54 minutes ago, Tiger93 said:

I know people will roll their eyes at this, but this is a good game to get a sense of where we really are right now as a team. Our losses have been to two really good teams (Houston and Colorado), one very solid one (North Texas, by far our worst effort), and one major conference team (Wake Forest) that we could have beaten if our offense was a tick better that day (I am not trying to claim a moral victory, just putting forth a realistic assessment of the game). South Dakota State is also a better team than us. I am not sure I would say they are really good, but even if we played well that would have been a tough game to win (and we didn't play well).

Our wins have been against the dregs, as Robert Morris, Coppin State and Morgan State are holding down 300+ NET rankings. So, we really didn't discover much from those games.

With the UMass matchup, we get to play a very solid team in the comforts of SECU, who probably wants to deal out some revenge for last year.

I would imagine UMass would be favored by somewhere in the neighborhood of 7-8 points. I think the effort level (which was questionable at times during this same stretch last year) has been good so far this year. However, the execution needs to get much better. I think we will get a focused and solid effort on Wednesday. What that yields, I have no idea. Which is why I am interested in this game. 

It is. Unfortunately, we aren’t going to like what we see as a gauge of where we are. Every year we get beat by very good teams (understandable). But then we have games that are winnable (wake. Colorado) that we either get blown out or shit the bed late. Solid matchups( unt. SDSU umass) where we may win 1 but lose more than win. And the everyone’s favorite, the local bad schools that we typically beat.  Record inflaters. That’s who we are and will Atleast until 2028