I just scanned a few posts on that forum and it’s chock full of just flat out wrong information. I would love it if those guys were doing the scouting for the actual team. This one might have been my favorite though:
I think Houston is a slightly above average team in a bad conference. I think they have a lot of great athletes, but we have better basketball players and more size. I wanted Houston because their schedule is atrocious. If we can at least stay with them rebounding and Grimes and Sasser are not unconscious from three, we win this game going away.
I will concede that if Syracuse stays with us rebounding, the probably do win this game. But I put their chances of hanging with us on the boards at around 1%.
I’m not sure who posted that but we have a large basketball fan base and every fanbase has idiots. Some of these guys come out of the woodwork during both winning and losing streaks.
I read that thread and it’s an interesting read. On the one hand, it is crystal clear that a large percentage of their fanbase lives and breathes college hoops, and is very knowledgeable in a general way.
On the other hand, the stats they use for their analysis are very old-school. They seem to focus on the least-relevant stats to how the Coogs in particular function.
For sure. We have our fair share of those too, but they’re mostly on the football board. I think both fan bases (for any game) fall into the trap of making too many assumptions. If your entire team plays up to their potential, your chances of winning are pretty good (at least at this stage). But we all should know that won’t happen. Kids have off nights, injuries hamper things, coaches strategize.
Our biggest wild card going into this game is Jarreau. When he’s healthy, there aren’t too many guard defenders that are better than him. He locked up Derrick Alston, Jr. earlier this year; held him to 0 points in 32 minutes. And he’s done that to pretty much every good scoring guard we’ve played this year. But, if he can’t move well, or can’t fight over screens on Saturday, it’s going to be a tough day for him and us unless Boeheim just has a bad shooting night. Grimes can step in for Jarreau, but he’s not nearly the defender Jarreau is. Not many are.
So, while it’s fun to talk individual and team matchups on here, and spout statistics (I’m as guilty as the next guy), none of us has the slightest clue what will actually happen on Saturday. But I am looking forward to the opportunity for my Coogs to get to a level they haven’t achieved in almost 40 years. I’m expecting a very competitive game no matter who comes out on top.
What we do know will happen on Saturday is that UH will not have every single thing go their way and people on this board will blow it out of proportion
I actually saw a stat on ESPN that WVU was ranked as a team who’s rate for going under screens was in the bottom 10% of the country. We saw that play out in that game for sure.
Teams usually start out with their big guard on buddy, which is when we bring in Richmond (6’5) to run the point. Most teams have a guard 6’2 or shorter, so if you can play an extended clip of the game without a short guy on the floor, that gives you guys an advantage. But if Sasser is out there, he’ll have to guard either Richmond or Braswell 6’8/Griffen 6’6. If Girard isn’t playing really well, he won’t be on the floor.
Cuse will definitely use Sasser’s man to screen for Buddy. It will be interesting to see how we handle that. If Sasser isn’t shooting well and getting killed with 3’s shot over him I can see CKS using Mark a great deal more.
If we hit 11 3’s and play our normal D we win, if we get 25+ from the post, we probably win, if we get 9ish 3’s and 15ish from the post, we win… so I like ours chances barring shooting insanity from Cuse.
Agree about the difference between the football and basketball boards. The posters on our basketball board historically are more engaged and completely into both the details and nuance of the program. Heavy on substance, light on drama.
Our basketball posters know a mega-ton of details about our opponents too.