MartintheMopMan

Let's get rolling guys! It's 6:30 in the morning and I'm ready for some basketball! I made a sign for my door to caution potential interuptees, I set-up my ESPN on the TV I use as a monitor, I am absolutely ready to roll.   Chat: https://btownbanners.com/chat/   The numbers:   [attachment=3642:1.PNG] [attachment=3643:2.PNG] [attachment=3644:4.PNG]

Indiana, Illinois, MSU, Maryland

The bee-line - 69 The Crean-Team - 85

No one called those two as the upsets.

Nebraska and Wisconsin are wearing negatives of each other's jerseys. That's confusing.

It was until you said that.

Means it's too bad we don't have a spot open on our coaching staff.

Well, no such luck.

This looks like the end of our game against Iowa. No one wants to win this one.

My biggest fear in the BTT is for us to look like Iowa does today. I am certain they wish we did not have the BTT right now.   THAT INSANE TOM CREAN COMMERCIAL JUST PLAYED! I can't believe it's real.

I mean like, this is a joke right? They switched jerseys before the game?   I can't get over how bad Iowa looks. Too bad for Minnesota they didn't get to play this game instead.

Iowa has serious problems down the stretch.

Failed the ACTs and had to sit out a year when he started. His recruitment is actually really interesting, I read a good article on it awhile back, I'll try and dig that up.

Our Final Four and Championship Game appearances are more recent.   But, they're a consistent Elite Eight team, which people like. Having been through this drought with Indiana, I can see why people wish we had their kind of success, but if it's not going to translate to a banner then it's a waste and just enough to give you hope that next year you'll get over the hump. When people talk about wanting Sean Miller, it makes me nervous because I don't know if he is the kind of coach who could ever get over the hump unless a lot of things fall right in those last games. He is a great overall coach and can build a very good team with very good players, but in individual matchups he is a little lacking.

Higher seeds have it today: Michigan, Iowa, OSU, Wisco.   Michigan v. NW gave me some trouble, because Northwestern certainly isn't a bad team this year. But, Michigan is playing for an NCAA berth they may still not get and Northwestern is playing for an NIT berth they may get anyway, so Michigan is more motivated. Plus, Michigan matched up well against them a couple weeks ago when they played except for the brief period where they didn't. That was at home, but eh, I think they can carry a few hours south. I would be surprised to be wrong on my others, but can see Michigan going either way.

Yeah, I wouldn't worry yourself with it. It's mostly just a thread letting people work feelings out on their own. We just did all that great digging on April the other day and I would have hated for it to go to waste!

The players you hang around don't have very good info since he didn't play at a junior college.   Anyway, Jeremiah April. Here are the threads about him, a lot of them about why he isn't getting more minutes, including rumors (that I've heard elsewhere) about his not meeting practice expectations. Then, from the Transfers and Targets thread, a tweet from about two months ago when April visited Georgetown (and the link to the post there where I ask where April is because he is not playing at a junior college).   So, cool.   https://btownbanners.com/topic/5176-2014-c-jeremiah-april-to-iu   https://btownbanners.com/topic/7555-jeremiah-april-to-transfer   https://btownbanners.com/topic/6776-april   https://btownbanners.com/topic/6037-april-still-in-boot   https://btownbanners.com/topic/5880-jeremiah-april-in-boot   https://btownbanners.com/topic/9074-hoosier-transfers-and-recruiting-targets/page-27#entry250377  

Thanks for sharing '66. That was a great article. I knew there was some story behind how OG started playing that was interesting, but I couldn't remember what, I'm glad this article filled in the gaps. And it's cool hearing some about how Crean acts v. other coaches act from the kids. I feel like we don't see that much.   But man, think about the "What if?" if he had gone to Iowa instead.

I know. But, the previous unbalanced schedule was better. It certainly wasn't perfect, but we had what, 7 home-and-homes and 4 either/ors instead of 6 and 6? I hate playing a team only once in the conference season, now we do it for almost half of the conference teams.

Let's not forget it started on Wednesday at 4:30. So, people like Treesh who would attend if they were nearby and could score some cheap seats aren't going because they're still at work and no one from Minnesota or Illinois is using 3 vacation days to travel to Indy to watch their team lose in an early round. Students won't even come because they have class.   This stupid 5 day BTT is a hot circle of garbage. It took the worst day of the BTT, made it even worse, and then moved it earlier in the week. Anyone who shows up is really dedicated to their team, loves basketball and works odd hours, or stupid.   Personally, I blame the fact that we let that crapbox Rutgers into the Big Ten. Yet another thing they ruined with their existence. Oh, how is the barely unbalanced schedule going where we play almost all teams twice? OH WAIT! THANKS AGAIN RUTGERS!   I would politely ask Rutgers and Nebraska to leave the Big Ten. If the "but, Nebraska was already here" crowd is too powerful to keep Maryland, then I'll accept losing Maryland if it means getting rid of Rutgers. They don't belong here and no one wants them here. I hate Rutgers.   And it's not even a fun rivalry hate where "oh you guys beat us in Basketball, I totally hate you!" and maybe we can satisfy it later. I hate their existence and presence in the Conference.

April is the hardest to tell of all of them in my opinion. Did we bump his thread? He has like 5 threads actually, I'll bump them tonight, I think I have them open.   His tape and limited minutes showed he had ability, he had been playing for a fair amount of time, and he had some real schools sniffing after him, not just us. But, he hung out in the walking boot of doom for awhile, then we kept hearing about how he was not meeting expectations in practice, then he was gone. Word on the street is he just took a visit to somewhere legit too.   I have trouble believing he was Creaned just for his scholarship because he wasn't good enough. If so, we wouldn't have Priller still. I think there was a personality clash that made him never be a good fit which combined with not having PT to make it so he didn't stick around. I still think we'll see him play in the Tourney before his eligibility runs out (unless he quit basketball entirely).   That's the problem with having this argument about "potential" now anyway. It's one thing with graduated players, but kids with another 2-3 years of eligibility left are a different story. Look at the developmental changes Z3 or Maximus made with the latter half of their eligibility. I don't think it's unreasonable to think one of the transfers with potential will do the same wherever they end up.

Saw some calls for a thread to talk about the BTT games themselves. Probably could have just gone in the College Basketball Thread but here we are.   On right now: Minnesota is a sad sad team and Illinois is not being very nice about it.

To answer your direct question, yes it is.   KenPom has conference play only stats for each team. They are disfavored for this kind of thing because, well mostly because it's a lot more work to get them. You can export the data for his main stats in one click but he does not have easily accessible conference only data. It would have to be manually entered into a spreadsheet. Also, they're disfavored because they're not adjusted stats.   Overall though, there is no need to game the numbers. These statistics simply are not useful for predictive purposes; they can tell us we're less likely to win than others, but they can't tell us if we'll win. The reason teams with top defenses usually win is those teams win each of their match-ups.  Indiana's defense is relevant to the point it changes whether we win or lose an individual game. For any given game, a team with a better defense has a greater probability of winning, especially in later rounds as the gaps between the teams reduce.   I'll tell you this much either way. The sheet linked above and under discussion is from before last year's Tourney and was created and designed to isolate the common traits of winning teams in order to better predict Champions, Cinderellas, and Final Four teams. How did it do? Not so good. Duke was not in the pool of 14 potential champions because it had an AdjDE of 57. So, don't let statistics make you think any result is impossible. With the right match-ups, we can certainly be champions. With the wrong ones, we can hope for any given 40 minutes.

Yeah. KenPom's free stats are through the last game played.

Yes, but you stopped talking ranking and started talking AdjDE and AdjOE, which is what my comment was about.   Also, Duke was 57th a week from now last year and improved to 12th during the tourney.