Michael Strahan’s alma mater in Houston
I agree, give me LSU. Anyone who lost to Kentucky this year (let alone by double digits) doesn’t scare me.
I understand that people are discounting Michigan because of the Livers injury, but to do so is a mistake. They still have Dickinson who is a really tough guard for most teams, a lottery pick who is also their best defender and a ready made replacement who shot 39.5% from three. Will they miss Livers if he doesn’t come back? Absolutely. Can they still get to the final four? Absolutely. They can beat anyone.
A little scouting here on Mt Saint Mary (super slow pace) and Texas Southern (has a go to scorer.)
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One downside of the whole tournament being in Indy is that if Michigan wins on Saturday we most likely will not have seen much of the LSU/St Bonaventure game since it starts at 1:45. At least we know with certainty that the Michigan game will start at 3:00pm since there isn’t a game at Mackey before then.
I’m even more comfortable after seeing OSU take Illinois to OT. I figured we were just keeping up because they were tired and that our game wasn’t a good indication of post-Livers life. But Illinois is on fire and OSU was right with them. I know matchups are different and that doesn’t mean we would have gone to OT with Illinois, but just in terms of having the horses to compete, I think that final proved we’re still right there, especially since we played so terrible in the semi.
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Smith/Brooks/Brown/Wagner/Dickinson is just as good, if not better, of a 5 man lineup than any of the 2 seeds have.
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unfortunately that group played about 3 minutes together last game. But it was a weird game so we’ll see what the lineup is moving forward
Yeah, the key will be to actually have them play together. We just can’t afford foul trouble and playing suboptimal lineups anymore.
I think (hope) that was just a product of the short turnaround following Livers’ injury and not needing to play that game like it was do-or-die. I’m really banking on the coaching staff now recognizing that there is nothing to hold back for and playing the best lineup for the longest possible duration. Hopefully, Martelli is in Howard’s ear reminding him that NCAA Tournament games have longer commercial and (I think) halftime breaks.
They also have more time to think about what they think their best lineups are
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I do think we’ll see a lot more of the Smith/Brooks/Franz/Brown/Hunter lineup in the tournament. IIRC we closed the game with Williams in over Johns for key possessions down the stretch, and I’d have to imagine if Franz hadn’t fouled out he’d be in there instead. Now that we’re in do or die time I’d guess that lineup will be out there the plurality of the time.
With regards to second round opponents, I know it’s been mentioned already but both the teams we’re playing already play super short benches. On that end it’s nice for us because at least our second round team won’t be able to throw multiple endless bodies out there on short rest, but also on the whole it scares me. Come tournament time short benches are my preferred mode of operating, play your best players more.
The Bonnies basically don’t play a bench, they played 7, 8 and 8 guys in their conference tourney games. In the first round against Duquesne, a 16 point win, they played 14 bench minutes. In the final they played 17, and it looks like a little of that was foul trouble based. That’s great if we can get them in foul trouble, but considering our offensive FT rate is 241st nationally I don’t think that’s likely, especially since they have a top 100 defensive FT rate. Also I don’t have a stat to prove it but I assume a team like SBU ranks highly in the 2 foul participation stat.
LSU is similar on that end but a better matchup IMO. They played 7 guys against Alabama, 8 in the semi’s and 9 in the quarter finals. I assume that trends towards them playing fewer guys against us in a 2nd round matchup, but even when they played 2 bench players it was for 9 minutes each, so more combined minutes than what SBU was doing. They played their bench for 33 minutes against Arkansas, which is similar to what we did vs OSU (3 guys for 44 minutes but 12 of those were Williams which I assume gets reduced if Franz isn’t fouled out). But LSU doesn’t play defense to begin with, 4 of their 8 guys who play at least 30% of minutes commit 4.7 fouls/40 or more, and they don’t have a single player taller than 6’9 who plays regularly (Watford who’s a wing). It seems like their natural matchup for Hunter is a 6’7 guy, so either open 3’s of the double or easy buckets/foul trouble for LSU on single coverage seem likely.
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Not the highest but definitely above the national average:
You will be unsurprised, no doubt, to see that Michigan is significantly on the low side, though this also qualifies as their second largest figure since it was first tracked in 2010 and is double last season’s):
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LSU’s defense PPG is ranked 280th which is bad! I have no idea if they will be able to match Dickinson’s size down low. Honestly, I rather have this draw compared to Illinois’s (their draw is brutal, they have the likes of Loyola Chicago, Houston, Ok State, Tennessee in their bracket)
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