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Post by Commissioner on Sept 14, 2019 12:06:28 GMT -5
This thread is where I'll place my 2019-20 Horizon League team previews. As in recent years, I'll open with just a little review of the league's top returning players in the various stat categories. These are the returning leaders in the major stat categories. I've used only conference play stats, which both evens things out for the competition played and perhaps better reflects who was playing well during the conference season, and hence is more likely to remain strong this coming year. Scoring | Avg. | 1. Antoine Davis, Detroit | 26.0 | 2. Loudon Love, Wright State | 16.6 | 3. Darius Quisenberry, Youngstown State | 16.3 | 4. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | 16.1 | 5. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | 15.9 | 6. Tarkus Ferguson, UIC | 14.9 | 7. Jalen Tate, Northern Kentucky | 14.9 | 8. Marcus Ottey, UIC | 14.6 | 8. Godwin Boahen, UIC | 14.6 | 10. Billy Wampler, Wright State | 14.4 | 11. Jayquan McCloud, Green Bay | 14.1 | 12. Tyler Sharpe, Northern Kentucky | 13.9 | 13. Jaalam Hill, Cleveland State | 13.5 | 14. Brad Brechting, Oakland | 13.4 | 15. DeAndre Abram, Milwaukee | 13.2 | 16. Jaylen Minnet, IUPUI | 12.3 | *17. Rashad Williams, Oakland | 12.2 | 18. Tank Hemphill, Green Bay | 11.3 | 19. Cole Gentry, Wright State | 11.2 | 20. Dantez Walton, Northern Kentucky | 10.9 |
*Probable redshirt as transfer from Cleveland State. The league’s 3-4-5 scorers—Tyree Appleby, Camron Justice, and Jaevin Cumberland—all transferred out. The league still manages to return 14 of the top 20 scorers.Rebounding | Avg. | 1. Loudon Love, Wright State | 7.6 | 2. Naz Bohannon, Youngstown State | 7.6 | 3. Tarkus Ferguson, UIC | 7.2 | 4. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | 7.1 | 5. Brad Brechting, Oakland | 6.9 | 6. DeAndre Abram, Milwaukee | 6.2 | 7. Elyjah Goss, IUPUI | 5.9 | *8. Jordan Blount, UIC | 5.8 | 9. Jaalam Hill, Cleveland State | 5.4 | 10. Tank Hemphill, Green Bay | 5.4 | 11. Marquis Moore, Detroit | 5.0 | 12. Harrison Curry, Detroit | 4.9 | 13. Deante Johnson, Cleveland State | 4.8 | 14. Dantez Walton, Northern Kentucky | 4.6 | 15. Jalen Tate, Northern Kentucky | 4.6 |
*Possible injury redshirt in 2019-20 Here the league returns 10 of the 20 top, not including UIC’s Jordan Blount, who will likely miss the whole season after an ACL tear. After Drew McDonald, who graduated after leading the league last year, the next 5 return.Assists | Avg. | 1. Tarkus Ferguson, UIC | 5.0 | 2. Darius Quisenberry, Youngstown State | 4.4 | 3. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | 4.2 | 4. Jalen Tate, Northern Kentucky | 4.2 | 5. Godwin Boahen, UIC | 3.8 | 6. Antoine Davis, Detroit | 3.5 | 7. Cole Gentry, Wright State | 3.0 | 8. Dantez Walton, Northern Kentucky | 2.8 | 8. Jayquan McCloud, Green Bay | 2.8 | 10. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | 2.7 | 11. Kasheem Thomas, Cleveland State | 2.7 | 12. Naz Bohannan, Youngstown State | 2.6 | 13. Grant Weatherford, IUPUI | 2.5 | 14. Devin Morgan, Youngstown State | 2.2 | 15. Marcus Ottey, UIC | 2.1 | 15. Jaylen Minnett, IUPUI | 2.1 |
Only 2 of the top 15 graduated, but 4 more transferred. Blocks | Avg. | 1. Jaalam Hill, Cleveland State | 1.3 | 2. Amir Allen, Milwaukee | 1.1 | 3. Brad Brechting, Oakland | 1.1 | 4. Rob Howard, UIC | 1.0 | 5. Jalen Tate, Northern Kentucky | 0.9 | 5. Jacob Wiley, UIC | 0.9 | 7. Elyjah Goss, IUPUI | 0.8 | 8. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | 0.8 | 8. Kameron Hankerson, Green Bay | 0.8 | 10. Olamide Pedersen, Youngstown State | 0.7 | 11. Loudon Love, Wright State | 0.7 | 11. Tank Hemphill, Green Bay | 0.7 | 13. DeAndre Abram, Milwaukee | 0.7 | 13. Tarkas Ferguson, UIC | 0.7 | 13. Paul Djoko, Northern Kentucky | 0.6 |
11 of the top 15 return.Steals | Avg. | 1. Tarkus Ferguson, UIC | 1.8 | 2. Darius Quisenberry, Youngstown State | 1.7 | 3. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | 1.4 | 4. Tyler Sharpe, Northern Kentucky | 1.4 | 5. Grant Weatherford, IUPUI | 1.2 | 5. Godwin Boahen, UIC | 1.2 | *7. Jordan Blount, UIC | 1.2 | 8. Cole Gentry, Wright State | 1.1 | 8. Marcus Ottey, UIC | 1.1 | 10. Marquis Moore, Detroit | 1.1 | 11. Jelani Simmons, Youngstown State | 1.1 | 11. Kameron Hankerson, Green Bay | 1.1 | 13. Dantez Walker, Northern Kentucky | 1.0 | 14. Antoine Davis, Detroit | 0.9 | 14. Jalaam Hill, Cleveland State | 0.9 |
FG Percentage | Pct. | 1. Brad Brechting, Oakland | .633 | 2. Jalaam Hill, Cleveland State | .616 | 3. Jalen Tate, Northern Kentucky | .593 | 4. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | .551 | 5. Tank Hemphill, Green Bay | .531 | 6. Loudon Love, Wright State | .506 | *7. Jordan Blount, UIC | .495 | 8. Kameron Hankerson, Green Bay | .482 | 9. Naz Bohannon, Youngstown State | .480 | 10. Marcus Ottey, UIC | .463 |
*Possible injury redshirt 3 Point FG Pct. | Pct. | 1. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | .450 | *2. Rashad Williams, Oakland | .434 | 3. Michael Akuchie, Youngstown State | .415 | 4. Jamie Ahale, UIC | .407 | 5. Garrett Covington, Youngstown | .400 | 5. Jelani Simmons, Youngstown | .400 | 7. Kameron Hankerson, Green Bay | .381 | 8. JayQuan McCloud, Green Bay | .376 | 9. Antoine Davis, Detroit | .362 | 10. Godwin Boahen, UIC | .358 |
Free Throw Pct. | Pct. | 1. Cole Gentry, Wright State | .911 | 2. Jaylen Minnett, IUPUI | .864 | 3. Godwin Boahen, UIC | .863 | 4. Antoine Davis, Detroit | .854 | 5. Tyler Sharpe, Northern Kentucky | .843 | 6. Darius Quisenberry, Youngstown State | .837 | 7. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | .814 | 8. JayQuan McCloud, Green Bay | .806 | 9. Brad Brechting, Oakland | .794 | 9. Billy Wampler, Wright State | .794 |
Minutes | Avg. | 1. Antoine Davis, Detroit | 37.9 | 2. Tarkus Ferguson, UIC | 37.2 | 3. Darius Roy, Milwaukee | 35.9 | 4. Godwin Boahen, UIC | 34.3 | 5. DeAndre Abram, Milwaukee | 33.4 | 6. Tyler Sharpe, Northern Kentucky | 33.3 | 7. Cole Gentry, Wright State | 33.0 | 8. Marcus Ottey, UIC | 31.8 | 9. Xavier Hill-Mais, Oakland | 30.5 | 10. Darius Quisenberry, Youngstown State | 29.5 |
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Post by Commissioner on Sept 14, 2019 21:52:06 GMT -5
Here are 10 incoming transfers to watch in the HL this year:
Jordan Ash, 6-3 G, Wright State. Northwestern grad transfer. A 3-star recruit out of high school, Ash played in a lot of games at Northwestern (80 in first three years) without logging a lot of minutes. He had started twice last year when an injury ended his season after 10 games. He never averaged more than 2.1 ppg at Northwestern, but he was respected, and the team captain. He should contribute and add more leadership to a veteran Wright State team.
Marcus Burk, 6-3 G, IUPUI. Transfer from Campbell did his transfer redshirt last year. He averaged 15.1 ppg, and shot 41% from three for Campbell in 2018. The Big South is still a lesser league than the Horizon, but those are impressive numbers. With Cameron Justice deserting IUPUI and star freshman recruit Calvin Temple going elsewhere after the late August termination of Coach Gardner, Burk will get lots of playing time, and he can score.
Brad Calipari, 6-0 G, Detroit. Grad transfer from Kentucky. Is Calipari any good? I don't know. His high school recruiting was apparently cut short by the presumption he'd play for his father at Kentucky, but before that he reportedly had an offer from Massachusetts. Is he walking on at Detroit because he didn't merit a scholarship, or because he didn't need it financially and he and his Dad decided to take one for old friend Mike Davis and the Titan team? Word is he can shoot the lights out, though it didn't show in his very sparse playing time as a walk-on Wildcat. But with the Calipari name, he'll draw attention every time he steps on the floor, and his practice opposition the last three years has probably been better than anything he'll see in the Horizon.
Harrison Henderson, Jr., 6-10 C, Milwaukee. A transfer from USC, Henderson was 3-start recruit out of HS. He never got going at USC, but there aren't a lot of 3-star, 6-10 players in the HL.
Kevin Kangu, Jr., 6-4 G, Oakland. Kangu was the starting PG on Vincennes national juco champs last year, and apparently played well in OU's summer trip to Greece. OU has a big void at point with Braden Norris's desertion, and Kangu will be first up to fill it. In Kampe's point guard-oriented offensive scheme, he could put up big numbers.
Te'Jon Lucas, 6-2 G, Milwaukee. Junior transfer from Illinois started 19 games in 2018, averaging 5.7 ppg, 3.2 apg). He led Illini in assists per game each of first two years, and should be one of the HL's better point guards. I'm a little surprised he hasn't shown up yet on pre-season all-conference teams, but that may be sloppy research by the national publications.
B.J. Maxwell, 6-4 G, Detroit. A grad transfer, Maxwell averaged 9.2 points and 4.7 rebounds per game last year. In 3 years at Abilene Christian he made over 40% of his three point attempts and over 55% of his two point shots.
Justin Miller, 6-7 F, Detroit. It looks like Miller will be eligible this year. Last year, at Louisiana, he averaged 9 points and 7.4 rebounds. In 97 games over 3 years, he averaged 9.1 points and 5.4 rebounds. He'll help Detroit underneath.
Daniel Oladapo, 6-8 F, Oakland. Oladapo has a P6 build, and averaged 14.6 points as a freshman at Chipola JC last year.
Torey Patton, 6-5 G, Cleveland State. Patton started at Akron, playing in 32 games in 2018 and averaging 3.3 points and 3.1 rebounds. He then spent last season at Indian Hills, a top juco program, where we was honorable mention all-America, averaging 15 points and 8.3 rebounds. In high school, he was a two-time All-State player and Ohio D-II Player of the Year as a senior. Cleveland State certainly has playing time available.
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Post by Commissioner on Sept 15, 2019 21:31:59 GMT -5
Five Freshmen to Watch this year in the Horizon:
Amari Davis, 6-4 G, Green Bay. A two-time first-team all-stater, Davis led his team to the Ohio Division II championship last year, and was named Player of the Year. Davis averaged 30 points per game as a senior. Davis will have to fight for playing time with seniors Kam Hankerson and JaQuan McCloud and junior PJ Pipes, but his style is well-suited for Linc Darner's up-tempo offense.
John Harge, 6-8 F, Northern Kentucky. Harge is the son and grandson of former pros, so he ought to have some basketball smarts. He spent last season at Hillcrest Prep, averaging 20 points and 8 rebounds. With the graduation of Drew McDonald and Chris Vogt's transfer to Cincinnati, the Norse need size, and Harge should get a chance to play.
Tanner Holden, 6-6 F, Wright State. Holden's problem may be getting playing time on a deep Wright State team. But Holden drew rave reviews from Coach Nagy on the Raiders' Italy trip this year. He's a good all-around athlete who could have played collegiate football, and he's got a good mid-major game as a large guard or a quick small forward. He averaged 25 points and 11 rebounds as a high school senior, and had offers from a bunch of MAC teams and CUSA member Marshall.
Shae Mitchell, 6-7 F, Milwaukee. Mitchell was ranked a 4-star recruit by ESPN. That was too high, but he also got three stars from Rivals and 247 Sports, and had offers from multiple MVC schools. P6 schools scouted him but the consensus was he too slight for the top conferences. I thought he'd help Milwaukee last year, but instead he redshirted and reportedly has added weight and muscle.
Jamail Pink, 6-1 G, Detroit. Jamail Pink was drawing national attention in junior high, but then he sort of fell off the radar, playing at a small Lutheran school and then spending last year under the tutelage of John Lucas. Pink is tough to predict, but he's got interesting bloodlines, as the nephew of Clyde Drexler.
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 7, 2019 23:15:56 GMT -5
Here's our first team preview. We'll do these more or less from bottom to top as they are appearing in pre-season rankings, but saving our Titans for last. Cleveland State
We Wasn’t Felton’ Good About Our Future2019: 10-21 Overall, 5-13 Horizon (9th); NET 283 Cleveland State enters the season with the 4th longest active winning streak in NCAA Division I—two games. Click on graph to enlargeAfter just two seasons, the Dennis Felton era collapsed at Cleveland State this summer in a flurry of transfers. It’s not entirely clear what happened. Felton’s teams hadn’t had much success on the court (just 22-44 overall), but he was assembling some decent talent, including Tyree Appleby, a second team all-conference player as a soph last year, and all-freshman team member Rashad Williams. Despite a generally dismal season, the Vikings won four of their last six. With all of their top 8 scorers and top 9 rebounders set to return, and St. Francis transfer Rasheem Dunn (15.4 ppg in 2018) ready to go, CSU looked to be a school on the upswing. The first rumblings that something might be up came on June 13, when Williams announced he would transfer. But Williams had some apparent family reasons for the move, and no one thought too much about it. A blow to the program, to be sure, but hardly a catastrophe. Within the week the Vikings signed guard Torrey Patton, an honorable mention all-american at Indian Hills CC, a top juco program, and Abou Ousmane, a 6-9 center from New York. June 24 then brought good news and bad news—Furman grad transfer Jalen Williams committed to CSU, but forward Seth Millner, after a solid freshman season (7.1 ppg, 4.7 rpg) in which he had started 30 games, entered the transfer portal. Then, on June 27, all hell broke loose, the public learning from this tweet from Coaching Changes about a possible mutiny of CSU’s top players: Four days later Appleby and forward Jalaam Hill (11.2 ppg, 6.1 rpb) entered the transfer portal, and the rush was on. By mid-July Cleveland State was left with 3 scholarship players not already gone or in the portal. In early July Felton was hauled off the recruitment trail, called back to Cleveland, and fired. We may never know what exactly went on at CSU, but obviously some tipping point was reached. It can’t be the two-year W-L record. Bad as it was, everybody knew Felton had a rebuilding job, and again, he was getting some talented players in. Scott Garrett was named AD at the end of the first week of April, and well into June all seemed well. So it would seem to be something that affected the athletes, because that’s where the revolt began. Yet one suspects it wasn’t just a question of style, discipline, or personality. Buying out Felton would have cost CSU over $1 million. Given the lateness of the player revolt, you have to think they’d likely have bitten the bullet for at least one more season. But CSU pulled Felton off the recruiting trail and fired him very late in the off-season to try to hire a new coach and do a rebuild. It really looks like something nasty—perhaps something that kept them from having to buy out the contract, which they really couldn’t afford to do. And Garnett’s parting statement hints at that, and none too subtly: “[We] operate with the expectation that [coaches] should build a culture supportive of our student-athletes in the classroom, accountable for their conduct as representatives of the University, and for their performance on the court.” That sounds like it was more than winning just 22 games in two years, or even having a player revolt. In any case, under the circumstances Garrett probably got about as good a hire as possible in Florida State assistant Dennis Gates. Gates wasted no time. He managed to talk Jalaam Hill, Jalen Williams, and sophomore forward Spider Johnson out of the portal, keep Patton to his commitment, and add a several recruits who at least fit the description “intriguing”—not bad for a guy who was hired almost two months later into the season than Mike Davis was last year at Detroit. The Vikings are being pretty uniformly picked for last in the Horizon, but they do still have some talent. And it usually seems, in the HL, that when everybody picks a team for last, that team does a bit better than expected, if not exactly “well.” Gates has a plausible starting five returning. Senior point guard Kash Thomas (5.8 ppg, 2.9 apg) is a solid player who has started 57 games at CSU and averaged over 20 minutes per game in each of his three seasons. Thomas also made 41% of his three point attempts last year, a big improvement from his first two seasons. Under the circumstances, CSU also has a pretty good collection of big men for Thomas to feed. That include Hill, a 6-7, 225 lb. junior who averaged 11.2 points and 6.1 rebounds last year, the latter number good for 9th in the league; one-time Titan target and DePaul transfer, 6-8, 250 lb. Al Eichelberger (5.8 points, 2.9 rebounds per game); and 6-9 Detroit Edison grad Deonte “Spider” Johnson, a soph who started a few games last year. Behind them is likely to be the 6-8, 240 lb. Furman grad transfer Jaylen Williams, who should at least bring a winning attitude—Furman won 71 games in his three years on the roster. My best guess is that Torrey Patton, a 6-5 junior, will claim the #2 guard position. The 6-5 Patton began at Akron, averaging 3.3 points and 3.1 rebounds in 30 games in 2018. Last year he played at Indian Hills, one of the top juco programs, and All-America honorable mention on 15 points and 8.3 rebounds per game. Gates also pulled in trio of high scoring juco guards and a left-handed freshman from Portugal, Hugo Ferreira. One thing that’s a bit of a shame is that CSU probably won’t be in a position to take advantage of one of the league’s more interesting non-conference schedules. They’ve got DePaul at home, and while it’s “just DePaul,” that’s the only P6 team that will appear on a Horizon team’s regular home court this year. They’ve also got home games with good, in-state rival in Toledo, CUSA member Florida International, and frequently suggested Horizon expansion candidate Robert Morris, from the Cleveland metro area’s hated rival Pittsburgh. Their road schedule includes nearby Kent State, which is always solid, and a couple of games against P6 teams—Minnesota and South Carolina—that would be very winnable for a good Horizon team, but probably not for CSU this year. It's almost impossible for the sane prognosticator not to pick the Vikings for last, but I suspect they'll win a couple more games than people think. Probable StartersPG – Kasheem Thomas, 6-0 Sr. (5.8 ppg, 2.9 apg, 41.3% 3PtFG) SG – Torey Patton, 6-5 Jr (15.0 ppg, 8.3 rpg at Indian Hills CC; 3.3 ppg and 3.1 rpg at Akron in 2018) F – Jalaam Hill, 6-7 Sr (11.2 ppg, 6.3 rpg, 1.1 bpg, 59.1% FG) PF – Al Eichelberger, 6-8 RS Jr. (5.2 ppg, 3.2 rpg) F – Deante “Spider” Johnson 6-9 Soph. (2.6 ppg, 4.0 rpg) Key Bench Players G – Tyrese Potemra, 5-11 Soph. (18.8 ppg, 3.1 apg, 45.2% 3PtFG at Laramie County CC) G – Tre Gomillion, 6-4 Soph.. (13.7 ppg, 6.5 rpg, 3.4 apg, 58% FG at Gordon State CC) G – Craig Beaudion, 6-3 Jr. (14.4 ppg at Colby CC) F – Jaylen Williams, 6-8 RS Sr. (1.4 ppg, 1.8 rpg at Furman) F – Daylen Williams, 6-8 Fr.
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 9, 2019 9:22:54 GMT -5
IUPUI[2019: 16-17 overall, 8-10 Horizon (8th), NET 197 Nine of IUPUI’s conference losses were by single digits, including five of the final six conference losses by 5 points or less. Click on graph to enlargeSOS: IUPUI to ICUAn outside observer looking in would see three, and possibly four, Horizon teams in considerable disarray—Detroit (on APR probation, on top of a third straight 20-loss season), Cleveland State (with a late July coaching change and a mass transfer exodus), and IUPUI (big losses and the coach leaving in late August after a DUI) would head the list, with Milwaukee (63 losses in three years, including 11 straight to end last season) not far behind. All four appear to have stabilized a bit, but if they don’t show improvement, the HL will have so many NET anchors that its post-season opportunities and seedings could be quite limited. For IUPUI, last year should have been the breakthrough year after 7 straight losing seasons. The Jaguars entered the year as the 70th most-experienced team in the country, and they had both size and offensive firepower. But the Jags’ veteran lineup couldn’t win the close games and finished with 8 losses in their final 10 games. Overall, IUPUI was 6-14 in games decided by 10 points or less; late in the Horizon season, they lost consecutive games by 1, 2, and 3 points. Their .500 record was still enough for a CIT bid, but all that did was give them a loss to Marshall (by 5 points) for an eighth consecutive losing season. As is common for a veteran team, the Jags were hit hard by graduation, losing starters Evan Hall and D.J. McCall, along with 7-1 center Ahmed Ismail, who made ten starts. But they were also hit by transfers: Nick Rogers, a back-up guard who nailed the game-clinching trey in the Jaguars’ big non-conference win last year over Boston College, and Camron Justice, their leading scorer and a second-team All-Conference selection, both flew the coop as well. When Gardner resigned, guard Calvin Temple--perhaps the best 2019 recruit in the Horizon--decided to re-open his recruitment. And mysteriously disappearing from the roster in August was Jack Hansen, who played in 31 games as a freshman and would have been the team’s tallest returning player. No word on what happened there. There is word on what happened with Camron Justice, and I’ll comment here on that. Last December, the Indy Star www.indystar.com/story/sports/2018/12/06/vandy-transfer-camron-justice-leading-iupui-mens-basketball-kentucky/2201680002/ ran a piece on Justice that began thusly: Camron Justice had spoken to his father, Raymond, just about every day during his first two years at Vanderbilt University, but this conversation was different. Raymond Justice sensed that something was off with his son. The confidence and enthusiasm in his voice had disappeared. The player who bugged him to go to the gym before the morning pot of coffee was done brewing didn't want to step foot in the gym anymore. The player who made 200 to 300 3-pointers a day was no longer concerned with perfecting his technique. His son was drained mentally and broken physically. ... every day, Camron seemed less and less like his old self. "At the time I could see his demise," the elder Justice said. So just before Christmas during his sophomore year, Camron packed his belongings and left Tennessee. He headed back to southeastern Kentucky.The piece goes on to talk about how injuries plagued him and forced him out of the rotation; his grueling rehab; how the coach who recruited him left for another job; how he couldn’t relate to new coach Bryce Drew’s system and couldn’t work back into the rotation. It continues: The former basketball superstar began questioning everything. Should he have opted for surgery sooner? Was coming to Vanderbilt the right decision? Did he want to play college basketball at all? "I felt like I was at a time where I was struggling," he said. "It was crazy for me because I was struggling to find passion to go to the gym. ...
"I found out a lot about myself during that down time," he said. "Obviously when I made the change and decided where I wanted to go, coach [Jason] Gardner told me straight from the jump, 'I'm going to let you do what you do this year. Find your mojo. Get your swagger back.' "I really think he was a backbone. Letting me go back out there and find out that I could still play the game at a high level."Justice repaid Gardner by transferring to Western Kentucky as a grad transfer after the season. "Thanks, Coach, for turning my life and game around. I'm outta here. One more year would just be too much for me to take or you to expect." I understand that coaches leave the kids they’ve recruited for better jobs; that the kids gotta look out for themselves; that they may have family or other concerns. But really, Justice had no more loyalty than that for the Coach who turned his career back around? It’s not like he left for a P6 school. Western Kentucky is a better program in a better conference than IUPUI and the Horizon, but Is he really more likely to launch a pro career from WKU than IUPUI? Or even reach the NCAA tournament? Was it family? According to Googlemaps, IUPUI is just under five hours drive from his home; WKU is just under 4 hours. An hour. Hey, that's nearly 5 percent of a day. If he’s thinking about his post-basketball future, IUPUI is probably a better school than WKU. I don’t know Justice or his circumstances, so I don’t want to be too judgmental. But you have to wonder if maybe Justice didn’t owe Gardner a little more than to split as soon as the 2019 season ended. Anyway, on to the future. IUPUI was, as noted, already hurting when Coach Jason Gardner resigned at the end of August after being charged with DUI. Jaguar AD Rod Perry moved quickly to make assistant Byron Rimm the interim head. Rimm previously spent 10 years as head coach at one of the most thankless jobs in the nation, Prairie View. When Rimm started there, Prairie View had had just 1 winning season in 26 years in Division I. In fact, they’d had just 5 seasons with even double-digit win totals. Rimm got the Panthers to two winning seasons, and 7 with double-digit wins, in his first nine years, but he got the axe when his last team collapsed back to a 1-18 start. Now Rimm does have two returning starters in guard Grant Weatherford, a good defensive player who picks his spots on offense, and forward Elijah Goss, who led the team in rebounding last season. He also has junior guard Jaylen Minnett, the Horizon’s Sixth Man of the Year, and adds guard Marcus Burk, a transfer who averaged 14.8 points with Campbell in 2018. The obvious move for Rimm is to put Minnett into the starting lineup next to Weatherford, with Burk as the first man off the bench. Given Minnett’s effective in the 6th man position, however, he may start Burk ahead of Minnett, with the latter still getting 25 minutes per game. He could start all three-they're clearly three of his five best players based on past performance--but I wouldn’t expect to see the three on the court together often, as the 6-3 Burk is the tallest of the group, and at Prairie View Rimm showed a preference for a traditional 2-1-2 lineup. Up front, the Jags need a big year from Goss. Another likely starter is junior Isaiah Williams. The 6-8, 225 lb. Williams has an impressive physique, but he’s been a roamer—he redshirted at Akron in 2017, played at Liberty in 2018 (4.2 ppg, 2.2 rpg), and spent last season at Pensacola State JC in Florida. So IUPUI is his 4th school in 4 years. Other options are 6-9 grad transfer Zo Tyson, who barely played last season at Colorado State (0.8 ppg, 1.1 rpg in 13 games), 6-10 soph Brandon Kenyon, who played in just 7 games last year, and 6-8 junior Jakoby Kemp, who appeared in 6 games last year. Kenyon may get first crack since Rimm showed a tendency to prefer having a traditional center while at Prairie View. IUPUI has a sound backcourt. Another thing they have going is that they are an older team--almost all key players are juniors or seniors, and several of them are redshirts, giving them an extra year of maturity and development. Older teams do well in mid-major ranks. But the talent looks sparse, and they desperately need a couple guys to step up in the front court to be a factor in the Horizon. Overall, it looks like another thankless job for Rimm and another long season in Indy. A lot of Horizon fans spent the last 4 years needlessly freaking out about the UD/Oakland "home court advantage" in playing the Conference tournament in Detroit. Now they're freaking out about playing the tournament on the Jags home court in Indianapolis. In 2020, it's highly doubtful they've anything to worry about. Probable Starters[/b] PG – Grant Weatherford, 6-2 RS Jr. (6.2 ppg, 3.0 rpg, 2.5 apg). SG – Jaylen Minnett, 6-1 Jr. (12.0 ppg, 31.6% 3PtFG) F – Elijah Goss, 6-7 RS Jr. (6.8 ppg, 6.3 rpg) F – Isaiah Williams, 6-8 RS Jr. (4.2 ppg, 2.2 rpg at Liberty in 2018) F – Zo Tyson, 6-9 RS Sr. (0.8 ppg, 1.1 rpg at Colorado State) Key ReservesG – Marcus Burk, 6-3 RS Jr. (14.8 ppg, 40.3% 3PtFG at Campbell in 2018) G – Jamil Jackson, 6-6 RS Jr. (2.8 ppg before injury in 6th game of season at Southern Utah in 2018). F – Jakoby Kemp, 6-8 RS Jr. (2.8 ppg, 1.3 rpg in 6 games) C – Brandon Kenyon, 6-10 Soph. (2.6 ppg, 1.1 rpg in 7 games)
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 10, 2019 9:35:23 GMT -5
Milwaukee2019: 9-22 Overall, 4-14 Horizon (10th), NET #299 Milwaukee’s 11 straight losses are the second longest streak in school history, after a 14 game streak in 1998. It’s the 6th longest current losing streak in the country. Click on graph to enlargeNow Arriving at Panther Arena, Transfer Station for the Big 10, Big East, ACC, and Most Any Other Conference You Might Think OfGranted that we live in the transfer era, it seems like few mid-major leagues get whacked as regularly as the Horizon. I don’t know if that’ really true, or I just notice HL transfers out more because I follow the league much more closely than others. In any case, transfers out have certainly hindered the HL’s upward mobility. And few schools have been hit harder than Milwaukee. Twice in three years the Panthers lost their top three returning scorers to the transfer bug. After the 2018 season, five players who each averaged over 19 minutes per game transferred from Milwaukee, including those top 3 scorers (Jeremiah Bell to UAB, Brock Stull to Minnesota—where he was apparently locked up and never heard from again--and Bryce Nze to Butler), top rebounder (Nze), and top assist man (Stull). A sixth, Carson Warren-Newsome, was averaging 9 points and 3.8 rebounds when he transferred midway through last season. That came just 2 years after the twenty-win 2016 team lost its top three returning scorers to transfer: Jordan Johnson (also the nation’s #2 assist man) to UNLV; Akeem Springs to Minnesota, and Austin Arians to Wake Forest. They also lost freshman JayQuan McCloud that year, who resurfaced last year as a 13.7 point scorer at conference rival Green Bay. This year, the Panthers finally hope to be on the receiving end of some major transfer talent. One is point guard Te’Jon Lucas, who led Illinois in assists in both 2017 and 2018. Lucas doesn’t have a three point shot and isn’t much of a scoring threat, but there’s little doubt that he’ll be one of the league’s best at running the offense. Blue Ribbon, the most serious of the national pre-season publications, projects him as the Horizon Newcomer of the Year. It’s an award the Horizon doesn’t actually have anymore (having gone to “Freshman of the Year” early this decade), but it’s still nice to be recognized. The other big transfer, literally as well as figuratively, is 6-10, 240 lb. Harrison Henderson, who comes in from USC. Henderson one of those guys who they describe as having played “sparingly,” which is to say, hardly at all, in two years at USC—a total of 76 minutes over two seasons. Still, he is big. I’m not at all sure that he’ll emerge as a starter, but he’ll get his chance. I’m not sure that Henderson will start because I’m not at all sure he’ll be more than an average player, despite his size and high school pedigree. If that’s the case, Baldwin may go with a smaller, more agile lineup. The guy who needs to step up to make that happen is 6-7 G/F Shae Mitchell. Mitchell is one of those guys who got early rave evaluations from the national scouting services (4 stars at ESPN, 3 at Rivals) but whose growth and progress halted in high school, so that in the end he was looking at mid-major offers. Still, there is some real promise there, and Mitchell used a redshirt freshman year to add 30 pounds to a slender frame. I like Mitchell and think he’ll be pretty good. However Baldwin configures the lineup, If he and Henderson were to both fulfill their early promise, Milwaukee will rise very quickly. A final newcomer to watch is guard Josh Thomas, a 15 ppg scorer in the juco ranks who has size (6-4, 205 lbs) and is said to be a good defensive player. These 4 join three returning starters, the best of whom is senior point guard Darius Roy. I’m somewhat surprised that Roy isn’t getting any mention on the pre-season all Horizon teams. Roy came in from the juco ranks last year and averaged 15.8 points, 4.1 rebounds, and 4.1 assists while shooting 41% from three. He also shot 84% from the foul line and was ironman on the court, averaging 35 minutes per game. Roy's not known for defense, but those stats still are indicative of a strong, all-around game and a dominant position in his team's offense. I'd take Roy over Tyler Sharpe for sure. 6-8 senior DeAndre Abram, the team’s #2 scorer and top rebounder, also returns. Abram loves to play the Titans—he scored 31 and 28 points against us in last year’s two games, but had just one other 20-point game against D-1 competition all year (20 against UMKC). The final returning starter is forward Amir Allen, who averaged over a block a game. A couple of role players, forwards Will Sessoms and Bobby Arthur-Williams, provide some bench depth. What Milwaukee lacks is scoring punch. The Panthers were far and away the lowest scoring team in the Horizon last year, and one of the worst shooting teams in the nation. Unfortunately for Panther fans, none of the newcomers really address that problem. The best bet to fix that would be more consistent play from Abram, who shot just 32% from behind the arc last year. That said, I think the Panthers are probably being underrated a bit by the early publications. The consensus seems to be for an 8th or 9th place finish. I think they’re better than that. It seems like most years in these previews I’m (correctly, as it usually turns out) warning Milwaukee fans that their team is not going to be as good as they think. Not this year, maybe because expectations seem to be so low. While the lack of proven scoring is an issue, this team has size and depth, and has several players who would be reasonable candidates for substantial improvement. This is a solid defensive squad, too. I wouldn’t put a top 5 finish out of the question, and if everything breaks right they could contend. More reinforcements arrive next year, notably 6-9 forward Vin Baker, a transfer from Boston College. And then there is still the hope that Class of ’21 forward Patrick Baldwin, Jr.—a kid sitting on offers from almost all of the sport’s blue bloods (Duke, UNC, Kentucky, UCLA, Kansas, and more) will pull a Ray McCallum and decide to play for Dear Old Dad. Milwaukee fans have been through the ringer the last few years (along with Detroit and CSU fans, we might note), but things are, I think, looking up. Probable StartersPG – Te’Jon Lucas, 6-2 RS Jr (5.7 ppg, 3.2 apg at Illinois in 2018) SG – Darius Roy, 6-2 Sr. (15.8 ppg, 4.1 rpg, 4.1 apg, 40.5% 3PtFG, 84.3% FT) SF – DeAndre Abram, 6-8 RS Sr. (12.1 ppg, 6.9 rpg) PF – Amir Allen, 6-8 Jr. (6.1 ppg, 4.3 rpg, 1.0 bpg) C- Harrison Henderson, 6-10 RS Jr. (1.3 ppg at USC in 2018) Key BenchG – Josh Thomas, 6-4 Jr. (15.3 ppg at Wabash CC) G – Arturo Bingham, 6-5 Soph. (6.4 ppg at SW Mississippi CC) G/F – Shae Mitchell, 6-7 RS Fr. F – Bobby Arthur-Williams, 6-7 Sr. (3.0 ppg, 3.0 rpg) F – Will Sessoms, 6-9 Sr. (3.7 pg, 2.6 rpg)
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 11, 2019 22:23:04 GMT -5
Youngstown State2019: 12-20 Overall, 8-10 Conference (6th), NET #262 The five current DI teams with lowest all-time winning percentages are, from the worst, Chicago State, Kennesaw State, Maryland-Eastern Shore, Prairie View, and Central Arkansas. YSU is 24th worst. Click on graph to enlargePigs Flying? Hell Freezing Over? A First Division Finish in Youngstown? In 2017, Youngstown hired Jerrod Calhoun to replace Jerry Slocum, and for the first time in memory there was a sense of energy in the YSU hoops program. A young coach who knew the area, and had been a successful D-II head coach and high major assistant, Calhoun actually seemed to think you could do something positive with YSU basketball. So far, Calhoun’s energy and spirit hasn’t shown up in results. The Penguins are just 20-44 in Calhoun’s tenure, and home attendance, after spiking in first year, fell by nearly 15% last year, to a level slightly below Slocum’s last season. That makes 2020 a big season for YSU. Will progress show up on the court? Or are the Penguins forever doomed to the bottom of the Horizon? The prognosticators are at least mildly bullish on YSU this year. The national magazines-Lindy’s, S&S, Blue Ribbon & Athlon—all project them for a 4th to 6th place finish, as do the guys at the HoriZone Roundtable. I’d probably join that consensus if I did rankings. Even a 6th place finish would be heady territory for the ‘Guins. They haven’t finished in the top 6 since 2013, nor in the top 5 since 2007, and have never cracked the top 4 in 18 seasons in the league. There’s reason to be optimistic. Youngstown got a little buzz last year when they won six straight late in the season. True, they then closed with 4 consecutive losses, but three of those were at co-champs Wright State and Northern Kentucky, and in the HL tournament against third place OU. Also, like IUPUI, they lost a lot of close games—7 of their conference losses were either in overtime, or be 8 points or less (though we should note that YSU’s late winning streak included also 4 wins by either 1 or 2 points). The Penguins were one of the youngest teams in the country last year—the 34th youngest per KenPom—and a year’s experience may lead to more wins in close games. YSU returns all of its rotation players, and adds forward Jamir Thomas, one of the top juco players in the country last year. The big surprise in 2019 was freshman guard Darius Quisenberry, who led YSU in scoring and assists and kept getting better as the year went on. Quiz averaged 9.7 points in the Penguins first 6 games; 11.1 in the second half of non-conference play; 14.1 in the first half of conference play, and 18.3 in the second half of conference play, including 30 point outbursts against UIC and Cleveland State. That got him second-team all-conference honors a year ago, and he’s in the top 3 among returning HL players in scoring, assists, and steals during conference play. Quisenberry’s fine season overshadowed fellow freshman guard Jelani Simmons, who also played well. The 6-5 Simmons averaged 8 points per game and knocked down over 40% of his three point attempts. Another big guard, 6-5 junior Garrett Covington, returns to round out the three-guard offense. Covington made the league’s all-defensive team last year, while averaging in double figures when YSU had the ball. The returning starters up front are junior Naz Bohannon and soph Olamide Pedersen. Bohannon, a bullish 6-6, 235 pounder, is one of the best offensive rebounders in the league- indeed, in the country, as he was 12th nationally in offensive boards per game. Pedersen, the team’s tallest player at 6-9, started 17 games last year. Although he may start, I’m going to guess that Jamir Thomas, a bruising 6-8, 250 lb forward, will start ahead of Pedersen. First, Pedersen didn't start any games, nor reach double digits in minutes played in any game, after January 31. Second, Thomas is good. He averaged 14.6 points and 7.3 rebounds at Garden City CC in New Jersey. Even if Pedersen regains his starting slot, Thomas will get plenty of minutes. YSU is also deep. In addition to whichever of Pedersen (or possibly Thomas), Calhoun can call on 6-8 Michael Akuchie in the front court. Akuchie was a back end rotation player last year, averaging 11 minutes. For backcourt depth, he’s got 6-5 senior Donel Cathcart, who started 7 games last season, and Devin Morgan, who started 6 games and was the team’s #3 scorer after Quisenberry and Covington. Junior Christian Bentley and soph Tyler Foster could also be a factors. Bentley started 11 games at Siena in 2018, then spent last year in the juco ranks. Foster—another big guard at 6-5—made 6 starts for East Carolina last year, and got a waiver making him immediately eligible. Covington notwithstanding, YSU’s problem last year was a very shaky defense. YSU was #338 in Ken Pomeroy’s defensive efficiency ratings, 9th in the Horizon in opponents’ shooting percentage, and gave up a whopping 200 more free throws than they attempted (they were 20th in the country for most personal fouls). When you look at the number of close losses suffered by the Penguins, you can venture that the difference at the foul line is what kept the Penguins below .500. But Pedersen and Thomas are good lane-fillers who ought to force more than a few altered shots. The Penguins hope that a little more experience behind last year’s young team will cut down on the fouls and improve the defensive efficiency. YSU also was a poor shooting team, and in particular needs more three point consistency from Quisenberry (31.9%), Morgan (32.4% in a team high 182 attempts), and Covington (34.1)%). Quisenberry, Cathcart, and Simmons are all 80% foul shooters, so YSU ought to be able to protect a late lead. Finally, we note that Calhoun persuaded his mentor, West Virginia’s Bob Huggins, to give him a home game in Youngstown. It’s at the Covelli Center instead of YSU’s usual home court at the Beeghly Center, but Covelli a 20 minute stroll from campus. Give credit to Huggins for agreeing to play Calhoun on the road. With only two seniors in a deep rotation, and none in the starting lineup, the Penguins are starting to look like a long term threat—if they can show progress this year. But if YSU staggers to another 20-loss season, Calhoun should and likely will be on a very hot seat. People expect YSU to make a run at .500, at the least, and that’s not unreasonable. Probable StartersG: Darius Quisenberry, 6-1 Soph. (13.8 ppg, 3.8 apg) G: Jelani Simmons, 6-5 Soph. (8.1 ppg, 40.2% 3PtFG) SF/G: Garrett Covington, 6-5 Jr. (10.7 ppg, 4.0 rgp) PF: Naz Bohannon, 6-6 Jr. (7.8 ppg, 8.3 rpg, 3.0 apg) PF: Jamir Thomas, 6-8 Jr. (14.6 ppg, 7.3 rpg at Garden City CC) Key BenchG: Devin Morgan, 5-10 Sr. (9.5 ppg, 2.5 apg) G: Christian Bentley, 6-3 Jr. (2.1 ppg with Siena in 2018) G/SF: Donel Cathcart, 6-5 Sr. (7.0 ppg, 35.4% 3PtFG) G/SF: Tyler Foster, 6-5 Soph. (4.1 ppg at East Carolina) PF: Michael Akuchie, 6-8 Jr. (4.0 ppg, 3.0 rpg) F/C: Olumide Pedersen, 6-9 Soph. (2.7 ppg, 3.4 rpg)
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 12, 2019 21:16:12 GMT -5
Green Bay21-17 Overall, 10-8 Horizon (4th), NET 190 Green Bay has had 7 head coaches since joining D1. Only Dick Lien (1983-85) had a losing record with the Phoenix. Click on graph to enlargeif Nothing Else, At Least We Have a Player Named ‘Tank’This year, with each team, I’ve included a little graph showing the school’s KenPom ranking since 1997. Green Bay is the 5th team in this group of previews, and the 5th for which the overall trend line over those years is down. The decline has been especially strong since Butler left after the 2012 season. Perhaps it was inevitable. If you look at the schools making up the conference, and in particular the resources they devote to basketball, their attendance numbers, their (lack of) tradition outside of Butler, Detroit, and Loyola (two of which have left), there’s a very strong argument that the MCC nee Horizon simply had 15 years of overachievement from the late 1990s to the culmination with Butler’s back-to-back final four appearances. The league got a bit lucky with a bunch of good coaches (Perry Watson, Bruce Pearl, Bo Ryan, the long run of coaches at Butler, Gary Waters, Brad Brownell, perhaps Jimmy Collins), and with Butler providing a steady boost, it simply punched above its weight. Someday I’ll have to write up a history of the MCC/Horizon. But the conference has gone from being a predator conference (snatching up Dayton and Marquette, and nearly Creighton and Bradley in the late 1980s) to a scavenger conference, picking at the leftovers of the increasingly equal, if not superior, Summit. Green Bay was the first dominant team in the reconstituted MCC after the league absorbed the top half of the Summit before the 1995 season. The Phoenix finished second to Xavier that year (the last season in the league for the Musketeers and also for La Salle) but won the conference tournament to claim an NCAA bid (Xavier got an at-large). There they lost by one to Purdue. They went unbeaten in conference play in 1996 and returned to the tournament. But that would be their last NCAA bid for 20 years, until the arrival of Linc Darner as coach in 2016. Darner came into Green Bay four years ago touting his “RP 40” system—40 minutes of “relentless pressure.” His Phoenix have never quite lived up to that billing, but they do play a very up-tempo offense and do come at teams in waves. According to KenPom, the Phoenix played the 13th most up-tempo pace in the country last year, with the 8th shortest average length of possession when on offense (and that was their lowest rank in Darner’s 4 years.) This squad will be typical, with a bunch of big guards and small forwards often playing without clearly defined positions. Every time Green Bay gets the ball, you’ve got to get back on defense quickly and be ready to play. Green Bay loses all-conference forward Sandy Cohen from last year’s CIT runnners-up, but returns its next 8 top scorers, and next 9 in minutes played. Still, the Phoenix aren’t getting much respect. They’ve generally been picked to finish lower in the conference standings than last year, when they finished 4th before their CIT run. One reason for that may be a sense that last year’s relative success was more based on luck than talent. The Phoenix, for example, gave up more points than they scored in conference play, by more than a point per game. By comparison, UIC, which tied Green Bay for 4th, outscored its opponents by more than point per game, and Oakland, which finished a game ahead of Green Bay, outscored the conference opposition by more than 3 points per game. IUPUI, which finished two games in back of the Phoenix at 8-10, also outscored its conference opponents. Of course, winning close games matters. But being outscored is usually not a formula for sustained success, and teams that put up winning records while being outscored usually tend back toward the mean the next year. We’ll see if that happens with the Phoenix this year--but just in terms of personnel, Phoenix fans have a decent case to feel slighted by the preseason polls. The man mainly expected to pick up much of the slack from Cohen’s graduation is 6-2 redshirt senior JayQuan McCloud. The well-traveled McCloud—Murray State, Milwaukee, and Highland CC—finally found a home last year with the Phoenix, and with Cohen gone will be expected to up his 13.7 ppg. However, there are several other players who could up their game to help cover the loss of Cohen. It’s worth noting that even as Green Bay improved from 13 to 21 wins last season, three young players the Phoenix were looking to for improvement actually took a backwards step in production. Shooting guard (and Novi native) Kameron Hankerson dropped from 10.7 points, 2.6 assists, and 38.7% shooting as a sophomore to 8.1, 1.6, and 32.8% as a junior. Forward Manny Patterson dropped from freshman averages of 6 points and 4.9 rebounds to 4.6 and 3.8, respectively. And guard PJ Pipes fell from 7.2 points and 1.9 assists to 6.1 points and 1.3 assists as a soph. All three could have comebacks this year, with Hankerson the best bet in my mind. Elsewhere, the Phoenix feature the Horizon player with the best name, ShanQuan “Tank” Hemphill, and athletic forward who plays a bigger game than his 6-6, 190 lb. frame would suggest, and bring in one of the league’s more promising freshmen in guard Amari Davis, Ohio’s D-II Player of the Year last season. Cody Schwarz is a tall perimeter player who can shoot over the opposition, senior forward Josh McNair started 16 games last season, and juniors Trevion Bell and Hunter Crist provide depth at guard on what will be one of the more experienced teams in the Horizon this year. The bottom line is that Green Bay finished last season strong (11-5 including their CIT run) and they’ve got the bulk of that team back. They've got both age and experience, usually very positive factors at the mid-major level (much more so than for the top majors, where the best players often become early entries to the NBA). Screw the prognosticators: Could be a good year up north. Probable StartersG – JayQuan McCloud, 6-2 RS Sr. (13.7 ppg, 2.3 apg, 39.3% 3PtFG) G- PJ Pipes, 6-2 Jr. (6.1 ppg, 1.3 apg, 35% 3PtFG) F – Tank Hemphill, 6-6 Sr. (11.7 ppg, 5.6 rpg) F – Josh McNair, 6-6 Sr. (5.6 ppg, 3.4 rpg F – Cody Schwarz, 6-9 RS Sr. (6.0 ppg, 2.9 rpg, 34.6% 3PtFG) Key BenchG – Amari Davis, 6-3 Fr. G – Kameron Hankerson, 6-5 Sr. (8.1 ppg, 32.8% 3PtFG) G/SF – Trevion Bell, 6-7 Jr. (5.8 ppg,, 34.7% 3PtFG) G – Hunter Crist, 6-3 Jr. (1.2 ppg) G/SF – Japannah Kellogg, 6-8 Fr. F – Manny Patterson, 6-8 Jr. (4.6 pgg, 3.8 rpg)
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 13, 2019 22:26:24 GMT -5
Oakland2019: 16-17 overall, 11-7 Conference (3rd) , NET #209 Horizon League Conference Play Composite Standings Since 2014 (Oakland’s 1st year), Oakland 66-38 .635 Green Bay 66-38 .635 Northern Kentucky 45-27 .625 Wright State 64-40, .615 IUPUI 16-20, .444 Cleveland State 43-61, .413 Milwaukee, 42-62, .404 Detroit, 40-64, .385 UIC, 37-67, .356 Youngstown State 33-71, .317 *Valparaiso, which of course has since left the Horizon, was an impressive 52-16, .765 during OU’s first 4 seasons in the conference. Click on graph to enlargeNotice that Oakland is the first of our 6 previews (so far) whose long term KenPom trajectory has been upward. Like Coach's Hair, This Preview is All Over the PlaceWhen Oakland joined the Horizon, Greg Kampe had a reputation for scheduling anybody, anywhere. During his first two seasons in the Horizon, Oakland indeed had the conference’s toughest non-conference schedule. Since then, however, Kampe has toned that scheduling down somewhat, and the new king of the road guarantee game looks to be Detroit coach Mike Davis. It is often suggested that the main reason for a mid-major to play a series of guarantee road games against top P6 teams is that that is the best way to prepare the club for the conference tournament. And since almost no mid-majors get at-large bids anymore—the Horizon hasn’t had one since Butler in 2009—the entire goal is to win the conference tournament. Though this seemed to work well for Davis at Texas Southern, I’m not certain that this is as successful as some think. For example, Dan Monson has been following this philosophy at Long Beach State for a decade. And while the Forty-Niners have 11 straight seasons at .500 or better in conference, they’ve had just 4 overall winning records and 1 NCAA bid in that time—about the same as the Titans (5 overall winning records and 1 NCAA bid in the period). Additionally, some coaches say that the players and fans prefer these games to lackluster home affairs again teams many fans have never heard of, not to mention non-D1 opponents. And then there’s the money. Every mid-major can use it, and Some of the MEAC and SWAC schools, always starved for cash, use the money to subsidize other operations. In Detroit, it appears the plan is to cycle the money back into the basketball budget. If that is done, we may see serious long-term benefits. The problem with the philosophy isn’t so much for the one or two teams that schedule in this fashion, but its effect on the rest of the league, especially if more teams adopt this philosophy. No one seems to quite know the NCAA’s new NET formula, but like the old RPI (though perhaps not as much) it’s primary ingredient remains the W-L records of one’s opponents. By definition, your conference opponents play .500 ball in conference play (games against your own team are backed out of the records, so your team’s conference record doesn’t alter that result). In the Horizon, your conference opponents will have a combined conference record of 144-144. And note that this is true for every other team in every other conference. Now let’s suppose each HL team plays a full, “traditional” non-conference slate of 13 games. Say 1 is against a non-DI team, which won’t count for NET purposes, and each team goes 7-5 against the rest of their non-con schedule. That means the non-conference record of your conference opponents will be 63-45, and since you play each team twice, the total record will be 126-90. Added to the 144-144 conference record, your opponents have a combined record of 270-234. Alternatively, if everyone plays a “Mike Davis schedule” in non-conference play and goes 5-8, that means they are collectively 45-72 in non-conference play, doubled (because you play each team twice) for a total of 90-144, for a total combined opponent W-L record of 234-288. In the first case, that’s a .536 W-L percentage. In the second, it’s a .448 W-L percentage. That’s a huge difference. And of course, it’s going on all through the league, dragging down the league’s NET. (The effect is actually worse because you’ll play 1 to three teams a third time in the league tournament). In these circumstances, an at-large bid becomes all but impossible. The drag on each team’s NET due to the poor conference-wide W-L record, and the fact that the team will by definition now enter the NCAA tournament with a lot of losses, also means that the conference tournament champ is pretty much guarantee a 15 or 16 seed. That doesn’t much matter in a conference like the SWAC in which Texas Southern plays—SWAC schools almost never are seeded above 15 no matter how great their record. But even in today’s run-down Horizon, that’s not true. The Horizon is still a significantly better conference than the SWAC, and its teams usually can garner a 14 or 13 seed. That difference is huge. Since the NCAA went to 64 teams in 1985, 16 seeds have won just one game, and 15 seeds have won just eight. Teams seeded 14th, however, have won 21 first-round games, and teams seeded 13th have won 28. In other words, 15th and 16th seeded teams combined win a game about once every four years, but 13th and 14th seeds, on average, win one to two first round games (closer to two) every single year. The reason is not just that 13th and 14ths seeds are better than 15th and 16th seeds. The reason is that they are playing much more beatable competition. This doesn’t mean that HL teams should play a bunch of patsies in the non-conference season. Rather, like most things in life, it suggests that moderation is the best course. I’d like to see HL teams drop non-D1 games, try to schedule up a bit, and commit to buying at least one home game against a good, solid mid-major themselves, in addition to being bought. In the short term, the “Mike Davis” schedule may help the Titans, but in the long term it is simply no way for the conference to prosper, and the Titans are unlikely to prosper if the conference doesn’t. Based on last year’s NET ranks, Detroit and Oakland have the league’s toughest non-conference schedules this year. So how about Oakland? The Grizzlies overcame a poor non-conference season to finish third in the Horizon year, and only lost to eventual champ Northern Kentucky in the tournament semis on a last second shot by Drew McDonald. With no graduation losses, they were a presumptive favorite for 2020, a status boosted when rising 5th year seniors Brad Brechting, Xavier Hill-Mais, and Jaevin Cumberland announced on March 14 that they’d all be returning—no grad transfer for them. “Jaevin, Xavier and I came in with each other and started something that will never split us apart," said Brechting. "We love Oakland and it is our family. We have unfinished business next season and are determined to complete our mission." That “never split” stuff lasted less than a month, with Cumberland announcing his intent to transfer in early April. He wound up at Cincinnati, where he’ll join his cousin, Jerron, one of the nation’s better players. After Cumberland (17.2 ppg) announced, the next day freshman point guard Braden Norris, who was second in the league in assists and first in three-point field goal percentage, flew the coop. Kamari Newman, the team’s top scorer after the big three (9.4 ppg) soon transferred as well, as did oft-injured James Beck, who started 6 games, and little-used back-up guard Stan Scott. Despite the losses, Oakland could finish in the first division if they can solve the void at point guard left by Norris’s transfer. Oakland fans seem high on guard CJ Gettelfinger, a prolific scorer in high school in Tennessee with good basketball genes (his father played at Kentucky) and a long frame. But Gettelfinger is hard to judge. He committed to OU super early—well before his sophomore year—which cut off his recruitment, so he didn’t have other offers. He bears the signs of a guy who is going to need some time. He played at a small private school in a part of Tennessee not known for hoops, and he was injured much of his senior year. A better bet to start is Kevin Kangu, who spent last year playing for the national juco champs at Vincennes CC. Kangu got first chance on OU’s summer trip to Greece and appears to have won the starting job. Off guard Traveon Maddox, who had a strong freshman year, can also handle the point in a pinch, and they’ve got a pair of freshmen, Emmanuel Newsome and Madison Monroe, who may see playing time in a thin backcourt. Kampe had hoped that Cleveland State transfer Rashad Williams would be granted immediate eligibility, but it appears that that is unlikely to happen. If it does, move OU up into the ranks of true challengers for the league title. With Hill-Mais and Brechting, OU will have one of the league’s best front courts. Brechting’s improvement was over the season was a major reason for OU’s strong finish. Over OU’s first 19 games, Brechting averaged 5.2 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 0.6 blocks; over the last 14 games, he averaged 15.2 points, 9.1 rebounds, and 1.3 blocks. And don’t totally write off last year’s vastly overhyped freshman, Babtunde Sowunmi. I noted before last season that, a bit like Gettelfinger this year, Sowunmi had all the signs of a kid who would need some adjustment time before contributing. He’s a big, hard-working kid. I still don’t expect much from him but wouldn’t be shocked if he came through. Freshman Jackie Harris and juco Daniel Oladapo may be better bets in the front court. OU has very little proven depth, and is especially unsettled in the backcourt. But Brechting, Hill-Mais, and Maddox form a strong core. They look like a middle of the pack team, but could surprise if things break well and some of the freshmen and jucos surprise, or if Williams is granted immediate eligibility. Probable StartersPG – Kevin Kangu, 6-4 Jr. (8.1 ppg, 2.6 apg at Vincennes CC). SG - Trey Maddox, 6-5 Soph. (6.7 ppg, 37.7 3PtFG%) F – Daniel Oladapo, 6-7 Soph. (14.5 ppg, 8 rpg at Chipola JC) PF – Xavier Hill-Mais, 6-7 RS Sr. (18.3 ppg, 7.2 rpg). C – Brad Brechting, 6-11 RS Sr., (9.5 ppg, 5.9 rpg, 1.1 bpg, 57.8% FG Bench) G – CJ Gettelfinger, 6-4 Fr. G – Emmanuel Newsome, 6-0 Fr. G – Madison Monroe, 6-3 Fr. F – Jackie Harris, 6-6 Fr. C – Babtunde Sowunmi, 6-10 Soph (38 minutes played in 2019) C – Yusuf Jihad, 6-8 Fr.
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 15, 2019 8:57:18 GMT -5
UIC2019: 16-16 overall, 10-8 Horizon (5th); NET 211 UIC returns 99.6% of its scoring and 99.2% of its rebounding—if Jordan Blount plays. Click on graph to enlargeA Hot Seat for Flames Coach This year, Steve McClain’s 5th at UIC, looks like his make or break year. McClain launched his UIC stint with a couple of highly touted recruiting classes, but doesn’t have much to show for it—a 58-76 overall record (53-51 since his disastrous 5-25 first year); a CBI appearance for the 2017 team, which finished the regular season at 15-18, and a CIT appearance for the 2018 team, which got to 20 wins (20-16) by winning three games in that tournament. After a third place finish in 2018, the Flames were generally picked for 3rd last season, for 2nd in some predictions, but ended up the 5th seed in the conference tournament, where they lost in the first round. UIC is again a consensus pick for the league’s top three, but if this senior-laden team doesn’t break through, it’s hard to see it happening under McClain. UIC is built around three senior guards, Tarkus Ferguson, Marcus Ottey, and Godwin Boahen. Ferguson, Street & Smith’s projected Player of the Year and a consensus all-conference selection, is the league’s top returner in assists and steals, 3rd in rebounding, 6th in scoring, 13th in blocks. I don’t know that he’s the best player in the league, but he is probably its most complete all-around player. Meanwhile, Boahen and Ottey put up nearly identical stat lines: Boahen.. 14.8 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 367 FGA, 82 PF, 77 TO, 39 St Ottey..... 14.8 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 364 FGA, 85 PF, 80 TO, 36 St But their styles are different. Boahen is the three point shooter, Ottey the cut and drive guy who gets to the rim. All 3 of the guards can handle the point, but Ottey plays more on the wing. All three have all-conference potential, and all three will likely average 32 minutes or more per game. McClain can also call on junior Jamie Ahale, a three point shooter. I’m high on Detroit Edison freshman Brian Taylor, but he may find it tough to get minutes as I expect McClain to ride his upperclassmen as far as possible this year. While UIC has the league’s best backcourt, how the Flames’ season breaks may depend on the health of 6-8 Senior Jordan Blount (9.3 ppg, 5.6 rpg). Blount tore his ACL in the off season, and it initially appeared he would be out for the season. Recent reports, however, say he could be back by the time conference play begins. If so, UIC could be a complete team by the time the HL tournament rolls around. But if Blount can’t make it back, UIC is going to be unproven in the front court, and all that guard play may not be enough against Loudon Love, Naz Bohannan, or Oakland’s front line. Even with Blount, the Flames were relatively weak on the boards and in inside scoring and interior defense. For a time it appeared that the odyssey of 6-8 KJ Santos, who started with UIC back in 2016, was going to end with a return to Chicago. Though not an inside player, that would have helped some. But ultimately Santos, last seen riding the pine at Missouri, ended up turning pro (which is to say, disappeared, though it wouldn’t surprise me to see him playing somewhere in the Caribbean soon). So someone will have to improve from a group that includes 6-8, 230 lb. senior Rob Howard (17 starts last season), 6-9, 235 lb. sophomore Travell Washington (13 starts), 6-8 junior Michael Diggins (5 starts), and 6-7 junior Jacob Wiley. There's Deon Ejim, a wide bodied, 6-7 freshman who was redshirted last year due to injury. And there is a 6-10 sophomore on the bench, Braelen Bridges, but he didn't play last year and was only a role player before that at NW Florida, a juco. The most likely scenario is that Howard and Diggins start (at least if and until Blount returns) with Washington the first big off the bench. But someone in that group has to get better. UIC will play up-tempo, and they’ll throw up a lot of three pointers. The Flames have an interesting non-conference schedule that includes road games with in-state opponents DePaul, Bradley, and Illinois State, a guarantee game at Memphis, Cal-Irvine at home, and a tough tournament in Boca Raton, where they’ll face host and CUSA member Florida Atlantic, and either St. Bonaventure or San Diego. Very few of those games look like easy wins or sure losses, and they could enter conference play with anywhere from 5 to 10 wins. If Blount returns, UIC will likely be starting 5 seniors in conference play. They've got talent. They've generally been picked, again, for third or second place, and that's with at least some of those prognosticators (Athlon, which has the Flames finishing third, and HorizoneRoundtable, which puts them 2nd) assuming that Blount is out for the year. McClain will definitely be on the hot seat if he can’t get this team over .500, and he may need a fair amount more than that. Probable StartersG – Tarkus Ferguson, 6-4 Sr. (15.5 ppg, 6.8 rpg, 5.2 ppg, 36.8% 3PtFG, 1.5 spg) G – Godwin Boahen, 5-11 Sr. (14.8 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 3.2 apg, 37.3% 3PtFG) G – Marcus Ottey, 6-2 Sr. (14.8 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 2.4 apg, 30.4% 3PtFG) F – Rob Howard, 6-8 Sr. (6.2 ppg, 3.8 rpg) F – Michael Diggins, 6-8 Jr. (6.7 ppg, 3.1 rpg) *F – Jordan Blount, 6-8 Sr. (9.3 ppg, 5.6 rpg) *Out until at least late December Key BenchG – Jamie Ahale, 6-5 Jr. (3.4 ppg, 37.2% 3PtFG) G – Brian Taylor, 6-6 Fr. F – Jacob Wiley, 6-7 Jr. (2.8 ppg, 3.1 rpg) F – Travell Washington, 6-9 Soph. (2.1 ppg, 1.2 rpg) F - Deon Ejim, 6-7 RS Fr.
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Post by motorcitysam on Oct 15, 2019 19:17:04 GMT -5
I have to say, I expected more wins for UIC under McClain.
The KJ Santos saga is just weird. It is no surprise he got buried on the bench at Mizzou, and going back to the Flames would at least give him a chance to graduate and rejoin the coach who actually wanted him. Seems like he took some bad advice, or wasn't listening to the good advice he may have been getting.
Tarkus Ferguson has been my favorite non-Titan HL player for a couple of years now. The dude is the definition of "stat stuffer".
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Post by ptctitan on Oct 16, 2019 4:29:35 GMT -5
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 16, 2019 9:55:55 GMT -5
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Post by ptctitan on Oct 16, 2019 12:56:50 GMT -5
Thanks. Obviously, I glossed over that part of your preview.
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Post by Commissioner on Oct 16, 2019 22:10:47 GMT -5
Northern Kentucky2019: 26-9 Overall, 13-5 Horizon (Tied 1st, 2nd seed); NET Ranking # 112 NKU has won 72 games in the last three years. The last time they won 72 games in a three year period: Oakland: 2009-11 Green Bay: 1994-96 Cleveland State: 1986-88 Detroit: 1977-79 IUPUI, Wright State, UIC, Milwaukee, Youngstown State: Never Of course, teams play more games now, so it’s not quite the feat it used to be. It’s still pretty impressive. Click on chart to enlargeNorthern Kentucky is only the second of now 8 previews where the team's long term trend in Ken Pom rankings is going up. The other is another new member, Oakland. Hornin InDarin Horn replaced Dennis Felton as head coach at Western Kentucky back in 2004. Both men landed that first head coaching job while still in their 30s. Like Felton, Horn parlayed 5 years of success at WKU into an SEC job, where, like Felton, he unable win consistently and was eventually fired with a sub-.500 record. And now, like Felton, Horn is attempting to reboot his head coaching career in the Horizon, nearly a decade after fizzling out in the SEC. All Horizon fans should hope this works out better. Unlike Felton, who inherited a total rebuild at Cleveland State, Horn takes over one of the league’s strongest programs. NKU has the league’s best facilities, it’s strongest attendance numbers after Wright State, and has played in two NCAAs and an NIT in the past three seasons. NKU loses the best player in school history, HL Player of the Year Drew McDonald, from last year’s regular season co-champs return. Also gone are point guard Zaynah Robinson, who started 19 games, and seven-footer Chris Vogt, who was starting to show potential in his sophomore year but followed Coach John Brannen to Cincinnati. But there’s enough back that NKU is a consensus top three pick in this year’s Horizon, with most placing the Norse second behind Wright State. My own sense is that the Norse are being overrated, but not by much. They should finish in the first division and the only reason I can’t call them a dark horse to win it all is that almost everyone else is predicting them to do so well. Horn’s big challenge will be NKU’s lack of size after the departure of McDonald and Vogt. NKU doesn’t have anyone over 6-6 who has ever started a D-1 game. Making things worse, 6-8 freshman forward John Harge, one of the more promising recruits in the league, tore his ACL in the summer and is likely to miss the entire season. The best bet to fill the void is Silas Adheke, a redshirt junior who played a total of 98 minutes in 20 games last year. Before that he was a part-time starter in the juco ranks. Adheke plays a true low-post game, and at 6-8, 245 lbs., he has the size needed to battle the league’s best bruisers, including Wright State’s Loudon Love. But he may not have the talent. In that case, look for former Titan commit Adrian Nelson in the starting lineup. I thought losing Nelson was one of the worst parts of Bacari Alexander’s flame out. I’m still really high on Nelson, who looked solid in a limited role (about 8.5 minutes per game) as a freshman. He doesn’t have Adheke’s post-up game, but is very good at taking it to the rim and finishing, and is a solid player off the ball as well. As you can probably tell, I think he’s better than Adheke, but Silas may have the game they need to better round out the starting five. The other four starters are pretty certain: Jalen Tate, Tyler Sharpe, Dantez Walton, and Trevon Faulkner. Tate and Sharpe have both made some pre-season all-conference teams. Tate is one of the best all-around players in the league. He can run the offense, he can score, he rebounds well, and he’s one of the best defensive players in the league. He doesn’t shoot a lot of threes, but he shoots them at a 40% clip and that keeps forces defenders to play him tight on the perimeter, which frees his drive, which he does well. Sharpe is the team’s top returning scorer and one of the better three point shooters in the league. Faulkner, a 6-3 sophomore, saw his minutes increase as the year went on, and knocked down a season high 20 points in the Horizon Tournament quarter final against Detroit. He didn’t shoot a lot but hit over 70% of his shots last season in conference play, a remarkably high percentage for any guard. Walton, a senior, was the only player (McDonald included) to start all 35 of NKU’s games last year. Walton is an active player. If he can boost his three-point shooting (32% last year, 29% for his three seasons) he’ll be one of the best players in the conference. Joining Nelson off the bench is sophomore guard Paul Djoko. Djoko has a nice floor game but needs to gain confidence in his ability to score. Last year one could almost leave Djoko unguarded when the Norse had the ball and keeping track as he passed up wide open shots from close to the basket could have made for a good drinking game. Two other guys who could factor in off the bench are Bryant Mocaby, a big guard who started 2 games last year while otherwise playing very limited minutes, and junior Tre Cobbs, who sat out last season with a knee injury after sporadic playing time his first two seasons with NKU. Mocaby was brought in as a three-point shoorter, but hit just 10 of 41 attempts last year. Cobbs is a point guard. And then there are three very interesting players on the roster in Karl Harris, Bryson Langdon, and Adham Eleeda. Harris is a big (6-5) guard who started his collegiate career at La Salle, spent a year juco, and then averaged over 8 points for Northern Arizona in 2018. Langdon is a point guard who averaged over 16 points and hit over 40% of his three point attempts in the juco ranks last year. And Eleeda was #3 in the country in juco ranks for three pointers made last season while at Sheridan College. Horn isn’t the kind of coach who goes 11 or 12 deep, so three or four of these guys will get squeezed, but from the fan and coaching perspective, it’s nice to have options. If I were forced to predict, I’d wager Cobbs, Mocaby, and Djoko will find their minutes limited, but that’s with the caveat that it’s hard to predict how good the jucos and Harris are. There’s a lot to like in this NKU team, and no obvious reason that NKU won’t keep the momentum launched under Brannen. NKU has a soft non-conference schedule that should yield at least 9 wins, so a 4th consecutive 20-win season appears likely even if they disappoint in conference play. More than a few Horizon fans are already wondering (worrying) about the Norse leaving for the MVC or some such place. I doubt that’s in the near future, but the rest of the Horizon is going to have to up their game or the Norse are going to dominate this conference. Meanwhile, NKU has a budding rivalry with Wright State. The Raiders visit NKU in the season’s final game, and notwithstanding my stuff about NKU being a bit overrated, no one will be surprised if that game is for the regular season conference title. Probable StartersPG – Jalen Tate, 6-6 RS Jr. (13.7 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 4.1 apg, 40.7% 3PtFG) SG - Tyler Sharpe, 6-0 Sr. (14.4 ppg, 38.3% 3PtFG) G – Trevon Faulkner, 6-3 Soph. (4.7 ppg) SF – Dantez Walton, 6-6 Sr. (11.1 ppg, 5.5 rpg, 2.7 apg) PF – Silas Adheke, 6-8 RS Jr. (2.0 ppg, 1.7 rpg, 70.8% FG) Key BenchPG – Tre Cobbs, 6-0 RS Jr. (2.2 ppg in 2018) PG – Bryson Langdon, 5-9 Soph (16.3 ppg, 3.8 apg at Arizona Western JC) SG – Bryant Mocaby, 6-5 Soph. (2.5 ppg) SG – Adham Eleeda, 6-5 Jr. (13.3 ppg, 40.8% 3PtFG at Sheridan JC) G – Karl Harris, 6-5 RS Sr. (8.2 ppg for Northern Arizona in 2018) G – Paul Djoko, 6-4 RS Soph. (1.7 ppg) F – Adrian Nelson, 6-7 Soph. (2.8 ppg, 2.5 rpg, 59.6% FG)
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