The Denver Pioneers were a missed free throw away from playing North Dakota State in the Summit League Championship, and Joe Scott was also maybe that close to not being let go by the Pioneers.
The Joe Scott firing was a little shocking, but it kind of makes sense. With Denver Lacrosse, Hockey, and Soccer all being very extremely competitive programs; it makes sense that the expectations for the private university would be higher on the men’s basketball team. It’s sort of like how I had incredibly low expectations for Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice because it was directed by the guy who made 300 and written by the guy that wrote all three Blade films…I guess it’s the same… I know a few people that have migrated to Denver, and I’ve asked them if they ever go to Pioneer basketball games and usually the reason they don’t go is because the Pioneers were pretty boring to watch.
Rodney Billups, who you will always refer to as “Chauncey Billups’ brother” is offering a more up-tempo style of basketball in comparison to the Princeton offense that Joe Scott ran. One has to wonder how long it will take for this to turn out to be successful for the Pioneers.
Billups has a great young core of players who appear like they could work out well for an up-tempo style of play. By the way, it will be okay for Mav fans to accuse the Pioneers for being trendy in picking an up-tempo style. It’s fine. Freshman guard Joe Rosga finished the season averaging 12.7 points per game; freshman forward CJ Bobbitt finished with 8.4 points per game; and freshman guard Thomas Neff finished 6.0 points per game. All three freshmen shot above 43% from the field.
The Princeton offense is all about taking the best shot available, so their players usually shoot high percentages. The best shot isn’t always the most important thing in an up-tempo style of play, so soon the Pioneers as a whole may actually not lead the conference in field goal percentage for once.
The Pioneers are going to have a couple roster changes for Billups to move forward with this new brand of basketball. They are losing two guys, Nate Engesser and Marcus Byrd, who averaged double digit scoring, but we’ve routinely seen this to not be a problem for Denver. Both players were efficient scorers, and seemed to find themselves open quite a bit while playing in the Baxter Arena… I thought Byrd was one of the more underrated players in the Summit in 2016, he averaged 16.7 points over the last 8 games of the season. He was probably the biggest reason the Pioneers did not finish 8th in the conference.
Denver will also lose their point guard, Bryant Rucker. It is weird to call someone a point guard when they average 1.5 assists per game, but the Princeton offense is not an offense for point guards to rack up assists. No one seems to know what is going on with the sophomore center Daniel Amigo who only played in 13 games this season for Denver, but he showed some promise in his freshman season. It’s okay, the Pioneers have 6’6″ sophomore center Christian Mackey to haunt our dreams. I swear that kid was allowed 15 fouls in the first round of the Summit League tournament.
The Pioneers have two high school seniors that have signed letters of intent: a 6’0″ and 145lb point guard from Arvada, Colorado…and a 6’6″ wing player from the state of Texas. These players could change their minds and go elsewhere with Denver going a new route in coaching, but as of right now the Pioneers only have room for one more player to sign for next season.
Their roster is filled with wing players, so one would think they would love a junior college post player or point guard; or a 5th year transfer at either position. Denver is not really known for landing transfers, but maybe the new style will call for it.
Drake’s Kale Abrahamson is leaving the Bulldogs and will be eligible immediately. Abrahamson is originally from Des Moines, so it is not like he would be transferring back home. He started his college career at Northwestern, so he clearly likes academics…Denver just seems like the perfect place for the 6’8″ player that could help Chauncey’s brother jump start his culture change in year one. He shot a pretty low percentage from the field (39.1) in his one year at Drake, but Drake basketball seems like a cluster of poor choices right now. I say this like it’s a mean thing, but I am all about the Summit League going all in on trying to steal Drake away from the Missouri Valley. Just think about it…
It is hard for most coaches to see a high level of success in year one, especially when changing everything; but the Pioneers have the pieces to move forward. They are most likely not going to end up winning the regular season, but by could have things figured out as a team by the time they start the conference tournament, again. They will probably finish the regular season standings in 2016-2017 somewhere between 4th and 8th in the Summit League. Now if only they would actually play someone in their non-conference schedule.
I almost forgot this game was happening. It’s not that I am not used to the Mavericks playing in March, or that I am weirded out at a 8:30 pm college basketball game in the state of South Dakota on a Sunday night. I just almost forgot the Omaha Mavericks, or the Summit League, was a thing because I made the mistake of listening to John Bishop and Josh Peterson on Unsportsmanlike Conduct all week try the 215th way to rephrase the questions: Is Mike Riley a good football coach; and is Tommy Armstrong Jr a good quarterback?
Oh, but it’s happening…it’s finally here, the Mavericks are playing in the Summit League tournament as a 3 seed. I don’t really know where to start with this as I am too excited. So um, okay, how about this…
Denver, huh?
I like the idea of Omaha fans traveling to Denver this weekend for hockey, all while other Omaha fans are traveling to Sioux Falls to see Omaha and Denver play in men’s basketball. The fans going to Denver get to start little trivial arguments of who is better, drink some beer, go to a hockey game, bond over why they both hate North Dakota, and grow a rivalry. Oh, and not to mention, UNO softball is in Colorado this weekend to play Colorado State and Idaho State. I know it doesn’t have much to do with the Pioneers, but hey, hopefully some Mav fans can get to Fort Collins for some Mav softball.
Omaha and Denver basketball have two contrasting styles. Omaha loves to get out and run and find quick baskets, and Denver likes slug up the court and pass the ball 5 times before even thinking about shooting, and then pass 3 more times, and then get a backdoor cut for a player to get a wide open shot. These two contrasting styles makes this game the hardest to guess on to win and get out of the first round of the tournament.
Denver, though, while last in the Summit League in scoring, can actually really play at a fast pace and keep up with higher scoring teams. Playing in Omaha, the Pioneers were able to get 5 guys in double figures and were able to outscore the Mavs with 75 points. Weeks later, playing at IPFW, Denver scored 84 points before losing by 4 to the Mastodons. Denver had three different guys score more than 20 points in that game, and they were able to hit 20 three point field goals as a team. 20! Amazingly, Denver shot absolutely no free throws in that game. IPFW had to shoot 62% from the field in that game and shoot 12-of-18 on threes to outscore Denver in that game.
Statistically, it’s not easy to talk about Denver because of their Princeton offense. They are last in scoring in the Summit League, last in rebounding, last in blocks; but they are first in field goal percentage and free throw percentage…the things Denver cares about. Interestingly, Denver finished 4th in the conference in steals, which is good for them because they love playing possession to possession. So maybe, we should look more at some intangibles in this game.
I’m just going to assume that Denver is going to be the least represented fan base in Sioux Falls, based on what LetsGoDU whined about last month, well they may have more fans than Western Illinois there. Zing. Omaha has a bus of students heading to Sioux Falls, and people that have the ability to not work on Monday morning could be headed up…and people that do not care about sleep. Seriously, 8:30 pm on a Sunday, and maybe an even later start time if the earlier games don’t go according to plan.
The Mavericks may have some Oh Shit, We’re Actually Here jitters, but Derrin Hansen made a point that the quickest way to get over that is to get out play fast and make it a basketball game. Denver’s staff has been here before, but Denver’s players may actually have those jitters as well since the team is mostly newcomers. Denver does have some seniors that have been here before that can help ease the nerves of the Pioneers. Oh here is a stats thing: Denver’s senior forward, Marcus Byrd averaged 17.8 points per game over the last 6 games of the season, he also shot 59% from the field, and 60% on threes. That is pretty scary.
It’s good for the Pioneers that the Mavericks don’t have anyone that has been in a conference tournament before. Oh wait, there is Jake White! In 2013, White played in each of Wichita’s State’s games in the Missouri Valley tournament. He had a 9 point, 8 rebound, and 3 assist performance in the first round against Missouri State. That team also went to the Final 4 that year.
I’m sure Jake White is happy being named to the All Summit League 2nd Team, but maybe he feels a little disrespected and is incredibly hungry to win and keep playing. Not that the guys on the 1st Team weren’t great, and I am sure it was incredibly hard to decide between John Konchar, Mike Daum, and Jake White to get onto the 1st Team…but 2 freshmen beating out a senior has to piss someone off. The same goes for Devin Patterson. How about the snub to Tre’Shawn Thurman? Garret Covington was selected to the 2nd Team, for scoring a lot of points on a team that was limited on scoring options that finished last? Thurman averaged more points, more rebounds, more blocks, and shot a higher field goal percentage than AJ Jacobson who was named Honorable Mention…and Thurman averaged less minutes. I know the stats may not be a big part of it because guys are going to get stats for Omaha at their pace, but still…Thurman has to be happy for his teammates, but not happy about the snub.
Tra-Deon Hollins was the first Mav men’s basketball player to be named to the 1st Team for the Summit League, by the way.
I don’t think there is just one guy that is most important for the Mavericks to get a win in the first round. All of the Mavs needs to play efficiently, and make few mistakes…especially after the load of mistakes the Mavericks made against the Pioneers in Omaha with the missed layups, missed dunks, and terribly timed turnovers. That’s the other thing, is there a game that Omaha would like to have back more than any other as that Denver at Omaha game? Actually, maybe that whole week. Omaha seems to have more of a revenge factor, and be playing for more recognition in this first round than Denver. That was also a game that Omaha played without Randy Reed, who just had two of the best basketball performances of his life in the last two games.
Derrin Hansen also said it pretty well on the radio this morning when he said his team appears to play better when going into their tougher games. I didn’t get all of it, because I had that moment at work where the guy that takes 15 minutes to ask me a question that a normal person only takes 1 minute to ask had to come up and ask me a question…and give me the whole story has to why he has come to ask me the question…you know, so I could understand the point of view of all the characters involved.
By the way, could Hansen feel slightly snubbed for not being named Coach of the Year? Hansen actually probably doesn’t care all that much, but his players might be a little angry about it and that may add to their hunger for some conference wins. Not to take anything away from Jon Coffman. He did a great job, even after losing a player due to academics. Hansen lost his returning leading scorer, lost a freshman who was expected to help replace the shooting lost in Marcus Tyus, and finished 3rd in the conference after being expected to finish 7th in the Summit League.
For all 7 of the people that have paid attention, I basically selected no upsets in the first round of the Summit League tournament…which is kind of lame. If someone had a gun to my head and said I had to pick who was the most likely to get upset in the first round of the conference tournament, I would have to answer because I really question the mind of the person who would hold a gun to my head for something that like, but I would shockingly pick South Dakota State… I like South Dakota State, but their game with Oral Roberts just looks like a trap. The Jackrabbits swept Oral Roberts, but just played them last week, and Oral Roberts has a great coach and the leading scorer in the conference, and a load of dudes that can just randomly turn it on in a game.
I did not go to last night’s game. It is not that I did not want to go, but it seemed impossible for me to convince another human being to go to this game with me, especially with the Chiefs-Broncos going on at the same time. I thought of finding the one person I have a connection with that knows the least about college basketball, but also fills out a bracket each year just because their work forces them to; and I would just convince them that they beat that St. Mary’s team that is always in the bracket and winning a game or two. I ended up not doing that. I watched the game from home.
Gary Sharpe accidentally referred to Zach Jackson as Zachson…this is going to have to become a thing.
Hollins gets in every passing lane. He might get 10 steals this game.
Can hear Sharpe and Grant Nieland talking over the audio of the commercial. They’re thinking Omaha will win by 40 or 60. I love this perk from Mav access.
Tim Smallwood is showing some great hustle so far. Hope he keeps it up.
Jake White picks up his second foul, and Hansen is keeping him on the court; because why not?
The Mavs seem to be giving up some good looks on the perimeter to St. Mary’s, this could get scary when the Mavs are playing the likes of South Dakota State.
Did Tim Smallwood drink some Brawndo?
Devin Newsome had this running floater in the lane, that he missed, but I sat here in amazement at what was happening. I hope he’ll use this aggressiveness in the future.
Hey some skinny blonde lady in a bikini just followed me on twitter. I should give her my social security number.
I love the unintentional college football analysis between Sharpe and Nieland during the half time. Sharpe called Alabama “sick.” I’m not hip enough to use “sick” as a good thing yet. You’re using something negative to describe something in a positive form. I would never say “Alabama is so George Clooney as Batman.”
I’m bummed and happy at the same time about the redshirt to Marcus Tyus. I am scared about this team’s three point shooting. I think it is a legitimate concern. I commented earlier how one injury could hurt any team in the standings from 2nd to 9th…so this could really hurt the Mavericks. I do know that this will be a big help to Tyus’ career and his overall health.
The mouse on my new computer is so annoying. Thank God it has a touch screen.
Daniel Meyer has a number of post moves. It seems like he’s got part A, part B, but just cannot finish on part C of each post move, yet. Can we just throw the ball to him for last 5 minutes of the game to let him work on that?
Sharpe keeps referring to players as a “southpaw” and I have no idea what it means. I am just sitting here smiling and nodding.
I think Sharpe just hit on Bonnie Ryan during the kiss cam…
Kyler Erickson with an amazing steal of an inbound pass. Players work harder when he’s on the court. When my Millard South friends ask me how he is doing, I tell them he is the high energy guard off the bench. He makes everyone else on the court work harder. That’s an important character to have on a team.
Number changes sometimes confuse me. Every time I get a glimpse of Tim Smallwood in his new number, I am just like: what the hell is Rostampour doing?
My wife is in the other room and is taking a break from the research she does on all of her grants, and she is watching Gossip Girl and laughing. I’m just so damn mad right now. By the way, do you realize how much research goes into a grant?
We just gave up 3 offensive rebounds on one play. Need to work on boxing out on defense. Newsome is the Maverick that finally came up with the rebound.
Meyer with a great baseline spin move to get a basket.
Meyer with a three point attempt. I feel like Hansen might ground him for that one. I feel like it’s going to be like Major League when Wesley Snipes makes an unnecessary flashy catch and manager has the best line in the entire trilogy to top off the scene. Actually I am not sure if Major League counts as a trilogy. Major League 2 is a significant drop off, and you would have a hard time picking between Major League 3 and George Clooney as Batman for something to sit around and waste 2 hours with. Plus, ML3 has Scott Bakula, and it is impossible to watch Scott Bakula in a sports movie and not lose concentration wondering when the hell Paul Blake made the transition from a college quarterback in his 30s to transitioning to AAA baseball manager. I would have gone into a coma if Sinbad was cast in ML3.
People are leaving a minute early, so they can beat the traffic from the 100 people at the game.
Mavs went 8-16 on the cursed basket. I really think that Remy Davenport and Ellie Brecht broke the curse.
I wonder if an outsider is going to look at the stats of this game and say something along the lines of: Tre’Shawn Thurman only had 3 points, he’s having a sophomore slump.
Derrin Hansen said he needed to get these three freshmen games, so it was great to get them a game where they could figure game situations out. All three scored in double figures.
This team is deeper than last season. I know it wasn’t a top opponent, but you want your players to be efficient in games like this, and everyone off the bench played incredibly efficient. The Mavericks were missing a high energy bench guy last season. Now they have: JT Gibson, Randy Reed, Kyler Erickson, and possibly Tim Smallwood and Devin Newsome as high energy guys off the bench.
Some random things around The Summit League
I thought Wisconsin was incredibly overrated at 17, but losing to Western Illinois…after leading at halftime? It is incredible to see Western Illinois get this win though. They were picked 8th or 9th by most in The Summit League. I thought they would be tougher outs in games because of their experience, but maybe still struggle. They can be great if Garret Covington has a sidekick.
Denver with 3 games in 3 days. I am still in shock that Marcus Byrd could get 8 assists in one game. Nate Engesser with 26 points in 27 minutes against Lipscomb.
Paul Miller is rapidly rising as a star, as the Bison were expecting. They were thinking that Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, and Miller would all have to make up for the scoring loss of Lawrence Alexander. Turns out that they just need Paul Miller to do it. Malik Clements is looking pretty good too, the Mavs offered him out of high school.
I watched IPFW’s game on ESPN3 when I got home Friday night. I am still not sold on this team as a team in the top half of the standings in The Summit. Their highly touted newcomers did very little against Valpo. Other than John Konchar, he looks good.
Oral Roberts with a nice win over Missouri State. Former Mav, Jalen Bradley, had a game high of 16 points with 4 threes. AJ Owens had 14 points and 6 rebounds, and 3 blocks to make me look silly. It’s scary to think that the Golden eagles could get a win while Obi Emegano and Brandon Conley did not play very well.
IUPUI with a win at Indiana State…how is that Summit League-Missouri Valley challenge talk looking now?
South Dakota also with 3 games in 3 days. Tre Burnette had 22 points and 16 rebounds against Wright State.
It is going to be a very exciting year in the Summit League for men’s basketball. Several teams are returning a good portion of their rosters, and while many think the league will be easily won by South Dakota State; they will be in a much tighter race for a championship than most people think. Every team has a goal of winning the Summit League, but what is their case as to why they are number one? After all, 9 walk in and only one comes out… I’m just messing with you.
Denver
Hi, we are the Pioneers, and we know that some people are picking us to finish last in The Summit League this upcoming season. But we saw a statistic from kenpom recently that our coach, Joe Scott, has coached teams over the last ten years that have had the 2nd highest 2 point field goal percentage in division one. That is because we run the Princeton offense, we are all about using the entire shot clock to find the absolute best shot possible, it is based on unselfishness and not on stars.
We ranked 298th in division one in points per game as a team, but we were 20th in the country in field goal percentage which was 1st in the Summit League. We were 3rd in the Summit League in 2013-2014 in field goal percentage behind North Dakota State and Fort Wayne, who were both pretty good that year. We were also 3rd in the Summit in three point field goal percentage over the last two years, and we recruit to our style, so expect that to continue.
We know we are a young team this year with 8 freshmen and 4 sophomores, but it is not like we are going to just play the underclassmen for 40 minute a game. We have an unselfish trio of seniors to run our offense with Marcus Byrd, Nate Engesser, and Bryant Rucker. Engesser shot 51% from the field last season, he and South Dakota State’s Jake Bittle are the only 2 guards in the Summit League to shoot over 50% on the year, and they have the two best shooting percentages of any players returning to the Summit League this year.
With the exception of three games in the Summit League last season (we are still pretty baffled by our losses to IPFW), we play every game very close, so your players better be ready to hit some clutch shots in the closing minutes. We know we had a record of 12-18 last season, but we are a tough home team going 9-7 at home and we even beat this upcoming year’s favorite, South Dakota State, in Denver. So take that!
Engesser is the only returning player for Denver that averaged more than 10 points per game.
Fort Wayne
So we return the least amount of division one experience in the Summit League, but at least we have arguably one of the top three point guards in the league with Mo Evans. Our offense will probably run through him, and he will hopefully be either on the 2nd team All Conference team or at least Honorable Mention at the end of the year. Team that up with Joe Reed and we have a good inside-outside game that can be pretty difficult to defend. With so many new faces on our roster, it could be difficult to set a consistent line up at first and get everyone on board with our team defense, but at least we will be a mystery team for our opponents to defend.
One thing that we would like to point out is that we were last in The Summit League in free throw percentage last year, which can matter sometimes apparently. Our three players that shot the most free throw attempts: Steve Forbes (75%), Joe Edwards (63%), and Isaiah McCray (49%) are all gone. We still have Evans and Max Landis who both shot over 80% from the free throw line, two of the best returning players in the league in free throw percentage. We recruited a junior college player named DeAngelo Stewart who shot 82% from the free throw line in his sophomore season at North West Tech. Let’s just say we do not plan on losing to Dartmouth by 1 because we went 18-30 from the line or losing to Georgia Tech by 9 because we went 14-28 from the line. Oh, we know we cannot go 100% from the free throw line, but damn it we lost 4 games last season where missed the exact number of free throws that we lost the game by. That stings a little.
Stewart also played at Alabama State his freshman season, where his team went to the CIT, and we are totes expecting Stewart to be a major contributor on this team. Some magazine also tabbed him as the preseason newcomer of the year in The Summit League. We added another junior college player who has division one experience in 6’11” and 270lbs Andrew Poulter who started his career at Arkansas-Little Rock. Does anyone in the league have anyone that can defend 6’11” and 270? Do not answer that. Aside from these additions, we have two transfers from Purdue and Bradley that will have to sit the year out, but hopefully they should help our team out in practice.
Wait, what does Stewart’s jersey say? The Mastadons will need big things from their newest addition this season.
IUPUI
Remember how many dicks picked us to finish dead last in The Summit League last year, and we ended up winning 6 conference games? Do you remember that? Were you there for that? Sorry if we are a little rambunctious right now, but seriously do you freaking remember that? We have one of the better young coaches in probably all of the Mid Majors, and he can go into any recruits home and his parents will remember who he is just by his name alone. Scott Sutton goes into someone’s home and his parents are automatically concerned if he has his drinking problem under control because they hear the name Sutton, and that is what they associate with. With new facilities, a new coach, a new type of recruit, our program is a reboot film and it is being led by the best young director out there, James Gardener. We had one of the largest attendance increases by per game average in the country last season, so you know things are getting good.
Again sorry if we seem rude, but y’all can suck it. Combine our coach with Indianapolis, the 14th largest city in the United States and we are actually a fun place to live. It’s not like we’re a bunch of yokels that base their diet off of a 5.99 steak combo meal at the local grocery store chain. No, this is IndianGoshDamnApolis!
We lost 5 players to transfer, but it is cool because we have already forgotten their names. We get to put 4 new players onto our team that transferred from bigger conference schools, so basically we traded in a vespa for a regular motorcycle. Like, we actually have a threatening post game now that we get to add to a 6-10 team, so we are thinking those wins are going up. Oh, and we still have the widely disrespected Marcellus Barksdale, maybe the best wing defender in the league. Who are the two biggest offensive threats at the wing position in the Summit League? Obi Emegano and Garret Covington? That is cute. Barksdale held Emegano to 30% shooting in three games and Covington to 36% shooting in two games last season, so that is nothing to us.
What can the Jaguars do with an actual post game this year?
North Dakota State
We basically win everything as it is, so why would you expect anything to be different this year? We lost Lawrence Alexander, but we return everything else for the most part. Our players actually have the most returning division one starts in the entire Summit League. On top of all the players returning, we got to take our team on a summer trip to the Bahamas for exhibition games, where we learned even more about each other. We have the best defense in the league, and while we are young, we have an incredibly mature and well disciplined roster. Anyway you want to cut it, we are the San Antonio Spurs of the Summit League. We have the best fans in the Summit League, because of the cold weather and there not being much to do in Fargo or the state of North Dakota, there is not much else to do.
Can you think of a team with a better core of post players than us? Chris Kading, AJ Jacobson, and Dexter Werner: the three players combine for the complete package in the post. If you think Omaha’s Tre’Shawn Thurman can run the floor and dunk, you should see our newest recruit post player Deng Geu, he’s 6’8″ and has about a 40 inch vertical. There is about 4 blocks a game right there with Kading, Werner, and Geu. Oh, and our perimeter players are incredible defenders, so that stupid Jackassrabbits and their great core of guards do not scare us at all. We held that team to 31% shooting in the Summit League championship last year. What a bunch of turds.
The Bison lost by 10 to Gonzaga in the NCAA tournament.
Omaha
We know you are supposed to get better the more and more you go through transition, but we admit that last year we did not appear better by our amount of wins and losses. Looks can be deceiving though… After picking up our best win ever as a basketball program, we stumbled mightily with losses against teams we should have beat like UMKC and Chicago State. Consider the injuries though to some of our best players: Jake White, Devin Patterson, and Marcus Tyus battled through injuries. You get all of those guys healthy on the court and we have a pretty deadly team. Throw in some added motivation with a brand new arena and an opportunity to play in the Summit League Tournament, and we have an under the radar team. Our attendance has been rising each and every season since the transition, and we expect that to continue as we move into the Baxter Arena so hopefully we can gain more and more of a home court advantage as time goes on.
We ended the 2014-2015 season on a three game winning steak, all those games were on the road. We were actually even maybe 2 or 3 plays away from ending the season on a 6 game winning streak. We still have yet to beat North Dakota State, but we came closer than we ever have before. This was all with only having 4 players returning last year. This year we have 9 players returning and 61% of our scoring, which is the 4th best in the league behind Western Illinois, South Dakota State, and North Dakota State. We were able to take our players to Italy and learn about each other, we got in 10 extra practices, 4 exhibition games, and we know that this will pay off this season We score a lot too.
College Sports Madness put senior guards Marcus Tyus and Devin Patterson on the Preseason All Summit League 2nd team, SDSU had George Marshall and Deondre Parks on the first team, so if you think about it; we have the second best back court in the league. That is probably how it works, right? Sophomore Tre’Shawn Thurman has the highest points per game average for any returning post player in the league, unless you count NDSU’s AJ Jacobson as a post player, that is up to you. Thurman also has the 2nd highest rebounds per game average for returning players, actually he is tied with fellow Maverick Jake White. So we could have the second best back court in the league, as well as one of the top post combinations in the league.
The transition is over!
Oral Roberts
“OBI EMEGANO:PLAYER OF THE YEAR! SCOTT SUTTON:14 STRAIGHT WINNING SEASONS! FIRST IN THE LEAGUE IN ATTENDANCE! GOLDEN EAGLES RULE!”
*drops microphone*
*flips off the crowd with both hands*
If there is ever a Summit League All Century team, Emegano will probably be on it.
SOUTH DAKOTA
We had a winning record last year and most people were thinking we would finish in 7th or 8th in the conference. Fun thing: we were able to pick up a win against every single Summit League team last year, other than ourselves, that would be ridiculous. Craig Smith is from the Tim Miles coaching tree, so you should expect him to increase his win totals this season, based on nothing. We may have lost a ton of our scoring and whatever, but we still have Casey Kasperbauer: the three point king of the conference. We also will have Tyler Flack back who sat out 2014-2015 due to injury, and a gang of role players that know how to play as a team. No one was expecting Tyler Larson to be one of the best players in the league last season, so who knows who will step up this year.
Yes again we lost a lot of our team, but we found two great recruits in Tyler Hagedorn and Dan Jech. Hagedorn picked to come here over Omaha and North Dakota State, and Jech picked us over North Dakota State, Montana State, Louisiana-Lafayette, and others. You want to talk about a place where there is nothing to do? Talk about Vermillion, South Dakota. All our players can do is work out and get better at basketball. Also, somehow Hagedorn continues to get taller and is now listed at 6’10”. Did any teams in the Summit League pick up any big men better than what we picked up (on paper)? Probably not.
Fear Red! Or something like that.
SOUTH DAKOTA STATE
We are the favorite to win this league this season, everyone’s favorite. We return the most scoring in the Summit League, after Western Illinois, but ours has proven to be competent. Slam! We have an inexperienced post, but if we cannot get the ball into them we can just do whatever we want with Deondre Parks, George Marshall, and Jake Bittle. Even after those three we have Reed Tellinghuisen who can score on the outside and is also capable of getting to the basket. We keep being told about how our freshman Adam Dykman was incredibly overlooked by everyone as well.
We lost to North Dakota State by 1 in the Summit League championship, and our returning core is clearly upset about it. It is not a question of why will South Dakota State win the Summit League, but rather; who has any chance of beating South Dakota State?
Seriously, come at us, bro.
Western Illinois
We do not have much to say. Garret Covington will score a bunch of points though, probably even be 1st Team All Summit. We had a lot of injuries last season.
If it were possible, Covington might be demanding a trade.
Basketball, meh, mainly the NBA has entered into an era of looking at teams by asking the question: Who has the best Big 3? Having a Big 3 certainly is key, but really I think it’s just as important to follow up with who has better role players to back up Big 3? Could the 2008 Boston Celtics have won an NBA championship without their young starters Kendrick Perkins, Rajon Rondo, and older bench players of PJ Brown, Sam Cassell, and James Posey? But while we are on the subject, that I brought up, let’s take a look at who could have the best Big 3 in the Summit League in the 2015-2016 season.
SDSU:
Jake Bittle, George Marshall, Deondre Parks
There is little doubt that the Jackrabbits will have the best guard trio in the league. Each averaged double figures in scoring, and all three can defend the perimeter. Each averaged double figure scoring, and Bittle has the highest field goal percentage of any returning player to the Summit league at 53.4 %. The Jackrabbits also have 3 of the top 5 returning players in 3 point field goals made, Marshall made 64 threes in 2014-2015 and he did not even play the entire season. The big question mark is; with Cody Larson graduating, who is going to rebound and defend in the post for them?
The Jackrabbits are returning 74% of their scoring from 2014-2015.
Role Players:
Reed Tellinghuisen, 6-6 SO: If you look at the Jackrabbits fan forum, someone posted pictures of Tellinghuisen lifting weights, which is not weird at all. He does appear as if he has added some weight onto his frame, which is great as he will be used more at the 4 position in his second year as a Jackrabbit. The Summit League has Tellinghuisen, AJ Jacobson, and Tre’Shawn Thurman all in the same class at the forward position. How excited are you for 2017-2018?
Connor Devine/Ian Theisen: These two split time and basically taking turns of who was backing up All Conference player Cody Larson. These two combined for for almost 5 points and 4 rebounds per game. With a young front court, these two will be counted on more in the 2015-2016 season to step up.
Skyler Flatten, 6-6 SO: Flatten was actually getting a decent amount of minutes, but then something happened. George Marshall happened.
Keaton Moffitt, 6-5 SR: Keaton Moffitt also happened. The transfer, from Division 2 Sioux Falls, made quite the impact on his team with his leadership and hustle, routinely making big plays when it was needed most.
Omaha:
Devin Patterson, Tre’Shawn Thurman, Marcus Tyus, (Jake White)
The Mavericks could have a Big 4 if Jake White is healthy, with as many injuries as he had in his junior season, it is going to be like getting an entirely new player in the line up. It seemed as if the entire team faced injuries issues last season, so if the Mavs can stay healthy, they can be a very dangerous team in the Summit League with their senior back court of Patterson and Tyus to go along with their rising sophomore star Tre’Shawn Thurman.
Random stat: The Mavericks have the most experienced roster with the average eligible player being 2/3 of the way through their sophomore season, but they have the smallest roster with an average height of 6’4″. If Zach Jackson, Ben Kositizke, and Zach Pirog all redshirt, the roster gets even smaller, but more experienced. It is still up for debate if this is one of the meaningless things I have ever posted here.
The Mavericks are looking to make a big jump with a new arena and new era.
Role Players:
Tra-Deon Hollins, 6-2 JR: Averaged 17 ppg, 6.2 rpg, and 5.3 apg his freshman season of junior college, he appears to be a little bit of everything, and can really help the Mavericks improve their perimeter defense.
Daniel Meyer, 6-9 SO: Only averaged four and a half minutes a game in 2014-2015, but he is likely to see an increased role with the graduation of Mike Rostampour and the departure of fellow redshirt freshman Rylan Murry. Meyer appeared to play with a lot of activity on the team’s trip to Italy.
Randy Reed, 6-6 SR: I’d like to see Reed’s shot chart, I cannot think of many jump shots Reed made, or took. He really can slash and get to the basket though. When Marcus Tyus missed the last 6 games of the season, Reed really did a decent job of bringing energy off the bench. There were many instances in the Mavericks’ home game against Oral Roberts that he made a play to keep Omaha in the game. I would think with not a ton of post players around the Summit League that Reed will be used as a backup 4.
NDSU:
Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, AJ Jacobson
After losing the Summit League player of the year, Lawrence Alexander, the Bison will look to replace that offense in their back court. AJ Jacobson said in a Q&A that the Bison are all about a team effort, and know that there is a next one up to take Alexander’s place. It will probably actually be two up with Kory Brown and Carlin Dupree to take the load on offense over. Seriously, this team is starting to become the HYDRA of the Summit League.
While this team is still relatively young, they seem to have completely bought into Dave Richman’s schemes. A Big 3 probably does not really matter to the Bison, they appear to be ready for anything. Looking at their roster, they probably have the most complete roster in the Summit League. It is also probably worth nothing; that while the Bison are a young team, their roster has the most division one starts on the active roster for 2015-2016 with 197 starts. Kory Brown is after all a 4 year starter…assuming he is going to start this season.
The Bison will continue to work as a team after the loss of Lawrence Alexander.
Role Players:
Chris Kading, 6-8 SR: Kading averaged 5.3 points per game and 3.9 rebounds per game in 2014-2015. He is not much of a threat on offense, but he does rarely make mistakes. Actually the Bison rarely make mistakes as a team. Kading led the Summit League in blocks per game.
Paul Miller, 6’4 SO: Miller averaged 6.7 points per game and 3.8 rebounds per game, while making 37 threes in his freshman campaign, which is all impressive considering he was sharing the back court with the likes of Lawrence Alexander, Kory Brown, and Carlin Dupree. He also had 10 games in which he scored in double figures.
Dexter Werner, 6-6 JR: Had a massive jump from his sophomore to his junior season going from 2.8 points per game to 8.4 points per game. He also only averaged under 20 minutes per game in 2014-2015. With Werner coming off the bench, he and Jacobson allow the Bison to be extremely tough at the 4 position for 40 minutes. It also allows Jacobson to move over to the 3 and play more outside, which is not a bad thing for them. Werner was second on the team in blocks per game, and is tied with Omaha’s Tre’Shawn Thurman as the 2nd leading shot blocker returning to the league.
IUPUI:
Marcellus Barksdale, Darrell Combs, Nick Osborne
A bunch of new faces for IUPUI, which is not a terrible thing. Marcellus Barksdale is the team’s returning leading scorer, but he can easily fall to the team’s 2nd or 3rd best scorer on the team. Eastern Michigan transfer Darrell Combs is ready to go and has shown he can get buckets. I cannot wait for the “combing the court” puns from terrible ESPN3 commentators. Loyola-Illinois transfer Nick Osborne is expected to make a big impact on this team as well, and will more than likely serve as the team’s primary post presence, as he and other Loyola-Illinois transfer Matt O’Leary are the only upperclassmen post players on the team. Osborne was known for getting into lots of foul trouble when he was a post player for Loyola. The Jaguars are going to look entirely different this season.
The Jaguars exceeded expectations in 2014-2015, what can they do with a group of new and improved players?
Role Players:
Seriously, how many 6’5″ guards do the Jaguars need?
Aaron Brennan, 6-6 SO: Averaged 6.4 points per game in 2014-15 and started in 24 games, but could be moved to the bench with the additions of Osborne and O’Leary. Not a bad thing for your team to have a guy on your bench with 24 career starts as a freshman.
DJ McCall, 6-5 SO: Averaged a shade under 5 points per game and had 15 starts on the year. Could also see an increase of minutes with the graduations of Elijah Ray and Khufu Najee.
The further I get into this, I realize that the entire team is a group of role players.
South Dakota
Tre Burnette, Tyler Flack, Casey Kasperbauer
I admit that throwing Flack’s name into the mix is a risk. Due to an injury, he has yet to play under Craig Smith, but Craig is probably going to like using a 6’7″ guy who shot 45% on threes in his sophomore season. Combine that with Casey Kasperbauer ranking 95th in the nation last season in threes made, and South Dakota will rely on the three ball a lot this season, again. The trio can really make up for the losses of Tyler Larson and Brandon Bos from last season.
Tre Burnette is the Summit League’s leading returning rebounder from 2014-2015, and Kasperbauer has the most three point field goals made of any returning player to the League, he also has the 3rd highest three point field goal percentage of any returning player.
South Dakota lost 56% of their scoring, that is the most in the Summit League.
Role Players:
Trey Norris, 6-0 Sr: Came off the bench in his junior year after being a starter in his sophomore season, but will compete for the starting point guard position with incoming JuCo player, Shy McClelland. Norris had a drop off in production from his sophomore season under coach Smith, but he can still be a capable part of the offense for the Coyotes.
Eric Robertson, 6-8 Sr: He made the game winning shot over the Mavericks in Omaha, right? I just remember the beard, and being incredibly angry. I do not completely blame him for the Mavericks’ loss, it is just the final image I have in my mind of that game. Perhaps an increased role in his senior season with the departure of James Hunter, but Craig Smith did a decent job recruiting two 6’9″ freshman (Tyler Hagedorn and Dan Jech) that he may be intrigued to get to the top of the rotation immediately.
IPFW
Mo Evans, Max Landis, Joe Reed
I continuously forget about the existence of Max Landis, but he is on the team, I swear it, and he was 4th on the team in scoring last season. The ‘Dons lost a lot of their post game, and they do not appear to have much replacing what they lost, so the team could rely a lot on Mo Evans to be a star. Landis will be there to shoot the three, and Joe Reed will need to be counted on even more to be a stretch 4 than he has before. Seriously, this is the first time we have seen the ‘Dons without a serious threat of a stretch 4. Yep, first time in 5 years? Reed did shoot 36% from behind the line last year, but did not take many as he only made ten on the year. The team will be counting on two junior college transfers to fill the void of what they lost from last season, and will need them to adjust and contribute quickly.
Side note: The ‘Dons will have transfers from Louisiana Tech, Purdue, and Bradley all eligible to play in 2016-2017.
The ‘Dons have the fewest number of Division 1 starts by players on their roster.
Role Players:
Andrew Poulter, 6-11 JR: Played in seven games his redshirt freshman year at Arkansas-Little Rock before transferring to Western Texas for his sophomore season, where he averaged 7 points and 5 rebounds per game.
DeAngelo Stewart, 6-6 JR: Played his freshman season at Alabama State before transferring to Northwest Tech in Kansas for his sophomore season. Averaged 16 ppg, 6 rpg, and shot 47% from the field in his sophomore season. A few people have already tabbed Stewart as the Newcomer of the Year in the Summit League.
Western Illinois:
Garret Covington, JC Fuller, and Jabari Sandifer
It is hard to determine who the Leathernecks’ third best player is behind Covington and Fuller. Sandifer was the third leading scorer on the team with 7.4 points per game, and he also led the Summit League in assists with 4.3 per game. He even had a great opening weekend in the Summit with 22 points and 4 assists against IPFW and 20 points and 6 assists against Omaha, but then he was basically never heard from again only scoring in double figures one more time through the season.
Western Illinois actually has a lot of experience on their team, but how much faith can you put in a team that has gone 1-27 on the road in the last two seasons. The last time they won a road game was January 30th, 2014 against IPFW.
The Leathernecks return 89% of their scoring, can they see improvement if they stay healthy?
Role Players:
Mike Miklusak, 6-6 JR: Played in 15 games because of a season ending injury He had 21 points and 7 rebounds against Omaha. I am putting my head down right now.
Jamie Batish, 6-4, SR: A bit of an inconsistent guard, but gives the Leathernecks an option on offense after averaging 6.4 points per game in his first season with the team. He had 15 points in a win against Omaha. Seriously, I am going to punch myself in the face right now.
Tate Stensgaard, 6-8 SR: Played in 20 games before facing a season ending injury. Has shot over 56% on his career as a Leatherneck.
Denver:
Marcus Byrd, Nate Engesser, Bryant Rucker
Honestly it is pretty difficult to analyze a team’s Big 3 when they run the Princeton offense. Excuse me, I have to take a break, I just had a random memory of Barry Collier being a terrible basketball coach.
Okay, I am back… With their offense you need guys that take high percentage shots. These three seniors-to-be had a combined shooting percentage of nearly 50% from the field and 42% on threes. Marcus Byrd has the highest three point field goal percentage for any player returning to the Summit League. The Summit League has been more difficult for Joe Scott and the Pioneers than it was for them against the Sun Belt and WAC, which hopefully is not all that surprising. The Pioneers have gotten worse each of the last three seasons going from 22 wins to 16 wins to 12 wins, can they go for 10 this year? With their high shooting percentage, the Pioneers can always be in a game, but with the Summit League having so many good shooters, teams have been able to take over games down the stretch. It is pretty difficult to beat at home as they are 32-13 at home over the last 3 years, and last year they lost 7 games at home by a combined total of 39 points…one of those games was a 16 point loss to IPFW as an outlier.
Denver does not care about a Big 3.
Role Players:
Daniel Amigo, 6-10 SO: 5.7 ppg, 46 FG%
Jake Pemberton, 6-3 SO: Likely to see an increased role with the graduation of Brett Olson and Cam Griffin.
Oral Roberts:
Obi Emegano, Brandon Conley, Scott Sutton
With Korey Billbury and Bobby Word departing from the team, I really cannot come up with who is going to make up a Big 3 for the Golden Eagles. On paper, it looks kind of rough for Oral Roberts and coach Sutton, but Sutton is probably one of the top coaches in the Summit League and entering his 17th season as the head coach of the Golden Eagles, so they cannot really be counted out, especially if they arguably the best player in the conference. You want to talk about new faces? Oral Roberts is going to be like trying to figure out who is joining the cast of another Expendables film.
Obi Emegano is a popular choice of Preseason Player of the Year.
Role Players:
Seriously have no idea what will be happening with this team. Perhaps this is what happens to a team when they change conferences so often…naw what I mean Denver? Brandon Conley is probably the only for sure thing on the team, everyone else seems to be the mystery man with his trigger on the finger. The Golden Eagles can probably get above .500 in the conference with Emegano and Sutton though.
With players coming and going, roles need to be filled on teams, and some players just respond quicker than others. North Dakota State’s AJ Jacobson clearly had a big year as a redshirt freshman, which was a huge help to the Bison as they lost three key seniors from their 2014 championship team. IUPUI’s Marcellus Barksdale went from averaging 0.3 points per game as a freshman in 2012-13 to averaging 8.6 points per game in his sophomore season, and now is considered an All Conference candidate by many. South Dakota State’s Keaton Moffitt transferred from a division 2 program to be a top guy off the bench for the Jackrabbits. Omaha’s Mike Rostampour made an immediate impact with Omaha in his junior season after transferring from division 2.
With the Bison and Jackrabbits as the two favorites to repeat as the two top teams in the Summit League, the league seems to look like it will be in a pretty tight battle for who is 3rd to 8th (or 9th) in the conference standings at the end of the year. So who are some of the potential wild cards in the Summit League that can set their team apart in 2015-2016?
Denver
EVERYONE ON THE ROSTER NOT NAMED MARCUS BYRD, NATE ENGESSER, OR BRYANT RUCKER
Here is a statistic that may jump out at you. Denver returns the second fewest amount of division one starts on their roster in the Summit League, behind IPFW. They are a young team, though so was North Dakota State last season, with 6 freshman and 4 sophomores on the roster, so I am incredibly curious who can make up for the losses of Cam Griffin, Brett Olson, and Jalen Love.
The team virtually has no post game, but it is not really something that is incredibly needed in the Princeton offense. Barry Collier ran the Princeton offense really well without a competent big man at Nebraska. That was a really bad joke. Could sophomore Daniel Amigo make a big jump if he is healthy? He started in all 15 of the games he played in during his freshman year averaging 5.7 points per game, and had three double digit scoring performance, but they were all in blow outs.
Daniel Amigo is super serial.
IPFW
JOHN KONCHAR – 6’4″, rFR
Could Konchar be a big time player as a freshman. He redshirted in his first season with the ‘Dons, I assume because of the 4 upperclassmen guards that were on the roster last season. Konchar averaged 29 points, 14 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals, and 2.5 blocks per game in his senior season in high school in Chicago. Holy crap! He did see action in IPFW’s preseason game last season, but he only had 3 points in 15 minutes, but hey it was a preseason game.
RACHINE TALLA – 6’9″, SO
Talla is seriously the biggest question mark for IPFW. He redshirted at USC Upstate his freshman season, and then only played in 2 games in junior college because Mississippi is the worst place on earth. So how much of an impact can a guy be who has basically not played a competitive game of basketball in 3 years.
IUPUI
JORDAN PICKETT – 6’0″, SO
Pickett transferred to IUPUI after only playing in five games at Loyola before suffering a season ending injury in 2013-2014. The Jaguars do not have much of a back court, they have a lot of 6’5″ guards, but can the bigger players deal with all of the smaller shooting guards the Summit League has to offer. Pickett is likely to have a big role for the Jaguars in 2015-2016. In the Jaguars’ red-white scrimmage last season, which was basically IUPUI vs their players who were forced to redshirt due to transferring, Pickett was able to score 11 points against…the Jaguars.
NICK OSBORNE- 6’8″, JR
One of three transfers from Loyola on the roster. Osborne is expected to make an immediate impact with the Jaguars, as they have not had much talent in the post in a few years. Osborne averaged 5.4 ppg and 4 rpg, and shot 50% from the field in his sophomore season at Loyola. He did average 3 fouls per game, so curious to see how much time he will spend on the bench due to foul trouble in the Summit League.
How much of a difference can Nick Osborne make with the Jaguars.
NORTH DAKOTA STATE
They lost Taylor Braun, Marshall Bjorklund, and TrayVonn Wright a year ago, and they ended up repeating as Summit League Champions with a 1st year coach. I think they will be fine…
One could ask; who is going to be make up for the 19 points per game that they lost in Lawrence Alexander? Can Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, Paul Miller, and junior college transfer sophomore Malik Clements make up that 19 points a game in the back court? Yes, they probably can.
OMAHA
JAKE WHITE- 6’8″, SR
Can Jake White be the best post player in the Summit League? Can he?
Last year we were teased with White. With 10 rebounds in his first half as a Maverick, we were thinking our front court would be unstoppable with him and Mike Rostampour. Then a few minutes into the second half, White hurt his knee, and then for almost a month we kept being told: not this game, but next game probably… If you look around the post players at the Summit League, White is capable of being the best post player in the League, but he has to stay healthy. When White transferred, Derrin Hansen stated that White would be the best post player in the Summit.
DANIEL MEYER – 6’9″, SO
Meyer only played 4.5 minutes per game in his freshman season with the Mavericks, but with Mike Rostampour and Rylan Murry (i cried a tear) no longer on the roster, Meyer should expect more playing time in his sophomore season, I mean, right? It sounded as if he did really well in Italy, but it did not sound like the teams the Mavs played against had many players taller than 6’5″…but I did not look at official rosters, just shady looking websites that did not look fully updated. When Meyer did play last season, I was never terrified that he was going to ruin everything. He seemed to move pretty well without the ball, set good screens, and had a nice touch. He even looked like he could be as good as a passer out of the post as John Karhoff, but we will have to wait and see.
ORAL ROBERTS
ALBERT OWENS- 6’9″ SO
With the graduation of Denell Henderson, Owens will competing for the starting center position with junior college transfer Tre Vance. Owens did average 3.8 ppg and 2.4 rpg, but he never really received any significant playing time in any of the Golden Eagles’ big games. Yet, if you look around at some of the conference predictions, Owens is expected to be a big key factor to ORU’s success. You know, assuming they have some success this season.
Owens has great size listed at 6’9″ and 260lbs.
JALEN BRADLEY- 6’0″ JR
Bradley is familiar with the Summit League, as he originally played for the Mavericks, but he only played in a total of 26 minutes against the Summit League due to injuries in 2013-2014. Bradley went on to junior college for his sophomore season, where he averaged 17 points per game. Everyone knew Bradley could shoot at Omaha, I remember watching him shoot from half court in warm ups and making it regularly, but we did question if he could defend or play the point guard position. While he was at Omaha, they were deep with guards with: CJ Carter, Marcus Tyus, Alex Phillips, Caleb Steffensmeier, Devin Patterson, and Justin Simmons. The Mavericks could have used him in his sophomore season as that energy guy off the bench, and that would likely still be his role, but ORU fans are expecting him (and 6’3″ Div 2/Fresno State transfer Aaron Anderson) to fill a void left in Korey Billbury and Bobby Word. That is a lot to ask.
SOUTH DAKOTA
TREY NORRIS – 6’0″ SR
Norris started in all 28 games he played in for the Coyotes in his sophomore season, but then was sent to the bench in his junior season as Craig Smith took over at South Dakota. Can he be counted on to be the starter again and help lead the Coyotes to another winning record?
TYLER FLACK – 6’7″ JR
Sat out 2014-2015 with an injury. He started 19 out of 29 games his freshman season and 27 out of 30 games in his sophomore season. As a sophomore, he averaged 8.5 ppg and 4.7 rpg, he also shot 55% from the floor. Is he going to be the same after a serious injury, and will Smith have big plans for Flack?
Can Tyler Flack be Tyler Flack again?
Here is a glaring stat for South Dakota. I was looking at the South Dakota State fan forum, wishing I had it in me to do some trolling, and the Jackrabbits are pretty stoked that they return so much of their scoring. The Jackrabbits return 74% of their scoring, which is second in the conference behind Western Illinois who returns 89% of their scoring, but that is Western Illinois… Anyway, South Dakota lost the most scoring in the Summit losing 54% of their scoring. So they are going to need Flack and Norris to return to 2013-2014 form.
SOUTH DAKOTA STATE
CONNOR DEVINE/IAN THEISEN
Did I mention that South Dakota State is returning 74% of their scoring? I think I just did that. Most of that is the loss of Cody Larson. The Jackrabbits arguably have the best guard trio in the Summit League with George Marshall, Deondre Parks, and Jake Bittle, but they are left with little in the post after the loss of Larson, and they are young in the post. Devine and Theisen shared the time behind Cody Larson in the post last season, can they and freshman Nebraska natives Michael Daum and Adam Dykman make up for that loss in Larson?
WESTERN ILLINOIS
When you only when 8 games, you lose 13 of your last 14 games, one of your wins is a 2 point win at home against Devin Patterson-less Omaha team, and 15 of your 20 losses are by 10 points or more, there is not much confidence riding in your team going into the next season. So basically everyone on your roster not named Garrett Covington is a wild card.
The Leathernecks did have some injury issues in 2014-2015, and they have the 2nd most returning division one starts on their roster in the Summit League behind North Dakota State, and as previously mentioned, they do return 89% of their scoring.
Thursday morning I will leave for a wedding in Mexico, the wedding happens to be on my birthday, so it will probably be the coolest place that I have ever spent my birthday. I am a big sports fan, but I am also not such a crazed sports fan to where I will have my phone out the entire time checking college basketball scores. Mostly because of signal on my cell, but also out of respect for the people getting married… I just hope to come back to find out that the UNO Mavericks have picked up a win. I am sure the room I am in will have wireless and I can check the score there, but who knows.
I do not ever want to be negative with any of this, but it is hard to find many positives for a team that is on a five game losing streak and just lost to the preseason last place team with UNO having a historic scoring performance from their senior captain. So here are some positives…
Denver is also struggling. A team picked second in the preseason rankings (see how preseason rankings are worthless) finds themselves at 6th in the conference at 2-3 with losses to South Dakota State, also IUPUI, and they are responsible for IPFW’s only win. IPFW was the voted as the preseason champion.
Another positive, CJ Carter and Marcus Tyus are playing awesome right now. CJ Carter scored 45 points on only 25 field goal attempts in his last game. How many NBA players have you seen that needed to take 39 shots in order to get to 45? Tyus, also went 7 of 10 in the Mavs last game. He is also rebounding and passing the ball better this season, he really has become a more consistent player this season. UNO did shoot 50% plus in their two losses, so naturally you want to blame defense, rebounding, turnovers, all the good stuff. Before Oral Roberts and IUPUI, UNO was 6-0 when shooting above 44% and 0-9 when shooting under 44%, not counting Iowa Wesleyan. #themoreuno
UNO has no games this work week. Denver plays Oral Roberts on Wednesday night, so UNO has more time to prepare for this game. That can not be a negative. Okay, now I do not know where to go from here.
If you were listening to the broadcast on the radio, Gary Sharp mentioned that teams are playing the Mavs to get better, it seems like some players are having out of body experiences and shooting much better against Omaha. Ouch, considering Denver already shoots 49% on the year as a team and leads the Summit, so are you telling me they are going to be better than that?
Denver runs a Princeton offense, similar to Air Force, ehhhh, and is led by their two senior wings Brett Olson (shoots 51%) and Cam Griffin (shoots 54%). Let me throw something at you. Brett Olson stands at 6’5″ and Cam Griffin is 6’3″. Denver is not really that big of a team, they do not have a talented big guy like Air Force did with Marek Olesinksi. Marcus Byrd is probably their most talented guy that is 6’7″ or taller who averages 9 and 4 and shoots 52% from the field and 49% on threes. So three of their top players shoot higher than 50%, well this already sounds fun.
Why mention this? The perimeter defense that I have spoken of as being a big issue for UNO. In 2012-2013, I thought the Mavs biggest weakness was in the post, and then it got better in 2013-2014 with the addition to Mike Rostampour to the lineup, but now it is a strength of the team with Jake White and Tre’Shawn Thurman also in the post. Now the Mavs are having trouble guarding wing players. Opposing teams’ starters that are 6’7″ or taller are shooting 46% from the field against the Mavs, guards that are 6’2″ or shorter are also shooting 46% from the field against the Mavs, and players that are 6’3″ to 6’6″ (and I will throw in Nebraska’s Terran Petteway and Shavon Shields into this category, just because) are shooting 50% from the field.
Maybe that does not sound like a significant thing, but when you are in a league filled with 6’3″ to 6’6″ wing players that can shoot the ball, it is a problem. There are not a lot of great talented big guys in the league. Hell, UNO is in last place and after IPFW’s Steve Forbes and South Dakota State’s Cody Larson, UNO probably has the next best 3 big men in the league of Mike Rostampour, Jake White, and Tre’Shawn Thurman. Korey Billbury and Obi Emegano combined for 20-32 from the field against the Mavs, and statistically they are not quite as good as shooters as Cam Griffin and Brett Olson. I do not even want to get into IUPUI.
I am pretty interested to see what Mike Rostampour will do in this game against Denver. In no way do I think 5 rebounds in two games is okay with Mike Rostampour. The last time he only had 3 rebounds in one game, he came back the next game with 11 points and 11 rebounds against Marquette. The only time he had less rebounds over a two game stretch, he had 4 combined rebounds in 2 games against South Carolina State and Drake last season, he came back with a performance of 19 points, 9 rebounds, on 7-11 shooting with 2 threes at South Carolina State. I would be incredibly surprised if Rostampour has three bad rebounding games in a row.
I love Carter and Tyus, but at 6’1″, I wish one of them could play the point guard position for the stretches of the game that Devin Patterson is on the bench. You are never quite sure what is going to happen when the Mavs go to the bench. It is like you are putting in a new Weezer CD, you know there will be part of a song that is pretty good, but the rest of the CD, you are not entirely sure what you are getting yourself into. I thought of this, I used to be a big Weezer fan, but I have not given that band one dollar since that Maladroit album.
When Matt Hagerbaumer, Alex Phillips, and Caleb Steffensmeier came off the bench last season, you knew exactly what you were getting. Defense and rebounding from Hagerbaumer, and some sweet dunks when he got the opportunity. Defense and shooting from Alex Phillips, maybe one poor decision from time to time, but nothing too extreme. Defense, ball control, and if you needed a comeback or a dagger three from Steffensmeier, he would give it to you. All three of those guys would get you high percentage shots.
We know we are going to get a boat load of offensive rebounds from Jake White, but offensively he has been hard to figure out so far. You are not really sure what you are going to get out of the bench on a consistent basis from anyone else on the bench. He is only shooting 37% from the field, but that is with some nagging injuries. Maybe Randy Reed can get us 10 and 7 this game, but then 2 and 1 the other game. Tim Smallwood and Rylan Murry can get us a couple threes this game, but then both seem to be too shy from deep the next game. This is why I wish Carter or Tyus could play the point, I think they are both capable of it, it just does not seem to happen often. With one of them at the point, the Mavs could have 3 starters on the court with 2 bench players at any given time as opposed to 1 starter with 4 bench players, which seems to be leading to problems lately.
A general perception that I have right now is that the team loses a lot of defensive intensity when Mike Rostampour is on the bench. Which it would probably be impossible to have the intensity go up with him on the bench, but it is quite noticeable how much the team is affected when Rostampour is on the bench resting or is in foul trouble. Might I recommend a little more Daniel Meyer when Rostampour is in foul trouble? Tre’Shawn Thurman is awesome, but he is not the definition down low banger like Rostampour, Jake White is also not exactly in that category either, but Meyer is really the only player that would fall into that category after Rostampour. I do not see what is wrong with a Meyer-White-Thurman front court for a small stretch. Maybe it is not the ideal lineup against Denver, but against a slightly bigger South Dakota State or IPFW, it seems pretty reasonable.
I do think we need to stop looking at this season as We Beat Marquette and we need to start look at it as We Lost to Seattle, UMKC, Chicago State, and IUPUI.
Omaha Mavericks Blog 