Identity Crisis

Few people would argue over the last several weeks, that the season is either slipping away or has entirely fallen off the cliff.  We could debate all we want to about which one really is the case, but that would be neither fruitful nor fun.  The second thing that we can all agree on is that something needs to change with this team, something my good friend from the lower west coast and I discussed over lunch this afternoon.  Although we could have another less fruitful but potentially more fun argument over the details of the changes each of us feel need to happen, we can probably agree that bigger picture things need to be addressed.

Where to begin?  I could sit here and say something like: we need to take better shots on offense.  We have a solid OR%, but we need to do a better job of getting to the charity stripe and not settling for jumpers.  On defense we need to force more turnovers, get back on defense better during transition, and not give up so many easy looks.

All of these things are true, and I am sure there a several other changes other people have observed which are equally correct, but that is a lot of changes.  Is the answer just a tweak here, an adjustment there and a re-focus over there?

I believe the problems are more systemic than these simple adjustments, not that these are always simple in and of themselves or in combination.  I am not insinuating that it is an overall systemic problem with the program or overall coaching and recruiting aspects of our team.  I think the real issue at play is an identity crisis.

You can call it what you want, and everyone has their own definition:  chemistry, mojo, heart, attitude, gumption, toughness, camaraderie, maturity, ‘it’, killer instinct, leadership, and hundreds of others.  I just happen to believe identity encompasses all of those extra characteristics about players and a team that we just don’t have.  How many times have you seen someone smile this year?  Who is our leader, Fisher?  When was the last time you saw him get on anyone for not playing defense?  Can you actually see him ever getting on his teammates for not practicing hard?  How about Stokes?  Maybe, but it seems more like the team follows Fisher’s lead.  Are we a defensive team or an offensive team?  Is Pena really our 3rd option, or do we just not have anyone else who can step up?  Our pace is generally pedestrian, why is that?  Can we actually shoot 3's?  Why can't we run the 1-2-2 press like we have in past years?  When will James Bell end up suffocating Cheek with his pillow case for taking up all his playing time?  Better yet, why hasn't Fisher/Stokes/Pena gotten in either Jay's ear or Cheek's face about him taking all these stupid shots while he is on the floor?  Too many questions, and the answer are, well, scary.

So here we are, one more regular season game left, and we don’t even know what type of team we are.  The question now becomes, is there anything we can do about it?  Most of you, myself included, are more or less resigned to the fact that the answer is pretty much, no.  But that does not mean we shouldn’t try.  And if the answer is that there is no answer really, then we have two options.  Keep playing they way we have been, same style, same line ups and pray to God, Jesus, Mohammad, Allah, Yahweh, Buddha, Osiris, and every other God all at the same time hoping something clicks.  Or we have option B:  let’s try something a little different maybe even crazy.

Why not?  The season is pretty much over.  It is not like on Saturday, we are going to only take good shots, create a ton of turnovers, and get the FT line on almost every possession.  And in order to do any of those things we would need all if not 1 of the following to happen: Yarou to develop a killer jump hook, Cheek to start hitting shots at a 60% clip, Pena to not miss a mid-range jumper the rest of the year, Wayns to develop an extra gear where no one can stay in front of him, and Stokes to start hitting from the opposite foul line.  Not going to happen. 

So, here is what I propose, and I can’t believe I am actually saying this.  I want fewer minutes from Fisher, Stokes, & Pena.  I want more minutes from Cheek, Armwood, Sutton & Bell.  Hold on it gets better or worse depending on how far from the cliff we are in your opinion.  For 5 minutes each half, right around the 10 minute mark (so maybe 12-7), I want a line up of Sutton, Armwood, Bell, Cheek & Wayns.  I don’t even want to run the 1-2-2.  I want full court 40 minutes of hell style, where we just run all over the floor.  Offensively, I want the same thing.  Pure reckless abandon.  I want Cheek chucking up as many shots as he wants, not like we really have to beg him to do that now do we.  I want Bell green lighted once he steps over the half court line, and I want Wayns putting his head down going 1 on 3 in transition.  Ok, so I don’t really want all the recklessness.  Calm down Todd, but I do want energy and enthusiasm.  I want some excitement and good forbid some toughness.  I want Stokes, Fisher, and Pena to get some rest and STAND UP AND CHEER for the second unit while they are on the bench.

Or, how about force feeding Yarou the rock down low until he either vomits or passes out.  Give him a guaranteed touch in the high to mid post on every single possession he is on the floor.  I’m not talking about touches after penetration by Wayns or Fisher, either.  Straight up, move your ass into the paint, waive your hands for the pass, and go to work.  He can pass back out if he wants or he can start learning how to abuse people down low.  I’m totally fine with this approach as well.  I just need something different.  If I am calling for Cheek to get more minutes, I think we all know that I am clearly camping out inside the panic room with Jodie Foster.

In short, I want to Jay to say ok.  We are in trouble right now.  We are going to change it up.  From now on we are going to be X.  You name it, something different but importantly we are going to be at least something other than the overrated team that just never figured it out.

These are pure and total pipe dreams though.  Jay will not budge this late in the season from what we have been doing all year.  It would take drastic injuries or a suspension for Jay to take a radical approach.  But the time for sticking with the game plan and making small adjustments each game and half is long gone.  We have been exposed for being a team that really doesn’t understand what it needs to do to win.  We have been exposed as fragile in demeanor and a team that lacks energy and toughness. 

I came across this quote from someone at work today. (you know the people who put these on the bottom of their email that they send you – why do people do this?)  Anyway, it sums up the issue about our team very succinctly for me. 

Life isn’t about finding yourself.  Life is about creating yourself. – George Bernard Shaw

We clearly are not going to find an identity now, but that doesn’t mean we can’t get to work on creating one.

The Sun Also Rises

I have been a little weak on content these past couple of weeks, but I promise next week you will not be disappointed.  In honor of keeping my personal goal of at least 2 posts a week, I am here to provide you with a sneak preview of the content in the week ahead.  And of course some random musings and stats.

Saturday at 2:00 we take on St. John's.  Quick note on St. John’s: They take only 23% of their shots from 3 & their opponents take almost 40% of their shots from 3.  That difference is absolutely amazing, and frankly I really don’t know what the hell it means, do you?  So combine that number with the pace St. John’s plays 66.6 possessions a game (pretty much exactly the D1 average – so not that fast) and the difference in shot attempts becomes even more startling.  If the pace was really high, I could imagine St. John’s running down the court creating TO’s and the other time being rushed and just chucking it (which is what 40% of shots from 3’s really is).  But I just don’t know.  I guess we will find out Saturday.  End quick, err medium note.

So, judging from a lot of the reactions going on in the comment threads on the other Nova blogs, the fan base is clearly circling this game as a must win, a season saver, and or a measuring stick for our overall progress.  I have to agree, but like me I also disagree.  There are no real must win games, except for the obvious one and done games like the tourney.  It always feels like it, but you know what? Let's just say we lose on Sat.  Guess what?  We are still going to play the rest of the games on our schedule.  We are still going to get into the Tournament.  As far as our seeding is concerned, all of these games are must wins and important games, but life and the season will continue.  The sun also rises.

Currently, Joe – I hate Villanova – Lunardi has us as a 4 seed.  I think that is about right, but I could see us currently as also a 5 seed.  Right now I think we are better than the 6 seeds (West Virginia, St. John’s, Missouri, Texas A&M), but we could slide down to one of those spots with a less than stellar finish to our season and a poor showing in the BE tourney.  The only way I see us sliding lower/worse than a 6^th seed would be if we lose out, and also lose to a Rutgers type in the opening game of the BE tourney.  I personally do not think that will happen, but the rest of you are entitled to your opinions.

Speaking of opinions, back to the comment boards.  The last couple of days there have been 2 much discussed topics.  End of game execution & playing time/rotation/and distribution of minutes.  I thought both of these would be excellent topics for me to research and write about.  Problem is they happen to be very in depth researching topics, and I have failed to finish them in time.  That’s why there is next week, and the sun also rises.

End of game execution:  A lot of NBA stats blogs/websites talk about clutch minutes, points, shots, %, etc.  They define it generally as something like this: clutch minutes = less than 3 minutes to go in a game when you are either up or down by so many points – 3 maybe 5? (I’m too lazy to actually look it up right now, and it’s not really important for our discussion)  I thought that approach would be a) too narrow – the NBA has longer games and more games which makes these stats more relevant & b) way too time consuming. 

So, I choose to look at the 9 games in which our margin of defeat or victory was less than or equal to 5 points.  We are 4-5 in these types of games.  W’s = La Salle, Temple, DePaul, Seton Hall.  L’s = Pitt, G’Town, UCONN, Syracuse, Rutgers.  Sorry for bringing that last one back into your memory, by the way the stats for Rutgers in the last 5 minutes are retarded.  They had an offensive rating of 263.93!!!!  So in 100 poss they would score 263 points.  On the season Rutgers rating is 106.6.  There are some very, very interesting stats from these games.  By the way I am looking at how we do as a team and as individuals in the last 5 minutes of these games.

Lineups/Rotation/Minutes Played:  First, now that Stokes is back you are going to see a much more steady rotation from Jay.  Last game was his first game back, so the minutes were all out of sorts.  So, what I plan on doing with this post is figuring out who I want to play how many minutes a game.  Then I am going to figure out who I want to play with whom and for how long (rotation).  Once I have my minutes and rotations set, I can then create a hypothetical team, and I can take a look at how they will produce.  This is a much more subjective post, and I know from the comment threads that there is a lot disagreement about who should be playing more minutes, etc.  And as you can tell, I haven’t fully developed this idea, and I may even scratch it.  Hopefully Saturday will give me some inspiration.

Villanova University Master Plan:  Last Tuesday, sorry two Tuesdays ago, I attended an Alumni event in DC where I live.  Father Donahue presented the Villanova University Strategic plan, well he talked about unveiling it and really just gave a heart pulling plea for money.  That’s fine, that’s what these event are all about.  And I thoroughly enjoyed the open bar and food, along with the good company.  However, in the presentation he showed some renderings of some of the proposed buildings and development that the University WANTS to do. (I want to stress that because this is a long way off, and there are many hurdles that must be jumped, ahem Radnor’s blessing) This got me curious, so I checked out the Villanova University Master Plan.  I am in the progress of getting my master’s in Urban Planning, so I obviously enjoy this stuff.  I plan on posting my thoughts about the Master Plan and the proposed development on our campus.  But for those who do not know, the big proposed development is… housing, specifically senior housing (who knows how many seniors will have to live there, ex: if 50% of the rooms are occupied by seniors, does that count as senior housing?  Or do all the rooms have to be occupied by seniors?) ALL ALONG THE SOUTH SIDE OF LANCASTER.  Yeah, that’s right, where the parking lots are.  I still don’t know exactly how I feel about it.  It will also include a performing arts center, and some shops, and stores and a completely retooled streetscape along Lancaster.

There it is: your week ahead preview.  For the record, I am really feeling pretty good about the game Saturday.  Maybe I’m naïve, or a homer, but I still feel like this team is growing.  We are in a rough patch, for sure, but we are young and talented.  The key is for us is to make sure everyone knows what role they are and then to execute it.  We have the pieces to the puzzle but they are not in the right place at the moment.  And for all of you who think the sun has set on this team (you probably would have stopped reading this lousy blog then), well you know what I would tell.

Syracuse Differential Graph & Observations

Last Friday, I did a guest post on the Nova Blog about what missing Corey Stokes means to our team, (note:  it does not include stats from the DePaul game).  So if you missed that here is the link: here.

Also, I am going to try after every game and provide the Differential graph along with 5 notes/observations.  They will be tied to the game, but they also might be more along the lines of current trends and issues that I have discussed earlier in the season.  So, you should still obviously continue to check out Villanova by the Numbers for your typical tempo-free analysis of each game.

Observations

1. Armwood is the man.  He got his first double double of his career and he will likely get many more of those in the next several years here at Nova.  He is the type of player who everyone on other teams hates because he has an attitude, some nastiness, and does all of the dirty work.  I originally believed Jay included him in the starting line up for these characteristics that he possesses, but now I believe there is another reason.  It is clear from the games that he has a great attitude in my opinion:  tough, fearless, and selfless.  He also is very vocal.  So next year who will be the leader of this team?  I think Armwood is clearly the one I want it to be, and I think Jay does to.  So by playing him and starting him, he has created a role for him on our team, gained the respect of the older players and more importantly the younger players.  As long as Armwood emerges as our unquestioned leader next year, we will be a much more mentally and physically tough team.  Example:  Near the end of the game in a big spot Armwood stepped up to the line to hit 2.  Didn’t you just know he was going to drill those?

2. Cheek.  Why is it that Cheek continues to see extensive minutes?  Last night he went 2-9, and took 39% of the teams shots while he was on the floor!  Are you serious?  39%?  For anyone out there who thinks, hey Cheek just needs to get his confidence back, you are crazy.  If taking 39% of a teams shots while your on the floor when you had made only 1 FG in the last 3 games isn’t confident, then I don’t know what is.  Talent and brains not confidence is the issue.  Is he a jump shooter or a slasher?  We see his body and say slasher and a scorer, yet rarely does he do these things.  Still he is taking over 40% of his shot attempts from 3.  He also has a very long release which I noticed last night.  Translation:  he is not a spot up shooter, nor do I think he can come off of screens that well.  His best shot is when he is on the dribble, and that is something I do not want to see him do.  However, I have a theory why he gets the minutes he does.  Cheek is from where?  New Jersey, right?  He was an All-American there, from a pretty good program.  If we are going to be successful recruiting, especially with Lavin at St. John’s (By the way for everyone giving Lavin all of this credit this year:  St John’s is the 2^nd, I repeat 2^nd most experienced team in the COUNTRY.  So yes, Lavin has done well, but if there was ever a year St. John’s would do well it would be when they have a very old experienced team) we need to keep getting top Jersey kids.  Cheek being a very good HS player means that he is looked up to in the state, by younger kids in his program and by other players who played against/watched him.  They will pay attention to Nova games, and will eventually become big fans and want to go to Nova as long as Cheek gets PT.  Jay must be thinking about this because there is no other explanation that I can think of that explains Cheeks continued floor time.

3. Stokes & Fisher:  So, as I talked about in my guest post, we need Stokes on offense.  He provides stability and he is a senior who makes good decisions.  Fisher is still our best player, but sometimes he is just off.  Last night was one of those days.  Here is the thing about these 2 players in my mind.  Fisher is the heart of our team.  When he is off, everything else seems to go kind of crazy, and he has yet shown the real leadership and also ability to get everyone else going even if he isn’t.  You can see it when he came to the bench last night, he wasn’t terribly upset but just shaking his head and he seemed frustrated.  (And in case you were wondering, I am not a body language expert for the Bill O'Reilly show.  Really how stupid is that?)   We need him to shake off bad starts, bad calls, and get people involved and make smart decisions.  As far as Stokes is concerned, he feeds off of energy but he doesn’t create it.  Everytime we had a big defensive play, he would come down and drill a shot, but if we needed him to hit a real big time shot while the chips were down, I don’t think he makes those.

4. Wayns.  With Armwood’s move into the starting line up and Jay’s insistence on playing Cheek around 20 minutes a game, Wayns has been hurt the most.  His minutes in BE play before Marquette – which marked the beginning of Armwood’s rise in PT – were 77.7% of minutes played.  Since Marquette and excluding the games Stokes missed (because clearly he got some of Stokes minutes while he was hurt) Wayns is playing only 62.5% of available minutes.  Also, since the Marquette game he has an eFG of 35.5%, which is very, very low.  I would need to look more in depth into what exactly has changed for Wayns, but I think he is struggling in his new role.  I like Armwood in the starting line up, but we need Wayns.  He needs more minutes not less.

5. Yarou – After the DePaul game I looked at the box score and saw that Yarou – who was not in foul trouble – only played 26 minutes.  He had 8 of our teams 15 offensive rebounds, and watching the first 5 minutes of the game (which I did before going to help a friend move) he was unstoppable down low.  It was clear they would not be able to keep him off the glass.  Flash forward to the game last night, and Yarou only played 17 minutes – again not in foul trouble.  This past game Jay went with a lot of different looks, and I think that in the next 2 games or so we are going to see a lot more consistency in the rotations now that Stokes is back.  However, we need Yarou.  I can’t think of why he only got 26 and 17 minutes in back to back games without foul trouble.