Dave in Green

Specifically, a second Miami player ran over to double Big Dog the second he put the ball on the floor. By the time Big Dog was into his second dribble, he was tightly double-covered and had trouble with the outlet pass. The way to overcome that is for Big Dog to plan his pass to come after a single dribble. That way the second coverage player is about halfway between the man he was covering and Big Dog. The player who's left unguarded should immediately break for the basket and be the primary target for a pass from Big Dog. Quick adjustments like that will break down that kind of double coverage.

This is too good not to mention: Zips will have a rare advantage at the free throw line tonight! Zips free throw shooting percentage for the season is 65.2% vs. 63.9% for Can't.

I don't know why Coach Smart would be upset with the Davidson coach, who began taking all of his starters out with about 2 minutes left and a precarious 77-54 lead.

Previously mentioned here.

Looks as if the worst case scenario is in effect with both Pat and BJ done for the season. How ironic that the last time the Zips were this depleted they were blown out of the NCAA tournament by VCU. This season Coach Smart will be better able to empathize with Coach Dambrot. Back on January 31 VCU was sailing along with a 17-3 record and a national ranking. That day their starting PG went down with a season-ending injury. Since then mighty VCU has gone 4-6, including an 82-55 blowout by Davidson tonight. I'll bet the two good coaching friends will be spending more time on the phone together than usual discussing what it feels like to deal with adversity.

Sorry for the late response: I had a dream job in Southern California but the company went belly up. As I was looking for a new job, I got a call from Akron and ended up moving back here because the job offer was better than what I'd been able to find in Southern California. As a child of the midwest (Illinois), I was OK with the four seasons. Best move I ever made. Met and married a wonderful Akron girl who's been the love of my life for the last 32 years and counting.

Turf toe (metatarsophalangeal joint sprain) prognosis: Barring a miraculous recovery, it's going to be the worst case scenario of both Pat and BJ out for the rest of the season and the Zips playing in the tournament with 8 healthy scholarship players.

EA goes further to say that BJ has had "a nagging malady all season that has recently flared up again." That would help explain why he hasn't played longer minutes or performed up to the level we had expected. I just hope that whatever it is heals up over the off season and he comes back 100% next season.

I believe I'm the only one who mentioned missing all those players, and it was very clearly stated within the context of how much total talent the Zips have lost from prematurely departing players and injuries, and how little team depth was left on a team built around a deep bench. But please feel free to give it your best creative interpretation.

Tickets for Monday's game came with the season ticket package, so whatever the season ticket sales total is will be the baseline for announced attendance.

Worst case scenario for the Zips is that neither Pat nor BJ play another game. That would leave the following rotation: Big Dog Kwan Aaron Jake Reggie Deji Nyles Antino Malcolm Those who wanted to see Kwan in the low post would likely get their chance if he becomes Big Dog's backup. And those who wanted to see Deji play more minutes would probably also get their chance to see how effective he can be playing longer minutes.

Elton agrees on the Bullies, who are intent on replacing previous Can't teams as the designated thugs of the MAC:

Glib, the numbers I cited are from a season database that's not sortable by just half season or conference vs. non-conference games. I did find another database that breaks out the Zips stats for the 17 conference games to date but doesn't show our opponents' numbers for those games. Here are the Zips conference vs. season numbers: Personal fouls per game: Zips average 19.6 in conference vs. 18.5 for the whole season. Free throw attempts per game: Zips average 16.2 in conference vs. 17.5 for the whole season. Assuming our opponents' numbers moved a similar amount, a rough estimate would make the difference more in the 3.5-4.0 point range in conference games. This would tend to fit the model of a larger percentage of road games in conference play than non-conference, and away teams tend to get less benefit on calls by officials than home teams.

Sade281, I don't think anyone has yet welcomed you to ZipsNation. We really appreciate new forum members as some of the old ones tend to post the same old stuff, and it gets really boring. So welcome to ZN.o and please keep sharing your enthusiasm about Antino with us. Antino is one of the most exciting players I've seen since I've been following the Zips. I'm so happy he selected Akron, which is so far away from his home in the Houston area. One of the things I noticed about Antino at this game in Oxford is that he was absolutely miserable at the end of the game even though he scored a lot of points. You could see the unhappiness on his face and in his posture because he knew his team was losing the game. That told me that winning games is more important to Antino than personal statistics, and that's a sign of a team player. We already love Antino, and the best is yet to come over the next three seasons.

Zip_ME87, good recruits alone will not automatically lead to an NCAA tournament game win. But what I can absolutely promise you is that the Zips will never win an NCAA tournament game without good recruits. Keener'92, you have the right to say anything you want about the 20+ game win streak, and everyone else has the right to agree or disagree. But I'm right.

Keener'92, you know I like you. But I could give a flying flip about what you or Google or Wikipedia or Twitter or Facebook or any disgruntled poster on any forum has to say on the subject. The only thing that matters, repeat, THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS, is what recruits think about the 20+ game winning streak. If any good recruit has been influenced to select UA over other schools, the streak matters. Period. End of story.

If, if, if ... Had the Zips beaten Miami, they would have controlled their own destiny and would have been perfectly positioned to earn a top 4 MAC tournament seed by beating Can't. The Zips would have owned the tiebreaker over Can't and whoever lost Friday's UB-BGSU game, locking the Zips into a top 4 seed regardless of any other Friday result. Losing both Pat and BJ for the Miami game was the final blow. MU 70, Zips 63 CMU 85, UT 77 Can't 81, BGSU 80 UB 93, OU 66 NIU 65, WMU 63 EMU 67, BSU 60 MAC STANDINGS 12-5 - CMU 11-6 - Can't 11-6 - UT 11-6 - BGSU 11-6 - UB 9-8 - Zips 9-8 - WMU 8-9 - MU 7-10 - EMU 7-10 - NIU 4-13 - OU 2-15 - BSU FRIDAY MATCHUPS: 9-8 Zips @ 11-6 Can't 11-6 BGSU @ 11-6 UB 12-5 CMU @ 9-8 WMU 11-6 UT @ 7-10 EMU 8-9 MU @ 4-13 OU 7-10 NIU @ 2-15 BSU

With a cap of 13 scholarships, someone had to be left off the list. For all Nick's attitude problems, most fans here seemed to think he had more potential as a player than Melo if he ever got his head screwed on straight. But Nick was the first of many dominoes to fall, including Pat and BJ last night. Of course the main point of my post was to point out the huge accumulated loss of Zips talent on the court by the end of the game last night. Tree, Nick, Noah, Pat, BJ and even Melo had been starters last and/or this season. All at one time were expected to play some role in the Zips having a great regular season and perhaps their first post-season run. No team could stand that much unexpected loss of talent. This is at least as great a loss of Zips player talent as when they went up against VCU in the NCAA tournament with Q suspended for the season, Alex suspended forever, Deji out with back spasms and Pat and Brian Walsh sickened by flu or food poisoning. VCU slaughtered that decimated Zips team, and the current team is just as vulnerable if Pat and BJ remain out.

Don't forget the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. Skip is salivating at the thought of spending Christmas week in Boise.

After the first 6 team personals in each half, all fouls are shooting fouls. So that does narrow it down a little. I agree with zippy5 that the big number (116) is less meaningful than the average difference per game. Let's look at this in more detail to try to gain a better understanding of what's going on. Personal fouls per game: Zips are averaging ~18.5 and their opponents ~17.0, so in raw personals the Zips are being whistled just 1.5 times more per game (~9%) than their opponents. A number of factors could be contributing to this difference. But it doesn't seem like the kind of huge difference some may think exists due to the Zips shooting a large number of 3s where there's a much smaller chance of drawing a personal than driving the basket. Free throw attempts per game: Zips are averaging ~17.5 per game and their opponents ~21. So the Zips are getting an average of ~3.5 fewer free throw attempts (~17%) per game than their opponents while drawing 1.5 fewer personals. You might say that some of that difference is from the Zips missing the front end of many 1 and 1s due to their poor team free throw shooting percentage (65.2%). But at 67.9% Zips opponents are averaging only slightly better from the free throw line, a negligible difference. So at least part of the 3.5 fewer free throw attempts per game could indeed be related to the Zips taking a higher percentage of shots that typically don't draw personals, i.e. 3-pointers. Total impact on the game: When you crunch the numbers on opponents drawing 1.5 more fouls and getting 3.5 more free throw attempts per game with a 67.9% free throw shooting percentage, the Zips are losing about .679 x 3.5 = ~2.4 points per game at the free throw line to their opponents. Since free throw points generally represent ~20% of all points scored in a typical college game compared with ~50% for 2-point field goals and ~30% on 3-pointers, the Zips have that other 80% of total points scored to make up the extra 2.4 points per game they give up to their opponents at the free throw line. Conclusion: The final scores of college basketball games are determined by the combined performance in all areas of both the offensive and defensive games, not just one or two obvious ones. Giving up an average of 2.4 points per game at the free throw line is just one area of the game, one that could be more than offset by averaging 2 more field goals or 1 more 3-pointer per game. The Zips' below average 2-point and 3-point field goal shooting percentages are as important an issue as their free throw shooting deficit. Likewise the inability of the Zips defense to stop defenders from driving to the basket without fouling (remember Zeke?) is yet another area where a small improvement could pay big dividends. It's up to the coaching staff to determine the areas of performance where improvement is likely to pay the biggest dividends based on the abilities of the players they have to work with.

That's a long drive home after a loss. Miami is not an easy matchup for the Zips even when they're healthy. Toward the end of the game, when the Zips were slowly falling behind, I fantasized how the following Zips lineup would have fared over the last few minutes: Pat Forsythe at center (out with an injury) Demetrius Treadwell at power forward (gone from the team) Nick Harney at small forward (gone from the team) BJ Gladden at shooting guard (out with an injury) Noah Robotham at point guard (out with an injury) The five Zips players above represent a ton of basketball talent. None of them were available to close out the Miami game, and it's questionable if either of the two still on the active roster make it to the Can't game. Teams have to adjust over the course of a season to the loss of a player all the time. Unluckier teams may lose two or even three at a time. Losing five players of that talent level is nothing less than catastrophic.

There was one Big Ten level official on the floor last night, Glenn Mayborg. He did a thoroughly professional job. There was one MAC/Patriot level official, Kevin O'Connell. His calls were reasonably balanced. And then there was Frank Spencer. He started the evening by issuing a warning to the Akron bench for some unspecified reason. He continued by calling incidental contact fouls on Zips players and missing hard hits on Zips players. He finished by calling a technical on a Zips assistant coach who was only politely inquiring why his player who just got flattened didn't belong at the free throw line. There were some things that happened last night that probably didn't make the TV or radio feeds.

Extra home game at the JAR. Zips may be looking for more walk-ons.

Running out of gas and no deep bench to turn to.

He complained about a foul not being called after Big Dog was hit.