Dave in Green

A whole bunch of teams (including the Zips) could end up tied at the top at 11-7 if every single game came out a certain way. Odds of that many games going a certain way are right up there in lotto land.

AirRage has previously idenitifed himself (or herself) as a faculty member, and so would have access to UA information not necessarily made public.

Good to know the possible scenarios, as unlikely as they may be. But don't forget the MAC West: If CMU loses their last three games and the Zips win their last two, both would have 11-7 records and the Zips own the tiebreaker by virtue of winning the only game between the two teams this season If Toledo loses their last three games and the Zips win their final two, the Zips finish 11-7 to UT's 10-8. We'll know at the end of this evening if either of those unlikely possibilities is still in play.

Antino's already taller and heavier than this guy:

Renaming UA is likely one of hundreds of "ideas" under some degree of consideration. As with all the other ideas it would have to pass close scrutiny to prove that a name change would create more value than it would cost. Traditionalists will shudder as they did in 1913 when changing the old Buchtel College name was considered. Forward thinkers will be open-minded as they weigh exactly what new name might work to UA's advantage in today's rapidly changing higher education landscape.

Antino grew up last night and proved the wisdom of the Zips coaching staff in recruiting this undersized kid from an obscure HS team in Houston that didn't have that great a winning record. The level of confidence he played with against OU was years beyond what we saw earlier this season. Antino is going to push Noah for more PT over the next three seasons. Last night also proved the wisdom of twin towers and why we've arrived at that. Plain and simple, Kwan is struggling at getting the pass from the high post to the low post. Last night Kwan had another four turnovers, mostly on imprecise passing into the low post. On the other hand, Pat and Big Dog are working together like a veteran team in the high and low post, and had zero turnovers between them. And for anyone who thinks Big Dog is dog slow, ask the OU frontcourt players trying to guard him on the wing when he pulled quick spins and dribble drives around them for easy layups. Who ever thought at the beginning of the season that we'd see these two on the court together with Big Dog dribble driving to the basket and Pat knocking down outside jumpers?

If Deji starting had helped the Zips to a fast start over OU, there would be more merit to giving him more consideration as a full-time starter. In the second half and back in his normal rotation, Deji did what he always does so well, bringing a spark off the bench. As for playing more minutes, Deji played 20 last night. Toward the end of the game he uncharacteristically clanked two free throws off the front of the rim, often considered a sign that a player is fatigued, and went to the bench. Deji has proven time and again to be a great force off the bench playing ~20 minutes per game. I trust that Coach Dambrot will continue to use Deji in the way that he's proven to be most effective to the team.

Pointless.

Sadly, maybe one of us is missing the other's point. You said winning 20 games had no more benefit for the team than winning 19. Recruiting is important to the team. Noah is the most important recruit the Zips have landed in years. Noah publicly stated that a major reason why he chose UA over other schools is because the Zips "have 20-plus wins every year." Ergo, continuing the streak of 20-plus win seasons does have a benefit for the team in recruiting quality players like Noah who are attracted by the prospect of winning 20-plus games every year. It's a small psychological factor. But UA needs every little factor in its favor that can be mustered to try to attract quality players.

Right, this has nothing to do with this

The Zips are in a much worse situation than we imagined four games ago. All we can do now is take it one game at a time and try to get things turned around. OU's having a worse season than the Zips, and beating the Zips in Akron for the season sweep would be a big consolation prize for the Kitties. It will take a complete effort in all aspects of the game for the Zips to get back into a winning mode. They've had some time now to adjust to Noah's absence. Twin towers will likely be getting their third straight start together. Time to make it pay off.

Agreed. The discussion has turned from starting to playing time. Since different players have different levels of effectiveness depending on how many minutes they play, the question is about the optimum number of minutes per game Deji should play to produce the most effective overall results for the team. If Deji plays longer minutes will it help the team perform better or is he the type of player who produces better in quick bursts with plenty of bench time in between? We know what Coach Dambrot thinks after coaching Deji for the last four seasons by the number of minutes Deji is currently averaging. Some fans have differing opinions. It's an interesting discussion that we revisit every season with different Zips players.

You are correct. I was going by basketball-reference.com, which does not show him starting any NBA games. But other sources indicate that he did start some games later in his 16-season career. The main point is that a 6th man can be as important to a team as a starter as many great 6th men have proven over the years. It takes a certain type of player who really wants to play that role off the bench and does it well. Who knows if Deji actually prefers his current role over being a starter?

What happens when you put all your best scorers in the starting lineup is that when the lower-scoring subs come in you tend to have more scoring droughts. Of course no one on this forum would ever think of complaining about Zips scoring droughts. Or you can try to have more consistent and balanced starting and sub units with a good mix of scorers, rebounders, defenders, etc., on each. The former works best for teams with a short bench whose starters all play long minutes while the latter makes more sense for a team that plays a deep bench with more evenly distributed PT. The deep bench and frequent rotation employed by the Zips is much more open to second-guessing than teams like Toledo and Buffalo that have really strong starting fives who all play long minutes. However, it should be noted that Buffalo's coaching staff recognized that their starters were worn out and outplayed by the Zips at the end of their earlier game at the JAR, and they adjusted for the game in Canada by using more subs and keeping the starting five fresher for the end of the game, when they pulled away from the Zips. Appropriate adjustments are a sign of a good coach, and even those who may not agree with all of Coach Dambrot's decisions seem to agree that he's a good coach. So it will be interesting to see what adjustments the Zips make over the next few games. Anyway, this is a good discussion where everyone seems to have mutual respect for each others' opinions.

Wow, I just have to add that UT outscored NIU by 20 freaking points at the free throw line and still lost.

It sounds like the current generation of college students doesn't buy into anything unless there's a big marketing program behind it. The older fans here will recall the good old days when students didn't need a marketing program to tell them what to do with their lives. We figured it out for ourselves.

Is it OK to call NIU's improbable win over UT in Toledo an upset (Juice missed a 3-pointer at the final buzzer)? NIU 84, UT 82 MAC STANDINGS 11-4 - CMU 10-5 - UT 10-5 - Can't 10-5 - BGSU 9-6 - UB 8-7 - Zips 8-7 - WMU 7-8 - MU 6-9 - EMU 5-10 - NIU 4-11 - OU 2-13 - BSU FRIDAY MATCHUP: 4-11 OU @ 8-7 Zips SATURDAY MATCHUPS: 11-4 CMU @ 5-10 NIU 2-13 BSU @ 10-5 UT 9-6 UB @ 10-5 Can't 10-5 BGSU @ 7-8 MU 6-9 EMU @ 8-7 WMU

1981 grad, I get it that you have very strong beliefs on this issue. In my experience it goes on with every sports team and every fan base. Many fans of every team come up with ideas that seem so logical that they can't believe the coach is not doing it. The point I was trying to make is that in most cases coaches have very good reasons to do it one way rather than the other. It seems so logical that the second leading scorer on any basketball team should be a starter that it defies logic when it's not that way. I would just say that Coach Dambrot is no dummy. He reads the box scores and knows who his second leading scorer is. In spite of that he has well-considered reasons not to make Deji a starter. I wish I could tell you why. But to the best of my knowledge, no one here knows exactly why. We can only speculate. It's interesting as Deji nears the end of his career at UA that he has gone from the player who many on this forum wanted to kick down to D-II to the guy they want in the starting lineup. If Coach Dambrot was smart enough to keep Deji as a Zips player in D-I when fans wanted to dump him, he's probably smart enough to know if Deji contributes more to the total team effort off the bench than he would as a starter and also how many minutes he should play in each game for maximum effectiveness. Coach Dambrot might be wrong, but I have more confidence in him than in fickle fans -- Zips fans in general, not you specifically -- who went from dissing Deji to begging for more of him.

Hondo did play starter minutes as the Celtics' 6th man. Since Deji is averaging the 5th most minutes per game of any Zips player, he technically is also playing starter minutes. Over the past few games he's been averaging about 23 minutes per game, roughly the same number of minutes as Pat, Kwan and Jake have averaged on the season. Only the starting PG (first Noah and now Antino) has averaged more than 25 minutes per game when they've been starters in the Zips' deep rotation. Starting and starter minutes are two separate issues. The Hondo factor could apply to why Coach Dambrot elects not to start Deji. There would be other reasons why Deji plays the number of minutes he does. I speculated in another thread that one possible reason for Deji's limited PT could be his history of back spasms that have caused him to miss practices and games, including the recent EMU game and the 2013 NCAA tournament game against VCU. There are reasons for things that are not always shared with the public, so all we can do is speculate.

As I recall they always start the seniors on senior night, if only to play a few minutes before reverting to the normal rotation. So Deji and Nyles should both start Friday night. Historical footnote: The all-time leading scorer for the Boston Celtics was not a starter but the team's 6th man. John Havlicek brought tremendous energy off the bench that gave the team a boost when the starters began coming off the floor. Many Celtics fans wanted to see Hondo as a starter. But his head coaches (Red Auerbach, Bill Russell and Tom Heinsohn) were unanimous in their belief that Hondo had greater overall value to the team coming off the bench, and resisted fan pleas. During his 16-year career with the Celtics, one of the greatest players the NBA has ever seen never started a single game.

Of course we're not suddenly missing Tree. We knew we'd miss him from the minute he was gone and we have all season, not just the last four games. The thing is that you don't really miss a player so much as long as the team is still winning, and losing four in a row is a painful reminder of the double loss of Tree at the beginning of the season and Noah near the end.

Of course the Zips are missing both Tree and Noah. What team wouldn't miss both their best forward and their best guard? There's nothing that can be done about it except try to adjust as much as possible with the remaining players. The Zips currently have only three healthy scholarship guards with Antino, Nyles and Deji sharing minutes. Deji's PT has been slowly ramping up to the point that he's now averaging more than Nyles. I'd expect that trend to continue through the tournament. I'm a little concerned that Deji missed the EMU game with back spasms after playing short minutes in a few games before that. Remember that Deji missed the 2013 NCAA tournament game against VCU with back spasms, which have been a recurring problem with him. That may be the reason why he hasn't been played longer minutes this season. The Zips absolutely need as many minutes as they can get from Deji, but they can't afford to risk overplaying him to the point of missing games with back spasms. The one area where the Zips still have an edge over other MAC teams is at center. It's pretty clear that Coach Dambrot is trying to rebuild the team on the fly to take advantage of the Zips' remaining assets. Starting both Pat and Big Dog in the past two games and playing twin towers at various times throughout those games is a sign of what to expect in the MAC tournament. Against Miami they played a combined 57 minutes and against Buffalo 55 minutes. They're getting better with experience at working together. Last night they combined for 26 points and 13 rebounds. It's still a work in progress, and there are only three regular season games left to polish it up. But it's likely the best opportunity the Zips have to make any noise in the MAC tournament. Other teams may have better guards or better forwards, but none have two better centers.

The Zips lost their guts with Tree and their brain with Noah. All they have left is heart.

Bye-bye, top 4 seed (barring a miracle of the Zips winning 3 of 3 and both Can't and BGSU losing 2 of 3): UB 67, Zips 62 MU 86, CAN'T 81 (OT) BGSU 76, OU 65 CMU 72, EMU 56 WMU 53, BSU 48 UT, NIU (postponed to Wednesday for water main break) MAC STANDINGS 11-4 - CMU 10-4 - UT 10-5 - Can't 10-5 - BGSU 9-6 - UB 8-7 - Zips 8-7 - WMU 7-8 - MU 6-9 - EMU 4-10 - NIU 4-11 - OU 2-13 - BSU WEDNESDAY MATCHUP: 4-10 NIU @ 10-4 UT FRIDAY MATCHUP: 4-11 OU @ 8-7 Zips SATURDAY MATCHUPS: 11-4 CMU @ 4-10 NIU 2-13 BSU @ 10-4 UT 9-6 UB @ 10-5 Can't 10-5 BGSU @ 7-8 MU 6-9 EMU @ 8-7 WMU

It's the down year that all the other teams in the MAC have experienced many times over the past decade.