Princeton Game Thread

[breezy123]

Pat Forysthe player of the game. He played some nice minutes for Zeke. Be a totally different game without him!

[plowerman78]

here is my 5 count, usually put this on twitter, of course you can follow me @AK_BigChief (shameless plug)

1. BIG win, we may not realize now but this is the type of wins come February/March and will look good. With their size and skill im pretty sure Princeton will win the Ivy League this year.

2. We beat Princeton at their own game. Yes we love to run but tonight we played slow and still got a W. Years past we havent been able to pull out a win like this (Dayton VCU Nevada just to name 3)

3. Despite 4 fouls Zeke still put up 17 points (in 17 minutes). The 2nd 3rd and 4th fouls were VERY weak. The sky hook from almost the 3 pt line was great. Since the Creighton game the light switch has come on. Finally seeing the NBA potential out of him. Watch out in MAC play.

4. Just like a year ago in the MAC tourney semis Abreu had ice water in the veins at the end. 2 huge free throws, need a leader like that.

5. Finally congrats to Coach Dambrot. 300 wins is an amazing accomplishment. Has made Akron a winner year after year. Say what you want about his past, but realize people make mistakes. KD has learned and has been openly thankful that UA has given him this chance.

3400 on hand seemed like a lot more then that, well done Akron community. Things really got loud down the stretch. We are 8-4 now and lets keep this going. See you all Wednesday vs Coppin State

[zipdiehard]

Poor rebounding almost did us in against a very good club.

The problem I had with the calls on Zeke is that they were ticky tack fouls when the refs were letting very physical play go most of the night. Princeton obviously had a game plan to knock our guys off the ball when they took a pass. Several times they just jumped out and laid a hip into Tree or Zeke when they took the pass. I was impressed that our guys didn't seem to lose their focus with it either, even though Tree seemed perturbed toward the end of the game, especially with #34.

I'm curious on something else; are players able to lead with their off arm when dribbling or driving to the hoop? That happened numerous times last night, especially whenever Alex was pressuring their guards. My recollection is that outside the NBA it is normally an offensive foul.

[Hilltopper]

Poor rebounding almost did us in against a very good club.

The problem I had with the calls on Zeke is that they were ticky tack fouls when the refs were letting very physical play go most of the night. Princeton obviously had a game plan to knock our guys off the ball when they took a pass. Several times they just jumped out and laid a hip into Tree or Zeke when they took the pass. I was impressed that our guys didn't seem to lose their focus with it either, even though Tree seemed perturbed toward the end of the game, especially with #34.

I'm curious on something else; are players able to lead with their off arm when dribbling or driving to the hoop? That happened numerous times last night, especially whenever Alex was pressuring their guards. My recollection is that outside the NBA it is normally an offensive foul.

The minute I saw Glen Mayborg was the head official at last nights game, I knew Zeke and our bigs were going to have a bad time. I appeared that he made every ticky-tack foul call he could think of last night. We finally got a call to go our way at the end when one of the other refs called a foul that gave us a new possession with 19 seconds left. That resulted in a new shot clock and forced Princeton to foul.

Glen Mayborg

[Quickzips]

Poor rebounding almost did us in against a very good club.

The problem I had with the calls on Zeke is that they were ticky tack fouls when the refs were letting very physical play go most of the night. Princeton obviously had a game plan to knock our guys off the ball when they took a pass. Several times they just jumped out and laid a hip into Tree or Zeke when they took the pass. I was impressed that our guys didn't seem to lose their focus with it either, even though Tree seemed perturbed toward the end of the game, especially with #34.

I'm curious on something else; are players able to lead with their off arm when dribbling or driving to the hoop? That happened numerous times last night, especially whenever Alex was pressuring their guards. My recollection is that outside the NBA it is normally an offensive foul.

The officiating was wildly inconsistent, but at this point you almost have to expect that. I can count on one hand the number of times I've seen what I consider to be "good" officiating in a Zips game. It's sad that it's come to the point where you pretty much just have to expect it as part of the game, but I really don't know what other solution there is at this point.

As I stated earlier, the thing that impressed me most was that Zeke didn't let the poor officiating impact him mentally. He went to the bench (while Pat F. did an outstanding job filling in) and waited patiently for his opportunity to get back in the game. When he did he hit some big shots, grabbed some tough rebounds in traffic and played his normal tight defense. Two years ago, heck even last year, you didn't see that out of Zeke. A few cheap fouls lead to more fouls, rushed shots, poor positioning on the glass, etc. I really feel like I watched a huge turning point in Zeke's career last night.

[Dave in Green]

@zipdiehard, you make a really good point on the Zips rebounding. It's consistently been one of their weaker areas this season. The Zips are #119 in the country in offensive rebounds per game, #189 in defensive rebounds per game and #155 in total rebounds per game. They need to improve on that. I also agree with you that the refs were generally good about not going whistle crazy. I saw a lot of incidental contact and expected a MAC whistle parade. But they generally let the teams play, which was mostly a plus. The exception was Zeke, who Glenn Mayborg apparently has some kind of special attraction to. If you could put a piece of paper between Zeke and an opposing player, Mayborg thought that was close enough to be a foul on Zeke.

The Princeton players were doing more than leading with their off arms. They were very good at offensive hooking. In fact, they were so good at it without getting whistled that I'm pretty sure they've studied and worked on the following tip from How to Foul Without Getting Caught in Basketball: Hook and turn offensive move. It depends on where you are on the court, but if you are in the post or running through screens, this move tends to work without being caught by referees. The move is simple. With your back turned to the defender, you spin forward as you hook your arm around him while moving to the basket. That helps explain how Tiger players were able to consistently get a step on their man and drive to the basket so apparently easily. It was clearly visible from the stands, and we commented on it during the game.

[GoZips]

The minute I saw Glen Mayborg was the head official at last nights game, I knew Zeke and our bigs were going to have a bad time. I appeared that he made every ticky-tack foul call he could think of last night. We finally got a call to go our way at the end when one of the other refs called a foul that gave us a new possession with 19 seconds left. That resulted in a new shot clock and forced Princeton to foul.

Glen Mayborg

Mayborg is the official I yelled at after the game as he headed to the locker rooms. I called out to him that Akron won in spite of him

[akronzips71]

Mayborg is the official I yelled at after the game as he headed to the locker rooms. I called out to him that Akron won in spite of him

Are those stats the fouls he personally called?

I don't know how that relates to other officials, but it looks like he calls an entire game worth of fouls by himself. If that is the case, he should be fired.

[GoZips]

Are those stats the fouls he personally called?

I don't know how that relates to other officials, but it looks like he calls an entire game worth of fouls by himself. If that is the case, he should be fired.

I do not track statistics like DinG and some other do. I do know that Mayborg has a strong anti-Akron and especially

an anti-Zeke bias. I would settle for him and Mike Boroski never officiating a Zips game.

A friend commented to me today that Mayborg averages eight more whistles per game than any other official.

[Zipmeister]

That was one intense game. The crowd was bigger than I expected, and they made a lot of noise. Hummer looked as good as advertised early. But the Zips tightened up the D on him, and he ended up hitting only 5-13 from the field. It was a little frustrating at times to see the Tigers slicing into the paint and getting all those easy layups. Zeke had them a little intimidated until his favorite referee decided to take him out of the game with a series of pissy little foul calls. It's been quite awhile since I've seen a ref treat Zeke like they did in his freshman season. It was never more evident how important Pat Forsythe is to this team than it was tonight. Without Pat to fill in for Zeke, the Zips would have been in big trouble. You could see Pat getting a little winded from playing more minutes than he's used to. But he played good D with a couple of blocks, and hit 4-5 of his shots. Zeke was 7-7, so the center position produced 11-12 from the field.

I believe that Zeke and Pat are benefitting greatly from going at each other in practice. Zeke appears to be picking up some of Pat's offensive moves, and Pat seems to be picking up some of Zeke's defensive intensity. Come tournament time, they're going to be an awesome pair of centers for any opponent to go up against. Needless to say, the inbound pass to Zeke with 1 second on the shot clock and the long-range hook was a thing of beauty, and the crowd response was deafening. Zeke's scoring average is up over 13 points per game and climbing. He's doing a great job of increasing his NBA draft value. As a team, the Zips were way off on 3s (2-13), but the inside game continues to be their strong point, as they hit 24-36 2s. I can't wait for the next game, even though it's against lowly Coppin State. Still some fine-tuning to do before taking on the MAC.

Lowly Coppin State?

According to Sagarin Coppin State is the 7th best 2 win team in the country; behind such names as Old Dominion and Coastal Carolina. Coastal Carolina's victories this season include an overtime win against the Zips and a sound thrashing of Johnson and Wales.

[Dave in Green]

StatSheet.com has a whole section devoted to ref stats here. I haven't spent much time there because I'm not that interested in ref stats, and don't fully understand how to interpret them. But some quick and obvious stats can be found on any ref, including Glenn Mayborg who is here.

Looking at Mayborg's schedule, the only other Zips game he's reffed this season was the OT game at Coastal Carolina. In that game, the 43 total fouls called were not too far off average for an OT game, and 1 less foul was called on the visiting Zips than the home team. Zeke played 39 minutes and was whistled only twice. It's possible that Mayborg was doing more officiating in the backcourt, which would have given him fewer opportunities to whistle Zeke. But that's pure speculation. There isn't enough data available to explain how Mayborg officiated that game within the context of the other two refs.

Last season, Mayborg officiated in 4 Zips games. In 2 of those games, Zeke was called for only 1 foul each. In the other 2 games, Zeke had 4 and 5 fouls. Mayborg officiated 3 Zips games in Zeke's sophomore season, and Zeke had 4 personals in each of the 3 games. Mayborg reffed 5 Zips games in Zeke's freshman season, when he was more foul prone, and he totaled only 12 personals in those 5 games. Again, it's not clear if the games where Zeke was whistled for the most fouls happened when Mayborg was primarily covering the frontcourt action, where he'd be more likely to have opportunities to whistle Zeke.

Comparing Mayborg's officiating record against about 250 other refs, so far this season he ranks #41 in most fouls called per game (37.4, which includes all calls by all 3 refs in each game). Courtney Holmes leads with 41.9 fouls per game, with our old friend Bo Boroski way down at #149 with 35.0 fouls per game.

As far as I know, there are no stats kept on how many fouls are called by each official against each player.

[Dave in Green]

Lowly Coppin State?

According to Sagarin Coppin State is the 7th best 2 win team in the country; behind such names as Old Dominion and Coastal Carolina. Coastal Carolina's victories this season include an overtime win against the Zips and a sound thrashing of Johnson and Wales.

You need to do a little remedial work on your statistical analysis. You left out the pertinent fact that lowly Coppin State is currently ranked #286 by Pomeroy, 51 positions behind #235 powerhouse Texas Southern, which gave the Zips a huge battle right here in this forum.

[Zipmeister]

You need to do a little remedial work on your statistical analysis. You left out the pertinent fact that lowly Coppin State is currently ranked #286 by Pomeroy, 51 positions behind #235 powerhouse Texas Southern, which gave the Zips a huge battle right here in this forum.

Technically, I did not perform or report any statistical analysis; just presented some facts. Your data, however, again points out just how lucky we were to get by Tex So. with a W.

[akronzips71]

Actually they have played USC, Indiana, Iowa, St. Joes, Arizona State. Four top 100 teams. One could argue their OOC is tougher than ours. Don't take them all that lightly.

[Dave in Green]

Technically, I did not perform or report any statistical analysis; just presented some facts. Your data, however, again points out just how lucky we were to get by Tex So. with a W.

I define statistical analysis as copying numbers from various sources and adding at least one adjective or adverb.

[wadszip]

Lowly Coppin State?

According to Sagarin Coppin State is the 7th best 2 win team in the country; behind such names as Old Dominion and Coastal Carolina. Coastal Carolina's victories this season include an overtime win against the Zips and a sound thrashing of Johnson and Wales.

Coastal Carolina has two D1 wins (5 overall), but they were against Akron (although depleted) and by 23 points over Clemson.

[Zipmeister]

Actually they have played USC, Indiana, Iowa, St. Joes, Arizona State. Four top 100 teams. One could argue their OOC is tougher than ours. Don't take them all that lightly.

I'm with you 71. If unforeseen circumstances limit our personnel to the last seven guys on the bench this could be a barn-burner.

[akronzips71]

I'm with you 71. If unforeseen circumstances limit our personnel to the last seven guys on the bench this could be a barn-burner.

Ha Ha

I hope you don't wind up eating those words.

[zippy5]

Actually they have played USC, Indiana, Iowa, St. Joes, Arizona State. Four top 100 teams. One could argue their OOC is tougher than ours. Don't take them all that lightly.

So since they lose to good teams, it makes them not as bad?

[akronzips71]

So since they lose to good teams, it makes them not as bad?

No, it means that losing to good teams does not mean you are horrible. If NIU football played all Big Ten teams this year, they might not have a winning record, yet they are obviously a good team.

[zippy5]

No, it means that losing to good teams does not mean you are horrible. If NIU football played all Big Ten teams this year, they might not have a winning record, yet they are obviously a good team.

Yes. Being horrible also makes you horrible, and Coppin State is horrible.

[Valpo Zip]

Per the RPI formula, it is better to play a team with a great record beating cream puffs than a team with a crappy record even if they lost to great teams.

Your opponents winning% is worth 50% while the opponents' opponent's winning% is only 25%. Just saying.

[akronzips71]

Yes. Being horrible also makes you horrible, and Coppin State is horrible.

And if that is the case, it should be a walk in the park.

[RACER]

after watching the princeton game. i have to agree with big zip,and his band of mr.negative followers.kd does not care about winning occ games.you could just tell the way the guys were playing. they did not care if they won or lost.after all it was just a stupid occ game.lucky for us we only have 1 occ game left.after we lose that one we will start the the mac season.then i think we will see the team start playing hard. kd will start to actually care to coach.we still have the problem of alex just dribbling around,and can't finish games.kd still does not know how to draw up plays with one second left with marshall.untill we get those things fixed we will never be any good.i really think we need to bring back coleman crawford.

at least he cared about occ games,and so did the players.