ZoomSlowik

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Mar 25, 2013 -> 01:24 PM) I hate that it took a competitive league and made it into an uncompetitive joke. Right, because the league was the perfect example of parity before that. It's not like 7 teams have won nearly every title since 1980 or anything.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 25, 2013 -> 11:09 AM) People want it both ways. They criticize players who use their no trade clauses and don't move from contenders to playoff teams, saying they don't want to win, yet they criticize LeBron for moving (and taking less money) to a stacked team. I can't speak for anyone else, but I didn't blame him at all for leaving Cleveland with the clusterf*** of a roster that they had. Joining two other studs in Miami was slightly annoying, but at least he didn't end up in LA like every other superstar.

QUOTE (Dick Allen @ Mar 25, 2013 -> 11:03 AM) He won the title last year. If he wins it again, this "overall playoff success" BS is just that. The roster he played with in Cleveland wasn't as good as the roster MJ played with when he couldn't beat Detroit. LeBron dominated in the finals and is dominating this year. MJ starting winning championships at about the same age LeBron is now. Haters are gonna hate, but LeBron is the best in the game, and one of the best of all-time. Detroit was also a hell of a lot better than teams like Dallas and Orlando.

QUOTE (bmags @ Mar 25, 2013 -> 10:26 AM) Wade and Bosh are great, but I still think Lebron would have won a championship last year if he stayed in cleveland. Andy has turned into a damn good player, and who knows who may have found their way there as well. Lebron is just the king of the league right now. He made his choice, his team is great, they are going to win for a long time. There's always a super team in the nba, this is their time. Meh. Varejao is made of glass and the rest of that team was horrid. They'd lose virtually every game when he wasn't superhuman, and I don't mean the 25-9-7 type games he does on a nightly basis in Miami. You have to remember that they lost a playoff series in 6 where he averaged 38-8-8 on 49% shooting, and that would have been a 5 game loss if he hadn't hit a miraculous buzzer-beater in game 2. Miami would also be a pretty huge threat depending on how they built their roster around Wade and Bosh.

I'll agree with Illinois fans for once, they got screwed on that out of bounds call.

It was better when the team name was Luol's Dong.

QUOTE (ZoomSlowik @ Mar 21, 2013 -> 01:59 PM) I'm with Gottlieb, the rules regarding flagrant fouls are getting out of hand. A bunch of plays (going back to last week) where incidental contact to the head (several where the recipient of the hit barely flinched) results in 2 FT's and the ball, not to mention some ridiculously long delays. I'm getting more annoyed with this rule with every game played. Maybe my memory is fuzzy, but I don't remember it being a huge issue throughout the regular season. Now they're absolutely killing a team's momentum for what is frequently incidental contact. If I were a perimeter defender, I'd jump up on the ball-handler on every play and then go down like there's a sniper in the building every time they try to clear space with the elbow. Easy two free throws and the ball the way it's getting called.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 02:48 PM) If you know what you are looking at, it's not hard to see how a team plays in that many games. Does it tell you everything? No. But they played the same way last year so don't discount that. Simply put, whether you like my sample size or not, I was right. You can try and pick apart every little thing I typed, but the bottom line is VCU is not a great offensive team, especially against better teams that can score with them. If their defense doesn't set the pace, their offense is nothing to write home about. If they played half court defense, they wouldn't be good enough for any of us to talk about them. They played about the same way when they went to the Final Four too, and that was a much weaker team.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 02:37 PM) I'll answer that when they start playing 7-game series in college basketball. I've just seen VCU enough times (2-3x last year, 3-4x this year) to see them struggle offensively against better teams, the teams that can score against them. They win because of their defense, not because they are great on offense. WOW, THREE GAMES! If you want to make that argument, Michigan must really suck. I've watched them about 10 times and I've seen them struggle to score against tough defensive teams like OSU and Wisconsin and lose to Penn State. I guess we don't have any recent examples of a VCU team that's inferior to this one beating any quality teams either. I know I'm sounding like an ass with this post, but I get annoyed when people say "you have to watch the games" and then admit that they're working with a really small sample size. I must never watch basketball at all just because I use stats to back up my argument.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 02:29 PM) No because Georgetown has superior talent and doesnt have a system that is prone to being beaten by better athletes. VCU on the other hand has inferior talent to Michigan and runs a system that is supposed to take advantage of superior athleticism. It would behoove VCU to learn how to play grind out games, so when they face a team like Michigan they can slow it down and frustrate them. I'm not in any way arguing that Florida Golf Coast would win a series against Georgetown, I just used that as an extreme example of drawing conclusions from one game. However, I do think Georgetown was overrated and that running the Princeton offense has it's pitfalls. A grinding offense does seem to work better against Michigan, but plenty of less talented teams have put up big point totals against them. If you execute on offense and force just enough mistakes and/or catch off-games from some of their guys. you can beat them. I don't think VCU is a better team than them or anything, just that if they play well, they can make a game of it. I don't think you can draw good conclusions from a few games here and there.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 02:20 PM) That's the problem with stat guys. They don't play 100 times, they played once and got their asses handed to them. Stats often don't reflect reality with a small sample size. Stats are also inflated or deflated by the level of competition. I'm not trying to insult you, I just disagree with trying to prove points using #'s exclusively. Stats are very good and important, when used in context. No s***, but that one game doesn't necessarily mean the same thing would happen every time. Or do you think Florida Golf Coast would kick the s*** out of Georgetown if it were a 7-game series?

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 02:09 PM) If they try and run against Michigan they are going to get blown out more times than not. Now maybe some of those games are 10, 15, 20. But that was one of the easiest games to pick in the tournament. Meh. VCU had their chances to stem the tide during that first half run, they missed numerous makeable shots shots in the paint (albiet some of them weren't easy). They're also usually better from 3 (they average 8 made 3's a game at a 36% clip). Michigan got a ton of transition opportunities off their missed shots, taking the ball out of the net a few more times would have an impact. If they played 100 times, I could see a lot of 72-66 type games.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 01:31 PM) I should have been more simple in my response. If you rely on offensive rebounds (missed shots) and have athletes that can get to the rim, it is pretty easy to understand why they can struggle so easily on offense when playing against a team that can match that. Again, my whole argument from the beginning is what they can do or not do against better competition. Look at your first post again: Your point wasn't that they struggle to score against good, athletic teams, your point was that they're not a good offensive team and can't keep up with teams if they break your presssure. That's very different from what you're arguing later. The second part, fine. Obviously Michigan wasn't a good matchup because of their offensive ability. But they're not so offensively challenged that Michigan should win by 25 every time they play.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 01:27 PM) If you rely heavily on offensive rebounding, it tells me you aren't a very good shooting team. And as I stated, when they playing a better team, they struggle offensively, I could give a crap less what stats they pile up while playing the Topeka YMCA. Watch the games. This isn't rocket science. VCU's whole game is predicated on their havoc defense and wearing other teams down. Steals, turnovers and tired defenders and yes offensive rebounding (which is helped when the other teams get worn down) is where they get their offense. Sometimes their is a cause and effect to get a result. Looking at the results only without the others can cloud the truth, especially when the level of competition increases. To further my point, VCU scored 51 against Wichita State, 58 against Duke, 65 against Missouri, and 62 & 56 against St. Louis. They scored 78 against Memphis and 84 against Butler. If you watched the Butler game, they were very good offensively, but that fed off the fact they shredded Butler defensively and Butler didn't know which was was up. Butler couldn't score with them, feeding right into their style. Doesn't look like they were that great offensively against the better teams on their schedule, does it? You said when they can't force turnovers, they struggle to score. Now you're including offensive rebounding in that, which has little to do with their defense. They only forced 13 turnovers against Missouri and still got 65. That's not a "bad" offensive game. They got 62 against St. Louis despite only forcing 8 turnovers and shot 45% from the floor. That's not a "bad" offensive game. Since you already conceeded the Butler and Memphis games, that's a pretty mixed bag against quality opponents. Michigan won this game because they abused VCU's defense, not because they played stellar defense themselves.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 01:14 PM) It's not half truth at all. It's not a freakin's secret that VCU struggles on offense if they can't create it with their defense. It doesn't take rocket science or a stat sheet or watching 7k basketball games to understand the obvious. I'm not sure what their is to argue about that. Because it is only part of the story. Yes, they get a lot of points off their defense. They're also one of the top offensive rebounding teams in the country and have numerous athletes that can get to the rim. Their DEFENSE relies on turnovers a lot more than their offense, it's not very good if you take care of the ball.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 01:07 PM) Yes, but they get their offensive efficiency from breaking down the other team and them not being able to score. Their offense is based off their defense. When their defense is not effective, they really struggle to score. Stats can lie... I'll rely on the eye test. That's a half truth at best. But hey, you apparently watch 7,000 basketball games a year to know all.

QUOTE (Rex Hudler @ Mar 23, 2013 -> 12:47 PM) That's the problem with VCU. They aren't great offensively and don't consistently make shots. If you can score against their pressure and handle it, they won't keep up. They're style is to wear you down so you can't score. For them to win against more talented teams, they have to make you play ugly and wear you down so you can't score well. Michigan is too good offensively. This wasn't a good match up for VCU. They were 11th in the country in offensive efficiency. Admittedly they count on offensive rebounding and turnovers a fair amount, but it's not like Michigan is a good defensive team. The downside is that VCU definitely struggles defensively if you beat their press, but a shootout would have been more likely based on the numbers.

Michigan is getting great shots, but this would be a lot closer if VCU could make shots. They're getting some too, missed like 4 at the rim, several floaters and 2 or 3 wide open 3's. At this point, they're going to have to get the ball out of Burke's hands as much as possible and hope the other people make mistakes. So far those guys have done better than I expected with the ball.

I can't remember the last time I saw three missed dunks in one half.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Mar 22, 2013 -> 01:43 PM) They are? Then they didnt watch a game all season. Wisconsin never has talent. And the top two teams havent even played yet. Their most talented player only plays 22 MPG, and I'm sure Badger would agree with that.

You'd think they'd make a few of these just by the law of averages...

Ole Miss actually gets some buckets when someone besides Henderson shoots. At this point, I'd dare him to shoot.

QUOTE (LittleHurt05 @ Mar 22, 2013 -> 12:21 PM) Wisconsin better jump to a lead soon, because Henderson is bound to start making shots at some point. Meh, he shoots 38.5% on the year. The guy sucks.

Wisconsin is definitely doing some stupid s*** with the ball. They're lucky Marshall Henderson has no conscience.

QUOTE (farmteam @ Mar 21, 2013 -> 11:11 PM) Mark Titus ‏@clubtrillion 31m I'm sure Haith's a good guy, so I do feel bad for picking on him. Hopefully he'll turn Northwestern around & put all of this behind him. I suddenly became ill.