Recap: Georgetown 66, St. John's 59

Georgetown won a hard fought game against the St. John's . . . um, what are we calling them these days?  Red Storm?  ThunderHorses?  Redmen?  Johnnies?

Anyway, the Hoyas pulled it out in the end to cap off the year with a positive.

Let's run the numbers (as I sip on some Scotch waiting for midnight):

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Home                            Visitor   
.            Georgetown                      St. John's         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            30        31        61
 
Effic.        107.5     110.9     109.1        90.7     104.4      97.5  
 
eFG%           55.6      54.5      55.1        52.1      42.9      46.6  
TO%            23.5      19.6      21.5        20.2      16.3      18.2  
OR%            35.7      27.3      32.0        14.3      50.0      36.8  
FT Rate         7.4      59.1      30.6        16.7      14.3      15.3  

Assist Rate    76.9      25.0      52.0        63.6      58.3      60.9  
Block Rate      0.0       4.8       2.8        10.0       5.3       7.7  
Steal Rate     10.1       3.3       6.6        10.1       6.5       8.3  
 
2FG%           45.0      63.2      53.8        53.3      28.6      38.9  
3FG%           57.1       0.0      40.0        33.3      42.9      39.1  
FT%           100.0      76.9      80.0        50.0      40.0      44.4

Tonight's pace was far more deliberate than either team had been averaging coming into the game (G'town: 69.5, St. J: 68.4), and be a harbinger of a slow down for the Hoyas now that conference play is underway.

I suspect that many fans will look at the 13 turnovers and think that Georgetown did a better job taking care of the ball, but with only 61 possessions in the game, that still ends up with a >20% turnover rate for the 5th consecutive game.

In spite of some poor shooting from 2FG in the first half (3/10 on 2-pt jumpers) and too many turnovers, the Hoyas were respectably efficient on offense thanks to solid shooting from behind the arc (4/7).  At the same time, they were able to limit St. John's second-chances to build a 5 point lead.

The Vesper half saw the Hoyas determined to pound the ball inside (12/16 on dunks, layup and tip-ins), but the Johnnies also made an adjustment by pounding the offensive glass to gather half of their 24 available misses (albeit three of those came in the last few seconds of the game).  Georgetown should not be satisfied with the defensive effort in the 2nd half.

The game very nearly turned on a four possession stretch in the 2nd half where the Hoyas had four turnovers (at least 3 of those unforced), and watched a 9 point lead turn into a 1 point deficit (St. John's scored 13 points in 5 possessions during that stretch, and 46 points in their other 56 possessions).  But instead of reverting to last year's nightmare, the Hoyas were able to get a dunk and two layups while holding the Redmen scoreless to regain a 6 point lead, which they sustained the rest of the way.

One other point to add:  free throw shooting.  I suspect some St. John's fans are going to look at that 4/9 FT shooting line and bemoan the fact that if only they had made the normal % of FTA, they'd have won - or at least been much closer.  This argument, or course, was the same for Hoya fans last season for both games against the Johnnies - as was noted in this space.  In summary using Tom's methodology, St. John's came in shooting 64% on FTs, so they effectively left 2 points at the line last night; G'town came in shooting 71% FTs, so effectively picked up 1.5 points at the line.  That +3.5 points was less than the margin of victory.

INDIVIDUAL NET POINTS STATS

Georgetown            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Wright, Chris          59   19.7  151.7   17.6      59    91.3   10.8      +6.9  
Monroe, Greg           60   30.3  107.9   19.6      60    96.7   11.6      +5.0  
Freeman, Austin        56   13.6  129.2    9.8      58    93.8   10.9      +0.8  
Clark, Jason           55   15.0   63.8    5.3      54    77.8    8.4      -2.1  
Vaughn, Julian         40   19.7  101.0    8.0      41    69.1    5.7      +2.4  
Thompson, Hollis       18   13.2   33.2    0.8      17   108.0    3.7      -2.3  
Sims, Henry            22   13.1   67.7    1.9      21    82.3    3.5      -1.0  
TOTALS                 62         107.2   63.0      62    87.8   54.5     +10.3  

St. John's            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
KENNEDY, DJ            50   17.6  117.8   10.4      50    99.8   10.0      +1.0  
BOOTHE, Malik          23   14.1   16.8    0.5      24   131.0    6.3      -4.7  
EVANS, Sean            34   27.5  109.4   10.2      34    88.0    6.0      +3.1  
COKER, Dele            16    5.6  212.6    1.9      17   101.7    3.5      -0.3  
HORNE, Paris           54   19.5   49.7    5.2      53   103.9   11.0      -5.7  
HARDY, Dwight          43   21.3   95.8    8.8      43    96.4    8.3      +0.2  
BURRELL, Justin        35   15.6  113.9    6.2      34   104.6    7.1      -0.2  
STITH, Malik           16   17.5   69.0    1.9      16    62.5    2.0      +0.1  
BROWNLEE, Justin       39   26.9  103.0   10.8      39   123.3    9.6      -0.5  
TOTALS                 62          92.2   56.0      62   102.8   63.7      -7.1

The first half was a bit of an encore of the Harvard Chris Wright show, as he put up 14 points (3/5 2FG, 2/3 3FG, 2/2 FT) along with 3 assists and 1 steal to go along with 0 turnovers.  What may have been missed was that Wright played just as well in the 2nd half, although he only scored 7 points (2/3, 0/0, 3/3).

Greg Monroe returned to early season form by using 30% of available possessions tonight, and made only 6/16 shots (6/15, 0/1, 3/4) but lead the team with 5 assists and 4 offensive rebounds.

Austin Freeman was he usual low usage, high efficiency self, but threw in a couple of dunks for bonus points.  Julian Vaughn did his lunchpail work in the trenches to score 8 points while leading the defense.

Clark, Thompson and Sims were relatively quiet on offense, but Sims and Clark had good defensive games - Sims struggled memorably during the 4 turnover stretch, but played very well in the first half, hopefully a good sign.

HD BOX SCORE

St. John's vs Georgetown
12/31/09 8:00 at Verizon Center
Final score: Georgetown 66, St. John's 59

St. John's              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
KENNEDY, DJ            33:55  -12  11/46  2- 4  2- 5  1- 2  9/48  5/14  3/50  1/50  0/37  2/32  4/22   1
BOOTHE, Malik          15:57  -11   0/20  0- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/16  1/ 7  0/24  2/23  1/18  0/10  0/10   2
EVANS, Sean            22:19  + 5   9/37  4- 7  0- 0  1- 2  7/30  1/10  0/34  2/34  0/23  3/17  6/16   4
COKER, Dele            11:22  + 4   2/18  1- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/15  0/ 6  0/17  0/16  1/13  1/ 9  0/11   2
HORNE, Paris           34:40  - 2   4/51  0- 3  1- 4  1- 2  7/50  1/18  0/53  3/54  0/32  2/33  0/22   1
HARDY, Dwight          26:49  - 1  14/43  1- 4  4- 9  0- 0 13/47  1/13  1/43  1/43  0/26  0/30  1/17   0
BURRELL, Justin        22:31  - 9   9/27  4- 4  0- 0  1- 2  4/33  2/ 7  0/34  2/35  1/21  0/23  3/13   4
STITH, Malik           08:39  + 5   0/17  0- 2  0- 1  0- 0  3/16  3/ 7  1/16  0/16  0/ 4  0/ 9  0/ 4   1
BROWNLEE, Justin       23:48  -14  10/36  2-10  2- 4  0- 1 14/40  0/10  0/39  1/39  0/21  5/27  3/10   3
TOTALS                 40:00       59    14-36  9-23  4- 9    59 14/23  5/62 12/62  3/39 14/38 17/25  18
.                                        0.389 0.391 0.444       0.609 0.081 0.194 0.077 0.368 0.680    

Georgetown              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Wright, Chris          38:08  + 9  21/66  5- 8  2- 3  5- 5 11/48  4/18  1/59  1/59  0/34  0/24  2/37   1
Monroe, Greg           38:59  + 2  15/61  6-15  0- 1  3- 4 16/47  5/17  0/60  3/60  0/36  4/25  4/36   2
Freeman, Austin        37:50  +12  15/64  5- 7  1- 1  2- 2  8/48  1/19  0/58  1/56  0/33  0/24  1/37   1
Clark, Jason           34:55  + 0   7/51  2- 3  1- 5  0- 0  8/43  0/16  1/54  2/55  0/32  0/25  4/32   4
Vaughn, Julian         25:37  + 3   8/38  3- 5  0- 0  2- 4  5/32  1/11  1/41  2/40  1/23  2/19  7/28   2
Thompson, Hollis       10:54  - 2   0/17  0- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/11  0/ 6  0/17  1/18  0/10  1/ 5  2/ 9   0
Sims, Henry            13:37  +11   0/33  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/16  2/13  1/21  2/22  0/12  0/ 3  2/11   2
TOTALS                 40:00       66    21-39  4-10 12-15    49 13/25  4/62 13/62  1/36  8/25 24/38  12
.                                        0.538 0.400 0.800       0.520 0.065 0.210 0.028 0.320 0.632    

Efficiency: Georgetown 1.065, St. John's 0.952
eFG%: Georgetown 0.551, St. John's 0.466
Substitutions: Georgetown 16, St. John's 28

2-pt Shot Selection:
Dunks: Georgetown 5-5, St. John's 4-5
Layups/Tips: Georgetown 13-21, St. John's 7-15
Jumpers: Georgetown 3-13, St. John's 3-16

Fast break pts (% FG pts): Georgetown 8 (14.8), St. John's 2 (3.6)
Pts (eff.) after steal: Georgetown 6 (150.0), St. John's 7 (140.0)
Seconds per poss: Georgetown 19.4, St. John's 19.4

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As noted elsewhere (e.g. link), this was the last game that Barker Davis will write up for the Washington Times.  An alum as well as a sportswriter, Barker's enthusiasm for the Georgetown basketball program was welcome, especially when it was in the doldrums early this decade.  I thought this post on HoyaTalk best summarized the thoughts of many Hoya fans.  Good luck, Barker!

Stats pages will be updated tomorrow.  Happy New Year.

Looking back in anger, individually

Brian's been looking at last year's meltdown and how likely it is to repeat. I thought I might see something at the player level that could shed some illumination.

To be honest, I didn't expect much. The sample I had time to gather is incredibly small, and team stats are more or less aggregations of individual stats, so how much could I learn?

Well, at first blush, maybe the great collapse of 2008-09 could have been predicted.

Let's look at the year before and at % change of Offensive Rating from non-conference to conference play. In addition to a positive % change, a small negative change would actually imply relative improvement, as unlike the team stats, these aren't adjusted for competition.

Here's the year before the meltdown:

2007-08
Player             % Change   Class/Left?
Crawford, Tyler       16%     Sr/Graduated
Sapp, Jessie          -1%     Jr
Hibbert, Roy          -2%     Sr/Graduated
Wallace, Jonathan     -6%     Sr/Graduated
Ewing, Patrick        -7%     Sr/Graduated
Freeman, Austin      -16%     Fr
Summers, DaJuan      -21%     So
Macklin, Vernon      -23%     So/Transferred
Rivers, Jeremiah     -46%     So/Transferred

See any incredibly obvious trends? There's a small sample here so I'm loathe to commit to anything until I get a bigger sample, but man, it seems to me that you could take this a few directions:

• Do upperclassmen retain their offensive value better? Should this have been a warning sign?
• Are there style issues at hand? The "halfcourt" players seem to maintain more of their offensive value.
• Lastly, we could have seen it coming in that of the four players who played often and retained most of their effectiveness into conference play, three were graduating.

And now last year:

2008-09
Player                  % Change   Class/Left?
Mescheriakov, Nikita       89%     Fr/Transferred
Sims, Henry                30%     Fr
Freeman, Austin            -5%     So
Clark, Jason               -9%     Fr
Wattad, Omar              -11%     So/Transferred
Wright, Chris             -13%     So
Sapp, Jessie              -14%     Sr/Graduated
Monroe, Greg              -14%     Fr
Summers, DaJuan           -18%     Jr/NBA
Vaughn, Julian            -22%     So

I'm not sure this helps my theories much, except maybe style of play. There certainly needs to be a bit more work done here, but there's little doubt that when only one starter -- Freeman -- maintains their level into conference play -- you have an issue.

Over the next few days, I'll try to look at a bigger sample as well as what elements of these players' play created a drop.

Just off of this, I'd be a bit worried about Vaughn (can he bully the BE?) and Monroe (lack of go to low post moves) more than anyone. Given how mediocre the offense has been so far this year, we need to see improvement in conference play, not regression.

Looking back in anger, part 2

Last night I posted some tables showing the adjusted offensive and defensive efficiencies for the Hoyas over the past six seasons, broken into two groups:  early season (Nov. - Dec.) and late season (Jan. - Apr.).

Tonight I'll go ahead and run through the four factors tables that underlie each of the efficiencies we discussed.

Again here, I've adjusted each of the stats to account for the level of competition, but this is a much less certain trick then when I adjust efficiencies.  Without getting too technical, I have KenPom's adjusted efficiencies available for all of Georgetown's opponents over the past six seasons, but I have no adjusted stats for the four factors.  Think of the RPI, which uses record (25%), opponents' record (50%) and opponents' opponents' record (25%) - since I can't account for opponents' opponents for these stats, they are missing that component equivalent to about 25% with the RPI.

Also, I suspect that this will quickly turn into a stats dump, as it's getting late tonight. I'll try to come back and flush this out a bit more tomorrow.  At inspection before posting, this article looks like a mess, but I need to get to bed!

To start, let's take a look at the offense:

Offense - Early Season
Season    O. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
2003-04    103.9      50.4       19.6       39.1  *    42.4
2004-05    106.9      53.8  *    20.8       36.7       32.4
2005-06    109.9      54.8  *    18.0       32.6       32.9
2006-07    113.8 *    55.6  *    21.7       39.8  *    34.5
2007-08    119.1 *    59.2  !    18.8       36.0       35.4
2008-09    117.4 *    57.2  *    20.1       36.8       54.7  !

What I've done is tag each column if the team was performing significantly better or worse than an average team.  Roughly put:

! = Top 10    * = Top 25    x = Bottom 50    X = Bottom 25

Before I delve into this table, I'll go ahead and post the late season stats for offense:

Offense - Late Season
Season    O. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
2003-04     96.2      44.7  x    21.0       30.2  x    32.8
2004-05    113.2 *    55.0  *    22.2       33.9       32.8
2005-06    117.7 *    54.4  *    18.9       36.4       35.9
2006-07    125.9 !    58.2  !    20.6       42.1  !    38.6
2007-08    114.3 *    55.6  *    22.3  x    33.7       35.8
2008-09    108.3      52.5       23.4  x    34.6       38.2

At this point, I think there are at few truisms that become apparent:

• For a team to operate at a very good (Top 25) or elite (Top 10) efficiency on offense, it needs to shoot extremely well.  Doing another thing very well is useful, but not necessary.
  
• Being very good or elite at one of these skills in the early season is likely to translate to conference play, but not a guarantee.
• Generally, expect performance to decline a bit in conference play.  This seems most likely with turnovers.
• Getting offensive rebounds is nice, but not committing turnovers is nicer.

Now let's run the defense:

Defense - Early Season
Season    D. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
2003-04    91.6       49.2       28.1  !    39.6  X    28.4
2004-05    97.3       47.1       23.0       37.2  X    39.5  x
2005-06    92.9       47.1       20.7       28.3  *    29.9
2006-07    89.1  *    44.6  *    21.1       29.1       36.3
2007-08    87.2  *    42.1  *    18.4       30.8       25.1  *
2008-09    82.6  *    39.8  !    25.1  *    36.7  x    27.5

Defense - Late Season
Season    D. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
2003-04    92.8       50.5       24.8  *    34.4       43.1  x
2004-05    94.4       47.6       21.1       33.2       39.6  x
2005-06    92.6       47.7       20.0       31.1       27.5
2006-07    88.7  *    43.2  *    19.5       34.6       28.5
2007-08    85.3  *    41.8  *    20.7       31.1       41.4  x
2008-09    95.0       48.9       21.5       34.4       36.9

Here, the conclusions are similar:

• Preventing teams from making shots is the best way to run an efficient defense.
• Usually, early season field goal defense will translate well into conference play.
  
• Bad rebounding early season can be corrected by conference play.
• You can still have a great defense despite giving up fouls
  

So what happened last season?  A few things.

1. The team shot less accurately from the field in conference than early season.  This wasn't dramatic, and I'd guess tied to the 3FG shooting (I'm too lazy to look right now).  I couldn't let that stand, so I've appended another table at the end with shooting percentages for all seasons. Turns out it was as much 2FG shooting as 3FG shooting.  Shows what I know.
2. Offenisve turnovers went up quite a bit
3. Items #1 and #2 also happened in 2007-8, but were a bit more severe last year.
4. An elite ability to get to the FT line evaporated in conference play.  This may have been a bit of crutch propping up the offense early on.
5. The defense was defending field goals at <40% eFG early season, but this fell to Esherick-level in conference.  This was the single biggest change in the factors for offense or defense last year, and was fundamental to the collapse in conference. 
6. Better rebounding couldn't make up for the drop in turnovers generated by the defense.

Finally, how does the team's early season stats look, heading into the game vs. St. John's tomorrow night?

Season    O. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
2009-10    114.4 *    57.7  !    23.2  x    39.3  *    37.7

.         D. Eff.     eFG %     TO Rate    OReb %     FT Rate
           81.9  *    42.5  *    20.9       27.8  *    25.7  *

The offense is currently rated as very good, but I expect that to drop down a bit in conference.  As likely as not, the shooting accuracy will drop down a bit against taller Big East clubs, and that lousy turnover rate is most likely going to increase even more.

Rebounding on both ends is very good so far, and while a small decline would be expected in each case, I don't think either will become the worry that we saw last year.

The overall adjusted def. efficiency is very good so far this year, and there isn't a single underlying stat that raises a red flag of unsustainability.  I suspect that this season, much like 2007-8, the Hoyas will go as far as their defense will take them.


Edited to add these table:

Offense

.           Early Season                Late Season
Season    2FG%   3FG%   FT %          2FG%   3FG%   FT %
2003-04   49.0   40.3   70.2          40.7   31.9   72.3
2004-05   51.6   37.9   69.7          51.8   35.8   70.9
2005-06   56.9   37.5   69.3          52.1   34.6   71.3
2006-07   59.7   36.9   70.8          56.8   37.1   71.2
2007-08   60.1   41.0   60.2          54.2   37.1   68.1
2008-09   58.1   34.6   75.3          53.1   32.4   68.2

2009-10   54.0   36.1   71.1

Defense

.           Early Season                Late Season
Season    2FG%   3FG%   FT %          2FG%   3FG%   FT %
2003-04   43.9   32.9   62.6          50.9   31.9   69.3
2004-05   43.2   33.9   66.7          45.8   33.2   73.8
2005-06   41.4   37.7   64.1          48.0   33.8   70.8
2006-07   42.8   30.6   71.0          43.4   30.2   71.0
2007-08   38.3   29.9   65.8          41.6   29.4   68.4
2008-09   36.8   28.8   71.6          49.5   34.0   70.5

2009-10   41.3   30.3   72.5

Looking back in anger

As the Big East regular season gets under way, it comes time to wonder what we've learned about the Hoyas so far this year.

About this time last season I also wondered what November and December had demonstrated - heading into a home game against Pittsburgh, Georgetown was ranked #1 overall by Ken Pomeroy, with a net adjusted efficiency (adj. off. eff. - adj. def. eff) of + 42. That is, we expected that the Hoyas would outscore the median Div-I team (e.g. Holy Cross or Hofstra in 2009) by 42 points in 100 possessions.

I was so excited that I made one of those fancy-pants graphs to demonstrate visually just how good Georgetown was (click any figure to enlarge):

2008-09 Big East Aerial (31-Dec-08)

You'll need to read this post to understand everything in this figure, but simply:  upper-right = good; lower-left = bad.

The Hoyas went 6-14 the rest of the way.  Obviously, that figure - and the Hoyas early season performance - didn't tell us what was to come, only what had happened so far.

Now I could simply knock out this year's version and let it rest, or I could stare at a bunch of numbers on a spreadsheet and try to understand why the early season performance by the Hoyas was such a poor predictor of the rest of the season.

Let's do both.

First, here's this year's aerial, through games played Monday:

2009-10 Big East Aerial (28-Dec-09)

As conference play gets underway, Syracuse and West Virginia appear to be the class of the Big East, both with fairly balanced teams (offense vs. defense efficiencies).

Georgetown, surprisingly, is a solid third by KenPom's ratings, although the team is highly dependent upon its defense (#1 in the conference) as the offense is merely average.

Following is an enormous cluster of teams, headed by Marquette and Villanova and followed by St. John's, Pitt, UConn, Louisville, Seton Hall, Cincinnati and South Florida.  That's nine teams all grouped together.

Notre Dame - which almost fell off the chart with its extreme of the league's best offense and worst defense - and Providence are slightly behind the peloton, and Rutgers and DePaul hold the final two spots.

A few points to make:

• Note that the scaling on this year's aerial is slightly different than last year's.  The offensive scale doesn't go quite so high and the defensive scale doesn't go quite so low.  For instance, Notre Dame had better adj. off. and def. eff. stats last year, while this plot may lead you to think that their offense is actually better this year.
• The elite teams this year aren't quite as elite as those from last season headed into January.  Since four Big East teams made it to the Elite 8 last year, a drop-off this time isn't unexpected.
• No team last season made it to the NCAA tournament from behind the isopleth that crosses the solid diagonal at OE=107, DE=93.  This year, S. Florida sits just behind that line.  Three teams that were ahead of that line last year (Georgetown, Notre Dame and Cinci) failed to make the tourney, although they were bubblicious until the end.  If that's any sort of bellwether, it would mean 12 Big East teams are capable of making the NCAAs this year (although obviously some will not).
  
• A few teams may look out of place:
• Georgetown's pedestrian offense may seem unusual, but did you know that the Hoyas have finished higher than 8th in off. efficiency in the Big East only two times in JTIII's first five seasons (2006 & 2007)?
• Louisville's offense is better than their defense?  The Cardinals have finished 4th, 2nd, 1st and 1st in def. efficiency in conference their first four seasons.  If the offense can tread water, expect Louisville to improve as its defense does.
  
• Pitt was one of the most lopsided teams last year - they had a great offense and mediocre defense.  It's the opposite so far this year.
• To my eye, the most dramatic year-over-year improvement is S. Florida, but I'm not sure how they'll do without Gus Gilchrist for the foreseeable future.  St. John's is also far ahead of last year.
  

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Okay, that was fun, but what about the real issue - how well can we predict the rest of the season from how well a team plays in November and December?

Here's Georgetown's won-loss record for the past 6 seasons in the early part (all games in Nov. and Dec.) and late part (Jan. - Apr. games) of the schedule:

.                Early                  Late
Season       W   L     Net         W   L     Net 
2003-04      9   0   + 28.8        4  15   - 11.8
2004-05      8   3   + 13.7       11  10   +  1.1
2005-06      8   2   + 21.2       15   8   +  7.7
2006-07     10   3   + 23.1       20   4   + 15.7
2007-08     10   1   + 31.9       18   5   + 12.1
2008-09     10   1   + 29.6        6  14   -  3.6

That third column for each segment ("Net") refers to the difference between off. and def. efficiency during those games.  It turns out that the best two W/L records, and the 2nd and 3rd best net efficiencies from early season preceded two epic collapses - yes, this dataset goes back to the final Esherick season, although this is just a coincidence since this is as far back as KenPom's database goes back in time.

Now hopefully, if you're my regular reader or you've bothered to make it this far down the article, you'll want to dig a bit deeper into those numbers above.  For instance, what was the quality of competition like during each early season?  If we adjust the underlying off. and def. efficiencies for that competition, what would the net eff. numbers look like?

Let me tackle those one at a time.  First, I'll re-post those net. eff. numbers with the opponents' average KenPom rating:

.             Early                    Late
Season      Net   Rating             Net  Rating
2003-04   + 28.8   258             - 11.8   63
2004-05   + 13.7   175             +  1.1   55
2005-06   + 21.2   190             +  7.7   49
2006-07   + 23.1   150             + 15.7   48
2007-08   + 31.9   160             + 12.1   59
2008-09   + 29.6   119             -  3.6   61

Clearly, JTIII does not subscribe to Esherick's (and by proxy, his father's) scheduling philosophy.  The 03-04 team was simply getting fat on a bunch of low-major teams early season, and never had its mettle tested until conference play got rolling.  The 08-09 bunch, however, played the toughest early-season schedule so far - remember that the UConn game last year was played before New Year's, so it is included.  The huge drop in net efficiency last year came after the team looked to be able to handle just about anyone early on.

Let's now take a look at each of the individual efficiencies, now adjusted for competition during the segment.  This is analogous to looking at KenPom's Adj. Efficiencies, rather than raw efficiencies.  As I mentioned at the top, when we discuss adj. efficiencies, what we mean is how would we expect the team to perform against an average Div-I team.

Here we go, looking at offense first:

.                Off. Eff.
Season     Early  Late   Diff.
2003-04    103.9   96.2  -7.7
2004-05    106.9  113.2   6.3
2005-06    109.9  117.7   7.7
2006-07    113.8  125.9  12.1
2007-08    119.1  114.3  -4.8
2008-09    117.4  108.3  -9.1

The last Esherick team was the worst offensive team in the group, both early and late season, once you adjust the stats for the level of competition.

One of the great mythical concepts of the Georgetown/Princeton offense is that it is massively complex and takes considerable practice time and game experience to master.  The first three seasons under JTIII certainly give evidence to that, as the team improved from early season to late season.  This wasn't the case in 07-08, where the team was stocked with upperclassmen and operated at a high level even with the step back in conference.  But last year's team showed the biggest overall drop intra-season, and the roster had only 1 junior and 1 senior - surely an improvement should have come.

It's also worth noting that, in spite of the collapse last year, the team was still scoring more than 12 points per 100 possessions more than the 03-04 club.

.                Def. Eff.
Season     Early  Late   Diff.
2003-04     91.6   92.8   -1.2
2004-05     97.3   94.4    2.9
2005-06     92.9   92.6    0.3
2006-07     89.1   88.7    0.3
2007-08     87.2   85.3    1.9
2008-09     82.6   95.0  -12.4

Excluding last season, this table just makes a lot more sense to me.  I can understand offenses going to slumps, for example due to a prolonged stretch of poor outside shooting, but I'd expect that a team's defensive ability will be fairly well established in the first two months of the season, once the level of competition is accounted for.

An important trend, and one that I don't think most fans or analysts are picking up on, is that each Hoya team in the JTIII era has been better defensively than the previous year's team, and had improved from early-season to late-season.  Heading into Jan. 2009, Coach Thompson was beginning to look like some sort of defensive genius.

Then the wheels came off.

If we use the Esherick team as an archetype for one that had lost its confidence, or perhaps better a coach that had lost his team, we still see only a small drop in the quality of defensive play.  Last season, there were no significant injuries yet the defense on the court in conference play not only didn't resemble the early season team, it broke with a general trend over a five-year period.

.                Net Eff.
Season     Early  Late   Diff.
2003-04     12.3    3.4   -8.9
2004-05      9.6   18.8    9.2
2005-06     17.1   25.1    8.0
2006-07     24.8   37.2   12.4
2007-08     31.9   29.0   -2.8
2008-09     34.8   13.3  -21.4

Finally (for tonight), I'll summarize the previous tables with the net adj. efficiencies for the past six seasons.  I think its worth noting that, as much as we like to decry the late season swoon last year, it's worth recognizing that the early season performance was about as good as the Hoyas have played since JTIII arrived, just a touch below the 06-07 team during its run to the Final Four.  The shock wasn't so much how poorly they were playing by the end of the season, but rather how far they had fallen in such a short period of time.

While the Esherick team's collapse wasn't nearly as large, that team simply wasn't good enough to start with to be able to collapse very far.

Tomorrow, I'll dig a bit deeper into the underlying stats, and take a look at what we've learned so far this year.

Big East HD Box Scores - This time I mean it . . . maybe

West Virginia and Seton Hall tipped of the Big East regular season tonight with a 90-84 OT win for the Mountaineers in their game at the Prudential Center.

Last year I attempted to post HD box scores for as many Big East teams as possible, during conference play.  I made it almost until the end of January, when real life circumstances reduced my free time to virtually nil.

Foolishly, I'm going to try it again this year, starting with tonight's game.

Here's the deal - if the school posts usable play-by-play data on their team page, I will maintain a page for them with all available conference games posted (home and road).  If a school doesn't have the requisite info available, I'm not going to bother keeping a page.  I've played around a bit with an alternative source for play-by-play data [StatSheet.com], but it's not playing nice with my compiler so I'm going to limit things to just the official athletic department sites (links are in the table).

If you are interested in a box score for a team without "good" play-by-play, you should be able to find it whenever they play a "Yes" team from the table below.  St. John's is a unique case, where I believe those games played at Carnesecca Arena will have the info I need, but MSG games will not.  I'll keep a page going for the Johnnies, even though that's only four home games this season.  Obviously, any available road games will also be posted.

If you are a fan of one of the "No" schools and would like to see these HD box scores, please e-mail or call your Sports Information Director (SID) or equivalent and ask them to start posting the play-by-play.  I believe most (all?) teams are using StatCrew software, so they should be able to provide the play-by-play if they wanted [MSG games excepted].

Here's what I've got planned for this year:

School           PBP Good?      Comments
Cincinnati         No           No substitution data at team site
Connecticut        No           Seem to provide opponents' stat package
DePaul             No           Box score only at team site
Georgetown         Yes          Preferred style
Louisville         Yes          Same format as G'town
Marquette          Yes          Same format as G'town
Notre Dame         Yes          No 2nd half box score; can handle this
Pittsburgh         Yes          No 2nd half box score; can handle this
Providence         No           Box score only at team site
Rutgers            No           Box score only at team site
St. John's        Maybe         On-campus games only; MSG games have box score only
Seton Hall         Yes          Only pbp and final box score; can handle this
South Florida      No           No substitution data
Syracuse           No           Box score only at team site
Villanova          Yes          Same format as G'town
West Virginia      No           Box score only at team site

To view available box scores, just click on the Big East HD Box Scores link at the top right of the page (just below "Tempo-Free Stats 101"). That will bring you to the Georgetown page, then just click on the link for any available team.  For tonight, here's the direct link to the West Virginia-Seton Hall HD Box score.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

While I'm here, I thought I'd mention that I've added another line to the HD box score.  Going back to an early attempt at tracking fast breaks, I'm now tracking points scored after steals and Off. Efficiency on possessions generated by steals (rather than "points off turnovers", which you can find in most detailed box scores).  If you stop and think about it, this efficiency is simply points after steals divided by steals [then multiplied by 100], but I'll save you the trouble of doing the math.

I'd say that this feature is still in the beta phase, meaning that I've only just added it and am still testing as I go.  Turns out that tonight's game was a lousy test since Seton Hall just doesn't give up the ball very often (WVU had only 1 steal!!).

Recap: Georgetown 86, Harvard 70

The Hoyas ended the early part of their schedule with a matinee game at the Verizon Center against the Crimson of Harvard, and walked away with an 86-70 victory.  Since it was a noon start on a weekday, looks like I'll be about the last one to post a recap (some of us have to work two days before Christmas).

Let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Home                            Visitor   
.            Georgetown                      Harvard         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            37        40        78
 
Effic.        118.7     103.7     110.9        89.0      91.4      90.3  
 
eFG%           50.0      57.6      53.8        52.2      41.7      46.2  
TO%            21.6      29.6      25.8        32.4      22.2      27.1  
OR%            47.4      40.0      44.1        25.0      30.0      28.1  
FT Rate        36.4      18.2      27.3        43.5      46.7      45.3  

Assist Rate    53.3      44.4      48.5        45.5      54.5      50.0  
Block Rate     16.7      25.0      21.1         8.3       3.8       6.0  
Steal Rate     21.6      17.3      19.3        13.5       9.9      11.6  
 
2FG%           50.0      61.5      56.0        50.0      40.0      44.7  
3FG%           33.3      28.6      31.2        40.0      30.0      33.3  
FT%            91.7      66.7      83.3        90.0      85.7      87.5

The game was played at a manic pace today, second only to the Washington game for the fastest of the year.  Harvard prefers a lot of possessions and got their wish - however, they weren't necessarily dictating tempo as each team's time of possession was ~15.5 seconds.  Probably more a function of all those turnovers.

The first half looks to be the more statistically dominant for the Hoyas, but it should be noted that the score was tied at 33-33 with 3:31 left before Georgetown made an 11-0 run to close out the half.  The run was the result of Greg Monroe, well, going nuts:  1 layup, 1 assist, 1 off. reb., 2 def. reb., 2 blocks and 2 steals (one of which came immediately after he committed a turnover himself) and a charge drawn (h/t Craig Stouffer).

During the second half, the Hoyas were able to build the lead up to 24 points midway through the half, before a stretch of 4 turnovers in 7 possessions allowed Harvard to close the lead back to 15 points.  The margin bounced between 12 and 18 points the rest of the way.

That second half turnover rate might work against an Ivy-league opponent, but would likely allow most Big East teams back into a game.  At this point, I don't have any reason to think that turnovers won't be a problem in conference play.

INDIVIDUAL NET POINTS STATS

Georgetown            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Wright, Chris          70   31.8  126.5   28.1      70    80.7   11.3     +13.5  
Monroe, Greg           67   21.1  131.6   18.6      67    73.9    9.9      +8.4  
Freeman, Austin        65   26.0  108.8   18.4      67    95.2   12.8      +4.0  
Clark, Jason           41   13.9  116.5    6.7      41    85.4    7.0      +0.7  
Vaughn, Julian         40   12.0  121.2    5.8      42   101.0    8.5      -0.8  
Thompson, Hollis       52    5.6   67.8    2.0      51    93.4    9.5      -4.1  
Sanford, Vee           14   27.3   21.4    0.8      14    48.6    1.4      -0.8  
Dougherty, Ryan         2   50.0    0.0    0.0       2   100.0    0.4      -0.7  
Benimon, Jerrelle      19    8.6   79.3    1.3      17   132.7    4.5      -2.0  
STEPKA, Stephen         1  100.0    0.0    0.0       0    90.9    0.0      -0.5  
Sims, Henry            14   21.4   66.7    2.0      14    73.8    2.1      -0.1  
TOTALS                 77         108.5   83.8      77    87.4   67.3     +16.3  

Harvard               Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Webster, Christian     52   18.1   71.8    6.8      53    98.5   10.4      -3.1  
Lin, Jeremy            64   24.1  103.3   15.9      63   104.6   13.2      +1.3  
McNally, Oliver        48   29.0   77.2   10.8      48    88.0    8.5      +0.4  
Miller, Doug           39   11.3  137.5    6.0      38   108.0    8.2      -0.4  
Wright, Keith          46   17.3  101.3    8.1      46    94.9    8.7      -0.1  
Curry, Brandyn         47    9.1  172.4    7.3      46   101.4    9.3      +0.5  
Georgatos, Jeff         2    0.0    -      0.0       2    80.0    0.3      -0.3  
Giger, Dee             20   30.8   79.8    4.9      21   151.3    6.4      -2.9  
Casey, Kyle            41   24.9   62.9    6.4      42   109.5    9.2      -3.8  
Magnarelli, Pat        26   19.4   61.6    3.1      26   126.8    6.6      -3.4  
TOTALS                 77          90.3   69.3      77   104.9   80.8     -11.4

Obviously, today was the Chris Wright show, as he scored the most points by a player in the JTIII-era.  It may have taken him 21 shots to get there, but it's awfully hard to criticize his decision-making in the second half, where he took and made 2 3FG, and converted 6 of 7 layup attempts.  He had 6 steals and 4 assists to go along with all those points, but he also committed 4 turnovers in the game, holding down his efficiency stats a bit.  Nonetheless, putting up a 120+ ORating game while using more than 30% of available possessions is impressive.

Greg Monroe led the team in offensive efficiency, and also was strongest on defense among the main six rotation players.  He used less than 22% of possessions for the third consecutive game, and I think he may be changing his role a bit in the offense after getting out to a dramatically high-usage start to the season.  He's posted 100+ ORatings in those 3 games.

Austin Freeman used more than 25% of possessions while on the court and was modestly efficient while doing so, but his defense looks a bit suspect (in spite of the 3 steals).  Jason Clark and Julian Vaughn had quiet offensive days, but Vaughn's defensive rating was poor.  Clark somehow managed to foul out in 41 possessions played.

Hollis Thompson is an interesting case for plus/minus versus net efficiency.  The plus/minus stat, which cares only how the team played while he was on the court, loved him today with a +14 (second on the team).  The net efficiency stats, which track his contribution to the team while he was on the court, was not impressed at all, giving him the lowest score on the team.  As I couldn't watch the video stream of the game (I was at work, remember?), I'll leave it up to my intrepid reader to decide which metric does a better job capturing Thompson's performance today.

Henry Sims, Vee Sanford and Jerrelle Benimon all got a bit of run today, although none did much on offense.  Sims and especially Sanford look to have played well defensively while on the court though.


That wraps up most of the out-of-conference schedule (except for Duke).  The Hoyas kick off the conference schedule against St. John's on New Year's Eve.

HD BOX SCORE

Harvard vs Georgetown
12/23/09 12:00 at Verizon Center
Final score: Georgetown 86, Harvard 70

Harvard                 Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Webster, Christian     28:25  -13   8/42  0- 2  1- 5  5- 6  7/37  0/12  1/53  3/52  0/37  0/24  1/27   1
Lin, Jeremy            33:07  -13  15/60  5- 7  1- 3  2- 2 10/48  4/15  3/63  6/64  1/42  1/28  3/29   2
McNally, Oliver        24:13  - 3  11/45  2- 5  1- 4  4- 4  9/35  1/13  2/48  4/48  0/27  1/20  3/20   3
Miller, Doug           20:14  - 4   5/36  2- 4  0- 0  1- 2  4/31  1/11  0/38  0/39  0/21  2/19  2/13   3
Wright, Keith          25:15  - 9   8/37  4- 8  0- 0  0- 0  8/34  0/ 8  0/46  1/46  2/32  3/22  5/23   1
Curry, Brandyn         23:29  - 6   7/45  0- 1  1- 1  4- 4  2/28  4/10  2/46  0/47  0/28  0/18  1/19   1
Georgatos, Jeff        01:17  + 0   0/ 2  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/ 1  0/ 0  0/ 2  0/ 2  0/ 3  0/ 1  0/ 1   0
Giger, Dee             10:46  -13   5/18  0- 1  1- 1  2- 2  2/11  1/ 4  0/21  3/20  0/16  1/ 6  0/ 7   0
Casey, Kyle            20:13  - 6   8/45  3- 6  0- 1  2- 2  7/24  0/10  1/42  3/41  0/25  0/12  3/20   4
Magnarelli, Pat        13:01  -13   3/20  1- 4  0- 0  1- 2  4/16  0/ 5  0/26  1/26  0/19  1/10  1/11   1
TOTALS                 40:00       70    17-38  5-15 21-24    53 11/22  9/77 21/77  3/50  9/32 19/34  16
.                                        0.447 0.333 0.875       0.500 0.117 0.273 0.060 0.281 0.559    

Georgetown              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Wright, Chris          35:32  +13  34/78 11-16  2- 5  6- 7 21/58  4/17  6/70  4/70  1/36  2/30  4/29   2
Monroe, Greg           34:27  +12  16/74  7-10  0- 1  2- 2 11/59  2/21  4/67  3/67  5/36  6/33 10/28   1
Freeman, Austin        33:45  + 9  21/73  7-14  1- 3  4- 5 17/57  2/20  3/67  4/65  0/33  2/31  2/26   2
Clark, Jason           21:37  +16   8/49  1- 2  2- 3  0- 0  5/35  3/16  0/41  3/41  0/25  1/17  1/17   5
Vaughn, Julian         23:00  + 4   4/44  2- 5  0- 0  0- 0  5/37  2/15  0/42  1/40  1/21  2/19  2/17   1
Thompson, Hollis       25:49  +14   0/59  0- 1  0- 2  0- 0  3/44  2/23  1/51  0/52  0/22  1/22  1/22   4
Sanford, Vee           08:05  + 6   1/14  0- 0  0- 2  1- 2  2/12  0/ 5  1/14  2/14  0/ 6  0/ 7  1/ 7   1
Dougherty, Ryan        01:17  + 0   0/ 2  0- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/ 3  0/ 1  0/ 2  0/ 2  0/ 0  0/ 1  0/ 1   0
Benimon, Jerrelle      08:18  - 3   0/18  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/15  1/ 7  0/17  1/19  1/ 6  1/ 8  0/ 7   1
STEPKA, Stephen        00:39  + 0   0/ 0  0- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/ 2  0/ 0  0/ 0  0/ 1  0/ 0  0/ 1  0/ 0   0
Sims, Henry            07:31  + 9   2/19  0- 0  0- 0  2- 2  0/ 8  0/ 7  0/14  2/14  0/ 5  0/ 1  1/ 6   2
TOTALS                 40:00       86    28-50  5-16 15-18    66 16/33 15/77 20/77  8/38 15/34 23/32  19
.                                        0.560 0.312 0.833       0.485 0.195 0.260 0.211 0.441 0.719    

Efficiency: Georgetown 1.117, Harvard 0.909
eFG%: Georgetown 0.538, Harvard 0.462
Substitutions: Georgetown 30, Harvard 34

2-pt Shot Selection:
Dunks: Georgetown 1-1, Harvard 3-3
Layups/Tips: Georgetown 25-42, Harvard 14-30
Jumpers: Georgetown 2-7, Harvard 0-5

Fast break pts (% FG pts): Georgetown 14 (19.7), Harvard 14 (28.6)
Pts (eff.) after steal: Georgetown 25 (166.7), Harvard 12 (133.3)
Seconds per poss: Georgetown 15.7, Harvard 15.4

Stats pages will be updated tomorrow.

On Mescheriakov

This morning, the Georgetown athletic department announced that Nikita Mescheriakov will be transferring (link).

"Nikita expressed the interest to transfer to a school where he knows he will get more playing time than he feels he will get here," Thompson said. "We wish him the best in his future endeavors and appreciate his hard work."

I'm not really interested in engaging in the snark, vitriol or lunacy that's popped up today on the popular Hoyas forums/blogs (link, link, link), and if you've come here looking for that, you've stumbled into the wrong place.

What I was curious about was the rationale for Mescheriakov's abrupt increase in playing time last season, starting with the home game against Cincinnati and his even-more-surprising move into the starting lineup for the road game at Syracuse.  Now obviously I can't know what Coach Thompson's thinking was last season when he bumped up Mescheriakov's role, but I wondered if there was something in last year's stats that would indicate why Nikita became a major player.

A couple of items before we jump in:

• Heading into the Cincinnati game, Georgetown had lost 5 of 7 games, being outscored by 4.5 points on average (or a Net Efficiency of -6.9, to be tempo-free). This was the stretch from the rout vs. Pittsburgh to the road loss at Seton Hall.  We'll use this stretch as the frame of reference for the swooning Hoyas, pre-Mescheriakov's expanded role.

• Over the next 12 games Nikita played consistent minutes, and started in the final eight - the Hoyas went 4-8 during this stretch.  I'm ignoring the final game of the season (at Baylor in 1st round NIT), where Mescheriakov started but only played 5 minutes.

First, lets look at some basic team stats for each segment:

.                 Pre-Nikita                 With Nikita 
.              Gtown      Opp             Gtown       Opp
Record           2-5                        4-8

Pace            66.5                       65.5
 
Effic.         102.9     109.8             97.5       99.1
Net                  -6.9                        -1.6
 
eFG%            49.7      50.9             51.5       47.9
TO%             21.0      17.9             23.9       21.8 
OR%             35.8      40.3             31.5       32.9 
FT Rate         28.5      18.2             20.8       31.3

The first myth to dispel is that Mescheriakov was some sort of massive defensive liability.  Once he was added to the rotation, the Hoyas defensive efficiency improved by more than 10 points per 100 possessions, and three of the four factors improved, most noticeably defense rebounding [h/t Dan Hanner].  Unfortunately, this drop came at the expense of the offense - the Hoyas were scoring more than 5 less points per 100 possessions in return.  Regardless, the result was that Georgetown was more competitive with Mescheriakov in the line-up, at least on paper.

But there's the rub - while the efficiency and other underlying stats improved, the win-loss record didn't, or at least not much.  From a previous post, I discussed how to estimate expected win-loss record based upon net efficiency, so we can do that here:

.                 Wins  Losses   Exp Win  Exp Loss   Luck
Pre-Nikita          2     5        2.2      4.8      -0.2
With Nikita         4     8        5.4      6.6      -1.4

So when we discuss how "unlucky" Georgetown was last season, quite a bit of that bad "luck" came with Mescheriakov getting major minutes.  I put the word luck in quotations here because it's not entirely clear that we're talking about luck in the literal sense.  Read this for further discussion of luck versus skill, etc.


Of course, we're looking at small enough samples that the differences between opponents played could be confounding our results.  To address this, I'll compile Performance stats during each stretch - remember that Performance is points scored (or allowed) minus expected points scored (or allowed).

To keep things neat and simple, here I'll use expected efficiencies rather than actual expected points.

.                     Offense                 Defense
.              Expect  Actual   Net    Expect  Actual   Net     Overall
Pre-Nikita      103.6   102.9  -0.7     103.2   109.8  -6.6      -7.3
With Nikita     103.4    97.5  -5.9      97.7    99.1  -1.4      -7.3

Once we account for competition,we see that the apparent improvement in Georgetown's play from Mescheriakov's insertion in the lineup is due entirely to easier competition.

Specifically, the Hoyas should have scored at about the same rate in each set of games, and actually did score about as well as expected during the early swoon.  Once Nikita was in the rotation, the offense struggled.  Meanwhile, more than half of that great leap in improvement on the raw defensive numbers is accounted for by simply playing a set of teams with a worse offense on average, while Mescheriakov was in the rotation.

To be clear, we can still see that defensive play did improve at the cost of the offense with Nikita getting major minutes, but the overall result was a wash (-7.3 vs. -7.3).  In the end, having Mescheriakov as part of the rotation didn't help to pull the Hoyas out of their tailspin, but it also didn't really hurt.

Recap: Old Dominion 61, Georgetown 57

In a raging blizzard, Georgetown staged their traditional McDonough Gym loss to the Old Dominion Monarchs, 61-57.  The Hoyas fell behind by as many as 18 points in the 2nd half, and simply ran out of time in a desperate effort to close the deficit, getting as close as 59-57 before the game ended.

Let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Home                            Visitor   
.            Georgetown                      Old Dominion         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            33        29        62

Effic.         63.5     124.2      92.4        96.7     100.0      98.9  
 
eFG%           35.0      60.4      48.9        51.6      51.9      51.8  
TO%            33.3      24.1      29.2        21.2      24.1      22.7  
OR%            13.3      60.0      36.7        33.3      43.8      38.2  
FT Rate        45.0      54.2      50.0         6.5      11.5       8.8  

Assist Rate    83.3      69.2      73.7        78.6      66.7      73.1  
Block Rate     20.0       9.5      14.6        15.4       0.0       7.4  
Steal Rate      9.1      13.8      11.4        15.1      10.3      13.0  
 
2FG%           30.8      71.4      51.9        50.0      42.9      46.3  
3FG%           28.6      30.0      29.4        36.4      60.0      43.8  
FT%            77.8      53.8      63.6         0.0      66.7      40.0

After two consecutive games with blistering 70+ possession tempo, the Hoyas returned to some normalcy with a leisurely 61 possession affair.  The pace slowed considerably in the 2nd half as ODU tried to shorten the game, as can be seen by the large disparity in seconds per possession (ODU = 22.2, GU = 16.3).  In fact, the Monarchs ran off more than 24 seconds per possession in the 2nd half.

The simple explanation for the loss is turnovers.  One in three possessions in the 1st half ended with a turnover, and the Hoyas gave the ball away 18 of 62 possessions overall.

But the loss is really attributable to a complete failure of the offense in the 1st half, and not just from turnovers.  The Hoyas managed to gather only 2/15 (13%) of their own missed shots, and missed 8 of 11 layups in the half.  Those were equal opportunity misses:  Wright (3), Monroe (2), Freeman (1), Vaughn (1) and Sims (1) all kicked in.

Georgetown came out of the the locker room with a much more efficient offense, thanks to aggressive offensive rebounding and a tolerable turnover rate, but in turn weren't able to clamp down on the Monarchs' offense.  The Hoyas couldn't string together consecutive defensive stops until ODU was ahead 47-29, and despite a 28-14 run to close out the game were never able to get themselves out of that enormous hole.

Georgetown missed 6 of 13 FTA in the Vesper half, including the front end of two 1-and-1s by Julian Vaughn; overall the Hoyas out-shot the Monarchs 22 to 5 on free throws.  While a few more made FTs would certainly have helped, ODU did themselves no favors by making only 2 of their attempts, and I find the FT shooting to be only a small part in the loss.

INDIVIDUAL NET POINTS STATS

Georgetown            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Wright, Chris          56   18.2   67.4    6.9      58    84.1    9.8      -2.3  
Monroe, Greg           61   21.7  100.4   13.3      60    92.0   11.0      +1.7  
Freeman, Austin        58   21.0   91.1   11.1      59   101.5   12.0      -1.1  
Clark, Jason           59    7.9   98.5    4.6      60    92.7   11.1      -3.1  
Vaughn, Julian         38   38.9   82.9   12.3      40   102.6    8.2      +0.6  
Thompson, Hollis       24   13.2  141.6    4.5      24    67.3    3.2      +1.8  
Mescheriakov, Nikita    1    0.0    -      0.0       2     0.0    0.0      +0.0  
Benimon, Jerrelle       6    0.0    -      0.0       5    64.0    0.6      -0.6  
Sims, Henry             7   57.1   50.0    2.0       7   115.7    1.6      -1.1  
TOTALS                 62          87.7   54.5      63    91.4   57.6      -2.7  

Old Dominion          Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
James, Darius          45   22.9   73.8    7.6      46    88.4    8.1      -1.0  
Lee, Gerald            38   18.0   86.1    5.9      40   104.3    8.3      -1.8  
Hassell, Frank         45   18.3  103.8    8.5      46    69.3    6.4      +2.5  
Bazemore, Kent         42   24.1   85.1    8.6      41    83.8    6.9      +0.9  
Finney, Ben            50   16.5  156.2   12.9      51    81.5    8.3      +5.4  
Iliadis, Trian         32    7.9  166.7    4.2      30    89.2    5.4      +0.4  
Cooper, Chris           8   52.1   10.0    0.4       8    94.2    1.5      -2.3  
De Lancey,Marquel      18    3.2  237.5    1.4      16    74.9    2.4      -0.1  
Carter, Keyon          37   26.4   56.7    5.5      32    97.3    6.2      -2.3  
TOTALS                 63          90.6   55.1      62    86.3   53.5      +2.1

For consecutive games, Greg Monroe used less than 25% of possessions while on the court, but he was one of only two Hoyas to create more than a point per possession used.  His defense numbers look average, but as Mark Tillmon noted several times during the 2nd half, his gambling for steals occasionally left his teammates scrambling to cover for him.  At other times he simply looked better than anyone else on the court (e.g. leading a fast break or making a corner 3FG).

Hollis Thompson played less than half of the game tonight, but was easily the most efficient player on the court for Georgetown.  He scored only 4 points in the game, but contributed two assists and an offensive rebound - along with only 1 turnover.

Julian Vaughn used up a lot of possessions tonight with turnovers (5 in 38 off. possessions played), and this somewhat outweighed his yeoman's work on the offensive glass in the 2nd half.  Austin Freeman quietly played well - his 1/6 shooting from behind the arc is somewhat skewed by two desperation 3FGAs in the last 15 seconds of the game.  Unfortunately, neither played especially well on defense.

Chris Wright and Jason Clark had poor games tonight, albeit in different ways.  Wright struggled shooting in all facets [2/5 2FG, 0/3 3FG, 0/1 FT] and contributed three turnovers.  He did manage seven assists in the game and played the most credible defense of the starters.  Clark was efficient enough at both ends, but simply not active enough in the offense - both of his 2nd half 3FG excited both the crowd and his team, but little else of his play was memorable.

Jerrelle Benimon and Henry Sims both saw some playing time in the 1st half as JTIII looked for a spark, but neither could contribute much - Sims committed 2 turnovers in 7 offensive possessions.  Nikita Mescheriakov played just long enough to commit a foul.


Looking at the Monarchs' side, the difference was clearly Ben Finney.  Scuffling a bit after respectable freshman and sophomore seasons, Finney made 3/4 3FG (he came in 6/25 from 3FG) and didn't commit a turnover despite leading ODU in minutes played.  Frank Hassell had a nice defensive game, as well.

HD BOX SCORE

Old Dominion vs Georgetown
12/19/09 7:00 at McDonough Arena
Final score: Old Dominion 61, Georgetown 57

Old Dominion            Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
James, Darius          29:32  + 0   7/42  2- 3  1- 4  0- 1  7/40  5/15  1/46  4/45  0/18  0/24  2/21   2
Lee, Gerald            25:13  - 1   6/37  3- 6  0- 0  0- 0  6/37  3/14  0/40  3/38  0/15  1/21  0/15   5
Hassell, Frank         28:00  + 5  10/45  4- 9  0- 0  2- 2  9/39  0/15  3/46  0/45  0/18  1/21  6/23   2
Bazemore, Kent         26:31  + 1   6/35  3- 6  0- 2  0- 0  8/36  4/12  0/41  2/42  1/16  3/23  4/24   4
Finney, Ben            31:21  + 4  13/54  2- 5  3- 4  0- 0  9/46  5/18  3/51  0/50  1/21  2/25  4/20   2
Iliadis, Trian         20:31  + 5  11/31  1- 1  3- 4  0- 0  5/29  0/ 9  0/30  0/32  0/15  0/16  2/17   3
Cooper, Chris          05:09  - 3   0/ 5  0- 0  0- 0  0- 2  0/ 7  0/ 2  0/ 8  3/ 8  0/ 5  1/ 6  0/ 3   2
De Lancey,Marquel      10:32  + 4   0/19  0- 2  0- 0  0- 0  2/17  2/ 8  1/16  0/18  0/ 9  0/ 9  1/10   0
Carter, Keyon          23:11  + 5   8/37  4- 9  0- 2  0- 0 11/34  0/11  0/32  3/37  0/18  0/20  1/22   2
TOTALS                 40:00       61    19-41  7-16  2- 5    57 19/26  8/62 15/63  2/27 12/33 20/31  22
.                                        0.463 0.438 0.400       0.731 0.129 0.238 0.074 0.364 0.645    

Georgetown              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Wright, Chris          36:33  - 1   4/53  2- 5  0- 3  0- 1  8/42  7/16  1/58  3/56  0/38  0/30  4/31   2
Monroe, Greg           38:34  - 4  15/57  2- 7  2- 2  5- 9  9/42  4/15  2/60  2/61  1/40  1/29  6/32   1
Freeman, Austin        37:42  - 4  13/53  4- 5  1- 6  2- 2 11/43  0/13  0/59  3/58  1/39  2/30  4/32   2
Clark, Jason           37:29  - 4   6/55  0- 0  2- 6  0- 1  6/42  0/16  2/60  2/59  0/39  1/30  2/31   1
Vaughn, Julian         25:22  - 9  13/34  5- 8  0- 0  3- 5  8/29  1/ 8  1/40  5/38  4/30  4/21  3/20   2
Thompson, Hollis       15:31  + 2   4/22  1- 1  0- 0  2- 2  1/15  2/ 6  1/24  1/24  0/13  1/10  1/13   2
Mescheriakov, Nikita   01:09  + 3   0/ 3  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/ 2  0/ 1  0/ 2  0/ 1  0/ 1  0/ 1  0/ 1   1
Benimon, Jerrelle      03:34  + 2   0/ 4  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/ 3  0/ 1  0/ 5  0/ 6  0/ 2  0/ 2  0/ 3   0
Sims, Henry            04:06  - 5   2/ 4  0- 1  0- 0  2- 2  1/ 2  0/ 0  0/ 7  2/ 7  0/ 3  0/ 2  1/ 2   1
TOTALS                 40:00       57    14-27  5-17 14-22    44 14/19  7/63 18/62  6/41 11/31 21/33  12
.                                        0.519 0.294 0.636       0.737 0.111 0.290 0.146 0.355 0.636    

Efficiency: Old Dominion 0.968, Georgetown 0.919
eFG%: Old Dominion 0.518, Georgetown 0.489
Substitutions: Old Dominion 45, Georgetown 19

2-pt Shot Selection:
Dunks: Old Dominion 1-1, Georgetown 0-0
Layups/Tips: Old Dominion 12-22, Georgetown 11-21
Jumpers: Old Dominion 6-18, Georgetown 3-6

Fast break pts (% FG pts): Old Dominion 6 (10.2), Georgetown 4 (9.3)
Pts (eff.) after steal: Old Dominion 10 (125.0), Georgetown 10 (142.9)
Seconds per poss: Old Dominion 22.2, Georgetown 16.3

For tonight's game I've added an extra feature to the possession tracker graph - yellow triangles indicate where each turnover took place for the offense.  In the 1st half, the Hoyas had three consecutive possessions, and 9 of their first 21, end in a turnover.

Stats pages will be updated tomorrow.

Distributions, and their meaning

This all started innocently enough.

Heading into the game against the Washington Huskies, I fully expected Georgetown to struggle mightily with turnovers, since Georgetown was turning the ball over on more than 22% of their possessions.  Against a high tempo team, I expected these turnovers to be turned into easy fast break points for the Huskies.

Turned out, Washington had a harder time holding on the ball than the Hoyas.  For the game, Georgetown outscored UW 28-23 on points after turnovers, as the Huskies ended fully 30% of their possessions with a give away.

Somehow, this got me to thinking about the four factors, scoring efficiencies and steals.  So I turned to KenPom.com and downloaded all of the end-of-season stats for 2004 through 2009, and starting playing around with the data.

Specifically, I was curious what the distribution of turnover rates were for teams in college basketball, as well as the median value.  While conference-only stats might be a bit more useful when looking at the Hoyas, they're a bit more tedious to generate (Pomeroy has done all the work for me for stats for all games), and his complete database has more than 2000 team-seasons, which makes statistical analysis much less susceptible to the occasional outlier.

An important point to keep in mind during this discussion is that I'm only looking at team-to-team differences, not game-to-game differences for a team, or player-to-player differences within a team.

First, I looked at the distribution of turnover rates (turnovers per 100 possessions).  Since we have TO rates for both offense and defense (i.e. turnovers committed and generated, respectively), I decided to compare histograms of the two, to see if the rate offenses turn the ball over varies equally to the rate defenses force turnovers (click any figure to enlarge).

The convention used here will be consistent throughout:  I created 25 equally-sized bins for a histogram, counted the number of team-seasons in each bin, then ran a Gaussian fit through each (assuming a normal distribution) to get the median and the width, really FWHM (full width at half of the maximum) which are reported next to the histogram.  The histograms are plotted offense on top, then defense on the bottom.

For turnover rate, the distributions look very similar, but not identical:  turnover rates by the offense is slightly broader and the median is a fuzz higher, while turnover rates by the defense are a bit narrower and the median lower with a strange tail extending to the right.  I suspect that this tail is due to a few coaches going all-out in attempting to force turnovers (think 40 Minutes of Hell), while most teams vary about the 17-24% range.  Since all teams try to prevent turnovers while on offense, that distribution looks a bit more classically bell-curve shaped.

This was all well-and-good, but frankly not very interesting, at least not yet.  Next, I ran steal rate (steals per 100 possessions):

At the top is the steals allowed while on offense, i.e. opponents' steal rate, while the bottom is steals generated while on defense.  Hopefully, these pairs of distributions look as different to you as they did to me.  The top plot (steals allowed) again has a much more symmetrical shape than the bottom (steals committed), and now it is much narrower.  I think that asymmetry on the bottom plot -the tailling on the right side - goes back to the idea that a few coaches will have their players constantly attempt for steals.  I'll discuss the difference in widths a bit more later on.

This got me thinking about two things - for now I'll just stick to the distributions, but if this post doesn't turn into a novella, I'll return to the other point (about turnovers and steals) at the end.

My next inclination was to wonder whether offensive and defensive efficiencies also show a difference in their distributions.  After all, all teams are trying to score and prevent the other team from scoring, so I'd expect that they'd be roughly the same. Here we go:

If you couldn't see much of a difference in the distributions in that last plot, I hope you see the difference here.  While both have a classical bell-curve shape, the offensive efficiencies are much more widely distributed than the defense.

So what does this mean?

When I looked at the difference between off. steals (allowed) and def. steals (committed), I noted that the defensive curve was broader.  The explanation is a bit complicated, but is as follows:

• The stats were are looking at are "raw" or not adjusted for competition.  And each histogram is generated from the end-of-season stats for each team.

• Therefore, each statistic is based upon playing a large number of teams (typically ~30 games) of varying talent and strategies.  So, when a statistic is a measure of some consistent team strategy (i.e. defensive steals), the distribution will be broad, since the statistic will be inflated or deflated expressly by strategy.

• To demonstrate by continuing the example of defensive steals, a team like VMI has a very high steal rate which seems to be a fundamental component of their defense, while Washington St. has a very low steal rate as Tony Bennett eschews a gambling defense.  In each case, their opponents will allow more or fewer steals than normal because of the defensive strategy, and this accumulates over the course of 30 games.  By season's end, this consistent strategy results in a statistic (here steals rate) far from the median or average value.

• Conversely, all teams try to minimize steals allowed.  Perhaps a certain offensive style is likely to lead to more steals for the defense, but offensive players on the court are always trying to prevent steals allowed.  Over the course of 30 games, they'll play against aggressive and passive defenses, so sometimes they'll have a high steal rate allowed, sometimes low.  But by the end of the season, they'll regress towards some median value.

• When you extend this logic to all 2000 team-seasons, active strategies will result in a wider distribution than reactive responses.

This sounds reasonable to me, but can I prove this hypothesis?  We'll need to take a look at another stat where we can compare strategy to reaction by the offense and defense.  Thanks to a recent diatribe by John Gasaway, we know of another statistic:  rebounding.

Simply put, defensive rebounding is reactive - every team wants to get every rebound while on defense.  But offensive rebounding is strategic - some coaches will send 3 or 4 players to crash the boards on a missed shot, while others will send everyone back to prevent a fast break.

So if my thesis holds water, we'd expect offensive rebounding % to have a wider distribution than defensive rebounding %.  Let's take a look (here, I'll be using OR% and OR% allowed [= 1 - DR%] to make the distributions directly comparable):

And there it is, just as predicted.  The distribution of teams' offensive rebounding rate is wider than the defensive rebounding rate.

Feeling rather smug, I went ahead and ran all of the four factors (along with steal rate), summarized in this table:

.                     Offense                    Defense
Stat           Median  Width   W/Med      Median  Width   W/Med     Difference
Raw Effic.     101.0    9.7     9.6%      100.6    7.5     7.4%        2.2%
Adj. Effic.    100.2   12.8    12.8%      100.8   11.9    11.8%        0.9%

eFG%            49.0    4.4     8.9%       49.1    4.0     8.1%        0.8%
TO Rate         20.7    3.2    15.2%       20.5    3.1    15.0%        0.3%
O. Reb %        33.0    4.5    13.7%       32.9    4.0    12.3%        1.5%
FT Rate         35.5    7.0    19.6%       35.4    8.4    23.8%       -4.2%

Steal Rate       9.8    2.1    21.5%        9.7    2.4    25.0%       -3.2%

That column "W/Med" is simply the width divided by the median, as a way of normalizing the statistics to make them comparable.

The last column is the one of real interest, and is simply (Off. W/Med - Def. W/Med).  For the case of steal rate, the difference is negative, meaning that the relative width of the defensive distribution is wider, which we now know means that the defensive behavior is controlling the stat.  For rebounding percentage the value is positive, and so the offensive team has a greater impact.  Also note that the difference between offense and defense is more than twice as strong for steal rate as rebounding %, which seems reasonable.

The others:

• Free Throw Rate:  The most strongly dependent upon the defensive strategy, more so than even steals.  I suspect here that the strategy of end-of-game fouling is dominating the stats; if I could re-run with just 1st half statistics, I wonder if the result would be so strong, or even the same.
  

• Turnover Rate:  This is slightly more dependent upon the offense than the defense, but the difference is very small.  Essentially, the offense and defense are equally responsible for turnover rate.  In light of the strong dependence of steal rate on the defense, this may be surprising.  I'll have more to say about that at the end.

• Effective FG%:  Again only a weak difference, but shooting accuracy is more dependent upon offense than defense.  This stat also may be opening up a second way to understand the difference column - while certainly offensive strategy (e.g. Princeton offense:  shoot only open 3s or layups) can help, I wonder if player skill is also being measured here.  That is, the ability to shoot accurately may be more important than the ability to defend shooters.

• Raw Efficiency:  This most decidedly indicates that offense is determining efficiency more than defense.  The significance of this goes back to the eFG% remark, where I don't know if the stats are saying offensive strategy or offensive skill is the driver but I suspect both are involved.  This also is likely a cumulative effect of the first three factors (eFG%, TO Rate and O. Reb%) all correlating more with offense than defense.  The factors are listed in order of importance, so the strong influence of defense on FT Rate just isn't as important.
  

• Adj. Efficiency:  For curiosity sake, I also ran KenPom's adjusted efficiencies, which is as close as I can get to conference-only stats using Ken's data.  Since the quality of competition is now accounted for, we see the offense-as-driver is much weaker.  The implication here is that when good teams play bad teams, offensive skill of the good teams dominates (assuming that all teams can implement strategy equally adeptly).  Since the rest of the stats are not adjusted for competition, this also may be telling us that all of these results would be weaker when teams of equal ability play.  This is to say, players' skill or relative athleticism may be more important than the coach's strategy, after all.
  

Near the start of this article, I mentioned that I had a second thread of thought about turnovers and steals:  I wondered how important steals were to turnovers.  The intuitive response is simply one-to-one since, after all, a steal is a turnover.  But I could rationalize other arguments:

1. If a defense tries for a lot of steals, the offense would commit more other types of turnovers (5 seconds calls, throwing the ball out of bounds, etc.).
   
2. If a defense tries for a lot of steals, there would be less other types of turnovers, e.g. errant passes would be more likely to be intercepted by a ball-hawking defense than allowed to sail out of bounds.

So, I simply plotted defensive turnover rate (TOs forced) versus defensive steal rate (steals committed):

The slope of the line is greater than 1, by about 20%.  This indicates that alternative hypothesis #1 is, in fact, the correct one.  Teams that force more steals also force additional turnovers beyond steals, so that they'll get 6 extra turnovers for 5 extra steals.

Interestingly, if I do this same plot using offensive turnover rates and steals (TOs and steals allowed), the slope of the line is exactly 1 (not shown).  Since we now know that steal rate is a defensive-dependent stat, I think the first plot is more valid, but I'm still thinking this through.

Finally, I can adjust both the offensive and defensive turnover rates for the steal rates, effectively creating a new stat [= TO Rate - Steal Rate * slope].  The temptation is to call this "Unforced TO Rate", but this would only make sense if the distribution analysis would show a very strong dependence upon offense rather than defense.  So, I ran the numbers

.                     Offense                    Defense
Stat           Median  Width   W/Med      Median  Width   W/Med     Difference
TOs-Steals      8.5     2.0    23.5%       10.5    1.9    17.7%        1.5%

This is what I'd call just a modestly pleasing result.  If I remove the steals component out of turnovers, the offense is controlling "Unforced TO Rate" about as strongly as rebounding rate.

Frankly, I was hoping for more, but I suspect I am trying to push the statistics a bit harder than they will allow.

Recap: Georgetown 74, Washington 66

If you're lucky, you don't know why the text for the game recap is being written hours after the stats have been posted.

After a grinding defensive battle in the first half, Georgetown came roaring out of the locker room to start the second half with a 21-2 run and did enough to hold on for an 8-point win over the Washington Huskies.

Let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Visitor                         Home      
.            Georgetown                      Washington         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            40        40        79

Effic.         75.8     110.5      93.1        73.3      93.0      83.1  
 
eFG%           32.8      63.5      46.6        43.1      53.0      48.4  
TO%            22.7      20.1      21.4        32.8      30.1      31.5  
OR%            30.4      21.4      27.0        23.5      38.9      31.4  
FT Rate        34.4      65.4      48.3        17.2      12.1      14.5  
 
Assist Rate    60.0      68.8      65.4        41.7      31.2      35.7  
Block Rate      4.3       9.5       6.8         8.3       9.1       8.7  
Steal Rate     20.2       7.5      13.8        17.7       5.0      11.3  
 
2FG%           37.5      68.2      52.2        47.8      61.9      54.5  
3FG%           12.5      25.0      16.7        16.7      25.0      22.2  
FT%            81.8      64.7      71.4        80.0      50.0      66.7

Despite the score, this game was most certainly played at the Huskies pace - the 79 possessions played was 11 more than the Hoyas' adjusted season average, and 5 more than even Washington averages.  The Huskies came into the game as the 25th fastest-paced team in the nation, and that will only go up.

Unfortunately for UW, they pushed the pace in part by turning the ball over more than 30% of the time, uncharacteristic for the normally stingy Husky offense (TO Rate = 17.5% before the game).  Actually, Washington turned the ball over 21% and 25% their last two games coming in, so this may become a real problem for them.

Georgetown's offensive struggles in the Lift-Off half were simply from missing shots, particularly jump shots.  They made only 1/8 3FG, but also missed 8 of their 9 2-pt jump shots.  Hollis Thompson took a bagel (0/4 2FG), perhaps due to some jitters playing in front of family and friends.  Greg Monroe (2/6 2FG, 0/1 3FG) and Austin Freeman (1/6 2FG, 1/3 3FG) also struggled from the field.  Oh, and Austin Freeman missed a dunk that looked impressive up until the moment of consummation.

Julian Vaughn made all four of his free throw attempts in the half (and the game), so I will recuse myself from further snark for the foreseeable future (I blame the corrosive influence of CasualHoya for that).

Washington's offense had its own set of problems - the aforementioned turnovers, but the Huskies also couldn't grab many of their frequent misses (4 OReb on 17 chances), so when they did manage to get a shot off, it was generally one-and-done.  The Hoyas forced 15 2FG jumpshots in the half, but UW was able to make 7 of those to stay close.

The Hoyas opened the Vesper half with Jason Clark taking about a 5-foot leaning jumper.  Eight of the next nine shots were either layups or dunks (with a Clark 3FG thrown in for good measure), and the lead had ballooned to 20 points.  Georgetown was never able to put the Huskies away, thanks in no small part to 8 turnovers in their last 28 possessions, but Austin Freeman and Chris Wright combined to hit 9/11 FT in the half to keep the Hoyas ahead.

Washington took a cue from the Hoyas and also pounded the ball in the paint in the 2nd half (16 of 21 2FGA were dunks, layups or tips), but couldn't combine their strong inside shooting with either outside shots or free throws to scrap all the way back.

INDIVIDUAL NET POINTS STATS

Georgetown            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Vaughn, Julian         44   23.2  161.0   16.5      45    57.9    5.2     +10.9  
Monroe, Greg           73   18.4  105.0   14.1      73    80.7   11.8      +2.8  
Wright, Chris          74   20.8   77.7   12.0      74    87.8   13.0      -1.3  
Freeman, Austin        72   21.4   87.7   13.5      72    77.9   11.2      +1.9  
Clark, Jason           76   17.8   87.8   11.9      75    73.3   11.0      +1.4  
Thompson, Hollis       55   14.3   51.3    4.0      54    83.5    9.0      -3.8  
Sanford, Vee            3   16.7  200.0    1.0       3    71.1    0.4      +0.6  
Sims, Henry             3   33.3    0.0    0.0       4    60.0    0.5      -0.5  
TOTALS                 80          94.3   73.0      80    77.6   62.1     +12.1  

Washington            Off     %           Pts      Def           Pts   
Player                Poss  Poss  O.Rtg   Prod     Poss  D.Rtg  Allow    Net Pts
Bryan-Amaning, Matt    56   15.6   55.0    4.8      54    87.7    9.5      -3.8  
Pondexter, Quincy      65   29.7  113.4   21.9      67    84.1   11.3      +8.1  
Overton, Venoy         43   16.3   34.1    2.4      41    81.8    6.7      -3.8  
Thomas, Isaiah         62   27.8   98.7   17.0      63    94.7   11.9      +2.9  
Turner, Elston         29   13.6    0.0    0.0      31   106.3    6.6      -5.4  
Gaddy, Abdul           42   14.8   82.8    5.1      43    86.0    7.4      -1.2  
Trent, Clarence        17    7.5   52.3    0.7      16    64.6    2.1      -0.8  
Suggs, Scott           40   13.1   96.6    5.1      39    83.1    6.5      -0.4  
Holiday, Justin        24   17.0  104.4    4.3      23    89.2    4.1      +0.4  
Breshers, Tyreese      17   17.4   64.5    1.9      19   113.4    4.3      -1.9  
Gant, Darnell           5   20.0    0.0    0.0       4    81.0    0.6      -0.7  
TOTALS                 80          82.0   63.1      80    88.7   71.0      -6.6

The six main players for Georgetown did a good job sharing the ball today, with the starters all averaging between 18-23% of possessions used.

The player of the game was Julian Vaughn, and if you saw the game, you probably didn't need me to tell you that.  With two dunks and 5 made layups on 6 attempts, Vaughn scored as efficiently as you could hope.  He had only 1 turnover to go along with an assist, 2 blocks, 3 OR and 4 DR in only 23 minutes, as he traded time with Hollis Thompson throughout the game.  Vaughn was also the Hoyas' best defensive player.

Greg Monroe also chose to shoot from inside, taking 12 layup attempts and making six.  He seemed to be trying to initiate contact without much success, and ended up taking a few layup attempts with a high degree of difficulty.  The East German judge was not impressed.  This was also easily Monroe's lowest possession usage game of the year (all previous games had been 25%+), helped both by only 2 turnovers and the high number of assists for the Hoyas in the game.

Austin Freeman and Jason Clark gave their typical workman-like efforts, but Chris Wright struggled with turnovers and Hollis Thompson lost his outside shooting touch.


The Huskies were essentially a two-man team, with Pondexter and Thomas producing more than 60% of UW's points.  Justin Holiday played well in limited time.


Stats pages will be updated tomorrow.

HD BOX SCORE

Georgetown vs Washington

12/12/09 11:00 am at Honda Center, Anaheim, CA
Final score: Georgetown 74, Washington 66

Georgetown              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Vaughn, Julian         23:13  +24  18/50  7- 9  0- 0  4- 4  9/33  1/11  0/45  1/44  2/21  3/17  4/21   3
Monroe, Greg           36:57  + 3  15/67  6-13  0- 1  3- 7 14/55  3/19  3/73  2/73  1/40  2/35  5/30   3
Wright, Chris          37:40  + 5  13/69  4- 6  0- 1  5- 7  7/54  3/21  0/74  5/74  0/43  0/34  5/34   2
Freeman, Austin        35:56  + 5  11/66  2- 7  1- 5  4- 4 12/51  4/19  3/72  3/72  0/41  3/34  3/32   0
Clark, Jason           37:31  + 6  13/68  4- 6  1- 5  2- 2 11/54  3/18  3/75  3/76  0/41  1/36  3/33   3
Thompson, Hollis       25:33  - 3   4/46  1- 5  0- 0  2- 4  5/40  2/14  2/54  3/55  0/31  0/28  3/22   3
Sanford, Vee           01:20  + 0   0/ 2  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/ 1  1/ 1  0/ 3  0/ 3  0/ 1  0/ 0  0/ 2   0
Sims, Henry            01:50  + 0   0/ 2  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/ 2  0/ 1  0/ 4  1/ 3  0/ 2  0/ 1  0/ 1   0
TOTALS                 40:00       74    24-46  2-12 20-28    58 17/26 11/80 20/80  3/44 11/37 24/35  14
.                                        0.522 0.167 0.714       0.654 0.138 0.250 0.068 0.297 0.686    

Washington              Min   +/-   Pts  2PM-A 3PM-A FTM-A  FGA    A    Stl    TO   Blk    OR    DR   PF
Bryan-Amaning, Matt    28:25  - 6   5/42  2- 6  0- 0  1- 2  6/43  0/16  1/54  2/56  2/37  1/26  6/27   0
Pondexter, Quincy      33:50  - 8  23/59 10-14  0- 1  3- 3 15/54  2/15  5/67  6/65  0/39  2/29  4/31   3
Overton, Venoy         22:41  - 5   2/34  1- 4  0- 0  0- 0  4/32  1/13  2/41  3/43  0/29  0/18  2/22   4
Thomas, Isaiah         31:53  -10  21/52  6- 8  3-10  0- 2 18/48  2/12  0/63  4/62  0/36  0/28  5/27   4
Turner, Elston         15:01  -21   0/12  0- 1  0- 3  0- 0  4/20  0/ 5  0/31  1/29  0/20  0/16  2/14   2
Gaddy, Abdul           19:53  + 0   2/38  1- 3  0- 1  0- 0  4/35  3/16  1/43  3/42  0/18  3/18  1/16   3
Trent, Clarence        06:13  + 7   0/17  0- 0  0- 0  0- 0  0/14  0/ 7  0/16  1/17  0/ 4  1/ 8  2/ 5   0
Suggs, Scott           19:18  + 7   5/38  0- 1  1- 3  2- 2  4/31  2/15  0/39  1/40  1/20  0/16  0/19   3
Holiday, Justin        11:14  + 5   4/24  2- 4  0- 0  0- 0  4/20  0/ 9  0/23  2/24  0/15  2/ 9  2/13   0
Breshers, Tyreese      09:51  - 6   4/14  2- 2  0- 0  0- 0  2/11  0/ 4  0/19  2/17  1/ 9  0/ 5  0/ 8   1
Gant, Darnell          01:41  - 3   0/ 0  0- 1  0- 0  0- 0  1/ 2  0/ 0  0/ 4  0/ 5  0/ 3  0/ 2  0/ 3   0
TOTALS                 40:00       66    24-44  4-18  6- 9    62 10/28  9/80 25/80  4/46 11/35 26/37  20
.                                        0.545 0.222 0.667       0.357 0.113 0.312 0.087 0.314 0.703    

Efficiency: Georgetown 0.925, Washington 0.825
eFG%: Georgetown 0.466, Washington 0.484
Substitutions: Georgetown 21, Washington 29

2-pt Shot Selection:
Dunks: Georgetown 3-4, Washington 1-1
Layups/Tips: Georgetown 19-31, Washington 14-23
Jumpers: Georgetown 2-11, Washington 9-20

Fast break pts (% FG pts): Georgetown 10 (18.5), Washington 10 (16.7)
Pts (eff.) after steal: Georgetown 11 (100.0), Washington 9 (100.0)
Seconds per poss: Georgetown 15.9, Washington 14.2

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This likely only concerns a couple of true stats-geeks, but Alan and I were discussing the Net Points stat last week, which has led me to make a subtle change to the underlying math.

The original method for calculating Net Points was simply to add Points Produced and Points Allowed.  Unfortunately, this tends to favor high usage players, who can score at inefficient rates but still put up positive Net Points simply by dominating possessions.  An alternative is to multiply (Off. Rating - Def. Rating) by possessions used, but this gives the opposite effect, where low usage players with good efficiencies receiving a disproportionate amount of credit.

What I will do (and have done retroactively for this season) is to simply take the average of the two methods.  Hopefully, this will do the best possible job of identifying each game's key players, and provide a useful alternative to the dreaded +/- stat.

P.S. - All of this comes straight from Dean Oliver's Basketball on Paper, Chapter 20, although if you're still reading all the way down here, you probably already knew that.