Saturday, December 12, 2009

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



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

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.

3 comments:

  1. I don't know if the pun was intentional, but "stats dump" made me giggle.

    Heckuva game from JV today.

    ReplyDelete
  2. And now, thanks to some judicious editing, no one else has any idea what you are talking about.

    :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Truly love the in depth analysis, both stats and commentary, provided here. Appreciate you effort.

    ReplyDelete