Another shot selection and lineup efficiency update

Georgetown continues its death march this week with consecutive games against top-7 teams - whether by vote, RPI or statistical model.

As was discussed in comments here, the most likely outcome for this stretch was for the Hoyas to go 2-3 in these five games; since Georgetown has already won two of three, I suspect most fans have one of two positions for this week:

1. Georgetown's playing with house money, so even if they don't win either game this week, they're still likely to make some noise come March
2. The Hoyas have to win at least one of these games to prove that they are among the elite teams in the country.

I really didn't expect the Hoyas to be better than a top 20 team this year, but thanks to some obscene outside shooting and a much better job protecting the basketball, they've been a bit of a revelation these last few weeks. I'm still not convinced that the current level of performance is sustainable, but this week should tell us a lot.

As a means of getting ready for this week, here's another update of a couple of the stats I track:  shot selection and lineup efficiencies.

I've changed the range of games I'm posting this time.  I'm now starting with the game vs. Washington, and including all games forward from there.  This is because of the natural break in the schedule between easy opponents (excluding the Temple game) and better competition.  I'm not able to include the Butler game since no play-by-play was available.

This has eliminated all of the cupcakes (unless one considers DePaul and Rutgers to be cupcakes), and led to some significant changes in what these stats are showing.

First up, shot selection:

Player               Dunks   Layups   2pt J's   3FGA      FTA  
Wright, Chris        0 /0     41/65    9 /21    13/35    32/41
                              0.631    0.429    0.371    0.780

Freeman, Austin      4 /5     36/48    7 /29    20/43    32/38
                              0.750    0.241    0.465    0.842

Monroe, Greg         7 /7     32/60    11/35    4 /9     40/64           
                              0.533    0.314    0.444    0.625                 
    
Vaughn, Julian       11/11    23/40    7 /16    0 /3     18/27
                              0.575    0.438    0.000    0.667
    
Clark, Jason         1 /1     6 /15    4 /10    21/48    15/21           
                              0.400    0.400    0.438    0.714                 
    
Thompson, Hollis     0 /0     3 /7     4 /12    2 /12    6 /10            
                              0.429    0.333    0.167    0.600                 
    
Sims, Henry          1 /2     1 /4     0 /1     0 /1     5 /10     
                              0.250    0.000    0.000    0.500                 
    
Benimon, Jerrelle    0 /0     1 /3     1 /1     1 /3     5 /7           
                              0.333    1.000    0.333    0.714    

Sanford, Vee         0 /0     1 /1     0 /1     0 /3     1 /2      
                              1.000    0.000    0.000    0.500

Pithy comments:

• It seems like Chris Wright has one or two driving layups blocked a game, but he still has managed to lead the team in layups made during this stretch (and is second in layup %).  If he can keep his 3FG% above 35% and get his FT % above 80%, I'd say he's playing at about as high a level as I would have hoped for this season.

• Austin Freeman's line surprised me, in that it seems to skewer the great myth that he has one of the best mid-range games in college basketball.  He's shooting only 24% on 2-pt jumpers, and he's taking too many relative to either layups or threes.  He does make about 75% of his layup attempts, which leads the team.  And his outside shooting is excellent.
  

• Greg Monroe is also still struggling to make his 2-pt jumpers, although it's up a tick since the last time we looked.  He's also made 4/9 3FG during this stretch.  Very nice.
  

• Since we've chucked out the start of the season, Julian Vaughn's 1/10 start shooting FTs is gone, and he suddenly looks like a competent shooter across the board.  Well, maybe not from outside - I'd like to think those three shots from 3FG were with the shot clock running down, but I doubt it.

• Although he seemed to go through a bit of a shooting slump in December, Jason Clark has regained his outside stroke.  I'd love to see a higher percentage on layups, but otherwise no complaints.

• Hollis Thompson, on the other hand, finally made a 3FG in the Rutgers game (he was 0/9 during this stretch of games before Rutgers).  He's got such a classic shooting form that I expect every one of his jump shots to drop.
  

Lineup stats (minimum of ten possession played on offense and defense):

.                                                Offense                    Defense
Lineup                                     # Poss  Eff. Secs/poss    # Poss  Eff. Secs/poss
Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Vaughn--Wright       251   119    17.2         249    99    18.9
Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Thompson--Wright      90    96    16.4          86   105    17.4
Freeman--Monroe--Thompson--Vaughn--Wright     45   129    18.4          47    94    18.1
Benimon--Freeman--Monroe--Thompson--Wright    41    98    14.7          39   123    11.6
Benimon--Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Wright       34    79    17.2          32    88    15.0
Clark--Monroe--Thompson--Vaughn--Wright       29   103    18.1          28    68    21.0
Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Sims--Wright          24   125    20.9          26   123    19.3
Freeman--Monroe--Sims--Thompson--Wright       16   156    18.4          14    79    25.6
Clark--Monroe--Sims--Thompson--Wright         16    69    15.8          15    80    16.1
Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Thompson--Vaughn      16    75    18.5          15    67    20.9
Benimon--Clark--Monroe--Thompson--Wright      15   120    16.3          13   123    23.5
Benimon--Clark--Freeman--Thompson--Vaughn     12   125    18.9          13    69    19.8
Benimon--Clark--Freeman--Monroe--Thomspon     12    75    22.2          14    93    17.2

More pithy comments:

• The starting lineup is very good.

• When the Hoyas go small (Thompson in for Vaughn), the team give up a bit of defense and really struggles on offense; when the team goes big (Thompson in for Clark) it kicks some ass.
  

• One of the reasons we clamor for more playing time for Henry Sims around here is that the early season lineup stats showed that his primary lineup (Clark-Freeman-Monroe-Sims-Wright) was about the best the Hoyas could run out.  This isn't the case anymore, as it's been too porous defensively.  However, a lineup of Freeman-Monroe-Sims-Thompson-Wright has the best differential (Off Eff. - Def. Eff.), albeit in only ~15 possessions played.
  

• Bringing in Benimon seems to cause a substantial drag on the offense, at least for the two highest usage lineups.  Defensively, its a mixed bag.

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That's all I've got.  No predictions for tonight's game against Syracuse, but it's worth noting that the performance stats are showing that the Hoyas are playing better on offense, but worse on defense these days.