Recap: VCU 74, Georgetown 56

Image from here.

It turns out, Chris Wright wasn't the answer.

The Georgetown Hoyas succumbed to a barrage of open 3FGs by the VCU Rams while failing to do much of anything on the offensive end, losing in a rout, 74-56.

Storyline #1:
The Rams made 11 or their first 19 shots from behind the arc, including 5 of their first 7 to start the Vesper half, in moving out to a 18 point lead with 11:13 left in the game.  Meanwhile, outside of Hollis Thompson [4-6 3FG], the Hoyas managed to shoot 1 for 20 from 3FG for the game (inside of Hollis Thompson, it's too dark to shoot).

Storyline #2:
With less than a minute left in the first half, Georgetown trailed VCU by 6 points when Chris Wright missed the front end of a 1-and-1.  Over the next 21 possessions for each team (14+ minutes of game time), the Rams outscored the Hoyas 33-14 and had built an insurmountable 25 point lead with only 7 minutes left in the game.  Eight of the Hoyas' 21 possessions during that stretch resulted in a turnover.

Storyline #3:
The Hoyas ended the game with only three more field goals made [20] than turnovers committed [17].


But the stat of the night for Hoya fans is likely what time they turned the game off.


At this point, Coach John Thompson III has a public relations problem that he's going to have to deal with:  the reputation of having teams that either implode [2009, 2011] or suffer a bad upset in their final game of the season [2008, 2010].  One of those is a tough label to shake, but the combination can be - dare I say - professionally fatal.  How JT3 deals with tonight's embarrassing effort, and the implications it has for his career, will be interesting to say the least. 

As for the players, it should be noted that the four seniors - Austin Freeman, Chris Wright, Julian Vaughn and Ryan Dougherty - have all been outstanding representatives of the university both as players and as students.  At different times, they all brought excitement and joy to Hoya fans this season (remember Ryan's layup against Appalachian State?).

I do feel sorry for those guys, because the legacy of flaming out by the end of the season is likely the one that most fans will associate with them, rather than any successes that they had.  I'm quite certain that they are at least as upset about the way Georgetown's season (and their careers) ended as any fan.


With the graduation of the three senior starters, the Hoyas will enter next season with few expectations of success.  Hollis Thompson comported himself well tonight and it looks like it will be his team to lead for the next two years


For the last time this season, let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Home                            Visitor   
.            Georgetown                      Virginia Commonwealth         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            30        33        62
 
Points          24        32        56          35        39        74   

Effic.         81.2      97.5      89.8       118.4     118.9     118.7  
 
eFG%           38.0      48.1      43.3        52.2      57.1      54.5  
TO%            30.5      24.4      27.3        10.2       9.1       9.6  
OR%            44.4      25.0      35.3        31.2      18.8      25.0  
FTA/FGA        28.0      22.2      25.0        73.9     104.8      88.6  

Assist Rate    77.8      45.5      60.0        66.7      88.9      77.8  
Block Rate      9.1       0.0       5.3        15.4      15.4      15.4  
Steal Rate      6.8       3.0       4.8        10.2      12.2      11.2  
 
2FG%           61.5      53.8      57.7        27.3      37.5      31.6  
3FG%            8.3      28.6      19.2        50.0      46.2      48.0  
FT%            71.4     100.0      84.6        64.7      68.2      66.7

Thinking about NCAA Seeding

The NCAA tournament bracket was announced tonight, and Georgetown received a 6 seed in the Southwest Region, playing the winner of the Southern California v. Virginia Commonwealth play-in game.

While there is always the normal sturm und drang about included and excluded teams after the brackets are announced, I was curious how the actual seeding played out versus Ken Pomeroy's rating system.

Now there's nothing magical about Ken's system (although John Gasaway would have you believe otherwise), but it provides a nice objective metric against which to judge the seeding.  In particular, Ken's system will struggle with teams that were missing an important player for a significant chunk of time, but will have that player back in time for the tournament ("I wonder who he means").

One thing to keep in mind is that this isn't the same sort of analysis as the log5 odds calculations that Tom provides here, and Ken has just posted for the entire NCAA field over at Basketball Prospectus.  Rather, here we're just concerned with how hard each sub-region is, relative to the others.

Here's a breakdown of the Southwest region:

Seed   Team                  Mis-seed
  1    Kansas                    0
 16    Boston U                  0
  9    Illinois                 -4
  8    Nevada Las Vegas         -2
  5    Vanderbilt                3
 12    Richmond                 -1
 13    Morehead St               1
  4    Louisville               -1
  3    Purdue                   -1
 14    St. Peter's               0
 11    Southern California       0
       Virginia Commonwealth     2
  6    Georgetown                2
  7    Texas A&M                 4
 10    Florida St                0
 15    Akron                     0
  2    Notre Dame                1

The first two columns should be self-explanatory; I've color-coded matchups to make the table a bit easier to read, with the play-in game using it's own color.

The third column, labeled "mis-seed" is simply a comparison of the actual seed assigned by the tournament committee with the seed found by ranking the 68 tournament teams via KenPom's ratings.  A positive number means a team is over-seeded (the team received a higher seed from the tournament committee than Ken's system would have assigned) and a negative number is an under-seed.

For example, the 8/9 game in the Southwest pits Illinois and UNLV.  Through Sunday's games, Ken ranks Illinois and UNLV as the 20th and 22nd best teams in the country.  Since every team ahead of them also made the tournament, their expected seeds from KenPom is simple enough to calculate [ = KP rating / 4, rounded up].  So Ken would have given Illinois a 5 seed, and UNLV a 6 seed.  The mis-seed for Illinois is KP seed - NCAA seed [ = 5 - 9], which gives a mis-seed value of -4; UNLV earns a -2 this way [= 6 - 8].

The upshot of all this is that, regardless of who comes out of the 8/9 game, Kansas (assuming the win over BU) will be playing a team that Ken Pomeroy would tell you is at least two seed lines better than a typical 8/9 opponent.

At the other extreme, 10-seed Florida State gets a break in playing 7-seed Texas A&M that Ken would predict is actually the worse team of the pair, by a hair


If you take this further and break the bracket down into upper and lower sub-regions, it is quickly apparent that Kansas was done no favors by the committee, while Notre Dame has a far easier draw.

Here's a summary of the difficulty for each of the 1 and 2 seeds, found by averaging all of the other team's mis-seed values in the upper and lower halves of each region.  I've included each team's own mis-seed stat, as well:

.                           avg. opp.                         avg. opp.
Region       1-seed         mis-seed       2-seed             mis-seed
East         Ohio St. [0]     -1.1         North Carolina [2]   -0.1
Southeast    Pittsburgh [1]   -1.1         Florida [3]           0.4
Southwest    Kansas [0]       -0.6         Notre Dame [1]        0.9
West         Duke [0]          0.6         San Diego St. [0]     0.3

By this metric, the East region is the hardest in the tournament as both OSU and UNC have a sub-region which is under-seeded, although the Buckeyes have a lot more to complain about.  Meanwhile, the West with Duke and San Diego St. is the easiest region, with both teams' opponents over-seeded on average.

Pitt is done no favors in the Southeast, while Florida - who KenPom would have pegged a 5-seed - plays in a slightly soft sub-region.  And Notre Dame's luck continues with the most over-seeded sub-region of all the top seeds.

And finally, for the sake of completeness, here are the mis-seed stats, averaged as a function of seed-line:

Seed    Mis-seed       Seed    Mis-seed
  1       0.3           16       0.0
  2       1.5           15       0.0
  3       0.5           14      -0.3
  4      -1.8           13      -2.0
  5       2.3           12      -2.8
  6       2.0           11      -1.4
  7       1.8           10       0.5
  8       0.5            9       0.3

The stats from this table - if they are representative of most of the NCAA tourneys since the expansion to 64 teams - give a fairly good explanation why those 5/12 upsets are so common:  the 5-seed is the most over-seeded in the bracket, and the 12-seed is the most under-seeded.  Plan accordingly.


After the jump, the rest of the region mis-seed tables.

BET log5 predictions, after quarterfinals

Here's the updated log5 analysis of the BET tourney, after the quarterfinal round is in the books.

We finally see our first major movement in the odds, as UConn knocked out clear favorite Pitt. The Huskies are unsurprisingly the biggest beneficiaries of their own good play, as their chances of winning the Big East Tournament are now roughly 7.5 times what they were as of Tuesday morning. Note, though, that the log5 calculations don't take into account the fatigue factor of playing four games in as many days, so Syracuse is probably even more of a favorite than the current odds show them to be.

The second semifinal should be a very competitive game between two double-bye teams that cruised by large margins in their opening game. The only regular season meeting between the Cardinals and Irish went to overtime, and I (and ESPN) am hoping for another good game in the rematch.

Seed  Team     2nd Rnd   Quarters   Semis   Finals    Champ      Orig
9     UConn      100       100       100     39.2     15.5        2.1
16    DePaul     out       out       out      out      out        0.00002
8     G'town      -        out       out      out      out        2.4
1     Pitt        -         -        out      out      out       31.7

12    SHU        out       out       out      out      out        0.3
13    Rutgers    100       out       out      out      out       0.03
5     St.J's      -        100       out      out      out        2.7
4     Cuse        -         -        100     60.8     30.7       19.8

10    Nova       out       out       out      out      out        2.3
15    USF        100       out       out      out      out        0.001
7     Cinci       -        100       out      out      out        6.0
2     N.Dame      -         -        100     53.3     29.5       12.6

11    Marq       100       100       out      out      out        1.4
14    Provy      out       out       out      out      out        0.01
6     WVU         -        out       out      out      out        5.2
3     L'ville     -         -        100     46.7     24.4       13.5

Editor's note: These are the percentage probabilities a team will make it to that round, based on KenPom ratings.
"100" means that team did advance to the round, a "-" means the team had a bye to that round.

BET log5 predictions, after Round 2

Here's the updated log5 analysis of the BET tourney, after the 2nd round is in the books.

Cincinnati is the biggest beneficiary of the action thus far, with their odds up 4.1%. Still, the top four seeds are the four likeliest to win, and their odds are mostly unchanged. Note that this calculation, unlike the one done by Basketball Prospectus does not give St. John's any home court advantage; perhaps it should.

Seed  Team     2nd Rnd   Quarters   Semis   Finals    Champ      Orig
9     UConn      100       100      26.5     10.6      4.5        2.1
16    DePaul     out       out       out      out      out        0.00002
8     G'town      -        out       out      out      out        2.4
1     Pitt        -         -       73.5     47.3     31.7       31.7

12    SHU        out       out       out      out      out        0.3
13    Rutgers    100       out       out      out      out       0.03
5     St.J's      -        100      32.4     10.0      4.1        2.7
4     Cuse        -         -       67.6     32.1     18.9       19.8

10    Nova       out       out       out      out      out        2.3
15    USF        100       out       out      out      out        0.001
7     Cinci       -        100      47.6     24.8     10.1        6.0
2     N.Dame      -         -       52.4     28.6     12.3       12.6

11    Marq       100       100      36.4     13.8      4.3        1.4
14    Provy      out       out       out      out      out        0.01
6     WVU         -        out       out      out      out        5.2
3     L'ville     -         -       63.6     32.8     14.3       13.5

Editor's note: These are the percentage probabilities a team will make it to that round, based on KenPom ratings through Tuesday's games (ratings through Wednesday were unavailable at of 9:30 AM CT).
"100" means that team did advance to the round, a "-" means the team had a bye to that round.

Recap: Connecticut 79, Georgetown 62

Image from here.

The expression "playing out the string" comes to mind as the Hoyas lost their fourth straight game with an injured Chris Wright today, 79-62.

Georgetown remains unable to score without Wright leading the offense - in the seven halves of basketball that Georgetown has played without Chris Wright (2nd half v. Cinci forward), the Hoyas have averaged 0.83 points per possession. In the 10+ games previous to his injury (thru 1st half vs. Cinci), G'town had averaged 1.09 points per possession.

The Hoyas defense was no great shakes today either, especially in the first half. The Huskies simply controlled their offensive board, grabbing 9 of their own misses and converting them into 10 points. Of course, part of the defensive issues were traceable back to the offense - UConn converted 7 steals into 12 points in the Lift-off half as well.

That about all the time I've got tonight, so the stats will have to speak for themselves.


Let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Home                            Visitor   
.            Georgetown                      UConn         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            35        33        68
 
Points          30        32        62          42        37        79   

Effic.         86.2      95.7      91.3       120.7     110.7     116.3  
 
eFG%           51.9      42.3      47.1        54.8      52.2      53.7  
TO%            28.7      17.9      23.6        17.2      17.9      17.7  
OR%            28.6      31.6      30.3        45.0       9.1      32.3  
FTA/FGA        15.4      50.0      32.7        45.2      56.5      50.0  

Assist Rate    25.0      30.0      27.3        40.0      16.7      29.6  
Block Rate      9.1      15.0      11.9         6.7       0.0       3.3  
Steal Rate     17.2       6.0      11.8        20.1      12.0      16.2  
 
2FG%           60.0      53.3      56.7        50.0      60.0      54.8  
3FG%           27.3      18.2      22.7        44.4       0.0      33.3  
FT%            75.0      76.9      76.5        57.1     100.0      77.8

Recap: Cincinnati 69, Georgetown 47

Picture from here.

The Georgetown Hoyas played a competitive 30 minutes before getting blown off the court at the Fifth Third Arena today by the Cincinnati Bearcats, 69-47.

At this point, I think there are two ways to look at how the Hoyas are playing at the end of the conference schedule:

1. It's not as bad as you think.  Georgetown has lost 4 of 5 games, but has only been non-competitive at the end in two of those games - both versus Cincinnati.  Both at UConn and versus Syracuse, the games came down to the last few possessions and the opponent did enough to win.  Maybe the Bearcats are simply the perfect matchup against the Hoyas this season, and Georgetown isn't winning whether Chris Wright is available or not (they were down 7 in the second half when Wright was hurt in the first game).
   
   
2. The ship be sinking.  Georgetown is playing like a dead man walking right now.  Austin Freeman is about the lone credible threat on offense, and everyone knows it and is forcing him to either give up the ball or take a tough shot.  Let's face it, Freeman is not Kemba Walker and is never going to create many shots for himself.  Meanwhile, Julian Vaughn and Jason Clark, the only upperclassmen capable of covering for the loss of Wright's scoring and leadership, instead have disappeared.

I wish I could tell you definitively that it's scenario #1, but I can't.

I don't think the season is over - with the current personnel, the Hoyas should be able to win at least one game in each of their next two tournaments - but there is certainly some truth to the notion that expectations should be at a season-low.

Georgetown simply isn't making shots, either inside or outside.  And without the ability to play lockdown, stifling defense for 40 minutes (or even 20 minutes), the Hoyas just can't win without making those shots.


Let's run the numbers:

TEMPO-FREE BOX SCORE
 
.            Visitor                         Home      
.            Georgetown                      Cincinnati         
.            1st Half  2nd Half   Total      1st Half  2nd Half   Total
Pace            28        31        59

Points          24        23        47          30        39        69   

Effic.         86.1      74.8      80.1       107.7     126.8     117.6  
 
eFG%           37.5      34.0      35.8        47.6      59.5      53.6  
TO%             7.2      16.3      11.9        25.1      13.0      18.7  
OR%            22.2      21.1      21.6        38.5      25.0      32.0  
FTA/FGA        14.3      40.0      26.4        57.1      85.7      71.4  
 
Assist Rate    66.7      25.0      47.1        37.5      70.0      55.6  
Block Rate     10.0      10.0      10.0        10.0      13.3      11.4  
Steal Rate     14.4       6.5      10.2         3.6       0.0       1.7  
 
2FG%           30.0      46.7      37.1        40.0      50.0      45.0  
3FG%           37.5      10.0      22.2        36.4      45.5      40.9  
FT%            75.0      60.0      64.3        83.3      77.8      80.0