Hoops Preview: Penn State
THE ESSENTIALS
WHAT | #5 Michigan (13-0) vs #49 Penn State (7-6) |
---|---|
WHERE | Crisler Arena Ann Arbor, MI |
WHEN | 7 PM |
LINE | Michigan –11 (Kenpom) |
TV | ESPN |
THE US
A month of mildly alarming games against teams in the triple digits on Kenpom comes to an end, and the Great Conference Slog begins anew. This year's Big Ten looks poised to send more than half its membership to the NCAA tournament. Michigan is projected atop it by any analytics site you choose to poke, but there aren't many easy outs in the league this year.
Michigan eases back in, relatively, with a six-game stretch in which they've got a 77% or better chance to win each game aside from a trip to the Trohl Center. After that: buckle up. Ten of Michigan's final twelve games are "A" tier—signifying a top 50 opponent, adjusted for location.
A home game against Penn State is first up. Are you ready? (Oonts oonts oonts oonts.)
THE LINEUP CARD
We're experimenting with FFFF style lineup pages. Click for big.
Projected starters are in bold. Hover over headers for stat explanations. The "Should I Be Mad If He Hits A Three" methodology: we're mad if a guy who's not good at shooting somehow hits one. Yes, you're still allowed to be unhappy if a proven shooter is left open. It's a free country.
Pos. | # | Name | Yr. | Ht./Wt. | %Min | %Poss | ORtg | SIBMIHHAT | |||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
G | 13 | Rasir Bolton | Fr. | 6'2, 180 | 69 | 25 | 106 | No | |||||||||||
#206 composite FR. Not Just A Shooter who's 44% from deep and worse inside line, but does get to free throw line. Not a point guard. | |||||||||||||||||||
G | 2 | Myles Dread | Fr. | 6'4, 215 | 68 | 15 | 110 | Meh | |||||||||||
#164 composite FR. Just A Shooter hitting 34%. | |||||||||||||||||||
G | 44 | Josh Reaves | Sr. | 6'5, 214 | 82 | 20 | 99 | No | |||||||||||
Pesky defender is top 20 in steals last three years but has suffered greatly attempting to take on more responsibility this yea. TO rate spike. | |||||||||||||||||||
F | 11 | Lamar Stevens | Jr. | 6'8 230 | 88 | 30 | 98 | Probably? | |||||||||||
Finesse 4 takes a ton of off the dribble jumpers. Ill-suited to be a go-to guy but here we are. 18% on threes this year; 32% last year. | |||||||||||||||||||
C | 24 | Mike Watkins | Jr. | 6'9, 254 | 57* | 21 | 97 | Yes | |||||||||||
All Big Ten Defensive Team C is rebound machine with last year's #29 block rate. Missed first 5 games with Issues. | |||||||||||||||||||
C | 21 | John Harrar | So. | 6'9, 243 | 36* | 13 | 110 | Yes | |||||||||||
Generic Backup C, except he doesn't do much shot altering. OREB hound. | |||||||||||||||||||
G | 5 | Jamari Wheeler | So. | 6'1 170 | 51 | 13 | 94 | Yes | |||||||||||
Handsy D pest commits a ton of fouls and can't shoot. | |||||||||||||||||||
G | 0 | Myreon Jones | Fr. | 6'3, 170 | 34 | 22 | 85 | Yes | |||||||||||
Composite #180 FR. Takes a ton of shots when he's on the court and is hitting 31/29. | |||||||||||||||||||
F | 35 | Trent Buttrick | So. | 6'8 234 | 24 | 12 | 124 | No | |||||||||||
Heh. (Just A Shooter.) |
[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the preview.]
THE THEM
Penn State is the 10th-ranked Big Ten team in Kenpom; they're also in the top 50. Welcome (back) to 2019 Big Ten basketball. Even the squirrels have knives.
The Nittany Lions are one of the few teams in the conference that has basically no shot at an NCAA bid as conference play resumes. They lost at DePaul in their Gavitt Game and took an ugly 59-56 loss to Bradley in their tournament; they've also dropped 11 and 9 point games to NC State and Alabama, respectively. PSU's first two conference games were narrow losses at Maryland and at home against Indiana.
Also they're the 1 in Kenpom #7 Virginia Tech's 12-1 record. Squirrels: knives.
Watkins is Don Brown's partner in the gritty 70s crime drama they star in
Penn State hangs its hat on its top-25 defense, and that starts with center and amazing mustache-haver Mike Watkins. Michigan fans didn't get to see much of him last year, as he went out for the season with a knee injury just five minutes into Michigan's only game against the Nittany Lions. When not doing that Watkins was vacuuming up rebounds at a top ten rate, blocking a bunch of shots, and hitting 69% percent of his twos.
Watkins recovered from his injury but then missed Penn State's first five games after some offseason incidents and a public disclosure of mental health issues. Since his return he's been fairly good but has seen regressions in most of his non-rebounding stats. He may be battling rust and his brain still.
Watkins doesn't have much of a post game but he's got good hands and is excellent rolling to the basket. 80% of his shots at the rim are assisted; 82% of them went down last year. The lack of Tony Carr and PSU's failure to replace him with anything resembling a point guard has seen his two-point shooting drop to exactly 50%. He's suffered more than most from PSU's lack of a creator. He's still a defensive force.
Penn State's other defensive ace is Josh Reaves, a 6'5" guard who was a bit of a fave-rave amongst the degenerates who paid a lot of attention to the lower tiers of the Big Ten last year. Reaves has been in the top 20 in steal rate since his sophomore year, paired that with 56/38 shooting a year ago, and had a decent assist to turnover ratio.
Unfortunately for Penn State, they've been forced to thrust a near-perfect college three-and-D guy into a bigger role than he can handle. His usage has barely ticked up but the post-Carr offense has put Reaves in a more prominent spot. Some of this ends up in dribbles that go nowhere and have to be reset, which dumps more usage on other folks. The rest of it goes to turnovers. Reaves's TO rate has shot up from 15 (okay) to 25 (club me with a spoon so I can die).
You can see the regression in Reaves's on-off splits. Last year PSU was at exactly 1 PPP when he was off the floor and at 1.14 when he was on; this year his presence makes no difference. This isn't about Reaves himself, except insofar as he's the kind of guy who has a limited ability to generate shots.
Stevens (#11) is a jump shooter [Marc-Gregor Campredon]
Speaking of a lack of a true go-to-guy: stretch-ish 4 Lamar Stevens. Stevens has always been a good-at-bad-shots kind of gent who takes a lot of face-up midrange jumpers. Think former Wisconsin forward Nigel Hayes. Stevens is taking a ton of unassisted Other Twos—55% of his shots, 70% of the makes unassisted—and while he's hitting just 38% in that midrange he's being forced into taking many of the really bad shots PSU's lack of creation dumps on whoever the old dude is. He's a decent to good bailout option; too many of PSU's possessions end in that bailout. He's got 30% usage and an ORTG under 100. QED.
Stevens has been abysmal from three (18%) so far and was at 32% last year. He's been unlucky but given the prevalence of bad shots he's forced into his true shooting talent in this context is definitely below 30%.
Stevens doesn't provide much oomph on D, FWIW.
PSU's backcourt starters are both freshmen. Neither are point guards at this stage. Rasir Bolton is in the Not Just A Shooter Range where about half of his attempts are from behind the line, where he's hitting 44% on high volume. As you can see above, he has that Steph Curry kind of release where the ball gets out lightning fast.
The rest of his offensive forays are split between free throws, which he's getting a lot of and hitting 88%, and shots on which he doesn't get fouled. These are bad. Bolton's creating all of them himself, so that's a thing, but he's a year or two away from being that infuriating Penn State guard who's a fringe NBA player.
Classmate Myles Dread may have the best name in the Big Ten. Early in his career he's a low usage Just A Shooter hitting 34%.
PSU doesn't have much of a bench. John Harrar is a generic backup C who's good at OREBs and nothing else. Guards Myreon Jones and Jamari Wheeler both have sub-100 ORTGs; Jones eats up 28% of PSU's shots when he's on the floor and is shooting 31/29. Yikes. Wheeler's a bit better but is a 6'1 guy shooting 40% from the line and 21% from two. Keep him away from the basket and he'll cough up turnovers and bad other twos.
Finally, Trent Buttrick has recovered from what must have been a hellish middle school experience to be a D-I basketball player. He's a near-invisible Just A Shooter stretch four.
THE TEMPO-FREE
Penn State's offense is grim: in the 200s in all three varieties of shooting, very susceptible to steals, and bad at getting to the line. The relative bright spot is offensive rebounding and even that is just kinda good (74th), not clobbering like a couple of teams Michigan has held down. It all adds up to Kenpom's #118 O.
PSU tries to combat their half-court inefficiencies with a lot of transition. 22% of their shots come in the first ten seconds of the shot clock and there's 14-point eFG gap between those transition opportunities (59%) and their halfcourt (45%).
Penn State's 24th on D thanks to a ton of turnovers forced—17th in steal rate—and excellent defensive rebounding. They're not great at preventing shots from going in but do a pretty good job at covering three point line.
PSU is pretty pretty bad at preventing folks from getting to the rim, 297th. That's the sacrifice they're making in order to hold down opponent three point attempts.
THE KEYS
Funnel usage to Stevens. Michigan's defense excels at forcing Other Twos, and Stevens has taken more Other Twos than any other Big Ten player. He's hitting those at 37%; Michigan will be very happy to live with that. If he's taking contested midrange jumpers Penn State's going to struggle to keep up.
Live in Bolton's shirt. He's got deep range and a super-quick release; a Bolton three is by far Penn State's best offensive option. Once he ventures inside the arc his conversion percentage actually drops and he'll boot the ball away some.
Drive closeouts. PSU will be leaping at shooters and trying to recover; this could be a big game for Iggy and/or Matthews.
THE SECTION WHERE I PREDICT THE SAME THING KENPOM DOES
Michigan by 11.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:26 PM ^
Beat Penn State!!!
Michigan by 20
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:33 PM ^
I miss football season. Basketball won't be any fun for me this year.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:40 PM ^
What the hell? What kind of monster would think this way? We just escaped that nightmare. Who the hell do y-
Oh. Carry on.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:43 PM ^
This is pretty funny. At first, i was like, what the fuck? What the hell is this jarhead thinking?!?!?!?!
Then i read your username. Logged on just to upvote you.
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:44 PM ^
Well done good sir. Also we are still Michigan so maybe in April after our championship we immediately right the ship when all freshman and Poole declare for the draft.
January 3rd, 2019 at 6:36 PM ^
A championship buys you, what, 3-5 years of a BPONE grace period? I would ride with Teske, Z, Livers and walk-ons next year if we're the defending champs.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:37 PM ^
Bought a student section seat. Will yell "GET OFF MY LAWN" during timeouts.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:40 PM ^
Z/X looks so young in that picture at the top of the post.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:55 PM ^
And Mr. "killing it in practice" Mark Donnal.
So weird to see that picture for sure.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:40 PM ^
Win the game
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:42 PM ^
Love the FFFF style layout, especially the new icons. Is that some kind of large planetary object with a large gravitational field representing a Ballhog?
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:34 PM ^
It's an artistic representation of a black hole.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:53 PM ^
I was looking for a letter "B" next to any of the names, thinking that there is no way they don't have at least a couple of returning starters. Then I realized that "B" = bold font. Doh.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:50 PM ^
Maybe Trent spent his middle school and high school days liking the name Buttrick.
NTTAWWT
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:50 PM ^
Shoot well, win. It's good to be at home. Glad we play PSU first, IU second.
Hear IU's point guard is ailing.
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
Will PSU score 50? I think nope
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:57 PM ^
I would like to nominate a new icon for basketball FFFF: Ben Wallace Fro for elite defender/rebounder/blocker.
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:47 PM ^
Why not Dennis Rodman piercings?
January 3rd, 2019 at 12:58 PM ^
With the last name of Dread, I feel like the kids need to be named things like Judge or Existential.
LEVITICUS DREAD would also work.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:38 PM ^
He just needs to go to law school, pass the bar, and become a Judge....easy peasy
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:03 PM ^
Don't forget Natty Dread.
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:13 PM ^
Ecclesiastes Dread works on a lot of levels too.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:07 PM ^
I love the black hole to signify ball hog, that's hilarious
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:49 PM ^
A picture of Carmelo Anthony would work just as well.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:15 PM ^
Love the FFFF-style lineup page. One of the best ways to summarize a starting lineup and overall team I've ever seen.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:54 PM ^
What does FFFF even mean? I swear this site needs an acronym dictionary...
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:10 PM ^
It means fee fi fo film
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:42 PM ^
It has a glossary - https://mgoblog.com/content/mgoblog-glossary-terms-and-memes - but FFFF is missing from it. May have been a while since it's been updated.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:19 PM ^
Time to crank it up Beilein.
Go Blue.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:29 PM ^
I like the FFFF Lineup Card.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:34 PM ^
Didn't Penn State have A Dude last year? Was he a senior? Did he go pro?
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:48 PM ^
Tony Clark. He's playing in Italy now.
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:08 PM ^
Tony Carr. He left after his sophomore year, was drafted late in the second round and ended up in Italy. That's why they have no PG this year.
January 3rd, 2019 at 1:53 PM ^
Like the FFFF style graphic
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:04 PM ^
I went to that link for Mike Watkins. Was inspired to post a long comment to him which i hope was encouraging. Writing is not my strength. I also went through mental health issues around the same age, I think I was a few years older. I was advised by my psychologist and psychiatrist to eliminate all the extra noise to focus on myself. They went so far as to have me try not to have girlfriends. Mike can't do that, he has to play basketball for his own scholarship's sake and his coach's livelihood. I would imagine that the drop off in his stats and subsequent ability have more to do with having to learn all about himself and the way he thinks than with anything happening on the basketball court. That is a full time job in itself and I don't envy him.
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:27 PM ^
I have a close relative of around that age who also deals with some mental health issues that can be doubly painful because people tend to not believe them. It's a very personal thing and hard to pin down. It almost seems to be epidemic with young people of that age and I seriously question whether the fact that their brains were not quite developed enough as they were going through adolescence. After all, theirs is the first generation that really fully experienced the internet era as small children. It's possible that the wires got crossed up because of it. I'm not saying all of them obviously but certain individuals.
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:44 PM ^
TIL: PSU's coach is Pat Chambers.
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:13 PM ^
EIGHT years of obscurity. He's made the NCAA or NIT once! And he's still not really on the hot seat.
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:05 PM ^
Miss me yet? ?
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:43 PM ^
Ed DeChellis. I do miss him as the basketball coach. His teams have had generally steady improvement at all of ETSU, PSU and Navy.
However, he is responsible for the only class I failed during my undergrad career.
At the time, PSU required 3 credits in phys ed classes to complete an undergrad degree. My Sophomore year, I took basketball. 8 AM class. DeChellis "taught" the class, it was his last year as a PSU assistant (under Jerry Dunn) before he left to coach at ETSU. It was fun, twice a week I played some ball in the early morning.
However - something like 60% of the class' final grade was based on a written Final Exam. And the day of the Final was the ONE time all semester where I slept through the class.
I sought him out, pleaded my case to re-take the final. His question was "are you scheduled to graduate this semester?" I didn't pick up on why he was asking that question. I said "no." So his response was "sorry, I'd help you out if you needed this to graduate, but it's not my fault you slept through the Final this AM."
So, it was an F for me in basketball, of all freaking things.
Then, 2 years later I'm interviewing and they ask to see my college transcript. And the interviewer asked about that F on my transcript! I did get a job offer, but I was pretty horrified at that moment in time.
January 3rd, 2019 at 10:40 PM ^
That is a fascinating and hilarious story. Thanks for sharing!
I'd have seen about re-taking that class and replacing the grade so it disappeared from your transcript!
January 3rd, 2019 at 2:44 PM ^
Two year old photos are the best that you can do? Most of the UM players shown aren’t even on this year’s team.
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:15 PM ^
Brian, should the icon for a good rebounder be a bottle of Windex instead of a broom?
just a thought...
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:15 PM ^
It seems sensible that Trent Buttrick chose a school that doesn't put names on the back of jerseys.
January 3rd, 2019 at 3:45 PM ^
Bull's eye funny!!!
I'm trying to pretend to work over here and you making me loose my shit...
January 3rd, 2019 at 4:29 PM ^
Don't want to hear about your loose shit.
January 3rd, 2019 at 4:41 PM ^
Yessssss, FINALLY! Two games a week of Big Ten Basketball is back!
January 3rd, 2019 at 4:51 PM ^
Just like get off to a good start please
January 3rd, 2019 at 5:20 PM ^
Shouldn't the ballhog icon in the basketball chart be a pig face? I don't get the Saturn-looking thing. But a pig-face? Now that's funny.
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