Basketball from a fans perspective
SOS & RPI
In this instance SOS is not the
emergency signal it’s Strength of Schedule closely aligned
with a team’s RPI. Saturday morning’s
St. Louis Post-Dispatch contained a story on Mizzou’s opponent this evening
Green Bay. It was pointed out to the
coach Green Bay’s RPI is in the 300 range, Cuonzo Martin pointed out: “The game
was scheduled prior to me arriving here.”
March 20, 2017 Martin was announced as Mizzou’s new basketball coach to
place the schedule into a time perspective.
Martin also pointed Green Bay’s
coach is a former teammate of his at the time they played at Purdue. The pre-season along with the SEC portion certainly
had not been finalized by the end of March but it does provide us clues. Other than winning a post-season conference
we discussed Team A being invited to the NCAA Tournament with a 18-12
record. Meanwhile Team B with a 21-9
record is excluded and bound for the NIT Tournament. Fans, alum and the student body are often
upset when THEIR school is excluded from participation in the NCAA. NOTE: Game report in Monday's edition.
2018 NBA draft
If we use NBADraft.net as our guide it proves quite interesting. Seven of the first eight players on their
list are freshmen, Luka Doncic from Slovenia at number three is a member of the
first eight however youth continue to be served. There is not a single senior in the remaining
number of prospects up to pick number 14.
Believe it or not we must move into the second round and the 36th
pick before a senior is mentioned. That
senior is forward Johnathan Williams forward from Gonzaga. This could all change by next June but is still interesting nonetheless.
You need to know him too
Oklahoma appears to have a rising
star on their hands, Trae Young 6-2 combo guard made the leap from high school
to Division I with relative ease. Even
more interesting the Sooners recruited this talent blocks away from the campus,
Trae’s home-grown in Norman. We become
enamored with big men that’s part of the reason Duke’s Marvin Bagley III (6-11)
or Arizona’s DeAndre Ayton (7-1) have received much of the early season media
coverage. As for Young he can score the
basketball, but he also can set up teammates averaging 8.7 assists per
game. I’ve yet to have an opportunity to
see Young play but I’m checking the Oklahoma schedule.
Seattle Sonics
I have held off writing about
Seattle and its pursuit of an NBA team because I was receiving mix signals. “We’re building a
brand-new arena” or “Key Arena will be refurbished,” back and forth we traveled
I couldn’t keep up. I believe there
might be residents of the metro unsure what was to occur as well. We are at the end a decision has finally been
reached and Key Arena (opened in 1962) will be refurbished with the hope of an
expansion NHL team or the return of an NBA team to the region. Adam Silver, commissioner has gone on record
earlier indicating Seattle was on the compact list for a team. From reports there could be two paths, Seattle
could be awarded an expansion team, or the Grizzlies could be purchased and
re-locate to the Pacific Northwest. All
in all, it appears Seattle will become an NBA city once again the only question
now is when.
Get the ball
6-11 Andre Drummond is one of
those guys with a nose for the ball, 7-foot Robin Lopez isn’t. Several Big Men are great at rebounding the
basketball. Although the Pistons lost
their game against the Bucks Drummond scored 27 points and snatched down 20
rebounds. Drummond currently leads the
NBA with 15.3 rebounds per game and DeAndre Jordan is 14.2 rebounds. Early in the 2017-18 season finds a total of
12 NBA players are listed as double-double men.
Eclectic former NBA player Dennis Rodman might have been the greatest at this task considering his height. At 6-7 and 210 pounds he recorded 12 consecutive double-digit rebound seasons, seven of those seasons he led the NBA. Venturing further into the past Wilt Chamberlain pulled down nearly 24,000 rebounds while Bill Russell was at 21,000 the number one and two all-time leaders. Wilt Chamberlain set the NBA single game record with 55 rebounds in a game against the Celtics in 1960
