Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Memphis Shoots The Lights Out Against Belmont, Kent State Beats West Virginia

#10 Memphis 97, Belmont 81
This was a 16 point win for Memphis over a very good Belmont team, and it's leading to a lot of media hype about this Memphis team. I'm just going to caution them to calm down. The reality is that Memphis had a fluky day, with 7-for-14 shooting behind the arc, as well as a lot of made jump shots (overall they finished with a 64.7 eFG%). There's a lot of talk about the superior athleticism of Memphis, but the reality is that Memphis had superior athleticism to every team they played last season, and they still finished in dead last in Conference USA in offensive efficiency. The reason? They're a horrible passing team, and tend to just play one-on-one basketball. And honestly, I didn't see much improvement here - they just hit all their open shots.

Belmont dominated the boards, and though they lost the turnover battle 18 to 9, I think a lot of that had to do with Memphis hitting shots. The fact that Memphis was hitting from outside forced Belmont to expand their zone out beyond the arc, opening things up for Joe Jackson, Will Barton and Wesley Witherspoon to attack the basket. A cold-shooting Memphis team would have had to have attacked the basket even more, against a more compressed zone, which would have exposed their poor passing game.

Memphis is clearly improved from last season, and they look like an NCAA Tournament team. But it's way to early to say that they deserve that #10 ranking. Memphis next heads to Maui, where there's a stacked field. They'll open against Michigan on Monday, and in their second game will play either Duke or Tennessee. Belmont, unfortunately, is going to have to drop in the BP68. I had them as a 9 seed because I thought they would beat Memphis. With the loss here they're simply not going to have the opportunity to collect the big win required to get that nice seed. Their conference is just too weak. And what that means is that a whole bunch of teams thinking they might end up with a 5 or 6 seed are going to sweat out Selection Sunday worrying about the Selection Committee sticking them with Belmont. Belmont's next game is Saturday, against Towson.

Kent State 70, West Virginia 60
It's hard to try to glean too much from a game played at ten in the morning. It was obvious that this game was going to be all about attitude, and Kent State simply brought it in the second half. West Virginia looked like they didn't even want to be there, and they just got rolled. I loved the intensity from Kent State - it felt like I was watching an NCAA Tournament game. Their defensive effort held West Virginia to 0.88 points per possession, their worst home offensive performance since a 53-43 win over Cleveland State in December of 2008.

With this win coming right after an underwhelming seven point win over Oral Roberts, West Virginia definitely has something to prove. Unfortunately, their schedule is pretty light the next few weeks. They won't play a major conference team until December 3rd, when they head to Mississippi State. Kent State, meanwhile, went a long way toward establishing themselves as a contender in the MAC with this win. They play Alcorn State on Saturday, but then have a tough test next Tuesday when they play Cleveland State.

Saint Mary's 57, Northern Iowa 41
Saint Mary's lost a lot of offensive firepower after the graduation of Mickey McConnell, but they didn't need a whole lot here as Northern Iowa simply could not execute offensively at all. Northern Iowa was an atrocious 16-for-59 from the field with, by my calculation, 0.64 points per possession. Anthony James, to pick one unfortunate soul, finished 1-for-15 from the field. And what makes this particularly strange is that St. Mary's isn't known for being a good defensive team. Last season they finished 15th in Pomeroy offensive efficiency, and 127th defensively. I would hesitate to claim that the defensive woes for Saint Mary's have been fixed - one game does not a quality sample size make.

Unfortunately, Saint Mary's has an awfully soft non-conference schedule. They can potentially play Weber State at the Shamrock Office Solutions Classic on November 28th, but other than that they won't play another quality team until they see Baylor on December 22nd. I'm not sure what Randy Bennett was thinking with this schedule. The WCC is improved, but he's still given his team an awfully tiny margin for error. As for Northern Iowa, they have this atrocity of a performance after a dominating 17 point win over Old Dominion. How good are they really? It's too early to tell. They will play Northern Colorado on Sunday. Their next quality opponent will probably be Providence, on November 26th.

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