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| William & Mary won the league!?!?! |
William & Mary finished 5-1 against the other three co-champions (UNCW, Northeastern, and JMU), but lost twice to Delaware, and fell on the road to both the 8th and last-place teams (Elon and Charleston).
UNCW played the final game of the conference season, needing only to beat 5-12 Elon to clinch the outright league title. The Seahawks lost by 19.
Defending league champion Delaware (nope, not over it yet) went 1-10 in non-conference play, losing to Cal Poly, Army, and Delaware State. The Hens beat William & Mary twice and went 9-9 in conference.
JMU went 0-6 against the other co-champions, and 12-0 against the rest of the league.
First-year league member Elon finished 6-12 in the league. And carries a three-game winning streak into the conference tournament, the longest such current streak in the CAA. Which features wins over co-champs Northeastern and UNCW, and followed a seven-game losing streak.
You'll forgive us, but we won't be making any predictions about the CAA Tournament, which begins this evening in Baltimore, as the 7/10 (Drexel/Charleston) and 8/9 (Elon/Towson) matchups tip. (Though we did finish the season 10-8 ATS on W&M games, despite a two-game hiccup at the end of the year.)
We won't be prognosticating (though if you ask us for a darkhorse tourney winner, we'll give you Hofstra), but we will be offering a bit of a prescription for Tribe fans. We've said all year that W&M has to shoot the ball to win. We've been wrong. You'll hear people say that the Wrens need to rebound, to take care of the basketball. Those people are wrong, generally speaking.
The key to victory for our Wrens is simple. They have to defend.
Allow us to geek out for a minute. As Dragons Speak proprietor Dan Crain pointed out on Twitter yesterday, only once since 2007-8 has the CAA Tournament champion not ranked in the top two in the league in defensive efficiency. W&M is seventh in that stat. But their wins and losses tell a more complete story.
Advanced metrics on this point are crystal clear. W&M's Offensive Rating (ORtg, an estimate of points scored per 100 possession) in its 12 conference wins is a very good 115.65. In the Tribe's six losses, their ORtg only drops to 113.62, a figure that would rank in the top 20 in the nation. W&M's effective field goal percentage (eFG) in wins is 61.1%. It drops only slightly to 55.1% in losses. The Wrens' total rebound percentage is better in victories, but again not a wide margin (50.8% in wins, 45.8% in losses). And counter-intuitively, the Wrens turn the ball over nearly twice as much in wins as they do in defeats (12.05 per game versus 6.5).
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| Yes, please |
It's not rocket surgery this weekend in the Charm City. It's all but certain that the Tribe will run a very efficient offense. If Tony Shaver's team plays focused, even marginally effective defense, W&M has a very good chance to win any game they play.
Roll the balls out, and let's see what happens. Lotta ball left. Stay on target*.
* - We're appropriating some long-ago mojo for a new purpose. It worked once, so why the hell not try again?
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49 comments:
Is stay on target a Star Wars reference?
Some unsolicited Warriors stats:
- They are first in the league in FG% (47.7%), despite being third in the league in 3 PT FG attempts per game.
- (natural corollary): They are first in the league in 3P% at 38.9%.
- Kly Thompson is shooting 43% from behind the arc (7.1 attempts per game), Stephen Curry is 41.3% from behind the arc (8.1 attempts per game) and Harrison Barnes is 42.8% from behind the arc (2.7 attempts per game).
can we translate all the numbers into a sentence or two?
that sentence is in the post, dave. it's this:
The key to victory for our Wrens is simple. They have to defend.
'stay on target' is a misery loves company reference. it's pretty much why the red sox won the world series in 2004.
that top photo is fantastic
my wife and kids had delayed openings today, but for some reason, my school was closed. i am sitting around watching "parks and recreation" and eating chocolate.
Why is it that whenever announcers and sportswriters talk about blitzes they say that the coach "dialed up" the blitz? It seems to be the only type of play that gets dialed. No one dials up a run off tackle, for example. And why are blitzes always described as "exotic"? What would a provincial blitz look like?
ncaa dropped the hammer on boeheim, cuse. didn't see that coming.
oh noes
@DanWolken: Syracuse and the NCAA negotiated a statute of limitations for eligibility violations of May 4, 2003. How convenient.
Why does three wins in a row seem like so many to me right now?
I meant to comment yesterday about how much I love driving my AWD crossover vehicle in the snow, but my excitement was tempered by all the folks out on the road yesterday who should not have been that were just in the way.
Is Parks and Rec season 7 on NetFlix yet?
I like the part where the Cuse Director of Basketball Ops was emailing professors as the players
If Cuse drew this penalty, then UNC is absolutely fucked
I remember living in Arlington in a building with a parking lot in the back. There was a hill leading down into the lot. It snowed and the building didn't do a great job of clearing the lot. Some jackass in a Pathfinder ... A PATHFINDER ... could not get his truck up the hill and out of the lot. He kept stopping mid-hill and couldn't get enough traction to start moving forward again. Rather than back up and get a running start at the hill to let momentum (P=MV) do the heavy work, he put the car in park and laid down plastic garbage bags ... PLASTIC GARBAGE BAGS ... ON THE SNOW ... with the hope of getting more traction. All of this at around 2 am. I know this because I heard terrible wheelspinning noises outside my window.
Virginians should not be allowed to drive in the snow.
That Ken is a funny guy
http://kenpom.com/blog/index.php/weblog/entry/caa_log52
I'm actually pissed we didn't get more than a coating of snow yesterday. All we needed was .69" of snow for the record and the Cape got a foot.
Stay on target might be from MLC but it definitely originated in Star Wars. Right, Gold Five?
This mixtape isn't so bad if you need some Friday afternoon background music. https://soundcloud.com/hoodinternet for my newbie rap ears. Almost too much top 40 music though.
my ramblings endeth
man, mayhugh, i couldn't agree more about how daunting this feels. but some caa team is gonna win three in a row. why not us?
Rob, if you go back to the MLC annals, you will see that "Lotta ball left. Stay on target." was really the mantra of your posts in 2003. Way to go, dipstick. Looks like we are losing in the semis in heartbreaking fashion. And Tony Shaver will keep our starters in too long.
2014 caa tourney = 2003 alcs
2015 caa tourney = 2004 alcs/world series
because i used the 'why not us?' corollary.
and if i have to, i'm bringing cowboy up with me to baltimore.
And "Hell's coming with me"?
fuck yeah, man. whatever hack cliche(s) it takes.
My 3 year old starts soccer today in about an hour. I expect shit least 2 full meltdowns, lots of laughing/hijinks and possibly an accidental pants shitting.
zson did a soccer clinic in the fall. He often tackled the kid with the ball, grabbed the ball away from other kids, ran carrying the ball, sat in the goal with the ball, and generally acted like a disruptive donkey. I think 3 is too young, at least for boys, to understand soccer. The older kids behaved more soccer-like.
So they flirted and preened about like gay peacocks, had terrible haircuts, over-celebrated, and flopped on the ground feigning immeasurable pain at the slightest semblance of contact?
i don't know if that's soccer, or clarence's freshman year of college.
Twitter tells me the new Action Bronson album drops March 23rd. I'm sure mark and zman already knew this
I think I wrote a post about that and the new Tuxedo album which is available now.
The jets have eric decker, Percy harvin and Brandon Marshall ... and the worst QB situation outside of buffalo. Very strange move.
there's an urban legend in my country about swingers landscaping their homes with white rocks as a signal to other swingers. my boss just sent me a text asking about it. lots of ways to go with this. gonna go with 'first rule of white rocks club is don't tslk about white rocks club'.
Harvin will be cut in 12 days.
wiz are on their way to blowing a 35-point lead
Soccer was a relative success. It was more clinic than organized practice. She thoroughly enjoyed it and didn't shit her pants or have a meltdown. Great success!
Marshawn just got himself paid. $12 mm in '15 ain't bad.
I thank Zman for not mentioning the Washingtoon football club in the bad QB situation sentence.
Washingtoon. It's a cartoonish entity from Washington. Sometimes typos fit.
At least RG3 has a lot of upside in the right system. The troika of Manuel Cassel and Tuel is abysmal.
Even when the Jets cut Harvin they'll have a very talented WR situation with no one to throw to them. It's like Chicago wanted to punish Marshall
So the Wiz won tonight but nearly blew the 35-point lead Rob mentioned. And coming in they had gone 3-12 after starting the season 31-15. Downright Lynamian. The Curse of Les Boulez is still kicking around pretty lively, eh?
#LesWizerables
Teej, did you make that up? Never mind, I am going to think you did.
Bon soir, Les Gheorghies
hey gheorghies!
poker night with old pi lams . . .
Clarence, I did indeed come up with that one myself.
Heading to my first spring training game of the year today. Cardinals-Nats. Yesterday it was nearly 80 degrees and sunny here. Today it's 65 and overcast. Not optimal baseball weather. I'm sure none of you northern folks want to hear me complain though.
I learned last night that using the phrase "fleshy lollipop" in a suggestive way is a suboptimal way to arouse one's spouse.
i learned this morning that 'wanna quickie?' is equally suboptimal.
I always say "you won't feel a thing and it will be over in seconds."
One benefit of today's weather is that it gives me an excuse to wear my Expos jacket.
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