Year of the Offenses

Defense wins championships is an old maxim. It's easier for a bad offense to score against a mediocre defense than for even a great offense to score against a great defense (or so the conventional wisdom goes). This year's Sweet 16, however, is heavy on the offense, and not as much on the defense. According to Ken Pomeroy's adjusted efficiency, the top 3 teams, 8 of the top 10, and 11 of the top 14 teams on offense still remain in the tournament. The worst offensive efficiency by any remaining team belongs to George Mason, but they're still in the top 20% in the country (ranked 68th). By contrast, there are some bad defensive teams who are still playing - Boston College checks in at 97th, and Gonzaga is a robust 170th in the country, which puts them in the bottom half of defensive teams. 5 of the top 7 defensive teams are now sitting at home. The trend was reflected in who got into the tournament, too - just 4 of the top 30 offenses missed the tournament (Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, Oregon, and Michigan), while 8 of the top 30 defenses missed out on the dance. So it's been a very good year for the offense, which means good things for Duke - #1 in adjusted offensive efficiency on the season. For the record, here's how the 16 remaining teams stack up

Offensive Efficiency
1) Duke - 119.5
2) Texas - 119.3
3) Gonzaga - 118.8
5) Villanova - 118.5
6) Boston College - 117.8
7) Connecticut - 117.8
8) Georgetown - 116.7
10) Florida - 116.4
12) Washington - 116.1
13) West Virginia - 115.4
14) UCLA - 115.1
25) Memphis - 112.8
29) Wichita State - 112.3
39) Louisiana State - 111.1
65) Bradley - 107.6
68) George Mason - 107.1

Defensive Efficiency
3) UCLA - 85.9
6) Texas - 87.1
8) Connecticut - 87.5
9) Louisiana State - 87.6
10) Bradley - 88.1
11) Memphis - 88.1
12) Florida - 88.2
15) George Mason - 88.9
16) Villanova - 89.4
17) Duke - 89.5
26) Washington - 90.6
43) Georgetown - 92.5
45) West Virginia - 92.6
60) Wichita State - 93.8
97) Boston College - 96.6
170) Gonzaga - 101.4

Duke 78, Wake 66

Player	Off. Poss.	Off. PPP	Def. Poss.	Def. PPP
Paulus-on	56	1.21	54	1.11
Paulus-off	10	1.00	11	.55
Redick-on	58.5	1.21	57	1.00
Redick-off	7.5	.93	8	1.13
Dockery-on	47.5	.97	46	1.11
Dockery-off	18.5	1.73	19	.79
McRoberts-on	56	1.29	55.5	.97
McRoberts-off	10	.60	9.5	1.26
Williams-on	45	1.33	43.5	1.08
Williams-off	21	.86	21.5	.88
Melchionni-on	31	.77	31	1.00
Melchionni-off	35	1.54	34	1.03
Nelson-on	36	1.36	36	.83
Nelson-off	30	.97	29	1.24
Team Totals	66	1.182	65	1.015

Very nice offensive day for the Devils, particularly in the second half, when they picked up 44 points in just 30 possessions. The numbers reflect very solid offensive contributions from McRoberts, Nelson, and Paulus (and also subpar offensive contributions from Dockery and Melchionni). I was actually surprised at Dock's numbers for the game, because he seemed to play very good defense on Gray, and also caused some turnovers that led to easy points. Once again, though, the defense wasn't stellar - it was good enough, but not great. It would be very, very refreshing if they could hold BC under 1.00 ppp this afternoon. Part of the reason is that we again got killed on the glass - Wake gobbled up 16 of their 36 misses, and 27 of Duke's 33. Everything else about the D was pretty good - Wake shot just 41.7%, including just 29.2% from beyond the arc, and turned it over 14 times against just 10 assists. We've just really got to do something about that defensive rebounding...

And how bout 9 consecutive ACC finals appearances. Wow. It's been a remarkable run over the past decade. Let's keep it rolling a little while longer.

Duke 80, Miami 76

Player	Off. Poss.	Off. PPP	Def. Poss.	Def. PPP
Paulus-on	52	1.13	52	1.15
Paulus-off	16	1.31	15	1.07
Redick-on	68	1.18	67	1.13
Redick-off	0	.00	0	.00
Dockery-on	33	1.06	34.5	1.25
Dockery-off	35	1.29	32.5	1.02
McRoberts-on	40.5	1.04	40.5	1.28
McRoberts-off	27.5	1.38	26.5	.91
Williams-on	65	1.18	63.5	1.13
Williams-off	3	1.00	3.5	1.14
Melchionni-on	23.5	1.45	22	.82
Melchionni-off	44.5	1.03	45	1.29
Nelson-on	50	1.36	48.5	1.03
Nelson-off	18	.67	18.5	1.41
Boykin-on	5	.60	4.5	1.11
Boykin-off	63	1.22	62.5	1.14
Boateng-on	3	.67	2.5	1.60
Boateng-off	65	1.20	64.5	1.12
Team Totals	68	1.176	67	1.134

So what do we know... this team is not going to go down as one of the great defensive teams in Duke history. Since the BC game, our defensive rating has been 101.97. Now I can't perform the fancy adjustments to allow for the opponents' offensive strength, but as a matter of raw numbers, this rating played out over the course of the season would rank somewhere around 190th in the country, around such stalwarts as Santa Clara, Hartford, and Fresno St (and shockingly, Michigan St - wow). Now, there was a point in time where we played good enough defense that even with this late slump, our raw rating for the season is 94.1. So how can we get back there? Two things - one is personnel: more minutes for Nelson and Dock, fewer for Lee and Greg. This doesn't need to be dramatic, but even a total shift of 8 minutes more combined for the first two would probably mean a 4 or 5 point difference. Second, I think we should sacrifice any thought of fast break. We don't score a ton of transition points of missed shots anyway, and so sending all 5 players to crash the glass would help control the defensive boards. Our defense is generally pretty solid on the first shot, but giving up offensive boards has let the other teams put up good PPP numbers. Since the BC game, opponents have gotten about 42% of their own misses. Cutting this down even to 35% would probably net another 4 or 5 points, even if it meant less transition opportunities for us (again, most of Duke's transition points come off of turnovers, not missed shots). These two minor changes could make a major difference.

Can't Really Call it Les Robinson Day Anymore

The first day of the behemoth now known as the ACC tourney is upon us, and it has me remembering fondly the days when ol' Les had his Wolfpack as regular Thursday participants. Now, with 8 of the 12 teams playing today, it's much harder to scoff. That said, let's take a look at the slate...

1) Clemson at Miami - Clemson has won 4 of 5 after hitting a big dry spell in the middle of the season, and is playing its best ball of the year. Miami stumbled down the stretch, losing 6 of 7. During that time, Miami's offense really cooled off - they had a 101.8 ORating and shot just 27.9% from beyond the arc, despite having guards in Hite, Diaz, and Harris who love to gun it from there. Clemson is exactly the opposite - they suddenly discovered they had an offense, scoring over 80 points in each of their last 4 wins and posting a 115.8 ORating over that stretch. Akin Akingbala is doing his best Sharrod Ford impersonation, and the guards are nailing the 3 at a 43.7% clip. Both teams should continue the trend today - look for Clemson to keep on winning.

2) Wake Forest at Florida State - Wake had a very nice showing against NC State last weekend, but their season will end with this game this afternoon. Florida State is determined to get an NCAA bid, and they're finally playing with both energy and discipline. The only meeting between the two this season was a relatively easy 7 point win for FSU - they hit 55% beyond the arc and only turned the ball over 9 times, and this was on the road. Expect to be watching a 20-win FSU team take on the 'Pack tomorrow (fun stat of the day - no 20-win team from a BCS conference has ever been denied a tournament bid - FSU and Texas A&M, take comfort, perhaps).

3) Virginia Tech at Virginia - I'd like to say the Cavs win this. I want to say the Cavs win this. They in fact need to win this for an NIT bid (I'm assuming that the new NIT still has the "team must be over .500 rule"). But they've been fingers-to-the-nose stinking the last few games away from U-Hall, with defensive debacles at FSU, Clemson, and UNC. Both games this season between the teams were close and ugly, but both were wins for the 'Hoos. I just have this hunch that they can't pull it off the third time. Also, by the numbers, Tech was 8th in eMargin, and UVA was 12th. When VT lost, it tended to be close. When UVA's lost, they've gotten blown out.

4) Georgia Tech at Maryland - I'm going to go on the record as being shocked (shocked!) that anyone is still legitimately considering the Terps as a tournament team. This is actually a very easy leave-off for the committee, because they get to only consider the Terps sans Chris McCray. And those Terps have been bad. Yes, Gary, you did have to play Duke and UNC twice. But you lost those 4 games by an average of almost 18 points. Tech was finishing its season on a nice run until getting dismantled by Clemson - they had a good win over NC State, and played extremely well in losses to UNC, Duke, and Maryland (in OT at MD). This is a young, talented team that should be trouble next season. They also should end Maryland's season today.

ACC Season in Review

The final update to the Tempo-Free stats has been made over on the right side. Some comments...

1) North Carolina - their seven game win streak to end the season catapulted them to the top of the conference in efficiency margin - over that time they had a plus 0.25, which is terrific (equates to about a 15-20 point margin of victory in the average game). For this shift, look no further than one stat - offensive turnovers. Through the first Duke game, Carolina turned the ball over 27.2% of its possessions - on its winning streak, that number was dropped to 16.8%. This accounts for an improvement in both their offensive and defensive efficiency - offensively because it gives a good shooting team somewhere in the neighborhood of 7-9 more possessions a game (which, for UNC, would yield 8-10 more points), and defensively because it denies the other team easy transition opportunities. Carolina's half court D has been good all year, but the numbers didn't always reflect it because of transition baskets. Over the last 7 games when they didn't turn the ball over, their defensive rating was 91.8 - very good. If they continue to protect the ball on offense, they will be a very difficult team to beat.

2) Duke - consecutive losses (and a string of not so big wins) dropped Duke to second in the efficiency margin numbers for the conference season. Duke's defensive woes started at BC - the first seven games of the season, the Devils posted a 93.9 DRating. In the nine games since, their DRating is 101.7. The Devils have still been forcing turnovers - over 20% of the opponents' possessions ended in turnovers over that nine game span. Teams have just been shooting slightly better, and getting to the free throw line - opponents have four more free throw attempts a game, and hit 74%. Except for the last three conference games, the offense continues to be very good - there's no reason to think that Duke won't break out of this mini-slump and go back to executing at a high level. But the defense needs to be ratcheted up - we need to match the intensity and aggressiveness that other teams have recently been bringing to us.

3) NC State - um, live by the three, die by the three - in their six losses, they have hit just .299 from behind the arc - averaging about 7 for 24 in those games. Overall, though, they are a very good shooting team - over 50% on twos and over 40% on threes, and they lead the conference in eFG%. They play field goal defense only - they don't force a lot of turnovers, and they don't try for offensive rebounds. They're only so-so at that defense though, so they'll go as far as their offense takes them (which, if they're hitting, could be very far indeed).


4) Virginia - yes, the lobsided loss to Carolina probably distorts all these numbers, but the numbers show that Virginia was in fact as bad as everyone thought they would be, but managed to pull out some wins anyway. They're last in the conference in efficiency margin, 11th in offense, 10th in defense, 12th in shooting, 11th in forcing turnovers, 12th in allowing assists and blocked shots, etc. What they have done well is rebound, particularly on the defensive end. And their defense has been better than the current numbers - take out the UNC debacle, and their 5th in defense. Earlier in the season when they were winning, defense was their hallmark - they hovered around the top of the conference in defense for the first 5 weeks. But the margin for error for these guys is so small - if Singletary has a bad game, it's pretty much over for them. Hopefully they'll get to host an NIT game.

Finally, I've been looking into the TFS numbers from other conferences, and two teams jump out as just steamrolling through their league. Funny thing is, they're both in the same conference - Texas and Kansas. Texas has been dominant in conference play - their margin is +24.8, and they have the best offense and second best defense. Kansas has been almost as good - checking in at +18.8, with the best in-conference defensive rating of any major conference team (86.35). This is a reflection both of the quality of these two teams (high) and the general quality of the Big XII (low - only 4 teams have a positive efficiency margin). This argument is a little circular - do Texas and Kansas have great numbers because the other teams are all bad, or are the numbers of the other teams skewed because they had to play Texas and Kansas? Either way you look at it, both of these teams have the stuff to make a deep run into March. The fact that Kansas and North Carolina have done as well as they have this year is remarkable - the growth over just one season has been amazing to watch.

And You Thought Duke Had No Depth...

Just got back from the semifinals of the CAA tournament, where #1 UNCW easily handled #5 Northeastern, and #3 Hofstra came back to upset #2 George Mason. Second game first - Hofstra got 8 total bench minutes from 1 player, and I don't think coach Tom Pecora even wanted to go that deep. Greg Johnson came in for Loren Stokes when he got hit in the eye early in the first half, and punched in the balls late in the second half, and Johnson spelled Agudio when he got a little foul trouble. Uter, Kieza, and Rivera all played the full 40 - and that's after Rivera played 40 and Kieza 39 the night before. Still, they had plenty left to overcome an early George Mason lead and pull the upset. Defense was the key here - Mason scored only 16 in the second half, and was held to only 32.7% shooting on the game. Hofstra is a fun team to watch - the three guards (Stokes, Agudio, and Rivera) all have good outside shots and good slashing games, and Adrian Uter is a poor man's Ben Wallace - he's in there to rebound, block shots (he had a couple facials on Jai Lewis), and show off his ridiculous 'fro. Mason coach Jim Larranaga made a questionable personnel choice late in the game - he took out Will Thomas, who had been having the best game of any Patriot, for most of the last 3 or 4 minutes. Unsurprisingly, the offense stalled out, and they couldn't put together any kind of comeback. Losing before the conference finals isn't the end of the at-large world for George Mason, but losing the way they did can't have helped. They'll be seriously sweating it out next Sunday.

The first game was vintage UNCW basketball. It was close only once in the second half, at 44-41, but the 'Hawks went on a 15-3 run to ice the game away. Everything they do is evenly distributed - I had to look at the box score to see who their leading scorer was (TJ Carter) - 4 ended up in double figures, and Goldsberry was content to merely distribute - he had 3 points but 10 assists and only 1 turnover. No single player stands out, but they all play well, and when all is said and done, they usually win. Northeastern probably had the two best players on the floor in Jose Juan Barea and Shawn James (8 blocks, all emphatic), but they were largely contained, and the better team won easily. Barea led all scorers with 17, but it took him 19 shots to get there, and he had 6 turnovers against 5 assists - the conference player of the year never really got his rhythm. UNCW should have a tougher time tomorrow night with Hofstra, which has a more well distributed scoring attack, and will put pressure on Wyrick in particular, who will be guarding a quicker player all night. I'm really looking forward to going back and seeing the title game in person.

Tomorrow I'll post the tempo-free stats for the season, and will probably have some things to say about the overall numbers. As the week progresses, look for conference championship game previews, ACC Tourney previews, and then recaps for every ACC game I can see (which will hopefully be the vast majority). Have I mentioned yet how much I love this time of year?

UNC Game Efficiency

Player	Off. Poss.	Off. PPP	Def. Poss.	Def. PPP
Paulus-on	58	.86	57	1.02
Paulus-off	24	1.08	25	1.00
Redick-on	80	.95	79	1.11
Redick-off	2	.00	3	1.00
Dockery-on	51	.86	52.5	1.01
Dockery-off	31	1.03	29.5	1.02
McRoberts-on	42	.60	42.5	.94
McRoberts-off	40	1.28	39.5	1.09
Williams-on	69.5	.96	68	1.06
Williams-off	12.5	.72	14	.79
Melchionni-on	55	1.05	52.5	1.03
Melchionni-off	27	.67	29.5	.98
Nelson-on	55	1.05	56.5	.99
Nelson-off	27	.67	25.5	1.06
Boykin-on	0	.00	1	.00
Boykin-off	82	.93	81	1.02
Johnson-on	1.5	1.33	1	2.00
Johnson-off	80.5	.92	81	1.00
Team Totals	82	.927	82	1.012

I had to double check the numbers on Josh, because I didn't remember there being that drastic a difference between when he was on and off, but those are the right numbers. I think this was less attributable to any poor play by him, and more attributable to good play on offense by Lee and DeMarcus, both of whom played a lot of their minutes with McRoberts on the floor. Also, taking out our first 5 possessions (10 points), the team scored 66 in 77, for a .857 ppp (this makes Nelson's contributions even more remarkable - outside of those 5 possessions, the team scored only 8 points in the 22 other possessions he was on the bench).

As for general observations - as the on-the-ball pressure has increased on our guards, the offense has struggled. Paulus in particular has trouble with aggressive defense - it gets him going a little too fast, and he tends to make mistakes. The Carolina game was played at a frenetic pace - each team had the ball for just under 15 seconds on the average possession. This year, our offense has been better playing at a little bit of a slower pace, and Carolina won this one by speeding it up. Finally though, this game didn't look too terribly different from any of our other close games, except that shots that Redick made earlier, he missed last night. I'm certainly not putting the responsibility for the loss on his shoulders - plenty of people didn't play too well yesterday. But if he hits just 44%, we win both games this week. I think what this reveals most is how razor-thin the margin for error is for this team, and how much trouble we'll be in if no one can step up to fill the void if Redick continues to be off.

I'm headed down to Richmond today to watch the CAA semis, so I'll miss the MVC and Southern championship games today. Arch Madness at the Savvis Center featured several upsets, and completely realigned the bubble for the Valley - Bradley and SIU probably played themselves in (one definitely will be after today), and Creighton and Northern Iowa are now probably pretty nervous. Wichita State should still be safely in, even with the loss yesterday. Missouri State probably wishes it could play that Arkansas game again. In the Southern, the upstarts (Georgia Southern, Elon) who led the conference in the regular season couldn't get the job done in the tournament, and traditional powers Davidson and UT-Chattanooga will play for the automatic bid today. Shocking as it is to say for the SoCon, the winner is probably a 16-seed.