You mean that stretch of games, where we had 3 top 100 RPI wins and when we got 3 of our 4 road wins for the year.
Nelson Ododa
- Thread starter 9Legs
- Start date
You mean that stretch of games, where we had 3 top 100 RPI wins and when we got 3 of our 4 road wins for the year.
I don't think fan2011 a ANO/Wood comparison is fair one. There is no one on the squad individually presently that can do what ANO did for the team defensively and Wood wasn't brought here by CM thinking he was going to fill the type of role a player like ANO was. The comparison I would make is Wood/DT.
I think Philly and 97 are positively thinking that Wood can possibly benefit the squad by his outside shooting upside potential. Unfortunately maybe cause of injury issues DT has never come close to his offensive numbers his frosh year. Looking at Wood's total shooting numbers they more or less mirror that of DT's.
What I look at though with MW on a small sample size was his 35% with 3PT his soph season and that both years he took more 3PTers than 2s. Tech must have had him positioned outside more. We know TA works well down low and even though TJ can shoot from 3 he seems able if not scoring down low to find the open man outside.
DT shot 6-41 with 3PTers last year and 21% for soph/junior seasons. Also wonder how many open looks he turned down from there? Wood could be the guy that you need shooting 35% or better from 3 and thus creating more space for TJ and TA down low. Plus MW (small sample size) can make foul shots. We shall see.
I think Philly and 97 are positively thinking that Wood can possibly benefit the squad by his outside shooting upside potential. Unfortunately maybe cause of injury issues DT has never come close to his offensive numbers his frosh year. Looking at Wood's total shooting numbers they more or less mirror that of DT's.
What I look at though with MW on a small sample size was his 35% with 3PT his soph season and that both years he took more 3PTers than 2s. Tech must have had him positioned outside more. We know TA works well down low and even though TJ can shoot from 3 he seems able if not scoring down low to find the open man outside.
DT shot 6-41 with 3PTers last year and 21% for soph/junior seasons. Also wonder how many open looks he turned down from there? Wood could be the guy that you need shooting 35% or better from 3 and thus creating more space for TJ and TA down low. Plus MW (small sample size) can make foul shots. We shall see.
Yes.
Opponent record when we had ANO: 104 - 76 (58%)
Opponent record when ANO was injured: 60 - 84 (42%)
We played a bunch of really weak teams when ANO was out. We also had our worst loss of the season when he was out (GMU). Our best wins of the seasons were @VCU and vs. Davidson, both of which ANO was healthy for and both of which were blowouts.
Last edited:
Philly the numbers don't lie...that's directed. Imo ANO getting dunked on once by cocks doesn't make him totally soft Just limp in that moment but since it's our rival it will be forever embedded. We definitely don't want soft wood But really ANO probably could been better in another system. Where he's forced to play. MO we get good kids I mean nice players our face is " good guys " I'm meaning on the court. This is our tendency as Kee said..So it's hard to call a player soft when that's our image..I will miss ANO he could been helpful and wish him the best..now on to next Fri
Not so much Sour grapes but an ingrate. Mooney did alot to help him a long in his freshman year, I normally wish players who transfer the best but in this case I can understand any negative feelings.
Record with ANO: 12-11
Record without ANO: 7-1
Road record with ANO: 1-8
Road record without ANO: 3-1
Top 100 wins in 23 games with ANO: 3
Top 100 wins in 8 games without ANO: 3
We played barely above .500 ball with him and .875 ball without him.
Record without ANO: 7-1
Road record with ANO: 1-8
Road record without ANO: 3-1
Top 100 wins in 23 games with ANO: 3
Top 100 wins in 8 games without ANO: 3
We played barely above .500 ball with him and .875 ball without him.
Why would Zo leave? Well in my opinion you don't leave a potential NCAA team unless
you realize you are going to have less role. Wood was practicing with the team, TJ was showing
more and more offensive skills, may be Zo saw more bench time then floor time this year.
There was some writing on the wall that said diminished role. Players that CM likes in his style of
coaching were on board and Zo realized that. Just my humble opinion.
you realize you are going to have less role. Wood was practicing with the team, TJ was showing
more and more offensive skills, may be Zo saw more bench time then floor time this year.
There was some writing on the wall that said diminished role. Players that CM likes in his style of
coaching were on board and Zo realized that. Just my humble opinion.
the phrase spoken to me by a member of the staff was "addition by subtraction." Even I can figure that out.....let's move on, he's gone.
He was poached, simple as that. A good p% team saw that he was able to graduate transfer, knew his skill set would help them out, gave him a call and convinced him to transfer.
One should be mindful that Alonzo now gets to play in the ACC against the likes of Duke, North Carolina, Loiusville, et c. Just imagine if Zo has a good performance against Duke on national tv. This would get much more attention than a similar performance against any A10 team. IMHO, he made a good decision to take this once in a lifetime opportunity. OSC
Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't, don't care, he wasn't the best fit for our system anyway. We played better without him last year anyway. There are so many stats out there, you can poach any number of them to prove or disprove whatever point you are trying to make. I like to point to this thing called the scoreboard and we sure went on a sweet little run that happened to coincide with his not being on the court last year.
I like our returning players, I like Deion playing more minutes as an interior defender versus trying to guard smaller guys out on the wing. I like guys who keep there feet on the ground and just play good solid back to the basket defense vs. trying to go for the highlight real block, which if unsuccessful, messes up our whole rebounding scheme. We will be fine, we will miss him at times next year, but I think we have a chance to be better without him as well.
I like our returning players, I like Deion playing more minutes as an interior defender versus trying to guard smaller guys out on the wing. I like guys who keep there feet on the ground and just play good solid back to the basket defense vs. trying to go for the highlight real block, which if unsuccessful, messes up our whole rebounding scheme. We will be fine, we will miss him at times next year, but I think we have a chance to be better without him as well.
To each their own. Sure you can get stats to say whatever you want with enough work, but the true power of statistics is using them to accurately predict future outcomes. When you find statistics that are effective at predicting future outcomes (namely offensive and defensive efficiency in college basketball) those statistics actually mean something. Sure we won games when ANO was out, but they were against weaker teams. The statistic we put up that are actually meaningful and indicative of future performance became worse when ANO was out.
When the statistics that are indicative of future performance get worse it means that your team is less likely to win games. It doesn't matter that you got wins against bad teams, we were less likely to win games without ANO than with him.
Also, Mo Alie-Cox has averaged 5 points per game against Richmond and has never scored more than 7 points against us. Lets not pretend that he was some unstoppable force that ANO was too soft to handle.
Last edited:
ANO is soft on the offensive end. He cleaned up some garbage, but never demanded the ball and never developed any go to moves in the post. He had the most NBA ready body and athleticism of any Spider in years, but never showed any real improvement on the offensive end. To the poster who said this was Mooney's fault because he didn't play ANO enough, do you think Mooney didn't want him to succeed? Do you think he didn't want to leave his most athletic big man out there who should have been a mismatch for most guys he played against? He sat him because he knew ANO's replacement had a better chance of creating something on the offensive end.
That play was in March 2014, not this past season. To me, unfortunately this is the one play I think of most when I think of ANO's career. Lots of potential but never quite put it all together. We saw some flashes here and there.
I just don't think he was a great fit for the way we play - our bigs need to be able to pass and shoot from the outside - he didn't do either particularly well. Most times he received a pass at the high post, it was a hand off and a screen, not terribly dynamic to keep a motion offense moving,
I don't think anyone is arguing that Zo was a better offensive option than TJ, very few of our players would qualify. My argument, and many others have beaten this drum before regardless of the player, is that CM uses very odd substitution patterns at times, particularly O for D. And when Alonzo was on O, he often ended up out on the perimeter where he wasn't well suited to contributing on offense.
Stats aside, I would take Alonzo as our backup center every time over our other options. Alas, it's no longer an option.
Stats aside, I would take Alonzo as our backup center every time over our other options. Alas, it's no longer an option.
+1 to 97 and Pike above. First, our season was heading nowhere with ANO in the line-up. When he went out, our 7-1 record "saved" our season. Would we have beaten those three top-100 teams with ANO in the line-up? I personally doubt it. And, as Pike so nicely put it, this could be a classic case of "addition by subtraction." I say it primarily because ANO never learned how to "flow with our offense." When he got he ball, our "movement" stopped. He was not able to pass and keep the offense flowing. If we are not better without ANO, I will be surprised. Finally, I do believe that DT will be our "new" version of ANO, in terms of interior defense. I see him as our new interior defensive "stopper." I'm also hoping that Paul will be able to pass, from the high-post, as well as TJ. If he can, we should have an offense that truly "flows" again, like it did in the Dan Geriot days. I will remain optimistic about this (that our offense is much better without ANO) until I am proven wrong. And, I can see DT and TD playing good enough defense that we also may not need ANO, this year, defensively.
If we are hoping our offense flows better with DT at the five then we could be in for a long season. I'm not trying to knock Deion but his offensive productivity last year was abysmal.
Again, it's irrelevant with ano gone, but there's too little offense out of Deion to rely on him with starter level minutes.
Lastly, that 7-1 "run" w as during the softest part of our conference schedule. Folks can debate it all they want but it's incredibly unanalytical to confuse correlation with causality.
Again, it's irrelevant with ano gone, but there's too little offense out of Deion to rely on him with starter level minutes.
Lastly, that 7-1 "run" w as during the softest part of our conference schedule. Folks can debate it all they want but it's incredibly unanalytical to confuse correlation with causality.
I disagree. I get up every morning. The sun rises every morning. Therefore me getting up causes the sun to rise.
I knew it! And now I can prove.
I find it funny how you talk about how bad you thought ANO was on offense, and then say we will be ok because we have DT to replace him. Unfortunately DT was one of the worst offensive players in the A10 last season (7th worst according to kenpom) whereas ANO was well within the top half of A10 players offensively.
Also, the stats are in for our offensive performance with vs without ANO, we were better with him last year in terms of points scored per possession (1.06 vs 1.01). The difference is equivalent to ~4 points per game given our usual pace. It really can't be much clearer, we were measurably worse on offense without ANO.
Again, the 7-1 run was due to playing weak teams, not because we were better without ANO. We were actually worse on both offense and defense without him, luckily we didn't need him to beat bad some teams and sneak in some wins against good teams. Unfortunately we couldn't avoid our worst loss of the season when ANO was out, we would have been 8-0 with ANO.
Last edited:
like everyone, I hope DT is awesome this year. to me, there's no question ANO was better than DT last year. the improvement this year is that they can't be on the floor together now!
DT will be strong defensively, and hopefully he'll get to the rim. I'd love to see him make shots but at this point I'm not counting on that. I hope to be surprised. we can be very good offensively with ANO or DT ... but not both. that problem had been solved.
DT will be strong defensively, and hopefully he'll get to the rim. I'd love to see him make shots but at this point I'm not counting on that. I hope to be surprised. we can be very good offensively with ANO or DT ... but not both. that problem had been solved.
I think you are about to hear from 2011 about how good ANO was offensively. And I think the two sides that disagree are looking at different aspects. ANO may not have tried to be offensive often enough, may not have been able to get open often enough, and may have missed obvious chances to get open. (So people say he was bad) But when he did try to be offensive he was pretty successful at it. (that is why many advanced stats say he was good).
I think this is similar to the with and without ANO debate. The players seemed to be more confident in their positioning on both offense & defense without him. As well as crisper and more confident in passing. But...
Less efficient in finishing both offensive & defensive plays.
So observation says better without, stats say better with.
I think both could change and evolve, getting better either way. And we will see one of those ways this year.
I think for me it looked for his low post offense never was enough practice but maybe I am wrong . I hope he has a good experience in Pittsburgh because I have family there and it is a good city with much pierogees!! I think this year is a very good chanced for our team.
The last 8 games of our schedule was not the softest part of our schedule. Towards the end of our OOC schedule, we played an 8 game stretch with average RPI of 175. We went 5-3 during that stretch (with ANO). The last 8 games the average RPI was 152, when we went 7-1.
We also had 3 of our 5 best RPI victories during that last stretch, including a top 100 road win, a top 100 home win, and a top 20 home win. We also had 3 of our grand total of 4 road wins during that stretch, including back to back wins over UMass and St. Joes. The last 8 games was not our toughest stretch of the year, but it was certainly not "soft".
And no correlation does not always imply causality. I don't doubt there were a multitude of factors that led to our great closing stretch, but to just discount ANO's injury as not being a factor, lacks scientific rigor as well.
I suppose that we are just going to disagree on this issue. It is a good debate.
We also had 3 of our 5 best RPI victories during that last stretch, including a top 100 road win, a top 100 home win, and a top 20 home win. We also had 3 of our grand total of 4 road wins during that stretch, including back to back wins over UMass and St. Joes. The last 8 games was not our toughest stretch of the year, but it was certainly not "soft".
And no correlation does not always imply causality. I don't doubt there were a multitude of factors that led to our great closing stretch, but to just discount ANO's injury as not being a factor, lacks scientific rigor as well.
I suppose that we are just going to disagree on this issue. It is a good debate.
Last edited:
No harm in speculating about ANO in perpetuity..... and for those that want to, have at it,,,,,,,but the future is with our current roster and they hold much more interest to me.
The Kneepad Warrior aka Boss McKinney was severely underrated. Had he gone to Pittsburgh he would have grown a Bill Cowher Pitt-Stache and it would have drowned his opponents in pure furry awesomeness. In a game against Syracuse at the very moment the stach found the fresh pate of Derrick Coleman looking like a racist toupee Bill Rafferty would have said, "Man to Moustache." Raft would have also said "Send it in Ja-son" when one of his free throws broke a backboard in a national televised game against God Shammgod and Providence. God, would say, "I may be named God twice and Sham once, but today I gazed on the face of a true God... God jumps when he shoots his free throws and his free throws break backboards" in reference to the "Devourer of Beer Cans" McKinney.
Rafferty would also often remark, "Onions!" but that would only be in reference to the pungent aroma of the Pitt-Stach in passing.
Non sequitur? Maybe. But as relevant as 90% of this thread? Probably.
Sorry it didn't work out fully with ANO. Chad Varga did quite well at PIttsburgh after leaving us. Hope ANO does too but certainly won't be tracking him to see if he does. Maybe we can start some more threads about other former players and debate their merits too? Adam Mobley? Jeremy Metzger? Marseilles Brown? Pat O'Malley?
Rafferty would also often remark, "Onions!" but that would only be in reference to the pungent aroma of the Pitt-Stach in passing.
Non sequitur? Maybe. But as relevant as 90% of this thread? Probably.
Sorry it didn't work out fully with ANO. Chad Varga did quite well at PIttsburgh after leaving us. Hope ANO does too but certainly won't be tracking him to see if he does. Maybe we can start some more threads about other former players and debate their merits too? Adam Mobley? Jeremy Metzger? Marseilles Brown? Pat O'Malley?
What about Damon Bacote, and William Herndon, and Gravelle Craig?
Charles Stephens? Andres Sandoval? Brian Morris? Luke Piotrowski? TJ Paterick? Courtney Nelson? David Brewster? That one-time UVA recruit who never actually suited up for us?
This quote from Ododa suggests that we did not really get tough in practice, nor focus on rebounding (not a big shock on the latter):
“The competition has been really tough, really different compared to Richmond where I came from,” Nelson-Ododa said. “It has been really tough but I am finally getting used to it. We really emphasize defense and rebounding and that is really different from Richmond as well as the overall toughness.”
“The competition has been really tough, really different compared to Richmond where I came from,” Nelson-Ododa said. “It has been really tough but I am finally getting used to it. We really emphasize defense and rebounding and that is really different from Richmond as well as the overall toughness.”
Similar threads
