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Predict our A-10 game results

What will be interesting is that I think we have a chance to get off to a good start in A10 play.

The Bonnies will be a tough opener, but given the game is at home - that is a winnable game.
Then we get the @Loyola, Mason at home, and @ Duquesne. I picked us to go 2-2 in that stretch, but we could be 3-1 or 4-0 as that is not a tough opening round of games. If we go 4-0 - look out. Raises, extensions, bubble talk for NCAA tourney.
 
LOL. We've entered the part of the pre-game cycle where the folks that despise Mooney the most start talking themselves into a "we SHOULD win this game" and "we COULD start 4-0". Which of course leads to the inevitable, "Classic Mooney loss to a mediocre team" 5 minutes after the game ends.

Mooney has a tough time beating Mark Schmidt. We know this.
 
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This is a completely rebuilt Bona team. If we can't beat them at home this year don't know when we ever will. Gkiller outlined how we lose most of our scoring punch next season. We can't just keep kicking and kicking and kicking the can down the road. Or apparently we can and do. Oh well.
 
What will be interesting is that I think we have a chance to get off to a good start in A10 play.

The Bonnies will be a tough opener, but given the game is at home - that is a winnable game.
Then we get the @Loyola, Mason at home, and @ Duquesne. I picked us to go 2-2 in that stretch, but we could be 3-1 or 4-0 as that is not a tough opening round of games. If we go 4-0 - look out. Raises, extensions, bubble talk for NCAA tourney.
What happens if we go 0 and 4? Not suggesting we will, just wondering.
 
Correct. If we go 9-9 as many on here predict, we will be 17-14, which guess what will mean a .548 winning percentage. It will be the embodiment of Mooney, completely average, not bad enough to rouse Hardt out of his big luxurious perch to make a change, not nearly good enough to give even optimistic Spider fans hope for the future especially given who we lose. A perfectly mediocre Mooney season. At least Moondog will bank another cool 1.5 million to be completely average at his job.
 
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And of course it goes without saying that the main reason he is above .500 as a coach is because every year we have about 4-5 wins against teams ranked 250 or worse. Without those wins, he'd be staring at break-even or worse. I know, I know, most teams have games like that, but still.
 
Pin it and lets revisit at the end of the year. If I am off base with our 55% winning percentage, I will eat crow. If I'm on target though, maybe you will come around a bit that maybe this Mooney guy isn't much better than average.
 
Most people on this forum forecasts are for U of R to either be 500 in conference play or have a losing record. As a result, if the team ends up having a winning record it is an indication the coach staff did a great job.
 
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We were underdogs for all of our away games, but we did not lose them all. We beat UNLV. We also beat the spread on many of the away games. This helped us have a NET around a 100, which is not great, but pretty good.
we haven't won on the road. Neutral sights aren't road games
 
Most people forecasts are for U of R to either be 500 in conference play or having a losing record. As a result, if the team ends up having a winning record it is an indication the coach staff did a great job.
No, the season is not successful just because we finish better than 11th. What kind of attitude is that? We aren't evaluating the program based on how bad a bunch of writers thought we would be -- we are evaluating it on performance. Did we win a lot of games or not? Did we win the regular season or finish in the top four? Did we win the conference tournament? Did we make the NCAAs or NIT? Those are the metrics for evaluation, every single year.
 
No, the season is not successful just because we finish better than 11th. What kind of attitude is that?
It's a loser attitude, but it probably aligns very closely with the attitude in the Robins Center and UR administration.

We aren't evaluating the program based on how bad a bunch of writers thought we would be -- we are evaluating it on performance. Did we win a lot of games or not? Did we win the regular season or finish in the top four? Did we win the conference tournament? Did we make the NCAAs or NIT? Those are the metrics for evaluation, every single year.
Any serious A10 program doesn't base success on this, but I think UR does. They clearly don't care about A10 regular season or tournament championships, beating VCU, or NCAA tournament appearances. If they did, we wouldn't have a coach with such a terrible record in all these categories still as head coach for nearly 20 years. Your priorities are not the priorities at UR. It sucks, but it makes UR basketball a lot easier to understand and makes me not follow the program nearly as closely as I once did. Most of us on this board care more about winning than the school does. That's the reality.
 
Most people on this forum forecasts are for U of R to either be 500 in conference play or have a losing record. As a result, if the team ends up having a winning record it is an indication the coach staff did a great job.

It would just be the 3rd time in 13 seasons he's outperformed A10 expectations. Not sure what that means for the other 10.
 
I referred to away games as not at the Robin Center.

lol. It's an important distinction in all the metrics. For someone that follows & quotes Kenpom and SRS often it's hard to believe u wouldn't understand that distinction.
 
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This discussion just reiterates for me that I trust Hardt exactly zero percent if he had to make a hire.

And for those disparaging the 500 crowd, two points:

1. Most of us could not care who coaches UR to big winning %s, I’m just as happy if it was Moon bc he runs a clean program. We don’t care who, we just want to win more and play in far more ncaas.

2. But numbers don’t lie, so the sample size of 19 years - as well as the OOC results in the short term - suggest it is far more likely UR finishes around 500. It’s not negativity, it’s realism.
 
No, the season is not successful just because we finish better than 11th. What kind of attitude is that? We aren't evaluating the program based on how bad a bunch of writers thought we would be -- we are evaluating it on performance. Did we win a lot of games or not? Did we win the regular season or finish in the top four? Did we win the conference tournament? Did we make the NCAAs or NIT? Those are the metrics for evaluation, every single year.
Not to mention these writers love to spin zone losses into good things about the team and Mooney as well. O'Connor after the Florida loss, "Richmond falls to Florida by 11, but it was the best the spiders have played" if your team's best performance is a 11 point loss to a non ranked P5 team, then there's an issue.
 
It has happened once, in the 16-17 season where we actually started 5-0 believe it or not 😱
So we are 1) overdue to get it done a second time or 2) the probability is pretty slim based upon continuing results over time.
 
My goodness, this board sucks.
Aa has been mentioned before in a thread I am not going to search for, this board is one of the most active in the A10 as well as more active than many of UR’s opponents. Perhaps you picked the wrong description. You could say it is depressing or you could say that it was overly repetitive but it definitely does not “suck”. There are good posts on here and I wish other programs I follow had such a Forum.
 
I did a quick breakdowns in the losses and the decent wins. To me, the FT numbers are more reflective than the 3 point numbers in showing influence on the outcomes. In most of the losses, the other team shot a decent amount more FTs and UR's level of aggression did not match it, based on FTA. Couple that with the 3 point numbers and it shows that UR was both not getting to the line, nor outshooting the opponent from 3 in order to make up for the disparity.

I'm omitting results from the games vs the dregs of the OOC schedule since IMO the talent level was the most important factor in winning those, as opposed to other factors resulting in wins/losses vs more competitive competition.

FREE THROWS
  • BC shot 7 more FTs, made 9 more than UR. 7 point loss. Huge factor.
  • CU shot 14 more FTs, made 13 more than UR. 5 point loss. Huge factor
  • WSU shot 14 more FTs, made 9 more than UR. 12 point loss. (only 3 FTA by UR) Very big factor.
  • UR shot 3 more FTs made 5 more FTs than UNI. FTs NOT a huge factor in the loss. (UNI made 6 more 3s than UR. 5 point loss.)
  • UF shot 6 more FTs, made 9 more than UR. 11 point loss. Moderate Factor (very big if you only consider the makes.)
  • UNLV - UR shot 10 fts, UNLV 12. UNLV made 3 more. Blowout win. FTs not a factor in the outcome. (60/64 2 point/3point shooting splits for UR most important.)
  • Charlotte - Charlotte shot 12, UR shot 20 FTs. UR made 13, Charlotte 8 in a 8 point win. Big factor in UR's favor in the win. (again tho, the UR edge in makes aren't trending with the edge in attempts)
THREE POINTERS (percentages)
  • BC 39, UR 26
  • Colorado 30, UR 25,
  • Wichita 33, UR 30
  • N. Iowa 41, UR 33
  • Florida 31, UR 50
  • UNLV 28, UR 64
  • Charlotte 29, UR 17

Based on this, I think you can say 3 point shooting was a major factor in 2 games (one win and one loss), with it being a medium/high factor against BC (loss.) This does not account for 3 point volume in each game, only percentages (for instance, UR shot 3s much better than UF, but UF made 9, UR 11 - so the difference in 3s - UR +6 - was not as great in the score as the difference in FTs made was - UF +9.)

I think you could say FTs were a big/major factor in 5 games (1 win, 4 losses) and not a factor in 2 of those games (1 win, 1 loss.)

What I think the two points do say is that UR needs to be more aggressive on offense. Shooting above average from 3 in only 2/7 games against fair to good competition but only shooting more FTs than the opponent in 2/7 games shows that guys individually, and the offense as a system, need more aggression built in.

Getting to the FT line is so widely valued in the modern game because it is a skill that can be replicated and counted on for regular, easy points. King leads the team at 2.9 FTA per game (84%), Quinn is at 2.8. (64%), Dji 2.5 (45%!!!) and Bigs 2.2 (78%).

The aggression also is likely reflected in the rebounding numbers, but I'm keeping this to shooting numbers for now.
 
we knew going in that shooting was an issue with this team.
King's first game may have made us forget that though.
 
Well, Roche is not shooting terrible percentage - but has not been able to make them in the big games. Bigelow shooting 40% - which I think is better than expected. If nothing else I think we were expecting Noyes to provide a couple three's a game.
We could certainly use some 3s from Noyes, but I'm not sure he will get enough minutes to be a factor from 3, which means to be at our best, we will need Roche to be a big factor in some games this year. Dji has played well, and his play earned him the starting spot, but I expect there will be some games where we might not want high 20s minutes from him without a 3 point game. He is averaging 27 mpg, but attempts less than one 3 a game. Some games that might be fine, but others maybe not.
 
12-6

Vs SBU - W
@ LoyolaChicago - W
Vs GMU - W
@ Duquesne - W
@ Davidson - L
Vs GWU - W
Vs Dayton - W
@ Fordham - L
@ vcu - W
Vs LaSalle - W
Vs UMass - L
@ GWU - L
@ URI - W
Vs Davidson - W
@ StLouis - L
Vs vcu - W
Vs St Joe's - W
@ GMU - L
Hopefully my pick streak is over now!
 
Pin it and lets revisit at the end of the year. If I am off base with our 55% winning percentage, I will eat crow. If I'm on target though, maybe you will come around a bit that maybe this Mooney guy isn't much better than average.
There is lots of time left, but if I'm 4700, maybe I at least do some price checks on the current price of crow.
 
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