Vader's Louisville Post game

[Vader_Storm]

Game Ball



Odukale- Let’s just say this in simple and clear language. Femi Odukale, was by far, the best player on the court on both ends of the floor, and it was not remotely close. 16 points on 7-15 shooting, 3 boards, 3 steals, 1 assist. For all the 3 pointers and midrange shots Femi hit abusing Carlik Jones on offense, it was more impressive what he did on defense as Jones had significant trouble against Femi’s height and length the second Femi took the floor. As Jones play suffered, so did the Louisville offense when our team roared back in the first half. Odukale had a DRTG defensive power rating of 93, best on the team. Femi’s steal rate is still twice as high as anyone else on the roster for the entire season. His defense is far, far ahead of most freshmen. Typical NYC toughness…



Game Ball Assist

Big John- I thought this was a pretty darn solid effort by the freshmen here. In 24 minutes, 7 points on 3-8 shooting, 7 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, zero turnovers. I thought his defense was respectable and he finished with a DRTG defensive power rating of 96, 2nd best on the team behind Femi in this game. I still think the coaching staff needs to do a better job with John in the offense. Id like to see him pulled away from the basket a bit more to utilize his passing as we are starting to get 1 assist per game from him. Key Stat: In Hugley’s last 6 games, he has 4 total turnovers. This is a remarkable turnaround here as opposed to his first game against St. Francis where he had 4 turnovers alone in 1 game. His rebound rates of OR-12 DR-18 are still very solid for a freshmen. He is getting better game by game on both ends.



Team Defense

For not having the teams best on ball defender in Toney or the teams top rebounder in Champ, we held our own. We finished with a team DRTG defensive rating of 92 and forced 17 turnovers which is respectable. While Louisville did shoot 47% from the field and 20% from 3, we still did a pretty good job here given the circumstances including not even having our head coach. I have 2 significant gripes with the defense. Xavier Johnson has to be better as an upperclassman. In the very first possession for Louisville, Johnson was effortless trying to get through a simple screen. He had more than enough time to recover on Jones and close the shooter, but he was again “lazy” and stood there watching as Jones nailed a wide open 3. He was lazy and it continues to happen with him on defense. William Jeffress also needs to be more aware of closing shooters. Its becoming a trend to where he is giving way too much space on 3-point shooters and is consistently getting burned because of it. He needs to understand this isn’t high school and cannot be giving the amount of space he is giving from 3. This is a simple learning adjustment that needs to be addressed by the coaches. He’ll learn from it.



Team Rebounding

This game was lost on the glass. We were outrebounded by 19. Noah Collier played 27 minutes and grabbed 2 rebounds. Coulibaly played 15 minutes and grabbed 0 rebounds. Brown played 4 minutes and was a net negative in every aspect of the game including 0 rebounds. Had we switched out Noah for Toney or for Champ even without our Coach, it would have made a big difference to possibly winning the game. Noah’s defense was ok and his rebounding was way below what we need to be a full-time starter. He isn’t anywhere near ready for this role and needs an offseason to get much stronger which is what I said for well over a year. Getting Toney back who is still the best player on the team on both ends of the floor will be a huge lift in the future.



Quick Thoughts



Gerald Drumgoole had 2 turnovers in 5 minutes of time. He was on thin ice before this game…



Femi Odukale was 0-4 from the line and is shooting 38% from the free throw line for the season. This trend will NOT continue long term and I guarantee it. Femi was an 82% foul shooter last year and was having games where he was making over 10 free throws per game last year making them with ease. This isn’t an “if” he gets substantially better from the line, it’s a when. With that said the team free thrown shooting is a huge concern as I said multiple times previously. We shot 42% from the line against Louisville, continue to miss the front end of 1 and 1’s, and our team free throw shooting is simply poor. We were 8-19 as a team from the line. That is bad where we easily could have tightened this game up with better free throw shooting



Xavier Johnson the last 2 games has played a total of 22 minutes and 21 minutes. He has 3 assists and 8 turnovers in these games and is shooting 35% from the floor in these games. His usage rate is WAY to high. I said this repeatedly in the offseason to cut down his usage rate and get the ball away from him more and that was with a usage rate at 25. Johnson’s usage rate the last 2 games were 33.8 and 33.7. This is pitiful ball dominance when he is in the game. The best thing for the team is for Femi to continue to develop, heal his broken arm, gain strength, and earn more playing time with better offensive play to take Johnson away from the ball. Johnson has always been inconsistent, but as an upperclassman, he simply has to be better than this on both ends. Johnson’s laziness on defense is simply inexcusable.



Player by player comparison

AKC on defense as a sophomore through 7 games- 88 DRTG (lower number is better)

Gary Mcghee on defense as a senior on a 1 seed- 90.9 DRTG



AKC is shooting the ball at 63% for the season and has 3 total turnovers in 7 whole games. Like Ive said multiple times in the past, it would be a really, really, really, wise idea to give him the ball quite a bit more on offense. AKC still continues to average 1 assist per game. Through 7 games AKC has more assists than Brown had all of last year combined. To put it simply, Brown should watch the rest of the season as he is so far behind AKC and Hugley it’s not worth talking about. And AKC needs to cut the fouls down. He is far to valuable on defense to our team and could be much more valuable on offense if we actually used him more. We badly need AKC's 7 foot wingspan on defense.



We need more contributions on offense from Horton and Sibande. Horton did some decent things off dribble penetration the last 2 ACC games, either scoring at the rim or dishing outside for an assist in transition. I think Horton needs to be more aggressive on offense and stop watching Johnson and deferring to Xavier Johnson all game long. This happened last year when Toney deferred the entire first half of the season with a low usage rate then started commanding the ball the last 15 games of the season being our go to guy on offense at seasons end. Horton and AKC need to be more selfish here. Both their usage rates are low and both are capable to bring more to the table on offense.



5-2, get Toney back soon and much better days are ahead… Happy Holidays to you all...

 

[9nationalchampionships]

There were some positives even in the face of a loss. Losing your 2 best players is hard for any team to overcome and Lou recruits on a national level.

 

[wbrpanther]

Game Ball



Odukale- Let’s just say this in simple and clear language. Femi Odukale, was by far, the best player on the court on both ends of the floor, and it was not remotely close. 16 points on 7-15 shooting, 3 boards, 3 steals, 1 assist. For all the 3 pointers and midrange shots Femi hit abusing Carlik Jones on offense, it was more impressive what he did on defense as Jones had significant trouble against Femi’s height and length the second Femi took the floor. As Jones play suffered, so did the Louisville offense when our team roared back in the first half. Odukale had a DRTG defensive power rating of 93, best on the team. Femi’s steal rate is still twice as high as anyone else on the roster for the entire season. His defense is far, far ahead of most freshmen. Typical NYC toughness…



Game Ball Assist

Big John- I thought this was a pretty darn solid effort by the freshmen here. In 24 minutes, 7 points on 3-8 shooting, 7 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, zero turnovers. I thought his defense was respectable and he finished with a DRTG defensive power rating of 96, 2nd best on the team behind Femi in this game. I still think the coaching staff needs to do a better job with John in the offense. Id like to see him pulled away from the basket a bit more to utilize his passing as we are starting to get 1 assist per game from him. Key Stat: In Hugley’s last 6 games, he has 4 total turnovers. This is a remarkable turnaround here as opposed to his first game against St. Francis where he had 4 turnovers alone in 1 game. His rebound rates of OR-12 DR-18 are still very solid for a freshmen. He is getting better game by game on both ends.



Team Defense

For not having the teams best on ball defender in Toney or the teams top rebounder in Champ, we held our own. We finished with a team DRTG defensive rating of 92 and forced 17 turnovers which is respectable. While Louisville did shoot 47% from the field and 20% from 3, we still did a pretty good job here given the circumstances including not even having our head coach. I have 2 significant gripes with the defense. Xavier Johnson has to be better as an upperclassman. In the very first possession for Louisville, Johnson was effortless trying to get through a simple screen. He had more than enough time to recover on Jones and close the shooter, but he was again “lazy” and stood there watching as Jones nailed a wide open 3. He was lazy and it continues to happen with him on defense. William Jeffress also needs to be more aware of closing shooters. Its becoming a trend to where he is giving way too much space on 3-point shooters and is consistently getting burned because of it. He needs to understand this isn’t high school and cannot be giving the amount of space he is giving from 3. This is a simple learning adjustment that needs to be addressed by the coaches. He’ll learn from it.



Team Rebounding

This game was lost on the glass. We were outrebounded by 19. Noah Collier played 27 minutes and grabbed 2 rebounds. Coulibaly played 15 minutes and grabbed 0 rebounds. Brown played 4 minutes and was a net negative in every aspect of the game including 0 rebounds. Had we switched out Noah for Toney or for Champ even without our Coach, it would have made a big difference to possibly winning the game. Noah’s defense was ok and his rebounding was way below what we need to be a full-time starter. He isn’t anywhere near ready for this role and needs an offseason to get much stronger which is what I said for well over a year. Getting Toney back who is still the best player on the team on both ends of the floor will be a huge lift in the future.



Quick Thoughts



Gerald Drumgoole had 2 turnovers in 5 minutes of time. He was on thin ice before this game…



Femi Odukale was 0-4 from the line and is shooting 38% from the free throw line for the season. This trend will NOT continue long term and I guarantee it. Femi was an 82% foul shooter last year and was having games where he was making over 10 free throws per game last year making them with ease. This isn’t an “if” he gets substantially better from the line, it’s a when. With that said the team free thrown shooting is a huge concern as I said multiple times previously. We shot 42% from the line against Louisville, continue to miss the front end of 1 and 1’s, and our team free throw shooting is simply poor. We were 8-19 as a team from the line. That is bad where we easily could have tightened this game up with better free throw shooting



Xavier Johnson the last 2 games has played a total of 22 minutes and 21 minutes. He has 3 assists and 8 turnovers in these games and is shooting 35% from the floor in these games. His usage rate is WAY to high. I said this repeatedly in the offseason to cut down his usage rate and get the ball away from him more and that was with a usage rate at 25. Johnson’s usage rate the last 2 games were 33.8 and 33.7. This is pitiful ball dominance when he is in the game. The best thing for the team is for Femi to continue to develop, heal his broken arm, gain strength, and earn more playing time with better offensive play to take Johnson away from the ball. Johnson has always been inconsistent, but as an upperclassman, he simply has to be better than this on both ends. Johnson’s laziness on defense is simply inexcusable.



Player by player comparison

AKC on defense as a sophomore through 7 games- 88 DRTG (lower number is better)

Gary Mcghee on defense as a senior on a 1 seed- 90.9 DRTG



AKC is shooting the ball at 63% for the season and has 3 total turnovers in 7 whole games. Like Ive said multiple times in the past, it would be a really, really, really, wise idea to give him the ball quite a bit more on offense. AKC still continues to average 1 assist per game. Through 7 games AKC has more assists than Brown had all of last year combined. To put it simply, Brown should watch the rest of the season as he is so far behind AKC and Hugley it’s not worth talking about. And AKC needs to cut the fouls down. He is far to valuable on defense to our team and could be much more valuable on offense if we actually used him more. We badly need AKC's 7 foot wingspan on defense.



We need more contributions on offense from Horton and Sibande. Horton did some decent things off dribble penetration the last 2 ACC games, either scoring at the rim or dishing outside for an assist in transition. I think Horton needs to be more aggressive on offense and stop watching Johnson and deferring to Xavier Johnson all game long. This happened last year when Toney deferred the entire first half of the season with a low usage rate then started commanding the ball the last 15 games of the season being our go to guy on offense at seasons end. Horton and AKC need to be more selfish here. Both their usage rates are low and both are capable to bring more to the table on offense.



5-2, get Toney back soon and much better days are ahead… Happy Holidays to you all...

First half Femi and second half Femi were two different Femis offensively. To be expected from a freshman but he showed great promise.

 

[Ski11585]

Just after I tried to have a reasonable exchange with @BballinsiderfromPitt about rational analysis of the team, Vader has to go and compare AKC's defense through 7 games(!) against Gary's entire senior year having played in a pretty darn good BE.

*sigh*. That comparison is meaningless.

 

[BballinsiderfromPitt]

Just after I tried to have a reasonable exchange with @BballinsiderfromPitt about rational analysis of the team, Vader has to go and compare AKC's defense through 7 games(!) against Gary's entire senior year having played in a pretty darn good BE.

*sigh*. That comparison is meaningless.

This is why my takes seem so irrational. We twist every single metric to make these players look better than they are in one or two games.

he played 15 mins and had zero rebounds last night. Gary would’ve had 4 fall into his hands even when he sucked.

 

[Vader_Storm]

Just after I tried to have a reasonable exchange with @BballinsiderfromPitt about rational analysis of the team, Vader has to go and compare AKC's defense through 7 games(!) against Gary's entire senior year having played in a pretty darn good BE.

*sigh*. That comparison is meaningless.

It is all the data that we have so far and I post it every game.

And Pitt has played 3 Power 6 teams already including 2 on the road.

Here are the Pomeroy rankings of the teams we have played.

Louisville-31
Northwestern-56
Miami-67
Drexel-152
Gardner Webb-212
St. Francis-260
Northern Illinois-304

We are almost 30% into the season. Yea, the schedule will get significantly tougher. We also don't have a bunch of practice games against the Chicago State's with a 5 game non conference schedule. The data should be used "lightly" until we get 10+ games under our belt. But it can still be used.

 

[Ski11585]

It is all the data that we have so far and I post it every game.

And Pitt has played 3 Power 6 teams already including 2 on the road.

Here are the Pomeroy rankings of the teams we have played.

Louisville-31
Northwestern-56
Miami-67
Drexel-152
Gardner Webb-212
St. Francis-260
Northern Illinois-304

We are almost 30% into the season. Yea, the schedule will get significantly tougher. We also don't have a bunch of practice games against the Chicago State's with a 5 game non conference schedule. The data should be used "lightly" until we get 10+ games under our belt. But it can still be used.

I realize it's the only data we have to date. But you could have let AKC's DRTG stand on it's on and assessed his defensive performance solely in the context of what Pitt's faced so far. But comparing such a small sample size to Gary's full season just seems like an attempt to be overly positive.

 

[BballinsiderfromPitt]

I realize it's the only data we have to date. But you could have let AKC's DRTG stand on it's on and assessed his defensive performance solely in the context of what Pitt's faced so far. But comparing such a small sample size to Gary's full season just seems like an attempt to be overly positive.

💯

 

[Vader_Storm]

I realize it's the only data we have to date. But you could have let AKC's DRTG stand on it's on and assessed his defensive performance solely in the context of what Pitt's faced so far. But comparing such a small sample size to Gary's full season just seems like an attempt to be overly positive.

Here's our team defense DRTG by game

St. Francis- 111.5
Drexel- 104.8

Northern Illinois- 98.6

at Northwestern- 86.1
Gardner Webb- 68.5
at Miami- 74.5
Louisville- 92.9

See the improvement there? What happened the first game or the first 2 games of the season is nothing like the rest of the season as our defense has gotten much better both as a whole and individually.

We are without our teams 2 best players right now (and our coach) and our defense didnt collapse last game against Louisville or the game against Miami on the road. Like I said previously, the team defense is ranked 42nd in the country. In our last 4 games, we played much better than the 42nd ranked team defense in the country. The first game of the year is making our team defense look worse than it is. We had 4 freshmen play at minimum 12+ minutes last game. And the defense still held its ground and was respectable, not great, but respectable.

The last time Pitt had a Top 40 caliber defense was in 2014.

 

[CougarClaws]

Here's our team defense DRTG by game

St. Francis- 111.5
Drexel- 104.8

Northern Illinois- 98.6

at Northwestern- 86.1
Gardner Webb- 68.5
at Miami- 74.5
Louisville- 92.9

See the improvement there? What happened the first game or the first 2 games of the season is nothing like the rest of the season as our defense has gotten much better both as a whole and individually.

We are without our teams 2 best players right now (and our coach) and our defense didnt collapse last game against Louisville or the game against Miami on the road. Like I said previously, the team defense is ranked 42nd in the country. In our last 4 games, we played much better than the 42nd ranked team defense in the country. The first game of the year is making our team defense look worse than it is. We had 4 freshmen play at minimum 12+ minutes last game. And the defense still held its ground and was respectable, not great, but respectable.

The last time Pitt had a Top 40 caliber defense was in 2014.

You fill your Panther-Lair Coach Lasso roll extremely well. The relentlessly optimistic always have big critics.

 

[Vader_Storm]

You fill your Panther-Lair Coach Lasso roll extremely well. The relentlessly optimistic always have big critics.

I still think the biggest wildcard / enigma 7 games into the season is Ithiel Horton.

Here's what we got

ORTG- 98.8, not bad, not great, but good enough for an NCAA team for a rotation player
23 mpg
7.3points per game
1.7 assist per game
1.1 turnover per game

There is some pretty surprising stuff here. The first is the minutes per game which is much lower than I thought preseason. His ORTG is almost in line what I expected preseason, which was 100-110. His assist to turnover ratio has been the single biggest turnaround from the first 2 games of the year by any player on the team. In the last 5 games Horton has 10 assists and only 3 turnovers, which is fantastic ball control. His shooting percentage are lower than expected but those can change quickly on a game by game basis.

But here's the hidden stat and a very strange one.

Our team has made 45 three balls for the season. Of those 45 three balls, 39 have been assisted. Ithiel Horton has 11 assisted 3 balls this year, most on the team. Xavier Johnson has 7 assisted 3's and Johnson has attempted more 3 point shots than anyone on the entire team. Why is it, that our supposedly best shooter, is the one assisting everyone else from 3 and our point guard, who has been a below average shooter from 3 his entire career, doing all the shooting and not the assisting from 3.

There are some conclusions that the team cant shoot well and cant make wide open shots which have really hurt Femi's assist numbers and perhaps X. But it is very strange looking at this 7 games into the season that Horton is the main driver assisting the majority of our 3 balls. Horton has been good in transition finding the open shooters too.

I think better days are coming for Horton shooting, I really do. I also think X is the player that has to really step up, on both ends of the floor. And X really needs to have far less ball possession moving forward with more passing from him.

Happy Holidays Coug

 

[CougarClaws]

I still think the biggest wildcard / enigma 7 games into the season is Ithiel Horton.

Here's what we got

ORTG- 98.8, not bad, not great, but good enough for an NCAA team for a rotation player
23 mpg
7.3points per game
1.7 assist per game
1.1 turnover per game

There is some pretty surprising stuff here. The first is the minutes per game which is much lower than I thought preseason. His ORTG is almost in line what I expected preseason, which was 100-110. His assist to turnover ratio has been the single biggest turnaround from the first 2 games of the year by any player on the team. In the last 5 games Horton has 10 assists and only 3 turnovers, which is fantastic ball control. His shooting percentage are lower than expected but those can change quickly on a game by game basis.

But here's the hidden stat and a very strange one.

Our team has made 45 three balls for the season. Of those 45 three balls, 39 have been assisted. Ithiel Horton has 11 assisted 3 balls this year, most on the team. Xavier Johnson has 7 assisted 3's and Johnson has attempted more 3 point shots than anyone on the entire team. Why is it, that our supposedly best shooter, is the one assisting everyone else from 3 and our point guard, who has been a below average shooter from 3 his entire career, doing all the shooting and not the assisting from 3.

There are some conclusions that the team cant shoot well and cant make wide open shots which have really hurt Femi's assist numbers and perhaps X. But it is very strange looking at this 7 games into the season that Horton is the main driver assisting the majority of our 3 balls. Horton has been good in transition finding the open shooters too.

I think better days are coming for Horton shooting, I really do. I also think X is the player that has to really step up, on both ends of the floor. And X really needs to have far less ball possession moving forward with more passing from him.

Happy Holidays Coug

Same old same old with Xavier. I really like a couple of his games though, so we got that going for us.

Horton cleary has everything we need from him, except confidence. I expect him to be a player, but it might not happen this year.

And a happy Holidays to you.

 

[Joe the Panther Fan]

Our team has made 45 three balls for the season. Of those 45 three balls, 39 have been assisted. Ithiel Horton has 11 assisted 3 balls this year, most on the team. Xavier Johnson has 7 assisted 3's and Johnson has attempted more 3 point shots than anyone on the entire team. Why is it, that our supposedly best shooter, is the one assisting everyone else from 3 and our point guard, who has been a below average shooter from 3 his entire career, doing all the shooting and not the assisting from 3.

Well part of the reason why Johnson has shot more threes is that Johnson has played a lot more minutes. Horton shoots more threes per minute (although not by a whole lot), but Johnson plays more minutes.

And I think the second reason is pretty obvious. Johnson isn't and never has been a great three point shooter, but one thing that he has never lacked is confidence. When he gets an open opportunity to take a three he shoots it. Because he thinks they are all going to go in. Horton, on the other hand, has passed up numerous open three point chances, because he's stuck in a place where he doesn't think he's going to make them. The old cliche is that good shooters always forget about the last shot and only think about the next one. Well, Horton seeming can't stop thinking about the last one.

Shooters with no confidence look like, well, Ithiel Horton. Until that changes he's probably not going to shoot them that much more frequently.

 

[Fk_Pitt]

You fill your Panther-Lair Coach Lasso roll extremely well. The relentlessly optimistic always have big critics.

Never thought I’d see a Ted Lasso reference on these boards. Very well done.