Preseason analysis

We're among the top 25 teams in the nation in athleticism and defense and just missing from the list in speed. On the preseason rankings, we are among the others receiving votes and come in at No. 37 in the nation.

That's the good news. The bad news is I failed to pay attention to current ratings when doing recruiting, so my future guards with the high potential in passing that had low starting values. Well, they're weighing me down and I about screamed in terror when I saw my team passing rating at a 29. If Moore gets injured at the point or ends up being in perpetual foul trouble, this could go from being a minor rebuilding season to extremely painful in no time flat.

That said, I'm a pressing team, so the high athleticism-speed-defense trifecta will carry me in a lot of games more than the pass rating will hurt me. It's just that some of those games could be really, really ugly. The question is whether I should shift practice time into ball handling and passing in an effort to cover those weaknesses as quickly as possible or just let it ride and go with normal development. I'm starting the year going normal and reserving the right to panic and switch things up after the first handful of games.

Wittenberg is the class of the conference, ranked No. 4 preseason. That's two losses in conference play. Grove City (No. 39 preseason) will be tough as well and there are a couple other teams close enough that games could go either way in league play. I would imagine an 11-5 or 12-4 conference record at season's end. Less than 11 wins is underperformance in my opinion, more than 12 is stellar. The non-conference schedule should be fairly friendly, worse than 7-3 and it's time to panic, 10-0 is within the realm of consideration, 8-2 is what that voice in the back of my head is saying. That would put my estimate for the regular season at a 19-7 mark. We'll see where things go.

Kendall makes a poor career decision and balks at the redshirt. Burdick on the other hand, takes it happily. All minutes are thus being poured into BH and Passing with pretty much everything other than conditioning set to merely maintain values for this year. 

Unlike some coaches, I don't believe in the relentless offering/taking off/re-offering game with the redshirt UNLESS I have no other choices. Why waste two players -- the desired redshirt, who may never take it, and a second player, who might take it happily -- and harm your team by not playing either. Identify your redshirt after the two preseason games are done so you can proceed to setting your lineup and depth chart in the most advantageous way possible for the year ahead. 

And with a victory over Grove City, I am proud to celebrate Iba-world career victory No. 100.

Wooster finishes the regular season with an upset win over No. 10 Wittenberg to earn a share of the regular-season conference title with a 22-4 record, 15-1 in league play and a perfect 13-0 in the "Mose Hole." That's the good news. The bad news is I still might be relegated to the PIT unless I win the NCAC tournament because I did a hideous job of scheduling this season, although some of it isn't my fault as you can't really expect a team in the world's top conference to go ghost ship and suddenly pull in an amazing number of walk-ons when you schedule them. In any effect, a much more successful regular season than I expected, highlighted by a win over what I think is one of the 2-3 toughest teams in Iba D3 this season. We'll see where things go, but it looks like I'll either be an incredibly high NT seed or a strong contender to win the PIT. 

Wooster finishes the season 25-6 overall. After choking away a spot in the national tournament field with a loss to rival Oberlin in the second round of the conference tournament (our first game), the Fighting Scots run to the Final Four of the PIT before getting tripped up by Bard, 75-65. 

This year's team outscored opponents 73.7-60.4 each game (but somehow gave up 60 points in just the second half in that aforementioned loss to Oberlin...*grumbles*). We shot .448-.325-.677 compared to .399-.315-.714 for our opponents. We held a 36.5-34.3 rebounding edge in each game, forced 9.5 steals and 19.5 turnovers while giving the rock away just 14.5 times per night. We were whistled on average for 19.1 fouls per game. After years of complaining, I am finally happy with our production from three-point range this season. 

Junior Lucas Smart (12.5 ppg, 6.0 rpg) was a second-team all-conference selection at small forward, even though he was a full-time power forward for us this season. Smart had some truly monster games for us and we're excited that we'll have him for another year. Steven Nelson (9.5 ppg, 4.6 rpg) was a third-team selection at power forward, although he spent his time swinging between starting SF and backup PF through much of the year. He's a senior and will be missed. Honorable mention for all-conference went to seniors Raymond Moore and Derrick Reiner and sophomore Francis Davis

Reiner's story was a bit of a sad one. The senior in-state prospect finishes at the No. 10 spot on the school's all-time rebounding chart (702) and looked to be on his way to breaking the school record for blocked shots. He needed just five entering the conference tournament and got two of those in the loss to Oberlin. He then failed to block a shot during the first three rounds of the PIT and managed just one in the loss to Bard, thus finishing No. 2 all-time with 128 blocked shots. Raymond Moore will graduate No. 10 all-time for assists (338). 

In all, we graduate three seniors who accounted for 24.5 points and 14.9 rebounds per contest. We'll return two of our top three scorers this year in Smart and junior Carl Wilson (8.9 ppg). We lose a pair of big's and a heck of a point guard to graduation. It won't take a rocket scientist to figure out where at least two of our three open scholarships in the off-season will be going. 

Overall, I'm happy with this season. I was unable to extend my NT streak, although some of that was due to no fault of my own as my non-con contained a ghost ship team and a former human team that went Sim and carried five walk-ons. We did lack a quality win though until upsetting No. 10 Wittenberg in the final game of the regular season. The 25 wins though were way better than I envisioned in the preseason. I think it will be enough for me to hold onto my A- prestige at year's end, but a drop to B+ range won't completely floor me. Now I'll just sit back and see how the recruiting trail shapes up.