Here we are 5 games into Season 69. Marian is sitting at 4-1. Marian can be found
here.
Without digging too deeply into each player, with my A- prestige I was able to get much better players. Not the ones I really wanted, but much better.
Henry Latimore |
Fr. |
PF |
63 |
27 |
32 |
58 |
14 |
33 |
12 |
12 |
37 |
60 |
61 |
29 |
C+ |
438 |
Joseph Stroble |
Fr. |
PF |
53 |
26 |
51 |
47 |
41 |
29 |
11 |
28 |
14 |
46 |
70 |
44 |
C |
460 |
Philip Fisher |
Fr. |
SG |
44 |
33 |
10 |
59 |
1 |
28 |
60 |
33 |
13 |
65 |
56 |
55 |
C+ |
457 |
Jack Smith |
Fr. |
PG |
39 |
63 |
1 |
23 |
1 |
10 |
59 |
34 |
47 |
37 |
71 |
69 |
C+ |
454 |
Samuel Barth |
Fr. |
PG |
46 |
70 |
14 |
38 |
1 |
14 |
18 |
50 |
46 |
37 |
83 |
34 |
B- |
451 |
Milton Ray |
Fr. |
SG |
40 |
42 |
8 |
44 |
1 |
1 |
59 |
51 |
32 |
54 |
81 |
47 |
C+ |
460 |
I'm pretty excited because this squad's potentials are much better. The starting D rating is much better. All the G will be 70 PER. I missed out on the BH/P to get the stamina and D I wanted. I won't ramble on about these guys like I have in the past seasons. Point is, for my FB/Press team, stam and D, and ath are much improved. The team isn't very fast, which is a problem, but Wooden recruiting is like that, as we all know. Can't get what we really want most of the time. One can see the step up in recruit though. Compare my two bigs for example:
Stephen Arcuri |
Sr. |
PF |
40 |
21 |
70 |
47 |
55 |
54 |
9 |
10 |
22 |
52 |
76 |
74 |
C |
530 |
Joseph Stroble |
Fr. |
PF |
53 |
26 |
51 |
47 |
41 |
29 |
11 |
28 |
14 |
46 |
70 |
44 |
C |
460 |
Stroble, the freshman, is better Ath/Spd/D, probably the same in every other category except for rebounding. And he'll be a better bh/p guy, which is great for FB/p. But I lost in rebounding. I couldn't find any I liked and will really have to look hard next season.
Game 1: at Bowdoin (SimAI) 53-101 W
After 5 games, Bowdoin is 465 rated and 1-4. This isn't a very good team. I'm not sure why I scheduled it except maybe I thought I needed wins with half my team graduated. I didn't really gameplan, I just set my distribution as usual. I hold them to .304 shooting. Stroble pulls in 11 boards in his opening game as starting freshman PF. Freshman Sam Barth, he of the 18 per, 14 lp goes off for 15. Moore gunboats 22 off the bench.
Game 2: Elizabethtown (tuhoopsmf1) 61-68 W
I'm favored by 1 in the game. Elizabethtown is 537 rated currently to my 503. Closer inspection shows their class breakdown as pretty even, so there's not a huge IQ advantage there. I'm aided by the fact they run a combo D. Ath/S/D ratings are comparable. They are a below average team in Stam, and bad FT shooters. Ratings wise that is, on the year they are shooting .769. Go figure. They lead until halfway thru the second half. I personally believe stam became an issue at that point when I tie it up at the 11:16 mark. They are more tired than my squad, some players being in the red for the good 10 minutes left of the game. My guys are fairly fresh. I outscore them the rest of the way. I win by 7 despite shooting .615 from the line. They shoot .800 from the line. Go figure again.
Game 3: Redlands (trentonjoe) 92-70 L
Redlands is 558 rated, 62/44/58 with good team stam at 75. He's got a lot of rebounders. The only weakness is he's not very good in BH/P which press can exploit. However, I give myself 10% in this game. I don't match up in any category. I'm +1 spread this game, but I don't expect it to be that close, and it isn't. They shoot a whopping .620 against me. I'm outrebounded, and have 10assist, 21 TO and 33 personal fouls. Ouch.
Game 4: at Capital (sean_65) 87-58 W
Capital is 501 rated with a 30/44/28 big 3 rating, and 72 team stam, with C FT. I figure I'm about 70% on this game. I'm on the road, which can be bad, but there's so many holes to exploit in this game, it would be a true upset to lose this one. The spread is -4, but much like the Redlands game, I don't think its going to be that close, and it isn't. FR SG Barth has a field day, going off for 25 points. The team shoots .526, and forces Capital into a 8/26 assist/to day. Even after so many seasons, I'm learning about the engine still. Barth has horrid shooting ratings. Remember, neither LP or Per are even 20. He is however, 83 stam and 70 speed and a B FT shooter. He went up against and 61 speed, 17 D guard who's backup is a FR, with 51spd and 17 D. So I guess the fact he's playing slower, less athletic guys with horrible D, even his dismal shooting ratings work, because he's scoring 7ppg from the line, and he's reasonably fast and doesn't tire out.
Game 5: #6 William Paterson (ncw23) 82-84 W
The first real shocker of the season. I'm +13 this game. Frankly, two things won this game for me. Playing at home, and a curious coaching decision by Ncw23. I decide to go +1 despite WP not shooting 3's, mainly because their guards do so much scoring. He's got better REB than I do, but not so much I feared going +1. I feared the 35 points his G's would drop on me more. Team Ath/Spd/D ratings are comparable. Team stam is 73. They are 551 rated to my 503. Here's where it gets interesting. He only plays 9 guys despite having a full roster. I wondered if he's ghost shipping it and still winning games. Yet I check his schedule and see he's changed tempo and +/- every game. Curious.
The result? I'm up at the half by 5. He comes back in the second half. But he's running UPTEMPO. The strength of FB/Press is that you use your depth to beat up on other team's bench. So running uptempo really plays into my hands as, predictably, he starts running into stam issues. One guy fouls out, the other has 4 fouls. I'm up by 2 at the 7 minute mark, and he's got two guys in the orange and they play the rest of the game like that. The result? The last 3 minutes of the box score show the two guards turning the ball over 3 times and Jackson, who was in the yellow, probably moving into the orange at that point, clanking multiple shots and turning the ball over. Two key free throws by FR Stroble (he of the C rating) seal the win. (Hey, I'll take a bit of luck too.) I don't score after the :41 mark, but they don't either, which I fully place on fatigue.
They still shot .525 and out rebounded me. But I did force 22 turnovers, which was nice.
So Marian gets a big win. It also really helped I recruited guys not only with good D ratings, but they were already good (44 and 57 and such). If they were in the 30's while I waited all season for them to improve, I would be losing all these games for sure with all my freshman. I can really use this win, since the rest of my schedule is brutal. What was I thinking. The remaining teams are 20-5, with the "worst" of the bunch being Aejone's St. John's team. Ouch. I may lose the rest of my games in the non conference season.
At this point, Marian is 4-1, shooting .466, .719 from the line, getting outrebounded by one on the season, and 13/15 assist/to ratio. However, I'm only allowing .435 shooting, and 11/22 assist/to ratio. That will change with the next 5 games coming up. FR Sam Barth, of the 18 per rating, is leading the team in scoring at 14.2ppg and 48% shooting. I'll check back in 5 games from now when I'm 4-6.