I-P-on-UD

Question for ud fan, with all those talents, will ud make NCAA tournament this year?

Flyer75

Wow.....look at all these Xavier fans posting in the Dayton thread....you excluded of course Thor. Xudash, can you please post a 4 paragraph scolding to your fellow fans for posting in our thread? 4 xavier fans on the last page alone. (Fyi.....I could care less....)

On a side note, Weber St up Wed for Dayton.

xavierhoops

LOL.

Seriously man, 3 of the posts totaled 19 words.

And the first was not about Dayton, rather about the fascination with wins over below average BCS teams.

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Chris Mack in 3 years at Xavier has had twice the NCAA wins (4) of the entire Dayton coaching staff in the modern era of NCAA basketball (2).

College Hoops

Five games certainly doesn't make the season, nor hopefully is this a trend, but UD is averaging more turnovers per game than they are assists.

AdamtheFlyer

Hoops, your post got me thinking about the early stats. I see a lot more good than bad.

They are averaging only 14.8 3PA per game, down significantly from 22 per game last year. They are making 40% from three, up from 34%.

Overall FG% is just shy of 49%, up from 43%.

Devin Oliver is shooting 51% and 30% from three. That's right where I hoped he would be. If that continues, he's in for a big, big year. Putting up 10 points and 8 boards per game early on.

Averaging 15 turnovers and 13 assists per game, 13 and 14 last year. I'm not sure I see a big problem there. You'd like to see the turnovers drop by a couple, but I don't think 15 is a number that will cripple them, and this team will likely not have as many assists as it did last year. They have more guys who can score without being dependent on a pass. Dillard, Sanford, Oliver, Benson, Robinson, and even Pierre can all create buckets on their own, be it off the dribble or an offensive board.

Kevin Dillard is shooting the ball much better early on (47% overall, 44% from 3), which seems to be a product of not having to do everything. Having Price and Sanford has allowed Dillard to play off the ball a lot more in the half court, freeing him to come off screens for open jumpers and better lanes to attack the rim. It also helps having capable players at every position, meaning only 1 or 2 sets of eyeballs are following his every move, not all 9 other sets on the floor. Having teammates who are not watching to see what KD is doing is pulling opponents eyes away from Dillard. He's playing like the A10 POY threat we knew he could/would be.

The best thing I see is the number of free throws attempted. Last year they averaged 18 attempts per game (and only 14 through 5 games). So far, they are averaging nearly 22, and as the team evolves that number could go up a bit. If that continues, this team will win a lot of games. I have said it over and over, getting to the line is actually more important than making a high percentage. Last year they shot 78%, this year they are at 70% thus far, and I think that is more likely to rise than drop. I'll take a slightly lower percentage if it means significantly more attempts. Keep getting to the line and the wins will follow.

These numbers will probably change going forward. I doubt they shoot 40% from three all year, but they can do 37%. I think they can top 45% overall, too. I think if the free throw attempts stay high and the three point attempts stay low, this team will be very, very good offensively.

I don't worry about the defense too much. They'll be ok. They have a couple of good defenders, but overall this is not a great defensive roster. The offense is good enough, the defense just has to be decent. I think it will be.

I like what I see.

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Sure, I've been called a xenophobe, but the truth is, I'm not. I honestly just feel that America is the best country and the other countries aren't as good. That used to be called patriotism.

TheCobra

Good post AdamtheFlyer. Agree with everything you said and agree that we have a bunch of guys that can draw fouls on this team. Dillard, Oliver, Benson and Robinson will get to the line a ton. Devon Scott has shot a lot of FTs in limited minutes as well. My only concern is these guys are not as good of free throw shooters as last year's bunch. There is often a negative correlation between "ability to draw foul shot attempts" and "ability to make foul shots."

In other news, it is hilarious that Xavierhoops would be the one to respond to a UD fan stealing his line of: "no, you are more obsessed with us because you spend more time talking about us than we spend talking about you." He's managed to minimize the value of the Xavier fans' posts on this thread because of the number of words used and because the first post wasn't about Dayton, but instead about a widely-held critique of Dayton fans by Xavier fans (how is this not about Dayton?). I'm convinced that there is more trash talk about trash talk than there is regular trash talk in this rivalry. And here I am talking trash about talking trash about trash talk.

So Xavierhoops, what the hell is the deal with Brad Redford's hair? He's letting his soul glow, and he looks like an idiot. No matter his hair do, Redford is going to have a hard time getting on the court against UD this year. Mack might just have to sneak him on the court every time Khari Price gives Dillard a breather, because he is the only player Redford has a chance of guarding. Sanford, Pierre and Oliver are way too big, strong and athletic.

xavierhoops

Cobra, I'd be happy to respond to your post, but I have no idea what you're trying to say. I re-read it a few times.

Oh, and sorry, I won't be able to satisfy your burning to desire to know more about Brad Redford's hair.

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Chris Mack in 3 years at Xavier has had twice the NCAA wins (4) of the entire Dayton coaching staff in the modern era of NCAA basketball (2).

FlyingElvis

Is Brad Redford balding? I thought last time I saw him on TV he had a circle of thinning hair on top. I'm not sure if I picked that up correctly.

As for the Flyers and assists, I think Adam is right. We have a lot of guys who create for themselves off the bounce this year. That's very different from last year where we had a lot of spot up shooters waiting for Dillard to create and dish. Of course, we still need him to be a great player, but we are much, much less reliant on him to create offense for everyone else on the team.

I'm very happy with our two starting guards. Both Dillard and Sanford are hard to stop offensively (and both can really shoot free throws which is big for end-of-game situations). Oliver suprises me with his tenacity rebounding and overall play. Pierre is having a very good freshman year. I love what Robinson brings inside.

Right now, all I can say is that our team is solid. I don't see any strengths or weaknesses that stand out. I don't see a "book" on how to gameplan against us. We are balanced but not spectacular in any one area. Outside of Colorado, we have not really run into a big challenge on our schedule. Not a lot about our true quality or lack of has been revealed yet, IMO.

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"US Bank Arena can't be that bad"

TheCobra

I don't know what to tell you.

Muddy Waters

Wrong.

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Wrong again, Adam.

My Post # 8 (copied below in its entirety) is unedited, and I neither stated nor implied anything about the 'accuracy' or otherwise of the RPI Rankings at this point or at any other point in the season – as you are already aware.

If you disagree with something that I actually post, either quote my post or STFU – it’s that simple.

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For those of you interested, I posted yesterday’s RPI Rankings for three reasons:

(1) To provide an early-season snapshot of the RPI Rankings for Atlantic 10 teams as a 'starting point' which can later be compared to future RPI Rankings.

(2) In order to demonstrate this early-season volatility of the RPI Rankings. I deliberately chose yesterday’s RPI Rankings as my first data point because no Atlantic 10 team played a Division I opponent yesterday. Therefore, this morning’s RPI Rankings show the changes in the RPI Rankings caused by a relatively small number of games played last night by teams that are not in the Atlantic 10. Note that there are 347 Division I teams this season.

(3) To provide a snapshot of Dayton’s RPI Ranking before the Flyers play RPI # 347 Weber State, RPI # 304 Northern Illinois, and at RPI # 24 Alabama (in order to demonstrate the effects of opponents' RPI Rankings on Dayton's RPI Ranking early in the season).

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Atlantic 10 RPI Rankings - Updated November 28, 2012

It is also interesting that idle St. Joseph’s RPI Ranking dropped from # 39 to # 66 last night. Very volatile.

However, as everyone already knows, the RPI Rankings in November, December, January, and early February are not necessarily indicative of the mid-March RPI Rankings.


BTW, the topic of this thread is 2012-2013 Dayton Flyers.

If any of you want to moan about RPI Rankings or people who post them, start a new thread for it.

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xu95

Powerhouse Colorado took 2 overtimes yesterday to get past 1-6 Texas Southern.

Muddy Waters

. . . and Colorado's RPI Ranking dropped from # 2 to # 4.

Cause for concern ?

Not at all, but thank you for your interest and your on-topic contribution to this thead.

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xu95

Yes, because as you so eloquently mentioned earlier, the RPI means nothing at this point. Thanks for agreeing with all of us yesterday.

xavierhoops

Haha. Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.

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Chris Mack in 3 years at Xavier has had twice the NCAA wins (4) of the entire Dayton coaching staff in the modern era of NCAA basketball (2).

College Hoops

Adam, I pretty much agree with what you posted. The only two exceptions I take are 1) hitting a high percentage in the last three or minutes of a game: 2) which is usually tied to number one is hitting a high percentage of your foul shots on the front end of a one and one. Irregardless of which team you root for, I think everyone rues the games that might have been lost because players missed a number of free throws on the front end of one and ones.