Keeping an eye on the national rankings

[kochrab]

It's incredibly easy to give up after two loses like we've had. Should we have won last night? Sure. SIU is going to be an incredible team in the future and played out of their minds last night. However, the determination this team has in also incredible. They want to win, they want to get deep into the NCAA this year. The players want this more than we do. If we lost to UE, sure, I'd be flipping out. Let's not jump ship on everything just yet.

[UNIAlum2010]

Erik Haslem still have us as the first 10 seed after last night. Which means he believes we have the 37th best resume right now.

https://twitter.com/haslametrics/sta...53538381033473

[BCPanther]

We can still take two losses in the regular season and a loss on Sunday and get in. Belmont got in at 26-5 and didn't have a win anywhere near as good as Colorado or South Carolina.

Belmont's best win was at UCLA. Losses to Green Bay, Jacksonville State (x2), Purdue, Murray State. That's 2 quad 3 and a quad 4 loss. NET and KenPom were both 48 and the OVC was the 19th ranked conference and was basically all quad 4 games.

Easy to overreact in the moment, I'm as guilty as anyone, but we're fine.

[uni1988]

Let's just stop with this Top 25 sh*t. This team is not good enough. Getting beat by Southern Illinois... F**king SAD.

[GoPanthers85]

I found a nice article about AJ.

https://www.midmajormadness.com/2020...-talking-about

[UNI Ka-Bullseye]

Let's keep winning and seeing more articles like this...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/nca...ess/ar-BBZbd8S

Thanks for sharing. I like the acknowledgment of the questionable call vs. WVU.

[Wxcpanther]

I will be there and bringing two other with me! I haven't been to a game in quite a while with attendance over 5k.

Best we have had this year was 4700, senior day last year we had 5500 I believe

[CyCarp]

Let's keep winning and seeing more articles like this...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/ncaabk/five-teams-that-could-become-cinderella-stories-in-march-madness/ar-BBZbd8S

[unipanther2154]

I'll also be making the trip up. its been a disappointing year for me with being able to attend games with a new job just before the season started. This will only be my 2nd game of the year. getting season tickets was a bit of a mistake with how things worked out.

[GoPanthers85]

If this crowd doesn't top 5k I will be really disappointed

I will be there and bringing two other with me! I haven't been to a game in quite a while with attendance over 5k.

[Wxcpanther]

I expect a huge crowd Sunday. No NFL and a team knocking on Top 25 door.

If this crowd doesn't top 5k I will be really disappointed

[run&blade]

I expect a huge crowd Sunday. No NFL and a team knocking on Top 25 door.

[clenz]

I don't follow MVCFans.com - what is the criticism of AJ's defense? In my eyes, he's made a nice improvement defensively since last year. I think the biggest way he can contribute on defense is by not getting into foul trouble - he's much too valuable to the team on offense to have him sitting out the last 8-9 minutes of a half because he got 3 sloppy fouls.

He's the worst defender in the league. Makes James Hardin look like Bruce Bowen in his prime

[hediondo19]

I have been thinking about how we are so good offensively (5th) and yet not so much defensively (125th). (I’m posting here because the offensive efficiency is largely due to AJ.) And how AJ has been criticized for his defense (at mvcfans.com) - and I thought, I think he’s as good as Spencer was as a sophomore. Then it occurred to me that we have a lot guys who are relatively young in Coach Jake’s system. Here are the Year, years playing, player, the playing time %:

I don't follow MVCFans.com - what is the criticism of AJ's defense? In my eyes, he's made a nice improvement defensively since last year. I think the biggest way he can contribute on defense is by not getting into foul trouble - he's much too valuable to the team on offense to have him sitting out the last 8-9 minutes of a half because he got 3 sloppy fouls.

[sivert]

I have been thinking about how we are so good offensively (5th) and yet not so much defensively (125th). (I’m posting here because the offensive efficiency is largely due to AJ.) And how AJ has been criticized for his defense (at mvcfans.com) - and I thought, I think he’s as good as Spencer was as a sophomore. Then it occurred to me that we have a lot guys who are relatively young in Coach Jake’s system. Here are the Year, years playing, player, the playing time %:

So 1.5 AJ Green 88%
Sr 3.5 Isaiah Brown 81% (32 min/gm)
Jr 1.5 Trae Berhow 78.6%
Jr 1.5 Austin Phyfe 65.1%
Sr 3.5 Spencer Haldeman 63.6%
Jr 3 Tywhon Pickford 53.3%
Sr 1 Justin Dahl 26.7%
Fr 0.5 Noah Carter 18.3%
Fr 0.5 Antwan Kimmons 17.5%
Fr 0.25 James Betz 6.8%

Isaiah has been in system 4 years and is clearly our lock down defender. Spencer also has been playing four years, but isn’t really a lock down guy.
Pickford was hurt last year, so he’s like a sophomore in experience. Same with Phyfe.
Trae is a transfer (2nd year)

Bottom line: About 145 of our 200 minutes are played by guys who have only been active on the floor for 1 or 2 seasons.