Here Kitty, Kitty, Kitty

In come the Bobcats of Ohio, as interesting a story as the MAC has.

First, they finished ninth in the MAC regular season, despite having some pretty solid players.  The found their stride, won the MAC tournament and went to the NCAA where they snapped a long MAC big dance losing streak and crushed a heavily favored Georgetown before losing in Round 2.

At that point, they were the super-sized favorites to win the East.

The off-season was not kind.  Armon Bassett left for the NBA Draft, was not drafted and averaged 2 points a game in the NCAA summer league.  Tuesday, the world learned he was arrested over last weekend for possession of marijuana.  Jay Kinney and Stevie Coleman were both dismissed from the team...they were each considered rising stars.

Still they were considered favorites to win the East.  Just not super-sized.

I don't know.  I'm not saying they won't win the East, because they could, but we probably were overrating them.  I mean, how do you look past a #9 finish with the players they had?

They are similarly underachieving this year.  They are 8-9 and 1-2 in the MAC.  They have won their only MAC road game (@Akron) and lost their home games--Kent and Miami.  To date, they have played the #89 schedule in the country, and have a nice win against Valparaiso at the Convo.  They also have a good win over Delaware, but they also have 5 wins against teams with an RPI over 200.

Amazingly for a MAC team, they played only two non-conference road games.  (2 were on a neutral floor).

Looking at the 4 factors, the game would appear to be pretty even.  Of course, OU's numbers were generated against better competition, but BG is also playing much better than they were when most of those numbers were generated.

NCAA Basketball

OU is playing good offensive basketball, at 1.03 PPP, but also giving points up at almost the same rate.  They play at almost the exact same pace as BG, which would not have been true last year.  They are not an especially good FG shooting team, but make up for it by being the best 3-FG shooting team in the MAC to date, presenting a key challenge to our perimeter defense.

They are 11th in the MAC in committing fouls and 11th in allowing free throw attempts.  Obviously, this is a great night for BG to get inside and convert some free throws.

Their biggest weakness in MAC play has been rebounding.  They were in the low 20s for offensive rebounding in both the Miami and Akron games while allowing their opponents 45% and 38%.  Then they allowed Kent to get 55% of the available offensive boards.  This presents a huge opportunity to BG's inside game to extend possessions and pick up some baskets near the the hoop.

As you can see, they are pretty solid in terms of not turning the ball over.  This has been how BG has won games this year, and it will be a great test to see if we can turn this team over.

The reason they don't turn the ball over much is their Point Guard, last year's Freshmen of the Year, DJ Cooper.  He has picked up right where he left off, 18 points and 8 assists per game, which is 3rd and 1st in the MAC, respectively (and 3rd in D1 in assists).  He is also first in A/T ratio.  Yeah, he takes a ton of shots, and his offensive efficiency rating is only 16th in the MAC, but he hits 3s, creates opportunities for other players, gets to the free throw line and gets steals on the defensive end.  And he's only a sophomore.  Heaven help the MAC if he does get better.

Their great 3-point shooting extends well beyond DJ Cooper.  Tommy Freeman hits 47% of his 3s, a total that most players would be happy with for all their FGs.  He' leads the MAC in 3-FG% and offensive efficiency and gets 82% of his points from beyond the arc.

Nick Kellogg has also hit 43% of his 3s.

On the inside, the big player is Sr. DeVaughn Washington, who is getting 10 points and 6 rebounds per game.  Ivo Balti is the second leading rebounder on the team (he is also 6'8").  In actuality, the leading rebounder on the team is Cooper.

This shapes up to be a very interesting game in a very interesting MAC East race.  OU is 1-2 and looking to get back one of the home games they dropped.  They certainly don't want to lose their 3rd so early.  At the same time, BG really needs to hold serve at home, given the difficult games that lie on the road in the East Division.

Beyond that, it shapes up as a classic inside-out game.  Can BG play zone and guard the perimeter against OU without letting Cooper get to the lane and cause havoc?  Can BG resist the urge to get into a 3-FG duel with OU and focus on getting the ball inside?

Can BG's guards compete against Cooper?  Can BG turn OU over? Can BG exploit the rebounding issue and get some key offensive boards, or will OU negate that advantage?

I'm enjoying the last six weeks of this season very much, and I'm looking forward to this matchup quite a bit.