Per Jordan Strack, Darius Gilbert suspended

Sentinel-Tribune has the rest of the story.  Gilbert was arrested for robbery for an incident that allegedly occurred over Memorial Day Weekend.  The arrest occurred this afternoon.

Gilbert is a D-tackle who will or would be a R-SO next season.  He finished last season as #2 on the depth chart, behind Chris Jones.  He played 6 games and had 2 tackles.

Coach Orr gives Summer Briefing

If you surf on over to bgsufalcons.com, you will find a video, in two segments, that features Coach Orr talking about the state of the basketball program.

It is strictly an in-house thing, there are no external members of the media present.  Still, I thought it was interesting.  I know that there is a lot of concern in the nation about the state of our men's basketball program and that concern has started to focus on Coach Orr...nonetheless, he is the Coach, and the best thing for our program would be for him to lead the program to success.

It isn't that I don't share those concerns, as I wrote here.  You cannot hide from the results, and the results are not great.

Anyway, I watched the segments and here is what Coach had to say.

First, on the plus side, both Scott Thomas and Dee Brown graduated.  I am always pleased to see the guys get their degrees.  I believe that if we keep a player for four or five years, there's no excuse for them not graduating, so good for them.

Our third senior, Torian Oglesby is expected to graduate in August.

All 3 are trying to play next year.  Thomas and Brown have been to camps to try and get a contract.

Then Coach Orr talked about how is coming back.  While we lost 2 starters, we have 3 coming back.

Coming back: starters

• Calhoun--2nd team All-MAC, leading scorer on team.
• Crawford--most improved player.  Coach noted he was 2nd in MAC in assists.  (My note:  Crawford is certainly the subject of a lot of debate right now. I will have a post next week where we try to get some facts into the discussion.).
• Cam Black--Was in better shape, worked hard.  "One of the best defensive players in the league."  Looking for a big jump.

Coming back:  reserves

• Kraus--missed during his injury.  Missed his toughness and defense.
• Erger--A great teammate.  Put him in for any situation.  "A coach on the floor."
• Sealey--lots of praise for his athleticism.  Energy.  Torian-style energy.  Break out season expected.

• Henderson--A 2.  Second most athletic player on team.  Can score the ball.  Finisher on the break.  Looking here to take up the outside scoring lost in Thomas and Brown.
• Orr--can score.  Can get to the free throw line.

Need these guys to score from the team to win.

My note:  that is 100% TRUE.  We saw what CMU did to BG--locking down on Calhoun and forcing BG to win from the outside.  That was hard enough with Thomas and Brown.  Without them, it becomes a very scary scenario...as in, it could be an issue game in and game out.  Which means that Henderson, Orr and Sealey need to be able to pick up that slack.  We have not really seen that out of any of them in their limited playing time.  Not saying they can't or won't, just that we haven't seen it.).

There are also some younger players...

Most fans are thinking about Jehvon Clarke.  Coach said he had some "moments."  Talented, mostly PG and a little off the ball.  Home run hitter, needs to work on singles and doubles.  (My note:  most fans have focused on the great moves he made, so Coach is saying he has to manage the offense better every possession.).

Desmond Rorie--Redshirted.  Needs to get into great basketball shape.  "Oozing potential."

Antonio Ferrell--walk on.  Made the team better in practice.  Made a big improvement.  Could play.

Newcomers

Richaun Holmes (So).---one year of JUCO ball is all he has played and he's only 18.  Great potential.  "Oozing talent."  (Apparently, the keyword for this briefing was "oozing."   He's 6'8" and athletic.  Leading shot blockers in JUCO.  Averaged 18 points, 9 rebounds and 6 blocks.  First team JUCO all-american. (In fairness, JUCO Division II).  Can play 4 or 5.  Can guard 4 or 5.  Needs to build up his body.

Spencer Parker--6'7".  Can play 2 to 4 and played 1 sometimes in prep school. Good in transition and with the ball.  Big praise for his ability.  Can guard at 2 and still be a rebounding force.

A note:  if this is true and Parker can indeed play 2 at his size and athleticism, then he becomes a major match up issue for any team in the MAC.

A last note on players:  if I have a concern about the Orr era it is that I don't think our players have developed as much as I would hope.  They seem, in general, to have sort of flat careers.  Two years ago, even though we had only lost one guy, it was clear that we weren't going to succeed unless some players took big jumps,and they didn't and we didn't.  This year, the same is true.  Henderson, Orr, Sealey, Black, Crawford--they all need to move their games up for us to compete in the MAC.

We have one scholarship available.  We have some flexibility.  Looking at HS players who fell through the cracks or are late qualifiers.  Looking at JUCO and 4-year transfers.  Looking at a "little bit of everything." This would be a great chance (in my view) to get a transfer in.  Next year's team has 4 seniors, and some strength starting the year after that would be really good.

In terms of scheduling, BG is playing in the pre-season NIT.  Playing in the UM Pod.  Two games.  Goal:  Madison Square Garden.  This is a real tournament, unlike CBE.  We could in theory win, which we could not have done in the CBE.

Coach's strategy is "taking this one game at a time."  I just wish he hadn't given this away to the opposition.

More scheduling:

Home games
MSU before Christmas.
UD
Youngstown State
Wright State
"Teams with a local flavor" which is a nice bit of spin.

Road:
Play @USF
Temple.  (12/31)

Looking to add one or two more games.

Finally, he notes that year after next, the MAC is going to an 18 game MAC schedule.  My perspective is that this is a good thing.  It is a tacit admission that we are a one bid league, but it takes us away from the very difficult task of finding interesting non-conference games and instead extends the best part of the season, which is the MAC season.

Coach noted there will be some scheduling issues with rotations, and that there will not be a clear EAST-WEST-EAST phasing to the schedule like there is now.

That's the guts of what he had to say.  Full interviews are on bgsufalcons.com.  I would so like to see the program step out of the middle of the MAC and become truly competitive.

MAC Home Court Advantage...

So, this is one of those things I put down on my notes to do during the off-season.  Never the time to do it while games are going on, but I perfect thing to do on a hot holiday weekend.  (Written on Sunday, published on Tuesday).

I found this article by Ken Pomeroy about determining what is the true home court advantage.  What he did was take paired games with a home and home in the same year, and compare the point differentials to see what the home court is actually worth.

I took MAC Men's Basketball and did the same thing.  The most obvious caveat is that by definition we're talking just division games in the MAC and we have a pretty small sample.  A real analysis would go back a  few years and sometime I might get around to that.  For now, this is what we have.

First, the AVERAGE difference is 9.7 points, which divided in half is 4.8 points per game.  Pomeroy found a 3.76 points per game, which means on average, a team in the MAC had a slightly higher advantage in the MAC than in D1 as a whole.

However, the average actually gives you a slightly distorted view.

First, there was an advantage in only about 3/4s of the pairs (73.3%).  In about one quarter, the road team had the advantage.

Second, there are really three significant groups of pairs.  In addition to games where there was no advantage, there were about 3 in 10 that had a small advantage (1-10 points) and a big advantage (more than 20 points).  Note these are raw differences, not divided by 2.

So, while the average difference is 4.8 points, in reality, in a third of the games (almost) the difference was more than 10 points per game in a pair.  I don't know how this squares with what Pomeroy found, but I do think that it illustrates the impact home court has in our conference.

In terms of individual teams, UT had by far the biggest home floor advantage.  They had a raw total of 20.8 per pairing or 10.4 per game.  They had a 31 point difference with WMU, 34 with NIU, 28 with EMU and 21 with CMU.  That's pretty interesting, especially given the relatively poor quality of the teams in the MAC West.  Also, it shows that if they can improve on the road at all, they are going to have a great chance to compete.

Here are the total MAC standings:

1. UT  20.8
2. OU 14.6
3. KSU 13
4. Akron 12
5. BG 10.6
6. WMU 10.4
7. CMU 9
8. NIU 6.6
9. EMU 6.6
10. Buffalo 4.8
11. Ball State 4.6
12. Miami 3.8

Future Football Schedules...

The University posted the long-term outlook for football schedules for the years ahead. Just one warning, which is that oftentimes these don't come to fruition. In fact, many times the contracts are worth nothing. For example, if a really good opportunity popped up for you on September 8, 2018, I wouldn't pass it up because you were afraid to miss the Maryland game.

Having said that, the schedules shows two BCS opponents coming to the Doyt. Indiana in 2013 as part of a home and home and Maryland as part of a 2 for 1.

On another note, BG has a home and home with Texas State, which is, in theory, elevating into the WAC for one season before heading to the Sun Belt. I learned on AZZ.com that former BGSU faculty member Denise Trauth is the President of Texas State. Which is interesting.

Note, as well, that BG will play FCS competiton, probably every year. Note Murray State, VMI, and North Dakota.

I like Tulsa coming here next year, that's a nice opponent for us, even if they aren't a BCS team. And, we put our unbeaten record in West Lafayette to the test on September 26, 2015. Or not.

Anyway, FWIW, here is the upcoming schedule as it stands today.





2013
8/29 vs. Tulsa
9/14 at Indiana
9/21 vs. Murray State
10/12 at Mississippi State

2014
8/28 at Western Kentucky
9/6 vs. VMI
9/13 vs. Indiana
9/20 at Wisconsin

2015
9/12 at Maryland
9/19 vs. Texas State
9/26 at Purdue

2016
9/03 at Ohio State
9/10 vs. North Dakota
9/17 vs. Middle Tennessee State
9/24 at Texas State

2017
9/09 at Indiana
9/23 at Middle Tennessee State

2018
9/08 vs. Maryland
9/22 at Louisiana Tech

2019
8/31 at Maryland
9/14 vs. Louisiana Tech

New Helmets for the Football Team

Through the twitter and the Facebook, BGSU has sent out the new helmets which arrived at the Sebo Center for Athletic Endeavor.

The initial reviews on the Internets appear to be good, at least based on social.  You can't really see it, but highly placed sources have confirmed that is a "matte" finish to the helmets, which means, more or less "not shiny" which I think will look pretty cool.  I was always a stripe guy, but this looks good to me and we'll probably have a new look next year.  At least it isn't one of those metallic abominations.

FBS Countdown, Falcons #91

The Orlando Sentinel probably has the top MSM blog for college football, at least one that doesn't have four letters in it.  They do a thing where they count down the 120 teams in FBS, worst to first.  It is kind of funny, you sit and watch everyday to see if it is your turn.  Well, it was BG's turn.  They have us #91.

You know, it is easy to make too much of these things.  They are mostly about last year, not this year.  One thing I don't think do as good as job of, as compared to Phil Steele, is looking at schedules and how teams might do better based on an easier schedule.  In fact, they cite BG's schedule as a disadvantage while I find it to be working in our favor.

Anyway, they mostly cite our WR graduations as a weakness, but don't mention Stokes, for example.

FWIW, they have Akron at 119 (we play them), CMU at 110, Miami at 106 (we play them), Kent at 89 (we play them) and Ball State at 86.  I'm very interested in where UMASS will end up, since they are up to 86 without mentioning the Minutemen.

Off-season fodder.

Angry Falcons Attack at UT...

No, really.

Phil Steele All-MAC Pre-Season Teams Released

One of the summer activities as we wait for Falcon sports to resume is to follow the work of Phil Steele, who puts out the best and most informed college football annual in the United States.  Remember reading Street and Smith's when we were young and the stories for the minor schools would be so outdated it would be embarrassing?  Not so with Phil Steele.

Anyway, he released his top four All-MAC pre-season teams.  Here is how the Falcons fared.

He has five Falcons on the first team, starting with Anthon Samuel at RB.  The MAC had a major exodus of RBs since last year (check out his first four teams, I would doubt you are familiar with too many of them--8 of the MACs top 10 rushers either graduated, left school early or left with Temple), so while Samuel might or might not end up first team All-MAC, he's as good a choice as anyone else.

On defense, Chris Jones and Dwayne Woods were both named.  These are both fitting choices.  Jones is set to have a monster year, and if he does, it only helps Woods by occupying blockers.

Finally, Boo Boo Gates is All-MAC first team as a kick returner, and Brian Schmeidebusch is All-MAC as punter.  Not sure about Boo Boo--or how big an impact kick returns will have with the new rules--but    Schmeidebusch is an absolute beast who is, as Coach says, a football player who happens to punt.

Moving down the line:

Second team:  Alex Bayer.
Third Team:  Je'Ron Stokes, Dominic Flewellyn.  (Stokes gets this ranking without playing a game in the MAC.  He is a huge sleeper for the Falcons, especially with depleted receivers.  If he has the kind of year he should be capable of, he could do much better than this.)
Fourth team:  Matt Schilz, Chip Robinson, Paul Swan, Boo Boo (at Safety) and Cam Truss.

The Schilz ranking is interesting.  He is behind Carder, Tettleton and Dysert, none of which you can argue with, but he is ahead of UT's QBs, Alex Gillett and Ryan Radcliffe, all of whom are back and had better efficiency ratings than Schilz did last year.  Now, the team is coming together around him, and if he is going to make a big leap, this is the year to do it.  But, I'm surprised in the confidence.

Anyway, that's how Phil Steele sees things.

Falcons have first reported Football verbal

The Falcons have their first verbal of the 2013 recruiting class.  It is Patric Hannon who is a RB Lyndhurst Brush High School.

He's unrated on ESPN, which might or might not mean anything.  One issue is that is very early, as in before even the summer camps have started, which is usually where you see an unheralded guy show what he can do. Hannon had a nice JR year, with 5.3 yards per carry, if only on 45 attempts.  And, he had 71 yards on one play...

As a SO, he only played 4 games due to an injury.  He also runs track.

By the way, the nickname for Brush is the Arcs, which is geekycool.

Anyway, welcome to the Falcons, Patric.

Update:  ESPN now lists him as an ILB.

Happy Mother's Day to the Falcon Nation!

Falcon Basketball Survey...

Hey, if you are a Falcon basketball fan (and if you are reading this, I think it stands to reason you could be), you could help the school out by completing their online survey about the game experience.  I think the game experience was pretty good, could be better, and I don't know if they will fix the things I commented on, but it is a start.  Anyway, you could also win tickets to the MSU game and you will get a modest gift certificate from the shop...

http://bgsufalcons.com/news/2012/5/9/MBB_0509124440.aspx

Career Review: Oglesby

I did a career review of Scott Thomas and Dee Brown a couple of weeks ago and I didn't want to forget about our third senior, Torian Oglesby.  We got so used to Thomas and Brown being in the same class and part of the team that you can forget about Oglesby and the significant contribution he made at times for this team.

He was a JUCO transfer and we didn't really know what to expect of him.  He came here from Mott CC with a 10/8 line and a reputation for being a good defensive player.  I think he actually was a bigger surprise than any player we have had for a long time.  He had energy and was pretty athletic and tough, and two of those three things were not in surplus in BG.  He finished around the basket better than anyone else we had and have had, with the possible exception of Marschall, going back to the pre-WVU days.

Of course, he will forever be remembered at BG for the NCAA record he set.  He made 26 straight field throw attempts, breaking a record set in 1978.  Yes, I know they were all close to the basket, that's how you set a record like that, and I'm going to guess that over the 34 years that record existed, there were hundreds of guys who only shot near the basket and none of them made 26 in a row.

He was certainly far from a dominant player.  He averaged 4.5 PPG and 4.0 RPG during his Falcon career.  That was, however, in 16 minutes per game.  He was the 7th most efficient offensive player in the MAC, meaning that he didn't use a ton of shots to get those 4.5 PPG.  He shot 74% from the field in his senior season, which was more than twice as good as his FT%, which is something which I doubt has been done very often in NCAA hoops, if ever.

He double-doubled twice this year, against UTSA and KSU.  In total, his senior season saw 5 double figure scoring games.

Anyway, he was a role player, there's no doubt about it.  He didn't get a ton of minutes, but I do think he was valuable to the team, he had the ability to bring the crowd to its feet and he was tough, and (as mentioned) we didn't have a ton of guys like that.

Best of luck in life, Torian.

MAC Men's Basketball Transfers

Out:

Akron


Michael Green (Chaminade)
6'6" played in four games.  2-star recruit.

CMU


Austin McBroom
All Fr., 10.9 PPG, 2.9 Assists per game.

Trey Zeigler (Pitt)
All-MAC 3rd team

Jorddan Myrcik
2 star.  Only played 5 minutes.

WMU

Matt Stainbrook (Xavier)
Probably the best player to leave the MAC.  Scored 11.4 points and got 6.8 rebounds.

KSU

Patrick Jackson
Transfer from Rutgers.  Never found role, never happy.  Will graduate and play next year.

Scooter Johnson
6'6" Lost time due to academics and injuries.  NQ

Miami


Brian Sullivan
Leading returning scorer, top 3-FG shooter in the MAC and All-MAC Freshman.

OU


Tyquan Goard (Delaware)
Tyquan had been a verbal to the Blue Hens, then he decided to go to OU, where he played 29 games and then quit just before the NCAA run to decide to go back to Delaware.  Godspeed, Tyquan.

Ethan Jacobs
At 6'10", he would get your attention, and yet he only played about a third of the games in two years.

NIU


Zach Miller (Hillsdale)
This one is fairly interesting.  Zach was told by Coach Mark Montgomery that he was off the team and off scholarship.  Zach and his family charged up to the AD's office, and the AD said that Montgomery could not take away his scholarship and he wasn't off the team.  AD apologized, Montgomery apologized, and then the kid decided to transfer anyway.

How's that taste, Coach?
The kid's dad is a big-time Illinois HS Coach, so that might not work out too well for them long-term.

Stien Berg
Jeremiah Jackson

Walk-ons walking on their way out of DeKalb.


In:

EMU

Mike Talley, Duquesne
This is potentially a pretty good get for the Eagles, who might well stock their entire roster with transfers before all is said and done.  He's a PG who scored 7.2 and had 2.1 assists in two years for the Dukes.

UT

Justin Drummond, Loyola, MD
A transfer from Loyola-MD (known as the other Loyola) where he was third-team all-MAAC and Sixth Man of a Year.  He was a double figure scorer.

OU

Kadeen Green, Missouri
He's a body at 6'8" who didn't play much at Missouri.  He will be eligible at mid-year.  He played about 11 minutes a game.

NIU

Tommie McCune, WVU
Lest you think the flow in DeKalb is only out, they did pick up this guy.  He only played a little as a FR at WVU, but he was a 3-star recruit and is 6'7".  Could be a very big player in the MAC.

College Football Zealots Previews the Falcons...

College Football Zealots is a pretty good website that lives up to its name with zealotry.   They asked me to answer some questions as a preview of the Falcons, and I was happy to do so.  Check it out, let me know what you think.

Falcons Dismiss Kyle Bryant

The Falcons announced today that they had dismissed LT Kyle Bryant from the football team, citing an unspecified violation of team rules.

The dismissal comes at a time when BG is trying to rebuild its O-line depth.  Bryant had game experience, with 6 starts and 8 games played in two seasons.  I know he had been mentioned as having an important role on the line next year, especially at the vital LT position.  Obviously, if a guy is counter-productive, he's counter-productive...it will be interesting to see how we adjust at T.

MAC Men's Basketball Attendance

Just a quick look back at the men's basketball attendance in the MAC.  I was mostly interested in seeing how our attendance changed when BG moved to the Stroh Center.

Granted, the team was a little better than the year before, but the team wasn't a lot better and it wasn't like BG was on a MAC title run at any point, so I will suggest that the move to the new facility was the bigger variable.  We also had Toledo at home and a nice home game with Temple, too.  Other than that, it wasn't anything too outlandish.

Attendance did improve.  For all games, BG drew 2,157 per game, which was a 37% increase over the last season at Anderson.  And BG moved from 10th in the MAC to 8th in the MAC.  Obviously, that still has a ways to go--we are pretty far behind the next highest team--but we're not going to start drawing like that until the team starts to win consistently.  Still, it was a nice improvement.

Beyond that, a few conclusions.  UT always draws well in MAC standards, and as Kowalcyk gets things turned around, you'll see them either lead or compete with OU for the lead.  OU and Ball State, I will contend, are the places where I consider there to be a year in and year out, win or lose historical support for the program.  Obviously, Kent and Akron are usually good and good at home, so they are drawing pretty well, too.

EMU, has the opposite problem.  There is just no feel of support for any of their programs, win or lose.  Perhaps Murphy will change that.

Back to the Falcons.  I honestly think until people start to sense that this team is challenging for something, this about as high as it is going to get.  We don't have UT next year but we are supposed to have MSU so that will help.  I just don't see too much more of an increase so long as the team is about .500 and not among the truly elite teams in the MAC.  We have not drawn anything close to well dating back to end of the Dakich years.

Anyway, the Stroh did bring some improvement, and has the potential to be a great place to watch a game with a great home crowd.  All we need is some wins.