NCAA Tournament Round One

Behrend 70  Hope 66  OT
Box

Everything I ever needed to learn in life really came from cartoons, because it really does feel like that

I came into this weekend with really no expectations of what I'd see.  Unknown opponents are just that, unknown.  Watching Behrend warmup it was clear they stressed fundamentals and defense when they ran at least 4 team drills without ever shooting a basketball.  It was actually kind of a neat thing to see in the year 2014.

As it turned out the game was a pretty good slug-fest of defense as neither team found much in the way of offensive momentum.  A couple of times both teams grabbed leads of around 5-8 points only to have the other team quickly rally and tie the game or seize the lead themselves.

For whatever reason Hope was sloppy with the basketball these last two weeks.  Against a team like Behrend that is fairly good at creating turnovers, being sloppy was ultimately going to be their downfall.

I give Hope a lot of credit for the way they battled the last 10 minutes, up against the wall and staring a near double-digit deficit in the face they fought hard enough, long enough to give them a chance to win.  In the end they had the ball in their hands with time ticking down and a chance to win.  You really can't ask for anything else given the way the game played out.


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One Quarter of Hope's games played ended up being against Sweet 16 teams this year.  That is unbelievably strong.  Maybe with a little more experience and some physical growth Hope can be one of those teams in the years to come.  They've certainly had a great view of what it takes to get there.

Dead:  It was a little dead inside DeVos until late in the game.  A few things worked against Hope having a large crowd.  First was Dance Marathon being held on campus, I think its a great cause but it sure seems like they could find a better weekend to do that.  Student attendance was about half what it should have been.  Second was two high school games involving Holland teams playing for District Championships.  Within about a 3 mile radius 6,000 people watched basketball games  Friday night at the same time.  Holland loves its basketball but there are times when the limits get stretched.  For our reputation, 2077 for an NCAA game is a little embarrassing but understandable.

Efficiency:

Estimated number of possessions:  Hope 77  Behrend 76
68/67 prior to overtime, a pretty normal paced game

Offensively Efficiency:  85.82

Behrend came into this one as the top rated defense in the Great Lakes based on efficiency.  They didn't disappoint.  This ended up being a pretty brutal offensive game with neither team reaching 100.  The halves split 98/72 with the OT being pretty much just like regulation. 

Defensive Efficiency:  92.96

From a defensive point of view Hope did everything they needed to win this game, in fact this should really win you every game.  First half they gave up a 103 second half they were a stellar 67 which included a 10 minutes stretch of giving up 2 fg's after they fell behind by 6.


Rebounding Efficiency:

Hope:  34.4% of available offensive rebounds
Behrend:  21.9% of available offensive rebounds

2nd Chance points:  Hope 14  Behrend 5

Hope did a really good job here against a team that came into this game with very good season rebound percentages.  You might say this kept Hope in the game.

Other Interesting Stats: 

Turnovers:   Nothing in this game determined its outcome more than turnovers.  For the 3rd straight game Hope turned it over at a higher rate than their season average.  Behrend deserves some credit for their defense, its obviously what they do well.  But for Hope the bottom line is they threw away a lot of points this week by just being careless with the ball.  Take care of the ball, score on a handful of those possessions and we're talking about a Hope win.

Eidson Affect:  Hope began the year with a struggling Alex Eidson and finished it with Eidson struggling again.  That's roughly an 8 game stretch where they went 2-6.  There's no doubt teams defended Hope's guard combo of Gardner/Eidson much better as the season wore on.  I think you can attribute some of Eidson struggling to better attention and better defense.  Alex went just 7-32 and a pretty incredible 1-13 from 3 in Hope's 3 post-season games.  The bigger point here is Hope needs to find a way to replace those missing points on nights Eidson isn't shooting it well.  Alex is probably always going to be a somewhat streaky player, most shooters are and the hope is they can find a little better balance in scoring across the lineup so that stretches like this don't affect them as much. 


Going Forward:

Unfortunately we've reached that bitter sweet time of year where things can end abruptly and before you were really ready.  The short term view is this should taste bitter and maybe tinged with some anger.  The kind of anger that makes you lift weights all summer and possibly tatoo pain and love on your fingers.  (Don't do that btw).  The more long term view is this turned out to be a really good season for Hope from what really is a very young team.

Hope got a chance to see what some of the best teams in D3 look like, won a conference championship they weren't picked to win and got a taste of the NCAA Tournament experience even if it was just a small taste.  If you think back to November and what you thought this team would be or could be I think you have to be very pleased with the general direction things went and where they're  possibly going.

Up Next:   me vs a new direction

Yep, three MIAA titles in 4 years John.