Seeding Concerns Overblown

[BrooklynBull]

Everyone seems concerned that to win the MAC UB would have to beat Toledo and Ohio in back to back games.  Unless the seven or eight seed pulls off an upset teams three trough six would have to beat Ohio and Toledo on back to back nights.  Even if UB made it to the two seed and either Ohio or Toledo dropped to the three seed, barring an upset by the sixth or eighth seed, the back to back wins would still have to take place, unless either one were to lose in the semis.

Basically, get to Cleveland in three through six and the path to the title will be the same, barring upsets, having to beat Ohio and Toledo back to back.

The magic number to get to Cleveland is 5 wins and losses by Bowling Green.

Get to Cleveland and just win.

[DocCas86]

43 minutes ago, BrooklynBull said:

Everyone seems concerned that to win the MAC UB would have to beat Toledo and Ohio in back to back games.  Unless the seven or eight seed pulls off an upset teams three trough six would have to beat Ohio and Toledo on back to back nights.  Even if UB made it to the two seed and either Ohio or Toledo dropped to the three seed, barring an upset by the sixth or eighth seed, the back to back wins would still have to take place, unless either one were to lose in the semis.

Basically, get to Cleveland in three through six and the path to the title will be the same, barring upsets, having to beat Ohio and Toledo back to back.

The magic number to get to Cleveland is 5 wins and losses by Bowling Green.

Get to Cleveland and just win.

I agree 100%.   The 3/6 game may be slightly easier than 4/5.  What I am hoping for the team is that they are playing their best...which would result in 7-1 or 8-0 down the stretch.  Do this and you head into Cleveland with more confidence / enthusiasm.  This matters more than the seed imo.

[DooleyBull06]

There’s still a lot of basketball on our end left to play. We are about to enter a stretch where we play just about every other day starting Tuesday. If everything is chalk from here on out we are probably looking at a 3 seed (easier path if Kent or Akron isn’t the 6 seed). A more likely scenario (assuming we drop a game or two) is some form of Kent or Akron then Ohio-Toledo. My bigger concern is will we have fresh enough legs to make that run. If yesterday’s game was a barometer of what to expect in March, all 5 starters played over 30 minutes. Doing that 3 nights in a row without help from the bench or the coach willing to use his bench, could bring massive fatigue. As it did last year. These next two weeks the bench has to step up. And Whitesell can’t be shy about using them. Of course playing with a lead will help all this. Keep trending upwards. Go Bulls!

[Tee4three]

Toledo is still Toledo in my eyes. Meaning I think they will blow it in Cleveland like usual 

They do look like the best team in the Mac so far this season though 

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

21 minutes ago, Tee4three said:

Toledo is still Toledo in my eyes. Meaning I think they will blow it in Cleveland like usual 

They do look like the best team in the Mac so far this season though 

We can keep saying that and we might be right but there’s no rational reasoning behind that logic other than pointing to past results which aren’t relevant to this year. I hope you’re correct but I think this Rockets squad is a notch above everyone in the MAC.

Edited February 13, 2022 by Big 4 Hoops Blogger

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

1 hour ago, Erie County said:

And just win is the point that we all like to discuss. That's the reason we post the concerns on here. 

We haven't beaten Akron, Toledo, or Ohio (0-3) and you think they will do it on three nights in a row? Beating Kent/Toledo will go a long way to end the year. 

Anything is possible, they've haven't shown us anything that they can do that let alone without rest. 

This is a very legitimate post. I agree with Brooklyn Bull that there’s no point being worried about their seeding. It is what it is and you just have to play the schedule in front of you. Buffalo would likely play a similar combination of teams regardless of where they’re seeded.

BUT… 

It’s asking a lot of this team to win three games in three days against three of the top 5 teams in the conference. Buffalo has the talent and ability to pull it off but they haven’t shown the consistency to play a solid 40 minutes of basketball in three consecutive nights. It’s going to be a tall task asking a lot of our starters to carry UB to a MAC Championship in Cleveland. They’re going to have to elevate themselves to a level we’ve rarely seen this year outside of a few stretches.

Edited February 13, 2022 by Big 4 Hoops Blogger

[Tee4three]

42 minutes ago, Big 4 Hoops Blogger said:

We can keep saying that and we might be right but there’s no rational reasoning behind that logic other than pointing to past results which aren’t relevant to this year. I hope you’re correct but I think this Rockets squad is a notch above everyone in the MAC.

Yeah I have no rational to my post. Mostly just in jest to the past rocket teams

The rockets have always been a team that hasn't wanted to work and go to the dirty areas to win games. Which is what you need to do in Cleveland. Time will tell if thats changed this season

I think you had a post that summed up the mac and cleveland really well. Toledo top team, Ohio most consistent at a high level and UB the most talented 

While we are talking about avoiding playing Ohio/Toledo back to back. I bet who ever ends up as the top seed wants to see ub as the 3 seed and not the 4 or 5

 

 

Edited February 13, 2022 by Tee4three

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

10 minutes ago, Tee4three said:

Yeah I have no rational to my post. Mostly just in jest to the past rocket teams

The rockets have always been a team that hasn't wanted to work and go to the dirty areas to win games. Which is what you need to do in Cleveland. Time will tell if thats changed this season

I think you had a post that summed up the mac and cleveland really well. Toledo top team, Ohio most consistent at a high level and UB the most talented 

While we are talking about avoiding playing Ohio/Toledo back to back. I bet who ever ends up as the top seed wants to see ub as the 3 seed and not the 4 or 5

 

 

Totally agree with you regarding Toledo. Time will tell if they made the proper adjustments to win in Cleveland or if they’ll continue the Rockets disappointing March play.

I completely agree with your final paragraph. As much as it sucks battling Kent/Akron in Cleveland, I’d much rather avoid UB if I were the top seed. There’s a reason why runs like what UB pulled off, winning four MAC Tournaments in five years never happens. It’s tough to win this conference tournament.

[DooleyBull06]

Can anyone tell me who has the best defensive metrics in the conference? Styles make fights…with Kent and Akron you might get a rock fight. With Toledo and Ohio you will have to score to keep pace. A separator could be which team is better defensively. Example…we keep saying Toledo is Toledo…we say that because in the past they have been nothing but offense. No defense. However if they play solid defense this year, their story could be different. 

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

45 minutes ago, DooleyBull06 said:

Can anyone tell me who has the best defensive metrics in the conference? Styles make fights…with Kent and Akron you might get a rock fight. With Toledo and Ohio you will have to score to keep pace. A separator could be which team is better defensively. Example…we keep saying Toledo is Toledo…we say that because in the past they have been nothing but offense. No defense. However if they play solid defense this year, their story could be different. 

If you go according to KenPom, the top 3 defenses in the MAC are Ohio, Kent State and Toledo.

The best offenses are Toledo (by far), Buffalo and Ohio.

Edited February 13, 2022 by Big 4 Hoops Blogger

[DooleyBull06]

54 minutes ago, Big 4 Hoops Blogger said:

If you go according to KenPom, the top 3 defenses in the MAC are Ohio, Kent State and Toledo.

The best offenses are Toledo (by far), Buffalo and Ohio.

Thanks. Sounds like an Ohio/Toledo collision course. I’d like us to derail that. We need to step our defense up.

Edited February 13, 2022 by DooleyBull06

[squire17]

I hope the Bulls finish the season playing their best, and it would be great to win it all in Cleveland. However, I don’t feel that Buffalo has any edge in talent over some of the top teams, and have grown to believe there are at least 2 better head coaches from that top tier: Groce, and Boals…not necessarily in that order. With respect to raw talent: Segu is fun to watch, has a lot of tools offensively, and is clutch but his size handicaps him defensively. Mballa clearly has regressed this season. Williams is the only Bull who belongs on the all MAC first team. Jack and Skogman have shown flashes of brilliance, and will have to bring their A game down the stretch, for the Bulls to have any chance at dancing. The bench, as someone already wrote, will have to contribute minutes especially in Cleveland, but I don’t expect much in the way of scoring or clutch play.

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

4 minutes ago, DooleyBull06 said:

Thanks. Sounds like an Ohio/Toledo collision course. I’d like us to derail that. We need to set our defense up.

To be fair, Buffalo has the 2nd best offense and 4th ranked defense. UB has a shot in Cleveland. They’ll just have to play their best ball that weekend.

Another sneaky team is Akron. They’ve done alright in conference play outside of getting swept by Kent State.

Edited February 13, 2022 by Big 4 Hoops Blogger

[UBinMD]

4 hours ago, Big 4 Hoops Blogger said:

We can keep saying that and we might be right but there’s no rational reasoning behind that logic other than pointing to past results which aren’t relevant to this year. I hope you’re correct but I think this Rockets squad is a notch above everyone in the MAC.

But they lost to Ball St so the are not infallible, let’s not believe that it would take a miracle game for us to beat them. They are very good, as is Ohio. When we play well, we can beat them. Just needs to be a consistent game from us without the long scoring droughts we have been prone to. I really am impressed with some balance. We had 5 guys in double figures and with 1 point from Skogman being number 6, to go with his 13 boards. It also felt like Rondo and Williams wanted the ball in their hands at the end to seal the game. Feels like we are figuring it out and winning close games is going to help down the stretch.

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

13 minutes ago, UBinMD said:

But they lost to Ball St so the are not infallible, let’s not believe that it would take a miracle game for us to beat them. They are very good, as is Ohio. When we play well, we can beat them. Just needs to be a consistent game from us without the long scoring droughts we have been prone to. I really am impressed with some balance. We had 5 guys in double figures and with 1 point from Skogman being number 6, to go with his 13 boards. It also felt like Rondo and Williams wanted the ball in their hands at the end to seal the game. Feels like we are figuring it out and winning close games is going to help down the stretch.

Definitely wouldn’t take a miracle for UB to win. In fact, I think the Bulls have the type of team to give Toledo problems. I was just stating that they’re a notch above everyone else. Doesn’t mean they’ll win in Cleveland based on past experiences.

Skogman developing into an offensive threat is a huge bonus closing out the season. With Mballa’s offensive struggles down low, they needed another big to pose a threat to provide more balance when they’re on the attack.

[skrabukes]

In the end, UB has an 10-12.5% chance to win in Cleveland.  If UB is 50-50 in each game it's 12.5%. If we say that UB is 60/50/40% to win each round, then it's the same. If it's 50/40/40, then it's 10%. I don't think UB would be greatly above or below 40-60% against any of the top 4 other teams, so that's the numbers. Toledo and Ohio are a bit higher, but likely not much higher than 20% if at all. Kent and Akron are likely in a similar number as us. The other teams are in a long shot position.  Even when UB was ranked and the overwhelming favorite,  they still were only around 50%. Nothing is a given, especially in a single game elimination. Just play well the rest of the regular season and then survive and advance. NET numbers and the like mean little, as only one team is going to NCAAs. I've enjoyed what I've seen the last 3 games and hope it continues.  If it does, then our chances could improve.  We're at our healthiest right now, so hopefully this is the "real" team that many people hoped for. 

[DocCas86]

44 minutes ago, skrabukes said:

In the end, UB has an 10-12.5% chance to win in Cleveland.  If UB is 50-50 in each game it's 12.5%. If we say that UB is 60/50/40% to win each round, then it's the same. If it's 50/40/40, then it's 10%. I don't think UB would be greatly above or below 40-60% against any of the top 4 other teams, so that's the numbers. Toledo and Ohio are a bit higher, but likely not much higher than 20% if at all. Kent and Akron are likely in a similar number as us. The other teams are in a long shot position.  Even when UB was ranked and the overwhelming favorite,  they still were only around 50%. Nothing is a given, especially in a single game elimination. Just play well the rest of the regular season and then survive and advance. NET numbers and the like mean little, as only one team is going to NCAAs. I've enjoyed what I've seen the last 3 games and hope it continues.  If it does, then our chances could improve.  We're at our healthiest right now, so hopefully this is the "real" team that many people hoped for. 

Here is a chart showing the distribution of kenpom rankings in MAC.  To illustrate how difficult it is to win - I have plotted where Toledo was ranked each year.   From 2013 - 2022, Toledo has been one of the top 3 teams six times (compared to our seven times).  There have been 8 MAC tournaments during that time and Toledo has yet to win one.  The fact that we won 4 in 5 years was pretty remarkable.  

 

[SGBull]

2 hours ago, DocCas86 said:

Here is a chart showing the distribution of kenpom rankings in MAC.  To illustrate how difficult it is to win - I have plotted where Toledo was ranked each year.   From 2013 - 2022, Toledo has been one of the top 3 teams six times (compared to our seven times).  There have been 8 MAC tournaments during that time and Toledo has yet to win one.  The fact that we won 4 in 5 years was pretty remarkable.  

 

Wow there are a lot of really bad teams in the MAC this year.

[DooleyBull06]

6 hours ago, UBinMD said:

But they lost to Ball St so the are not infallible, let’s not believe that it would take a miracle game for us to beat them. They are very good, as is Ohio. When we play well, we can beat them. Just needs to be a consistent game from us without the long scoring droughts we have been prone to. I really am impressed with some balance. We had 5 guys in double figures and with 1 point from Skogman being number 6, to go with his 13 boards. It also felt like Rondo and Williams wanted the ball in their hands at the end to seal the game. Feels like we are figuring it out and winning close games is going to help down the stretch.

Agree that any team is beatable on any night. I think the concern most of us have is UB being able to put together 3 consecutive wins against the teams currently ahead of us in the standings. When to this point we are 1-3 against those teams. And the loses have been ugly. Agree again, plenty of games left to keep improving mentally and on the court. Also agree with @skrabukesthat net means nothing come the tournament and it is all about surviving and advancing. Hopefully this win streak doesn’t go to their heads. Whitesell said they were humbled by the loses to Ohio and Toledo…hopefully we stay humble and grind hard.

[DocCas86]

This may sound crazy - but I was investigating Miami OH.  They were ranked respectably on 1/18 - #138 per barttorvik.com.  They had beat Georgia Tech, lost by 1 to Cincinnati, and lost by 3 to Toledo, in addition to the win against us (they shot 47% from 3pt).  Now they are ranked #268.  The main reason for the slide is Dalonte Brown missed six games since then and five of them were losses.  The only win during that time was against Western Michigan.  They got Dalonte Brown back this weekend and beat Bowling Green by 16.  So Buffalo needs to play well for rematch.  I also think MOH makes it to Cleveland and could give a #1 or #2 seed a tougher game than you would think, especially if they get hot shooting the 3s.  Not saying they will win, but they are a better team then their ranking would suggest with Brown back in the lineup.

The first test of my observation is tomorrow night @Ohio - I am predicting it will be closer than 15 points on barttorvik.com

[trueblue32]

21 hours ago, Big 4 Hoops Blogger said:

We can keep saying that and we might be right but there’s no rational reasoning behind that logic other than pointing to past results which aren’t relevant to this year. I hope you’re correct but I think this Rockets squad is a notch above everyone in the MAC.

I think there actually is rationale to this.  Toledo has recently been highly reliant on the 3, which being a higher variance stat can be difficult to maintain for 3 games in a row.

2018: 36.7% of their points came from 3. Shot 31.8% from 3 in their loss

2019: 38.6% of their points came from 3. Shot 45.2% from 3 in their loss, looks like bad D did them in here (another common theme among recent Toledo teams).

2020: 35.7% of their points came from 3. No tournament

2021: 38.7% of their points came from 3. Shot 20.7% from 3 in their loss

 

This year they're only getting 25.2% of their points from 3 which I think could be key to them going all the way in Cleveland this year.  They also have a better defense (by Toledo standards), although they've gotten a bit lucky in terms of opponent 3P% and FT% this year so they could be due for some regression there.

[Big 4 Hoops Blogger]

11 minutes ago, trueblue32 said:

I think there actually is rationale to this.  Toledo has recently been highly reliant on the 3, which being a higher variance stat can be difficult to maintain for 3 games in a row.

2018: 36.7% of their points came from 3. Shot 31.8% from 3 in their loss

2019: 38.6% of their points came from 3. Shot 45.2% from 3 in their loss, looks like bad D did them in here (another common theme among recent Toledo teams).

2020: 35.7% of their points came from 3. No tournament

2021: 38.7% of their points came from 3. Shot 20.7% from 3 in their loss

 

This year they're only getting 25.2% of their points from 3 which I think could be key to them going all the way in Cleveland this year.  They also have a better defense (by Toledo standards), although they've gotten a bit lucky in terms of opponent 3P% and FT% this year so they could be due for some regression there.

Great numbers. This Toledo team felt different to me and the numbers apparently back that up.

I was more so referring to not using previous results to predict future outcomes but I understand where you’re coming from and those changes could be huge for the Rockets moving forward.

[Chet]

Of course seeding matters. I would prefer the Toledo matchup is not until Saturday night. They are the class of the MAC, but they are Toledo and if history is an indication, they will probably loose before the final.

[DocCas86]

Looking at the MAC results this year, it is clear the MAC is a tale of haves / have nots.  The top 5 teams have been Ohio, Toledo, Kent, Buffalo and Akron.  If you look at how these teams have done vs each other, this is what is determining the seeding (maybe that is the case every year) but it seems more compelling this year.  The top 5 are 40-5 against the bottom 7.  Unfortunately this dynamic does not favor us in the seeding.  This is not a post to reopen the debate on team coach etc., more to point out why seeding is working out how it appears.  Not to get too far ahead, but we have two top 5 games left.  Wins in both would put us at 3-3.

One other thing, I am backtracking a bit - seeding will matter as 1-3 seeds will get games against the bottom 7.  The prospects for winning those games should be in neighborhood of 80% (rough estimate that should be in ballpark), whereas the 4-5 game may be 55% vs 45% - a little better than a coin flip.  What this means for winning the whole thing 1-3 seed ~20% +/- 5% vs 10% +/- 2.5% (again real rough - coffee hasn't fully kicked in).   I don't know the combinations - but the 3 seed may come down to our game against Kent, but we would need help from a bottom 7 team.