Michigan State Game

[Windycityfan]

Since I will be at the game, I decided to start us off. We are driving in from Chicago for the game.  I will be wearing my Buffalo sweatshirt with my son and wife wearing MSU clothing.   Both are MSU grads as his my daughter . When it is not MSU, we are all in for UB. 
 

Buffalo needs to bring it’s A game. That means less turnovers, good defense and better rebounding.  I am wishing for an upset.  Realistically, I am hoping for a good showing and a confidence builder before MAC  play.  
 
 

Go Bulls 

 

 

[UBinMD]

2 hours ago, Windycityfan said:

Since I will be at the game, I decided to start us off. We are driving in from Chicago for the game.  I will be wearing my Buffalo sweatshirt with my son and wife wearing MSU clothing.   Both are MSU grads as his my daughter . When it is not MSU, we are all in for UB. 
 

Buffalo needs to bring it’s A game. That means less turnovers, good defense and better rebounding.  I am wishing for an upset.  Realistically, I am hoping for a good showing and a confidence builder before MAC  play.  
 
 

Go Bulls 

 

 

Enjoy the game, hopefully we can pull one off!

[Windycityfan]

Thank you.  I will be waving and cheering right behind our bench

Good holiday season to all 

 

Go Bulls 

 

[John]

23 hours ago, Windycityfan said:

Thank you.  I will be waving and cheering right behind our bench

Good holiday season to all 

 

Go Bulls 

 

The question is do we have any chance in this game?? Michigan State does not seem  to as strong as other years. They have four players that average in the 14 to 12 per game. They are averaging 69 and holding teams to 66 per game. As. Always they are strong and very physical so we will see. Go Bulls!!

[UB Horns Up]

BSF birthday I turn 55 years old December 30th the day of this Michigan State game. I don’t think UB Bulls basketball has any chance most likely a 20 point loss. I will take a UB Bulls football Camellia Bowl win December 27 as a early birthday present that is a more winnable game for UB Bulls in my opinion. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! UB Horns Up! Go Bulls! Let’s Go Buffalo 

 

[DocCas86]

14 hours ago, UB Horns Up said:

BSF birthday I turn 55 years old December 30th the day of this Michigan State game. I don’t think UB Bulls basketball has any chance most likely a 20 point loss. I will take a UB Bulls football Camellia Bowl win December 27 as a early birthday present that is a more winnable game for UB Bulls in my opinion. Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! UB Horns Up! Go Bulls! Let’s Go Buffalo 

 

First wishing you a happy birthday. 

As for the game against Michigan St., I agree the chance of a victory is small, maybe 10%-15%. 

Looking at top 50 away games going back to Hurley's first season we are 2 and 15 against top 50 (I took the liberty in including North Texas from last year who was ranked between 50-60 (so if you prefer to you can leave that game out).  If you break that out for 26-50, UB is 2 - 8. 

Currently Michigan St. is ranked around 50, so I think keeping the margin 10 points or less would be a good showing, and again would provide some optimism heading into MAC play.

Here is a plot of margin vs opponent rank / along with best result against top 50:

[Bluebird96]

32 minutes ago, DocCas86 said:

Looking at top 50 away games going back to Hurley's first season we are 2 and 15 against top 50 (I took the liberty in including North Texas from last year who was ranked between 50-60 (so if you prefer to you can leave that game out).  If you break that out for 26-50, UB is 2 - 8. 

Here is a plot of margin vs opponent rank / along with best result against top 50:

Interesting to see the games vs Top 50 teams plotted like this. I would’ve thought UB had done better than 2-15, and especially surprising that Oats was just 1-9 in those games.  Also interesting that JW’s teams have kept all their Top 50 losses to 20 pts or less while Oats lost 5 by more than 20.  

[DocCas86]

32 minutes ago, Bluebird96 said:

Interesting to see the games vs Top 50 teams plotted like this. I would’ve thought UB had done better than 2-15, and especially surprising that Oats was just 1-9 in those games.  Also interesting that JW’s teams have kept all their Top 50 losses to 20 pts or less while Oats lost 5 by more than 20.  

I was a little surprised with that as well.   These are only away games and are based only on one source for rankings.  It does not include Oats win in NCAA tournament against Arizona.   As for the top 50 results - while Whitesell's tenure at Loyola was roughly .500, he did have some success early on - improving each of his first 3 years and then losing by 1 point to 15th ranked Butler in the HL championship in 2006-07. 

Here is a plot for entirety of Whitesell tenure (suggests average ranking of 125-135 to me):

An interesting observation - the trendline for expected result for away games is slightly better/ about equal to home games.  Ordinarily, the home game trend line would suggest better outcome.  This suggest that we have not had a home court advantage.  There are some outliers (James Madison, Ohio last year, Army 2020) that could be skewing the numbers somewhat.  But hope we can have some homecourt edge this upcoming MAC conference play.

Here is the same chart for Nate Oats - you can see better performance at home clearly in this, while the road performance of the two coaches is roughly the same. 

[UBinMD]

1 hour ago, DocCas86 said:

I was a little surprised with that as well.   These are only away games and are based only on one source for rankings.  It does not include Oats win in NCAA tournament against Arizona.   As for the top 50 results - while Whitesell's tenure at Loyola was roughly .500, he did have some success early on - improving each of his first 3 years and then losing by 1 point to 15th ranked Butler in the HL championship in 2006-07. 

Here is a plot for entirety of Whitesell tenure (suggests average ranking of 125-135 to me):

An interesting observation - the trendline for expected result for away games is slightly better/ about equal to home games.  Ordinarily, the home game trend line would suggest better outcome.  This suggest that we have not had a home court advantage.  There are some outliers (James Madison, Ohio last year, Army 2020) that could be skewing the numbers somewhat.  But hope we can have some homecourt edge this upcoming MAC conference play.

Here is the same chart for Nate Oats - you can see better performance at home clearly in this, while the road performance of the two coaches is roughly the same. 

Does that mean JW isn’t quite the dumpster fire we think?

[DocCas86]

4 hours ago, UBinMD said:

Does that mean JW isn’t quite the dumpster fire we think?

I am sure it depends on who you talk to.  The fits are not great in the above charts, but do suggest performance was better under Oats (not a surprise to anyone), particularly at home, with Whitesell's road performance slightly better than Oats.    In my judgment -  Oats could have produced rankings in the range of 25 - 125 long term if he stayed.  Whitesell's range seems to be more like 75 - 175, in top six of MAC (I think 150 is possible this year - but UB will have to improve from current ranking).    Whitesell / UB could win the MAC occasionally with those results.  I would not categorize Whitesell as a 'dumpster fire'.   I see the team could develop to have an outside chance this year in the MAC (a lot of basketball to be played) and an even better chance next year - assuming you keep key players. 

 

[UBinMD]

Let's see if the MAC can take down the "elite" Michigan teams on back-to-back nights. Hopefully we have a solid showing for 40 minutes and that the referees from WVU do not make the trip to East Lansing! Go Bulls!!🤘🤘

[Bluebird96]

Going to need to bring our A game and play some tough D to have a chance. Would like to see Curtis re-assert himself as the Bulls’ leading scoring threat after these past 4 games of <10 ppg. Maybe go a little nuts and knock down a bunch of 3’s.  

[MuchMany]

The Score app is showing Sy Chatman as a game time decision. Has he been listed as such before? 

[Chet]

20 minutes ago, MuchMany said:

The Score app is showing Sy Chatman as a game time decision. Has he been listed as such before? 

Would be tremendous. He hasn't dressed.

[MuchMany]

(Curtis, earmuffs) Jones could absolutely play at the B1G level. 

[Chet]

Nobody picked up shooter. 

[MKBullsfan]

Just need to score more. We are getting shots pretty easily but need to make them. 

[Chet]

Turnovers continue to be an issue. 7 turnovers and 3 assists.

[Tee4three]

Show signs of a good team, but getting schooled defensively 

[xDerekRx]

Down 39-27 but some things I liked but Defensively just can't stop them from scoring in the last 10 mins

[xDerekRx]

Late 3 makes the score at least look a bit better at 41-30.

If they could get just an average amount of stops defensively in the 2nd half this could be close

[MuchMany]

Offense the way bigger issue for me. Turnovers and stale sets stuck on the perimeter. Only thing defensively I'm seeing is some slow rotations and closeouts.

Kuluel looks very solid. He's going to get more and more minutes. 

[Chet]

Foster has played hard too. 

[xDerekRx]

11-0 run. Great start

[Tee4three]

21 minutes ago, MuchMany said:

Offense the way bigger issue for me. Turnovers and stale sets stuck on the perimeter. Only thing defensively I'm seeing is some slow rotations and closeouts.

Kuluel looks very solid. He's going to get more and more minutes. 

When they run sets the offense is very good

Issue is they go into this one on one mode for stretches, don't know if it's the players or maybe they are tired and stop moving but there is a drastic difference 

The defense against a team like mich st isn't as concerning but they are getting worked tonight