Some Relevant PL Rebounding Stats (for a change): Flawed or irrelevant stats are used constantly, especially when it comes to rebounding. One egregious misuse was recently committed by Kyle Whelliston (or whatever imposter is now using his name), when he illogically used a rebounding stat that was not adjusted for pace of play, and which also was not adjusted for quality of the opponents, as somehow relevant to Bucknell's rebounding. The stat used - average rebounds per game - is completely irrelevant until put in the context of who a team has played and how many rebounds are available.

Along the same lines, Lehigh fans recently were singing the praises of the MountainHawks' rebounding because they were tops in the Patriot League in rebounding margin. While the rebounding margin stat, in the proper context, is not quite as bad as simply looking a a team's average rebounds per game, it is still a deeply flawed number. First, it does not look at the quality of the opposition. Other than Holy Cross and Bucknell, the rest of the league schedules have ranged from mediocre to unbelievably bad. Secondly, rebounding margin does not measure how many of a teams' opportunities for rebounds were at the defensive end and how many were offensive. Since the average team collects about 70% of available rebounds when on defense and only about 30% at the offensive end, its rebounding margin is clearly dependent on how many rebounds are available at each end. If you hold down an opponent's shooting percentage, for example, you will get more defensive rebound opportunities and help your rebounding margin. If you shoot well yourself, you will get less offensive rebound chances, which will in turn improve your rebounding margin some more. Similarly, a team that gets a lot of steals or creates a lot of turnovers will have fewer chances to garner defensive rebounds and will reduce its rebounding margin, all else being equal.

In Lehigh's case, the spurious stat cited to justify their rebounding prowess - that Lehigh led the PL in rebounding margin - was largely due to scheduling games with D3 lightweights Haverford and Swarthmore. In those two games, LU outrebounded the big men of those two schools by a collective total of 96-47. If you merely remove these two D3 games from the LU stats, you'd find that Lehigh's rebounding margin falls from 1st place in the league to 5th!

So what to do to get around all of these problems? The answer is twofold. First, use only league games once teams have played a few league games. This puts the stats on a more "apples to apples" basis, even before teams have played every league opponent. Secondly, and most importantly, look at the percentage of offensive rebounds garnered by teams and also at the percentage of defensive rebounds that they collect. These stats eliminate the various biases that exist otherwise, and can be used to judge which teams are the better ones on the offensive boards, which teams are better on the defensive boards, and which teams are best in total.

Here are the PL stats through six games for defensive rebounding percentage, offensive rebounding percentage, and then the total (simply derived from adding the first two percentages). {Note that there are several methods that could be used for the total category.}

Defensive Rebounds as a Percentage of Opportunities:

1. Holy Cross 81.6%
2. American 74.5%
3. Bucknell 73.3%
4. Lehigh 72.1%
5. Colgate 68.5%
6. Navy 63.8%
7. Army 62.1%
8. Lafayette 60.0%


Offensive Rebounds as a Percentage of Opportunities:

1. Holy Cross 38.0%
2. Bucknell 32.7%
3. Army 32.1%
4. Colgate 30.7%
5. American 30.0%
6. Lafayette 26.9%
7. Lehigh 26.7%
8. Navy 24.8%

TOTAL:

1. Holy Cross 119.6
2. Bucknell 106.0
3. American 104.5
4. Colgate 99.2
5. Lehigh 98.8
6. Army 94.2
7. Navy 88.6
8. Lafayette 86.9


So what can we conclude from the above? First, the Crusaders have done an exceptional job at both ends of the floor. It will be very hard for any team to beat them if they enjoy this sort of success on the boards. Secondly, other than Holy Cross there are two other good rebounding teams - Bucknell and American; two so-so ones - Colgate and Lehigh; one fairly poor team - Army; and two awful ones - Navy and Lafayette. The terrible performance of these last two is explainable in that neither has a true post presence and both offenses are geared around launching up outside shots.

Two things stand out when we look at the individual segments. First, it is surprising that Army has been as weak as it has on the defensive boards, beating out only Lafayette. The Black Knights are doing a good job on the offensive boards, and one would think that their good fundamentals and the emergence of two solid centers this year would have put them a few notches higher. Secondly, it is very surprising to me that Lehigh is 7th on the offensive glass. One would think a team with athletic forwards such as White, Neptune, Anderson, and Carrington, along with Jose Olivares, would have have fared better than they have. The loss of Jason Mgreboff probably explains a bit of it, since he surprisingly gets an above-average amount of his rebounds at the offensive end, but even without him the Mountain Hawks should be doing better. For them to have any chance to beat Holy Cross tonight, they will need to do a better job in this area.

Effect of Wins and Schedule on the RPI: Many fans have a basic knowledge of how the RPI works - 25% weight to a team's own W-L percentage (adjusted for home/road), plus 50% weight to its opponent's W-L percentage, plus 25% weight to its opponents' opponents' W-L percentage. In the early part of the season, however, it's easy to lose sight of how volatile this ranking can be and how much it can change due to one or two results.

For example, let's look at tonight's Holy Cross vs Duke game. HC at present is ranked 73rd in RPI with a .5687 RPI. Its strength of schedule is ranked #183. How will these two rankings be affected by the game in Cameron tonight?

The Crusaders will see a significant boost in their RPI just by walking in the door. Should they lose, my quick calculation indicates their new RPI ranking will be approximately #63, with the actual RPI going up to about .5773. (Note that it is impossible to predict the exact effect because three previous HC opponents have games tonight, and also many of their opponents' opponents play as well, so 75% of their RPI will change due to these games.) This positive effect will be the same if they lose by one point or 41.

Should they pull off a major upset, the Crusader RPI ranking would likely rise to about #37, with an RPI of about .6031. This sort of variability in the RPI is very much a fact of life this early in the year.

As for strength of schedule (SOS hereafter), the current Crusader SOS ranking is #183. By tomorrow morning, my quick calculation indicates it will rise to approximately #128, win or lose. Again, remember that the wins/losses achieved tonight by past HC opponents (and their opponents) will also affect the SOS. One example of the effect of opponents' games is that the HC SOS ranking as of Sunday was #157. It fell to #183 in two days due to losses by Syracuse, Yale, Fairfield, and William & Mary.

Another example of how a big game early in the year can have a big RPI effect can be seen in Bucknell's experience with a couple of big games last year. When the Bison lost to Villanova, their SOS jumped from #45 to #17. And after taking a beating from Duke in early January, the RPI ranking went from #13 to #8 while the SOS rose from 19th to 14th. Sadly, exactly one month later, after winning nine games in a row, their SOS plummeted to #177, thanks to some awful ooc records run up by many of the other PL teams.

The good news for Holy Cross, Bucknell, and other league members is that the Patriot League ooc record this year is MUCH better than last year. Whereas the 2005-06 ooc D1 record for the league was 40-58 (.408) - .372 excluding Bucknell - this year's D1 record thus far is a lofty 37-28 (.569), even with Bucknell showing only a 3-5 record. The end result of this significant improvement is that the top teams in the league this year will not have to watch their RPI's go into a state of free-fall when they get into league play. At least not if they can win these games, which will be a much more difficult proposition than in past years.

Is there a home court advantage in the Patriot League?

We know that the home court is worth about 4 points in the average NCAA game. (See Jeff Sagarin's ratings for example.) This 4 point advantage creates a bigger differential than some might assume since it is either added to a team's expected margin if they are at home or subtracted if they are on the road. For example, if Holy Cross is considered to be three points better than Siena, they would either be a seven point favorite (in theory) at home or a 1-point underdog on the road.

But does this four point home court advantage (which creates an 8-point home/road differential) exist in a league with the type of crowds we see in the Patriot League? Indeed is there any differential at all??

To try to answer this question, I took a look at all Patriot League games for the past three years and looked at each team's home and away margins of victory/defeat and won-loss record. For the three years of games (168 games in all), the short answer is that the home court in the average game was worth 3.7 points (or a differential of 7.4 points between home and road). And the home teams compiled a 102-66 record (.607), as opposed to the .500 record that would be expected if there were no home court bias. That's 18 more wins and 18 less losses than expected. I'm not sure whether this difference is within a likely statistical deviation but it looks pretty meaningful to me.

It gets more interesting when you look at each team's home and road records:

Team Home W-L / Road W-L / Difference

American.....14 - 7 / 11 - 10 / +3
Army.......... 2 - 19 / 3 - 18 / -1
Bucknell.... 21 - 0 / 12 - 9 / +9
Colgate...... 12 - 9 / 5 - 16 / +7
Holy Cross.. 18 - 3 / 13 - 8 / +5
Lafayette.. 12 - 9 / 7 - 14 / +5
Lehigh..... 17 - 4 / 11 - 10 / +6
Navy....... 6 - 15 / 4 - 17 / +2

Total 102 - 66 / 66 - 102 / +36

Thus five PL teams won a lot more at home during this period, led by Bucknell, who has gone an incredible 21-0 at home over this period but nine games worse on the road. The other four with a big edge, in order, are Colgate, Lehigh, Holy Cross, and Lafayette. American and Navy have small edges in the W-L category and Army actually has a worse record, although that is meaningless given their futility in all venues over the past three years.

What may be more interesting is the point differential shown by the various teams home versus road:

------Point Differential at Home------
Team ....... 2006/2005/2004/Average

Bucknell …. 4.71 / 5.21 / 9.07 / 6.33
Holy Cross …. 4.36 / 5.29 / 6.86 / 5.50
Lafayette …. 3.93 / 5.00 / 4.14 / 4.36
Colgate …. 1.93 / 4.43 / 4.93 / 3.76
Navy …. 2.57 / 7.93 / 0.64 / 3.71
American …. 2.21 / 4.86 / 2.57 / 3.21
Lehigh … . -1.57 / 3.07 / 3.14 / 1.55
Army …. -1.86 / 1.79 / 3.64 / 1.19

Total …. 2.04 / 4.70 / 4.38 / 3.70

There are two interesting things that show up here. First, when it comes to the actual point value of the home court, three teams jump to the forefront: Bucknell, followed by Holy Cross and Lafayette. The first two have an edge that is significantly larger than the NCAA average. This seems to make sense in that the Bison in recent years have had the largest, loudest crowds in the PL, while the Crusaders likely are second. LC also has had a tradition of good crowd support. Two teams, Lehigh and Army, are way below average in the point value of the home court. The Army situation is understandable. Lehigh's low number is less understandable, but there are typically a lot of empty seats in Stabler. The perplexing part of the Lehigh record is that they have enjoyed a much better winning percentage at home even though they have not had much of an edge in point differential.

Also of interest, although it may well just be a statistical fluke, is that the value of the PL home court fell significantly in 2006 to 2.04 after it averaged 4.54 points in the two previous years. Indeed, Lehigh and Army actually played better on the road in 2006, at least according to their point differentials.

To add some perspective to these numbers, there were 24 seasons in the study (8 teams x 3). Of those 24 seasons, there was a home court advantage in point differential in 22 of them. And teams had a better record at home 18 times, the same record 3 times, and a worse record only 3 times (twice by Army).

The next question is why is there a significant home court advantage. Some of it might be due to the home crowds but that certainly can't be the only reason. Colgate, for example, had an almost average home court edge and yet plays before mostly empty seats. (Their LARGEST home crowd of last year other than for the Bucknell game was 535 fans. And I suspect that is a made-up, inflated number since every CU home game, including the games during semester break, had virtually the same attendance.) I imagine that a reasonable amount of the edge is the travel effect plus the home team's comfort level with their own court and shooting background. If I get ambitious I may take a look at whether there is any difference when schools are on break or in session.

Taking Care of the Ball: There are huge differences between the league's elite and the league's also-rans when it comes to each team's assist:turnover ratio and also when it comes to the assist:turnover ratio they allow their opponents. In fact, looking at all of the various statistical measurements for the 2005-06 PL season, these two assist to turnover categories had perhaps the biggest separation between the good teams and the bad.

First, here are the assist to turnover ratios for each PL team for last year:

Holy Cross / .99
Bucknell / .96
Lehigh / .94
American / .86
Lafayette / .75
Colgate / .71
Navy / .69
Army / .63

Looks a lot like the league standings, doesn't it? As a matter of fact, except for the Crusaders and the Bison being flip-flopped, it exactly mirrors last year's order of finish.

The top teams also created a lot of turnovers relative to the assists that they allowed. Take a look at the defensive assist:turnover ratio stats: (low is good)

Bucknell / .51
Holy Cross / .66
Colgate / .81
Lehigh / .85
Navy / .86
American / .90
Lafayette / .91
Army / 1.09

The two top teams from last year absolutely dominated this category. Bucknell, with its tough man-to-man and match-up zone, allowed only about a half an assist for every turnover they created - a very impressive performance. Holy Cross, with a similar defensive philosophy, gave up less than two-thirds of an assist for each turnover. Colgate was third but a long way back. Army badly trailed the field.

Finally, if we put these two categories together, by calculating the difference between each team's assist:turnover ratio and what they allowed, here are the PL leaders:

Bucknell / .45
Holy Cross / .33
Lehigh / .09
American / -.04
Colgate / -.10
Lafayette / -.16
Navy / -.17
Army / -.46

Again, with one exception this stat exactly tracks the league standings. Bucknell has a big edge and Holy Cross is way ahead of everyone else. I think this not only is a reflection of the Bison and Crusader personnel but also a reflection of the coaching ability and philosophy of their respective coaches: Pat Flannery and Ralph Willard. Both teams take care of the basketball and move it around offensively, and both teams play strong, hard-to-attack defenses that give up few easy baskets and also don't allow a lot of easy passes. With Charles Lee and Kevin Hamilton gone, I think it will be interesting to see what the BU and HC defenses look like in 2006-07. My guess is that both will continue to be the league's toughest.

Note: At the suggestion of a Holy Cross fan, I also took a look at the same stats for the 2004-05 PL season for that year's two dominant teams - Holy Cross and Bucknell. These numbers confirm how important the ratios are. (Can't prove whether it's causal or not, but in any event, the correlation to winning is quite high.) Here are the offensive and defensive ratios for HC and BU:

Holy Cross:

Assist to Turnover Ratio (on offense) = 1.21
Assist to Turnover Ratio (on defense) = 0.68 (low is good)
Difference = 0.53

Bucknell:

Assist to Turnover Ratio (on offense) = 0.76
Assist to Turnover Ratio (on defense) = 0.60 (low is good)
Difference = 0.16

Once again, the two top teams had the two biggest differences, with Holy Cross way ahead (as they were in the final standings that season). Looking back through a couple of seasons, the HC ratio of 1.21 was far ahead of that for any other team or season. In fact, no-one else was better than 1.0. The great ratio was largely attributable to a tremendous job byTorey Thomas and a good one from KHam.

Bucknell was extremely good on the defensive side, but I was surprised to see the mediocre ratio on offense. Although Badmus did well in this area and Bettencourt was OK, Charles Lee's ratio was not good and the ratio for McNaughton and Brown was awful. (Note: Lee improved a lot in this area in 2006.) Although it is way too small a sample to be statistically significant, the Bison assist to turnover ratio for the three games when Flannery took his medical leave was awful:

With Flannery = 0.82
Without Flannery = 0.57

Don't know whether there was a lack of focus during this time or if it was just a statistical anomaly.

When the Bison and the Crusaders match up with each other, it's normally the defense that wins. Looking back at the last nine meetings, both sides have poor ratios - the Bucknell assist to turnover ratio is 0.633 and the HC ratio is 0.695. HC had a huge edge in 2004 (0.80 to 0.48) but Bucknell had the advantage last year ( 0.84 to 0.62). The leader in this category has won seven of the nine meetings.

One side note: It's amazing to me that Bucknell won the 2004 playoff game against HC in the horse barn despite having only 8 assists and a whopping 28 turnovers. To offset the turnovers, the Bison had to outshoot the Crusaders 62% to 41% from the field and by 73% to 33% from the line and had to outrebound them 33-22. Even with these huge advantages, they still just barely won due to the importance of all the turnovers. Must have been an ugly game.

Thanks for the suggestion SOS.

Soccer on the Rise in the Patriot League: Lacrosse may be the league's top sport from a national perspective but soccer is moving up quickly, both on the men's and women's side.

In men's soccer, Lehigh has moved up to #13 in the nation in the NSCAA/adidas poll (#21 in Soccer Times) and Colgate is at #24 in the NSCAA poll. If Lehigh should falter in the PL tournament, there is a good chance that the league could get two bids to the NCAA tournament.

The news is also good on the women's side, where the league's first division is clearly the strongest in league history. Navy is the only unbeaten, untied team in the nation. Some observers had not given the Navy squad the credit it deserved until Thursday night, when they defeated Penn State, the #8 team in the nation. Navy had been ranked #19 and #25 in two of the major polls but they will take a big jump upwards in the polls if they prevail today against Bucknell.

Bucknell also is having a good season and stands at #12 in the Mid-Atlantic regional rankings. In fact, if the Bison were able to pull off a miraculous upset of Navy this afternoon, they would win the league and host the tournament. Very much a long-shot however. Also Colgate has a #8 ranking in the somewhat weaker Northeast region and Lehigh is still very strong. If Navy should lose in the PL playoffs, there is a very good chance for the PL to be a two-bid league for the first time.

With Colgate. American, and Lafayette now giving soccer scholarships, it seems like a pretty good bet that others will eventually follow suit. If that happens, it can only raise the profile of the league in general. Given that many soccer players are also good academically, there is a real chance for the PL to be a significant player in the soccer world (as they are now in men's lacrosse) in future years.

NOTE: Since this was published, the Bucknell women's teams stunned Navy 2-1 at Annapolis to prevent the Mids from finishing undefeated and untied. Before the Bison's first goal, Navy had not given up a goal in close to 1000 consecutive minutes. Subsequent to that game (and Navy's win over Penn State), Navy is now ranked 16th in the country and 4th in the Region by Soccerbuzz. Bucknell moved up to 8th in the Region - their highest ranking ever. Bucknell will now host the PL tournament on Friday and Sunday.

Team rebounding ... is critical in winning games. Just looking at the rebounding stats for the top individuals is like just looking at selected battles but ignoring the overall war. To evaluate the overall effectiveness of Patriot League teams on the boards, I looked at three different stats:

1. Percentage of offensive rebounds - what percentage of its own missed shots did each PL team get?

2. Percentage of defensive rebounds - what percentage of all missed opposition shots did each PL team grab?

3. Percentage of overall rebounds = the average of #'s 1 and 2 - this is a good measure of overall rebounding but not perfect, because it does not normalize the relativity between offensive and defensive rebounding opportunities.

Here are the PL rankings from league games in 2006:

Offensive Rebounding:

American / 36.1%
Bucknell / 35.9%
Navy / 35.0%
Colgate / 34.9%
Holy Cross / 34.3%
Lehigh / 28.6%
Lafayette / 25.5%
Army / 24.9%

Five teams are very close to each other in this category. The surprise team near the top is Navy, which may be partly attributable to its fast style of play causing more rebound situations when offensive players are not blocked out. It's also partly a tribute to Matt Fannin, who, even on one leg, led the PL in offensive rebounding. His extreme physical style and work rate paid dividends in this area.

Three teams - Lehigh, Lafayette, and Army - trail badly. The latter two squads are not a surprise since neither had a true big man or a big-time rebounder. It's a surprise to see Lehigh in this category since they had three big men and a couple of athletic forwards. To put the numbers in some perspective (although not balanced for "pace of play"), the smallish Navy squad had four players with 18 or more offensive rebounds in PL play; Lehigh had none.

Defensive Rebounding:

Holy Cross / 72.7%
Bucknell / 71.9%
American / 70.1%
Lehigh / 68.2%
Army / 66.6%
Colgate / 66.1%
Lafayette / 65.3%
Navy / 63.1%

Not too much of note here. The four dominant teams in the league standings are the top four in this category. Holy Cross was able to utilizethe balanced rebounding that was discussed in the earlier essay on individual rebounding. Navy, for all of its good numbers on the offensive glass, did a poor job at the other end. Undersized Army scrapped its way to an average performance on the defensive boards.

Total Rebounding:

Bucknell / 53.9%
Holy Cross / 53.5%
American / 53.1%
Colgate / 50.5%
Navy / 49.1%
Lehigh / 48.4%
Army / 45.8%
Lafayette / 45.4%

Putting the offensive and defensive caroms together, we see that the top two in this category are the two squads - Bucknell and Holy Cross - that finished 1-2 in the league, with first division American also near the top. Lehigh again does not fare well, considering the quality of the team and its size. Not surprisingly, the two small teams - Lafayette and Army - are at the bottom, trailing the field by a significant margin.

As I mentioned in the earlier rebounding essay, it will be interesting to see how Lehigh does on the boards this year missing its leading league rebounder, Mike Fischman, and also James Anderson, another leader in rebounds per minute. We'll see what their massive center Jason Mgreboff and the even taller John Gourlay can do now that last year's Mountain Hawk seniors are gone. Zahir Carrington, their freshman PF, might also get a chance to contribute in this area as well.

Both Bucknell and Holy Cross have to replace their rebounding leaders, Charles Lee and Kevin Hamilton, who were the top two rebounders in the league, thanks both to ability and to a heavy-duty amount of minutes. Both the Bison and the Crusaders have a plethora of returnees who can rebound, however, so I would expect both of them to again rank near the top when the 2006-07 rebounding stats are tallied.

Assists matter. It's not terribly surprising to see which teams are at the top of the Patriot League when it comes to assists. Here are the leaders in percentage of baskets coming off of an assist:

Holy Cross 65.6%
Bucknell 62.5%
Lehigh 58.9%
American 58.0%
Lafayette 55.9%
Navy 55.3%
Colgate 54.0%
Army 52.3%

If you flip-flopped Bucknell/Holy Cross and Colgate/Navy, this stat would exactly mirror the final league standings. These percentages would probably be more meaningful if I took out baskets scored on offensive rebounds but that would take more time than I have. I will note, however, that the top offensive rebounding team in the league was Bucknell, followed by American, which may have some effect on the percentage of assisted baskets. Army, by the way, was a distant 8th in the offensive rebounding category, which makes their low percentage of assisted baskets look even worse.

Perhaps more interesting is the ratio of assists to turnovers for each team:

Holy Cross .99
Bucknell .96
Lehigh .94
American .86
Lafayette .75
Colgate .71
Navy .69
Army .63

Except for Bucknell and Holy Cross being transposed, this stat tracks the 2005-06 PL standings exactly. It also mirrors the standings in that there was a big gap between the first and second division last year. Army again has a woeful percentage which, when combined with weak rebounding, goes a long way in explaining their record.

Assists per Minute.....As far as individuals go, here are the top returning playmakers, ranked by assists per minute (again adjusted for Pomeroy's pace of play) , with their minutes played shown first followed by the assists:

1 Lekavicius, Linas... Amer / 287 / 6.0
2 Thomas, Torey....... HC / 510 / 5.9
3 Badmus, Abe......... Buck / 403 / 5.5
4 Doherty prev yr...... HC / 296 / 5.2
5 Kina, Kaleo............ Navy / 342 / 4.3
6 Mercer, Derrick.... Amer / 497 / 4.3
7 Sinning, Cory....... Army / 378 / 3.7
8 Brown, Andrew....... Laf / 428 / 3.6
9 Johnson, Corey...... Navy / 472 / 3.5
10 Bell, Matt............. Army / 427 / 3.1
11 Betley, Matt............. Laf / 291 / 3.1
12 Checovich, Todd..... Colg / 244 / 3.1
13 Eitutavicius, A..... Amer / 309 / 3.0
14 Abdullah, Bilal......... Laf / 374 / 3.0
15 Olivero, Jose....... Lehigh / 442 / 2.9
16 Bates, Corban....... Army / 356 / 2.6
17 Chones, Kyle........... Colg / 305 / 2.4
18 Ingram, Andre....... Amer / 468 / 2.4
19 Simon, Jon................ Colg / 407 / 2.3
20 Neptune, Kyle....... Lehigh / 392 / 2.3
21 Mastropaolo, Darren. Buck / 246 / 2.2
22 Brown, Donald........... Buck / 326 / 2.0
23 Jackson, Marshall... Army / 301 / 2.0
24 Simmons, Keith........... HC / 448 / 1.9
25 Clifford, Tim................ HC / 336 / 1.8
26 Griffin, John............. Buck / 213 / 1.8
27 Vegotsky, Jason....... Buck / 156 / 1.7
28 Sprink, Greg........... Navy / 463 / 1.7
29 Cunningham, Colin..... HC / 162 / 1.7
30 Vander Baan Alex.... HC / 398 / 1.7
31 Lay, Travis............ Amer / 118 / 1.6
32 Mgebroff, Jason.... Lehigh / 140 / 1.6
33 Detmer, Ted.............. Laf / 234 / 1.5
34 Billbe, Brayden..... Amer / 319 / 1.5
35 Brigham, Bryce...... Navy / 220 / 1.4
36 Chones, Kendall....... Colg / 309 / 1.4
37 Gentile, Dan............. Colg / 248 / 1.3
38 Brewer, Kenny....... Army / 127 / 1.3
39 Daniels, Marc............ Colg / 288 / 1.1
40 McNaughton, Chris.. Buck / 364 / 1.1

A few things caught my eye about this stat:

1. Lekavicius, Thomas, and Badmus are significantly in front among the returnees.

2. I only saw American play twice but I'm a bit surprised to see Lekavicius ahead of Mercer by a significant margin.

3. The leader in assists per minute for those players taller than 6'5" is the sometimes underrated Darren Mastropaolo of Bucknell. Tim Clifford is next among the big guys.


In my post the other day, we saw that Lehigh has lost a lot in the rebounding category. Well, they've lost even more in the area of assists, which is why I think the key to the Mountain Hawks' season is what kind of play they get at PG from frosh Marquis Webb (or possibly from frosh Matt Shamis). If Olivero has to play a lot of PG, I think they're in trouble. Anyway, here are the assists per 40 minutes for those who are gone:

1 Gilfillan, Mitch.... Lehigh / 384 / 7.2
2 Hamilton, Kevin...... HC / 512 / 4.6
3 Reed, Alvin............ Colg / 355 / 4.5
4 Lee, Charles........... Buck / 461 / 3.8
5 Bettencourt, Kevin.. Buck / 440 / 3.5
6 Knight, Joe......... Lehigh / 400 / 2.9
7 Capusan, Andrei..... Laf / 360 / 2.5
8 Betley, Pat................ Laf / 339 / 2.1
9 Fannin, Matt........ Navy / 301 / 2.1
10 Hooper, David....... Navy / 141 / 1.6

There's the underrated Mitch Gilfillan leading the pack, not only ahead of Hamilton, but also well ahead of any returnee. The top six on this list will all be missed a lot by their respective teams when it comes to setting up their teammates.

Assist to Turnover Ratio.....Gilfillan not only had a high number of assists but he also had the league's best ratio of assists to turnovers - not always an easy double to pull off. Here are the top returnees in this category, followed by the players who hopefully graduated:

1 Thomas, Torey......... HC / 510 / 2.0
2 Doherty prev yr........ HC / 296 / 1.9
3 Lekavicius, Linas... Amer / 287 / 1.8
4 Mercer, Derrick..... Amer / 497 / 1.6
5 Badmus, Abe......... Buck / 403 / 1.6
6 Brigham, Bryce...... Navy / 220 / 1.3
7 Griffin, John............ Buck / 213 / 1.2
8 Sinning, Cory.......... Army / 378 / 1.1
9 Chones, Kyle............ Colg / 305 / 1.1
10 Betley, Matt............. Laf / 291 / 1.1
11 Bates, Corban....... Army / 356 / 1.1
12 Gourlay, John....... Lehigh / 98 / 1.0
13 Bell, Matt............... Army / 427 / 1.0
14 Simon, Jon............... Colg / 407 / 0.9
15 Ingram, Andre...... Amer / 468 / 0.9
16 Checovich, Todd..... Colg / 244 / 0.9
17 Johnson, Corey...... Navy / 472 / 0.9
18 Brown, Andrew........ Laf / 428 / 0.9
19 Simmons, Keith........ HC / 448 / 0.9
20 Eitutavicius, A...... Amer / 309 / 0.9
21 Mastropaolo, D....... Buck / 246 / 0.8
22 Vander Baan, Alex.... HC / 398 / 0.8
23 Olivero, Jose....... Lehigh / 442 / 0.8
24 Abdullah, Bilal........... Laf / 374 / 0.8
25 Kina, Kaleo............. Navy / 342 / 0.8

Graduates:

1 Gilfillan, Mitch.... Lehigh / 384 / 2.4
2 Bettencourt, Kevin.. Buck / 440 / 2.0
3 Lee, Charles........ Buck / 461 / 1.2
4 Knight, Joe......... Lehigh / 400 / 1.1
5 Hamilton, Kevin..... HC / 512 / 1.1
6 Reed, Alvin......... Colg / 355 / 1.0
7 Betley, Pat......... Laf / 339 / 1.0

It's interesting that, of the returnees, only four (plus Doherty) had what I would consider a good ratio of assists to turnovers: Thomas, Lekavicius, Mercer, and Badmus. Looks like Jeff Jones' coaching must be paying off when it comes to AU ballhandling! And Gilfillan, along with Bettencourt easily led the list of graduates. BTW, it's not a good sign for Navy that both of the guys who they play at the point (Kina and Johnson) are not true PG's and that both of them had more turnovers than assists.

Six teams return their starting PG's this year plus an experienced backup : Bucknell (Badmus/Griffin), Holy Cross (Thomas/Doherty), American (Mercer/Lekivicius), Lafayette (Andrew Brown/Harley), Navy (Kina/Johnson), and Army (Sinning/Bell). Over the course of the season, it will be an interesting theme to see the calibre of PG play generated by Hall and Shamis for Lehigh and by Colgate's Jon Simon (who played some point last year as well as 2G). This position may well determine if these two teams, who have been generally picked for the middle of the pack, are contenders or pretenders.

Rebounds for Returning Players: In a league rarely known for big-time rebounding centers, the top Patriot League returnees are all relatively small forwards. Bucknell's Donald Brown leads in rebounds per 40 minutes of play, followed by three other relatively small forwards: Jordan Nichols (American), Bryan White (Lehigh), and Corban Bates (Army). Most of the top fifteen played a fair number of minutes - all except Gilmore and Mgreboff - but it's not until # 16, Keith Simmons, that we see a player who was on the court almost all of the time. As I mentioned in the last post, the players who see expanded minutes this year may or may not be able to rebound at the same pace. Here is every returning player who averaged over four rebounds per 40 minutes (shows minutes played followed by rebounds per 40, again adjusted each team's pace of play) :

1 Brown, Donald....... Buck / 326 / 10.4
2 Nichols, Jordan..... Amer / 239 / 9.4
3 White, Bryan........ Lehigh / 323 / 8.8
4 Bates, Corban....... Army / 356 / 8.6
5 Billbe, Brayden..... Amer / 319 / 8.2
6 Daniels, Marc....... Colg / 288 / 8.2
7 Joneliunas, Paulius. Amer / 302 / 8.1
8 Gilmore, Brian...... Amer / 148 / 8.1
9 Lekavicius, Linas... Amer / 287 / 8.0
10 Mastropaolo, Darren. Buck / 246 / 7.8
11 Mgebroff, Jason..... Lehigh / 140 / 7.5
12 Checovich, Todd..... Colg / 244 / 7.5
13 Chones, Kendall..... Colg / 309 / 7.4
14 Betley, Matt........ Laf / 291 / 7.3
15 Schmidt, Everest.... Laf / 252 / 7.2
16 Simmons, Keith...... HC / 448 / 6.9
17 Vander Baan, Alex HC / 398 / 6.9
18 Chones, Kyle........ Colg / 305 / 6.8
19 McNaughton, Chris... Buck / 364 / 6.6
20 Clifford, Tim....... HC / 336 / 6.5
21 Sewell, Jimmy....... Army / 123 / 6.5
22 Neptune, Kyle....... Lehigh / 392 / 6.4
23 Dixon, Lawrence..... HC / 141 / 6.2
24 Thomas, Torey....... HC / 510 / 6.2
25 Cunningham, Colin... HC / 162 / 6.1
26 Lay, Travis......... Amer / 118 / 5.6
27 Ingram, Andre....... Amer / 468 / 5.4
28 Detmer, Ted......... Laf / 234 / 5.4
29 Doherty, prev yr HC / 296 / 5.2
30 Sprink, Greg........ Navy / 463 / 5.1
31 Badmus, Abe......... Buck / 403 / 5.0
32 Gourlay, John....... Lehigh / 98 / 5.0
33 Johnson, Corey...... Navy / 472 / 5.0
34 Teague, Adam........ Navy / 179 / 4.9
35 Bell, Matt.......... Army / 427 / 4.8
36 Roemer, Kyle........ Colg / 310 / 4.6
37 Kina, Kaleo......... Navy / 342 / 4.5
38 Sinning, Cory....... Army / 378 / 4.4
39 Griffin, John....... Buck / 213 / 4.3
40 Brown, Jarell....... Army / 370 / 4.2
41 Cummins, Paul....... Laf / 239 / 4.2

One thing that is amazing is the balance in the Holy Cross rebounding. There are six returning players on the list and all six averaged between 6.1 and 6.9 rebounds per 40 minutes. (And Pat Doherty wasn't far behind when he played the previous year.) Kevin Hamilton was just ahead of the returning six with 7.2 caroms per 40, while Kevin Hyland surprisingly had the weakest rebounding stats of the HC players (see below). One potential Navy weakness for 2006-07 can be seen in the stats - not one player among the top 29 rebounders.

Here's a few with decent rebounding totals but limited minutes:

1 Biles, Ben.......... Navy / 52 / 9.9
2 Colbert, Clif....... Navy / 76 / 7.0
3 Linthicum, Josh..... Buck / 28 / 6.4
4 Anderson, Philip.... Lehigh / 20 / 6.0

And finally, here is what each team has lost on the rebounding side:

1 Baldwin, Carlton.... Navy / 155 / 10.0
2 Anderson, James..... Lehigh / 214 / 9.1
3 Fischman, Mike...... Lehigh / 330 / 8.8
4 Lee, Charles.... Buck / 461 / 8.2
5 Foss, Jon........... Colg / 173 / 8.0
6 Hamilton, Kevin..... HC / 512 / 7.2
7 Green, Leonard...... Navy / 213 / 6.9
8 Capusan, Andrei..... Laf / 360 / 6.8
9 Engstrom, Erik...... Army / 256 / 6.5
10 Reed, Casey......... Navy / 175 / 5.4
11 Knight, Joe......... Lehigh / 400 / 4.4
12 Hyland, Kevin....... HC / 230 / 4.3
13 Knight, Simon....... Colg / 87 / 4.3
14 Fannin, Matt........ Navy / 301 / 4.2

Two things jump out at me looking at these stats. One is that here's another indication of how good the departed Carlton Baldwin was, when he was healthy enough to get on the floor. And secondly, that Lehigh may miss the unheralded duo of Anderson and Fischman more than some might think when it comes to controlling the boards. White is a good rebounder, but centers Mgreboff and Gourlay thus far have not rebounded like Anderson and Fischman.

Returning Patriot League Scorers: Many hoops previews emphasize the stats of returning players. This is useful to a point, but it can sometimes be misleading since a player's raw statistics are very dependent on playing time. Stats are also dependent to a lesser degree on a team's style of play. Players on a team that races up and down the court, shoots quickly, and also gives up fast shots at the defensive end should have more points, more rebounds, and more assists. Yet that does not necessarily make these guys better than players on the more methodical teams.

To evaluate the returning talent on this year's Patriot League teams in a slightly different light, here's a look at the scoring stats (PL only, for consistency) for everyone who played at least 8 mpg last season. The list shows points per 40 minutes adjusted for an average pace of play (using Ken Pomeroy's formula) so as to not penalize the teams that play a more methodical offense and/or tough defense.

Scoring per 40 Minutes for Returning Players

(shows PL minutes played, followed by pts per 40 minutes)

1 Brown, Jarell....... Army / 370 / 22.9
2 Olivero,Jose....... Lehigh / 442 / 22.6
3 Simmons, Keith...... HC / 448 / 19.9
4 Eitutavicius, A..... Amer / 309 / 18.0
5 Sprink, Greg.......... Navy / 463 / 17.7
6 McNaughton, Chris.. Buck / 364 / 17.0
7 Vegotsky, Jason..... Buck / 156 / 16.8
8 Cummins, Paul....... Laf / 239 / 16.5
9 Clifford, Tim............ HC / 336 / 16.1
10 Chones, Kendall..... Colg / 309 / 15.4
11 Bell, Matt............. Army / 427 / 15.2
12 Ingram, Andre...... Amer / 468 / 15.2
13 Kina, Kaleo........... Navy / 342 / 15.2
14 Brown, Donald...... Buck / 326 / 14.6
15 Neptune, Kyle...... Lehigh / 392 / 14.6
16 Roemer, Kyle......... Colg / 310 / 14.5
17 Simon, Jon............. Colg / 407 / 14.1
18 Joneliunas, Paulius. Amer / 302 / 14.0
19 Billbe, Brayden..... Amer / 319 / 13.5
20 Thomas, Torey....... HC / 510 / 12.9
21 Doherty prev yr....... HC / 296 / 12.8
22 Abdullah, Bilal........ Laf / 374 / 12.3
23 Lekavicius, Linas.. Amer / 287 / 12.2
24 Teague, Adam........ Navy / 179 / 11.9
25 Griffin, John......... Buck / 213 / 11.9
26 Brown, Andrew....... Laf / 428 / 11.8
27 Gentile, Dan........... Colg / 248 / 11.3
28 Brigham, Bryce..... Navy / 220 / 10.8
29 Chones, Kyle.......... Colg / 305 / 10.8
30 Badmus, Abe......... Buck / 403 / 10.6
31 Mercer, Derrick..... Amer / 497 / 10.5
32 Mgebroff, Jason..... Lehigh / 140 / 10.5
33 White, Bryan........ Lehigh / 323 / 10.2
34 Sinning, Cory........ Army / 378 / 9.8
35 Bates, Corban........ Army / 356 / 9.7
36 Schmidt, Everest...... Laf / 252 / 9.3
37 Betley, Matt............... Laf / 291 / 9.3
38 Nichols, Jordan...... Amer / 239 / 9.3
39 Mastropaolo, Darren. Buck / 246 / 9.1
40 Cunningham, Colin... HC / 162 / 9.0
41 Johnson, Corey...... Navy / 472 / 8.3
42 Vander Baan Alex... HC / 398 / 8.2
43 Gilmore, Brian...... Amer / 148 / 8.1
44 Daniels, Marc....... Colg / 288 / 7.3
45 Lay, Travis........... Amer / 118 / 7.3
46 Dixon, Lawrence...... HC / 141 / 7.0
47 Brewer, Kenny....... Army / 127 / 6.8
48 Checovich, Todd..... Colg / 244 / 6.6
49 Hilliard, Jamaal....... Laf / 226 / 6.3
50 Sewell, Jimmy....... Army / 123 / 6.2
51 Detmer, Ted.............. Laf / 234 / 5.8
52 Jackson, Marshall... Army / 301 / 5.3
53 Gourlay, John....... Lehigh / 98 / 4.0

I wonder how many observers of the Patriot League would have guessed Jarrell Brown to be the most prolific returning scorer? Maybe this explains why Charles Lee thought Brown was the second toughest PL player that he had to guard (after Kevin Hamilton). Two instant offense subs - Eitutavicius and Vegotsky - are also high on the list, as is the underrated Tim Clifford and up-and-coming Greg Sprink.

Of course, the numbers for certain players with high production/low minutes may merely be a statistical fluke and/or may be unsustainable if the player gets full-time minutes. That's why they play the games.

There are three other players with noteworthy productivity, albeit in very limited minutes:

Carr, Garrison......Amer / 95 / 19.3
Moonshower, John....Army / 77 / 11.3
Thomas, Rob.........Buck / 48 / 10.1

Carr's 19.3 pts per 40 minutes would be right up there with the big boys if he could sustain that pace over full-time minutes. That may be one of Jeff Jones' challenges - how to balance the minutes between guards Mercer, Carr, Ingram, Eitutavicius, and Lekavicius. To add to the puzzle, the players with the most points per minute may also be the ones who give up the most points per minute. To further complicate matters, it will get even harder to find minutes for all five if Jones follows through on his talk about using the three-guard offense less frequently this year. With all of the returning talent, it will be interesting to see what kind of a job Jones can do coaching it.

Finally, here's the list of the players who are gone, again sorted by points per 40 minutes:

1 Capusan, Andrei..... Laf / 360 / 20.8
2 Hamilton, Kevin..... HC / 512 / 20.2
3 Knight, Joe......... Lehigh / 400 / 17.6
4 Lee, Charles........ Buck / 461 / 17.0
5 Bettencourt, Kevin.. Buck / 440 / 15.1
6 Reed, Alvin......... Colg / 355 / 13.0
7 Reed, Casey......... Navy / 175 / 12.7
8 Betley, Pat......... Laf / 339 / 11.6
9 Fannin, Matt........ Navy / 301 / 10.7
10 Baldwin, Carlton.... Navy / 155 / 10.7
11 Borcherdt, Dan...... Army / 109 / 10.6
12 Foss, Jon........... Colg / 173 / 10.2
13 Gilfillan, Mitch.... Lehigh / 384 / 9.2
14 Fischman, Mike...... Lehigh / 330 / 8.8
15 Anderson, James..... Lehigh / 214 / 7.8
16 Hooper, David....... Navy / 141 / 7.8
17 Harris, Colin....... Army / 103 / 6.9
18 Green, Leonard...... Navy / 213 / 6.2
19 Knight, Simon....... Colg / 87 / 6.1
20 Hyland, Kevin....... HC / 230 / 5.7

Interesting that Capusan scored more per minute than Hamilton, Knight, or Lee. Of course Lafayette desperately needed the scoring. Bucknell and Lehigh lost the most in terms of points per minute, which should come as no great surprise to anyone. Navy also quietly lost some non-senior talent, with the transfer of freshman Casey Reed and the departure of oft-injured Carlton Baldwin from the Academy.

By the way, the Patriot League teams with the most methodical pace of play last year were Bucknell and Colgate, followed by Army and Lehigh. Navy had the fastest pace of play, with Lafayette fairly close behind.

Coming Soon - Rankings per minute for other categories