Xavier Game Thread II

[Chicagojayfan]

Super big win -- while people know I have a lot of confidence in this team putting things together this year, it had to start somewhere, and a second road loss in a row yesterday following the Butler loss at home would have put this team in a very bad situation:

Offense:
Yesterday wasn't our best offensive performance (hard to do that while shooting 25% from 3, especially when you're taking 28 of them (for 7/28), but our performance from 2 PT was one of the best of the season (24/36, including 18/27 at the rim. A lot of this was Kalk, but Baylor and Alexander got to the rim a ton yesterday (3/6 and 4/7) and even Ashworth was 1/2

Overall 102.6 offensive rating is good enough to win when we play solid D, and we did yesterday (also a nice stretch in BE play where we've been over 100 in our offensive rating for 10 of the last 11 games (only UConn the one below in that stretch)

Defense:
Things looked bad to start this game, but the D had several stretches where they really locked Xavier down yesterday. We held them to an offensive rating of 93.4, and only the 3rd time they've been under 100 in the past 10 games - UConn, Nova in that rock fight, and us

Turnovers:
Another thing that looked bad to start, but we finished strong and only committed 11 on the game. How important is this? Well, Turnover% based on possessions shows that when we are above 15% we have a great chance of losing - stretch that to 14.9% (what we did against Providence) and we are only 3-5 this year when above that percentage. Yesterday was 11.5% (w/ 11 Turnovers) and we won

Rebounding:
Winning the boards is not just about keeping the opponents from getting second chances, it's about getting transition opportunities for us, and during key parts of the game late, we got rebounds that led to points on the other end that kept us from imploding. We outrebounded them 37-33, and when we are under 50% for rebounds, we are 4-4

Add in games like Marquette where we got outrebounded and turned it over and it's no shock we lost there... IF this team can rebound and hold onto the ball the way I think they can, we might all be shocked by how far they can go

Individual stuff:
Kalk - nothing I can say that someone else hasn't said already - insane game yesterday
Baylor - Double-Double (again!), w/ 8 assists
Alexander - didn't shoot great, but had 5 assists and hit some big buckets
Ashworth - had a tough day from 3 w/ some good looks, but didn't let it get him down and ended with 9 assists, some key FT's and a big 3 pter late
Miller - the kind of game we all knew we needed from the 4 lately, but also made some key defensive plays and on the boards. I know Mac Trusts Bello more in the late stages of games, but I'd like to see Miller take more of that time as his defensive length helps us

Bench -
Bello - did what he does, handles the ball, gets to the right spots and when he shoots enough he hits a 3 (at 40% this year!)
No King, Traudt played the backup 5, Green the backup 4. They did a good job (separately, IIRC?) in the first half, but had a bad stretch where they both ended up on the floor when Baylor needed a break. I'm encouraged by what I saw from those 2 in the first half, and hopeful Mac will get them more time (separately, though!)

The game reminded me a bit of the NC State game from last year - tough opponent with some dynamic guards when our 3 PT shot wasn't falling -- so we did the obvious and got the ball to Kalk over and over again while playing D, rebounding and limiting turnovers. If this team has learned that and can keep doing that consistently, we may surprise even me down the stretch this year

[#RollJays]

Rewatched the game this morning. Baylor and Trey shot zero free throws. Not sure what they have to do to get a call. Trey clearly gets fouled with 45 seconds left driving to the hoop. Then gets called for a kick ball for the ball hitting him in the back of the foot. Just kinda laughable at this point.

[mannygakou]

Probably won’t matter. He can’t start and probably can’t back up either. And we already have a project big.

Whether we target a replacement for Ryan or a Kelvin Jones type depends on Kalk’s decision, but the days of a mostly non-playable upper classman taking up a slot on a top 25 team is over. It’s definitely over here, because if you won’t keep a good soldier like Reef who obviously (at first) thought his return was his choice but found out that it wasn’t, you won’t keep any player.

Reef's decision to transfer wasn't his first choice, am I reading this correctly?

[HandDownManDown]

On the same day, Reef and Bello indicated they would be returning to CU. A little while later it was announced that Reef was indeed not returning, and Mitchell issued a tweet saying he was not returning, thanking the fans, saying something along the lines of how life had a plan for him, or God did, or something like that.

I then heard he received a pink slip - his announcement to return was him vocalizing his decision, while the thanking tweet was him explaining their decision.

[go_jays]

Just a thought... don't have stats to confirm it and won't take the time to do that. So if someone else wants to... go for it.

But, seems to me that TOs and limiting Off Rebounds is the key to our success. I don't care about shooting percentages. We just need to value our possessions and limit theirs.

JMO

[Chicagojayfan]

Just a thought... don't have stats to confirm it and won't take the time to do that. So if someone else wants to... go for it.

But, seems to me that TOs and limiting Off Rebounds is the key to our success. I don't care about shooting percentages. We just need to value our possessions and limit theirs.

JMO

I agree - I put this above but probably didn't call it out enough

"Turnovers:
Another thing that looked bad to start, but we finished strong and only committed 11 on the game. How important is this? Well, Turnover% based on possessions shows that when we are above 15% we have a great chance of losing - stretch that to 14.9% (what we did against Providence) and we are only 3-5 this year when above that percentage. Yesterday was 11.5% (w/ 11 Turnovers) and we won

Rebounding:
Winning the boards is not just about keeping the opponents from getting second chances, it's about getting transition opportunities for us, and during key parts of the game late, we got rebounds that led to points on the other end that kept us from imploding. We outrebounded them 37-33, and when we are under 50% for rebounds, we are 4-4

Add in games like Marquette where we got outrebounded and turned it over and it's no shock we lost there... IF this team can rebound and hold onto the ball the way I think they can, we might all be shocked by how far they can go"

summary -

less than 14.9% turnover rate, we are 3-5, and less than 50% of the rebounds, we are 4-4

Butler is the only loss this year that doesn't fall into one of those 2 categories and they shot like crazy.. Anyway, control those 2 things, and we can go as far as we want

[SeattleJay]

Just a thought... don't have stats to confirm it and won't take the time to do that. So if someone else wants to... go for it.

But, seems to me that TOs and limiting Off Rebounds is the key to our success. I don't care about shooting percentages. We just need to value our possessions and limit theirs.

JMO

I would definitely agree with this. And, ChicagoJay has cited some good numbers.

One rather fine point. It’s really the differential between the 2 teams in these categories. We do not try to turn over the other teams generally. We are close to last in this defensive statistic. So, if we turn the ball over a lot, we are in trouble because we are near last in the league in causing turnovers.

Naively, one might question, why are we so bad at causing turnovers? Really, it seems part of the plan. We are going to play great drop coverage and close you out at the 3 point line with the idea that our EFG will be better than yours and we will do so without fouling.

So, if we can avoid turning the ball over, it’s going to be very important - especially live ball turnovers which lead to easy baskets.

We are a decent offensive rebounding team but we need to be better than our opponents to partially make up for our typical turnover deficit in tough games.

After those two stats, EFG is super important and of course, it’s about differential.

Finally, and a bit frustratingly is FT differential. We lead the league in committing the fewest fouls. We shoot FT’s well so that can be a huge help. Of course, we try to play clean and some of our BE brethren try to play physically. It never feels like we get as many calls as we deserve but the refs are doing their job and we have to live with or adjust.

Finally, it is really nice to have a 90% FT shooter as a PG to close out games where you have a lead and the other team is fouling to get back in the game.

I probably stated too much of the obvious. Oh well.

Let’s go Bluejays! It feels like it’s coming together.

[JacobPadilla]

Talked about this on the pod, but it's kind of wild rewatching the game and taking notes and then going back in reading this game thread. I get the emotional swings of being a fan, but man.

Talked about this on the pod with Matt that we recorded today, but I thought this was more or less a shot variance game. A lot of the runs for each team were sparked by shots going in for one team and not going in for the other. Misses and turnovers provided transition opportunities both ways as part of that.

But outside of a few lapses, I thought Creighton more or less played the same way for much of the game. When it looked rough, it was largely a result of Xavier hitting tough shots and Creighton failing to capitalize on good looks. But as I've said before, more often than not that will even out over the course of a full 40-minute game, and that's what Creighton counts on. Creighton consistently generated better looks than Xavier did to my eye, and that turned this into a 20-point game.

Here are the notable numbers:
— 3-point shooting: Creighton only shot 7-28, but the Jays still outscored Xavier by 3 from the arc by limiting them to 6-13 (the 13 attempts being the key).
— Non-restricted area 2s: Xavier 11-34 (4-18 in lane), Creighton 9-16 (5-10).
— Restricted area: X 11-19, CU 15-20 (Creighton +10 in the paint overall).

Forcing tough in-between 2s didn't work against Butler, but it will most of the time, and this game was another example.

Xavier's comeback was largely the result of Creighton deciding to go into stall mode and then missing almost every open shot they generated later in possessions. On the other end, Xavier made some tough plays to put pressure on CU. But the staff's determination was there wasn't enough time for Xavier to come all the way back barring a complete and total collapse on CU's part. The way it played out was much closer to worst case scenario than you'd have liked, but Ashworth and Kalkbrenner each made a couple of big plays and the coaches ended up being right as 5 was the closest Xavier got.

[wildjays]

The Bluejay Beat podcast with Matt and Jacob is posted, available to our Patreon subscribers. They have a lot to say after this one.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/bluejay-b ... =join_link

[SeattleJay]

The Bluejay Beat podcast with Matt and Jacob is posted, available to our Patreon subscribers. They have a lot to say after this one.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/bluejay-b ... =join_link

Well, I finally got a crowbar to my wallet and paid the $5 a month for Patreon. Definitely worth it for my Bluejay obsession.