The BU Zoo Blog

Congrats to the Bearcats on their first DI victory! I was really enjoying what I was watching from the Bearcats until the stream cut off half way through the second half.

This was the first game I got to see Umur Peten, and he looks like a nice inside-outside threat at 6′9. He has force Kryie Sutton to the bench, even though Kryie had put up double figures against Rider.

The important thing is that offensively and defensively the team looks like they are developing chemistry. I think the 3 games in 3 days at the CBI Classic really helped in that department.

What the Bearcats did best last game was control the ball. Bucknell is a very high-tempo team and Macon did a great job gameplaning by slowing the game down and getting back on transition defense. The Bearcats were very assertive on the offensive end. Dylan Talley and Greer Wright did a great job attacking the basketball and drawing fouls.

Very interesting game. This is a game that Binghamton could have won. However, most of the metrics point towards Riders favor.

The great stat to see was the Binghamton eFG of nearly 55%. The hot offense was lead surprisingly by Turkish walk-on Umur Peten, who was 6 of 8 from the field for 14 points including one from downtown. Mahamoud Jabbi was 3-3 for 6 points and 8 boards and Kyrie Sutton, who once again only played 15 points, was 6-6 for 12 points and 6 boards.

However, looking at the other three metrics of the Four Factors you can see some problems. The Bearcats turned the basketball over 19 times, include 9 from Dylan Talley. The Bearcats only drew 8 fouls while giving up 19. Finally and once again, we couldn’t keep Rider off the offensive boards. With all of those turnovers and offensive boards, Binghamton was lucky that Rider was having a bad offensive day or this could have gotten ugly.
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In the last game of the CBE classic, Binghamton was able to pull off their second victory of the season. Unforunately, it was also their second DII win. But hey- a win is a win.

It seemed like our Bearcats did everything right this. We shot the ball well, we forced more turnovers than A-M, and we go to the free-throw line at a better rate than A-M. The only thing that was very concerning about this game was the fact that Binghamton was out-rebounded by a DII, especially on the offensive glass.

We know that this team isn’t going to be that good in comparison to last years’ team. This means that rebounding is going to be very important for any chance of success this year. Defensive rebounds end your opponents possessions. Offensive rebounds give you extra possessions. If we get out-rebounded, that means that our opponent will have more possessions than us. The way that our offense is running, that could be a victory death sentence.

Speaking of rebounding: Kryie Sutton 15 minutes, 3 rebounds.

More of the same from the Bearcats, losing by 26 to St. Bonaventure.  The problems were once again mainly offensive.  St. Bonaventure was better shooting the basketball, handling the ball, on the offensive glass, and got to the line more than the Bearcats. According to StatSheet, the Bonnies lead was 100% safe with 10:30 left in the second half leading 52-23.

Looking through the box score, the thing that frighten me the most was how clearly the lack of a true point guard is hurting this team. Defacto PG Dylan Talley had 6 TOs and 1 Ast. In fact, Binghamton only had 4 assisted baskets the whole game. To put it in perspective, St. Bonnie had 3 different players with 4 assists. Kyrie Sutton also had only 1 rebound in 19 minutes. Hopefully as the season goes on, the Bearcats play more and more like a team on the offensive end or else we have the potential to be the worst offensive team in DI. I don’t want to think about the things that NJIT would do to this team.

The was quite obvious that the Bearcats were going to lose this game.  The question that was going to be answer was by how much were they going to lose.  In the first half, it looked like they were barely going to make 30 points total.

In the second half, things turned around offensively mostly because of the play of sophomore big man Kyrie Sutton.  Sutton looked like the best offensive player on the floor, even though he was matched up with High School All-American Dante Taylor.  He showcased a nice jump hook (but he needs another move) and even had a dominating dunk that was called back on a travel.  Physically and skill-wise, Sutton looked like he belonged in the Big East.  If he can keep up it on offensive, the Bearcats will have more wins than originally people thought.

The Four Factors can tell us a couple things about Binghamton. First, we are having trouble on defense. Pittsburgh kept getting open looks, while the Bearcat D kept being caught out of position.

Second, we had too many turnovers again. In the first half, Pittsburgh kept trapping on the sidelines leading to many Bearcat turnovers and not too many total points. Big props for Jamie Dixon keeping it classy in the blowout and changing their defensive strategy in the second half.

Third, Bearcats got to the line because of Greer Wright. Besides Sutton, Wright looked like a bright spot with his ability to get to the line. He almost had more FT attempts than Pitt had total. The only problem with that is , besides Wright, Lukusa was the only other Bearcat to attempt a FT.

Anyone that has been following The BU Zoo, knows that I have an affinity for stats.  After every game, I am going to post the box score and other goodies from StatSheet.com

This chart shows Dean Oliver’ Four Factors.   The troubling thing about the Bloomsburg game was how badly the Bearcat offense performed.  Shooting is the most important factor for winning basketball games and the Bearcats did not do a good job shooting the basketball and finding good offensive looks.  Bearcats won the game getting to the free throw line and on the boards.  Against DI opponents, things will be a lot different.

Look out for more stats, as the season goes on.