(I can't find win probability charts, but this is pretty close. I assume they are using Bill James' formula to calculate safe leads, but I might be wrong.)
That's beautiful domination right there--the game was unofficially over at 9:38 to go in the game when Clemson jumped up 60-30. When I'm watching a game with two non-Clemson teams, I often find myself rooting for the team that falls behind just 'cause I want to see a close game. But when it comes to Clemson, I want every game to be like last Saturday's game. (Just to be clear, the converse is true for any game involving USuCk. I quite enjoy rooting for the other team to pile on the points...)
A few bullet points touching on Virginia and beyond:
- I want to take a second and recognize a trying week of basketball for Virginia. They really got burned by the weather: the cancellation of the Maryland game leaving them in the undesirable position of playing 4 games over a span of 8 days. Not that I think that playing one less game would have made enough of a difference on Saturday, but Virginia was hanging by the end of the first ten minutes. Tough to blame them for a lack of endurance, no team should have to prepare for that kind of brutal schedule. At any rate, on normal rest I suspect Virginia would have come a lot closer to the 60+ points I thought they would in the preview.
- Lots of people have commented on the improved play underneath. I would agree to an extent--we haven't seen the bad finishes on easy shots in the three game win streak that we saw when during the three game losing streak. I'm not sold on any increased ability to create points underneath, however. Virginia and Miami are average-to-middling at defending the 2-point shot, so we should be expecting Trevor Booker to put up some big numbers.
- On that note, mea culpa Jerai Grant, again. I should make disparaging remarks about him before every game, because he always makes me look stupid when I write something snide about him in the preview. It was really a pretty impressive performance--Grant wasn't just cleaning up the garbage on the offensive board (as I noted, Virginia is good at keeping teams off the offensive glass and true to form, we only picked up 5 offensive rebounds in the game. Helps that we shot 58% from the floor, of course), he was finding open spaces underneath and finishing at the rim. If he keeps things up, I may have to re-evaluate my opinion of him as an athletic role player that contributes a little on defense, a little on offense. He's not going to be a guy to build an offense or defense around, but he's turning into a valuable supporting player that complements well better players on the floor.
- Again, back to point #2. I know its exciting to watch Clemson actually make some shots inside, but let's keep in mind that Virginia and Miami aren't great teams at defending the shot. Its worth noting that while Grant had a good game (in which he did manage a lot of garbage buckets), FSU managed to shut down Booker pretty effectively. I still feel the FSU game was won on the strength of our outside shooting. While FSU defends the inside shot well, they have struggled quite a bit against the outside shot. I'm not going to get excited about an offensive resurgence until we look better against a team that typically holds their opponents to a low effective field goal percentage, the kind of team that we seem to have struggled against the most this season (think Duke, Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech). Maryland on the road should be a good test, while they do show something of a split by defending quite a bit better against the 2-point shot relative to the 3-point shot, it's not as dramatic as the difference in Florida State's defense.
- Let me hand out some credit to the offense in addition to throwing out some caution, though. Others have pointed out Clemson's better long-range shooting, but I would also point out that we've incrementally cut down on our stupid turnovers, gotten to the line a little more often, and shot better from the free throw line. Going from 64% to almost 68% since the beginning of February might not sound like much, but for this late in the season its an accomplishment.
- I think 8-8 should get any ACC team into the tournament this year, but for whatever reason the national perception of the ACC is at odds with reality. I think that means a maximum of six teams from the ACC, and I'm worried if there are multiple 8-8 teams at the end of the year, the #7 team gets the shaft. For that reason, Clemson needs to aim for a 9-7 finish just to be safe, which means stealing one on the road in addition to beating a tough (and at this point, significantly underrated) GT team at home on two days' rest. While things look better than they did a couple of weeks ago, nothing is assured at this point.
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