SLU 68, Saint Joseph’s 61 (OT): Game Twenty Two

Hey.  I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling Twenty Two. Everything will be alright. — Taylor Swift

The season turned twenty-two with #254 SLU beating #148 Saint Joseph’s in an entertaining and informative overtime contest.  Maybe, just maybe everything will be alright.

Jerry Falwell Scoreboard

V, V, Victory.

Lineups

An unexpected and unfortunate change in the starting lineup: Gilllmann in for the injured Manning.  Put very ominously on twitter.

Starters:  Bartley, Roby, Yacoubou, Yarbrough, Gillmann Minutes Distribution (non-starters in Bold):

      1. Yarbrough (41)
      2. Yacoubou (35)
      3. Bartley (34)
      4. Roby (29)
      5. Gillmann (19)
      6. Reggie Agbeko (16)
      7. Miles Reynolds, Mike Crawford (14)
      8. Brett Jolly (13)
      9. Austin McBroom (10)
      10. Tanner Lancona, John Manning (0)

The overtime and the injury bring us back to the days early this season where everyone who played went for double-digit minutes.   The  missing Manning’s minutes went mainly to Miles Reynolds.

Four Factors

These Factors look suspiciously like those of the last game against UMass, particularly the Bills getting man-handled on the boards.  This time, the smaller lineup was able to use active hands to force 17 Hawk turnovers (mmm….delicious) and come out on top.

Leverage

Data www.kenpom.com
Data www.kenpom.com

25 minutes of High Leverage + overtime breaks the scale here.  The young Billikens logged big minutes in a game where every possession counted, and got the win.

SLU Player Stats

(Definitions at the bottom of the post)

Data www.kenpom.com
Data www.kenpom.com
  • Incredibly efficient and effective game from Ash Yacoubou, playing big minutes and carrying the offense, yet exceeding his points in AdjGS by chipping in 6 rebounds and 2 steals.
  • Reynolds continues to pinball his way to the foul line
  • SLU is now 1-0 in games where Roby has more steals (3) than fouls (2)
  • Yarbrough came back from a very bad UMass game to find some room to operate: 12 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 steals
  • Bartley played a solid floor game while logging big minutes
  • Negative production from a few players but not much of an overall drag

Summary

Except for the outcome, this game is a virtual carbon copy of the last.  The Safecracker had (got?) to try a few different small ball lineups with Manning out, and the team got to learn some lessons without losing.   This up-and-down team has now turned in two solid games in a row, perhaps for the first time this conference season.

—————————————————————————–————–————–

AdjGS:  variation on the Game Score metric created by John Hollinger, detailed here.  Hollinger’s original formula is Adjusted to reallocate the points in the game by ratio of the player’s overall impact.  Credit to the team at Rock M Nation for this improvement.

True Shooting %:  Per Basketball Reference, true shooting percentage is a measure of shooting efficiency that takes into account field goals, 3-point field goals, and free throws.

Leverage:  Per Ken Pomeroy, measures how much is at stake on a particular possession.  Leverage is not based on what happened during the possession, but is the range of win probability based on what could have happened.  Learn more here.

DNP-CD:  Did Not Play – Coach’s Decision.  Healthy and otherwise eligible player who did not see any action in the game.