Primarily a collection of news links about all 11 Missouri Valley League teams on a daily basis, culled from online newspapers, school athletic websites, the conference website, and school newspapers, plus some other content from time to time.
#55 Belmont (-1) at #98 Illinois State, 5 PM ET, CBSSN.
This season finale for Belmont is more or less meaningless, save for
building out an at-large case that I wish would gather more steam than it
seems to be gathering. You want me to prefer 18-10 TCU (50th
KenPom) or 19-9 Missouri (51st) over 26-4 Belmont (55th)? Well, I’m not
going to, so quit asking.
Anyway, this carries some meaning for Illinois State depending on the
results of other games. If all favorites win in the other MVC games this
weekend, Illinois State either finishes fourth (win) or sixth (loss) in the
league. If Valpo loses to Evansville AND Indiana State beats UIC (around a
12% chance), I think Illinois State can finish as high as third with a win.
In any case, they are very likely to finish somewhere from fourth to sixth
with an extreme outside shot at third. You can read all of these scenarios
here.
Based on the way these two match up, I’d initially think of this as a points
explosion and a game that simply comes down to whichever’s defensive
weakness is less weak. The first game kind of got there - Belmont won 80-69
mostly because they hit so many shots that Illinois State’s huge rebounding
edge got washed out - but it was also an anomaly where two great offenses
had to take significantly more midrange twos than they’re used to. (Also,
this was Snowmageddon in Nashville, so the crowd was thinned out.) I don’t
trust much of anything about how Illinois State defends ball screens, and
almost any scenario involving a screener favors Belmont on offense to me.
The Bruins dumped an absurd 1.53 PPP on ISUred in Nashville in P&R sets,
partially because the Redbirds just…never adjusted. Even pick-and-pops were
left wide open:
0:00
/0:09
P&R isn’t a huge feature of Belmont’s offense but I’m not really sure
how ISUred plans on guarding any sort of screening action when 1) Belmont is
among the nation’s very best in dribble handoffs and 2) Illinois State runs
the same basic, laissez-faire drop coverage against those too. The good news
here is that matching up a weak two-way rebounding unit with arguably the
best two-way rebounding team in the MVC certainly favors the Redbirds. This
Belmont team is far better defensively than the Belmont teams of old, but
they’ve had major struggles in overcommitting on drives to the paint,
allowing an absolutely monstrous amount of kickout threes this year. It
allows them to wall off the rim exceptionally well, but they’re going to be
vulnerable to a huge shooting day from Boden Skunberg and/or Landon Wolf.
Bonus points if this is the day Johnny Kinzinger hits threes. Whichever
offense blinks first loses. - Will Warren
C Games
#115 Murray State at #127 Bradley (-4), 2 PM ET, ESPN+.
I think it’s possible for the loser here to fall out of the top 5 in the
Valley, and thus lose out on a bye spot in Arch Madness, but I’m not
entirely certain of the tiebreaker scenarios. First meeting between these
two saw Jaquan Johnson struggle to his worst offensive game of the season,
shooting 2-12 against Murray State drop coverage. Johnson has been on an
offensive tear to close out the regular season however, and Bradley
desperately needs his ball screen and dribble creation in the rematch in
Peoria. The Racers were in the middle of racing out to an 8-0 Valley start
when they first met the Braves back on January 4, but since that blazing
start they’ve gone 4-7 with truly awful perimeter defense. Since that 8-0
start, the Racers have played like the 192nd best team in the country, with
the 293rd defense. Yes, a -11% 3PT% delta in that stretch is brutal, but the
rim defense has been just as bad, sitting at 310th in 2PT% defense in that
span. If Johnson plays like he has of late on the ball and the Racers defend
on the ball like they have of late, the Braves should finish out with a home
win and an Arch Madness bye. - Jordan Majewski
-Belmont @ Illinois State (Missouri Valley) – Belmont has
already wrapped up 1st place and should be positioned to end up on about
the 12 line if they can win out through the conference tournament.
This will be a bit of a test on the road tonight.
40. Belmont (26-4): Arch Madness will be a zoo, but Belmont is the top-shelf team in the Missouri Valley. Big man Drew Scharnowski
hammers dunks left and right, and there's size and shooting everywhere.
Belmont's offense ranks No. 1 in effective field goal percentage, and
this is one of the best shot-blocking teams that coach Casey Alexander
has ever had.
Scariest team on each of the top-12 seed lines
68.
12 seed: Belmont. This mid-major roster doesn't look like a typical
mid-major roster. Too big. Too much shooting. Too many real players.
Alexander has won 20-plus games
in 10 straight seasons dating back to his time at Lipscomb and has the best
team in the Missouri Valley this season. He has proven himself to be one of
the top evaluators of high school talent in the country and has one of the
nation’s top offenses this season. Alexander has beaten back interest from
other jobs in the past but is expected to be a hot commodity this time
around.
He could be in the mix at Kansas State
and in play at potential vacancies at Oklahoma and Georgia Tech as
well.
George Mason 12;
Murray St. 12; UC Irvine 11; Portland St. 10; Utah Valley 9;
Bradley 8; Harvard 8; Merrimack 7; Kent St. 5; Navy 4; Winthrop 3; Sam Houston St.
3; Saint Joseph’s 3; UMBC 2; East Tennessee St. 1; Colorado St. 1
Southern Illinois’ sweep of the Iowa schools was sparked by
Quel’Ron House’s
overall play and key baskets. The Valley’s fifth leading scorer (15.4 ppg)
is a two-time ‘Newcomer of the Week’ and this week claims his first
‘Player of the Week’ nod. House is the twelfth different MVC player
to earn the league’s top weekly honor.
Newcomer List Is Crowded
Ejjah Crawfordis making a late push to become the MVC’s ‘Newcomer of the Year’.
This week the UIC sophomore is receiving his second straight and third of
the last five weeks, ‘Newcomer of the Week’ award. UIC split a pair
of games and Crawford averaged 16 points, seven assists and 3.5 rebounds. He
recorded a double-double against Evansville and scored 20 points against
Valparaiso. His third weekly acknowledgement ties him with Valpo’s Owen
Dease.
Freshmen Successful Stretch Run
Ever since Roger Powell Jr. became the head coach at Valparaiso, freshmen
make big headlines. The program boasts of the last two ‘Freshman of the Year’ awards, and this week’s weekly winner, J.T. Pettigrew earned his third
‘Freshman of the Week’ award. Valpo swept their two games and
Pettigrew averaged 16.5 points and 5.5 rebounds. While Murray State’s Roman
Domon has been selected four times, Pettigrew and Belmont’s Eoin Dillon have
been named three.
Pettigrew is the Valley’s third leading rebounder (7.1).
The Bruins make their debut in the top 10 of the rankings as they continue a
blistering run through Missouri Valley play. Coach Casey Alexander’s team
has won 12 of its past 13 games, with the only loss coming on the road
against a 19-win Bradley squad.
Belmont
is the only Division I team ranked in the top five nationally in both
2-point percentage (61.3%) and 3-point percentage (40.3%).
There’s a long list of quality mid-majors once again this season who
are likely missing out on the Big Dance if they falter in their
league tournaments. Belmont has been really incredible for a
majority of the season and thanks to their metrics still have an
outside shot, though it’s pretty precarious.
The Bruins haven’t played a single Quad 1 game, but do have a
marvelous 5-1 mark against Quad 2 foes. A big win at UC Irvine was
the first and they’ve added to that number during MVC play, with
road wins over other contenders in Northern Iowa, UIC, Southern
Illinois, and Murray State.
A lot of winning has occurred in Nashville, but those three Quad 3
losses likely sink the Bruins’ realistic chances. They lost tough
home games against Richmond and Southern Illinois and were upset at
Indiana State right before New Year’s. All of these contests were
over a month and a half ago but it plagues the resume nonetheless.
It’s the final stretch of regular season play and there isn’t too
much left to prove for the regular season champions of the MVC.
Belmont can boost their metrics a bit more with a Quad 2 game at
Illinois State on Saturday but it’s almost certainly a lost cause if
they can’t win Arch Madness and get that automatic bid.
Murray State doesn't have the #1 seed and the conference title locked down
yet, but there is no way that they don't win two of their remaining four
games. So I'm considering this race over and finalized.
#127 Bradley at #102 UIC (-4), 8 PM ET, ESPN+. Thanks
to what I'll charitably call a collapse by the entire Missouri Valley,
Bradley can get closer to wrapping up a second-place finish in the MVC
with a win here. This does matter a little thanks to the MVC's quality
this year. Your seventh-place finisher is most likely Valpo, who is 20
spots off the pace of any of the top six at KenPom. The problem,
obviously, is that UIC is straight-up better.
Wednesday, February 25
C Games
#98 Illinois State at #85 Northern Iowa (-5), 7 PM ET, ESPNU. Arch
Madness can get very mad very fast, with the preseason favorite now
being likely to finish 6th and the best defense in mid-majordom a month
ago being 5th:
Four new teams joined the poll this week. Murray St. came in at No. 19.
Navy followed at 20. Davidson returned to the Other Top 25 at No. 22.
Louisiana Tech was 24th. They replaced Santa Clara, Arkansas
St., Massachusetts and Idaho.
Watch
out, the Valparaiso Beacons are heating up! The Beacons have won three
games in a row and five out of their last six games including two solid
wins against Bradley 79-72 and UIC on the road 71-67 this week. Valpo
has already surpassed their most wins in conference since joining the
Missouri Valley Conference and they close out against Drake who is ice
cold and Evansville who has just four wins against Division I opponents.
They are favored to win both games which would put them at 18-13 on the
season and 12-8 in the MVC heading into Arch Madness.
Looking
back at their wins in conference, they’ve also taken down Northern Iowa
while sweeping UIC and picking up a win against Illinois State. They’ve
played Murray State close, losing 85-79, and lost twice to Belmont by
just a combined five points. They’ve shown that they can easily compete
with anyone in the conference and shouldn’t be overlooked in the always
chaotic Arch Madness.
Over the course of the season, they’ve been
driven by their defense which during this last stretch of six games has
held opponents to 76 points or less in their five wins. They sit at
125th in defensive adjusted efficiency per KenPom and 183rd in offensive
adjusted efficiency. Here’s how the rest of their metrics shape up:
Offensive:
331st in effective field goal percentage
102nd in turnover percentage
105th in offensive rebounding percentage
86th in free throw attempt vs field goal attempt
229th in three-point shooting
342nd in two-point shooting
79th in block percentage
6th in steal percentage
Defensive:
122nd in opponent effective field goal percentage
162nd in opponent turnover percentage
67th in opponent three-point shooting
196th in opponent two-point shooting
54th in opponent free throw percentage
107th in opponent block percentage
61st in opponent non-steal turnover percentage
112th in opponent three-point attempt vs field goal attempt
71st in opponent assist per field goal made
Putting
these metrics together, you’ll see that they offensively aren’t a great
shooting team. However, they use their defense to apply pressure. They
are 308th in tempo, so playing fast doesn’t fit into their style. They
play excellent defense on the perimeter, so they force opponents to take
contested shots from outside, limiting their ability to get into the
paint.
Owen Dease has been one of the most
consistent pieces for Valpo this season. He’s averaging 13.3 points,
3.4 rebounds, and 1.2 assists while shooting 46.3% overall and 40.7%
from three-point. He is 222nd in the country in three-point shooting and
138th in free throw shooting percentage.
Freshman JT Pettigrew
has been very underrated as he is averaging 11.8 points, 6.6 rebounds,
and 1.5 assists while shooting 37.4%. His 27% possession usage rate is
183rd, while his 10.4% offensive rebounding percentage is 209th in the
nation. He is 108th in fouls drawn per game at 5.9 which translates into
a strong 53.6 free throw rate which is 155th.
Four
seasons ago, Belmont and Murray State left the OVC, where they were
perennial giants, for the stronger MVC, a move expected to raise the
level of competition and program profile over time but also away from
the security of more easily-secured tournament appearances, at least in
the short term. Well, no matter because they’ve adjusted quite well.
Belmont will finish its fourth year with 12 wins or more in league play,
and at 15-3 has a three-game lead in the league. Murray State has
cooled off considerably following a hot start, but still sits 12-7, just
a half game out of second place, an improvement under first-year head
coach Ryan Miller after three years of mediocre play. Now, parlaying
that into the first conference tournament title for either team will be
much easier said than done, as several other teams (Illinois State, UIC,
Bradley, Northern Iowa) have shown the capability of making some noise
in Arch Madness.
