Showing posts with label Josh Wright. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Josh Wright. Show all posts

Sunday, December 07, 2014

Shooting Woes

The Orange seemed stunk in a season long slump with their three point shooting, with a 20.9% accuracy for the season. The Syracuse team has not been shy about shooting beyond the arc, having taken 129 shots over the first 8 games, an average of 16 a game.  Unfortunately, they are making about 3.3 a game.

Trevor Cooney has been the lightning rod for the most criticism.  In part that is fair, as he is a junior, one of the most seasoned players on the team, and came to Syracuse with a reputation of being a perimeter shooter.  His bombing of Notre Dame last season showed he could do it when he lit up the Fighting Irish for 9 three point baskets on 12 attempts on his way to a 33 point night.  Cooney has hit only 13 of 46 attempts this season, for a success rate of 28.3%.

Cooney is, however, the best three point shooter on the team.  I am not just talking from a observation perspective.  Statistically, his 28.3% is the best on the team... and by a large margin. Here is the rest of the crew:

B.J. Johnson:   5 of 23 for 21.7%
Kaleb Joseph:   3 of 14 for 21.4%
Michael Gbinje:   3 of 21 for 14.3%
Ron Patterson:   2 of 18 for 11.1%

As a group, that foursome is 13 of 76 for 17.1%.  

All hope should not be lost.  It is highly unlikely that the Orange as a team are that bad at shooting the three, and things should come around.

Here are a list of the five worst three point shooters in Syracuse basketball history, minimum 30 attempts:

Paul Harris:  22 of 98 for 22.4%
Damone Brown:  20 of 89 for 22.5%
Elvir Ovcina:  37 of 153 for 24.2%
Louis McCroskey:   36 of 141 for 25.5%
Josh Wright:  34 of 120 for 28.3%

To give some perspective of how bad those five were as three point shooters, consider that Stephen Thompson, one of the all time great Orangemen, but a horrendous three point shooter, is only 9th worst at 30.3% (26 of 86).  So the five worst shooters are pretty bad.  

Right now, ALL five Syracuse perimeter shooters would be worse than #5 Josh Wright, and four would be worst than Paul 'I couldn't hit the broadside of a barn' Harris.  So unless Jim Boeheim coincidentally recruited the five worst shooters in Syracuse history at the same time, it is highly unlikely the shooting performance is indicative of their actual ability.

Trevor Cooney is an enigma. He is a 34% career shooter, and has been a disappointment for all three seasons, with high expectations based on Boeheim's comments about his ability.  Opposing defenses are keying on him, but even when he gets open, his shot is not falling. 

We would expect the Orange shooting to start to regress to the mean at some point. They aren't likely to ever be a great perimeter shooting team, but they should be in the 30-33% range, at a minimum. Just keep taking the shots.

Or, perhaps give walk-on Carter Sanderson more playing time (playfully said).  Sanderson is a graduate student at Syracuse, and is on the team because he still had a year of eligibility left after completing his undergraduate work at Lipscomb University.  Sanderson made 32.4% of his three point shots at Lipscomb, 55 of 170.  

Anyhow, there will be a brighter future in the team's shooting. I just hope it is sooner than later.

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

2006-07 Milestones

The 2006-2007 season has been completed for a few weeks now. The senior class is widely recognized as an underachieving class, both in terms of NCAA accomplishments and personal growth. It is true that in the three seasons they were significant contributors the team was 0-2 in the NCAA tournament, and was excluded from the third. On the other hand, they did contribute in back-to-back Big East Championships.

But the season is over, so it is time we can reflect on how the players did in personal accomplishments.

Demetris Nichols finished as the schools 28th all-time leading scorer with 1,344 points, tying him with Bullet Billy Gabor. Terrence Roberts finished at #50, with 963 points. Eric Devendorf, after two seasons, has 945 points, 53rd all time. Darryl Watkins comes in at 86th with 633 points.

If Devo keeps up his pace, he’ll finish around 9th all-time.

Roberts finished as the 18th all time rebounder with 716. Watkins is 25th with 614, and Nichols 35th with 509. Freshman Paul Harris had 248 rebounds, good enough to place him 66th on the all-time career list. Devo comes in at 79th with 180, Matt Gorman at 9th with 142.

If Harris were to play four years at 248 rebounds a year, he’d finish 6th all-time at Syracuse; the reality is that if he stayed four years, he would likely increase his average, and would finish at #2. I think Derrick Coleman is safe at 1,537 for now (Coleman had 333 rebounds his freshman year).

Devo is currently 30th on the Syracuse all-time assist list with 227. The enigmatic Josh Wright comes in at 32nd with 216. Nichols is 55th with 132, Roberts 58th with 121, Andy Rautins 80th with 60, Watkins 84th with 61, and Harris is 87th with 57. Statistics were only an official statistics as of the 1965-1966 season, so there’s not a ton of history to compare against.

There have only been 70 players to make a three point basket for Syracuse, with the shot being introduced in the 1986-87 season. Nichols finished 3rd all time with 205 3 point field goals. Devo is 13th with 104, Rautins 17th with 82 and Wright 30th with 34.Gorman is 38th with 17, Roberts 46th with 5, and Harris is 57th with 1.

How does Harris’ freshman campaign stack up? His 248 rebounds is 5th all-time for a Syracuse freshman. He was third all time in free throws made, and 14th all-time in points scored with 302.

Devo had the 6th most assists ever for a sophomore, and was 8th in points, and 5th in 3 point field goals made. Rautins had the third most three point fields goals ever for a sophomore.

Wright has the 9th most assists ever for a junior (and he did not make the top 10 in most turnovers).

Nichols finished with the 8th most points for a senior and the 2nd most three point baskets by a senior. He increased his scoring from his junior season to his senior season by 197 points; that’s only good enough for the 20th biggest increase from a junior to senior season (if you were curious).

26 times a Syracuse basketball player has had 50+ 3 point fields goals made in a season. Three occurred this season as Nichols, Rautins and Devendorf all accomplished the feat. The only other time that has occurred? 2005-2006 with Gerry McNamara, Devo and Nichols accomplished the feat.

Nichols 41.7% from three point range last season was the fourth best in Syracuse history for players with 100+ three point attempts.

Nichols 85% from the free throw line was 9th best in school history for players with 100+ free throw attempts.

Harris was a rebounding machine, almost leading the team in rebounding despite playing about 22 minutes a game. He averaged 13.08 rebounds per every 40 minutes of playing time; 4th best total in school history (though minutes played was only tracked starting in the early 80s). Derrick Coleman holds the top three: 13.77 (junior), 13.65 (senior), 13.55 (sophomore). Harris does hold the freshman record; Coleman had held it with 11.45.

Finally, Syracuse University played its 1,700 men varsity basketball game last season. Jim Boeheim coached his 1,000th game, and reached 750 career wins.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

Who'll Start At the Point?

Lot’s of discussion among the Syracuse faithful this year on who will play point guard for Syracuse. Candidates range from Josh Wright to Eric Devendorf to Paul Harris. Practices haven’t started, so who knows how well anyone is going to play or fit in with their teammates. Maybe Wright has improved over the summer. Or Devendorf has worked on his ball handling. Or Harris is so multi-talented he can handle the point. I don’t really know.

I do know the following however.

While I think Jim Boeheim prefers to have a strong point guard on the court, he has more than a couple of precedents over his career where he's tried playing with no true point guard, in favor of putting more overall talent on the court. He’s always been a big fan of putting the best five players on the court, whenever possible. That doesn't mean it always works out, but it has been tried.

In 1989-90, he tried starting the season with Stephen Thompson at the point so he could get Dave Johnson into the starting lineup. That did not work out well; Thompson was far more suited to playing above the rim, then 20 feet away, and by mid season, Johnson had to be benched so that Michael Edwards (a pure freshman with significantly less overeall talent than DJ) could start.

In 2001-02, DeShaun Williams was the starting point guard at the season’s beginning, so that Boeheim could insert Hakim Warrick at the power forward, and also play Preston Shumpert, Kueth Duany and Craig Forth. By mid season, he inserted James Thues at the point, shifting Williams over to the shooting guard, Duany to the small forward, and Shumpert to power forward (hard to believe!). Warrick, who would eventually end up being an all-time Syracuse great, ended out of the starting lineup; and the 2001-02 team ended up being so fractured, that I don't know if any move would've salvaged the team.

Last season (2005-2006), he continued to start Gerry McNamara at the point and had Eric Devendorf as the two guard, benching Josh Wright, clearly because he wanted the overall skills of Devendorf over Wright. Boeheim never made a switch there, either because he was happy enough with GMac at the point or unhappy with Wright's development and ability to take over at the point. As much as the team struggled at times late in the season, I’ve got to believe it was more of the latter than the former.

In 1978-79, he started Hal Cohen and Marty Headd at guards in order to get more perimeter shooting, while having Eddie Moss, a better defender and ball handler come off the bench. Late in the season, he swapped Moss for Cohen. Not a big change there as Cohen/Moss/Headd where splitting time fairly evenly regardless of who started

So looking at past seasons, it’s clear that Coach Boeheim could well start both Harris and Devendorf (I imagine it really doesn't matter which is the point). If it gels, he’ll stay with it... if not, he'll put one on the bench and start Wright. If he benched a young Hakim Warrick and a young Dave Johnson (both eventually drafted in the first round of the NBA), it's not unfathomable that Devendorf or Harris could be benched. Or that Harris would move to small forward and Terrence Roberts or Demetris Nichols would be benched.

Of course, the bigger point is which five finish the game, not who starts it. Starting is for pride, but finishing is for victory.