Games of Interest: Dec. 18th - 24th

[ShockerEngr]

At the 15 minute TO, #15 Xavier is up 52-44. From what I have seen of SIU (I have only seen this game and their game against Clemson), they look much better than I expected.

According to the announcers, Xavier had a 15 point lead deep into the second half against Hawaii before losing in OT.

SIU has some athletes, but low basketball IQ. Coaching is pretty suspect too.

[shox1989]

X up 68-64 with 8 and a half minutes left in the game. 70-65 Xavier with 7:45 left TO.

[shox1989]

Doug Gottlieb just said "SIU will get opportunities during Valley play to play some ranked teams- Creighton, Wichita and UNI, Creighton will definitely be ranked"

Xavier now up by 7 with less than 3 minutes left.

[shox1989]

Mark Lyons makes a long desperation 3 point shot with time running out on the shot clock to put Xavier up by 10 with 2:28 left.

Gottlieb says that SIU has some very good athletic players he thinks they will surprise some people in the Missouri Valley (I hope not).

[shox1989]

SIU is down 79-69 with 1:13 left and they are purposely fouling Xavier. This one is done.

[shox1989]

X is up 83-71 with 45 seconds left and SIU calls a TO and is still fouling them on purpose. 32 seconds left, SIU calls another TO and commits another foul on purpose. 20 seconds left, SIU calls another TO and another foul on purpose.

I guess they want to try and lose by 20.

[shox1989]

Oh my gosh it is 10 points with 8 seconds left and SIU is still fouling. Maybe they just want this game to last forever.

Xavier wins 87-77.

[ShockTalk]

#15 Xavier is leading SIU 42-40 early in the second half. For those interested in watching the game, it is on espn3.com

I noticed Holloway (their All-American) and Wells are both playing. I don't remember how long the suspensions were for the fight with Cincy, but they must be over.

It is the only game on espn3.com right now so it is easy to find.

Didn't watch the game, but here's what I found written about the Long Beach game (1st game of the tournament): "The Musketeers had Holloway back but Xavier was without starting guard Mark Lyons, starting forward Dez Wells and reserve Landen Amos. Lyons is eligible to return Friday, while Wells and Amos will miss the tournament while serving their four-game suspensions."

Wells was not listed in the box score against SIU.

[shox1989]

Didn't watch the game, but here's what I found written about the Long Beach game (1st game of the tournament): "The Musketeers had Holloway back but Xavier was without starting guard Mark Lyons, starting forward Dez Wells and reserve Landen Amos. Lyons is eligible to return Friday, while Wells and Amos will miss the tournament while serving their four-game suspensions."

Wells was not listed in the box score against SIU.

Holloway and Lyons played. Apparently Wells is still suspended. I don't think the announcers even mentioned the fourth guy, he must not be much of a factor on their team.

Holloway and Lyons appears to be their scorers. Holloway is an All-american. They both played a lot today. The X coach did take them out with about 1 minute left in the game when it appeared to everyone but SIU Coach Lowery that the game was over.

[ShockTalk]

Side note on the Diamond Head Classic: Now that it's second semster, Noel Johnson is eligible and playing for Auburn. In his first 2 games, he is off to a slow start playing a total of 26 minutes, 1-10 FG, and a total of 2 points. He did have a total of 8 rebounds. As his main competition for playing time is another sophmore at 6-7 who scored 16 tonight, I hope Noel (and Cheese) is at least happier with the Auburn coach than in his first gig as playing time may still be hard to come by.

Go Long Beach State! I think they have a shot tonight. Coming into this tourney, they were only 5-5, but one needs to look at there schedule. A loss @ #4 Louisville, @ KU by 8, @ UNC by 6, and overtime loss @ SDSU (and one bad loss). Wins over Boise St and Pitt. Given their schedule, it appears Coach Monson is building LB St in the tradition of Gonzaga.

[WSUwatcher]

Erased? What would the RPI be without them? In the teens?

Valid point, KC. I believe WSU's RPI pre-Chicago St. was over .62 (versus .6134 now), so they clearly have not yet recovered. The rank is okay, but the RPI itself is down. Probably would be in the low 20s if they had played a more representative opponent -- Ohio State is 22nd at .6243 (Warren Nolan), and KU is 23rd at .6218, and the Shocks would likely have been somewhere in that vicinity. It's tough when 50% of your RPI (opp's record) for a given game is .0000, as it is with 0-13 Chicago State. Remarkably, WSU's schedule strength still ranks 42nd anyway, according to Warren Nolan.

[shox1989]

[QUOTE=WSUwatcher;283030]Valid point, KC. I believe WSU's RPI pre-Chicago St. was over .62 (versus .6134 now), so they clearly have not yet recovered. The rank is okay, but the RPI itself is down. Probably would be in the low 20s if they had played a more representative opponent -- Ohio State is 22nd at .6243 (Warren Nolan), and KU is 23rd at .6218, and the Shocks would likely have "

It depends on who we would have replaced Chicago State with. If we replaced them with a team with a really good record and beat them, then yeah we could be in the low 20s. But if we replaced them with a team like Alcorn State, UMKC or the like (the most likely scenerio) then it wouldn't have been much different.

Maybe if we had just played another division 2 school then we could be in the low 20s as well. But most likely we would have replaced them with another weak division 1 opponent and our rpi wouldn't really have been much different.

Remember the other teams in the top 50 rpi generally play some weak teams too in December, so as long as we don't play too many it shouldn't really hurt us that much.

As you pointed out our SOS is still 42 after playing them.