And now the MAC....Helloooo Zips

So, the MAC season begins on Saturday with the Falcons heading the JAR to take on the Akron Zips.  When last we saw the Zips and the Falcons, the scene was the Gund and Akron had punched out the Falcons on their way to the MAC tournament title and a first round defeat to Gonzaga.

This year, they had almost everyone back, and brought in 7-foot OMFG recruit Zeke Marshall, and they have a proven coach and look to be a favorite to make their way back to the Big Dance.

They are off to a good start, with a 10-4 record, although they don't have any huge wins to brag on.  Their biggest win is at home against Niagara (RPI 112).  Their losses, however, are pretty substantial, including NC State,  @Texas A&M and Rhode Island at the JAR.

They have always been pretty hard to beat at home, and are 7-2 this season and were 11-3 last year (one of those losses coming to the Falcons.)

This year's time is pretty strong.  They don't have any true starts, but at the same time, they have a huge amount of depth.  They have 9 players averaging 10 minutes a game, and the most by any player is 28 minutes.  Their leading offensive player is only scoring 10 points per game.  (By contrast, BG's 9th player is Danny McElroy at 7.5 minutes per game and BG has three players getting more than 28 minutes a game).

Akron plays at BG's tempo, and leads the MAC in tempo-free offense and tempo-free defense.  Similarly, they are first in the MAC in FG% and second in FG% against.

They are good if not great rebounding team and take care of the ball really well.

Thanks to Big Zeke, they lead the MAC in blocked shots.

They lead the MAC in assists, but without any one player having a bunch of them.

There is no doubt, this team was good enough to win the tourney last year, and brings most of those guys back.  They are deep, and play well on both sides of the ball.  They are playing on their floor.  The main question is that Akron has beaten the teams they are supposed to beat and lose to the teams they were supposed to lose to, so there is not a good read on this team.

On paper, they are clearly stronger than BG at the JAR.  I will say this, if BG brings a defense like it did against St. Louis, they will be tough to beat in any MAC game.  As with all of our games, BG will need to establish its defense and get the ball inside on offense.  If they can keep Akron off the scoreboard and get into a defensive struggle, they will be playing the way they need to to win.

Hey, Call the Season Off

Elton Alexander of the PD has been on realtimerpi.com, where the website has picked the MAC Champion for this season based on the pre-season play.

The answer might surprise you.

According to real-time RPI, Ohio U will win the MAC at 13-3, with their very young team.  They see Akron tied for 4th, and BG finishing 7-9 in league play but at home for the first round of the MAC tourney.  Here's what the computer says:

1. Ohio University - 13-3
2. Buffalo - 12-4
3. Kent - 11-5.
4.Western Michigan - 10-6
4. Eastern Michigan - 10-6
4. Akron - 10-6
7. Ball State - 8-8
8. Bowling Green - 7-9
9. Central Michigan - 6-10
10. Miami - 5-11
11. Northern Illinois - 2-14
12. Toledo - 2-14

So, there it is.  That will save a lot of money heating the gyms this year.

OK....maybe we should just play it out.  I agree with Elton's comment though that Western Michigan is looking pretty tough with a couple of nice wins and this might be the year EMU competes a little too.  The West has at least a couple of better teams than they had last year.

It will be interesting to see later if the computer got this right.

Yeah, and the Rockets suck.

New Football Verbal

Bowling Green has dipped into the Northwest Ohio pool again, snagging a verbal commitment from Alex Nossaman of Bryan (6'3", 195, 4.65 speed).  Alex is a WR.  HT to AZZ.com.

He was named all-conference, and had some all-district mention as well, but as D-back.  

Here is some video....



Welcome to the Falcons, Alex

Falcon Men's Basketball Should Play 20 minute games.....

Hey, quick thing...if BG wants to save time, we can apparently save time and maybe money by playing 20 minute games.  Every game that BG has played this year has ended with the team that was leading at halftime winning.  In other words, the second half has proven nothing, merely an exhibition or show....

OK maybe not.

But that's an odd stat, no?

MAC Bowl Drought Ends

The Chips finally solved the MAC's bowl drought after 14 games with a win against Troy tonight in the GMAC Bowl.  It was an excellent game with a great comeback by CMU.  This team is not all LeFevour, both Antonio Brown and Brian Anderson made big plays in the 4h Quarter.

Now, 1-4 in bowls and losing 14 out of 15 is not good, but 1 win is better than none.

Recruiting Review

We spend so much time looking at our recruiting classes when they are coming in that we sometimes forget that the best time to evaluate them is when they are going OUT. Of course, that's about recruiting and coaching, but if a bunch of guys don't make it to the end of their career, then I guess that tells you something, right?

We have to wait five years to evaluate most classes, so four year guys (like Sheehan) will be evaluated based on their incoming class.

This was Brandon's first class as a head coach when he had control of the entire process. (The previous year had found Urban bolting in December). I just think it is real clear when we look back that there were problems being seeded right from the start, even if we couldn't see it yet. Let's look.

With that in mind, let's look. Below is the classification system I developed.

2005 Recruiting Class (Brandon II)

STAR--ALL MAC, top flight starter and producer, etc.
Starter--player in starting lineup consistently at some point in career.
Role Player--Corn McGrady type. #4 WR or special teams player. You get the idea.
Finished, no footprints. Completed eligibility without doing much.
Washed out--Did not finish career.

STAR (3)
Freddie Barnes QB
Jimmy Scheidler TE
Antonio Smith CB

Starter (6)
Chris Bullock RB
Cody Basler LB
Brady Minturn DL
Ruben Ruiz + TE
Shane Steffy OL
Chris Wright CB
 
Role Player (1)
Aaron Davis

Washed out (15)
Luke Alexander + WR
Jarrett Buckosh OL
Trevor Frericks DL
Jacob Hardwick DL
Thomas James DL
Nick Lawrence LB
Rhett Magner WR
Kevin Mahoney OL
Phillip Pollard OL
Michael Ream DL
Richard Solak OL
Bobby Thomas DB
Cordelle Thompson LB
Stephon Thompson CB
Guy Williamson OL

May get another year--Calvin Wiley DB

So, in a class with 25 players, 15 of them failed to finish their careers.  There are a couple of arrests tossed in their.  Given this, it is remarkable that BG was 7-5 this season, it would seem to me like a recruiting class like this would be a year killer in most programs.

Now, some washouts are to be expected, but I wonder how our classes really look lately as it relates to this--and the ability to generate stars and starters.  Using the same standards, I look at the four classes that are completed from the Meyer/Brandon years.  On each row, the bottom two lines are Meyer years and the top two are Brandon years.

So what do we see here?  First, the Brandon years definitely have more players who just don't make it through, and the second year is worse than the first, which is odd, since Brandon I was supposed to be weaker with Meyer leaving in December.

Now, where does the difference go?  There are more stars, to be sure, but the difference is not as dramatic as on starters, where the Meyer years clearly outpaced the Brandon years.

To me, the conclusion is inescapable.  BG football recruiting took a hit in the first two years of Brandon's run, and there was a trend not toward getting bad players but getting players who, for whatever reason, could not stick.  I don't know what was going on (compromises, etc), but I do know what the results are.

Game by Game, reviewed, with humility

Well now, it is time to call in the accounts.  Before the season, I went through and predicted how each Falcon game would turn out.  That's all before the season--not week by week.

So, let's see how I did.


9/3/2009 Troy LOSE  WRONG

We won this game.  I was afraid that Troy's front seven would be too much for us.

9/12/2009 at Missouri LOSE  RIGHT

Thought Missouri would be too much, was right.

9/19/2009 at Marshall WIN  WRONG

This was a disappointment, I thought BG would have enough to beat the Herd.

9/26/2009 Boise State LOSE  RIGHT

Boise was even better than I expected

10/3/2009 * Ohio WIN  WRONG

Probably the most disappointing loss of the season.  I liked the match up because their offense wouldn't be expected to exploit our young D, but our offense missed on a couple plays.

10/10/2009 * at Kent State WIN  RIGHT

Falcons rally to win.

10/17/2009 * at Ball State LOSE WRONG

Ball State was WAY worse than I expected, unable to make use of their great RB.

10/24/2009 * Central Michigan LOSE  RIGHT

Thought CMU would have too much and I was right..

11/3/2009 * at Buffalo WIN  RIGHT

Thought the Bulls were overrated and was right.

11/12/2009 * at Miami (OH) LOSE  WRONG

How did I miss this one?  Miami was WAY WAY worse than I thought.

11/20/2009 * Akron WIN  RIGHT

I thought Sheehan was better than Akron's QB and that was before he was kicked off the team.

11/27/2009 * Toledo WIN  RIGHT

Thought BG would have improved enough to win this game and I was right.

So I had us going 6-6 and I was one game low.  That is as good as it gets.  In fact, I picked 7 of the 12 games right, which is probably about normal if not a little low.  I didn't have enough confidence for us on the road, and those are probably the worst ones  I missed.

Depth Chart Review--Special Teams

So, finally, in our look ahead, we have special teams.  As I covered in stupefying detail, the special teams this year were below average at both until the end of the year, where things came around.  This year, the team is losing its KO returner, Roger Williams, the punter and holder, Nick Iovenelli, and the field goal kicker for most of the year, Matt Norsic.

My guess is that we can probably find someone to be a respectable kickoff returner, but the team is going to have to find someone who can punt.  Iovenelli was pretty serviceable over the course of the year.  At kicker, Phillips is back and he did some of the placekicking, but there is another walk-on lurking around and the possibility that more could be recruited.

So, much as with the other parts of our game, we have some work to do to fill holes on special teams.

Freddie Barnes to play in East-West Shrine Game

I was wondering when we would see this....Freddie Barnes will play in the East-West Shrine game, a great opportunity for him to showcase his abilities and hopefully impress some pro scouts.  Go Freddie!  We'll be watching.

Depth Chart Review--Defense

Last year, the defense had some serious losses, returning, in fact, just two starters.  You might think that this year's team would actually have lighter losses--and they do--but in fact the losses on defense are pretty serious.  The sardonic among us will wonder if some of this might be addition by subtraction, but I'm going to suggest that we are losing some real contributors, and that the team's struggles on defense were on the defensive line and this is a needed area of improvement for the team.

For example, only one of the lineman is graduating, and that;s Brandon Jones, a late bloomer who wasn't even on the two-deep a couple of years ago.  It is worth noting that this depth chart shows two TRUE freshmen in the starting lineup for our bowl game.

Beyond the front four, well, every player except one is leaving.  All three starting LBs (and a reserve), CB Roger Williams and both safeties, each of who was a major contributor to the defense for their entire career.  The only player here that is returning is Adrien Spencer.

The line did a lot of rotation, which I think will help us a little for next year because everybody got some snaps.  (Note that Kevin Alvarado could return as well).  But, it is possible that the line will only move from small and inexperienced to small and seasoned.

At LB, Dwayne Woods was on the two-deep as a true freshmen, so he might be expected to drop into a slot, and Champ Fells should be ready to go, as he got a number of snaps and made some plays.  The SAM side will be someone completely new.  In the backfield, Keith Morgan got some snaps during Mahone's suspension, so he might be a little ahead of the game, but we haven't seen enough of Quiles or Tim Moore (another true freshmen) to know what to expect.

Obviously, there's a year of coaching and growth to come, but on paper, based on what we saw this year and based on the youth of many of the players who are on the depth chart but returning, I think it is safe to say that we are at least one year from getting the defense where we would like to see it.

McLeod Honored on All-Decade Team

Keith McLeod was named to the collegeinsider.com mid-major All-Decade team, a nice honor for a truly historic player in our program.  Such a shame that team never broke into the Big Dance.

Football Depth Chart Review--Offense

Now that the football season is over, there will be a bunch of posts over time to look back on the season that just occurred.  The top priority this time of year is the basketball season, but in between, we do get to look back at football.

First, I want to look at the depth chart for the Humanitarian Bowl game, and use it to get some clues on what things might look like next year.  A little preview:  this team's graduation losses are almost as serious as last year's.

First, let's take a look at the offense.  Obviously, from a superficial level, this is where the losses are most serious.  Our two most prominent players, Tyler Sheehan and Freddie Barnes, are both graduating.  Beyond that, the left side of the line, our All-MAC TE, and change of pace back Chris Bullock are all leaving.

Looking ahead, obviously, BG has to replace a QB which is always a challenge.  It is very difficult to win without strong QB play.  Aaron Pankratz got some snaps against Boise, and was highly touted in HS.  In addition, Matt Schilz redshirted, and he was at one point a verbal to Kansas State.  And, two very strong true freshmen are coming in as well.  No matter who gets the job, we haven't seen them under fire in game conditions, and we'll have to keep our fingers crossed that they can manage our offense.

Beyond, as the QB matures, we will also need to wonder who he will throw to. With Barnes and Wright both graduating, the players from the end of the season that are still here are Hutson and Hodges.  However, it is important to remember that BG had a ton of injuries at WR, and the four players I typed in were all not on the depth chart at the end of the year, but could contribute next year.  (I have Pronty listed with ?? because I have not heard if he will be able to get a medical red shirt.

On the line, there were some injuries during the season, so Blaec Walker actually made some starts and is a little farther down the road.  Chip Robinsons has been highly touted for some time (as have a number of our o-lineman) and the team will be relying on them to jump in and contribute.

All in all, the offense is losing a lot of talent, both ball handlers and lineman.  The offense is not going to be without ability, but at the same time will have unproven quantities and perhaps a transition period for next year.  This will put more pressure on the defense than this year, which we will tackle tomorrow.

Majerus Speaks....

From Today's Blade....

"Our bigs got manhandled with seniority, strength, weight, and toughness," Saint Louis coach Rick Majerus said. "[BG] totally came out with a greater physical presence on the inside than we did."

"Bowling Green was on the road for a month, and they came home and looked excited to be here," Majerus said. "And we were at home for a month and looked like it. With our youth, our players didn't handle that. We needed to come out with greater energy, and they took advantage of us."

Recapping a nice Falcon Victory

Well, on a really cold night the day after a major holiday, Bowling Green's men's basketball team came home from a long 5-game road trip and played their best game of the season, a game that gives us optimism that we will be able to compete in the MAC season.  (59-50 win).

Coach Orr always says the season is a marathon, and you have to be resilient, and after a couple of losses and then a less-than-stellar performance at Towson, the Falcons needed to come up with a strong game and reward themselves with the victory.

As noted in my preview, the Billikens are a very solid team that would be very competitive in the MAC.  Obviously, they have a strong coach.  They are a very young team that has hardly played on the road at all, and that showed a little bit out there I think, but it was still a very nice win for our team.

The key thing you have to look at is defense.  The Falcons played an absolutely stifling defense, especially in the first half.  Yes, the Billikens missed some easy shots, as teams will do, but Bowling Green never let them get into any kind of a rhythm.  In the first half, NONE of their starters had a single point, and that is a pretty remarkable stat.

Beyond the shooting, Bowling Green was dominant on the glass.  When BG shot, we got the board 40% of the time, but when St. Louis missed, we got it 80% of the time.  This is a credit to the inside play of Otis, who is stringing together some productive games now, and Erik Marschall and Marc Larson, who Coach said had his best game in a while.  The ability of our team to get a missed shot and then, time and again, grab the rebound, was key to our victory.

Coach talked about the fact that everyone in the program now recognizes that the zone is our defense.  I think it is to our credit, though, that we have installed features to the zone that allow it to become a more aggressive defense, rather than a sit on your heels defense.  BG ran a half court trap off the zone, and it was very effective in keeping St. Louis out of their game.  That's just solid coaching from a really good staff.

And, as a reward, St. Louis made 19 turnovers.

As far as game flow goes, BG bolted out to a 9-0 lead and never trailed in the game.  In fact, the game was pretty steady, with BG maintaining a solid lead throughout the first half and then blowing it open in the second half because St. Louis got a few garbage points at the end to get it inside 10.  In reality, the game was not that close.

College Basketball

Beyond the rebounding and the turnovers and the scoring defense against St. Louis, the other key element that allowed this to be a win was that BG finally had some consistent free throw shooting.  BG was 18 of 21, at 86%, which is a great night in anyone's book. We were getting fouled at the end a lot, and BG kept hitting the free throws and extending the lead.

I think the chart below pretty much gives us the tale of the tape in how the Falcons won this game.

College Basketball

Individually, we played a 7 man rotation pretty effectively.  Otis has 13, Dee 12 and Marschall 11, and Otis and Larson each had 9 boards and Marschall had 7.  Coach felt that the inside guys played very well, with the exception of some turnovers.

It cannot be stated how important it is for the inside game to be clicking.  Both Larson and Martchall are solid players, but the key here is Otis, who is finally starting to put together consistent play that matches not just his physical presence but the ability he has shown in spurts throughout his career.  As a senior, if he can produce through the MAC season consistently as he has been, he is a force in this conference and makes us tough to beat right there.  He even nailed his free throws!

Anyway, it was a really nice night to be a Falcon, and it was great to see BG come up with such a solid win against a good team. ...can't wait to see the conference season unfold.

Falcons Surprise Billikens

The Falcons picked up a nice victory on their home floor tonight over a pretty good St. Louis team coached by a legend.  More Sunday, but a great way to send our guys into conference play.

Courtside At Anderson