UMHOOPS: Previewing Ohio State Bball with Eleven Warriors.
For those who don't know, Eleven Warriors is Ohio's version of Mgoblog (their love isn't just for gentlemen though).
umhoops.com has an article where they did a Q&A with Eleven Warriors about this weekends matchup with Ohio State. It's pretty interesting to see 11W perspective on their own team and how they predict the game to end.
GO BLUE! BEAT OHIO!
January 11th, 2013 at 9:37 AM ^
Damn Elven Warriors. If they get to use their bows, we don't stand a chance!
January 11th, 2013 at 9:45 AM ^
Take last year's OSU team and subtract Sullinger and Buford while adding Robinson, Stauskas and McGary to last year's Michigan team (yes and subtract Stu and Novak and Smotrycz). I feel pretty good about this matchup.
January 11th, 2013 at 9:51 AM ^
Shouldn't it be Five Warriors?
January 11th, 2013 at 2:00 PM ^
Ohio could become a dynasty in basketball, but it would still be a "football school."
January 11th, 2013 at 9:57 AM ^
I have this wonderful feeling that McGary is going to have a fantastic game and will throw down an angry/monster/SC Top Ten dunk and absolutely silence that crowd
January 11th, 2013 at 10:02 AM ^
That's what someone has said for every single game this year it seems. We are not batting a good average on that prediction.
January 11th, 2013 at 10:05 AM ^
Luckily I am the Miguel Cabrera of predictions and everyone else has been like Brandon Inge
January 11th, 2013 at 11:48 AM ^
Yeah. His game against Iowa was damn good. If we can get that type of production consistently I think he's pretty close to (but not quite) freshman all-american. As it is, he had a lot of positive plays against Nebrasky and I think he's coming along. I dont think it's unreasonable to expect 7 and 8 from him next year splitting duty with J-Mo. If Beilein moves him to the 4 and plays both maybe a double double average. It's going to be tough to peg a starting 5 again next year. But in a good way.
January 11th, 2013 at 11:49 AM ^
To be fair, he has had some pretty monster games this season, so some of those predictions were correct. (some statistically wise, but more importantly, just how he's affected the game with his hustle and an example of that is last game)
January 11th, 2013 at 10:08 AM ^
I'm kinda nervous about this game because its a rivalry game and its in hostile territory, and the record is on the line. Can't wait doe GO BLUE!!
January 11th, 2013 at 10:19 AM ^
If OSU wins, do you think their fans storm the court?
January 11th, 2013 at 10:26 AM ^
...but even if they do, a year from now they'll say that they didn't. Because they have integrity and are above such foolishness.
/s
January 11th, 2013 at 10:22 AM ^
Be interesting to see how the freshman play down in Ohio, especially if they can get a lead or keep things close. Hopefully, Nebraska was a bit of a wake-up on how hard you have to play in the B10 to succeed. Key is going to be staying poised and responding to whatever runs Ohio is able to make.
January 11th, 2013 at 10:28 AM ^
Thanks for sharing this, robbyt003.
One of the important themes that I was curious about (which they mentioned) is the inconsistency of Ohio State on offense, so I made myself this graphic representation of FG% for Michigan and Ohio State over their last ten games respectively (thumbnail link below).
Nebraska aside, ours is a relatively constant, even gradually improving performance on this measure, whereas Ohio State literally seems to be all over the place. Indeed, before Nebraska, the variance in the Buckeyes' shooting performance was nearly double our own. I agree that this will likely not be a blowout, but I have to think that the trend in this regard favors us.
Something else that struck me as well - if you look at other stats like assists, rebounds and turnover %, we are very comparable to Ohio State actually.
January 11th, 2013 at 10:39 AM ^
You're welcome. You sure do love charts and graphs! Are you a stats analyst or something similar?
January 11th, 2013 at 10:42 AM ^
Eleven Warriors is OSU's attempted emulation of MgoBlog the same way that Katzinger's is Columbus' attempted emulation of Zingerman's
re: the game, it's a Big Ten road game against an opponent with a pulse so it won't even be that huge an upset if they win. They have the perimeter defenders to contain Burke and the size to do damage on the boards, so this is going to be by far our biggest challenge thus far even if it isn't necessarily the best team we've played - I think at least NC State is better and this is the first time in ages that we're the better team than OSU. I think DeShaun Thomas will *have* to go thermonuclear to give them a chance to win, though I'm sadly counting on that happening - no one else IIRC has stopped him so far. However, we have four consistent offensive threats that you gotta respect - hopefully that is the difference.
January 11th, 2013 at 10:46 AM ^
At this point, Eleven Warriors is pretty respectable. They've got a lot of people writing for them, and Ross in particular is quite informed.
They do worship the ground Urban Meyer walks on and have dismissed Michigan as their primary rival because Alabama is the team they're really going to have to bead in order to win that NC next year, but it is an OSU blog. So that's partially to be expected.
January 11th, 2013 at 1:12 PM ^
I read some of the comments by their asshole and idiotic fans that they simply don't care about M's recruiting class and are now focusing on what teams like Alabama, LSU, and Florida are doing! LOL
I would LOVE it if that were true. I hope they overlook Michigan. If they're more focused on what SEC teams are doing, then they're more pathetic than I originally thought.
January 11th, 2013 at 10:56 AM ^
I visited elevenwarriors to look around and found a front page article about one of their RBs getting his medical redshirt after having played in 3 games this past season.
Can we expect news on Devin's medical redshirt application any time soon?
(thought about creating a new thread for this, but, well...you know)
January 11th, 2013 at 1:09 PM ^
Sort of off topic, yes, but after reading that preview I decided to venture to 11W (I rarely do that because I just hate that fucking team so much). I read comments in the forum topics about Lewan and Gardner...
unbelieveable
Their fans are so unbelievable. The stupidity that comes out of their mouths (fingers i guess?) is just amazing to me. I just...
<long sigh, breathing slowly to calm myself>
January 11th, 2013 at 2:05 PM ^
I believe if we can keep Thomas in check,Michigan will win by 15-20 points.
January 11th, 2013 at 2:53 PM ^
I thought this observation from 11W was pretty astute:
one thing to keep an eye on will be how the game is officiated. Craft is a very physical on-ball defender and he’s been a little over-aggressive, getting his 2nd foul way too early in the opening half
It seems like Craft could be called for a foul on nearly every play, but the aggressive player often gets the pass. I'm hoping Trey can muscle through Craft and draw those early fouls. Either that, or he blows by Craft for a nice lob to THJ or Little Dawg.
January 11th, 2013 at 7:43 PM ^
struggled big time against craft in the BIG tourny last year. hopefully the tables have turned this year.
January 14th, 2013 at 4:05 PM ^
The game having ended (and no one reading this thread anymore), it seems I'm a profit. Craft was allowed to foul Burke relentlessly and it made a big difference. Oh well.
January 14th, 2013 at 4:08 PM ^
Jokes on you, I read it.