Bruno
PhD Student
Posts: 1423
Loc: Brooklyn, NY
Reg: 11-21-04
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01-02-23 11:08 AM - Post#348718
Relative to expectations, Brown had a good NC performance. Highlighted by the great wins at Bryant and URI. Only one ‘bad’ loss at Loyola, and they didn’t play well at MSU plus couldn’t score at Northwestern in a game that was winnable because of their defense.
The defense has been such a surprise. I’m still not sure exactly how or why. But they are the top defensive rebounding team in the nation (due in large part to Wojcik), they force turnovers and are solid enough in the other areas. But it’s the biggest reason they have a winning record and they tied up lots of teams in knots, including Northwestern.
The offense has underwhelmed. They get turned over a ton. They don’t get many 2nd chance points off the boards. And of course the FT shooting has been the worst in the nation. Their shooting from the field though has been solid, and their assist rate - which can be a deceiving stat - has been very high. So those last two stats give you some hope that the offense itself maybe isn’t broken and that if they just control what they can control a little better, they’ve got upside here.
Brown has a recent history of underperforming in the Ivy after having a promising NC season, so who knows if any of these trends continue. It’s not exactly a stretch to expect their FT shooting will improve and their defensive rebounding will decline. But the beginning of league play is huge for them, because the teams they’d have to beat to make the Ivy tournament are right in front of them. Two of the teams they’ll need to finish ahead of come to the Pitz, and I’d think those are games they probably need to win to have a shot. At some point you just need to win the home games and take out the lesser teams on the road.
It all starts tonight.
| LET'S go BRU-no (duh. nuh. nuh-nuh-nuh) |
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