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Username Post: Next year        (Topic#24279)
Noah Friedman 
Freshman
Posts: 34

Age: 25
Reg: 01-19-20
04-21-20 11:41 AM - Post#306426    

What do people think about next years team? Do you think we could be better with an improved kirkwood and Ledlum getting better? I think we could be a better offensive team.

 
SomeGuy 
Professor
Posts: 6391

Reg: 11-22-04
Re: Next year
04-21-20 01:34 PM - Post#306427    
    In response to Noah Friedman

The one caution on next year’s offense is that, among returnees who logged 150 minutes last year, the two lowest ORATs on the team were Ledlum and Kirkwood. So more Kirkwood and Ledlum may not be a good thing, as there is an argument that they already took more shots than is ideal last year.

That said, neither had a terrible ORAT, so with predictable improvement they should move into unquestionable net positive territory. And the biggest issue for both guys is the ability to get to the free throw line and then miss the shots. That can be addressed by either learning to hit free throws, or getting fouled less (!). And Ledlum needs to either hit more 3s, or not take them.

To me, Harvard is a big mystery for next year. Talent-wise, they should be at the top of the league. But experience-wise they are way behind what should be a very good Yale team (the whole league is way behind Yale in returning win shares). And it is hard to guess precisely how Amaker puts the puzzle together. So my guess is that Harvard and Princeton are fighting for second place next year.

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
Next year
05-01-20 12:23 PM - Post#306874    
    In response to SomeGuy

Over on Penn Board there was an observation that Harvard '20-21 may be dependent on shooting.

Perhaps surprisingly, Harvard's 3 point shooting may be improve. In 2019-20 Harvard shot 45.5% from the field, 32.9% on 3's and 70.1% on FT's. If healthy, Seth would likely have led the team in 3pt %, Bryce virtually did so at 36.1%. Bryce did lead the team in FT% (87.2%) and Seth shoots over 80% as well.

The returning roster shot 34.5% from deep this past season. Players such as Rio (38.8%), Noah (36.2%), Danilo (35.8%) and Luka (34.8%) return as above average long range weapons. It will be important for Ledlum (27.3%) and Tretout (25%) to lift their percentages with more volume.

FT shooting will be a big problem if important starters like Mason (58.3%), Noah (61.4%) and Ledlum (61.8%) don't improve.

Interestingly, overall FG% could improve as Mason is efficient at 61% and the lowest FG%'s among high usage players belonged to Christian (34.8%), Justin (40.8%) and Bryce (41.2%). Of course, someone is going to have to step up at the end of the shot clock and replace those difficult attempts that usually fell upon those three players.

Overall, considering the absence of Seth and Bryce last season, it could be that Harvard's 3 point % improves but its FT shooting goes south. The Crimson could really use a designated bomber like Laurent Rivard or even the underclass version of Corey Johnson. Wonder if Luka Sakota or Spencer Freedman can fill that role?

Edited by HARVARDDADGRAD on 05-01-20 12:25 PM. Reason for edit: No reason given.

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
Next year
05-03-20 10:33 AM - Post#306952    
    In response to HARVARDDADGRAD

I'm expecting Yale at the top and Columbia at the bottom, with the other 6 squads each trying to establish an identity sufficient to make the tournament and threaten Yale by the end of the year. Dartmouth and Brown with a solid chance to unseat any of the P's and possibly Harvard.

I'm not so sure Harvard drops off more than a win or two, maybe not at all. Although our 2019-20 squad finished 10-4, they were only final possessions in road games away from 13-1. Towns, Aiken and Welsh were eventually joined by Juzang as non-contributors. Thus, the outgoing seniors consist of Lewis, Bassey and Baker. They will be missed, but Catchings seemed to finish healthy and he is similar to Bassey and played really well as a freshman. So, can bigger freshmen and returnees provide any of what Lewis and Baker did?

Fair chance we gravitate to 10-4 again.

Danger in that is that we will be underdogs vs Yale (again) and face tougher competition from Dartmouth and Cornell, teams we swept. Can't do worse vs Brown and home splits vs the P's last year was a disappointment. Loss of Lewis and Baker doesn't worry me as much because those schools lost their bigs (Aririzugoh and Brodeur). Brown will be a tougher matchup in my estimation as the Bears are big. Dartmouth's Knight might finally go on a tear against us (scored only 10 and 8 vs Chris Lewis this season).

A significant risk is that this squad will not have the depth of past Amaker teams. A loss of a key contributor like Haskett, Kirkwood, Ledlum, Djuricic or Forbes can't be backstopped like - believe it or not - the losses of Bryce and Seth. Of course, with Bryce and Seth, this squad had a chance at 14-0 and 29-1. A key injury this year and we look more like the squad that lost Siyani and finished 6-8. Of course, even under that team, the worst of the decade, we still finished in 4th place (pre-tournament) by embarrassing 5th place Penn in the final game and jumping out to a 37-13 lead. Zena was a beast! Miss him.

Edited by HARVARDDADGRAD on 05-03-20 10:34 AM. Reason for edit: No reason given.

 
Old Bear 
Postdoc
Posts: 3988

Reg: 11-23-04
05-03-20 07:54 PM - Post#306964    
    In response to HARVARDDADGRAD

IMHO, Brown's loss of Hunsaker and Anderson is overvalued by many on this board.

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
05-03-20 10:02 PM - Post#306965    
    In response to Old Bear

Agree with you sage Bruin.

Gainey, Choh, DeWolf and Mitchell could be the best frontcourt in the league.

Friday, Cowan and the transfer likely are a talented enough backcourt.

Thinking 20-21 would have been a good year for the tournament to be in Providence or Hanover!

 
SomeGuy 
Professor
Posts: 6391

Reg: 11-22-04
05-04-20 01:07 AM - Post#306967    
    In response to Old Bear

I think I might be the only one saying Brown has a backcourt problem, and i’m just talking so much that it seems like a lot of people. Most of what I see from others suggests that Brown is the favorite for the 4th slot.

But here is why I think Hunsaker in particular will be missed. He was the only guard for Brown who operated at an above average ORAT last year. Anderson was the only other guard who was close. All of the other options were so far behind these two statistically, and normally more burden and a higher usage rate makes players less efficient, not more efficient. Brown’s freshmen last year played the third most minutes of any class, and yet they were the least productive class in the league.

So I think Brown has two huge holes to fill.

 
mrjames 
Professor
Posts: 6062

Loc: Montclair, NJ
Reg: 11-21-04
05-04-20 02:21 PM - Post#306985    
    In response to SomeGuy

I have Harvard as a clear second to Yale, though I think much like we saw in 2016-17, that's probably not going to be where this team is going to be from the start. A lot of that will have to do with the typical Tommy Amaker lineup dance - and barring injuries, he will have a TON of options.

PG: Rio, Spencer (back from injury), Evan Nelson
Wings: Kirkwood, Ledlum, Tretout, Sakota, Catchings
Forward/Centers: Djuricic, Forbes, Ajogbor, Hemmings, Brayboy/O'Neil

Now, that's 14 people, and I don't expect all of them to play even if all were healthy and Tommy went completely mad on rotations. That being said, I could see 12 of those players seeing time to start. That usually causes some rough games and a long runway to a true rotation coming together. And the non-conference schedule is ROUGH next year. Not sure what's been announced, but some P5 teams and a fair number of strong mids/A10 schools.

My hunch is that the ultimate lineup could be Tretout, Ledlum, Kirkwood, Djuricic/Forbes, Ajogbor. Not sure if Tretout can be the point, and if not, there will be some competition between Evan, Rio and Spencer.

The team is going to struggle defensively, but should be much better offensively. Baker and Lewis were Top 100 nationally in block rate (Forbes was better, but didn't quite get to 40% mins to qualify). And Bassey is probably the best defender in the DPOY era not to win DPOY. Problem was - as we often discuss - the usage rates just don't work: Baker 17%, Juzang 17% and Bassey at 15% with fellow rotation players Haskett 19% and Djuricic 16%... none of these are anemic usage rates, but put any three of them on the floor together and you need a couple players in the 24-27% range to balance it out. That was fine when Bryce was using 35% of possessions, but without him, only Kirkwood and Ledlum could balance it.

Now, fast forward to this year... Ledlum's going to get 70% team mins (or more). He probably won't stay at 28% usage, but he'll be high usage still. Tretout's six 10-minute-plus games were at 17, 18, 25, 31, 31 and 33% usage. So, he could be a 20+% option as well. Add in Kirkwood, and now if you can play two of the three of them together, they can balance out the 15-19% usage players.

My simple guess for Harvard is that it ends up in that 101-125 range but just with its ORAT and DRAT rankings flipped (137th and 105th, respectively, last year).

 
Noah Friedman 
Freshman
Posts: 34

Age: 25
Reg: 01-19-20
05-05-20 12:59 AM - Post#306996    
    In response to mrjames

Very interesting. I think kirkwood can be a lot better and has to improve his ball control. Any insight how good this freshman ajabor is? Also does Harvard get to host the ivy tournament this upcoming year? Will there be fans?

 
mrjames 
Professor
Posts: 6062

Loc: Montclair, NJ
Reg: 11-21-04
05-05-20 10:09 AM - Post#306998    
    In response to Noah Friedman

I don't believe a decision has been made on Harvard hosting in 2021. I do believe there will be fans wherever it is, but that's just a bet based on there being a LOT of time between now and then.

I don't think Ajogbor will touch Lewis's freshman year numbers offensively (21% usage, 115 ORAT, 66% shooting). But Ajogbor is the real deal defensively. Shouldn't have too much trouble matching Lewis's block rate and with Forbes getting more time too, I don't expect Harvard's block rate (which was 14th nationally this year) to fall off a substantial amount.

Harvard's biggest problems last year were turnovers and being the worst three-point shooting team since Amaker's first year on the job by a full point-and-a-half. I suspect that will change, if only because the seniors shot a combined 31% from three, while Kirkwood, Haskett and Djuricic shot a combined 37% from three. Ledlum, Sakota and Tretout have a long way to go to prove they can be volume three-point shooters with good efficiency, so we'll see if they can contribute positively there as well.

 
digamma 
Masters Student
Posts: 466

Loc: Minneapolis
Reg: 11-27-11
05-06-20 11:46 AM - Post#307003    
    In response to mrjames

My biggest concern is point guard and the other problem mentioned in your last paragraph--turnovers. I still think Rio is a more natural 2 guard. My sense is that if the starting five is Noah, Ledlum, D-Lo, Rio and Forbes, we see Noah play point forward more than Rio playing a traditional point guard.

 
Noah Friedman 
Freshman
Posts: 34

Age: 25
Reg: 01-19-20
05-21-20 02:09 PM - Post#307689    
    In response to digamma

Does anybody have any ideas on where any of the Harvard players will play after they graduate. I saw Juzang signed with a league. How about Lewis, basket or bassey?

 
Noah Friedman 
Freshman
Posts: 34

Age: 25
Reg: 01-19-20
05-21-20 02:10 PM - Post#307690    
    In response to Noah Friedman

I meant baker

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
06-19-20 05:32 PM - Post#309290    
    In response to Noah Friedman

No one seems to be counting on Luka Sakota as a contributor. I was impressed by his size, skills and shooting. He could be a better version of Corey Johnson.

 
mrjames 
Professor
Posts: 6062

Loc: Montclair, NJ
Reg: 11-21-04
06-20-20 12:14 PM - Post#309302    
    In response to HARVARDDADGRAD

Sakota could be very good. He's technically a point guard, and if he could prove his value there, that could potentially have huge VORP for Harvard. It's harder on the wing, because Ledlum, Kirkwood, Tretout and Haskett are all options there, plus a guy like Catchings, who was injured most of last year.

But if he can be a passable PG, that would be of big value.

 
HARVARDDADGRAD 
Postdoc
Posts: 2685

Loc: New Jersey
Reg: 01-21-14
06-20-20 12:22 PM - Post#309303    
    In response to mrjames

Thanks Mike. At his size he could be very valuable if he's got defensive skills. Looked like Tretout had some defensive strengths. Haskett can guard the quickest of opposing guards.

 
Naismith 
Sophomore
Posts: 149

Loc: RI
Reg: 11-11-18
07-06-20 03:11 PM - Post#310038    
    In response to HARVARDDADGRAD

According to the Boston Globe and Harvard Crimson today, "Next Year" for Ivy intercollegiate athletics is likely to be September, 2021. Harvard's plans for housing this fall/winter says it all.

 
mobrien 
Senior
Posts: 390

Loc: New York
Reg: 04-18-17
08-07-20 04:16 PM - Post#311231    
    In response to Naismith

Princeton just announced that they won't be bringing freshmen and juniors onto campus in the fall, like they originally planned, but will be going fully remote instead. I'd be surprised if all the other Ivies don't end up doing the same. Colleges are perfectly designed to spread the virus, given that the odds that college kids won't party are approximately zero.

https://fall2020.princeton.edu/news/president-eisg...

 
palestra38 
Professor
Posts: 32685

Reg: 11-21-04
08-07-20 06:24 PM - Post#311237    
    In response to mobrien

What percentage will decide to defer? I feel bad for next year's freshmen. If as many as I expect defer this year, the acceptance rates will reach all time lows.

 
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