" title="Spartans Weblog">Spartans Weblog

Well, the unanimous conclusion of this blog’s readers is that Wisconsin is our main rival.  And I can’t argue with that conclusion.  Chalk this week’s Coffee Talk question up as non-debate-inducing.

The one caveat readers offered about Wisconsin being our biggest rival is the one-sidedness of the rivalry in recent years.  Wisconsin has beaten MSU in 11 of their 14 meetings since Bo Ryan took over as the Badgers’ head coach.

This got me to wondering where Tom Izzo’s records stand against each Big Ten team during his career.  Here are the numbers:

Izzo has a winning record against all 10 conference opponents, but now stands just one game up on Wisconsin during his career.  (That means he as 12-3 vs. Wisconsin pre-Bo.)  Next season will be a key year in terms of maintaining a positive balance vs. the Badgers.

Illinois has the next best record vs. Izzo and has probably been MSU’s #2 rival during the Izzo era.  Indiana’s #3, with the odds favoring Purdue leapfrogging them in the next couple years.

Michigan actually ranks 5th in terms of winning percentage vs. Izzo–although those numbers are built around the 5 wins Michigan racked up against MSU in the first 3 years of the Izzo era (the numbers have not been adjusted for Michigan’s self-imposed sanctions.)

Going forward, I put pretty goods odds on John Beilein building a team that contends more years than not in the Big Ten.  If he could build a nationally-ranked program in the Big East at a school with virtually no natural recruiting base, there’s every reason to think he can do the same with more access to local talent at Michigan.  And the financial investment Michigan has made in Beilein should ensure he gets enough time to rebuild the team to fit his system.

A tigher rivalry with Michigan would be a net positive for Michigan State in terms of the additional buzz it would create in the state.  And, as I think I’ve commented previously, Beilein’s and Izzo’s contrasting styles (3-pointers/zone vs. up-tempo/man-to-man) will lead to fewer in-state recruiting battles than might otherwise arise, allowing the two teams to maximize the use of in-state talent.

Tags: big ten, bo ryan, tom izzo, wisconsin, wolverines

Drew Neitzel’s numbers in the Timberwolves’ final two summer league games:

• Saturday: 6 points on 3-9 shooting, zero assists, and 2 turnovers in 20 minutes of an 81-67 loss.
• Sunday: 14 points on 6-11 shooting, 3 assists, and 1 turnover in 18 minutes of a 111-91 win.

At least Neitzel finished with a strong showing.  In a story that ran in Minneapolis a couple days ago, he spoke optimistically of his chances of getting a chance to compete in the fall for a roster spot with the Wolves.  The comments from Minnesota management were of the not-dripping-with-enthusiasm variety, though:

Assistant general manager Rob Babcock, who saw Neitzel play in college, noted that Neitzel had good court sense, fundamentals and shooting ability. Babcock added, though, that his height is “a little bit of a weakness” and that Neitzel doesn’t possess “blinding quickness.”

That, coupled with a Telfair signing or another free-agent acquisition, could dampen Neitzel’s hope of landing in Minnesota. But by show of the depth chart, Neitzel could get an extended look in the fall.

“There’s certainly a chance,” Babcock said. “That’s why he’s here — to compete for that spot.”

2009 commit Garrick Sherman received rave reviews about his recent play at a tournament in Morgan Town, West Virginia:

Sherman fits into the mold Tom Izzo has developed for his high- and low-post players. Garrick has huge hands to go with his big, strong, wide frame. He is a throwback low post scorer with a variety of back-to-the-basket moves. When watching Garrick play, the obvious hits you first — he is a huge young man, but as you watch further you start to really appreciate the work he has put into his game to get him to a point where he may have been the best prospect at the tournament. No one will mistake him for a classical dancer, but his footwork is well practiced through repetition and he gets where he needs to go much faster than advertised. His motor is relentless and he has the ability to dominate his area rebounding, but what is most impressive is his ability to get those huge hands on rebounds outside his immediate area on the floor. . . .

The Grand Rapids Press ran a feature story on Izzo today.  Not a lot of basketball-related content, but the story provides a few behind-the-scene glimpses at Izzo’s life.  Interesting comments on Michigan:

Still, it irks Izzo — and plenty of Michigan State fans — that Spartan successes in athletics and academics aren’t fully illuminated because the media spotlight shines perpetually on the University of Michigan.

“Friends tell me (our) program is better-known out-of-state than it is in-state,” Izzo said. “It is so easy to hate them, but it’s draining. You can waste a lot of energy.”

This is consistent with my own sense of the MSU basketball program’s place in the universe of media coverage and sports fandom in this state: the program still doesn’t receive the attention the last dozen years of success would seem to merit.  Maybe this is just a function of how much I care about Spartan basketball compared to everything else in the sports world, but here’s a real-live example:

In the last month the Detroit News has run just five articles about MSU basketball–two  recruiting articles with material originating at Rivals.com and Scout.com, a short article on Neitzel playing in the NBA summer league, a piece by Terry Foster on Jason Richardson’s work in Saginaw, and an interview with Tom Crean that references Izzo.  Not a substantive piece on the program’s current players to be found.  I realize it’s the offseason, but the state’s other prominent sports teams get more than just token coverage during the offseason.  As far as I can tell, there’s been only one original article published by the News related to the future of the team since the end of the last season; it ran just after MSU lost to Memphis (and is unavailable online now).

A quick check indicates the Free Press has actually run five MSU basketball-related articles about MSU in the last month, but four were about Neitzel.  The fifth was about former MSU assistant Jim Boylan.  So same basic deal–and less variety.

There are a few possible reasons MSU basketball doesn’t receive the same level of coverage/interest that other sports teams with similar track records get:

• Michigan has four professional sports franchises, three of whom have had a fair amount of success in recent years.  Teams like North Carolina, Duke, Kentucky, and Kansas have a lot less competition from other sports teams in their state.  And most states don’t have two big-time college athletic programs.
• Michigan State’s success in basketball, while now firmly established, still has a shorter track record than other elite college programs (Michigan football, UNC basketball, etc.).
• Sports fans in Michigan (even the majority of MSU fans, I’d guess) still lean pretty heavily toward football.  Until the MSU football team becomes a perennial contender, I think the Michigan football mystique will continue to overshadow MSU’s athletic programs.

Nevertheless, Izzo has certainly raised the profile of Spartan basketball considerably since taking over in 1995.  And, by the time he’s done, the program could have 20 years of national success under its belt, setting the stage for the program to rise to the level of Michigan football or UNC basketball in the eyes of the media and sports fans in the state.

Now to Coffee Talk: Ironically, another reason that the MSU basketball program hasn’t entered the state’s psyche the way Michigan football has is the lack of a clear, top-notch rival to create the level of excitement  that Michigan-Ohio State does in football or UNC-Duke does in basketball.  Michigan hasn’t fielded a contending men’s basketball team since the early years of the Izzo era.  In terms of competing for conference- and national-level success, a half dozen other Big Ten teams have played more meaningful games against MSU on at least a semi-consistent basis over the last decade: Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio State, Purdue.

So here’s the question: Who do you consider to be MSU’s top basketball rival? Is it Michigan or somebody else? Stated differently: If you could guarantee that MSU would win both its games against one team in the conference next season, which team would it be?

Tags: drew neitzel, garrick sherman, tom izzo

Another disappointing stat line for Neitzel: 2 points, zero assists, 2 turnovers.  The Timberwolves did finally win a game.

Michael Jordan’s son, Marcus, is interested in being a Spartan.  He’s 6′2″ and currently rated a 3-start prospect in the 2009 class.

Ohio State gets a transfer of the 7-foot variety from UAB.

Luke Winn predicts that Purdue will win three straight Big Ten titles.  Also points to Suton as MSU’s unsung hero.

Tags: drew neitzel, marcus jordan

Thursday Links

Good news for those of us that will be driving down to the MSU-UNC game at Ford Field after work on Wednesday, December 3: The start time is 9:15, so we’ll have extra time to get down there.  The game will be broadcast on ESPN.  The other top-notch match-up is Duke-Purdue.  That game will be played at 9:00 on Tuesday and also shown ESPN.

The Timberwolves summer league team played it second game last night.  They lost to the Lakers, 95-93.  I watched this game off and on at NBA.com–mostly the parts when Neitzel was in the game.  He finished with 4 points on 2-3 shooting; zero assists, zero turnovers; 13 minutes played.  His role on offense basically consisted of (1) bringing the ball up the floor, (2) passing off to a teammate, and (3) never getting the ball back.  Hard to tell whether he’s been told to run the point like that or it’s a funcion of not being able to create.  Both his FG makes were long 2-pointers.  Pooh Jeter had a good game, scoring 15 points and adding 3 assists.  Kevin Love put up 18 points and 17 rebounds–a man among boys.

There’s not a lot of passing in these games (just 22 assists on 66 FG makes for the two teams combined last night), so I’m not sure this is the best setting for Neitzel to make an impression.  And his defense looks about the same–drifts off his man to help on the perimeter a bit too much and taller players can shoot over him.

Morris Peterson is running a youth basketball camp in Flint.  Jason Richardson is holding a forum on “bridging the gap between fathers and sons” in Saginaw.  And he played some golf yesterday to raise money for the United Way.  Good to see former Spartans giving back in their local areas.

The Title Question

Turnovers have been a sore spot the last two seasons for MSU.  For over a season and a half, they inexplicably turned the ball over on roughly 25% of their possessions on an ongoing basis.  They finally got the problem under control at the end of this past season, turning it over on less than 20% of their possessions in 9 of their final 11 games.

Picking back up on our series looking at MSU’s historical statistical tendencies under Tom Izzo, I thought we’d look at offensive turnover percentage next to see if this has been an issue with earlier Izzo teams.  Here’s a graph of MSU’s year-by-year team turnover percentage for the last 12 years, courtesy of statsheet.com:

(Note: For some reason, I can’t get the Flash version of this graph to work.  And the labels at the bottom of the image file embedded above are shifted one year to the left.)

(Update: The Flash version is working now.)

For the most part, turnovers have not been a big problem for Izzo teams.  On only three occasions has MSU ranked in the bottom 100 nationally in offensive turnover percentage:

• 1996-97: Turnover percentage of 23.4.  Freshman season for Cleaves, Peterson, Thomas, and Granger.  Cleaves turned it over 4.0 times per game.  Thomas Kelley turned it over 2.0 times per game, even though he played only 20 minutes per game and averaged only 2.1 assists per game.
• 2001-02: Turnover percentage of 23.0.  Freshman season for Hill, Tobert, and Anderson.  Marcus Taylor was the point guard.  Six guys turned it over 1.6 or more times per game: Taylor, Anderson, Anagonye, Wolfe, Hill, Torbert.
• 2006-07: Turnover percentage of 24.1.  Freshman season for Morgan and Dahlman.  Travis Walton was the point guard.  Four guys turned it over 2.3 or more times per game: Suton, Morgan, Walton, and Neitzel.  Using the Kenpom method of calculating individual turnover percentage, Neitzel and Maurice Joseph were the only guys with percentages under 20.

(Note the five-year intervals between the three seasons.  Clearly, we’re OK until 2011-12.)

So the first two bad seasons were the freshman years of the first two major batches of perimeter players to come in under Izzo.  As those players developed, the team’s turnover percentage tended to decline over the 3-4 years following each of those peaks.

The atrocious turnover numbers of the 2006-07 season remain hard to explain.  Not surprisingly, all three of the high-turnover seasons above were bad-depth years.

On the flip side, Michigan State has never been an elite team in terms of taking care of the ball under Izzo.  There were only two years in which the team ranked in the top 100 nationally in turnover percentage:

• 2000-01: Turnover percentage of 20.3.  Marcus Taylor (as a freshman) and Charlie Bell (as a senior) split time at point guard.  They were the only two players to average more than 1.6 turnovers per game.
• 2004-05: Turnover percentage of 20.0.  Chris Hill (as a senior) and Drew Neitzel (as a freshman) split time at point guard.  No player averaged more than 2.0 turnovers per game (Paul Davis averaged 2.0).

Both season were good, but not great, depth years.  And both were years when the team had two legitimate point guards, which was rare for the first ten years of the Izzo era.  Of course, a big part of the mystery of the team’s turnover problems the past two seasons is that they’ve had at least two starter-quality point guards each season (three this past season).  Also, note that both teams had good senior ball-handlers playing in the paint (Hutson in 2000-01, Anderson playing power forward in 2004-05).

In sum, offensive turnover percentage has not been a defining feature of MSU under Tom Izzo.  For the most part, the team has been pretty average in this area.  I think this reflects two competing aspects of Izzo’s offensive philosophy.  On the one hand, he likes his teams to push the ball on offense, which will tend to lead to some turnovers.  On the other hand, he wants precise executive in the half-court offense without a lot of individual playmaking, which should theoretically reduce turnovers.  (Another paradox of the recent turnover problems, though, is that it seemed like the turnovers were much more prevelant in the half-court game.)

Hopefully, the end of the 2007-08 season marked the end of the Great Spartan Turnover Scourge.  Next year, Kalin Lucas will have a full season under his belt, Walton and Lucious will provide depth at the point, and Suton should provide a good ball-handler in the paint.  One key will be whether Morgan can eliminate his traveling problem.

The tentative plan for this series is to look at the remaining offensive stats (which are the shooting stats, since we already did rebounding) next.  Then we’ll move on to defense.

Tags: drew neitzel, msu basketball history, tom izzo, turnovers

The Timberwolves’ summer league team played its first game last night.  Neitzel scored 10 points on 4-5 FG shooting (all 2-pointers), including 2-2 on 3-pointers, in 14 minutes.  On the downside, he had zero assists and turned the ball over two times.

Someone named Pooh Jeter, from St. Vincent College the University of Portland, was apparently the starting point guard for the Wolves.  I assume that’s a bad sign.

The team lost to the Mavericks’ squad 88-74.  Kevin Love led the Wolves with 18 points and 13 rebounds.

Speaking of Neitzel, here’s another scatter plot of individual offensive stats.  This one’s for MSU’s 2006-07 season.

This one speaks pretty clearly for itself.  Neitzel was a beacon of efficiency in the midst of mediocre support from the rest of the team (mediocre on offense; the team was very good on defense).

Also, note that Walton was the second most efficient player on the team as a sophomore.  Of course, he was playing point guard full-time.  I think it’s going to be harder for him to be an efficient player on offense when he’s on the floor at the same time as Lucas.

Two random links:

• For those that don’t live in the Lansing area, Joe Rexrode is doing a series this week on the MSU Athletic Department’s financial situation.  It’s not a pretty picture.  Reportedly, the department has lost almost $5 million over the last four years.  Today’s piece asserts that revitalizing the football team is the key and notes that the men’s basketball team turned a profit of $6.8 million for 2006-07 (which was apparently only good for 5th highest in the Big Ten).  Of course, the accounting on all this stuff is fairly squishy.
• Durrell Summers put up another 40-point performance in the Lansing pro-am summer league (this would have been two Saturdays ago).

Tags: drew neitzel, offensive ratings, travis walton

Apparently, the executives at CBS finally got around to reading the Big Ten Wonk’s treatise on how maddening Billy Packer is to us college basketball junkies.  The Miami Herald is reporting that Packer is being relieved of his lead announcing duties and will be replaced by Clark Kellogg (hat tip to Spartan Dan, and Awful Announcing, in the comments section).

Kellogg is the epitome of what a college basketball analyst should be, balancing shrewd insight with a healthy enthusiasm for the game.  I would say, though, that it’d be nice to give Bill Raftery–who has a similar blend of insight and enthusiasm and a longer track record–a couple years as the color guy for the NCAA championship game.  (And Verne Lundquist beats Jim Nantz as a basketball play-by-play guy in my book.)

Now, if ESPN will just announce that Steve Lavin is replacing Dick Vitale as their lead analyst, all will be right in the world of college basketball television coverage.

Update: Rush the Court runs down the major Packer-generated controversies through the years.

Tags: basketball announcers

To get a better sense how individual offensive ratings and usage percentages fit together, here are scatter plots for the top two teams in the Big Ten this past season.  Note that the vertical axis is recalibrated based on the approximate average team offensive efficiency figure for both teams (108.9 for Wisconsin; 105.0 for Purdue).

• The Wisconsin data reflect a downwards-sloping trend line, implying that the players who used up more possessions freed things up for the guys not using as many possessions to score more efficiently.
• Marcus Landry and freshman Jared Bergen will need to replace Butch as the interior presence that opens up things for the rest of the offense.
• And Trevon Hughes needs to get a little more efficient as the return the player with the highest usage percentage.

• With the exception of Chris Kramer, the Boilermakers’ usage percentages are distributed pretty tightly around 20%.
• Their offensive efficiency was really pulled up by Robbie Hummel’s unbelievable freshman season.  Can he maintain that level of efficiency as teams focus on him more?
• Scott Martin won’t be tough to replace from an efficiency standpoint, but he did use up a higher-than-average level of possessions.
• Purdue really made their living on defense last season.  Imagine how scary they could be if the freshman become more efficient on offense as they develop.

Tags: offensive ratings, purdue, wisconsin