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The wild thing is the average points scored per assist. You would expect most everyone to be down in the low 2.x range, because Even if every assist was a made 3pt shot, the max ppa would be 3. Jimerson(13a @ 2.8), Jacobs(9a @ 2.7), and Weaver(6a @ 2.8) are outstanding, because they all are at, or markedly above their statistically projected points per assist if their feet were glued to 3pt land. Collins is dropping dimes to them at their favorite spots, with tons of space, beyond the 3 pt line. French and Goodwin are averaging 2.5 and 2.4 points per assist, so they both are at the charity stripe for the majority of baskets scored off a Collins dime. The vast majority of these assists are off Collins driving and feeding inside the paint. Perkins’ assists are a mixed bag, but exemplary in that he cashed in at 40 dimes at 2.7 ppa. Collins feeding assists to Hargrove only resulted in 20 assists at 2.2 ppa, so Hargrove is finishing most of these at the rim. This is the value of Collins. He creates flow and spacing, and has the vision to drop dimes behind him, cross court, to the cutter/slasher, and feeding the post/paint.

brooke would be a reason to switch local news preference!

This I need to watch more local news.

Great Facebook post features photos from SLU's D1 hockey team in the 1970s. I remember seeing the annual "Billikens vs. Blues rookies" exhibition as a kid and thinking the Bills' unis looked cool. In the thread, Joe Fresta writes, quote, "The 'Basketball Mafia' does not want hockey! With all the homegrown talent here hockey would bring a national championship way before basketball. They're probably afraid of that too." Thoughts?

Round of 32 action starts in 30 min here. If we win, we play the winner of Winthrop/ETSU. Great draw for SLU to make a Cinderella run.

I did not know where to put this but I thought it was priceless, so check this out: https://www.facebook.com/HowToBeADad/videos/226370061889319/UzpfSTE1ODk3NzEyMzE6MTAyMTQ4MDI2Njc0OTIxNTQ/

Welp, that did not go the way I thought it would.

I’ll listen to Dr Fauci and BBF can listen to whomever he would like

How difficult is it to go on an NCAA Tournament run? Statistically speaking the single biggest factor is your seed. Some of this will be obvious: A 1 Seed will have favorable matchups for 4 games. A 2 Seed will have favorable matchups for 3 games. A 3 Seed will have favorable matchups for 2 games. A 4 Seed will have favorable matchups for 2 game. A 5 Seed will have favorable matchups for 1 game. A 6 Seed will have favorable matchups for 1 game. A 7 Seed will have favorable matchups for 1 game. A 8 Seed will have favorable matchups for 1 game. The first game spread advantage for round one is likely to be: 1 Seed – 20+ points 2 Seed – 14 points 3 Seed – 13 points 4 Seed – 7 Points 5 Seed – 3 Points 6 Seed – 2.5 Points 7 Seed – 1.5 Points 8 Seed - .5 Points It pays of big to be in seed 3 vs 4. The top 3 seeds face conference winners from weak conferences. Seeds 4 plus are matching up against teams that played in or had they not won their conference tournaments would have played in. A top 3 seed, means being a top 12 team nationally. A 4 seed still has a significant advantage in the first round, that means being a top 16 team in the nation. Another way to look at is that there is only a one possession gap between seeds 5 and 12 in the first round games. Second game spread advantage for the tournament group of 32 is likely to be: 1 Seed – 7 points 2 Seed – 3.5 points 3 Seed – 2 Points 4 Seed – 1 Point Third game Sweet 16 spread advantage is likely to be: Seed 1 – 5 points Seed 2 – 1 point Elite 8 Spread advantage is likely to be: Seed 1 – 1 point. This also means that about half of the games played in each bracket are likely to have one possession projected point spreads. This does not take upsets into account. So the 1 seeds have the advantage of playing lesser teams by virtue of their matchups and they are often significantly stronger than teams just a few positions behind them in the national rankings. This year, the difference in strength of nationally ranked teams 1 and 10, is 7 points. but difference between teams 40 and 50 is 1 point. The bottom line is unless you are a one seed, there is nothing easy about even getting to the sweet 16. Runs are going to require some luck and likely come down to 1 or 2 key plays. Data: I looked at one of the projected brackets and ran the Sagarin numbers to calculate the point spreads. These numbers assume no home court advantage. Now we know that teams that end up playing close to home, can present a home court advantage which is typically worth 3 points. Without looking at specific teams, after seeding, I would say the second biggest factor is where you play. If it is close to home with strong support of the fans attending the game, that can be at least as big a factor as the seeding, especially for the middle seeds in the tournament. For a team to regularly make the Sweet 16, it needs to regularly be among top 16 teams in the nation. Even then it isn’t a sure thing. While some team will make a Sweet 16 from a lower position, it isn’t surprising that an 8 seed is in that group. But having one of the 8 seeds make it and being able to project which of the 8 seeds is another matter.

JAM TIME! Great work by David Pavlakovich

Relax, his response appeared to address the NBA portion of the question more than the SLU portion.

Can we make sure the word situation doesn’t come up again?

Title IX will result in an addition of a women's sport, if you are adding schollies for a men's hockey team. Add that into your budget.

As the last public address announcer for the Hockey Bills at the Checkerdome/Arena, hockey was indeed a very cool time (pun intended). The formation of the team was a direct result of the popularity of the Blues and the spill over of fans who could not get tickets to the NHL. The Blues were one of six expansion teams in the late 60s and all six were placed in one division. I believe the Blues won that division each time their first three years and then summarily went on and were shut out in three straight Cup finals, winning nary a game. But hockey was a hit. Sid Saloman owned the Blues and gave SLU a pretty good deal on playing our games at the Arena. We then had the largest college hockey venue at the time. But we didn't really have a league and we struggled to advance past NCAA qualifiers a few years running. I loved hockey but I was obviously biased; it was also my 'beat' for the UNews. Bill Selman's temperment, the only coach we ever had, rivaled that of Herb Brooks and Bill Belicheck. We had a few kids from St. Louis make the team but few rarely played; the pipeline was direct from Canada. When Ralston Purina purchased the team and the venue in the mid- to late-70s, the favorable lease went out the window and expenses grew. The team had no practice arena, holding practice at area venues like the Affton Ice Rink and others. Of course, overall, all our athletic facilities sucked. Student support for the program was weak despite constant Fireline runs to and from games. Ditto the basketball Bills at old Kiel. SLU students today have no idea. Games were two-game series; the visitors would come in for a Friday night game followed by a Sunday afternoon tilt. The largest crowds I ever got to see/PA were two games against the then #1 Bowling Green Falcons of Mike Liut and Ken Morrow. I think 11,000 came to the Friday game (I think we lost 4 to 1) and then 15,000 came to the Sunday game. It was that Saturday inbetween that then AD Joe McDonald announced hockey would be discontinued after that season. We won the rematch 4 to 3 on a Chuck Durocher goal late in the third. Hockey is an expensive sport just like football and if our BOT is somewhat reluctant to spend on its cashmaker (men's basketball), I can't see it taking a plunge into another unknown like hockey. A basketball 'mafia' seems highly unlikely; an anti-sports mafia seems more appropriate. Maybe roll in some NCAA basketball dough on a consistent basis and we can talk. Ditto if you throw in a niche sport like lacrosse. I find it funny when some talk about us being in an "East Coast Bus league" like the A10. Our hockey opponents included teams like Bowling Green, Lake Superior State, St. Lawrence (another SLU), Eastern/Western/Northern Michigan, Brown and Colorado College. You'd need a couple Dr. Richard Chaifetz' who were ice hockey buffs to pull this off.

People are buying up the toilet paper because anytime someone coughs everyone around them craps their pants.

A greater percentage of Hargrove's points came from a Yuri pass - 32% - than any other player. So despite David's answer, TJ benefitted more than any other player.

Home Team

Little known fact the first “alley-oop” was completed by the Flint Michigan Tropics. It was a pass from veteran Ed Monix to high flyer Clarence Withers. This amazing feat was first used in the 1976 MegaBowl and was drawn up by Jackie Moon. The play changed the game forever.

Those Detroit teams were great....I hated them! The bad boys. If you drove the lane against them you were going to end up on your backside. If you are looking for something to watch while quarantined check out the 30 for 30 “Bad Boys.” It’s amazing to see the difference in physicality between the game then and the game now.

Shout out to the posters that saw this in this young man before the recruiting process even began and had mentioned that SLU must get Yuri. The posters on this site motivated my wife and go see the kid play and we were rewarded with a 30 point effort and some great assists. Yuri brought back offense to the Billikens. The fast breaks that were so troublesome the season before became a thing of beauty and grace finishing at the hoop. Yuri will score more as defenses will play the pass but it will be pick your poison. Its funny that when Yuri signed the posters on Tiger board said it was a good signing for SLU. Note to those posters it would have been a good signing for them and anyone else in division 1. Yuri was probably one of the 10 most overlooked players in division 1 and will prove that when SLU reaches the sweet 16 next season.

Brooke is a smoke show. Has will be in a billiken uniform next year.

So many pages wasted on a pointless Powell vs. Toppin comparison and not one acknowledgement that if college basketball had NBA Jam, they'd be this year's best combo by far.

That was never my case hahaha*. Hes a pg. too me, a pg is more important. You'll die on a mountain of proving a case that is subjective hahahaha*. You've always been that way on this board. Ive also noted that day in and day out Powell had to go up against much more talent than Obi did due to SOS and pure talent hahaha*. * - sign of a bad argument.

I was more impressed w/ Daly than Powell, but....