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The Bills over Day by 10


The Wiz

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1 hour ago, kshoe said:

Are there any "semi-comprehensive" stats on how teams have performed coming off longer COVID layoffs or is it all anecdotal? 

I ask because there are also examples of teams doing well after they come back. Georgia tech was off for 17 days and hammered Clemson in its first game back and only lost by 2 to Virginia in it's next game. Florida St was off for 2 weeks and has gone 4-0 since coming back including a 32 point thrashing of NC State in the first game back.

I'd think if the "teams always underperform on the first games back" concept was a real issue, Vegas would be all over that and the lines would be adjusted accordingly. I think I saw on twitter today we opened as 8.5 point favorites, not all that different than the Wiz's 10.

There is no absolute stat.  But of the 12 teams I tracked through the first week of January, 10 teams struggled in their first game back.  Stopped counting after that since the pattern had already been established.  Even if the percentage has now fallen from low 80% to low 70%, it's still a decisive majority of teams that fall in this category. 

We would be bucking the trend if we won tomorrow's game by double digits.  It's possible but I don't think it's fair to our guys to set that as an expectation.

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I expect the shooting will be rough and the offense out of sync at times, but the key will be not to turn the ball over. At least get shots up even if they are bad shots, so we can do what we do best, crash the boards. Rebounding and hussle shouldn't be impacted by the layoff. We may need to give the bench and especially the hussle guys like Thatch and Hargrove a little more pt in order to spread the minutes around. Under normal circumstances, we would have little problem handling this year's Dayton bunch at home, but considering the layoff, who knows. I'm just happy we can FINALLY watch the team play again.

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I’m sure it varies by team and that there are plenty of instances of teams who came back from COVID and looked fine. I also saw firsthand with my second favorite team (Vanderbilt) how out-of-shape a group can look when they come back from not playing for an extended period. 

Fortunately, I think SLU has two big advantages that some other teams who have struggled in their return may not have had: 1) we are playing a rival who beat us in two emotional games last year. If there’s any game in which our guys will have a chip on their shoulder and will be ready to lay it all on the line it’s Dayton, and 2) we have a deep bench at all positions to get guys rest if they need time re-adjusting to the pace of play.

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24 minutes ago, NH said:

I’m sure it varies by team and that there are plenty of instances of teams who came back from COVID and looked fine. I also saw firsthand with my second favorite team (Vanderbilt) how out-of-shape a group can look when they come back from not playing for an extended period. 

Fortunately, I think SLU has two big advantages that some other teams who have struggled in their return may not have had: 1) we are playing a rival who beat us in two emotional games last year. If there’s any game in which our guys will have a chip on their shoulder and will be ready to lay it all on the line it’s Dayton, and 2) we have a deep bench at all positions to get guys rest if they need time re-adjusting to the pace of play.

-ok, what teams? would make me feel better to know this

 

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Just now, Cowboy said:

-ok, what teams? would make me feel better to know this

 

FSU missed 14 days and in their first game back won 105-73 against NC state  

 

But 14 days and 30 days is another thing

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12 minutes ago, Reinert310 said:

Carter also tweeted that Strickland will not be available tomorrow after traveling to Florida for a death in the family.

I have noticed the increase of pics involving Phil posted by SLU. 

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It's game day....Finally

So here are the 2 key takeaways from my preconference Bills review of 1/24/21

1.....It is Nov 19, 2020...at least as far as where the team is as to being game ready.   Sooo...if you believe that 1 week before the Bills played SIU-e in the first game of the season, we could beat the Jan 26, 2021 Flyers then you have nothing to worry about.   For those that just threw their hands up in despair ...yes, we can win....In the preseason Bayesian model forecast,  I had The Bills and Dayton even...both B+.  In the ensuing weeks, we rose up to A and then since the KC game , the Covid and rust factor has taken us back down to B+. ...BUT ...since the start of the season Dayton has been gradually slipping ....lost a starting guard 2 weeks ago to injury and just played their worst game of the season.  Dayton is currently a B team and we are playing at home. Theoretically, we are still the better team....The X factor is the Covid...are there lingering effects...if so, how much and how many players?   Which brings us to point 2...

2...The Rust factor....Measuring the effect of the layoff

Here is the chart from the Preconf Bills thread....

 

Here is how the rust factor will affect The Bills.

If we win by 8pts or more.....the layoff had little effect...we should be in good shape going forward

We win by 1-7 pts...small affect ..we will need 2 or 3  games to get sharp.

We lose by 1-7 pts...medium damage....we will need 5 games to be back to form

We lose by 8 pts...Heavy damage...we will need most of the rest of the season to get back to where we were.

So there you have it.

Buckle up Bills fans ...The count down clock has begun as we slowly climb and chug up  that 1st big hill of the roller coaster ride.

As it has been said many times before ...It ain't easy being a Bills fan.

Go Bills

 

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So many ways to win....also means so many ways to lose.

First, let's check the "Rust layoff" chart....According to the chart we registered in at the Medium level of rust....which means it will take us about 5 games to get back to where we were.  That doesn't mean we can't win games during this time...just that we won't be playing at the KC game level for a while.

So let's see what happened this game....

a decent shooting night would help ...48/36/72.....That didn't happen....52/23/59....2Pt shooting was good...3pt was abysmal ...had we made 2 more 3s to make the decent target....we win....FT s were poor....we were 3 short of the target ....in a 5 pt game it made a difference...speaking of FTs...........

 Under Day Defense I have included FT defense....not a stat I usually post. I did it because Day is currently ranked #1 in the nation in D FT%...They lead the nation with a 60% ...and sure enough we come in at 59%

stop Crutcher ...hold him to 14 pts...... 27pts ...nearly half of them  in 2 min near the end of the game.....obviously this was a killer...if we hold him...we not only win but come close to making the spread

Dominate the boards...I would like to see us win the battle by at least 8 rebs...Day by 2...a swing of 10 rebs...another killer...10 more rebs and we definitely win. Why did we need to win by 8 rebs...because Day is an F rated team in rebs.

75+ pts should give us a win... about right

11 TOs ... 10 TO...one of the few bright spots (along with the 2pt shooting)...the low TOs allowed us to stay close till the end.

Other bright spots...Goodwin with another double double...French 16 pts  and 2 blks...Collins ...11 assts,  a few more made  3s by the team and he would have been in the teens .

So , we have our work cut out for us.  4 more games to get up to speed. If we play our scheduled games ...we could be rolling again by Feb 16 ..about 3 weeks. In the meantime, this close effort against Day ...while we were not at full strength... shows not only do we have a chance to win the next 4 games but still have a chance to run the table from here to the end.

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