The Wiz's 20-21 Final Report Card

[The Wiz]

The 20-21 season will go down as one of the strangest in Bills history...and a season of lost opportunity...and that is saying a lot.  We started the season off late.   This gave us an additional 2 weeks of preseason hype.  The great thing was ....we actually lived up to the hype...getting off to a great start with wins over LSU and NCSt and our only loss to Minn in what I consider one of the most difficult venues for an away team.  Yes , those preseason forecasts of an A-10 championship and going to the Dance were on track .

 

And then it happened....

 

'Twas the night after Christmas 

And Covid appeared

We went into lockdown

And the season disappeared.

 

And thus it became a tale of 2 teams....pre covid and post covid.

The following report card looks a little different than usual ....The 1st and 3rd columns are the end of the season grades ...the 2nd and 4th columns are Christmas day when we were at our peak. It was around Xmas that I had us ranked at 18th ITN...AP had us at 23rd.  While things deteriorated after Covid, not everything fell apart. If you look at the report card closely,  you will see the offense fell off, especially the 3P shooting.... we went from one of the top teams ITN to just above average. If you just take the post Covid 3P shooting by itself , we graded out at D.  But again , it wasn't all doom and gloom.  We improved on defense ...across the board. This is what kept us alive post covid.

 

Let's take a look at the report card.

 

 

........End of Season...........Xmas............................End...................................Xmas

..................................OFF............................................................DEF.........................

PPG...............B+....................A-...............................A-........................................B+

FG%...............B+....................A................................B..........................................C+

3Pt%..............B-.....................A+...16th ITN.............C.........................................C-

FT%................C-....... .............B.................................................................................

Reb.................A-....................C+...............................A+...14h ITN......................A+...9th ITN

 OFF Rebs  = total rebs...DEF Rebs = opp reb

UP....Offense.....Reb...............Defense .....PPG....FG%.....3P%

Down...Offense......PPG.....FG%...3P%....FT%........Defense......none

Top 100 ITN (In The Nation)

Assts...Collins...10th ...dn

Rebs...Goodwin....17th....dn

Stls......Goodwin...29th....up

FT%....Perkins...50th......up

Double Double....Goodwin...8th ....dn

A couple of notes.....Even though it was a down year for Jimerson...he still finished as an A+ player in 3P% (39.4%) and while not a top 100,  the A+ is good for the top 5% of qualified shooters......Perkins needed 1 more 3PM and he would have been 95th ITN in PPG and an A+  3 P shooter....he finishes at 101 and A for the year. ...As for the double double pace, had we played a full season, Goodwin would have lead the nation. The players in front of him all had more games to make their double doubles.

Now let's look at the A-10 forecast....

.....................Season end.....preseason (11/24/20)........Difference

St. B...............A-....................B..................................+2

SLU................B+....................B+.................................0

Rich................B+....................B+.................................0

VCU................B+....................B-..................................+2

Dav.................B+....................B.....................................+1

Day................B........................B+................................ -1

RI...................B.........................B....................................0

UMass..........B-........................C+..................................+1

Duq...............B-........................B....................................-1

GM................C+........................C+.................................0

St. J................C-.......................C-...................................0

LaS.................C-.........................C-.................................0

GW..................D+.........................C.................................-2

For...................D-.........................D...................................-1

79%......with the exact grade or within 1 step

100% within 2 steps

Which is the goal for the preseason forecast...to be within 2 steps of the original forecast.

Biggest surprise....St. B and VCU....biggest disappointment....GW

And of course, we were right on the cusp of A- at the end of the season...actually almost between A- and B+  the difference between making the tournament or not.  I described it in one of the season ending posts before selection Sunday as a coin flip and the Bills landed on the coin's edge...neither heads or tails.

So what does this all mean? 

The biggest question  I have heard this season is ....What would have happened  if the Covid hadn't hit the Bills?   

So here is what I did.....I took our Xmas data and projected it to March.....Assume there was no Covid  and assume the Bills didn't improve or get worse  ....what would have happened? The first thing the computer does is to see who at the end of the season was most like the Xmas Bills......The answer is ...SD St U....What this means is after the season is over,  which of the 346 teams would the Bills have been most likely to tie. From there it shows us finishing at 16th ITN....and a 6th round seed in the Dance. Of course, the irony here is the SDSU game was one of our canceled games this year and would have been a quality win. Finally to rub some salt into the wound ....we would have beaten the Aztecs by 4.

But the sun will rise again tomorrow and soon I will be working on the 2021-2022 Bills preseason forecast . A forecast that will show the Bills sneaking up on the rest of the A-10 and the college basketball world  with a strong season .

To quote a famous passage....

"....And I heard him exclaim,

as he shouted out clear,

BILLIKENS WILL WIN

It will be better next year."

 

 

 

[Brighton]

After this season, I will no longer buy into the hype.. I'm NOW convinced that the program is cursed.

[Old guy]

I think that once Covid gets out of the way, and the scheduling, practice, and playing normalizes, we will have an excellent chance of going to the Dance next year. I think we have the talent and the horsepower to achieve this next season, if Covid stops being a factor.

[almaman]

2 hours ago, Brighton said:

After this season, I will no longer buy into the hype.. I'm NOW convinced that the program is cursed.

Not mutually exclusive.

[slu72]

ESPN'S way too early top 25 has St. B's listed as 15. Only A10 finisher. We weren't mentioned even in the other category. I think we will definitely be under everyone's radar next year except for Rothstein who seems to have a bromance with Travis. 

I buy into the curse thing.  I think it's related to that Exorcism the Jebbies tried to pull off back in the 40's. No idea how we shake it. 

[almaman]

5 hours ago, slu72 said:

ESPN'S way too early top 25 has St. B's listed as 15. Only A10 finisher. We weren't mentioned even in the other category. I think we will definitely be under everyone's radar next year except for Rothstein who seems to have a bromance with Travis. 

I buy into the curse thing.  I think it's related to that Exorcism the Jebbies tried to pull off back in the 40's. No idea how we shake it. 

had Fr Bowdern for religion fr year of HS! that jebbie gave me the the heebie jeebies

[White Pelican]

8 hours ago, slu72 said:

ESPN'S way too early top 25 has St. B's listed as 15. Only A10 finisher. We weren't mentioned even in the other category. I think we will definitely be under everyone's radar next year except for Rothstein who seems to have a bromance with Travis. 

I buy into the curse thing.  I think it's related to that Exorcism the Jebbies tried to pull off back in the 40's. No idea how we shake it. 

After mention of a curse up above, I was waiting for someone to bring up the Exorcist! I was not disappointed.

[almaman]

bringing it up idid not make your head spin then I guess?

[White Pelican]

1 hour ago, almaman said:

bringing it up idid not make your head spin then I guess?

Think that's funny, huh?

[almaman]

my first kidney stone made me think maybe that's what ailed that kid!

[VeniceMenace]

On 4/6/2021 at 8:50 PM, Brighton said:

After this season, I will no longer buy into the hype.. I'm NOW convinced that the program is cursed.

Ford has been cursed. Situations, big men turnover in Santos and Gordon, then two seasons dashed due to COVID. Hope springs eternal with Ford's level of recruiting. Not buying into the hype is akin to no joy in life for us MBMs.

[Dr. Holly Hills]

I am NOT a life long bills fan so I can say from experiencing other fan bases that SLU is NOT cursed.  To quote Doug Vaughn “if we can just get hot, we can win this baby!!”