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December 18, 2013

What Happened at MSG?

Filed under: Basketball — Chas @ 1:49 pm

If I had to lay odds, I would have had Ron Cook as the prohibitive favorite among Pittsburgh newspaper columnists penning the “Pitt’s weak schedule is the reason for the loss” column this morning. But, no. Dejan Kovacevic grabs the superficial brass ring. Oh, he’s not coming and saying it’s the reason. He’s just saying the question is still out there.

You’d better believe the topic came up again, as it’ll continue to do for as long as it goes unaddressed. In this context, the question was whether or not Pitt might have been better prepared for Cincinnati with an out-of-conference schedule ranked better than 167th in the country.

You may remember Kovacevic’s previous “question” of whether this Pitt team is better without Steven Adams.

Time for a personal aside. I hate. HATE the “I’m just asking questions” pieces. Regardless of the medium. At the end of the day, it is nothing but pot-stirring crap that someone doesn’t have the actual courage to stand behind. They aren’t saying they believe it (wink, wink). They are just acknowledging the question is out there and opening it up to others to discuss. That way they don’t have to back up what they are saying. They don’t have to take one side.

They can just toss it out there. Repeat it. Let others pick it up, and see what happens. Skew the debate without having to get your hands dirty.

Skip Bayless may be a gasbag troll best ignored, but at least you know what side he is taking on something (usually the side that gets the most controversy and attention). When a media person can’t even reach that level, it should be a concern.

/end rant

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Horrid And An Aberration

Filed under: Basketball — Chas @ 8:17 am

(At least I hope so.)

Like most people, every now and then I dream of work. And it is miserable and soul-sapping for the next day. Last night I managed to combine the work dream with that replays of that game. I’ve locked up all the knives in the house.

The number that reflects the ugliness is the way that killed the adjusted tempo. Coming into the game, per KenPom.com, Pitt’s AdjT was at 66.3 while Cinci was at 66.7. Nationally that was 271st and 255th respectively. That one game of misery dropped both teams’ averages by 1.7 to 64.6 and 65.0. One game (admittedly over only 11 games) did that.

There’s no way to pretend it didn’t happen. I want to, but too many are going to treat this like some indictment of Pitt’s schedule. Or as evidence Pitt is not that good. That may all be true, but that game is not the proof. That game was  a complete outlier. A freak game. They happen. They happen to really good teams at strange times.

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