Conference Rankings

[SonOfaGriz]

Attached are conference rankings and analysis for all 11 Big Sky teams. Each section includes key players with league stats, as well as interpretation of past league games. Worst case scenario, it's a good primer to look at headed into all the games for Wildcat fans. I write these every two weeks and I do not believe any other outlet puts out in depth rankings/breakdown for all 11 teams. I hope you like it, but if you think I'm a moron, please, go into great detail via comment on what I'm missing.

Montana and Weber State are their own tier----in terms of the Thursday (today) and Saturday games, Weber has to play well, no question, but Montana State's record is inflated due to a soft schedule---3 of their 4 wins came against one-win teams and their opening win vs SUU was before SUU had recovered from the loss of former top 25 recruit Dwayne Morgan--since then, the Thunderbirds look much better. MSU has probably the third best backcourt in the league with Tyler Hall and pg Harald Frey. Everyone knows what the Montana game on Saturday could be----I'll go further in depth there on Saturday.

http://www.montana-mint.com/2019/01/24/griz-remain-on-top-despite-early-stumbles/

 

[n.ogdencat]

Personally, I think this is some nice work. Thank you for sharing.

 

[Webergrad02]

Lots of time went into this. Kind of reminds me of the work Jon Reed would do over at the big sky bball blog. However, a little bit of Griz bias is showing. Especially the downgrading of the Bobcats. In Boise, MSU has the offensive power to knock off anyone. I also believe that Northern Colorado should be on the top tier.

 

[SonOfaGriz]

Lots of time went into this. Kind of reminds me of the work Jon Reed would do over at the big sky bball blog. However, a little bit of Griz bias is showing. Especially the downgrading of the Bobcats. In Boise, MSU has the offensive power to knock off anyone. I also believe that Northern Colorado should be on the top tier.

First, thanks for reading and commenting. The goal is to take every team seriously. I accept the potential interpretation as Grizzly bias, though full disclosure, I am a University of Idaho alum, twice over. I have the Bobcats a tier below because they have to prove they can beat good teams, and they haven't done that this year. The Cats are something greater than most of the conference, but they don't look like they have the defense to be a real threat against Weber and Montana without shooting lights out the whole game. Could they make a run? I have them in the second tier, so I believe they should be taken seriously, but I have no reservation putting them a tier below Montana and Weber.

UNC is a tier down because they've mostly had to ride 45-50 points from the combination of Jordan Davis and Bodie Hume to wins, and their 3-through-7 players have been unable to produce more than nominally. That could change, but in games where Jordan Davis averages closer to 1 point per shot, or Bodie Hume isn't hitting 40-50% of threes while shooting around 7 per game---which have happened to mostly be against Weber and Montana---they don't have the third or fourth guy who can step up like Weber and Montana (ex: Weber has four guys who compliment each other offensively that have big nights. Braxton is averaging 11ppg on less than 6 shots---that's a luxury that almost no one else has). .

Lastly----the above points are more to clarify my position, please do not read them as being antagonistically motivated. I'm all ears for reasons why I'm wrong or pieces I appear to be missing.