Recap: USC at Kansas

December 5, 2006

Kansas 72 - USC 62

My Observations

It sure didn't look pretty out there to me.  KU's offense looked unplanned and far from crisp.  On defense, unless the Jayhawks forced a turnover (they did on over a third of USC's possessions) it seemed USC could get a shot more easily than the heavily-favored hosts.  In the end, though, the numbers show a different game.  Frustration with KU's play likely resulted from our personal bias to get upset when our favorite team misses shots.  And in this game, boy did KU miss shots (eFG 41.3%).  But the overwhelming offensive rebounding advantage resulted in an average efficiency (1 pt/poss) for KU, while the barrage of TO's by USC resulted in a significantly below average efficiency (0.84 pts/poss) for the Trojans.

Four Factor Analysis

• SHOOTING - KU had a horrid night at 41.3%, while USC had a respectable 48.9%.  It wasn't just good defense by USC, as KU missed many open shots all night.  The problem was that it usually wasn't the right player shooting.
• OFFENSIVE REBOUNDING - This is what probably won the game for Kansas.  KU grabbed 51% of available offensive rebounds!  They also held USC to only 25% on their end.
• TURNOVERS - If there was a clear #2 reason for the victory, it would have to be USC's whopping 25 TO's (good for 34% of their possessions).
• FREETHROW RATE - Although KU made more FT's than USC (20 vs 17), given the Jayhawks' huge advantage in field goals attempted, this ratio of FTM/FGA actually looks better for USC.  In effect, USC made much better use of the FT line (37% rate vs KU's 32%).

Player Performance Analysis

Looks like at least one of the Stewart twins is capable of taking over a game at Allen Fieldhouse.  Too bad it isn't the one who goes to Kansas.  Lodrick Stewart was simply on fire with his shots.  He scored 23 points, including 5-8 from 3FG's.  He even had time for a blocked shot and 3 steals.  Didn't do as much of the other things (2 reb, 1 ast) but did make only 1 TO on a night his team couldn't hang onto the ball.  Given the strength of his opponent, he does deserve the highest rating on the floor with adjustment.

Gibson is an interesting case, though.  On a night where he committed 11 turnovers (that's right, no typo), his rating still came out okay in the raw and third best on the court when adjusted for opponent!  How can this be?  Simple, the TO's were the only thing he did poorly all night, and he made up for them with great shooting, rebounding and a few other numbers.  Plus, when the team is averaging only 0.84 pts/poss, a turnover isn't as costly to the team as when it's operating highly efficiently.  This is one case, though, where one player's TO's are such a high percentage of the team's overall TO's, that you could argue the team efficiency would actually be significantly higher if not for that player's TO's.  Rare that this ever happens, so in this case I will just say that Gibson's rating is probably overstated due to this anomaly.

For Kansas, it looks like last season's most efficient player is starting to make his run again.  Mario Chalmers played an excellent offensive game and made 6 STL on defense to go with 2 BLK.  Not sure if you could ask for more of a guard, except that he only made 1-4 3FG's.  Darnell Jackson also came back strong after a terrible game on Saturday.  He played with an intensity I hadn't seen in some time, and he looked like he was making stronger moves than usual.  He sweated out 11 pts and 9 reb (5 off) in just 22 minutes.

Sherron Collins also put together some nice stretches in this game, mostly with fast break opportunities and layups.  What's more, he did this without committing a single turnover.  He did struggle with his overall shooting, however, which keeps his rating from getting too high.

The big boys, Julian Wright and Darrell Arthur, came up short this game.  The combined for 40 minutes played because of foul trouble.  When they were in the game, their numbers looked only good, not great.  Wright struggled with shots and TO's but rebounded well, while Arthur scored efficiently and struggled with TO's a bit.

This was the first game all season that I felt Russell Robinson played poorly.  He turned it over five times, which is extremely unusual.  Fortunately, he did have eight assists to help compensate.  His poor shooting continued, so it combined with the TO's and fouls to produce a negative rating.

Sasha Kaun was forced into playing more minutes than he's used to because Arthur got into early foul trouble.  Let's just say that Sasha is struggling.  When he gets the ball inside of five feet from the basket, he has either taken it up (regardless of being double or triple teamed) or literally fallen down.  Last season, he was in good position for finishing plays, but as KU struggles to find its offensive rhythm, his inability to create anything for himself and lack of court awareness make him an offensive liability for now.  The injury excuse should be less and less valid with each passing game.

Brandon Rush looked like he was going to have a breakout game with some early 3-pointers, but his shots stopped falling, and his aggressiveness faded as the game progressed.  On yet another terrible shooting night (3-14 FG), the one good thing that came of it for Rush was that he found his freethrow shooting touch again (5-6).

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