The End Game

[IdaGriz01]

Despite all the games played last Thursday and on Saturday, the End Game has not become that much clearer for the Griz. That’s even with the two-game lead the Griz have opened up over EWU. But EWU has to face only one contender (NoColo) in their remaining four games, whereas the Griz face three. About the only good news is that the Griz finish with three games at home.

Weber has only three games left, two against non-contenders and then they get SUU at home. I’d be surprised if they didn’t win all three.

The Cats also face three contenders in their final four games, but they too finish with three games at home. They are not a lock for the regular-season championship, but it seems highly likely that they’ll get it.

Northern Colorado and Southern Utah still have five games to play. Of those two, SUU has a much tougher road to the finish. Three of their games are against contenders, and four are on the road. Worst of all, the last three are scheduled on the road with one travel day between them: MSU (Mar 1), ISU (Mar 3), WSU (Mar 5). UNC has three of their final five at home against non-contenders. However, they do end on the road, back to back at UM (Mar 3) and MSU (Mar 5).

If most of the remaining games go by expectations, with the Griz playing at least a semblance of their better version, UM should still slide into a fifth spot. Oddly enough, one of my projections had MSU and WSU as clear #1 and #2 … with the Griz, SUU, and UNC involved in a tie-breaker at 13-7. How weird would that be?

 

[oldrunner]

I agree with most of what you are saying, Ida. My Wilds haven't been playing as well as the Bobs lately. It looks very much like MSU will win the championship. As for the second prize, the Tournament, I would say it is a wide, open affair. The BSC has proven to be more balanced than previously thought. There are going to be some dog fights in Boise. It will be hardest for a bottom 6 team to pull off 4 wins in 5 days, but not out of the question. Of the top 5 teams, it will be a matter of who gets hot and who has the conditioning and depth to win 3 games in 3 days. It will certainly be interesting and fun to see.

 

[IdaGriz01]

Since the favorites (contenders UNC and SUU) won yesterday evening, nothing has changed significantly in the Big Sky. Those teams now have a full game lead on the Griz, but that’s about it. Both still have the same tough “contender” games ahead of them.

Here’s what the End Games looks like now (Current Standings and Future Games):

MSU (13-3)	Griz	SUU	SacSt	NoCol			
WSU (12-5)	PSU	NAU	SUU			
SUU (11-5)	Griz	MSU	ISU	WSU		
NoCol (11-5)	EWU	Idaho	Griz	MSU
Griz (10-6)	SUU	MSU	NoCol	SacSt	
EWU (8-8)	NoCol	SacSt	NAU	PSU

Sadly, expecting a “tough” game for Southern Utah, may be a stretch, since they get the Griz at home on Thursday. Much as I’d love to think otherwise, that does not bode well (even though UM won fairly handily against them in Mizzu). This Griz team is absolutely wretched on the road, now being 4-9. The only “quality” (if you can call it that) road win was at EWU (90-78). The other three were against BSC bottom feeders … and they barely escaped at Portland State in the last half-minute.

Still hoping for the best, but fearing the worst. Not quite a “make or break” game, but a Griz win on Thursday would go a long way toward ensuring a bye in the conference tournament.

 

[GrizBall]

I agree with most of what you are saying, Ida. My Wilds haven't been playing as well as the Bobs lately. It looks very much like MSU will win the championship. As for the second prize, the Tournament, I would say it is a wide, open affair. The BSC has proven to be more balanced than previously thought. There are going to be some dog fights in Boise. It will be hardest for a bottom 6 team to pull off 4 wins in 5 days, but not out of the question. Of the top 5 teams, it will be a matter of who gets hot and who has the conditioning and depth to win 3 games in 3 days. It will certainly be interesting and fun to see.

Below are the percentage of bench minutes for the conference. I would say UNC and WSU are at a disadvantage when it comes to winning 3 games in 3 days. UNC is highly reliant upon the 3-ball which seems like it would be negatively impacted based on the tournament format. In terms of minutes played for UNC Kountz (2) and Johnson (8) are in the top 8 in the conference.

WSU is the only team with three players in the top 5 with Jawara (3), McEwen (4) and Jones (5) playing heavy minutes. Haven't watched WSU outside of the UM games but I think you can make the argument that the heavy minutes are already starting to take a toll.

NAU has 2 players in the top 7 (Cone and Mains). BIshop (6), Fowler (9) and Venters (10) round out the top 10.

Also worth noting that the top 3 in bench minutes seemed to be playing much, much better towards the end of the season. Obviously could be a variety of factors, but interesting nonetheless.

PSU, ISU, UI, UM, and SUU have zero players in the top 10.

PSU 38.5% of bench minutes
ISU 37.2
UI 34.9
UM 30.4
NAU 30.1
MSU 29.6
SUU 27.8
Sac 24.8
EWU 23.1
WSU 22.1
UNC 21.5

 

[IdaGriz01]

(Bump … mostly to push a certain thread down.)

Thursday, February 24 Schedule
Idaho State at Northern Arizona … 6:00 pm
Eastern Washington at Northern Colorado … 6:00 pm
Griz at Southern Utah … 7:00 pm
Weber State at Portland State … 8:00 pm
Idaho at Sacramento State … 8:00 pm

Any upsets of the contenders would be good for the Griz. Obviously including a Griz win … which I would consider an upset at this point.

 

[AllWeatherFan]

It sucks that the conference winner gets to host the tournament!

Oh, wait…

 

[IdaGriz01]

Contenders – Weber State and Northern Colorado both won tonight, so no real change ahead of the Griz. On the good side, Eastern Washington lost (on the road to Sac State), so they’re now two losses behind the Griz. A little breathing room for that fifth spot.

 

[fanofzoo]

Contenders – Weber State and Northern Colorado both won tonight, so no real change ahead of the Griz. On the good side, Eastern Washington lost (on the road to Sac State), so they’re now two losses behind the Griz. A little breathing room for that fifth spot.

Maybe I am getting old but I just have a hard time whooping it up for 5th place in the bsc.

 

[IdaGriz01]

Contenders – Weber State and Northern Colorado both won tonight, so no real change ahead of the Griz. On the good side, Eastern Washington lost (on the road to Sac State), so they’re now two losses behind the Griz. A little breathing room for that fifth spot.

Maybe I am getting old but I just have a hard time whooping it up for 5th place in the bsc.

Old or not (and I am definitely old), I don't see "whooping it up" either. Except ... it would give the Griz that last bye. And that could be really important for this Griz team. Otherwise ... meah.

 

[grizzlyjournal]

A huge thanks to IdaGriz01 for starting this "End Game" thread. On Paper, the fierce battles in BOTH the men's and women's Big Sky Conf hoops conferences have been pretty fascinating.

SO: A final request for you & other stats geeks... How about an update (stats & sabermetrics) for both men's and women's teams?

I believe -- but am not certain -- that BOTH the Griz and GrizWBB teams have a shot (a long shot, yes) at a Top 3 finish.
The women have a tie breaker with SUU; the men have a tie breaker with EWU. If both teams win both their remaining games, there appears to be a statistical possibility for 2 Top 3 finishes. Correct me if I'm wrong. Go Griz. Go GrizWBB.

 

[TrueGriz]

A huge thanks to IdaGriz! for starting this "End Game" thread. On Paper, the fierce battles in BOTH the men's and women's Big Sky Conf hoops conferences have been pretty fascinating.

SO: A final request for you & other stats geeks... How about an update (stats & sabermetrics) for both men's and women's teams?

I believe -- but am not certain -- that BOTH the Griz and GrizWBB teams have a shot (a long shot, yes) at a Top 3 finish.
The women have a tie breaker with SUU; the men have a tie breaker with EWU. If both teams win both their remaining games, there appears to be a statistical possibility for 2 Top 3 finishes. Correct me if I'm wrong. Go Griz. Go GrizWBB.

Mathematically, The Griz can move up to tie for 2nd, but need a bit of help from more than 1 team. Would help a lot if MSU and WSU beat SUU. Griz would then have a tie breaker over SUU. Tie Breaker over WSU will be very difficult. Won't know until all the games are played. Could come down to RPI or NET.

Lady Griz win out, SUU loses one, Lady Griz finish 3rd. Lady Griz beat SUU twice so wins head to head tie breaker. Lady Griz can finish in a tie with MSU but MSU has a tiebreaker over Lady Griz. MSU clinched at least 3rd place in womens basketball.

 

[IdaGriz01]

A huge thanks to IdaGriz! for starting this "End Game" thread. On Paper, the fierce battles in BOTH the men's and women's Big Sky Conf hoops conferences have been pretty fascinating.
...

Mathematically, The Griz can move up to tie for 2nd, but need a bit of help from more than 1 team. Would help a lot if MSU and WSU beat SUU. Griz would then have a tie breaker over SUU. ...

Thanks GrizzlyJournal. This has been even more fun than I expected. Even though Griz could not win the regular season, every game among the contenders (and some almost-contenders) suddenly took on new meaning in terms of the conference tournament.

As GrizBall pointed out earlier in another thread, the Griz men have the tiebreaker over EWU and PSU. Thus, we no longer have to worry about them for a bye. Still, because so many contenders still have to play each other, there are some fascinating possibilities for where the Griz end up in the seedings. Here’s what the final End Game looks like:

			Mar 1	Mar 3	Mar 5			
MSU (13-4)		SUU	SacSt	NoCol			
WSU (13-6)				SUU			
SUU (12-5)		MSU	ISU	WSU		
NoCol (12-6)			Griz	MSU
Griz (11-7)			NoCol	SacSt

If form holds (i.e., the “favorites” – per ratings – win out), the Griz would end in a (13-7) third-place tie with Southern Utah. The Griz would (I believe) win that tiebreaker, as noted above: Split on the games, but points were 152-148 for the Griz (close! ).

Unfortunately, while the Griz can tie for 2nd place – a loss to SUU would give WSU 7 losses – the Wildcats own that tiebreaker: Split on games, but points go 152-149 for them.

 

[IdaGriz01]

... Still, because so many contenders have to play each other, there are some fascinating possibilities for where the Griz end up in the seedings. Here’s what the final End Game looks like:

			Mar 1	Mar 3	Mar 5			
MSU (13-4)		SUU	SacSt	NoCol			
WSU (13-6)				SUU			
SUU (12-5)		MSU	ISU	WSU		
NoCol (12-6)			Griz	MSU
Griz (11-7)			NoCol	SacSt

... while the Griz can tie for 2nd place – a loss to SUU would give WSU 7 losses – the Wildcats own that tiebreaker: Split on games, but points go 152-149 for them.

Know it will be hard for many of you, but we probably should prefer a kitties win tonight to push Southern Utah further down. That would help the Griz try for a three seed.

 

[Mavman]

So your telling me I may have jumped the gun getting tickets for the early session on thursday?
Three seed would be great for this team.

 

[IdaGriz01]

So your telling me I may have jumped the gun getting tickets for the early session on thursday?
Three seed would be great for this team.

Step one accomplished. MSU winning handily over SUU with a bit over a minute to go. Must be nice ... "only" 27 fouls called in this game.

 

[ilovethecats]

So your telling me I may have jumped the gun getting tickets for the early session on thursday?
Three seed would be great for this team.

Step one accomplished. MSU winning handily over SUU with a bit over a minute to go. Must be nice ... "only" 27 fouls called in this game.

Certainly had a better flow than Sunday, but maybe that was just because there wasn't 50 charging calls made. :roll:

Tournament is shaping up to be a good one. 4-5 teams can legitimately win it. And because this stupid conference doesn't reward the regular season champs with homecourt in the tourney, any team just has to get hot. Looking forward to it.

 

[Griz til I die]

So your telling me I may have jumped the gun getting tickets for the early session on thursday?
Three seed would be great for this team.

Step one accomplished. MSU winning handily over SUU with a bit over a minute to go. Must be nice ... "only" 27 fouls called in this game.

So I believe the Griz can clinch the 3 seed with a sweep over UNC and SAC this week, and an SUU loss @ Weber (which is likely). In that scenario, we would be tied in the standings with SUU, but we would have the tiebreaker because we split with msu and the T-birds were swept by the cats. So not only do we need to support our guys this week, but we need to to cheer for Weber on Saturday. A weber win would give them the 2 seed and us the 3 seed as long as we can take care of business, and then I would like our matchup much better against Weber so Decuire can continue his ownage of Randy Rahe and Weber in the tournament. We'd likely have to play either Eastern or PSU in our first game though, and that scares me. Everything's still on the table so far. We'll see how it shakes out.

 

[IdaGriz01]

So I believe the Griz can clinch the 3 seed with a sweep over UNC and SAC this week, and an SUU loss @ Weber (which is likely). In that scenario, we would be tied in the standings with SUU, but we would have the tiebreaker because we split with msu and the T-birds were swept by the cats. So not only do we need to support our guys this week, but we need to to cheer for Weber on Saturday. A weber win would give them the 2 seed and us the 3 seed as long as we can take care of business, and then I would like our matchup much better against Weber so Decuire can continue his ownage of Randy Rahe and Weber in the tournament. We'd likely have to play either Eastern or PSU in our first game though, and that scares me. Everything's still on the table so far. We'll see how it shakes out.

Yep. Comes down to this for tomorrow and Saturday:

		Mar 3	Mar 5
MSU (14-4)	SacSt	NoCol			
WSU (13-6)		SUU			
SUU (12-6)	ISU	WSU		
NoCol (12-6)	Griz	MSU
Griz (11-7)	NoCol	SacSt

 

[AZGrizFan]

Oh to have the NAU, Idaho or ISU games back….No excuse to lose to those squads.

 

[IdaGriz01]

Oh to have the NAU, Idaho or ISU games back….No excuse to lose to those squads.

Yeah ... woulda, coulda, shoulda.

Look at the bright side. After those bad losses, the Griz are still going to get at least a five seed and a first-round bye.