SB Nation - Jermain Davis

Black Heart Gold Political Cartoons, Volume 1

Oops Pow Surprise — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 11:22:11 -0000

Todd Lickliter says "sometimes it's a little dark before the dawn." Perhaps that's not the most apt analogy.

Welcome To The Swift, Fiery, Horrific Destruction Of Iowa Basketball

Oops Pow Surprise — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:18:31 -0000

There's no way to sugarcoat this news or otherwise adequately prepare you for this news, so let's just get it right out: Jake Kelly is, barring a miracle, leaving the Iowa basketball team... and he's not alone.

(A perfect visual metaphor for what's happening in Iowa City.)

The majority of the Kelly rumors, which could be settled by as early as tomorrow (or today, or six months ago, depending on when you read this article), place him at Indiana State, much closer to his hometown of Carmel, IN. Sure, homesickness doesn't normally set in after two years, but recall that his mother had recently moved to Solon to be closer to Kelly. Just a few months later, she was killed in a plane crash, plunging the entire family into a sadness we couldn't possibly wish on the worst of our enemies. If Kelly wants to be closer to his family, we won't presume the authority to call bullshit or second-guess that decision.

DEPARTURE COUNT: 1

What's far, far more troubling is the exodus occurring with the rest of the program. To the best of our knowledge, Jermain Davis did not lose a mother in a plane crash recently, yet the junior college combo guard has decided that he'd rather exhaust his eligibility at Minnesota State, a D-II school in Mankato, than with the Iowa Hawkeyes.

(no, not these guys.)

Davis, if you'll recall, was an important role player in Iowa's backcourt during the early season; he was key in Iowa's beatdown of ISU, scoring 16 points and adding 6 boards and 5 assists.

But Lickliter thought him better for the bench, and decreased PT combined with an injury meant that those 16 points Davis scored against ISU matched his entire scoring output for the last nine games of the season.

Davis blamed the system.

"I was just unhappy here," Davis said Wednesday afternoon. "I didn’t really understand my role on the team."

[...]

"The style that we play is just so slow," Davis said. "I like to play more fast-paced, and force turnovers and stuff like that."

No word on how exciting Mankato is.

DEPARTURE COUNT: 2

Oh, we're not even close to done.

According to Dochtermann, Jeff Peterson is also gone daddy gone, his likely destination Missouri State. This is a mortal fucking lock for being an issue with Lickliter; Peterson was seemingly practically handed the starting point job coming into this season, and really has it for himself now with Kelly and Davis gone. Or had it, anyway.

We've written before that Peterson's bad tendencies boded ill for the Hawkeyes this season, but all the same, he was vastly improved over last season, especially from the field. Logic dictates that the rate of improvement would begin to decrease--he couldn't have put up .575 from the field, .917 from the line, and .525 from 3-point land next season, after all. But no matter your opinion of his performance, he's the kind of guy you keep around for the sake of experience, depth, and program continuity. Unless your name is Todd Lickliter, of course.

By the way, this completes Iowa's slide from "Every player who logged minutes at the point this season is coming back" to "They're dead; my God, they're all dead." Just worth pointing out, considering Lickliter's penchant for a guard-dominated offense.

DEPARTURE COUNT: 3

Remember Chanse Creekmur, last seen dunking on what was at least an 8'6" rim over a car?

Yeah, he's "exploring other options." Always good to see your top junior prospect get cold feet, right? RIGHT?!

DEPARTURE COUNT: 4

There's lotsundlotsen rumbling that this revolt started in part over the mistreatment of David Palmer and Lieutenant J.R. Angle by Lickliter (we're pretty sure the seeds of discontent were sown well before this season tipped off; more on that later). While Angle is finally graduating (after not seeing one single second of playing time on Senior Day; the Angle family thanks you, Lick!), El Presidente has another year of eligibility.

Palmer also graduates in May, according to Dochtermann, and unless there's a graduate program in Iowa that he's in love with and he's wanting another year with this program, Palmer'll be hitting the ol' dusty trail too. This is the only departure of the group that's stuck strictly in the realm of "conjecture" at this point, but after getting done so hard that multiple players are walking off the team in disgust, why would Palmer even consider coming back? That's so El Unpresidential.

DEPARTURE COUNT: 5

So... how was your Wednesday?

Iowa's Problem Is Their... Defense?

Oops Pow Surprise — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 14:00:12 -0000

The popular media narrative these days is that Iowa's tactic to staying in the close games is crushing defense. And that seems to make sense, given that the Hawkeyes give up fewer than 60 points a game, ranking third in the Big Ten.

One slight, nagging problem: their defense isn't nearly that good.

Courtesy of John Gasaway of Basketball Prospectus (né Big Ten Wonk, if the name's familiar), we have weekly updates on points scored per offensive and defensive possession, which is a far greater judge of scoring and defensive efficiency when adjusted for the pace of the game. If you're not familiar with this statistic, then there's probably a pit forming in your stomach as you read this, because you know exactly where we're headed.

                                     Opp.
                     Pace    PPP     PPP      EM
1.  Michigan St.     63.3    1.08    0.94   +0.14
2.  Purdue           63.6    1.01    0.92   +0.09
3.  Wisconsin        58.2    1.07    1.00   +0.07
4.  Illinois         60.5    0.99    0.93   +0.06
5.  Ohio St.         62.4    1.07    1.04   +0.03
6.  Minnesota        63.4    0.99    0.97   +0.02
7.  Michigan         61.0    0.99    1.02   -0.03
8.  Penn St.         60.8    0.98    1.02   -0.04
9.  Northwestern     60.9    1.01    1.09   -0.08
10. Iowa             57.4    0.99    1.08   -0.09
11. Indiana          64.4    0.92    1.10   -0.18

Uh, yeah. And that's strictly conference play, so this far into the season, there's not much room for trying to blame anything on schedule strength anymore.

So here's what to garner from that table:

1) Slowhawks are slooooooow. Only Washington State, coached by Tony Bennett (son of longtime Wisconsin coach and total shot clock vampire Dick Bennett), is a slower BCS conference team. We also suspect that you wouldn't find a slower team in the next 5 conferences, though we assure you we can't be bothered to check. So when you see scores like Purdue 49, Iowa 45, it's not (only) that the Hawkeyes played good defense; it's that each possession took forfuckingever. Sure, neither team broke 50. Neither would your team if they only managed 9 shots from the field.

2) Iowa's offense? Not that bad, all things considered. Iowa is tied for 6th in the conference in offensive efficiency and within scratching distance of 4th place. When you keep in mind the prodigious rate at which the Hawkeyes turn the ball over, their ability to score points at even a middling pace is remarkable.

Now, sure, as near as two weeks ago, even a .01 depression meant Iowa was 2nd worst in the conference and led Gasaway to remark that "Indiana is suddenly within honest-to-goodness striking distance of not being the worst team in the Big Ten," but Iowa was still in the same conversation as plenty of their peers in terms of offensive production. This makes sense; Iowa's problem has (almost) never been shooting the ball, it's getting to the point of an open look that has hounded the good guys all year long.

3) But, um, that defense. Unlike the offense, which meandered around the middle and lower thirds/quadrants/however you draw these types of distinctions with 11 teams but still stayed close to the norm, the defense has been abused all season long. It's a narrative that won't get much light as long as Iowa's final scores resemble random NBA halftime scores, but it's true: Iowa's defense is, as efficiency is concerned, firmly entrenched in the worst 3 of the conference. Their bedfellows, Northwestern and Indiana, are also (not coincidentally) the other two members of the Big Ten basement.

That's not to say the Hawkeyes are particularly unskilled defenders, surprisingly. They appear to be well-drilled for the most part, and the tandem of Jarryd Cole and Aaron Fuller are particularly adept at drawing charges of questionable merit.

So where does the discrepancy come from?

Part of the problem is those prodigious turnovers. While the Hawkeyes have managed to not let them drive their offensive efficiency numbers into Indiana territory, it's hard to do the same for the defense when every fourth or fifth possession ends up in the opponent's hands, often for an easy layup. And while Iowa's defense is very good, it's rarely good enough to make up for the other half of the game.

4) This is not necessarily a coaching problem. Though we feel at times that Lickliter's offense has a distinctly KOKish odor, especially when the shot clock's running down and they're trying a disastrously ineffective high ball screen with Palmer or Cole for the fifth time in the possession ("they'll never see this coming!!"), the problems are, as we've mentioned before, largely personnel-based. Jeff Peterson, even when healthy, has clearly needed a lot of help at point this year--even as every scoring metric has exploded for the better, his turnovers have actually increased--Davis and Tucker were not serious answers to that question (would Freeman have been that answer? Honestly, we don't know).

Further, on the defensive end, Iowa has struggled mightily without Cyrus Tate. There was a recent local article (and I'm killing myself for not remembering to bookmark it, because now I can't track it down via the googles) that cited the coaches as saying Tate was Iowa's smartest defender. Yes, Healthy Tate is largely the stuff of myth as this season goes anymore, which fucking sucks, but just keep that in mind when you're thinking about how totally disastrous Tate's high sprained ankle was.

5) All things considered, there is considerable improvement. To go from the 2nd worst team in a weeeak conference to the 2nd/3rd worst (depending on how this game goes) team in the second toughest conference, is a positive trajectory. That's to say nothing of a 4 or 5 game improvement in the season standings, all while playing an incredible number of first- and second-year players and suffering the most calamitous talent loss in the entire conference over the course of the season (players missing or severely limited vs. Michigan: Peterson, Davis, Tucker, Tate--only 3 starters and a key backup to two of those guys, is all).For '09-'10, I'm most interested in Tucker's healthy return and Matt Gatens. Yes, the last few freshmen to play as well as Gatens (Jess Settles, Ricky Davis, and Jeff Horner) had bad patterns of improvement. However, they were all victims of outlying circumstances that seem unlikely to befall Gatens; we don't expect Gatens to suffer a bad back for his career, leave after his freshman season for the NBA, or be coached by [NAME REDACTED] for four years. Gatens should be good.

We should expect even more improvement from the Hawkeyes in '09-'10; a 19-12 record sounds about right, especially if Lickliter can land some help at the point. Most importantly--should 19-12 or something similar happen--the fretting, like the disturbing statistical inequity mentioned above, should finally abate.

The Problem(s) With Iowa Basketball

Oops Pow Surprise — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:40:51 -0000

Though we haven't spent much editorial space on the Hawkeyes' basketball team (largely because their games have been scheduled for Friday nights, Sunday mornings, and the curious "as soon as you fall asleep"), we're still watching, thinking, fact-gathering. And though the team is undoubtedly improved--even with a 1-3 conference mark, they're 11-6, and they didn't get their 11th win until February 2nd last season--that 1-3 record isn't quite where fans would like to see the Hawkeyes.

The animus has reached such a fever pitch, in fact, that the basketball forum on our favorite Hawkeye message board (no, not that one; not that one either) has become a functionally unreadable cacophony of "FUCK THE SYSTEM" and "LICKLITER WOULD RATHER PLAY HIS SYSTEM THAN WIN" and "SPEED IT UP YOU COCKMASTER." Setting aside the nonsense, like the notion that there's a coach anywhere that doesn't want to win, there are three glaring faults with the Iowa basketball team (the first feeding the last two), and while Lickliter isn't absolved of blame, they're all matters of personnel.

1) This team is still incredibly young. Here are the players who have been in the Iowa program for at least three years:

F Cyrus Tate (SR)
F J.R. Angle (SR)

Basically one legitimate, clear-cut starter, and then DanJRous. There's your long-standing, institutional knowledge.

And the list of players in their second year:

G Jeff Peterson (SO)
G Jake Kelly (SO)
F Jarryd Cole (SO)
F David Palmer (JR)

This list is even more depressing, because it goes (in order): a 2-star prospect who should have redshirted last season and who wouldn't start on most teams this year; another kid who maybe should have redshirted (but played well) and may have regressed from last year (though we can kinda understand why); an undersized forward whose PT has been cut in half in the aftermath of a major knee injury, and that guy from 24.

That's it. The rest are first-year players, and it's looking increasingly like the foundation of the program will be built on the first year guys instead of the sophomore class. It's one thing to have a young team; it's even worse when the weaknesses are largely contained to the more experienced players. Indictment of Lickliter? Maybe, but what is any coach going to do with, let's say, Cole or Peterson? They're not BXI-level players yet.

2) Cyrus Tate and Anthony Tucker are out. With Tate in the game, Iowa at least has a shot at establishing a semblance of an inside game, whether it be through scoring, rebounding, or defending the opponents' #1 big man. But when Tate went down yelping during the Minnesota game, all hell broke loose, and what was a suffocating dominance of the Gophers turned into, well, justifiable cause to suffocate yourself.

Obviously, It really didn't help when Jake Kelly, holding the ball with about 4 seconds to play and a chance to tie the game with a 3, instead hoisted a half-court shot that mysteriously failed. But Minnesota got back into the game by dominating the boards and jumping passing lanes while Iowa fruitlessly tossed the basketball back and forth around the perimeter, utterly devoid of an inside threat on offense.

Tate may or may not be back for the Hawks' next game against Purdue; God help us if he's not and his minutes go to Cole (who's basically Hot Rod Thompson with two more inches and one fewer knee) and Dr. Disaster, Andrew Brommer. Brommer may well one day be a serviceable big man in the league, maybe even by a year from now, but Good Jesus, the last Hawkeye I can remember getting major minutes while being so terrifyingly unsuited to be on the court was, like, Alex Thompson. So the question is, can Tate go from wearing a walking boot on Sunday to playing one week later? And speaking of questions, why in the hell is Iowa playing another Sunday morning game?! Is this enough to get Barta fired?

And then there's Anthony Tucker.

The Frozen Caveman Shooter is still on the bench, now recovering from mononucleosis, a particularly insidious disease for a basketball player. High-level guard play is usually based on shooting ability, usually based on ball-handling, and usually based on knowledge of the offense. It is ALWAYS, however, based on conditioning, which suffers in a bad, bad way with a case of mono. At this point, it's probably gravy if Tucker sees more than 5 minutes a game before March rolls around.

That's a shame, because as anyone who watched him play before the retardations set in knows, he has a gorgeous release on his jumper (that sounded Kincheny) and it was no accident that he was leading the team in scoring. There's a lot to be said for confidence in a shooter, and there isn't an ounce of panic in Tucker's game. Sure, Bawinkel's fine in replacement, but he's clearly not as good, especially with the ball in his hands. Tucker is a much more natural player overall, and like Tate, Iowa needs him back.

3) The team is sorely lacking at the point. One of the hallmarks of a good perimeter-oriented team is the ability to effectively distribute the ball, usually via the point guard. While we don't doubt Matt Gatens' basketball acumen, he's definitely not the kind of ball-handler (lol) you want bringing the ball up against a press, or trying to shake a good defender 1-on-1. He's not that athletic.

So while Gatens is probably your highest basketball-IQ guy, the point responsibilities go to Jeff Peterson, who as we discussed before, is not very good yet. Jermain Davis has also seen some time bringing the ball up the court, but he's definitely not a natural 1-spot and is at his most effective on the wing.

Peterson, to be sure, has shown some improvement; his shooting totals are way, way up across the board, and his steals have vastly improved as well. Of course, that's with 15 fewer BXI games than last year, but hush, folks, details. The one area where Peterson hasn't improved is turnovers; those remain at 3.1 per game, same as last year, and likely to rise now that there's no more superdirectionals or "Bryant" on the schedule. And having a point guard who can't effectively and smartly distribute the ball or at least set it in motion to eventually hit the open man on the wing is basically a guarantee of not making the tournament.

The one seriously glaring problem with this point guard situation is, um, Lickliter gave away a returning senior starter at that very position. Yes, Tony Freeman drove Lick insane, but it's not like World B. Freeman was the only thing keeping that team from sustained success. They were just plain bad, and without depth at the point (seriously, you couldn't tell Palmer or Lieutenant Angle that they "didn't fit into your vision for the team" instead?), this team might be just as bad when the dust settles on the conference standings in March.

Look, we're not saying "Iowa + Freeman = 17-0 in 08-09!!!", but this is a team that could desperately use his athleticism (especially now that he's not coming off a squeaky wheel) and his ability to hit contested shots. We understand that the Iowa offense is predicated on ball movement and getting guys open shots, and really, to that specific end, it hasn't been ineffective (check out that PPS). The problem is what happens when there's 5 seconds left on the shot clock, the man with the ball is covered, and there's no readily apparent 3-pass progression to get the ball to a wide-open shooter (or even if the guys are in place, defenders are laying back and praying for a pass through their lane). Freeman had a rather uncanny ability to get a good shot off under pressure, moreso than what most of the guys on this current iteration of Iowa Basketball have.

At the very least, keeping Freeman would have given Lickliter an opportunity to show potential recruits that he allows point guards to excel and put up stats in his system. Considering Lickliter's alternative course of action and the landscape of incoming commits, we're a little less than optimistic that this offense is fewer than 2-3 years away from really clicking. Hope Lickliter's got a Plan B, and soon.