SWC75
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I’ll continue doing a statistical analysis of games this year with some of the off-beat numbers I like to look at. I’ll post them after each game, probably the next day.
The first thing I’ll look at is “NET POINTS”. The idea is that each statistic in the box score is arguably worth a point, (that is, somewhere between 0.5 and 1.5 points). A point is a point. Teams score an average of a point per possession so anything that gets you possession is a point. A missed shot will more often than not wind up in the possession of the other team. Most baskets are for two points so if the passer who set up the shot is given half credit, that’s worth a point. One half of the blocked shots will likely have gone in and they are almost always two pointers, so that’s a point. If you add up the “positives”, (points, + rebounds + assists + steals + blocks) and subtract the “negatives”, (missed field goals, missed free throws, turnovers and fouls), you have a number that summarizes a player’s statistical contributions to a game. Then, by averaging the net points per 40 minutes of play, you factor out differences in playing time and have a look at the player’s rate of production. Both are important. The game is won based on what you actually did, not the rate at which you did it. But the rate is a better measure of the skills you can bring to the game.
Of course, there are things players do both on and off the court that contribute to victory. Leadership, hard work, keeping the team loose, scrambling for loose balls, (that could be a statistic: when neither team is in control of the ball, who winds up with it?), sneaker-sneaker defense, keeping the ball moving on offense, etc. etc. My experience is that with rare exceptions, the players who are the most statistically productive are the ones who grade highest in the things not measured by statistics, as well.
Here are the NET POINTS of our scholarship player in the most recent game and their averages per 40 minutes of play for the season, (exhibitions games not included):
Rakeem Christmas 19NP in 40 minutes season: 438NP in 735 minutes per 40: 23.8
Michael Gbinije….. 17NP in 40 minutes season: 216NP in 702 minutes per 40: 12.3
Tyler Roberson……. 11NP in 33 minutes season: 193NP in 524 minutes per 40: 14.7
Ron Patterson…….. 10NP in 23 minutes season: 25NP in 274 minutes per 40: 3.6
Trevor Cooney…… 9NP in 40 minutes season: 215NP in 824 minutes per 40: 10.4
Kaleb Joseph……….. 5NP in 17 minutes season: 131NP in 648 minutes per 40: 8.1
B. J. Johnson……….. 2NP in 7 minutes season: 56NP in 217 minutes per 40: 10.3
DNP-CD- none
Chinoso Obokoh….. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 16NP in 59 minutes per 40: 10.8
INJURED
DaJuan Coleman…. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 0NP in 0 minutes per 40: 0.0
Chris McCullough.. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 171NP in 450 minutes per 40: 15.2
SUSPENDED
None
Comment: Ron Patterson actually had a good game statistically. He only attempted 2 three pointers. Of course, he didn’t get make them.
Rakeem Christmas has led in net points 12 times, Chris McCullough 4 times, Mike Gbinije and Tyler Roberson 3 times, Trevor Cooney and BJ Johnson once.
POSSESSION
Before you can score you’ve got to get the rock. Syracuse had 11 offensive and 29 defensive rebounds. They had 9 offensive and 31 defensive rebounds. When we missed we got the ball 11 of 42 times, (26.2%). When they missed, they got the ball 9 of 38 times (23.7). We’ve won the rebounding battle by this measure 15 times in 22 games. For the year we’ve averaged getting 34.9% of our misses and our opposition has gotten 30.5% of theirs.
Effective offensive rebounding: Neither team did much offensive rebounding or did much with the ball once they got it. We got 9 second chance points off our 11 offensive rebounds, 0.818 points per rebound. They got 5 for their 9, 0.556. For the year we’ve averaged 1.02 points per offensive rebound: they’ve averaged 0.88. We’ve led in this stat 13 times in 22 games. In our ACC wins, the opposition has 46 second chance points from 70 offensive rebounds, (0.66). In our ACC losses they’ve gotten 50 second chance points from 31 offensive rebounds (1.61). We’ve been about the same: 65/71 (0.92) in wins and 32/32 (1.00) in losses.
Of our 12 turnovers, 4 were their steals and 8 were our own miscues. Of their 16 turnovers, 12 were Syracuse steals and 4 were their fault. We’ve had fewer turnovers in 16 of 22 games with one even and fewer unforced turnovers in 10 games with 4 even. Last year we had fewer turnovers in 29 of 34 games with 2 even. We are averaging 12 turnovers, 6 unforced, Our opposition is averaging 15/6.
If you add our 40 rebounds to their 16 turnovers, we had 56 “manufactured possessions”. They had 40 + 12= 52, so we were +4. We have won that battle 16 of 22 times with one even. For the season we’ve averaged 53 to 47 (+6).
SHOOTING
It’s still what the game is all about. It’s what this game was all about, for sure. We were 22 for 40, (.550) inside the arc, 4 for 21, (.190) outside it and 16 for 29, (.552) from the line. They were 18 for 46 (.391), 9/18 (.500) and 7/8 (.875). We’ve led in two point field goal percentage in 13 of 22 games, and in free throw percentage in 10 games (but only 4 times in the last 15). We’ve led in three point field goals percentage, believe it or not, in 13 games Our opposition hasn’t been exactly filling it up, either- until now. Since the Wake Forest game, they are 55 for 137 (.401). For the season we are .485/.309/.650. Our opposition is .436/.313/.699.
We had 42 points in the paint, 22 off turnovers, 9 “second chance” points, 16 fast break points and 10 from the bench. Our opposition had 32 points in the paint, 13 off turnovers, 5 “second chance” points, 4 fast break points and 46 from the bench. We also had 36 of Pat’s “first chance points” (Total points minus second chance points, fast break points and made free throws) to 54. The 16 fast break points were our most since the conference season began.
We’ve led in PIP 14 times, POTO 15 times, FCP 13 times SCP 13 times, FBP 16 times with 3 ties and BP 9 times, with a tie. For the season we are averaging 32-24 PIP, 16-11 POTO, 33-30 FCP, 12-11 SCP,9-6 FBP and 10-15 BP.
We had 72 points, 42 in the paint, 12 from the arc and 16 from the line so we had 14 ”POP”, (points outside the paint: 72-42-16) and scored 2 points, (14 POP-12 from the arc), from what I’ll call the “Twilight Zone”: that area between the paint and the arc that is the land of the pull-up jump shot, a lost art but a great weapon. They had 70/32/27/7= 31 POP with 4 from the Twilight Zone. We’ve only led in POP 9 times but we’ve led in TZ points 14 times in 22 games. For the year we are averaging 24 POP and 9 TZ, our opposition 26/7. The game is so much easier when you don’t have to go to the basket for all your points.
15 of our 26 baskets were assisted (.577) and also 19 of their 27 (.704). For the year we are assisting on 63.3% of our baskets to 65.3% for the opposition, who have had a higher percentage in 8 of 20 games, with one tie. Assists tend to come more often from jump shots than lay-ups or dunks so the more assists you get, the more you are settling for jump shots to try to win the game which is often a bad strategy. I think it’s interesting that we have a high assist percentage with our “point guard by committee” situation. The team is at least sharing the ball well.
You compute “Offensive Efficiency” by taking field goal attempts – offensive rebounds + turnovers plus 47.5% of free throws attempted and dividing that into the number of points. We were 61 FGA - 11 OREBs + 12TOs + (.475 x 29) = 75.775 possessions. They were 64 -9+ 12+ (.475 x 8) = 70.8 possessions. Since possessions shouldn’t be more than one off, I’ll count that as 74 possessions in which we scored 72 points, (0.973) and 73 possessions in which they scored 70 points, (0.959). We have, of course, led 15 of 22 games in offensive efficiency since the winning team always leads in that stat. For the year we are averaging 1.019 points per possession to 0.914 for the opposition.
We were actually more efficient against Virginia Tech, Florida State, Wake Forest and Boston College. The 83 points we scored were about pace. We had 147 combined possessions in this game. We’ve averaged 134 possessions this year. We averaged 122 last year, so the pace appears to be better than it was last season.
Hubert Davis once told us to “Get an offensive dude”. I decided to name an “Offensive Dude Of the Game, or an O-Dog, and use the hockey concept of points + assists. In this game Michael Gbinije was scored 18 points with 7 assists for 25 “hockey” points and thus was our ODOG. Rakeem Christmas has been the O-Dog 9 times, Trevor Cooney 6 times, Michael Gbinije 5 times, BJ Johnson, Kaleb Joseph and Chris McCullough once each.
Every other level of basketball plays quarters. To check the consistency of our performance, I look at what the score was at the 10 minute mark of each half to see what the quarterly scores would be. At a minimum, I think we want to score at least 15 points in each quarter and try to hold the opposition to less than that. The quarterly breakdown for this game 10-12, 24-18, 16-26, 22-14. For the season we have an average of 16-13, 17-14, 16-16, 19-18. We’ve won 52 of 88 quarters with 3 even. We’ve scored 15 or more in 56 quarters and held the opposition under that 45 times.
I also like to keep track who sits us down in each half. Besides being fun it gives an indication of who Coach B likes to design plays for since opening possessions are more likely to be scripted. Trevor Cooney sat us down in the first half with a jumper at 19:50 while Rakeem Christmas did the same at 18:04 of the second half. The longest we’d had to wait this year (5:02) was the first half against Miami. The average time we’ve had to wait is 1 minute 27 seconds. Rakeem Christmas has sat us down 15 times, Trevor Cooney 8 times, Michael Gbinije 7 times, Kaleb Joseph and Chris McCullough 5 times and Tyler Roberson 4 times.
Another fun fact is the “Taco Bell MVP”: the guy who gets us to 75 points so people can free, (or is it discounted?) tacos at Taco Bell. No tacos in this game, (although with some decent fouil shooting, we’d be munching on them now,(unless we could find something better). Michael Gbinije has now got us TACOs, (figuratively) twice. Rakeem Christmas, Trevor Cooney, BJ Johnson and Ron Patterson have each got us Tacos once. (I wonder how many point we have to score to get real meat in the tacos?) The longest we’ve had to wait after getting close to 75 points is 3:31.
FOULS
My theory about fouls is that the team that attempts the most two point shots will tend to get fouled the most. If the numbers are as predicted or close, there’s nothing to be read into them but if there’s a big disparity, it makes you wonder about how the game was called.
In this game, we attempted 40 two point shots to 46, scored 42 points in the paint to 32 and got fouled 25 times to 13, attempting 25 foul shots to 8. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled was 1.6 for us and 3.5 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled was 1.7 for us to 2.5 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team was 1.2 for us and 0.6 for them. I thought there were plenty of fouls by Virginia Tech that could have been called but weren’t. Never the elss, if the refs had called as many fouls on us as they did on them, we’d have had no chance to win this one.
Last year we attempted 1368 two point shots to 993 for the opposition and scored 1028 PIP to 753. We committed 546 fouls to 598 and went to the line 720 to 607 times, suggesting that there should be a relationship between two points attempts and points in the point and how many fouls are called on the other team and how many times you got to the line. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled was 2.3 for us and 1.8 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled was 1.7 for us to 1.4 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team was 1.2 for us and 1.1 for them.
This year we have taken 928 two point shots and scored 708 points in the paint. We’ve been fouled 398 times and taken 456 free throws. Our opposition has taken 759 two point shots and scored 528 points in the paint. They’ve been fouled 335 times and taken only 370 free throws. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled has been 2.3 for us and 2.3 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled has been 1.8 for us to 1.6 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team has been 1.1 for us and 1.1 for them. So the officiating overall has been pretty even-handed.
“MY MAN”
A reporter once asked Casey Stengel how come he won so many games with the Yankees. He said “Because I never play a game without “my man”. The reporter wondered who his man was. Casey suggested “You could look it up.” The reporter did look it up and found that Yogi Berra had played in every game that season at some positon: catcher, left field, pinch-hitting, something. He was the player Stengel had the highest regard for and the most trust in, so he didn’t want to do without him.
Who is Jim Boeheim’s “man” this season? The only way to tell is to see who plays the most minutes each game. In this game, the “Big Three”, Rakeem Christmas, Trevor Cooney and Michael Gbinije played all 40 minutes. We’ve had at least one player play the full game in each of the last 11 games and a a total of 21 players have done so in that span. Trevor Cooney has been the “Man” 14 times, Michael Gbinije and Rakeem Christmas 7 times each , Chris McCullough and Kaleb Joseph 4 times each and Tyler Roberson once. . Cooney still leads the team in minutes played with 824, 89 more than any other player. Encouragingly, the guy in second place is Rakeem Christmas, who earlier had a problem staying in games because of excessive fouling.
The first thing I’ll look at is “NET POINTS”. The idea is that each statistic in the box score is arguably worth a point, (that is, somewhere between 0.5 and 1.5 points). A point is a point. Teams score an average of a point per possession so anything that gets you possession is a point. A missed shot will more often than not wind up in the possession of the other team. Most baskets are for two points so if the passer who set up the shot is given half credit, that’s worth a point. One half of the blocked shots will likely have gone in and they are almost always two pointers, so that’s a point. If you add up the “positives”, (points, + rebounds + assists + steals + blocks) and subtract the “negatives”, (missed field goals, missed free throws, turnovers and fouls), you have a number that summarizes a player’s statistical contributions to a game. Then, by averaging the net points per 40 minutes of play, you factor out differences in playing time and have a look at the player’s rate of production. Both are important. The game is won based on what you actually did, not the rate at which you did it. But the rate is a better measure of the skills you can bring to the game.
Of course, there are things players do both on and off the court that contribute to victory. Leadership, hard work, keeping the team loose, scrambling for loose balls, (that could be a statistic: when neither team is in control of the ball, who winds up with it?), sneaker-sneaker defense, keeping the ball moving on offense, etc. etc. My experience is that with rare exceptions, the players who are the most statistically productive are the ones who grade highest in the things not measured by statistics, as well.
Here are the NET POINTS of our scholarship player in the most recent game and their averages per 40 minutes of play for the season, (exhibitions games not included):
Rakeem Christmas 19NP in 40 minutes season: 438NP in 735 minutes per 40: 23.8
Michael Gbinije….. 17NP in 40 minutes season: 216NP in 702 minutes per 40: 12.3
Tyler Roberson……. 11NP in 33 minutes season: 193NP in 524 minutes per 40: 14.7
Ron Patterson…….. 10NP in 23 minutes season: 25NP in 274 minutes per 40: 3.6
Trevor Cooney…… 9NP in 40 minutes season: 215NP in 824 minutes per 40: 10.4
Kaleb Joseph……….. 5NP in 17 minutes season: 131NP in 648 minutes per 40: 8.1
B. J. Johnson……….. 2NP in 7 minutes season: 56NP in 217 minutes per 40: 10.3
DNP-CD- none
Chinoso Obokoh….. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 16NP in 59 minutes per 40: 10.8
INJURED
DaJuan Coleman…. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 0NP in 0 minutes per 40: 0.0
Chris McCullough.. 0NP in 0 minutes season: 171NP in 450 minutes per 40: 15.2
SUSPENDED
None
Comment: Ron Patterson actually had a good game statistically. He only attempted 2 three pointers. Of course, he didn’t get make them.
Rakeem Christmas has led in net points 12 times, Chris McCullough 4 times, Mike Gbinije and Tyler Roberson 3 times, Trevor Cooney and BJ Johnson once.
POSSESSION
Before you can score you’ve got to get the rock. Syracuse had 11 offensive and 29 defensive rebounds. They had 9 offensive and 31 defensive rebounds. When we missed we got the ball 11 of 42 times, (26.2%). When they missed, they got the ball 9 of 38 times (23.7). We’ve won the rebounding battle by this measure 15 times in 22 games. For the year we’ve averaged getting 34.9% of our misses and our opposition has gotten 30.5% of theirs.
Effective offensive rebounding: Neither team did much offensive rebounding or did much with the ball once they got it. We got 9 second chance points off our 11 offensive rebounds, 0.818 points per rebound. They got 5 for their 9, 0.556. For the year we’ve averaged 1.02 points per offensive rebound: they’ve averaged 0.88. We’ve led in this stat 13 times in 22 games. In our ACC wins, the opposition has 46 second chance points from 70 offensive rebounds, (0.66). In our ACC losses they’ve gotten 50 second chance points from 31 offensive rebounds (1.61). We’ve been about the same: 65/71 (0.92) in wins and 32/32 (1.00) in losses.
Of our 12 turnovers, 4 were their steals and 8 were our own miscues. Of their 16 turnovers, 12 were Syracuse steals and 4 were their fault. We’ve had fewer turnovers in 16 of 22 games with one even and fewer unforced turnovers in 10 games with 4 even. Last year we had fewer turnovers in 29 of 34 games with 2 even. We are averaging 12 turnovers, 6 unforced, Our opposition is averaging 15/6.
If you add our 40 rebounds to their 16 turnovers, we had 56 “manufactured possessions”. They had 40 + 12= 52, so we were +4. We have won that battle 16 of 22 times with one even. For the season we’ve averaged 53 to 47 (+6).
SHOOTING
It’s still what the game is all about. It’s what this game was all about, for sure. We were 22 for 40, (.550) inside the arc, 4 for 21, (.190) outside it and 16 for 29, (.552) from the line. They were 18 for 46 (.391), 9/18 (.500) and 7/8 (.875). We’ve led in two point field goal percentage in 13 of 22 games, and in free throw percentage in 10 games (but only 4 times in the last 15). We’ve led in three point field goals percentage, believe it or not, in 13 games Our opposition hasn’t been exactly filling it up, either- until now. Since the Wake Forest game, they are 55 for 137 (.401). For the season we are .485/.309/.650. Our opposition is .436/.313/.699.
We had 42 points in the paint, 22 off turnovers, 9 “second chance” points, 16 fast break points and 10 from the bench. Our opposition had 32 points in the paint, 13 off turnovers, 5 “second chance” points, 4 fast break points and 46 from the bench. We also had 36 of Pat’s “first chance points” (Total points minus second chance points, fast break points and made free throws) to 54. The 16 fast break points were our most since the conference season began.
We’ve led in PIP 14 times, POTO 15 times, FCP 13 times SCP 13 times, FBP 16 times with 3 ties and BP 9 times, with a tie. For the season we are averaging 32-24 PIP, 16-11 POTO, 33-30 FCP, 12-11 SCP,9-6 FBP and 10-15 BP.
We had 72 points, 42 in the paint, 12 from the arc and 16 from the line so we had 14 ”POP”, (points outside the paint: 72-42-16) and scored 2 points, (14 POP-12 from the arc), from what I’ll call the “Twilight Zone”: that area between the paint and the arc that is the land of the pull-up jump shot, a lost art but a great weapon. They had 70/32/27/7= 31 POP with 4 from the Twilight Zone. We’ve only led in POP 9 times but we’ve led in TZ points 14 times in 22 games. For the year we are averaging 24 POP and 9 TZ, our opposition 26/7. The game is so much easier when you don’t have to go to the basket for all your points.
15 of our 26 baskets were assisted (.577) and also 19 of their 27 (.704). For the year we are assisting on 63.3% of our baskets to 65.3% for the opposition, who have had a higher percentage in 8 of 20 games, with one tie. Assists tend to come more often from jump shots than lay-ups or dunks so the more assists you get, the more you are settling for jump shots to try to win the game which is often a bad strategy. I think it’s interesting that we have a high assist percentage with our “point guard by committee” situation. The team is at least sharing the ball well.
You compute “Offensive Efficiency” by taking field goal attempts – offensive rebounds + turnovers plus 47.5% of free throws attempted and dividing that into the number of points. We were 61 FGA - 11 OREBs + 12TOs + (.475 x 29) = 75.775 possessions. They were 64 -9+ 12+ (.475 x 8) = 70.8 possessions. Since possessions shouldn’t be more than one off, I’ll count that as 74 possessions in which we scored 72 points, (0.973) and 73 possessions in which they scored 70 points, (0.959). We have, of course, led 15 of 22 games in offensive efficiency since the winning team always leads in that stat. For the year we are averaging 1.019 points per possession to 0.914 for the opposition.
We were actually more efficient against Virginia Tech, Florida State, Wake Forest and Boston College. The 83 points we scored were about pace. We had 147 combined possessions in this game. We’ve averaged 134 possessions this year. We averaged 122 last year, so the pace appears to be better than it was last season.
Hubert Davis once told us to “Get an offensive dude”. I decided to name an “Offensive Dude Of the Game, or an O-Dog, and use the hockey concept of points + assists. In this game Michael Gbinije was scored 18 points with 7 assists for 25 “hockey” points and thus was our ODOG. Rakeem Christmas has been the O-Dog 9 times, Trevor Cooney 6 times, Michael Gbinije 5 times, BJ Johnson, Kaleb Joseph and Chris McCullough once each.
Every other level of basketball plays quarters. To check the consistency of our performance, I look at what the score was at the 10 minute mark of each half to see what the quarterly scores would be. At a minimum, I think we want to score at least 15 points in each quarter and try to hold the opposition to less than that. The quarterly breakdown for this game 10-12, 24-18, 16-26, 22-14. For the season we have an average of 16-13, 17-14, 16-16, 19-18. We’ve won 52 of 88 quarters with 3 even. We’ve scored 15 or more in 56 quarters and held the opposition under that 45 times.
I also like to keep track who sits us down in each half. Besides being fun it gives an indication of who Coach B likes to design plays for since opening possessions are more likely to be scripted. Trevor Cooney sat us down in the first half with a jumper at 19:50 while Rakeem Christmas did the same at 18:04 of the second half. The longest we’d had to wait this year (5:02) was the first half against Miami. The average time we’ve had to wait is 1 minute 27 seconds. Rakeem Christmas has sat us down 15 times, Trevor Cooney 8 times, Michael Gbinije 7 times, Kaleb Joseph and Chris McCullough 5 times and Tyler Roberson 4 times.
Another fun fact is the “Taco Bell MVP”: the guy who gets us to 75 points so people can free, (or is it discounted?) tacos at Taco Bell. No tacos in this game, (although with some decent fouil shooting, we’d be munching on them now,(unless we could find something better). Michael Gbinije has now got us TACOs, (figuratively) twice. Rakeem Christmas, Trevor Cooney, BJ Johnson and Ron Patterson have each got us Tacos once. (I wonder how many point we have to score to get real meat in the tacos?) The longest we’ve had to wait after getting close to 75 points is 3:31.
FOULS
My theory about fouls is that the team that attempts the most two point shots will tend to get fouled the most. If the numbers are as predicted or close, there’s nothing to be read into them but if there’s a big disparity, it makes you wonder about how the game was called.
In this game, we attempted 40 two point shots to 46, scored 42 points in the paint to 32 and got fouled 25 times to 13, attempting 25 foul shots to 8. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled was 1.6 for us and 3.5 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled was 1.7 for us to 2.5 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team was 1.2 for us and 0.6 for them. I thought there were plenty of fouls by Virginia Tech that could have been called but weren’t. Never the elss, if the refs had called as many fouls on us as they did on them, we’d have had no chance to win this one.
Last year we attempted 1368 two point shots to 993 for the opposition and scored 1028 PIP to 753. We committed 546 fouls to 598 and went to the line 720 to 607 times, suggesting that there should be a relationship between two points attempts and points in the point and how many fouls are called on the other team and how many times you got to the line. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled was 2.3 for us and 1.8 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled was 1.7 for us to 1.4 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team was 1.2 for us and 1.1 for them.
This year we have taken 928 two point shots and scored 708 points in the paint. We’ve been fouled 398 times and taken 456 free throws. Our opposition has taken 759 two point shots and scored 528 points in the paint. They’ve been fouled 335 times and taken only 370 free throws. The ratio of two point attempts to times fouled has been 2.3 for us and 2.3 for them. The ratio of points in the paint to times fouled has been 1.8 for us to 1.6 for them. The ratio of free throw attempts to fouls called on the other team has been 1.1 for us and 1.1 for them. So the officiating overall has been pretty even-handed.
“MY MAN”
A reporter once asked Casey Stengel how come he won so many games with the Yankees. He said “Because I never play a game without “my man”. The reporter wondered who his man was. Casey suggested “You could look it up.” The reporter did look it up and found that Yogi Berra had played in every game that season at some positon: catcher, left field, pinch-hitting, something. He was the player Stengel had the highest regard for and the most trust in, so he didn’t want to do without him.
Who is Jim Boeheim’s “man” this season? The only way to tell is to see who plays the most minutes each game. In this game, the “Big Three”, Rakeem Christmas, Trevor Cooney and Michael Gbinije played all 40 minutes. We’ve had at least one player play the full game in each of the last 11 games and a a total of 21 players have done so in that span. Trevor Cooney has been the “Man” 14 times, Michael Gbinije and Rakeem Christmas 7 times each , Chris McCullough and Kaleb Joseph 4 times each and Tyler Roberson once. . Cooney still leads the team in minutes played with 824, 89 more than any other player. Encouragingly, the guy in second place is Rakeem Christmas, who earlier had a problem staying in games because of excessive fouling.