Mizzou 81, Vanderbilt 59: Study Hall

Your Trifecta: Oriakhi-Brown-Pressey. Your winners: Trobone and stlcardinalsfang. And a bunch of others came pretty close.

With 15:27 remaining in the first half, Vanderbilt led, 11-8.

With 2:40 remaining in the first half, Mizzou led, 46-15.

The full-game numbers below certainly tell us something, but when the first half is as ridiculous as this one was, the full-game numbers only mean so much. If we wanted to nitpick, we could point out that Mizzou completely fell asleep after halftime (Vandy went on a 16-3 run in the first 4:37 of the second half), and that eight turnovers from Jabari Brown and Keion Bell aren't going to cut it. But come on. In a nearly 13-minute span in the first half, Mizzou outscored Vandy by a 38-4 margin. It was incredible to watch even if the rest of the game was forgettable.

Mizzou 81, Vanderbilt 59

College Basketball Stats

	Mizzou	VU
Pace (No. of Possessions)	61.7
Points Per Possession (PPP)	1.31	0.96
Points Per Shot (PPS)	1.59	1.09
2-PT FG%	56.7%	53.3%
3-PT FG%	52.4%	33.3%
FT%	87.5%	30.0%
True Shooting %	69.8%	50.%
	Mizzou	VU
Assists	15	13
Steals	6	7
Turnovers	14	10
Ball Control Index (BCI) (Assists + Steals) / TO	1.50	2.00
	Mizzou	VU
Expected Offensive Rebounds	8	12
Offensive Rebounds	11	5
Difference	+3	-7

Ridiculous..

Obviously a lot of the shots Missouri took on Saturday were more open and makeable than a lot of the ones that they took against South Carolina. But it is still incredible to think about the simple fact that one team is capable of these two halves:

• First Half vs. S. Carolina: 27 points (6-30 FG, 1-14 3PT), 0.90 BCI
• First Half vs. Vanderbilt: 49 points (17-31 FG, 8-15 3PT), 2.00 BCI

Against South Carolina, Mizzou shot 31% on 2-pointers and 7% on 3-pointers in the first half. Against Vandy, they shot 56% and 53%. Make sense of that, I dare you.

It's also fun to scramble the halves around.

2H vs. South Carolina, 1H vs. Vanderbilt: Mizzou 93, Opponent 50
1H vs. South Carolina, 2H vs. Vanderbilt: Opponent 74, Mizzou 59

Well, I'm not sure that was "fun," per say ... a little maddening, maybe...

(Love those rebounding numbers, by the way.)

Mizzou Player Stats

(Definitions at the bottom of the post.)

College Basketball Stats

Player	AdjGS	GmSc/Min	Line
Alex Oriakhi	24.7	0.82	30 Min, 18 Pts (7-9 FG, 4-5 FT), 12 Reb (6 Off)
Jabari Brown	13.0	0.41	32 Min, 21 Pts (8-12 FG, 4-8 3PT, 1-1 FT), 3 Reb, 5 TO
Phil Pressey	12.3	0.47	26 Min, 12 Pts (4-9 FG, 3-4 3PT, 2-2 FT), 6 Ast, 2 Reb, 2 TO
Keion Bell	9.7	0.42	23 Min, 12 Pts (4-8 FG, 1-1 3PT, 3-4 FT), 4 Reb, 3 Stl, 3 TO
Earnest Ross	6.9	0.22	32 Min, 9 Pts (3-8 FG, 3-6 3PT), 7 Reb, 2 Ast, 2 TO
Tony Criswell	6.8	0.28	24 Min, 4 Pts (1-3 FG, 2-2 FT), 4 Reb (3 Off), 4 Ast, 4 PF
Negus Webster-Chan	6.2	0.39	16 Min, 3 Pts (1-1 3PT), 3 Ast, 2 Reb
Ryan Rosburg	4.1	0.83	5 Min, 2 Pts (2-2 FT), 3 Reb
Stefan Jankovic	-3.1	-0.26	12 Min, 0 Pts (0-1 3PT), 2 Reb, 4 PF

Player	Usage%	Floor%	Touches/ Poss.	%Pass	%Shoot	%Fouled	%T/O
Oriakhi	21%	66%	1.4	0%	72%	28%	0%
Brown	30%	42%	1.8	0%	68%	4%	28%
Pressey	25%	46%	6.1	74%	19%	3%	4%
Bell	31%	35%	2.0	0%	58%	20%	22%
Ross	17%	31%	2.3	54%	37%	0%	9%
Criswell	11%	47%	4.0	81%	10%	5%	3%
NWC	3%	100%	3.9	95%	5%	0%	0%
Rosburg	10%	56%	0.9	0%	0%	100%	0%
Jankovic	9%	0%	0.6	0%	50%	0%	50%

• Alex Oriakhi in wins (versus "real" teams): 18.2 Adj. GS points per game (13.3 PPG on 69% shooting, 9.0 RPG), 28.6 minutes per game
• Alex Oriakhi in losses: 9.1 Adj. GS points per game (7.0 PPG on 60% shooting, 5.8 RPG), 22.5 minutes per game
• Just saying.
• In the end, Vandy just had no answer for Oriakhi, and Mizzou did a wonderful job of acknowledging this and getting the big man the ball. Even when Vandy started playing well in the second half, Mizzou got him the ball when the Tigers needed a "Yeah, don't think you're going to be coming back in this game" basket. Nice moves from the big man and, of course, nice rebounding.
• Really, really unique game from Tony Criswell. We already knew that he sometimes shoots like he thinks he's a guard. Against Vandy, he passed like it instead (and still grabbed three offensive rebounds).
• Negus Webster-Chan looked damn solid. I've been waiting a long time to type those words. Please let this be the start of a long string of "progression toward the mean" games.

Three Keys Revisited

From Friday's preview.

Brown and Ross

Until Laurence Bowers is 100% healthy (and even if he plays on Saturday, we can't figure he'll be 100% right away), this defense is still reliant on Jabari Brown and Earnest Ross to not shoot Mizzou out of the game. They were once again abysmal from the field against South Carolina, and it almost cost the Tigers dearly. Mizzou doesn't need the pair to shoot 50% from the field ... but 40% would be awfully nice.

Jabari Brown & Earnest Ross: 30 points on 11-for-20 shooting (7-for-14 on 3-pointers). Amazing how much better this team looks when they're averaging 1.5 points per shot instead of 0.8.

Be! Aggressive! Be, be aggressive!

The only big advantage VU has in the table above is in the fouls department when Mizzou has the ball. The Tigers drew plenty of contact against South Carolina, and their free throw shooting bailed them out of a potential disaster. Kevin Stallings isn't Frank Martin; in other words, they don't play Murderball. But Mizzou still needs to steal as many free points as possible from the line.

Vanderbilt only committed 11 fouls for the game, but Mizzou did earn 16 free throws off of those fouls. Vandy plays relatively passive defense, so most of their fouls were because of Mizzou's aggressiveness. I'll take that.

First 10 minutes

Average Score after 10 minutes in SEC Play: Opponent 15.2, Mizzou 11.6 (-3.6)
Average Score over the final 30 minutes: Mizzou 55.4, Opponent 53.2 (+2.2)

Mizzou was down 14-4 after 10 minutes against Ole Miss, 22-7 against Florida and 17-13 against South Carolina. And, of course, the Tigers were losing to SEMO at halftime back in December. Starting fast has been an issue for this team. It cannot be if the Tigers are going to meet their potential from this point forward.

The score after 10 minutes: Mizzou 19, Vanderbilt 11. Good enough. Especially when the score over the next 7:20 was Mizzou 27, Vanderbilt 4.

Summary

If nothing else, it was really good to not have to feel tense. Even in the early stages of the second half of the South Carolina game, I wasn't scared or assuming a loss ... I was just annoyed and anxious. This one was over quickly. Let's do this more often. Like Wednesday in Baton Rouge.

---

AdjGS: a take-off of the Game Score metric (definition here) accepted by a lot of basketball stat nerds. It takes points, assists, rebounds (offensive & defensive), steals, blocks, turnovers and fouls into account to determine an individual's "score" for a given game. The "adjustment" in Adjusted Game Score is simply matching the total game scores to the total points scored in the game, thereby redistributing the game's points scored to those who had the biggest impact on the game itself, instead of just how many balls a player put through a basket.

Usage%: This "estimates the % of team possessions a player consumes while on the floor" (via). The usage of those possessions is determined via a formula using field goal and free throw attempts, offensive rebounds, assists and turnovers. The higher the number, the more prevalent a player is (good or bad) in a team's offensive outcome.

Floor%: Via Basketball-Reference.com: Floor % answers the question, "when Player X uses a possession, what is the probability that his team scores at least 1 point?". The higher the Floor%, the more frequently the team probably scores when the given player is involved.

Touches/Possession: Using field goal attempts, free throw attempts, assists and turnovers, Touches attempt to estimate "the number of times a player touched the ball in an attacking position on the floor." Take the estimated touches and divide it by the estimated number of possessions for which a player was on the court, and you get a rough idea of how many times a player touched the ball in a given possession. For point guards, you'll see the number in the 3-4 range. For shooting guards and wings, 2-3. For an offensively limited center, 1.30. You get the idea.

Anyway, using the Touches figure, we can estimate the percentage of time a player "in an attacking position" passes, shoots, turns the ball over, or gets fouled.