St. Bonaventure 81 Vermont 79
Matt Mobley hit a three pointer at the buzzer to sink the Catamounts in Rochester. Payton Henson's tip with five seconds left had given Vermont the lead before Mobley found space on the wing for the dagger. Anthony Lamb was a beast in his homecoming game pouring in 27 points and pulling down 8 rebounds. He has been getting to the line at a high rate and knocking them down when he gets there. He is poised for a tremendous rest of the season. Lamb is already a great player but I see him taking it to another level going forward. Vermont played well on offense and looked really good from the three point line. Everett Duncan looks better and better every game as he chipped in 11 points. Trae Bell-Haynes hit some tough shots down the stretch and finished with 13 points. Again it was the defense that let the Cats down. St. Bonaventure shot 60 percent from the field including 8/12 (66.7%) from three. Such uncharacteristic struggles for the Vermont defense. The Mobley shot to win it was made worse by the fact that it was his only made shot of the game. Vermont's defense had successfully held St. Bonaventure's leading scorer scoreless for 99.9% of the game. That loss hurts. Such a roller coaster of emotions in a great college basketball game, and Vermont just couldn't pull it off. The preseason hype was all about Vermont taking the next step and reaching the upper echelon of mid-major basketball. Maybe that hype was too much in the end as Vermont is sill a very good mid-major basketball team who hasn't quite made the leap. They whiffed on all of their chances for a signature road win which is how most of their non-conference schedules have gone. They demonstrated how much closer they are to reaching that next level but still have some work to do. This is certainly frustrating and a tad disappointing but they are exactly where they were at last season. I love statistics and I am going to delve into a deeper analysis of the Vermont season up until this point. I use the Ken Pomeroy rankings for a lot of my research because it is really good when used to compare teams for predictive purposes. All of his formulas are adjusted for strength of opponent and home/away/neutral so it offers an even playing field to see how teams stack up. I also have been using hoop-math.com to delve into some of the advanced statistics. All of the following numbers will be from those websites. Vermont has played the 21st toughest schedule according to kenpom. A further validation of the quality of opponent Vermont has had thus far. Vermont's current kenpom ranking is 70. They finished last year at 63 to give you a comparison. Their record broken down by opponents kenpom ranking are as follows :
1-100 (1-3)
101-200 (3-2)
200+ (2-0)
Throw in their non D1 win and you get their current 7-5 record. Buckell is one of those second tier losses and they are currently at 101, right on the border. The point here is that Vermont is right there against teams who are also in the upper tier. The highest ranked team they play the rest of this season is Albany and they are currently at 118. All of their other opponents are ranked below 150. This Vermont team is in the exact same position it was last season at this point. The only different the rest of the way is that Albany is better than they were a season ago. Does this mean they will go undefeated again? It is possible but unlikely. The defense is not quite where it was last season and that needs to improve in order for Vermont to make another big run. With a look behind the numbers there are two areas where Vermont is struggling on defense, at the rim and in transition. Opponents are getting to the rim about 10% more often and when they get their they are shooting it at a higher percentage. This is due to Vermont blocking less shots this season. Opposing teams are shooting 74% on unblocked shots at the rim which is a 12% increase on the same shots last season. This is the area where they miss Dre Wills, Kurt Steidl, and Darren Payen. Vermont is going to have to tighten that up by cutting off driving lanes to the rim due to the lack of consistent rim protectors outside of Lamb. Most of the other defensive numbers are the same. The most glaring weakness right now is Vermont's difficulties getting back in transition. Opposing teams are destroying the Cats in the first 10 seconds of the shot clock. Off a rebound Teams are shooting 31% better on threes and 21% better on jumpers. That is an astronomical increase. It happened several times in the game today and the game winning shot was a quick run up the floor after a made basket. The three from the wing in transition has absolutely killed Vermont this season. They are also committing more live ball turnovers this season which is leading to a 30% increase in shooting percentage at the rim in transition. Not all turnovers are created equal and even though Vermont has reduced their overall turnovers, more of them are leading to runouts. Opposing teams are getting the ball up the court fast and shooting a higher percentage as compared to last season. Now despite all of these bad numbers Vermont has still had chances to win in the last thirty seconds in 4 out of their 5 losses. Vermont has one game between now and January and if they can get together and clean up these defensive lapses they are poised to make another big run this season. This Vermont team is a very good team desite the non-conference disappointments and ready to start building momentum.
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