1. Did the refs look tired? The crew chief, fan favorite Tony Padilla, was in the Bahamas reffing games through Saturday, flew to Miami to ref a game on Sunday, got on a plane to Texas for a Monday game, and then another to Tallahassee for Tuesday. Who knows where he’ll turn up tonight? Despite college hoops leadership (NCAAism alert!) leaning fully into being professional basketball (check out the Player’s Era Tournament pay structure if you don’t believe me) they still – through their refs – choose
to live in a make believe world where we’re all just out here competing for the joy of the college experience. The refs are hardly trained, they call way too many games, and there doesn’t seem to be real evaluation process. Padilla, for example, generated some fun quotes from coaches in a story at the Athletic like, “never feel great when he’s on a game,” “never know how the game will be called,” and “this dude has never been wrong about anything, ever.” But it’s not Padilla’s fault. Reffing is just his side hustle – he’s a bail bondsman in Sacramento. So – just spitballing here – but if college players are going to make NBA salaries, maybe it’s time to move to fulltime refs? Anyone?
2. Coach Loucks finds a new reason to single out Steen after every game. It’s clear that his hair-on-fire energy and his leadership are traits to be valued by this staff. And while he was a double-double machine at the D2 level, CSU Bakersfield was the first game this year with one (13 and 10). He’s now 9th nationally in offensive rebounding.
3. While the 0-15 from deep was the 1st half story, there was a lot more to it as the guys just took a lot of bad shots. This was the 3rd game in a row where Loucks went into the locker room feeling the need to light his team up. Could be a trend, but could also just be a lesser opponent while the guys are looking ahead to the Texas A&M, Georgia, Houston, Dayton gauntlet that’s up next on the schedule.
4. Do assists matter? (spoiler: kind of). If you listen to most basketball announcers you’d think that assists count more than points – and who doesn’t love a good pass leading to a bucket? But the reality is that assists are only slightly correlated with offensive efficiency. So they’re nice, but more a measure of style than good offense. To wit: Gonzaga and Missouri both had elite offenses last season, while the Zags were 8th in assists and Mizzou was 250th. Points count the same, whether a teammate is generating them for you or not. Ham’s offenses, which relied on a lot of iso’s and offensive boards, never generated many, while the new offense is 62nd nationally. So in the case of this offense, yes, they matter, and freshman Cam Miles had 7, which gives him 12 in the past two games.
5. FSU won 89-59 in an 81 possession game. The offense is now ranked 84th, while the defense is 36th. The primary driver on both sides of the floor has been turnovers. FSU is 43rd nationally in taking care of the ball, while at the same time forcing more turnovers than any other team.
