Bigs in the Valley

[panther-state]

I just get super p***ed when any Panther gets called for a foul that didn't involve them throwing someone down on the ground and then preceding to kick/punch them...and even then I'd need a replay to confirm that he indeed wasn't just playing the ball. Is that really so bad? MVC refs just don't understand that.

,..but seriously, there are some officials, who when I see them in the McLeod Center, I know I will be picking on them and scrutinizing every call they make. It's definitely not a conspiracy, but that doens't make their consistency (or lack thereof) as officials any more tolerable

[TNMSUFAN]

As far as my Bears - the 5 is definitely our weakest spot. We do have size and some experience. But to date neither of our 2 bigs have come through consistently. Caleb Patterson has loads of potential. Great size, long arms, decent athleticism, good post moves (jump hook) and a sweet outside shot. But he really struggles on defense and rebounding the ball. Over the last 2 years he's had a few good games but also a bunch of horrible games. Rhine is a big strong post player. But he lacks offense and is fairly slow and foul prone. We Bears fans are all hoping this is Caleb's year.

I respectfully disagree with the 5 being our weakest spot because we have 2 6'10" guys who have 6 years combined experience in the program. Patterson averaged 6pts per game while playing around 14 minutes per game and Rhine didn't score much but did play 8 minutes per game. Both need to rebound and defend better but Patterson will score especially if he plays 25 minutes. Just for comparison with Patterson...Stutz averaged 7pts per game while playing around 15 minutes per game.

[DoubleJayAlum]

In the games I watched UNI-Creighton, Echinique could have been called a dozen times each game for camping in the lane. He just doesn't move out from the block at all.

You do realize the discussion is about foul calls, right? The problem is that the MVC doesn't let big guys play with any sort of physicality whatsoever. Sure, you have dirty players like O'Rear who get away with cheap shots when refs aren't looking, but they never give centers the benefit of the doubt, especially when they are playing defense against a driving guard.

One other thing that happens in the MVC seemingly more than anywhere else is that refs let guys get away with flopping. I remember a game against drake last year where the Drake bigs flopped every time Echenique touched the ball. I saw them do the same thing against Durley/Blair. Unfortunately, the refs called a foul on the offensive player every single time, putting them into foul trouble early and severely lessening their chance at being effective. The league can't keep letting this runaway flopping go on if we want to be able to win games against top competition in other leagues.

[DUBulldog]

WSU has Stutz. He's shown what he can do outside of the Valley. Now we just need to see him do it inside the Valley. Problem is he gets called for more fouls in conference play.

That isn't just Stutz. it seems to be how the Valley was called last year. If you were a big man, and played like a big, refs blew their whistles before contact was even initiated. I saw this happen to both Stutz and Echineque. At the same time, those same bigs almost had to bleed before officials blew their whistles when a defender hacked them. As a Creighton season ticket holder, this happened all conference long. I watched Wichita State on TV several times and it appeared the same type of thing was happening to him. Bigs in the Valley will only play as well as the referees allow them. Both Echineque and Stutz were allowed to be more active in the non-con and the post season than they ever were allowed to play in conference.

Now before we here someone chimes in with "There aren't Valley refs, these are the same guys that call games in the B1G and the Big XII." I know that. But the officials do call the game the way the Valley offices dictate, and last year, the refs were very whistle happy when it came to bigs playing any defense beyond standing still and taking up dead space. If you were a big and you were active, you got whistled.

As I said, how the bigs perform this year will have a lot to do with how the league office allows them to play. This is a sad statement, but true. And if the Valley consistently penalizes bigs for simply playing like a big, recruiting bigs, for any team, will become even more difficult than it is now.

I'm not sure I buy the argument. Just for the heck of it, I looked up Echineque's foul stats from last season:

71 fouls in 684 minutes (1 foul every 9.6 minutes or 4.15 fouls per 40 minutes).

I then looked up the stats for Drake's 2 centers, and found this:

VanDeest = 71 fouls in 701 minutes (1 per 9.9 minutes or 4.05 fouls per 40 minutes)
Woods = 63 fouls in 488 minutes (1 per 7.7 minutes or 5.16 fouls per 40 minutes)

Doesn't look like Echinique was being called for more fouls than other bigs in the league.

[LMS]

My concern wasn't the number of fouls but the way he "earned" them. The flopping was unbelievable at UNI. In the Big East, he could battle for position without people falling down every time they were touched. Not so much in the MVC.

[MoValley John]

I'm not sure I buy the argument. Just for the heck of it, I looked up Echineque's foul stats from last season:

71 fouls in 684 minutes (1 foul every 9.6 minutes or 4.15 fouls per 40 minutes).

I then looked up the stats for Drake's 2 centers, and found this:

VanDeest = 71 fouls in 701 minutes (1 per 9.9 minutes or 4.05 fouls per 40 minutes)
Woods = 63 fouls in 488 minutes (1 per 7.7 minutes or 5.16 fouls per 40 minutes)

Doesn't look like Echinique was being called for more fouls than other bigs in the league.

Echineque had to change his style of play during the Valley. You can cite numbers all you want, but Echineque went from an aggressive post to passive, he went from a jumper to someone that never left his feet. This was just to stay in games. Anytime he became aggressive, the whistle blew and he had to revert to passive.

[DUBulldog]

I'm not sure I buy the argument. Just for the heck of it, I looked up Echineque's foul stats from last season:

71 fouls in 684 minutes (1 foul every 9.6 minutes or 4.15 fouls per 40 minutes).

I then looked up the stats for Drake's 2 centers, and found this:

VanDeest = 71 fouls in 701 minutes (1 per 9.9 minutes or 4.05 fouls per 40 minutes)
Woods = 63 fouls in 488 minutes (1 per 7.7 minutes or 5.16 fouls per 40 minutes)

Doesn't look like Echinique was being called for more fouls than other bigs in the league.

Echineque had to change his style of play during the Valley. You can cite numbers all you want, but Echineque went from an aggressive post to passive, he went from a jumper to someone that never left his feet. This was just to stay in games. Anytime he became aggressive, the whistle blew and he had to revert to passive.

I think we both agree and disagree. I agree with you that things are called extremely tight in the post in the MVC. But, I disagree with you that it's limited only to the more physical post players.

Still don't understand how Matt Webster got away with everything he got away with a few years ago.

[SubGod22]

I'm not sure I buy the argument. Just for the heck of it, I looked up Echineque's foul stats from last season:

71 fouls in 684 minutes (1 foul every 9.6 minutes or 4.15 fouls per 40 minutes).

I then looked up the stats for Drake's 2 centers, and found this:

VanDeest = 71 fouls in 701 minutes (1 per 9.9 minutes or 4.05 fouls per 40 minutes)
Woods = 63 fouls in 488 minutes (1 per 7.7 minutes or 5.16 fouls per 40 minutes)

Doesn't look like Echinique was being called for more fouls than other bigs in the league.

Echineque had to change his style of play during the Valley. You can cite numbers all you want, but Echineque went from an aggressive post to passive, he went from a jumper to someone that never left his feet. This was just to stay in games. Anytime he became aggressive, the whistle blew and he had to revert to passive.

Stutz isn't the banger the Echenique is, but he had the same problems you described.

And the flopping annoys the hell out of me. Flop and it's an offensive foul. Try to hold your ground and let the other guy keep banging into you and it's a defensive foul as soon as he wants to make an attempt to shoot the ball. I've seen guys back a guy down 5 or 6 feet and then get the foul call as soon as they shoot a fade. Yes, Durley benefitted from that from time to time as well but it still pisses me off. If you're going to let the offensive player bang away (back down) then don't punish the defender for not giving ground. He doesn't have to!!! But flop with little to no contact and it's called on the offense.

I wonder about this conference sometimes. Who's now in charge of officials? He/she needs to be slapped a few times. I think the officials we hire, for the most part, are just fine. But how the league wants the game called is mind boggling sometimes.

[MoValley John]

I played with Google and found this article from last year: http://sports.omaha.com/2011/02/12/slowly-echenique-adjusting-to-new-role-style/

Interesting quotes.

No, the two don’t go way back. Far from best buddies. It’s just that the 6-9, 290-pound Teague likes to bang in the paint like Echenique. Something that they did when Creighton defeated the Salukis in early January.

“We didn’t talk much the last time we played, but him and I were a little upset that the refs didn’t let us play more physical,” Echenique said. “It’s good for me when I get to play against those guys. I don’t know what happened but he’s not going to be able to play.”

“Some games it’s a little annoying when you have two or three fouls early,” he said, “and you’re not trying to do too much because you don’t want to get another.”

Echenique knows that he just can’t bully the lighter post players in the Valley.

This wasn't a "poor me" piece, it really wasn't complaining about how the Valley calls games, either. In reality, it was simply another day of Tom Shatel blathering and wasting column inches. This time he was blathering and wasting space on Echineque. The one thing that stands out, however, is how naturally the comments I quoted flow through the article. It's not Shatel with a conspiracy, he isn't complaining about how post play is officiated in the Valley, the piece isn't even about post play in general. These quotes are matter of fact, that the Valley doesn't let posts play. The article wasn't how unfair the world was treating Echineque, in the end, Echineque needs to adjust to the way the game is called.

My point in the very begining is simply that the bigs in the Valley will be only as good as the officials let them be and if the Valley continues to officiate this way, it will have a chilling effect on being able to recruit good posts.

[Khan4Cats]

In the games I watched UNI-Creighton, Echinique could have been called a dozen times each game for camping in the lane. He just doesn't move out from the block at all.

You do realize the discussion is about foul calls, right? The problem is that the MVC doesn't let big guys play with any sort of physicality whatsoever. Sure, you have dirty players like O'Rear who get away with cheap shots when refs aren't looking, but they never give centers the benefit of the doubt, especially when they are playing defense against a driving guard.

The complaint was about calls in general, and I was commenting about about calls in general that seem to go against some players and not others.

And dirty players like McDermott are able to get away with stuff all the time when the refs are looking the other way in order to not have to listen to daddy whine.