Official 2013-14 MVCfans.com Prediction - 4th Place

[MVCfans]

In a very close vote, Missouri St was projected to be the 5th place finisher (results: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3265 )

Each week we will open a poll for users to predict the end of season finish for the MVC 2013-14 basketball season. We will work in reverse order, concluding with the predicted MVC champion chosen by our users between the last two teams remaining in week 9.

Week 7 - Who will finish in 4th place during the 2013-14 MVC mens basketball season?
-You are choosing the team that you believe will finish in 4th place for this regular season. Poll open until Monday, October 7.


Official MVCfans.com - Predictions:
10th Place - Southern Illinois
9th Place - Drake
8th Place - Illinois State
7th Place - Loyola
6th Place - Evansville
5th Place - Missouri State
4th Place - ...

[agrinut]

It's a joke that Bradley made it this far, team that finished 8th last year and lost a lot. Bradley is more likely to play on Thursday then they are to make it to Friday.

[BeBrave]

It's a joke that Bradley made it this far, team that finished 8th last year and lost a lot. Bradley is more likely to play on Thursday then they are to make it to Friday.

FIRST POST

I disagree, obviously. Bradley may have lost a number of players, but return their top 2, one of them being an all-conference player with a shot at POY. The players that they lost are being replaced by more talented ones. Not to mention they finished 8th in a conference last year that included Creighton and a final 4 team. That's a clown comment, bro.

[PantherSigEp]

It's a joke that Bradley made it this far, team that finished 8th last year and lost a lot. Bradley is more likely to play on Thursday then they are to make it to Friday.

FIRST POST

I disagree, obviously. Bradley may have lost a number of players, but return their top 2, one of them being an all-conference player with a shot at POY. The players that they lost are being replaced by more talented ones. Not to mention they finished 8th in a conference last year that included Creighton and a final 4 team. That's a clown comment, bro.

I'm pretty sure Simms-Edwards is gone, no? He was easily one of your best players and would be interested in hearing how his replacement is already better than him. Same with Will Egolf. Those guys have been in the league for a long time and were well-established leaders on the Braves. Replacing them and their production won't be an easy task in just one year. Who are their slated replacements? Lemon and Pickett are good players but the Braves finished 8th and were 3 games out of 4th last year. Missouri St and Drake were in that exact same position. I think MSU had more upside to make the improvement and get to that #4 spot but I think it's a close race.

I suppose I wouldn't call it a joke, but I don't think Bradley will be a top 4 team in the MVC.

[BeBrave]

It's a joke that Bradley made it this far, team that finished 8th last year and lost a lot. Bradley is more likely to play on Thursday then they are to make it to Friday.

FIRST POST

I disagree, obviously. Bradley may have lost a number of players, but return their top 2, one of them being an all-conference player with a shot at POY. The players that they lost are being replaced by more talented ones. Not to mention they finished 8th in a conference last year that included Creighton and a final 4 team. That's a clown comment, bro.

I'm pretty sure Simms-Edwards is gone, no? He was easily one of your best players and would be interested in hearing how his replacement is already better than him. Same with Will Egolf. Those guys have been in the league for a long time and were well-established leaders on the Braves. Replacing them and their production won't be an easy task in just one year. Who are their slated replacements? Lemon and Pickett are good players but the Braves finished 8th and were 3 games out of 4th last year. Missouri St and Drake were in that exact same position. I think MSU had more upside to make the improvement and get to that #4 spot but I think it's a close race.

I suppose I wouldn't call it a joke, but I don't think Bradley will be a top 4 team in the MVC.

I agree with most of what you said. Although, it is a widely held belief (clearly not just among Bradley fans) that this years team will have a lot more to offer, especially in terms of depth. Last years squad had maybe 5-6 guys who could contribute. This next years team, while young, will have hopefully 8-9 guys that can consistently play at the MVC level. In theory it should be a nice mix of all conference type guys (Walt, Pickett) and young talent (Auston Barnes(JUCO), Jordan Swopshire, Chris Blake(JUCO)). Add 2 transfers that had to sit out last year that fill nice roles (Omari Grier, Anthony Fields). I am not saying Bradley will win the conference, just that there is reason to believe that they could finish top 4. That thought is most certainly not a joke.

[AngryShock]

I think some things that people are selling Bradley short on are depth and another year under Ford. Yes, losing DSE hurts, but there are other guys who were there last year that I expect to be better and the recruiting seems to be pretty solid under Ford. I like what he's building in Peoria and feel they have as good a shot at 4th as any of the previous mentioned teams. MSU returns a lot of young talent and should be improved as well so I can understand an argument for them, but to come off as insulted that BU could be thought of as potentially slightly better is ridiculous. Either could finish as low as 6th or 7th if certain talent doesn't pan out, but could manage a 3rd place finish if it all comes together. Another ??? for MSU is Lusk. A lot of people are still waiting to see if he can do something whereas Ford has a history of success at Kent State to pull from. That also helps how people are going to view the two schools.

[Mikovio]

I'm probably biased, but I expect Bradley to finish 4th. I think UNI, Bradley and MSU will be 3-5 and any order wouldn't surprise me.

The guys Bradley lost all had some major flaws. Shayok looked lost out there, Crawford couldn't (wouldn't?) play defense, Eastman really didn't do anything particularly well, Knezevic never played, Egolf didn't see the floor much for one reason or another and Dyricus couldn't shoot. I'm sure we'll miss Dyricus for his defense, but I wouldn't be surprised it that's all. Bradley returns its 2 best players (Lemon--all MVC and leading returning MVC scorer and Pickett--all Newcomer and leading returning MVC rebounder) and brings in some highly regarded talent. There are a lot of newcomers but the Bahamas trip could help in that respect. The first game was an embarrassing loss but by the end they were rolling.

One of the greatest deficiencies the past few seasons at Bradley has been shooting, and there are signs it could be much improved. This is probably the best area of analysis because we don't have to quibble about strength of competition at the various levels. (Well, we still could, but let's not.)

In terms of 3 point shooting, we lost, going by their last full season of competition:

DSE - 28%
Eastman - 31%
Egolf - 35%

Only Egolf shot at an average D-I clip, which meant we often had our center drifting around the perimeter instead of down low grabbing rebounds.

We've gained:

Fields: 1-11 (9%) at Wake; 0-4 on Bahamas trip
Zecevic: ??; 1-11 (9%) on Bahamas trip
Grier: 40-98 (41%) at FAU; 4-25 (16%) on Bahamas trip
Swopshire: ??; 5-12 (42%) on the Bahamas trip
Barnes: 14-35 (40%) at JUCO; 1-4 (25%) on the Bahamas trip

What I take from this:

-Fields and Zecevic don't look good, although it's a small sample size.
-Swopshire looks like a good 3 point shooter, but again it's a small sample size
-Grier and Barnes have large enough sample sizes and stats to suggest they're good shooters, even if their Bahamas numbers don't bear it out. Could it be that they've regressed? Maybe but I'd doubt it, especially with Barnes, who compiled those stats just last year.

tl;dr Our shooting should get better if nothing else.'

Edit: Yes, it's important to mention that depth was severely lacking last year with Lemon and DSE playing 35 min/game, which I think caught up to the Braves in February. I think we'll have more contributors this year as opposed to last where we had 2 transfers on scholarship sitting out (Grier, Fields), 2 guys who never saw the floor (Knezevic, Wells), and Crawford and Shayok who Ford didn't want to play very much. That's 6 scholarships giving us a combined 15 minutes/game. We still have Wells at the end of the bench but it should still be much improved.

[BradleyBrave]

I would put little stock in anything that happened in the Bahamas as far as predicting what may happen this season. We were playing in a high school gym with a 24 second shot clock, the international 3 point line, and officials that gave one team 53 FTs in a game against us. We saw game after game improvement, so I guess that may be a takeaway, but again the rules were weird, the teams were weird, and it was more or less open gym with pseudo referees so take it all with a grain of salt.

As far as personnel losses versus what's returning, other than Simms-Edwards and maybe Egolf, BU didn't lose much. We return 2 of our top 3 scorers in Lemon (all league guard) and Pickett (all newcomer big). We are significantly more athletic, significantly longer at most positions, and deeper at most positions. We add 2 transfers with D1 game experience, with Omari Grier likely to be the more impactful of the two and a probable starter. Whatever DSE and Egolf brought to the table has been replaced in the aggregate by likely rotation players Grier (mentioned above), Fields, Zecevic, Blake, Barnes (likely starter), and possibly Xzavier Taylor.

Geno also has a proven track record of improvement and reloading year after year, so I expect another step forward for the program. The voters on here who watch a lot of Valley hoops seem to think we're taking a step forward as well. Whether that's 4th or not, I don't know. I am confident it won't be another Thursday night appearance though. Look forward to tipping it up New Year's Day.

[Wufan]

I think the future is bright for the Braves, but I'm not convinced that this is the year (although it could be).

My questions are:

Does BU have a true PG, or will Lemon have to play that position?

Will BU be able to put the ball in the basket?

Will anyone other than Pickett be able to play in the paint?

An optimist will answer these questions with a positive outlook. Agriut will answer negatively. I am taking a wait and see approach as there is lots of potential and zero results to show for it.

[bcg]

Will Egolf will be harder to replace than DSE in my opinion. Egolf created a matchup problems his final year when he started hitting three pointers. I do have to give both players credit for sticking it out the whole time since the program was down.

Bradley has been missing a shooting guard since Andrew Warren left and hasn't been a good rebounding team since 2006. We'll find out if the guys sitting out and juco guys can make perimeter shots and if the frontcourt can win rebounding battles.

The non-conference schedule is weak, so it might take awhile to see how good or bad this team is.