#123 R.P.I. Virginia Tech @ #9 R.P.I. Miami:

#11 Nationally ranked Miami has called: “next”!

20 up and 4 down sure reads like a daisy to me.
And so does in the 9-3 in Atlantic Coast intra-league  maker.

That ain’t half bad men, not at all. And all the more so when the pre-season mag’s had you tabbed A.c.c. mid-range at 7th through 9th, and yet as of this writing, the actual and factual A.c.c. standings have you tabbed as standing in at 2nd-place.

That does not suck.
And neither does this 2015-2016 Miami men’s hoops club which has come up -and smartly- by any and all pre-season metrics thus far.

As coach Jim Larrañaga has won a buncha games the last few seasons down on So.Beach, by being pretty good at most things, and yet not quite dominate at anything. That’s coaching folks. And this one is gonna be one tough roadie down in Coral Gables Florida.

The U at a glance:

• 12th in FT percentage (75.8%)
• 15th fewest fouls whistled against (4o3, total)
• 21st fewest Turnovers per game (10.6 tpg)
• 36th in shooting overall (47.5%)
• 31st in Scoring Margin (+11.5 ppg)
• 48th in scoring D allowed (66 ppg)
• NO injuries listed (thank God!)

‘cane Returning Starters=3

Miami Strengths:

• I’d have to say that 6’5” 2o5 lb. r-senior year lead-G’s #10,  Sheldon McClellan, and his team leading 16.3 ppg on a splashy looking 52% overall, counts. So does 87% from the charity-stripe (on 123 FTA’s); as does a cool looking 39.6% from beyond the arc. That’s no shallow marksmanship –if you can get it, from the Texas transfer by way of H-town (Houston). Shelly has been said to be a bit of a self-first gunner, who can score, though who never won anything real special in high school despite being a showcase outburst scorer who was ranked 47th in the nation. A pure Wing player, who has a decent passing element to his game, when he plays a more plural game. Also has very sharp handles for such a heavy volume shooter. Can score equally inside-and-out, and does court a pretty decent defensive rep’ when he wants too. A second best 1.1. spg and 3.3 rpg help fill out his stat sheet and although he may be prone to indeed playing some me-ball at times, Sheldon is a pretty damn efficacious me-ball player. You gotta give him is efficiency love, as Sheldon may take a lotta shots, though he (generally) takes and/or creates marketable shots for himself. Has an overseas career waiting for him as I type. Says his favorite food is a homemade sloppy Joe’s and I’ve never ever read that one before now.
• after Sheldon, scoring drops off to 11 ppg or less and takes on a committee stylized approach; however, there are things worth observing here… among them…
• 6’2” 180 lb. sophomoric Philly native, Ja’Quan Newton -same as Sheldon McClellan, lives at the FT-line and as he has banked 115 FTA’s of his own (on 74%) thus far this campaign. Something of a surprise or breakout baller this year, as he only started 3 games last season, after being the #1 recruit in my home state of Pennsylvania the year before that. Accordingly, I’d have to say that an unexpected and second-best on the team 11.2 ppg on 38% from range counts. As does the potential 2018 ceiling to this Newton kid; who has the look-n-feel of a guy who finishes his scoring career somewhere in the high-teens.
• 5’10” 181 lb. r-senior Point man and K-State transfer Angel Rodriguez has fallen back to Earth -so to speak- a bit this season, or at least he has not come up hardly any at all from where he has been in the last 40-60 games or so. That is indeed steady enough of him, though you’d like to see a bit more production from a guy who has a rep’ as a pure born leader and winner, when you need it the most. Angel is one of the more menacing individual backcourt defenders in the whole entire A.c.c. The team lead at 1.5 spg, the second at 11.3 ppg and the team lead again at 4.5 dimes per game is solid enough. In particular for a guy who came in with a very impoverished shooting scholastic dossier down in Puerto Rico; and has unfortunately regressed to a career low from range (at 29%). Angel is great at what he does (defense); and good at what his position (Pt.G) asks him to be, the Qb of the ‘cane offense. Beyond that? I’d say he’s down about all he can do with his Gift’s. I find that fair of him, even if there is still some he should do more, noise.

  

• Final year, #23, 7′ 249 lb. springy true-Center Tonye Jekiri, may not be epic, though he is a Nigerian double-double just looking for a place to happen and a lane to anchor on defense. As this is a hard cut, physically strong, sweaty workhorse Five down low. Might even be an fringe overseas guy for his team leading Windex work (9.9 rpg) and team leading swats (1.2 bpg). 54% shows you how close he plays to the basket where Jekiri makes his offensive living on put-backs and dunks (9.1 ppg). Does all the dirty work, and he does real fine dirt-work at that. Not a fun guy down low; has slowly developed some measure of ~10′ range, and runs the floor like a gazelle for being such an impressive physical specimen. Almost signed with Virginia Tech, and has one of the higher revving motors in the post in the A.c.c. Every team needs lead-pipe worker-bee such as Mister Jekiri.

Miami Weaknesses:

• pretty much all of my pre-season magazines publish the very same ‘cane nag, i.e. depth; or the lament thereof. Top-4 scorers and defenders all returned and not a whole lot else behind that. And yet sans foul-trouble, with judicious use of timeouts? You may never know the difference. You will however know a difference in the second-game of the A.c.c. Tourney if/when Miami wins game one on zero days rest.
• and BTW: the backcourt has more higher end 1-2 talent, although no depth vis-à-vis the more uniformly talented at a noticeably lower level and therefore somewhat deeper frontcourt does.

Hurricane Bench: (depth= 1.5 to 2 ballers) lead primarily by Mr. Ja’Quan Newton up above and with some love from fr. 6’7” 185 lb. S/F, Anthony Lawrence Jr. and 6’10” rookie year string-bean 2o5 lb. true-Center Ebuka Izundu. Lawrence nets you 4.4 ppg and is said to be mister versatile, whereas mister Izundu brings you internal substitute rebounding and defense, and not much O (1.7 ppg). 

Illation, conclusion (s) and OPT digits:

the takeaway:
The takeaway here is… that coach Jim Larrañaga has got a lot out this 2015-2016 Miami men’s hoops squad. To his enormous and possible Atlantic Coach of the Year, credit.

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As I found NO, as in zero, real weaknesses here down on So.Beach. Miami may or may not be great; though I like to think of Miami as Clemson+.

As no pre-season magazine that I know of had The hooping U pegged corrected when they all came out back in September of ’15. This also however makes the Hurricanes tough to peg. McClellan is very good, and Rodriguez is solid enough; and yes, that does conspire to give Miami one of the better starting 1-2 punches as A.c.c. backcourts go. Beyond that? I see a solid team, maybe even a good team, though not quite a 20-4 great team. That men is called: coaching (the verb).

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As to the game itself, yes, Virginia Tech and coach Buzz should finally have fresh-legs; what with 6 days off which leaves the Hokies +3 on rest. That will not hurt; however, is that enough?

Miami is 92% or 12-1 at home whereas we/Virginia Tech are 40% (2-3) out on the road. Miami is also a 13.5 point favorite up on the Vegas big-board for this one. And you can see why when you see that Virginia Tech is a 47.2% defensive team as the visitor and yet the ‘canes are a 40.1% defender as the host. The Home/Away splits look fairly lineal, with the exception of each team in defense. On top of that the Miami offense is 5% better in each of these two teams last five respective games. Then we come to our handy dandy friend the so-called Forum Guide…

Closer:
Graham Houston’s pet is predicting a relatively mere 8.125 point victory for The U on the season. Although when we give measure to the most recent five opponents only, this escalates to nearly an 11 point ‘cane win. Or in other words, not only does homecourt favor Miami, in Miami; recent play shows that this favoritism gap is widening a bit. As Tech has chilled out on scoring by 10 points off of our season average since late January, and been held between 49 and 56 regulation points as the visitor for well over a fortnight now.

This is not to say that Miami is such an offensive juggernaut as to be out of reach or beyond our O&M fresh-legs depth.

It is to say that we are gonna need more than that 56 point high-water scoring mark to win this one. As Miami averages a very nifty looking 78 at home. Further, the U has made more free throws (414) than its opponents have taken (396). And finally, even if this is something of the classical look ahead trap-game for the ‘canes, what with U.n.c. on tap next … Virginia Tech has dropped 22 of their last A.c.c. 23 road dates for a reason.

(81% confidence interval)
Virginia Tech=64, Miami=76

“LETS GO!”

“Hokies!”

 bourbonstreet**