California Week: What To Expect In 2012-13

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 22nd, 2012

After a week’s worth of breaking down the Golden Bears, it is time to give a way-too-early preview as to their chances in 2012-13. With five newcomers, three of whom are expected to play very big roles, and five returnees who will carry an even bigger load than they did last season, there are plenty of questions whose answers will remain unknown until we get a chance to see this team in action. But, that doesn’t mean we can’t make predictions. Simulating basketball in our minds is the closest we’re going to get to the real thing until late October, so here we go.

Cal’s Leading ScorerAllen Crabbe. The one-two punch of Crabbe and Justin Cobbs will have opposing defenses scrambling all night long. Cobbs can definitely score the ball, but the Bears are better with him distributing. With Cobbs dropping dimes to Crabbe, sharpshooting transfer Ricky Kreklow, and incoming freshman Tyrone Wallace, defenses will eventually be so preoccupied with the trio of shooting guards that they forget about the point guard. That’s when he can make his move. Similar to last season, this will be a team with balanced scoring. Crabbe, Cobbs, Kreklow, Kravish, and Solomon could all be averaging 8+ PPG by season’s end.

The Potential On This Year’s Roster Should Have Cal Fans Packing Haas Pavilion On A Regular Basis, Like On This Unknown Night When Jordan Farmar Is Attempting To Convert A Jumper Into The Teeth Of The Straw Hat Band. (credit: Arun Nevader)

Cal’s MVPJustin Cobbs. Just as Cobbs could very well win the scoring title, Crabbe could very well be the team MVP. But we already named Crabbe as the leading scorer, and taking two titles is just plain selfish. If Cobbs can find that balance we were talking about above of taking only good shots and always looking to pass first, he will be by far the most important part of coach Mike Montgomery’ s offense. And as we all know, defense may win championships, but good offense wins MVP awards.

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California Week: Will Improvement on the Offensive Glass Be Key to a Good Season in 2012-13?

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 22nd, 2012

For a team that made the NCAA Tournament in 2011-12, California’s extra scoring opportunities per game rate was quite low. The Golden Bears only averaged 1.9 ESOPG last season, which came in at 91st in the nation and sixth in the Pac-12. That’s not terrible, but it only converts to nearly four points per game, five if you throw a three in there. Take a team like VCU for example. The Rams averaged 7.7 ESOPG last season, meaning that they gained nearly 16 extra points a game if they had converted all of those (and that’s assuming all of the extra buckets came in the form of two-pointers). VCU finished the season with a record of 29-7, and 20 of those 29 wins were decided by 14 points or less. But the Rams earned all of those extra points, mainly because of the great work that coach Shaka Smart and company do stressing the importance of offensive rebounding.

Season

Team

Extra Scoring Chances

National Ranking

2011-12

California

1.9

91

2010-11

California

-1.3

236

2009-10

California

0.6

142

2008-09

California

-0.1

170

2007-08

Golden State

N/A

N/A

2006-07

Golden State

N/A

N/A

2005-06

Golden State

N/A

N/A

2004-05

Golden State

N/A

N/A

2003-04

Stanford

1.5

95

2002-03

Stanford

0.8

117

h/t to TeamRankings for statistics

Allen Crabbe and Richard Solomon will be the key to those extra opportunities in 2012-13. Sophomore forward David Kravish was by far the leader among 2012-13 returnees in offensive rebounding, so he will serve as a catalyst for the other guys. Kravish averaged two ORPG last season, which is a good number, especially for a young and wiry freshman. But after him, things dropped considerably for the Golden Bears. If they can bring their extra scoring opportunities per game up to four, and convert three of those possessions a game for a total of say, seven points, it could be a very good year for Cal. The Bears lost five games by seven points or less in 2011-12, and if they could have won three of those their final regular season record would have been 27-6. Then, all of a sudden your Pac-12 champions are in the mix for top three NCAA seed, not playing in Dayton on the Wednesday before the Tournament even starts. While that may seem like a stretch, it can all be solved with just a few more offensive rebounds each game.

Of course, none of this is as easy as I’m making it sound. This will take an entire team effort, not just by the bigs and coaching staff. An important part of offensive rebounding is having your guards shoot the ball when your forwards and centers are in a position to get that rebound, not sitting on the wing or on top of the free throw line. While Crabbe and Justin Cobbs are great shooters, if they can make sure that their shots come in the rhythm of the offense, the Bears will see their offensive efficiency skyrocket.

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California Week: Running Down the Returnees

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 20th, 2012

Five different players who earned significant playing time in 2011-12 return for California. Despite losing the Pac-12 Defensive and Player of the Year and their top scorer in the post, the Golden Bears return a solid foundation that should lead them to a second straight NCAA Tournament and fifth consecutive postseason berth. Below we’ll take a look at those five players, in order of last season’s scoring average.

  • Allen Crabbe, Junior, Wing (15.3 PPG, 5.7 RPG) – Out of California’s 34 games in 2011-12, Crabbe played 30+ minutes in 28 of them. The sophomore wing was a workhorse, consistently scoring in double digits (28 times in 34 games) and pulling down five or more rebounds a night (24 times). If you look at his stat sheet throughout the season, you will only find a few games in which Crabbe didn’t have a “good” night, according to his averages. And even in those three games, Cal won all three times by a combined 41 points, so he obviously knew when to take his off nights. Another sign of his consistency is in his numbers from his freshman to sophomore years – they barely change. Crabbe played a third of a minute more in 2011-12, scored 1.8 more points, pulled down 0.4 more rebounds, and 0.1 more assists and blocks. The only statistic that decreased was in the steals category – by 0.4. It’s kind of eerie in a way, but it is also a testament to how consistent Crabbe is. Mike Montgomery and staff have to like the fact that night in and night out, they know they are going to get a solid performance from him.

Crabbe’s Smooth Jumper Led The Golden Bears To The NCAA Tournament In 2011-12 (credit: Andy Wooldridge)

  • Justin Cobbs, Junior, Point Guard (12.9 PPG, 5.0 APG, 41.3 3FG%) – Cobbs got off to just about as good a start as any transfer player can have. The sophomore point guard averaged 11 points in his first seven games, good enough to take Brandon Smith’s starting spot right out from underneath him. Cobb’s best game came right in the middle of a six-game winning streak for the Golden Bears, when he exploded for 28 points, eight assists, and four steals in a crucial 86-83 victory over Oregon. From a scoring and sharing the ball standpoint, Cobbs did an outstanding job in his sophomore year. As we progress through the summer and into the fall, the next step is for Cobbs to become a more vocal leader on the court. “He’ll have the ball in his hands a lot, so how he responds to Coach Montgomery will have a huge impact on team chemistry. He has a lot of potential, but it’s things like leadership, decision-making, body language, and consistency that are on the wish list,” says “Kodiak” of California Golden Blogs.

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California Week: Players Not Returning

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 20th, 2012

While California will return four different players from its 2011-12 seven-man rotation, there are three players who saw significant time last year that will be departing. The two players that coach Mike Montgomery will miss the most are seniors, but two promising guards will be transferring out of the program as well due to the logjam at the position. Below, we’ll take a look at the four players who have moved on from the program and how big of an impact their losses will have.

  • Harper Kamp – The loss of Kamp will do the most damage early on in the 2012-13 season. Throughout stretches of last season’s campaign, Kamp was the only Bear in the low post who could score the ball consistently. Until the Bears are able to find a solid replacement for Kamp, they will struggle balancing out the already guard-heavy offense. Junior forward Richard Solomon will be the best immediate option as he had shown flashes of brilliance before being declared academically ineligible halfway through last season. Highly touted power forward signee Kaileb Rodriguez will also garner a lot of looks early on, where hopefully he’ll be able to hone his game against lesser competition before facing the rigors of a Pac-12 schedule. Kamp will likely go undrafted in the June 28 NBA Draft, but with his style of play, he will certainly end up competing professionally somewhere.

Kamp Gets Ready To Tap In A Missed Shot

  • Jorge Gutierrez – Anytime you lose the conference’s player of the year, it’s tough. Cal has always been deep at the guard position, but when shots weren’t falling, Gutierrez was the man you could rely on to knock down a clutch jumper. Even if his own shots weren’t going down, he still impacted the game through something else (steals, defense, etc.). If it wasn’t through just plain hustle (i.e., getting every lose ball in his general vicinity, choking defense), it was on the glass or finding the open man. The stats, even if they are ridiculous (13.1 PPG, 5.3 RPG, and 4.1 APG), don’t begin to explain how much the guard will be missed for his hustle and heart.
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California Week: Evaluating The Recent Past

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 18th, 2012

California is coming off back-to-back seasons in which it hasn’t qualified for the Round of 64 in the NCAA Tournament. For a team that is usually always in contention to win the Pac-12, this comes as somewhat of a disappointment to fans in Berkeley. In 2011-12, the Golden Bears looked like they were not only going to make the field of 64, but possibly make it out of the first weekend. Unfortunately, things went drastically wrong for the Bears down the stretch. Sophomore forward Richard Solomon contributed heavily on the glass in the first half of the season, but was lost as an academic casualty midway through January. This didn’t affect Cal immediately, but the strain put on Harper Kamp in the stretch run of the season would cost the Bears, who faced depth issues everywhere. “Over the past few years we’ve lost a lot of depth to transfers (or as an early pro in the case of Max Zhang) – so the players who would’ve been the sixth, seventh, and eighth men (Amandi Omoyke, DJ Seeley, and Zhang) are now playing for Cal State Fullerton or in China,” said “LeonPowe” of California Golden Blogs when RTC talked to him. California would finish its final five games with a record of 1-4, including an embarrassing, not as close as the final score indicated, 65-54 loss against South Florida in the First Four.

Mike Montgomery’s Team Seemed Headed In The Right Direction Going Into The Stretch Run In 2011-12, But A Poor Finish Resulted In A Less Than Favorable Draw In The NCAA Tournament. (credit: Mark J. Terrill)

As people around the program will tell you, however, the floundering finish was a long time in the making. Coach Mike Montgomery seemed to lose trust early in a couple of his players, most notably Brandon Smith. Due to the combination of a poor start by Smith and a hot one by transfer Justin Cobbs, Smith found himself buried on the bench. Even when the team’s top three shooter’s — Allen Crabbe, Jorge Gutierrez, and Cobbs — lost their touch late in the year, Monty decided to ride the sinking ship with them instead of going back into his bench. Smith only saw a combined 13 minutes of action in the final two games of the year, both 11-point losses. He is only one example, though. The already short bench was even shorter by year’s end, as Montgomery settled into a six-man rotation. Against athletic and quick defensive teams like Colorado and USF, the Bears never really had a chance to compete with those teams.

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Pac-12 Basketball Fantasy League: Recapping Round One

Posted by Connor Pelton on June 2nd, 2012

In an attempt to pass time throughout the long summer months without basketball, eight Pac-12 writers will be attempting something different this offseason. Beginning this week, the following Pac-12 writers (in first round drafting order) will participate in a fantasy style snake draft of the all-time Pac-12 players and coaches:

1. Andy Wooldridge (Building the Dam)
2. Jack Follman (Pacific Takes)
3. Ben Knibbe (UW Dawg Pound)
4. Connor Pelton (Rush the Court)
5. Drew Murawa (Rush the Court)
6. Mark Sandritter and Jeff Nusser (CougCenter)
7. Adam Butler (Pachoops)
8. David Piper (Addicted to Quack)

The purposes of the fantasy league are: (1) to determine the top 80 players and eight coaches to have ever played/coached for a current Pac-12 school, and (2) to have fun and pass time throughout the long summer months without anything but MLB and soccer. The only guidelines for the draft are that a coach must have been a HEAD COACH at a current Pac-12 school to be eligible, while players have had to PLAYED at a current school to be eligible. After the draft, all eight teams will be placed into a bracket and will advance based on a vote by you, the readers. So far, one round of the draft is complete. We recap it below.

Round One

#1 (Andy Wooldridge) – Kareem Abdul-Jabbar/Lew Alcindor, Center, UCLA

No question on this one. Two-time Player of the Year, three-time First Team All-American, three National Championships, and three NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player awards make Abdul-Jabbar/Alcindor an easy choice at number one.

Lew Alcindor is Our Overall #1 Pick

#2 (Jack Follman) – Bill Walton, Center, UCLA

Walton’s accomplishments are very similar to that of Abdul-Jabbar’s. Walton was named Player of the Year twice, was a three-time First Team All-American, and won a pair of National Championships. While Jabbar was a no-doubter at number one, Walton was the easy second choice.

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Pac-12 Weekly Five: 05.20.12 Edition

Posted by Connor Pelton on May 20th, 2012

  1. Not only do rosters begin to solidify this time of year, but coaching staffs do as well. Washington State made a big change earlier in the week by demoting assistant coach Jeff Hironaka. As the article points out, Hironaka has seemed close to landing a head coaching job somewhere around the nation the past couple years. His ability to teach and develop players made him one of the top basketball IQ assistants in the conference, but weaknesses in recruiting led to his eventual demotion to the title of director of player development and special assistant to the head coach. With the move solely motivated by recruiting, head coach Ken Bone will look to add an assistant in the coming weeks that has recruiting contacts around the country. Hironaka can no longer recruit off-campus or give instruction during games, but his salary will remain the same.
  2. Sticking on the Palouse, the Cougars learned on Thursday that center Richard Peters out of Westwind Prep International did not qualify academically to make it to Washington State, and will instead pursue a junior college. However, this did not come with much surprise to the Cougar coaching staff. In anticipation of Peters not qualifying, Bone signed a pair of transfer centers in Jordan Railey and James Hunter in recent weeks. In addition to Railey and Hunter, signees for next season include guard Demarquise Johnson and forwards Richard Longrus and Brett Boese.
  3. Oregon State received great news earlier this week when it received an signed letter of intent from small forward Victor Robbins. Robbins was not pursued hard by the Beavers until after Jared Cunningham announced he would forgo his senior season, but the three-star out of Compton High saw a hole to fill and decided to spurn offers from Gonzaga, Washington, and Georgia. Robbins will be the first in line to fill the small forward/shooting guard role left by Cunningham, and his signing will free up shooting guard Roberto Nelson to work solely on his shot this summer.
  4. Robbins and the rest of the Beavers will start the 2012-13 season a little early by taking a summer trip to Spain and France. The trip will take place August 18-28, but most importantly the Beavers will receive 10 additional practices before flying to Europe. Those will be huge as the Beavers add four new players to this year’s roster (small forwards Robbins, Langston Morris-Walker, Jarmal Reid, and center Maika Ostling), along with a pair of players (forward Daniel Gomis and guard Michael Moyer) who sat out the 2011-12 season. One player who won’t be making the trip is forward Rhys Murphy. Murphy requested and was granted a release from his scholarship, and while he intends to graduate from Oregon State, he is reportedly “exploring his options”. The move is an odd one as Murphy was in line to get solid minutes this season. Oregon State’s last foreign trip came prior to the 2007-08 season, when the Beavers traveled to Italy and posted a 2-2 record. Prior to the 2002-03 season, former head coach Jay John led Oregon State to a 4-1 record in Australia in his first year with team. This season, the Beavers plan to several games against “very good teams” according to head coach Craig Robinson. In addition to the basketball, Robinson says “We are hoping that we can get a nice sort of team-bonding experience out of it, as well as some cultural nuances that the guys can look back on as great memories.” The Beavers have been known to incorporate basketball road trips with cultural/educational experiences, as last season the Beavers visited New York City and Washington D.C. in the middle of an 11-day East Coast trip.
  5. In other scheduling news, Arizona State will be playing real, official basketball games in the 2012 Las Vegas Invitational. The other seven teams in the field are Creighton, Arkansas, Wisconsin, Florida A&M, Cornell, Presbyterian, and Longwood. Before all eight teams head to Vegas, the four small/mid-major schools will play a pair of games at the four power conference teams. While in Vegas, the four lower schools will play a two-round tournament, as will the four power conference teams. The only known game for the Sun Devils so far is that Cornell will be traveling to Wells Fargo arena for one of the regional games. Cornell will also travel to Wisconsin.
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California: 2011-12 Post-Mortem

Posted by Connor Pelton on May 1st, 2012

Over the course of the next two weeks, the Pac-12 Microsite will break down each team’s season: what went well, what didn’t, and a look ahead at the future. Today’s subject: California.

What Went Wrong

Sophomore forward Richard Solomon was a key contributor when he was playing, but due to being suspended, injured, and then academically ineligible, Solomon only appeared in 13 games. His main contributions were on the glass, where he averaged 5.9 RPG, but he also added a not-too-shabby 5.6 PPG. The Golden Bears only lost two games with Solomon in uniform, and while that could very well be a useless stat, it should also be noted that the Bears dropped a game in each of Solomon’s brief absences early in the year. But besides the losses, his absence put more pressure on Harper Kamp on both sides of the ball, something Kamp did not handle well when facing bigger, talented teams like San Diego State, Arizona, and UNLV. Another big problem was the disappearance of junior guard Brandon Smith. A starter coming into the season, Smith was outperformed by Justin Cobbs in big games, which led to dwindling playing time and dwindling confidence. Smith only had six points and zero assists against Missouri early in the year, and after turning in a zero-point, two-assist performance against San Diego State, he completely fell off the map. Smith was needed the most late in the season as Cal’s shooting woes began, but by then he was buried deep on the bench and only played a combined 13 minutes in each of Cal’s final games, both 11-point losses.

Even Mike Montgomery had a tough time watching California's NCAA Tournament loss to South Florida. (credit: Doug Benc)

What Went Right

All three starters at guard could score consistently, with Cobbs, Jorge Gutierrez, and Allen Crabbe all averaging in double figures. The biggest (good) surprise of the season was the play of freshman forward David Kravish. Kravish immediately made a splash in the low post for the Golden Bears and would finish the season averaging 7.0 PPG and 5.7 RPG. He finished the season with nine games in which he scored in double-figures, but by playing in an already potent offense, his most important contributions would come on the glass. Kravish pulled down a monstrous 18 rebounds in Cal’s 75-49 win against USC to go with two other double-figure rebounding nights. Having your most consistent rebounder being just a freshman has the future looking bright for coach Mike Montgomery’s squad, especially at a position that the Bears haven’t always been very deep at the past few years.

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Oregon State: 2011-12 Post-Mortem

Posted by Connor Pelton on April 24th, 2012

Over the course of the next two weeks, the Pac-12 Microsite will break down each team’s season: what went well, what didn’t, and a look ahead at the future. Today’s subject: Oregon State.

What Went Wrong

The calendar turned to February. In a month that can make or break seasons, the Beavers went 1-6. And it wasn’t as if they were playing bad basketball; they did compete and make games close. But when you are on a multiple-game skid it’s tough to finally break through, and the Beavers could just never do that. Of course, there were some key reasons as to why it all went south so quickly, mainly youth, inconsistency, and inexperience. Junior forward/point center Joe Burton lost all sense of touch in his usual silky, smooth offensive game, leading to what appeared to be a rift between he and coach Craig Robinson. Sophomore shooting guard Roberto Nelson had a few good games throughout conference play, but you can’t have your purest shooter on the roster only scoring one and four points against teams like Washington and Oregon. It was that type of inconsistent offensive production that made the Beavers a tough to figure out team throughout Pac-12 play.

After Robinson decided that screaming at his players did not work, the coach directed his anger at the basketball itself. (credit: Victor Decolongon)

What Went Right

The calendar turned to March, and the Beavers turned into a basketball team. Oregon State began the month with a pair of dominant wins over the Rocky Mountain schools before traveling to Los Angeles for the Pac-12 Tournament. While there, the Beavers played their best basketball since November as they began the tournament with wins over both Washington schools. That set up a semifinal game with fourth-seeded Arizona, and while the Beavers played well (leading by as many as eight points), fatigue caught up with them midway through the second half. Despite the setback against the Wildcats, Oregon State bounced back with a pair of huge wins against solid competition in the first two rounds of the CBI. The season would eventually end with a loss to Washington State in the CBI semifinals, but a 6-2 month of March was nothing to be ashamed about for Robinson’s Beavers.

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Oregon: 2011-12 Post-Mortem

Posted by Connor Pelton on April 19th, 2012

Over the course of the next two weeks, the Pac-12 Microsite will break down each team’s season: what went well, what didn’t, and a look ahead at the future. Today’s subject: Oregon.

What Went Wrong

The Ducks couldn’t win a big game. Oregon went 1-7 against 2012 NCAA Tournament teams, and if they could have won just two or three more of those games they could have been playing in the NCAAs, instead of the NIT, in March.

Moves like Dana (credit: Nati Harnik)

What Went Right

Despite Oregon’s struggles to win games against top opponents, they won most of the rest. And because of that, they found themselves on the NCAA Tournament bubble heading into Championship Week. A main reason for Oregon’s second place finish in the Pac-12 was the play of Minnesota transfer Devoe Joseph. Expected to be just a role player before the season began, Joseph proved that he belonged from his opening minutes against Fresno State on December 10. The senior guard out of Ontario, Canada, finished the season with a team high 16.6 PPG, good enough to garner a spot on the All-Pac-12 first team. As a surprise, Joseph and fellow Toronto senior Olu Ashaolu were honored on Senior Day with the playing of O Canada before the game began.

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