FBCB - Lafayette Leopards
 

The 2009-10 college basketball season has come to an end, and the Lafayette Leopards are in need of a new coach after the retirement of head coach Frank Romo.

In the 7 seasons Romo was at Lafayette, the Leopards had finished over .500 in the Patriot league just once, and never finished over .500 overall.

Overall, the Leopards had some success in the 70s, but have never been a serious power.

My coach card. As per usual I weighted myself heavily towards recruiting, but I've invested more points in scouting than I usually do, as the recruiting pool appears a bit deeper in this version. There are some steals to be had if you read the stats correctly and scout the right guys, so some points in this category should hopefully help here.

2010-11 Coaching Staff

These guys are all horrible, so not really worth discussing too much - all level 0 guys with a 4 in the key attributes for their role. All have been at the school for several years, and all have 1 year remaining on their $30k contracts. The unfortunate reality is that it will likely be some time before we are able to hire anyone better.

2010-11 Roster


Sheesh. Coach Romo sure liked recruiting Cs and PGs, and his final recruiting class was 3 Cs and a PF! Most of the team's talent - if that's the right term for it - lies in the backcourt. Delarosa, West, Wargo, and Loggins are going to be logging big minutes. Despite the youth in the frontcourt (including some 3-star freshmen), there are no real standouts. There's potential, but it's unlikely we have the coaches or facilities to take advantage of it.

2010-11 Recruiting

I like my teams to play inside-out, with one big guy who can put points up, and 3 guys on the perimeter who can shoot the 3. My first goal was to find myself a big guy who can play that scorer role, and I think we managed to do that here:


Markley isn't a great rebounder or post defender, but I think he's going to wind up being a very good scorer for us. I'm very happy that we were able to land him at all as, after leading on him right through to November, Columbia suddenly became his top school after giving him an offer. A furious last-stand in recruiting ensured he came our way however! My scouting isn't terrific, but he shows as a red/blue guy for us right now.

Up next I wanted to get a solid PG - a must for me - but I resisted that temptation and went for a wing instead. I had a few 3-star guys interested early on until the bigger schools came along, so I went for a promising looking 2-star guy:


He's not a superstar, but looks like he could develop into a nice 3pt shooter and defender. I'm hoping his hands are better than the 3/D grading. He scouts a red/green for us.

2010-11 Results

Well, the 'Print' button doesn't seem to work from the Team Schedule screen unfortunately.

We finished the season 15-15 (7-7), which overall makes it Lafayette's best season since 2000. We also managed to meet the AD expectations, which was to reach .500 in Patriot League play. I can't take too much credit for it however as I just left all depth charts and strategy up to my assistant coaches while I concentrated on bringing in talent through recruiting. :)

It went down how I expected however, with the backcourt foursome of West-Delarosa-Wargo-Loggins leading the way, while freshman PF John Parker played well and earnt the Patriot League Freshman of the Year and Freshman All-Conference team.


We lose Wargo's and McAndrew's post-play, but everyone else returns.

2010-11 Around the League

Just a quick look at the rest of the Patriot league and NCAA division 1 world.

Holy Cross won the regular season Patriot League crown but fell in the first round of the conference tournament, where #5 seed Colgate thrash Bucknell 77-45 in the final to qualify for the NCAA Tournament, earning the #15 seed in the East Region, losing in the first round to Mississippi State.



The 2010 NCAA Tournament Final Four saw two #2 seeds - Villanova & Arizona State - going up against some lowly-seeded teams from high profile schools, Arizona and Illinois. The #2 seeds won both games fairly comfortably however, and Arizona State goes on to beat Villanova 98-69 in the final behind senior SG Horace Campbell's 22 points for the Sun Devils' second championship in 5 years.

(argh, thanks to iTunes crashing my PC, I had to re-run that final four. Thankfully all the results stayed the same outside of the exact scorelines!)

2011-12 Season

Well, our AD is delighted after we reached expectations. That's good. Our prestige LEAPED from 10 to 11. That's pretty OK. Our freshmen class is ranked #245. That's.... not so good!

Prized recruit Reed Markley is now an orange/green and took a hit in some key areas, but still looks to be a good scorer. Charles Flores, however, isn't the defender we thought he'd be, and actually has WORSE hands than we had feared. Still, he can shoot it and will earn time here. He's a dreaded red/yellow now.

2011-12 Coaching Staff

Our coaches are still all under contract so we'll keep them around one more year then see if I can't make small improvements at each position.

2011-12 Roster

Again I expect most of the scoring to come out of the backcourt, though I will feature Markley as a key player inside. I've had a lot of success in single-player FBCB by force-feeding my bigs inside, so I'm hoping that carries over into this particular dynasty. I'm going to tweak around with the depth charts and strategy this season, rather than leave it all up to the assistants.
Recuiting-wise, we have 4 scholarship players graduating this season, but the key guys to replace are my two SFs Loggins and West. I'll be aiming for two wing players who can shoot 3s and defend and a PG who has safe hands and can hit the 3 as well. If possible I'd like to also land a defense/rebounds guy to play next to Markley.

Enjoying this, keep it up!!!

2011-12 Recruiting

Welp, it was a very difficult year for recruiting. One of the advantages to being located in Pennsylvania is our proximity to the NJ and NY recruits, so we have a fair few 3-star guys with very high interest in us to begin the year. Realising that their interest will likely fall once other schools get involved, I target a few 3-star swingmen but concentrate largely on 2-star guys rated in the 500-700ish range.

Disappointingly, we lead the entire way on two 2-star SGs who both scout red/blue for us, yet lose them to Ivy league schools.

We do manage to land a 3-star guy though, albeit not a star:


Pepper scouts as only a red/yellow, but I think he should be a solid-if-unspectacular rotation guy. Believe it or not his scouted 4 PRD rating would've made him far-and-away the best perimeter defender in the starting 5 if he'd played last year.

We lost out on numerous 2-star guys, eventually settling late in the recruiting season for a 2-star PG who will likely play SG for us:


Alanis scouts as a red/blue, but I think he'll be a red/yellow. Another rotation player.

You know it's been a tough recruiting year when you find yourself frantically scrambling through 1-star guys as the season wears down, and our final recruit of the year fits that description nicely:


Scouts as a red/yellow and has fairly balanced ratings for a guy rated so low, which leads me to think he'll drop dramatically. His lack of skill on D should fit in nicely with the rest of my guards! Red/yellow.

We scouted a ton of 1-star guys to use the fourth scholarship on but saw no one worth giving a scholarship to, so we'll save it for next season where we can hopefully use it on someone worthwhile.

2011-12 Results

Once again we schedule a cupcake non-conference schedule and finish .500 again overall and in conference play at 16-16 (7-7), once again meeting our AD's expectations.

Offensively we were the best team in the Patriot League and top-100 overall, scoring 75.8 points a game. Defensively we were woeful, giving up a Patriot League worst and #322 overall 77.7 a night. We have exactly one decent defensive player in our starting 5, sophomore PF John Parker. Everyone else is terrible on that end of the court.


The loss of West and Loggins is going to hurt next season.

2011-12 Graduations

As I said above, we lose a couple of good scorers in West and Loggins. The other guys are easily replaced.

2011-12 Around the League

Colgate were the #1 seed in the conference tournament, but we managed to upset them on our surprising trip to the conference tournament final, where we were defeated by #3 seed Holy Cross 88-76 despite Reed Markley's 22 point 11 rebound effort. Holy Cross earnt the #15 seed in the Midwest Region of the NCAA Tournament and played #2 seed Oregon close, losing 78-70.

We had a number of guys pick up awards this season.

There were no Cinderella stories in this season's Final Four, with #1 seed Villanova taking on #3 seed reigning champions Arizona State, and #1 seed Louisville taking on #2 seed Maryland. Both #1 seeds advanced, with Villanova winning comfortably 91-71 over Louisville, behind a big 27 point 14 rebound night from senior SF Dallas McKinley. It was the school's 2nd win in 5 seasons, and their 7th championship overall; an NCAA record.

2012-13 Season

Our prestige leaps forward again, up to 12! Our recruit class ranking is slightly improved this year, ranking #239 overall, and our AD remains delighted that we hit .500.

Of the incoming freshmen, 2-star guard Chuck Alanis actually turns out to be orange/green and the most talented of the three. 3-star Pepper is a bit of a disappointment, especially defensively where he turns out to be a 2/F rather than 4/D, which is a pretty big slide. 2-star Gadson really sucks on D as well (2/F) but the rest of his ratings pretty much hold up and he will get court time.

2012-13 Coaching Staff

We actually try and upgrade our recruiting and scouting assistant coaches this season, but it's hard to do with only 30k to spend on each. We end up getting 2 guys who are equally as bad as the guys we let go, losing out on the numerous upgrades we offered money to.

2012-13 Transfers

We lose walk-on sophomore PF Charles Gillespie, which is no real loss. With one scholarship free we draw a little interest from 3 players looking to transfer. The only one of interest is 6-7 sophomore SF Robinson Roan, a 3-star recruit to New Mexico State who didn't hit the court at all last season. We offer him a scholarship, but he heads to Notre Dame instead.

Definitely following along here... Lafayette is the home town school here, and I work right by their campus.

2012-13 Roster


Post-camp it looks like things are going to be similar to last season - we are going to score a ton of points, but also give up a ton more on the other end. Markley is looking great as a sophomore and a backcourt of Delarosa and the freshmen Alanis and Pepper gives us some serious firepower from long range. We are going to shoot a ton of 3s this season, while also feeding Markley inside.

Depth isn't a great strength for us, but if we can stay healthy and the freshmen play OK we should hit .500 or above this year, which is all the AD is asking of us once again.

2012-13 Recruiting

My goal this recruiting season was to bring in a true PG and some depth in the frontcourt.

I went a slightly different route this season by opting to look at JuCo players. 3-star JuCos aren't as hotly recruited at the beginning of the season, so it's a little bit easier to land these guys than regular 3-star players, though the downside is that they obviously aren't around as long which is a problem when you're trying to build a program from the ground up.

Still, I think we found guys that are going to help us. The first being:


Castro is a strong 3pt shooter, safe ball handler, and though his PRD rating will probably fall due to scouting error, he looks OK there. A 4/C would be nice. He scouts as a red/green and could be a very handy scorer for us over his two years on campus, even if his position wasn't exactly a need for us.

For our 2nd scholarship we really wanted a PG, and after missing out on a couple of young 2-stars with potential we went the JuCo route once again:


Dietrich is not the 3pt shooter I'd like him to be, but steady hands and balanced ratings makes him a nice pickup. He scouts as a orange/blue, and will tide us over until we are able to find a young talent at PG.

To shore up our inside we wanted to grab a PF/C guy who can come in and grab some boards and defend:


Yarber isn't at all spectacular but he looks like he can be a solid backup guy for us, good for 10-15 mins of bench duty. Scouts as a red/orange.

We didn't have a whole lot of options outside of these 3 guys, so I elected to use my final scholarship on a bit of a flyer:


Diller likely drops significantly, but his stats hint that his hands might be better than expected. I probably should have kept the scholarship and hoped for a transfer next season or something, but we'll see how he turns out. Scouts merely as a red/red.

2012-13 Results

It was a very, very disappointing season for Lafayette, as we finish just 13-17 (5-9). Defensively we were better, holding teams to 70.8ppg, but we scored less ourselves at just 67.5ppg. We were regularly out-rebounded, didn't force enough turnovers, and turned it over far to much ourselves.

To make matters worse, our stud inside man Reed Markley makes the stunning decision to turn pro following the season! He had a good year and made the All-Conference First Team, but he's just the 48th ranked sophomore in the nation! Crazy.

Outside of Markley, Delarosa had a decent senior season, though he turned the ball over too much for my liking, but was always really a SG playing PG anyway. Alanis had a decent debut and Pepper was quiet but is capable of more I believe.


Losing Markley is a major, major blow for us. I did not expect it at all and I have very few options to replace his offence next season.

2012-13 Around the League

Colgate again earned the #1 seed in the conference tournament, while we managed just #7. Going up against the defensively-minded Lehigh we struggled mightily, falling 63-48 to put an end to a disappointing season. #1 Colgate faced off against #2 Lehigh in the final and squeezed out a narrow 52-51 win. Colgate was awarded the #15 seed in the Midwest division, but fell in the first round to Kansas State 87-75.


In another Final Four with no #1 seeds, #2 Vanderbilt took on #5 Illinois, while #2 Maryland went up against #7 TCU. Both #2 seeds won by 10 points, and Maryland then went on to defeat Vanderbilt in a high scoring 100-93 game. It is Maryland's 2nd championship, with the other coming back in 2008.

2012-13 Graduations

I'm too angry to even comment on Markley's decision to turn pro. I fully expect him to go undrafted. In two seasons he was a force for us, and if he'd stuck around I imagine we'd have turned things around very quckly.

Delarosa didn't have the greatest of seasons for us and was a very inefficient scoring option, despite his high points tally.

2013-14 Season

Our prestige takes a hit again, falling back to its starting level of 10. We get some good news however as our recruiting class is our best yet by far, rated #176.

The AD is no longer delighted with us after last season, and are merely satisfied.

Of the JuCo recruits, Dietrich is about as expected. He's not a 3pt shooter but he's a better defender than we've had at the position (4/C) and shouldn't turn it over like Delarosa did. He's a yellow/green. SG Castro also comes in with good ratings and is the best defender on the team to boot. Orange/green. Both guys will feature heavily for us.

2-star PF Yarber comes in looking, well, like a 2-star PF. He's pretty average across the board and not the defender or rebounder we had hoped for. Red/orange. 1-star project PG Michael Dill is a pleasant surprise however! His hands are as bad as feared (5/D), but his shooting is OK and he has the makings of a spot-minutes backup combo-guard. Red/yellow.

Unsurprisingly, we learn that Reed Markley goes undrafted during the offseason....

2013-14 Coaching Staff

We make some more changes to our staff this season. Our recruiting assistant actually had a higher scout rating (5) than our scout coach, so we sack our scout, move the recruiting guy to scouting, and try and sign a better recruiter. We aren't able to do that however so we're stuck with a 4 recruiter again, though at least our scouting has improved.

2013-14 Transfers

We lose two walkon Sophomores who won't be missed, and have 1 scholarship (...Markley's...) to try our luck on the Transfer stage. There is only one guy who is interested in us and worth grabbing, SF Harold Tanguay from Seton Hall. He projects as a PF for us and a pretty decent one, but we'd only get him for one season so once again we make no moves in this phase.

2013-14 Roster

It's going to be an interesting season. We're going to have to hit a ton of threes if we want to hit .500 this season I fear. Defensively we are pretty solid inside and our guards are improved in that area too, even if none of them will be taking any All-Defensive player of the year awards home.

2013-14 Recruiting

Sheesh, another tough season of recruiting! I'm finding it tougher going recruiting with a school like this than I did in the previous version of the game, which is definitely a good thing. Well, maybe not such a good thing as far as my career at Lafayette is concerned!

I was in dire need of inside players and went after just about every 3-star and 2-star big guys with High interest or greater. Unfortunately, as per usual, we lost out on options 1 through about 6, most of which happened at the first signing period. Frustrating.

With 5 scholarships, I'd hoped to get 3 bigs, a swingman, and a PG. Instead, I managed just 2 bigs and nothing else. I had some 1-star options at the end, but none appeared worth the price of a scholarship. We are going to be a very, very shallow team next season up front!

The best rated big we got was this 2-star C:
Greenwood is a fairly one-dimensional player, but that's fine. I'm desperate for both size and inside scoring, and Greenwood gives me that. I'm sure his ratings will drop and disappoint me, but as far as Plan D's go in the recruiting game, I could do worse. He's a red/green.

Up next is the some-what less exciting 1-star pickup:
With options running out fast I trawled the 1-star bigs, and Carrier was the best guy without an offer. Again, one-dimensional, but he has great size and, importantly, good ratings inside and stamina. I'm sure he drops, but he's a red/green right now.

2013-14 Results

It was an inconsistent year for us, as expected. Teams that live by the three usually die by the three as well, and with no big inside presence to take pressure off our shooters, we had games where we couldn't hit the side of a barn.

Our goal of reaching .500 in Patriot League play hit a serious bump in the road after a 4 game losing streak, but we went on to win 2 of our last 3 to finish the season a clean .500 and extend my career at Lafayette for at least another few season! Overall we end the year just under .500 overall, at 15-16 (7-7).

Sophomore SG Chuck Alanis was our star, and shot the ball over 50% from inside the arc and amazingly just a touch under 50% from outside. Byrd and Parker did their best to give us an inside presence, but overall offence was just not our strong point. We put up just 64.9PPG (#288 overall), largely a result of how much we relied on outside shooting. Having said that, having two strong post defenders in Byrd and Parker and an improved perimeter defender in JuCo Paul Dietrich helped our defense dramatically, as we allowed just 66.3PPG (#54 overall, #3 in the Patriot League).


Not counting the walk-on, we have just 1 big returning next season.

2013-14 Around the League

We earnt 4th place in the conference tourney, took down Bucknell 64-55 in the first round thanks to a big night from Chuck Alanis, but were handily defeated by #1 seed Navy in the 2nd round. Navy would go on to defeat #3 Army in the final and earn the #16 seed in the South Region where they were unsurprisingly defeated easily be #1 Duke.


In the Final Four we had two #4 seeds taking on two #1 seeds. Both #4 seeds advanced to the final with Boston College taking down Duke, and Connecticut taking down Mississippi State. Boston College then defeats Connecticut 81-57 thanks largely to a 21 point 18 rebound effort from their super soph bigman Caleb Garza for the school's third Championship, and first since 2004.

2013-14 Graduations

I'm going to leave out the fringe players from the graduation posts. Basically this year we lost a whole heap of size. Parker and Bird were both talented pivots who will not be easy to replace next season.

2014-15 Season

Our prestige slowly climbs upwards to 11. Our recruiting class is about as badly rated as expected - #296. At least we are "cool" as far as the Hot Seat goes. Probably a good thing considering the lack of success we've had recruiting!

Somewhat surprisingly Greenwood, our 2-star C recruit, looks as good as advertised. A 7/B inside and 4/C jumper make him a weapon inside, and his D and shot blocking are both better than expected. He'll never be a big rebounder for us however. Still a red/green.

1-star giant Phillip Carrier is nothing to write home about, but a 5/B inside and blocks and high stamina makes him a decent backup if nothing else. He also surprisingly remains a red/green though if he ever reaches even yellow I'll be shocked.

2014-15 Coaching Staff

We sit tight with our dodgy level 0 staff. :)

2014-15 Transfer Period

We have 3 scholarships available for transfers, we have a little bit of interest from 5 guys, 4 of them PFs. Jerome McCluskey, a junior PF from Drexel, is the best of the bunch with pretty average ratings across the board. We make him an offer, and also give an offer to sophomore PF Terrence Roth from Jackson State. Not the scorer McCluskey is, but Roth can rebound the ball better and handles it like a guard.

Both players accept! Neither is a star but they give me some insurance if I'm not able to land a talent big or two this recruiting season. They are forced to redshirt and will be with us next season.

2014-15 Roster

Well, we are even more backcourt-weighted this year than last. Inside we are going to be forced to start freshman Jose Greenwood with sophomore Yarber. Greenwood is a fringe-starter, but Yarber was never intended to be a big-minutes guy. In the backcourt we are mostly OK but will be relying on continued progression from our shooters.

I really need to recruit a replacement PG and a starting quality PF/C this year.

Following along with this. Great stuff so far, keep it up! Tell

2013-14 Recruiting

A mixed season of recruiting, as has become custom! We very nearly landed 2 3-star orange/blues - one a scoring SG, the other a scoring JuCo PF, both who would've been perfect in my system. Unfortunately we lost out to Seton Hall and Boston University.

We were luckier with our plan Bs and Cs this year however. The highest rated of our recruits was this 2-star PG:


Despite being rated our highest recruit (#654 overall), out of the 3 players we signed he is perhaps the one I'm least excited about, and projects as a steady backup. Red/yellow.

We dipped into the JuCo pool again for recruit #2:

Walker is a pretty one-dimensional, blue-collar kind of guy. Another stop-gap for inside while we again continue to try and get our hands on the kind of dominant PF/C that has elluded me since Markley left early! Red/yellow.

The last 2 scholarships were used on 1-star guys, but I think they are pretty OK as far as 1-star guys go:
Despite his low ranking, I think Comeaux is a likely starter for me, especially if his 3pt rating holds up. Not a great defender, but hey, down this low in the recruit rankings you're lucky if you get a guy that's above average in 2 categories, so we're happy. Red/yellow.

And last, and maybe least:
We probably have too many bigs now - none of them particularly great - but I liked Jackman's scouted ratings. Physically he's sub-par, but he is a decent rotation guy for a program like ours. Red/orange.

2014-15 Results

We finished the cupcake non-conference games and entered Patriot League play at 8-7. It was then that our hopes of hitting .500 took a big blow as we started 0-3 in conference play, and then lost freshman big Carrier to academic suspension and starting PF Yarber to injury for over a month. With zero depth inside, we were forced to start little-used senior SF Charles Flores - a guy who rebounds like Muggsy Bogues, handles the ball like Yinka Dare, and shoots 3s like Anthony Morrow - at PF. Despite the injury/suspension woes and incredibly undersized frontcourt, we fought hard and thanks to a terrific February that saw us go 6-1 we finished with our best season yet, 16-14 (8-6)!

Alanis was again our leader at SG, though Pepper and, in particular, senior PG Dietrich both stepped it up as well. Freshman Greenwood did about what was expected of him and Yarber wasn't as bad as he could've been.

The real keys to our success this season (relatively speaking) was the fact that we looked after the ball (12.3 topg, #1 in the Patriot League), shot the 3 at a nice clip, and played surprisingly solid D. It was a real team effort!

2014-15 Around The League

We earned the #4 seed (again) in the conference tournament, but fell to #5 seed Lehigh 75-66, despite Pepper having a big 23 point 9 rebound night for us. Lehigh would then go on to defeat #1 seed Army in the 2nd round, before upsetting #2 Holy Cross in the final 73-71. They earned the #16 seed in the Midwest, falling to #1 seed Baylor 71-42.

We had several players rewarded for our good season, and I picked up the Patriot League Coach of the Year award!


Again, no #1 seeds made it through to the Final Four this season. #2 Oklahoma State fell to #3 Texas Tech, while #2 Mississippi State took down #3 UCLA to advance to the finals. Mississippi State would go on to win 59-48 thanks to a balanced scoring effort with 4 players in double-digits. It is Mississippi State's 4th ever championship, but the first since way back in 1983.

2014-15 Graduations

Well, it's the first season where I'm graduating guys I recruited.

PG Dietrich did well for us a JuCo quick-fix, and really stepped up his game as a senior. His 3pt shooting was supposed to be below-average but he rode a season-long hot streak to finish the year at a pretty impressive .381 considering his rating:

Castro, our other JuCo recruit, probably should've got more time, but served us well as a backup PG/SG/SF. An impressively efficient scorer (more so last year than this year) and strong defender, his bench pressence will be missed:

I really, really hate turnovers. If Flores had been a better handler, he'd have seen an awful lot more court time, because he was skilled. Filling in as a PF this season for us, he did better than I expected him to:

2015-16 Season

Our prestige is back up to 12, and our recruiting class ranks #263. I was hoping to get some bonus coaching points after my award but alas, it's not to be!

Our recruits are all about as expected. Not highly regarded, but all worthy of minutes. Got some interesting decisions to make regarding our rotation this year, especially inside and at PG.

2015-16 Coaching Staff

Once again, no changes.

2015-16 Transfer Period

We have zero scholarships available this time around, thanks to our semi-competent recruiting last season!

2015-16 Roster
(note: accidentally ran the career stats print-out after simming the first game of the season)

We opt to start the season with the same frontcourt as last season, as I don't think any of the new guys we brought in are good enough to displace Yarber or Greenwood unfortunately. Pepper and Alanis will once again lead us from the wings, while at PG we are going to start that promising 1-star PG we nabbed a few seasons ago, junior Michael Dill. Dill is a strong 3pt shooter and can run an offense, but he's a sieve on D and doesn't have the best hands either. He will be pushed by 1-star freshman Comeaux if turnovers become an issue.

We are going to play a mid-paced offence with low motion, and shoot an absolute ton of 3s. On D we stick with the m2m, heavily doubling outside players due to the lack of defensive ability we have on the perimeter.

I'm predicting another .500ish kinda season.

2015-16 Recruiting

Unless my scouts are off, I think I pulled off a bit of a recruiting coup this year. It was actually one of the easier recruiting phases I've had so far as we had numerous guys remain "very high", even a couple of decent 3-star PFs and Cs. But we really needed swingmen as we graduate 3 wing players this year - Pepper and Alanis included - so I instead focused on a couple of lower rated guys who figure to be pretty perfect for my "All 3s/No D" system.

First up is Vaughn Audet, a 2-star guy out of Maryland. I wouldn't be surprised to see his hands rating drop, but he appears pretty balanced (defence aside), and looks to be a replacement for Pepper at SF. Red/yellow, which seems low:
Rated about 80 spots below Audet was local PA boy Lon Vaughn. Vaughn is a terrific 3pt shooter, doesn't turn the ball over, and looks to be my starting SG next season. Scouts as red/green:
Finally, we nabbed 1-star SF David Via out of NY. Looking at his stats I believe his hands rating will drop to a 3/D, but if he comes out looking close to how we've scouted him, he's a real steal at #909 I think:

I went to John Jay High School, so I'm now David Via's biggest fan and I will be demanding that he gets significant playing time. ;) Fun read Groundhog, thanks for doing it-helping me get a read on what to do and not do in the new game.

:D

Next season all 3 freshmen will be fighting it out for the starting SG & SF spots, with the guy who doesn't make it getting significant minutes at both spots off the bench, so I think your boy Via will be getting some burn, don't worry. ;)

2015-16 Results

Once again we were inconsistent in pre-conference games, and entered Patriot League play just 8-7 against a cupcake schedule, as expected.

Things suddenly got dramatically better for us in conference play however, and we won a ridiculous 7 games in a row! Just when I was starting to get excited and thought the Patriot League was ours for the taking, we dropped 6 of our next 7 games to come crashing on back to Earth. D'oh.

What went wrong? Well, we were an efficient offensive team this season - our 1.37 Points Per Shot ranked 3rd in the nation (accounted largely by how good our guys are from long range), and we ranked in the top half of the conference in every statistical category related to putting the ball in the hoop. What we didn't do was force turnovers (#347) or block any shots (#293).

Our D was actually surprisingly good in every other way, as we didn't give up a ton of points or let the opposition shoot a high % from anywhere, but without any real kind of capability of forcing the opposition into turnovers I think we lost too many close games, especially the games where we didn't shoot the ball so well.

As expected Alanis and Pepper were big for us once again. Alanis had some big scoring nights and was always an efficient option for us, while Pepper shot the ball better but generally it was his all-round game that we relied on most from him.

Greenwood gave us points from inside but is far too one-dimensional a player, and Yarber was solid if unspectacular.

The most pleasant surprise for us was PG Michael Dill. He's more of a scoring guard than a PG but put up solid numbers for us, and more than justified the scholarship we risked on him a few seasons ago. Dill's backup, freshman Mark Comeaux, had an impressive debut and may start next to Dill next season if our freshmen don't live up to their ratings.

2015-16 Around the League

Even despite our big slide, we picked up the #3 seed in the conference tourney, my best result yet. We took care of Holy Cross in the first round, but were humiliated by #2 Army in the second round 65-39, bringing an unfortunate end to Pepper and Alanis' time at Lafayette. #1 Bucknell downed #2 Army in the final 74-66, earning the #16 seed in the West Region. They played #1 seed Iowa closer than the Hawkeyes would've liked, yet still fall 87-79.


In the Final Four #1 Clemson defeat #3 Boston College 87-69, and faced #1 Illinois who had beaten #3 Auburn 98-81. In the Final Clemson downed the Fighting Illini 82-51 for the school's first ever championship.