HB Arnett’s

COUGAR SPORTSLINE

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Vol. 32, Issue 22 – December 19, 2011

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BEARS DROP BYU IN MARRIOTT CENTER 86-83 IN COULD HAVE, SHOULD HAVE, BUT DIDN'T WIN GAME

Too many missed free throws, coupled with too many unforced turnovers and not enough clutch shots falling when the game was on the line were all responsible for BYU's nice try, but no-cigar loss to the Baylor Bears last Saturday afternoon in Provo.

There certainly was no home cooking in this 86-83 loss for the Cougars, but that is what you get when you follow the referee recipe provided by the Big 12 officiating crew.

That gave the game an interesting flavor and aroma, but it still boiled down to the lack of the three key ingredients needed for BYU to bake and baste Baylor for an upset.

Again, in case you weren't paying attention, missed free throws, turnovers at inopportune times and lack of crucial clutch shots with the game on the line were certainly factors in the loss, but are all secondary to BYU dropping to 8-3 on the year.

The two primary reasons for this hard fought, but losing effort for Dave Rose and his Cougars can be summarized in two words: Talent and timing.

Baylor has more talent and their timing of putting that talent on display in the second half of this game was impeccable.

BYU has some talent of its own. Brandon Davies finished an incredible game with 18 points and 13 rebounds. Despite his outstanding effort, Baylor's Perry Jones III was better. He finished with 28 points and 8 rebounds. He was at his best in the crucial last minutes with the game on the line.

While Davies is good, there was a reason that Utah Jazz General Manager Kevin O'Conner was at the game. He wasn't there to watch Davies, but sophomore Jones, who will more than likely be a lottery pick in next April's NBA draft.

While Brandon Davies will never be a lottery pick, his effort against a very athletic Baylor front line, helped cement his name on the NBA radar as a guy that can play. The only question on him is still timing.

Actually timing is not accurate; the question on him is still consistency. When he shows up, he is very, very good. When he doesn't, which seems to be against teams of a lesser quality, his play is just a notch above ordinary.

BYU did get some nice timing from Matt Carlino in his first appearance as a Cougar. He netted 18 points in his debut, but also had some costly turnovers when the timing couldn't be worse. More on him later.

The Cougars shot just 60 percent from the charity stripe. So did Baylor, but BYU has made a living at the line in years past. Ten percentage points better from the foul line and BYU gets the win against Baylor.

Speaking of timing, the knee injury to Stephen Rogers, couldn't have come at a worse time last week with Baylor on the horizon. Rogers would have helped with his outside shooting and more importantly, with his free throw shooting. Rogers, after surgery for a torn meniscus, is expected to miss at least three weeks, and possibly four, before returning to the court in his role as a sixth man.

Rogers certainly isn't sixth when it comes to the minutes played and points produced ratio on the team. Look below for more on the points produced per minutes played ratio this season for BYU players.

The Cougars get back in the saddle with two more home games this coming week. They will face Buffalo on Tuesday and face a very good UC Santa Barbara club on Thursday, Dec 22.

Buffalo is currently 6-2 on the year. Their two losses came against Princeton on the road and against St. Bonaventure at Buffalo.

UCSB is 5-3 on the year. Their three losses came against San Diego State and UNLV. The SDSU game was a 75-76 overtime loss at home and an 88-94 double overtime loss to UNLV in Santa Barbara. The third loss was 80-87 at Washington against the Huskies.

Both games will tip off at 7 p.m. and will be televised live on BYUtv.

PPPMP

It stands for points produced per minutes played. We are not sure if it proves anything, but we still found it interesting when we took a look at it for this season.

Here is what we found.

Matt Carlino leads the list in scoring for BYU in this category. It is not totallyvalid yet, because he hasn't played enough games to see if his current points per game per minutes played production will continue at the current rate.

Here is where BYU is right now as a team this season with their top ten players on the roster. We also are including rebounds grabbed per minute played.

Matt Carlino - .75 points and .04 rebounds per minute played

Noah Hartsock - .52 points and .20 rebounds per minute played

Stephen Rogers - .50 points and .11 rebounds per minute played

Charles Abouo - .47 points and .27 rebounds per minute played

Brandon Davies - .43 points and .27 rebounds per minute played

D. Harrison - .41 points and .08 rebounds per minute played

Nate Austin - .41 points and .30 rebounds per minutes played

Brock Zylstra - .30 points and .13 rebounds per minute played

Anson Winder - .21 points and .08 rebounds per minute played

Craig Cusick - .17 points and .09 rebounds per minute played

For what it is worth, here are the pppmp stats for the five starters in the three games BYU has lost this season.

Utah State

Brandon Davies - .54 points and .20 rebounds per minute played

Noah Hartsock - .50 points and .13 rebounds per minute played

Charles Abouo - .44 points and .16 rebounds per minute played

Stephen Rogers - .24 points and .00 rebounds per minute played

Brock Zylstra - .06 points and .09 rebounds per minute played

Wisconsin

Noah Hartsock - .46 points and .15 rebounds per minute played

Brandon Davies - .30 points and .13 rebounds per minute played

Brock Zylstra - .18 points and .22 rebounds per minute played

Charles Abouo - .17 points and .11 rebounds per minute played

Anson Winder - .00 points and .00 rebounds per minute played

Baylor

Charles Abouo - .77 points and .40 rebounds per minute played

Brandon Davies - .50 points and .36 rebounds per minute played

Noah Hartsock - .40 points and .13 rebounds per minute played

Craig Cusick - .11 points and .00 rebounds per minute played

Brock Zylstra - .10 points and .18 rebounds per minute played

I am not a statistician, but I don't have to be a certified number cruncher to see that in BYU losses, they are coming up short on the guard line in general and at the two guard spot in particular.

Maybe that is why during the Baylor game, we saw Dave Rose go with Craig Cusick at the point and move Matt Carlino to the two spot. We expect to see much more of that in the future.

For a reference in how deficient the pppmp ratio is at the guard line this season compared to last year, here are the numbers for Jimmer Fredette and Jackson Emery. Granted, these numbers are not normal because of the not normal status of Fredette. Never the less, the comparison is dramatic compared to the current guard numbers for this season.

Jimmer Fredtte - .81 points and .09 rebounds per minute played

Jackson Emery - .38 points and .10 rebounds per minute played

Just a footnote for next season. While it remains to be seen if Tyler Haws, upon his return from a mission to the Phillipines, will play the 3 or move over to the 2, we do know from his pppmp ratio as a freshman that he will be a big boost to the Cougar's starting lineup.

Here are Haws pppmp numbers as a freshman from the 2009-2010 season.

Tyler Haws - .43 points and .15 rebounds per minute played.

BYU POINT GUARDS, PAST AND PRESENT, MAKE NICE DEBUTS

Matt Carlino, in his debut performance as a Cougar, did not disappoint. Neither did Jimmer Fredette in his NBA debut against the Golden State Warriors in a preseason game.

Carlino, in just 24 minutes of play, scored 18 points and kept the Cougars in the game in the hotly contested second half.

He lived up to Dave Rose's billing of Carlino as a shooter and creative scorer.

After the loss, Rose said of Carliino that he simply needs more experience.

"That's what all young players need. They need to be in those situations. I can remember a few years ago in a game up at Utah. We had a wide-open 3 from Jimmer to win the game. We missed it, and we go into overtime and lose. What made him better? He played a lot more," said Rose.

In Jimmer Fredette's debut performance in his first real NBA action, the 10th pick of the NBA draft didn't disappoint either.

He netted 21 points against the Golden State Warriors Saturday night in Oakland. He played 35 minutes.

During that time he was 7-11 from the field, including 4-6 from three-point range. He was only 3-6 from the free throw line, however, but did grab 4 rebounds.

"He's a basketball player, said Kings' Head Coach Paul Westphal of Jimmer. “He understands what he's doing and why and I thought he did a good job.

"They tried to post him up with a bigger guy and he did a really nice job two or three times," Westphal added. "I thought his defense was everything you would hope for with a player who is coming into the league for his first game who is not known as a defensive player. He held his own just fine. Offensively, he looked very comfortable and made good decisions."

Golden State rookie head coach Mark Jackson also was impressed with Fredette.

"I thought he played very well," said Jackson. "It was very good to see him, live and in person. He's tough, hard nosed, gritty and obviously shot the lights out. Very impressive. I thought at times we allowed him to get us on our heels, but he played very well."

FLUFF AND STUFF

BYU lost the basketball game against Baylor last Saturday, but they may have won the cultural and cult war.

All you had to do was check in on the Baylor fan boards to see their comments not only on the game, but BYU, their fans and especially BYUtv.

They were very complimentary on all three topics. There is a reason that BYU administrators and authorities are insistent on not giving up BYUtv and the concomitant television rights to any league seeking to invite the Cougars.

Baylor fans' responses to what they saw on BYUtv, probably did more to ease and erase the notion that Mormons are a cult than any ideological dialogues that have taken place between the two denominations in the past.

We go back to the comments of Elder M. Russell Ballard at the groundbreaking of the BYU broadcasting facility when he said, "I don't believe any of us really realize what we're starting here today." He continued in his remarks by saying, "In my vision and my feeling, this broadcasting effort from Brigham Young University has the potential of being the voice that will be heard around the world, that will be the voice of the Lord, that will take head-on the contest that is going on in the world between good and evil.

Based on the responses and feedback that we read from Baylor fans, most of whom were exposed to BYUtv for the first time because of an athletic contest, our observation was that it validated what Elder Ballard said in 2009.

No word, however, in Elder Ballard's dedicatory remarks on what BYUtv will do for BYU basketball recruiting, but it certainly looks like it will be a boon for basketball.

It probably wasn't BYUtv that sold the latest verbal commit to Dave Rose's program, but the Cougars did land another player from Lone Peak HS last week.

Eric Mika, a 6-8 front court player from Lone Peak HS told Dave Rose that he would be signing with the Cougars next November. He currently is a junior at Lone Peak, but isn't playing because, despite living in the Lone Peak boundaries for years, the UHSAA denied him playing eligibility for this season after transferring from Waterford, a private school in Salt Lake.

The governing board of high school athletics decided that Mika was transferring solely for athletic reasons. That decision will likely keep Lone Peak from repeating as state champions this season. They currently have absolutely nothing inside and lack size in the front court. Teams with size inside and with decent play from the guard line can beat Lone Peak this year.

As a sophomore at Waterford last season, Mika averaged 17 points and 12 rebounds per game.

He also played AAU this past summer with Lone Peak players Nick Emery and T.J. Haws, both of whom have also committed to BYU.

Emery is a junior and Haws a sophomore this season at Lone Peak.

Emery is the player that has garnered most of the attention for his scoring prowess, but after not seeing Haws play since last year and watching him in a couple of games this weekend, he may be the surprise of the Lone Peak connection.

His body needs to fill out and if he grows some more, he will absolutely be the real deal at the next level.

BYU TELEVISION TIMETABLE

BYU vs. Buffalo

Tuesday, Dec 20 at Provo

Tipoff: 7:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv

BYU vs. UC Santa Barbara

Thursday, Dec 22 at Provo

Tipoff: 7:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv

BYU vs. Cal State San Marcos

Tuesday, Dec 27 at Provo

Tipoff: 7:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv

BYU vs. St. Mary's

Thursday, Dec 29 at Moraga

Tipoff: 9:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: ESPN2

BYU vs. Tulsa

Friday, Dec 30 at Dallas

Kickoff: 10:00 am Mountain Time

TV: ESPN

BYU vs. San Diego

Saturdy, Dec 31 at Provo

Tipoff: 4:00 pm Mountain Time

TV: BYUtv