126 today. Or 5 years younger than whitecat


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Anyone remember what the attitude was like towards Nova hoops and the staff in 1992?

I do.

Up 23 spots in Business Week.

As Jay Wright would say " Bang"!

http://catholicphilly.com/2016/04/t...llanovas-shining-moment-means-for-enrollment/

I was surprised to see that Jay makes more than Roy Williams.

I think it's common for the assistants of a NC team to get their 1st head coaching job immediately following the National Championship

For what it's worth, Jerry Meyer from 247 sports just predicted Duval to Villanova. He is the first on that site to pick Villanova in their crystal ball.

I have 2 signed balls from the Legend of Villanova Basketball Dinner in 2001. I'm not an autograph hound. I don't want to bother anyone. But would it seem logical to bring one tho. It has most of the 85 team plus Jay, Coach Kraft, Alex Bradley, Michael Bradley.

Your thoughts are appreciated .

Chris
Relwob

As a tax accountant who took almost 5 days off the first week of April to see our boys bring home a title the past two weeks have been a blur. With that in mind I really wanted to share my thoughts about the events of the past few weeks now that I can finally breathe!

Going into this tournament, I, like many others felt that if we could get past the second round, the sky was the limit. That said, to sit back and see that not only did we do it, but the oath we took to do it, I'm still in shock. Now without reiterating everything that had been said on the board the past few weeks I do want to say a few things.

I was totally blown away by the number of Nova fans in Houston! As a season ticket holder for 22 years I've been to a lot of games. I've traveled to see us play all over this country (even other countries!). However, nothing, I mean nothing compared to the sheer number of fans that were in Houston. As I sat in section 109 of NRG Stadium during the Oklahoma game the volume of the Nova fans was off the charts. I've never seen the screams, cheers, clapping, high fiving etc. with fellow fans like there was that night. I'm still not sure where everyone came from! It is not homer bullsh@t when people say we outnumbered the other schools-it's a statement of fact! However the dude who was dressed as Darth Vader with the Nova jersey- you were friggin awesome! Anyone in 109 - you were friggin awesome! The way we dismantled OU was off the charts.

Heading out to the Dogwood and the bar next door (forget the name) people were beyond pumped. That night the booze was flowing and the entire town was blue and white! Everything is big in Texas including the shots of Jack!

The next day was one to recuperate have a nice steak dinner and rest up for Championship Monday. The team hotel blew me away. It was like a blue and white bomb went off! Posters everywhere were boozing up. I won't list names but all the usual suspects plus dozens more were there. Great times!

Championship Monday I felt unsettled. Walking around the pregame event many people said the same thing- " I can't believe we could win the title tonight. However, I can't see us losing either". When Rollie showed up to say a few words the place got fired up.

Onto the game. You would think playing in the title game I would have been screaming like crazy. However, a strange nervous calm came over me. I was so into each and every play - I just stood there. When we were up 10 I thought we were about to blow their doors off-then when they started to climb back I thought oh boy here we go again. One Marcus hit that three I thought I was going to puke-I was convinced UNC would get a turnover off the inbounds pass to win the game. Of course we all know the rest! I just remember shouting "What the hell just happened?!? " It wasn't until I saw the trophy that I felt like I could rest! BTW, how f@cking cool is Jay. The guy wins his first title, in perhaps the best title games of all time, with the biggest shot in the History of the tournament and he just says " Bang. " and walks away- are you kidding me?!? The dude is a rock star.

As we wandered through the Houston night and found our way back to the team hotel I found mself reflecting not on the big moments of the season, but on the ups and more importantly on the downs if the past. Some reflections I had:

Sitting in my public speaking class sophomore year I remember the professor saying " everyone love to talk about 1985. Well let me tell you, I was a professor here at the time. It was an amazing time however, it will never happen again." As I look back, that professor should be fired!!

I thought about the great Lappas teams that didn't get it done. I thought about Whiterock chocolate. I thought about how we were convinced that Aaron Matthews could be a star. I thought of Medley talking trash at UCLA before they destroyed us. I thought of Johnny Helmsey hitting a three after the buzzer and Lappas screaming, pulling his lapels. I thought of the turnover meter.I thought of the bs A-Ray travel call. I thought of Nashvile, Minneapolis, Boston. I though of very drunk nights in St Thomas. I thought of myself and the one and only Novaworm driving up to meet EricW, Zman, The Letter Z, and kjbert driving to Ottawa just so we could see Fisher and Stokes play together for the first time!

Then I thought of the 2001 basketball banquet. Lappas had just been fired and Jay just hired. Jay was still wrapping up some things at Hofstra so he couldn't stay long however something he said always stuck with me. Jay told us that " that school in Durham, North Carolina had nothing on Villanova."He said we can and would get our program back to the Final Four. He said Villanova deserves to win another title. Now, 15 years later we are on the brink of taking over. I truly believe as Coach K, Roy, Pitino, etc. retire Jay will lead the charge to raise our programs to heights not seen! We are so lucky to have him as our coach.

Now I want to get a little deep here ( which isn't usually me) but I just feel I have to share this. Some of you may think I'm crazy but that's OK. I doubt many remember but about a year and a half ago I asked for some prayers as my grandfather, a WW2 veteran to whom I was very close and had lived with had recently passed. Well, as the oldest grandchild I had the honor of delivering his eulogy. It was both the hardest and easiest speech I had to give. Towards the end of my eulogy, I wanted to lighten the mood a little so I said, "Grandpa, you have done so much for me but I need you to do one more favor-if you ever get a few moments alone with God, please ask him to send Villanova another national championship!" It got a big smile from everyone at the time. This was only 18 months ago. Now go back to Houston, UNC has tied the game and we are coming out of the time out with the now famous 4.7 seconds left. I'm convinced we are going to be snakebitten again by Carolina. Then, I swear on my life, I heard my grandfather say in his broken Italian accent, " don't worry grandson, I got this". Jenkins inbounded the ball to Arch and the rest is history! The next day I am on my flight home to Newark and we are slowly coming in for a landing. I always like looking out the window to see if I recognize where we are flying over. Soon I realize we are over the GSP. I then spot the E&Y building and realize we are over Metro Park. It then dawns on me where we are, I look up and in the distance I see the cementary where my grandfather is buried. I practically lost it on the plane!

Now is all this a coincidence or just my imagination? Maybe. Do I think my grandfather was the reason we won? Probably not. However, the whole experience made me think about all those Nova fans who are not here anymore. I can't help but think we had a lot of good people up there pulling for us, maybe at a level we can't understand.

Now that I've gone way too deep I just want to end by saying I've never been prouder to be a Nova alumni. This school and the community around it are truly special. This board is full of special people. We have a lot to be proud of these days. Here's hoping to a lot more in the future!!! Go cats!!!

Available? I still have the 1985 game on VHS...............boy, am I old!!!

Hopefully he can keep his head on straight.

http://www.todaysu.com/recruiting/c...nce-gets-commitment-juco-big-man-emmitt-holt/

My championship mug finally has a little friend.

Is there any group of people more hypocritical than "these people"? How is this not bullying of people sleeping in public? And dude, it's not a photo bomb if you're taking the picture. You're violating defenseless people. I call this assault. I call this a hate crime.

http://pagesix.com/2016/04/18/why-y...-lewis/?_ga=1.223258459.1304667047.1423582971

This is apparently the new thing in cycling. Dudes hiding small motors and batteries in their bikes. There have been reports of it over the last couple of years but some Italian TV show apparently used thermal imaging at a third tier race in March and caught 7 dudes with abnormal heat inside their bikes, suggesting a motor.

I guess now that it's so hard to blood dope, this is the new thing. I have no idea why these guys all feel the need to cheat. You don't see this amount of cheating in any other sport (cue MLB steroid and NFL HGH comments).



http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/19/s...column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

http://velonews.competitor.com/2016/04/news/motorized-cheating-report-raises-more-questions_402803

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Use these links. They include sub-links to just buy the covers too. If for some reason they don't work when you click on them, paste them into your browser. Enjoy!

SIP: https://backissues.si.com/storefron...ns-villanova-wildcats/prodSI20160414SPEC.html

Weekly: https://backissues.si.com/storefront/2016/2016-ncaa-champions-super-nova/prodSI20160411.html

If the stadium holds 10,500, what is Radnor Township's beef with increased seating capacity for the Pav. renovations. Is it the # of b-ball games to football games that is giving them angina or the NIMBY syndrome?

Does anyone have any promo codes that are active? I see they have free shipping over $40... but I know some people got codes last week that were 15 or 25% off...

I know I'm late to the party, finally got an issue straightened out with Rivals for my $100 promo code from renewing my vusports subscription a couple years back with the "getgear99" promo. It won't be hard to blow through $100... back to waiting to see if the polo shirt I want gets more of my size in stock.

It’s been a great season. Here is a brief recap, a look forward to Josh’s draft prospects, and a few other things.


Points Per Possessions for the season

SHOT CHARTS vs UNC

Oddly clustered chart, left side of the court was lava. We shot extremely well in the mid-range and from 3pt.



Carolina’s best game from 3pt wasn’t enough. We did an excellent job defending the hoop and mid-range.



A FEW NOTES

• All four 3pt shots Jenkins took in the game were within 2 steps of where he hit the game winner.
• According to Matt Norlander who was sitting in front of the Nova section, Jenkins ran over to the Villanova section and yelled “What can they say now! Let’s ****ing go!”

KENPOM PLAYER OF THE YEAR

Brice Johnson was Kenpom’s Player of The Year. We held him to 14 points, which was his lowest total of the tournament, and his lowest efficiency of the tournament.

Josh Hart finished up at the #5 player in Kenpom. The Top 10 was as follows….

Brice Johnson
Malcolm Brogdon
Buddy Hield
Denzel Valentine
Josh Hart
Perry Ellis
Georges Niang
Domantas Sabonis
Thomas Walkup
Anthony Gil


CAN JOSH MAKE THE NBA?

Josh will be testing the NBA water – as he should be. Below is what I did last year for Hilliard and just added Josh's info.


Darrun measures out at 6’5.5” in shoes (Hart6'4.5") with a 6’9” wingspan (Hart6'7.5").

To give you some idea of how that stacks up, here are top wing prospects in the draft. All heights are in shoes, players are cherry picked based upon similar game / role as well as having easily accessible metrics.

2015
Hilliard 6’5.5” & 6’9”
Winslow 6’4.5” & 6’10”
Stanley Johnson 6’5” & 6’11.5”
Kelly Oubre 6’5.75” & 7’2.5”
Sam Dekker 6’7.75” & 6’11.5”
Justin Anderson 6’5.25” & 6’11.75”

2016
Hart 6’4.5” & 6’7.5”
Jaylen Brown 6’6.5” & 7’0.5”
Denzel Valentine 6’6” & 6’10”
Taurean Prince 6’7.5” & 6’11”
Malcolm Brogdon 6’5.5” & 6’10”
Wayne Selden 6’5” & 6’10”
Michael Gbinije 6’6.5” & 6’6”

Darrun was a little off the top prospects but still in the ballpark, Josh however is off the pace of the top prospects. The measurables are important because if Darrun (and now Josh) are going to make a living in the league, it will likely be as a 3 & D player. Defensive ability is harder to figure out from a statistics point of view, but measurables can give you an idea.

On a minutes weighted average basis the NBA SF is 6’6.5” Barefoot (don’t have Darrun’s or Josh’s height Barefoot) with a 6’11.1” Wingspan. For a SG it is 6’4.2” and a 6’8.2” Wingspan. (Hart6'4.5" in shoes & 6'7.5" wingspan)

Darrun’s 8’7.5” standing reach fits in about average. (Do not have Josh’s)




Darrun shot a lot of three pointers last year, 205 actually (Josh shot 154) which was 54% of his total shots. A remarkable 114 of those were from NBA range. Believe it or not he shot 39% from both three point range and NBA three point range. The shot chart below is only from NBA 3pt range. It is excellent news that he already has NBA range. Josh shot 86 NBA range 3pt shots and connected on 30%. However he shot 43% from between the college 3pt line and the NBA line. I do believe he can continue to extend his range with work, which we all know he will put in.


DARRUN NBA RANGE

Josh Hart NBA 3pt Range

The Villanova homers will say that Darrun can be a poor man’s Danny Green. How realistic is this comparison? Well Green takes 62% of his shots from 3pt land and hits 41% of them. He is 6’6.5” tall in shoes with a 6’10” wingspan. Pretty much the same shots, percentages, and body as Darrun. Josh on the other hand takes 34% of his shots from 3pt, while doing most of his damage with high efficiency at the rim and in mid-range. I’ll admit that Josh’s jump stop in the lane, and sweet mid-range shot may not translate to the next level.


At this point you might be thinking that somebody smarter than me, and with (even) more time on their hands has put together a model to project pro players off of their college stats and physical dimensions. And you would be correct, fivethirtyeight has put together a fascinating analysis that I definitely recommend reading. The algorithm projects Darrun as the #46 overall prospect (FYI the draft is a total of 60 picks), with a 6% chance he becomes an NBA starter, 43% chance of becoming a role player and a 51% chance he is bust prospect. I actually like those odds – the model projects a fairly high likelihood that Darrun will in fact become a role player in the NBA. Read the article, it is nothing short of excellent, and looks even better with the benefit of hindsight. Hopefully they put out a 2016 version of the article in the weeks before the draft.


So does Josh get drafted?
I thought Darrun’s skill set and body made him an excellent NBA prospect, I expected him to get drafted. By the numbers, Josh shouldn’t be the same level of prospect, however winning a national championship will do wonders for your draft stock. I think there is a very good chance Josh slips into the late first round or early second round. And I think this never would have happened without a deep tournament run.


MORE KENPOM

Kenpom has been producing his player of the year standings for six years, meaning we have a track record of five years for how those top 10 players do in the draft and whether they stick in the NBA. This is particularly interesting since Josh finished up as the #5 player.



This is a lot to take in, but here are some thoughts…

• The NBA has 420 players and the draft is 60 players. 14% of the league does not turnover on a yearly basis, so simply making a roster and getting minutes is an accomplishment in itself.
• The KPOY list has been exceptionally good at identifying good draft values. Anybody could see that Karl-Anthony Towns was a star, but every team passed over Draymond Green at least once.
• The list pretty clearly doesn't work as well for short guards, they may put up excellent numbers in college, but that skill set does not necessarily translate to the NBA level.
• I suspect there will be some tremendous draft values in this year's Kenpom top 10 players. Especially seeing as 3 are expected to be 2nd round picks, and 6 are not expected to be drafted at all. There are no short point guards in the group either.
• Of the 46 players (not 50 due to repeats) on the list from past years, 36 are still in the NBA. And there are only 4 on the list taller than 6'4" that are not still in the league. It’s tough to play basketball as a short guy, as I can personally attest.
• Only 3 guys on the list went undrafted, and one of them (Sean Kilpatrick) ended up signing and is still in the league.

FINAL THOUGHTS ON 2015-2016

There is a new “the shot”

The ride home from Providence, from Detroit, from Detroit again, from Buffalo. Those were the lows, hung over, sleep deprived, dejected. After Buffalo we vowed never to go to a first round game again. Of course a year later we were sucked right back in. This year the air in Brooklyn felt different. The team was focused, determined. To knock this team out you were going to have to earn it. The fans felt the determined confidence too.

It is a strange feeling to know that the greatest experience of my life just happened. My friends and I tried to process everything post game at the bar. Sure we will all get married and have kids… (and some of us already have) but those days you will know the outcome. Those days are the beginning of long journeys. That Monday night the outcome was never certain until the ball went through the rim (or when it left Kris’ hand according to Jay). This day was the end of the journey, the top of the mountain. From that mountaintop every Villanovan was screaming and crying pure joy.

Jay isn’t going to stop coaching and we aren’t going to stop cheering, but now that we’ve been to the top it isn’t going to be the same. That’s ok, because the view from the top isn’t one I’ll ever forget.

6-2. Two field goals and a safety. Fantastic writeup on the Stool.

http://www.barstoolsports.com/barst...g-game-final-score-6-2-yes-american-football/

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Still feels good to gloat considering we are NFC's.

any recommendations?

Thinking of making the trip in November.

Kansas coach Bill Self met with Duke transfer Derryck Thornton Jr. in Durham today, source told ESPN.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/co...-arrested-at-us-capitol/ar-BBrW5tb?li=BBnb7Kz

Always liked Turkey Hill better anyway........

Here it is. My highlight reel of the Final Four & National Championship games. It's fitting that I picked a song from 1985. Enjoy!

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Hope our friends and fine folks at the Sonesta, NRG, Dogwood, Crown Plaza, etc are all OK. Some pretty serious rains and flooding and I hear more to come.

i want to thank all of you guys and our team getting me though tax season.....i lock myself in a room for 77 days to crank out over 1300 returns.....my only enjoyment is your banter and our wonderful team....sometimes on black and white 1984 TV in my home office....the best part of the next 288 days is going to the beach with VU banners and tailgating for football season......may all you guys remain as happy as i have been the last 2 weeks.....its only been 2 weeks?