#32 Kansas vs. #33 Washington D.C.

#32 Kansas
G Earl Watson G Maurice Evans G Adrian Griffin F Matt Freije F Wayne Simien

#33 Washington D.C.
G Delonte West G Donnell Taylor G Roger Mason G DeMarr Johnson F James White

This looks like an appropriate play in game: these teams are pretty terrible. I think they're terrible, anyway: I don't know much about a lot of these guys. These teams are pretty comparable in a few ways: West and Watson are both decent third guards who are the stars of these teams. Evans, Taylor, Griffin, and Mason are defensive specialists who have trouble scoring enough to stay in the league; Evans is the best of the bunch, but Griffin is just about finished (well, all of these guys are close to finished except Evans). Simien and White are both undersized and underathletic forwards who are already out of the league between last year and this one. The big difference is between Freije and Johnson: Johnson is an athletic lottery pick bust on the wing who never learned to shoot; Freije is a basically useless forward who is tall, but doesn't defend or rebound and shoots poorly. Kansas has a definite size advantage, but their big guys don't rebound well so much of that might be negated. I don't see much to pick between these teams before I run the simulation.

Results
Team: Kansas
Wins: 687
PPG: 86.22
RPG: 64.72
APG: 18.96
TPG: 15.68

Team: Washington D.C.
Wins: 313
PPG: 78.99
RPG: 46.7
APG: 13.63
TPG: 13.78

Kansas only shot 39% as a team and won significantly more games. The advantage on the boards turned out to be huge--around fifteen per game. DeMarr Johnson killed D.C., throwing up 16 shots a game at terrible 32% overall-he took too many threes, and he shoots those very poorly at 21%. Kansas got much better shot distribution: Watson and Evans and Griffin-the strongest shooters-took the bulk of the shots, while D.C. distributed its shots among its weaker and stronger shooters.

I don't see any reason that defense would swing the balance of the game in favor of D.C.: if anything, a more accurate simulation would swing further in the Kansas direction, to reflect the inability of a smaller D.C. team to handle the size of Freije and Simien. D.C.'s perimeter players aren't talented enough offensively to exploit mismatches on the other end consistently. I don't know who wins the Freije/Johnson matchup--most likely nobody, and certainly not the fans watching the game. Similarly, if either team would be hurt by foul trouble, it would be D.C. guarding the bigger Kansas players inside. Finally, the Kansas team features a better mix of guards, wing players, and post players, while the D.C. team is heavily guard-oriented, almost like a mid-major college team in the NCAA tournament. I think Kansas is the clear winner today--but they shouldn't feel too optimistic after shooting 39% with Texas lurking.

Tomorrow: #1 Texas vs. #32 Kansas.
Full Bracket Here.