Johns Hopkins 2023

[wgdsr]

So, I think four is the magic number. 4 more wins and they make the tourney. Not sure it matters which 4 given the quality of the conference. 3 and they're on the bubble (unless one of them happens to be MD) and probably out. Obviously, a lot can happen between now and May, but I think it's probably as simple as 4 and you're in, 3 and you're out.

it's very possible hopkins has zero top 20 wins right now. or one. if that turns out to happen, it very much matters who they beat. maybe more than how many wins.

[Hoponboard]

I can see Jacksonville, Georgetown, Delaware and St. Joe’s running the table, so all those teams would be comfortably in the top 20.

[wgdsr]

I can see Jacksonville, Georgetown, Delaware and St. Joe’s running the table, so all those teams would be comfortably in the top 20.

that'd be a very difficult task for st joe's, maybe others.

jax will have a tough time sticking, as they're barely hanging on now & the back half of the sked doesn't have the same record (and probably eventually opp opp record) as the front, and 14-1? isn't much diff than 6-1 via %.

my point is it's way early.

[HopFan16]

I can see Jacksonville, Georgetown, Delaware and St. Joe’s running the table, so all those teams would be comfortably in the top 20.

Will be fascinating to see where Jacksonville's RPI falls if they finish, like, 16-1. Unfortunately for us I think there's still a good chance they'd be outside the top 20. The teams they have to play on the bottom half of the ASUN are baaaaaaad. It would help us if Utah also runs the table against a similar crop of teams.

I believe that Georgetown will hold up as a top 20 win. They're at #16 right now at 3-3 and still have Lehigh, Denver, Loyola, and Villanova to play. Might get #7 Nova twice.

St. Joe's is hooped. They are way too far down right now and not sure their remaining schedule is going to cut it. Even if they beat Duke this weekend I don't think the math works out.

At RPI 33 Cuse could sneak a back-door top 20 entry by the end of the year thanks to their competition in the ACC. Might require that they actually win one or two of those games though.

wgdsr is right — it's all very early. But it'd behoove the Jays to grab a signature win in conference play so that we don't have to sweat these non-con RPIs as much.

[Hoponboard]

Against Delaware, that was a tantalizing glimpse of English as a feeder up top. Imagine how difficult Jays will be to defend with two quick as darts feeders in Brooks and Angelus.

I can see a breakout game from Collison who needs to get in the offensive flow earlier than the last seven minutes of games.

Chauvette is the one player who surprises me virtually every game. Tricky release point or stretch shooter, he’s an under the radar scoring threat.

[jhu06]

Against Delaware, that was a tantalizing glimpse of English as a feeder up top. Imagine how difficult Jays will be to defend with two quick as darts feeders in Brooks and Angelus.

I can see a breakout game from Collison who needs to get in the offensive flow earlier than the last seven minutes of games.

Chauvette is the one player who surprises me virtually every game. Tricky release point or stretch shooter, he’s an under the radar scoring threat.

They need more offensive consistency. We are in the bottom half of the conference in most offensive categories and dead last in a number of them underscoring just how good marcille has been. They have proven options now in evans, chauvette, bauer, krampf-although he played without any confidence sunday, the curious mr. english, and so if peshko/grimes aren't going to show up or grimes and melendez are going to make turnovers there are options down the bench to move in. We're in game 11 and some of these guys are years into their tenures at homewood. On the maryland/uva game they talked a lot about Tillman teams don't beat themselves. We need that from the offense.

51 mentioned the Michigan stars. To use a phrase of an old friend, as much as the defense has improved, hopefully they can take care of the Michigan knowns this week and make their depth beat us.

The much derided in the media PM schedule should frankly start to look better. St.Joes had Penn beaten and couldn't finish but they have too much talent not to make a charge back into the top 20. Delaware was really impressive offensively and should start to roll. I don't think Navy and Cuse will be top 20 wins but they can do damage to UNC, Army, Villanova, BU and others.

[HopFan16]

We are in the bottom half of the conference in most offensive categories and dead last in a number of them

Literally not true

They have proven options now in evans, chauvette, bauer, krampf

Two seconds ago you wanted all four of these guys banished to the quantum realm and now they're "proven options." Simply incredible posting by you.

The much derided in the media PM schedule should frankly start to look better. St.Joes had Penn beaten and couldn't finish but they have too much talent not to make a charge back into the top 20.

St. Joe's is 50th in RPI. It's going to be extremely difficult for them to make it back into the top 20. Their remaining opponents are RPI 2, 23, 25, 37, 39, 46, and 59. Average is 33.

[get it to x]

We are in the bottom half of the conference in most offensive categories and dead last in a number of them

Literally not true

They have proven options now in evans, chauvette, bauer, krampf

Two seconds ago you wanted all four of these guys banished to the quantum realm and now they're "proven options." Simply incredible posting by you.

The much derided in the media PM schedule should frankly start to look better. St.Joes had Penn beaten and couldn't finish but they have too much talent not to make a charge back into the top 20.

St. Joe's is 50th in RPI. It's going to be extremely difficult for them to make it back into the top 20. Their remaining opponents are RPI 2, 23, 25, 37, 39, 46, and 59. Average is 33.

I am amused and amazed by HopFan16's ability to counter a jhu06 post in 15 minutes. I know "16" would never concede that "06" is a criminal mastermind, but it's almost like Professor Moriarty and Sherlock Holmes.

[51percentcorn]

Six weeks ago Peter Millimen needed to be burned at the stake to get rid of the demons that haunted Homewood Field. Soon, the Peter Millimen coach of the year posts will emerge.

No just one village idiot that would have gladly lit the pyre.

Some others might have stood around in their robes and looked the other way but wanted plausible deniability.

lol !

You merry fools are giving Milliman way too much credit.
While it's true he's brought in a couple good transfers and recruits, they just replace players he lost to graduation. He's also run off some good players and some good recruits. But the truth is he's had good players all along, he just hasn't know what to do with them until now. What's the difference? Crawley and Kelly. They've put together an offense that works and are playing a lot of players. This keeps the team rested and ready to make a run in the fourth quarter and now they're closing out games when they couldn't before. Even the announcers for the last game thought they both deserved a ton of credit. I also suspect Kelly has had a lot to do with playing Marcille since he's been working with the goalies. Marcille was riding Milliman's bench until Kelly came along. The team is trending well now, but was looking pretty bad before these two coaches joined the staff so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out their impact. Of course, the court jesters on here want to pretend that PM turned things around all by his lonesome, but the evidence speaks clearly to the contrary.

"While it's true he's brought in a couple good transfers and recruits, they just replace players he lost to graduation."

What does that even mean? It's kind of how the college game works - everyone eventually leaves and you have to replace them. The fact is he hit it out of the park with Mazzone - Melendez is a big upgrade to the walking wounded from last year and one of his freshmen is going to be a superstar. Be happy instead of whatever you are. Also a news flash - the players apparently love Crawley and being young energetic he'll hopefully help on the recruiting trail for a few years but he has not unlocked the mysteries of offensive lacrosse. There are only two offensive statistics that are improved from last year - shot percentage is up 4 percentage points and SOG percentage is up 7 points. Goals per game /Assist to Goals/ EMO % - all virtually identical to last year. So they are taking fewer shots and making the same number. Also given that the 26%/20% and 17% shot percentage guys who took over 250 shots last year are gone - a point you lamented big time when bringing up that Inside Lacrosse article where it was said it was hard to envision how Hopkins could replace that talent when actually it was very easy to see how given those 3 players were just too compromised by long term injuries - its also kind of easy to envision shot percentage going up. Addition by subtraction. The trick is to have it go up and score more goals.

The two big improvements in the team this year - are they are way more competitive off the ground and for a large part of the season the goalie has been lights out. Yes lets give all the credit to a volunteer assistant coach rather than the head coach - the VAC clearly determines who will play. BTW crowd - I can prove it too - I had Crawley gets all the credit if Hopkins is any way successful in the Black Hole Bingo. But a team that was down 50 or more to opponents in ground balls in '22 is now up 20+ 2/3rds of the way through the season. Mazzone has 36 or 38 ground balls? Lyne/Jennings/Rodgers had 43 combined total in 16 games. He's been everything as advertised and more. There is a tiny thundercloud on the horizon with goalie however. If you take the Syracuse game off the board for a second, the Hopkins goalie stats are 40 saves over 52 goals in the last 4 out of 5 games. So that's 43% in 4 of the last 5 games and that includes a 59% game against Navy. So Tim has had 3 different types of games - off the friggin charts/above average to strong/not so hot - Hopkins needs real consistency in this next stretch - 5 games at 55% each would be so much better than 2 games at 65 - 1 at 50 - and 2 at 40. The first person to agree with me BTW would be Tim Marcille.

[jhu06]

Six weeks ago Peter Millimen needed to be burned at the stake to get rid of the demons that haunted Homewood Field. Soon, the Peter Millimen coach of the year posts will emerge.

No just one village idiot that would have gladly lit the pyre.

Some others might have stood around in their robes and looked the other way but wanted plausible deniability.

lol !

You merry fools are giving Milliman way too much credit.
While it's true he's brought in a couple good transfers and recruits, they just replace players he lost to graduation. He's also run off some good players and some good recruits. But the truth is he's had good players all along, he just hasn't know what to do with them until now. What's the difference? Crawley and Kelly. They've put together an offense that works and are playing a lot of players. This keeps the team rested and ready to make a run in the fourth quarter and now they're closing out games when they couldn't before. Even the announcers for the last game thought they both deserved a ton of credit. I also suspect Kelly has had a lot to do with playing Marcille since he's been working with the goalies. Marcille was riding Milliman's bench until Kelly came along. The team is trending well now, but was looking pretty bad before these two coaches joined the staff so it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out their impact. Of course, the court jesters on here want to pretend that PM turned things around all by his lonesome, but the evidence speaks clearly to the contrary.

"While it's true he's brought in a couple good transfers and recruits, they just replace players he lost to graduation."

What does that even mean? It's kind of how the college game works - everyone eventually leaves and you have to replace them. The fact is he hit it out of the park with Mazzone - Melendez is a big upgrade to the walking wounded from last year and one of his freshmen is going to be a superstar. Be happy instead of whatever you are. Also a news flash - the players apparently love Crawley and being young energetic he'll hopefully help on the recruiting trail for a few years but he has not unlocked the mysteries of offensive lacrosse. There are only two offensive statistics that are improved from last year - shot percentage is up 4 percentage points and SOG percentage is up 7 points. Goals per game /Assist to Goals/ EMO % - all virtually identical to last year. So they are taking fewer shots and making the same number. Also given that the 26%/20% and 17% shot percentage guys who took over 250 shots last year are gone - a point you lamented big time when bringing up that Inside Lacrosse article where it was said it was hard to envision how Hopkins could replace that talent when actually it was very easy to see how given those 3 players were just too compromised by long term injuries - its also kind of easy to envision shot percentage going up. Addition by subtraction. The trick is to have it go up and score more goals.

The two big improvements in the team this year - are they are way more competitive off the ground and for a large part of the season the goalie has been lights out. Yes lets give all the credit to a volunteer assistant coach rather than the head coach - the VAC clearly determines who will play. BTW crowd - I can prove it too - I had Crawley gets all the credit if Hopkins is any way successful in the Black Hole Bingo. But a team that was down 50 or more to opponents in ground balls in '22 is now up 20+ 2/3rds of the way through the season. Mazzone has 36 or 38 ground balls? Lyne/Jennings/Rodgers had 43 combined total in 16 games. He's been everything as advertised and more. There is a tiny thundercloud on the horizon with goalie however. If you take the Syracuse game off the board for a second, the Hopkins goalie stats are 40 saves over 52 goals in the last 4 out of 5 games. So that's 43% in 4 of the last 5 games and that includes a 59% game against Navy. So Tim has had 3 different types of games - off the friggin charts/above average to strong/not so hot - Hopkins needs real consistency in this next stretch - 5 games at 55% each would be so much better than 2 games at 65 - 1 at 50 - and 2 at 40. The first person to agree with me BTW would be Tim Marcille.

You avert the reliance on the goalie by running up big margins offensively. That starts with your knowns piling up the points.

Yes HF16 stays on top of things. Oldfriends LaxFi (RIP) and WOMBAT used to do the same.

The other benefit of the strong start is that hopefully recruits see the PM plan coming together. I don't remember what his contract situation was but going into year 4 without a strong start at the very least might have hindered his staffs ability to pitch kids.

[wgdsr]

BTW crowd - I can prove it too - I had Crawley gets all the credit if Hopkins is any way successful in the Black Hole Bingo.

it's not fair, you have all the best spaces.

[Hoponboard]

Anyone know what happened to Wombat?

[jhu06]

BTW crowd - I can prove it too - I had Crawley gets all the credit if Hopkins is any way successful in the Black Hole Bingo.

it's not fair, you have all the best spaces.

That play at the end of the game out of the timeout was a disaster.

As 51 pointed out the "improvement" offensively has been addition by subtraction of personnel transitioning out.

[OCanada]

Anyone know what happened to Wombat?

Not sure what you mean. He is fine

[DocBarrister]

Anyone know what happened to Wombat?

Aliens.

Invasive probes.

You get the picture.

DocBarrister

[44WeWantMore]

Alas, we know what happened to LaxFi.
I hope Old Hopper / JHU6569 is merely aging gracefully.

Others missed from the early days:
- Wombat and the Swami are MIA.
- CBB has greatly reduced his posts.
- I assume IvyDude is posting in the Ivy Thread.

[OCanada]

Swami retired from his business and moved out of MD. I forget where maybe Fl. I heard from him a couple of times. There might be something in the laxpower files if they are available

Wombat is fine and around. The Wombatress and a close friend shared a desk at an alphabet agency.

CBB retired and travels frequently. More into emails now.

Lost track of Ivy Dude when Lax Fi ( and his dozen or so alter egos) passed.

[51percentcorn]

In terms of Michigan - there are clear challenges and perhaps some things you need to capitalize on. The first/immediate challenge is for Dunn/Callahan and Narewski (and the wings) - Michigan faces-off so far at 60% and with Rowlett and Wietfeldt they have a 2 headed monster that will not get worn down as easily. As mentioned before - the Wolverines rely pretty heavily on their attack - they are responsible for 43% of their goals an astounding 78% of their assists and 59% of their points. By contrast Hopkins top 3 guys on the stat sheet account for 39%/48% and 42% respectively. If the Michigan attackmen do shoot - it's a very high probability it's on cage (all 3 are over 70% SOG) and they score close to every 4 out of 10 shots. So if they get to shoot and Marcille is not on - it could be a long day. No defensive guru but this seems to suggest a close eye - try not to slide defense. If Smith/Szuluk/Brown/Mazzone can stand on their own they have a chance. They do have middies that can shoot - Jackson/Thompson/Aronson and Clay all have excellent shot percentages and have taken between 12 and 18 shots.

If you are looking for silver linings in a cloud of playing the first BIG game on the road - Michigan appears to have struggled in a couple areas. Clearing stands at 82% and opponents are clearing at 90%. The EMO/man down stats are tilted towards Maize and Blue opponents. Opponents are 10-23 44%. They turn the ball over at a 15 per game clip similar to Hopkins. And their goalie situation appears to be perhaps unsettled a bit - Carr has started 4 games Taylor 3 and in 5 of the 7 games save % has been 50% or below.

So - once again - need a high quality face-off effort from the team
- Shoot - make the goalie have to stop 25+ shots
- Marcille needs to get back to his impression of a wall
- Guard the knowns - Notre Dame obviously did despite losing 21 out of 30 face-offs - Michigan attack scored 1 goal
- It would be nice to have them foul a bit
- Hopkins has not had a single game with under 13 turnovers - 15/20/16 in last three - all wins yes but all nail biters - would be nice to take care of the ball for once
- Win the ground ball battle

[51percentcorn]

Oh - the bad news for both teams - the weather right now is forecasted to be god-awful. By the time 7 PM rolls around you could have temps in the low 40s high 30s and dropping with maybe some rain and a forecast of very high winds. Rain forecasted to be 100% for Saturday and a 1/2" - who knows when that shows up or ends but one thing appears certain winds 20-30 mph. That game might be a parents only affair.

[flalax22]

Talking to a close friend about the Jays, their improvement and he said if Benson and Petro were still there they would have recruited Hasbulla Magomedov to play midfield. I had to google him. His point was made.