Not sure where this really belongs, but a GREAT read about Sully and the Bucks...
http://insider.espn.go.com/ncb/insider/news/story?id=5942868
If you ever thought it was easy to replace a national POY, go ask Oklahoma Sooners head coach Jeff Capel about life after Blake Griffin. The same could have been said for Thad Matta and the Ohio State Buckeyes this year -- Evan Turner was national POY as a junior, and is now a member of the Philadelphia 76ers.
Turner did everything for the Buckeyes last year: He was their point guard, their featured scorer and far and away their best defensive rebounder. The ball was more or less always in his hands. Take every cliché about the difficulty of replacing your point guard and add every stock phrase about the challenge of losing your leading scorer. Then multiply by five. That was the task facing Thad Matta this year.
And yet, here we are: The Buckeyes are 10-0 and No. 2 in the country; they trail only the Duke Blue Devils in the polls.
To be sure, it's still December. Ohio State's schedule has been, for lack of a better term, uneven. That 18-point win on the road at Florida in mid-November seemed like a big deal at the time. But now that Jacksonville has also beaten the Gators in Gainesville, maybe a convincing win at the O'Connell Center's not such a great measuring stick after all.
Still, all any team can do is play the games it has been given. And even against a schedule that Ken Pomeroy rates as merely the 189th toughest in the country , Ohio State has been undeniably impressive. If anything, the most remarkable aspect of this Buckeyes team is its balance on both sides of the ball. Over its first ten games OSU has scored 1.18 points per possession while allowing opponents to score just 0.82 points per trip. Both numbers are outstanding. How has Matta pulled this off without Turner?
The easy answer is that Matta did it with recruiting. (If you've been paying attention the past five years or so, he's pretty good at that.) And in the person of 6-foot-9 Jared Sullinger, Matta may possibly have the highest-performing freshman he's ever had in Columbus. Greg Oden, Mike Conley, Daequan Cook, Kosta Koufos, Byron Mullens -- they all became first-round NBA draft picks after their freshman years at Ohio State. But if (and it's a big "if") Sullinger can keep doing what he's been doing, he will have surpassed all of the above in terms of effectiveness as a college player.
Let's take a closer look, not only at Sullinger, but also at his talented and experienced running mates.
1. Sullinger, at almost every level, is the new Turner: At every other position Matta has the same starting lineup as last year, one that features William Buford, David Lighty, Jon Diebler and Dallas Lauderdale. The only difference is that Sullinger has replaced Turner in that starting five. Last year Turner took 31 percent of the Buckeyes' shots while he was on the floor. This year the attempts are spread around a little more evenly, as Sullinger accounts for 26 percent of the shots during his minutes. But Sullinger's value to a team trying to replace a national player of the year has been immense. In effect, the freshman's presence has allowed a veteran like Diebler to simply continue doing what he's done before on offense: function as a highly efficient supporting player. Defenses collapsing on Sullinger in the paint also have to account for Diebler, who is hitting 48 percent of his 3s.
2. Then again, there are a few other candidates for "the new Turner:" The point guard duties have been farmed out, with Lighty and Buford upping their assist rates and freshman Aaron Craft coming off the bench and functioning as what some people like to call a "true" point guard (meaning he dishes a ton of assists and never shoots). Craft has struggled with turnovers, but on the whole the point guard-by-committee approach has worked beautifully. Matta's team has committed a turnover on fewer than 17 percent of its offensive possessions and -- as amply demonstrated by the Buckeyes' 55 percent 2-point shooting -- players are getting the ball in position to score. Consider that part of Turner replaced.
3. The two sides of Matta: There is "coach" and there is "recruiter," and some critics have said the latter is a far bigger presence. This year, though, the former can excel -- thanks to the latter. In Sullinger, Lauderdale and 6-6 freshman Deshaun Thomas, Matta has three options standing between 6-6 and 6-9 that he can deploy at will. None of those three is particularly foul-prone; all are available pretty much whenever the situation demands them. Sullinger is Sullinger (see below). The 6-8 Lauderdale, as he's done for years in Columbus, blocks shots like a 7-footer. (Opponents are making just 44 percent of their 2s against this D.) And Thomas makes 58 percent of his 2s while taking on a Turner-sized role in the offense during his 17 minutes per game. To say Matta has weapons is putting it mildly.
4. Sullinger, Sullinger, Sullinger: Sullinger's overall offensive efficiency is excellent, and if he were better than a 70 percent shooter at the line that efficiency would be stratospheric. The freshman draws nearly eight fouls for every 40 minutes he plays, a number that harkens back to the aforementioned Blake Griffin. Not only has he taken over Turner's duties as an outstanding defensive rebounder, Sullinger is also very good on the offensive glass. He makes 61 percent of his 2s and, perhaps most impressively, absolutely never commits a turnover.
We'll learn much more about the true potential of this Buckeyes team in the new year, of course, when OSU plays 18 games against what projects to be a very tough Big Ten. But at the moment, life after Evan Turner is looking pretty good in Columbus, thanks to Sullinger and the coach who landed him.
