Hoops Notes: New Polls Released, Terps Beat BC, Virginia Guards Seek Chiropractor

-- Movin' up. I was surprised to see us remain in the polls after the Iowa loss, and now we're back on the way up. In the Coaches Poll, UNC is surrounded by two packs of wolves.

-- Maryland 73, Boston College 71. It doesn't take much more than a glance to realize how important free throws were. So far this season, the Eagles have relied on the free throw line for a good portion of their offense--they're near the top of the ACC in both the FTA/FGA and FTM/FGA categories. Maryland beat them handily in both categories last night, and that helped the Terps eke out a close win.

-- The Virginia Cavaliers have posted some interesting numbers through six games. And by interesting, I mostly mean funny-awful. Not surprisingly, Singletary and Reynolds are having to carry this team, and already they're crying uncle.

Singletary has used 32.2% of his team's possessions, while Reynolds has used 27%. The results are terrifying.
Good gawd, y'allPlayer%PossO RtgPPFGAeFG%TO Rate (%)
Sean Singletary32.2980.9942.625JR Reynolds27.0920.9239.727

[Side note: eFG% is effective field goal percentage, which is the same thing as AdjFG%. I'm calling it eFG% from here on out because everyone else does and I don't want to create unnecessary confusion. Definition here if you need it.]

Singletary manages 21 pts-per-40-minutes via the saturation bombing technique. Gotta shoot to score, right?

Led by Clank! and Thud!, Virginia has produced the worst offense in the ACC to this point. They're among the worst shooting teams in the country, hitting 40% from the field (43.5% eFG%). Plus, they're turning the ball over on nearly a quarter or their possessions.

Mamadi Diane (41.1% eFG), Adrian Joseph (44.0 eFG) and Jason Cain (45.0 eFG) aren't helping the cause.

Tunji Soroye and Laurynas Mikalauska both average more than 20 minutes per game, and have, between them, 31 field goal attempts in 6 games. In 159 minutes, Soroye has scored a whopping 19 points. These two men are but innocent bystanders to the horrific destruction wrought by the Singletary-Reynolds-Diane brick brigade.

There is a bright spot, however: Virginia has been pounding the crap out of people on the boards (it won't last, of course, but it's interesting while it does). Even when looking at rebounding percentages--which compensate for the advantages in raw rebounding numbers given to a team that misses a lot of shots--the Cavs are impressive. Jason Cain in particular seems to have found his inner Dennis Rodman. His rebounding percentage (20%) ranks second among ACC players. In his last two games, he has 16 offensive rebounds (7 against Georgia Tech, 9 against Fordham).

Last season, the Cavs were both a bad shooting team and a bad rebounding team. Imagine how they'd look if that were the case this season...