UVa Diakite D Overcomes Utah St. Queta Rebounding

Future defensive player of the year Neemias Queta's 11 points, 10 rebounds and three blocked shots helped 8-seed Utah State dominate #1 seed 40-30 on the boards. Utah State made the "NBA Finals Alumni Tournament due to Sam Merrill being in the finals. Queta's player card appears by the UVa starting line-up further down, and the following is from the Utah State AD page - showing his 2-handed block.

The fun battle at center featured Queta against the NBA Finals player from UVa's 2019 team, Mamadi Diakite, who blocked 5 shots as part of a suffocating defense that led UVa 60-45 win. The Cavs will face the 5-seed Louisville 2020 team thwt snuck out a much higher scoring game in an 80-79 thriller over Chris Paul's 2005 Wake Forest team.

While UVa's weakness is rebounding, they are extremely tough to beat for a couple if reasons. In addition to Diakite's huge 21-29 blocked shot range, all the starters have strong steal ranges (11-14 to 11-17) and Jerome, Hunter and Guy have great endurance, all playing all 44 possessions (44-1) in the game.

Most important however is the team defense of -9. The Utah State dunk range is 51-54, but the first -4 takes awayball the dunk numbers and extra -5 of the -9 reverses the range to make it a 51-55 Stop range - meaning an automatic turnover on those numbers.

Overall the Cavs forced 21 turnovers to knly 11 for Utah State as part of the suffocating defense.

We also tried a video to show how we shuffle the three fast action cards we used for this game ra5her than the dice.

Scary good Big West (Cal-Fullerton) Blitz Big Ten

The two conference alumni teams we did not include in our league were the Big Ten and the Big West. In retrospect we should have included them to form a 6-Team alumni division along with the ACC, SEC, Big-12 and Pac-12 to out Venezuela in the other division with the other 5 international teams.

The Big Ten was a little thin with a player at all 8 possessions but only one true MLB bench player. We fill rosters with a standard batter card for a minor leaguer or retiree (Ichiro was on Japan's bench) with an 18-21 homer range (see bottom of third photo below) who needed to do any pinch-hitting. The Big Ten also occasionally needed to go to a standard minor league reliever (see PB:2-4 card at bottom of three photos.

However when we pulled the Big West cards we realized this team could have completed with the SEC, Pac-12 and ACC for the divisional title. Five Cal-Fullerton batters led the dominant 8-man line-up below, and when Shane Bieber starts for them they can beat any team. 

Below are those 8 players followed by 4 score sheets. We had the two teams play each other with each of their four starting pitchers throwing once. Summaries of the four games are below the photos.

The Big West certainly looked like a team we should have included. They outscored the Big Ten 20-6 in the four games and based on our record keeping for our season (3-0 series sweep for 5+ run win, 2 games to 1 for other games) the Big West would have a 10-2 record from these games.

Big West 1, Big Ten 0. Shane Bieber threw 8 innings of shutout, 9 strike out baseball to make Haniger's first inning homer 1-0.

Big West 8, Big Ten 2 (sweep). Justin Turner double and scored in the first and second inning and Khris Davis homered to chase Happ with a 6-0 score in the second en route to the sweep.

Big West 4, Big Ten 2. Frazier and Brandon Lowe doubled in runs in the 2nd and 3rd innings to give the Big Ten their only lead of the series, 2-0. However, 6 straight Big West relievers threw shut out innings and the Big Ten's Kolarek could not hold a tie in the 9th, walking JD Davis and then allowing singles to Hiura, Chapman and Suzuki in the loss.

Big West 7, Big Ten 2. Haniger's 2-run homer and Chapman's 3-run homer have the Big West a 5-0 lead in the first and they held the 5+ run lead after 8 innings for the sweep to finish 10-2 for the series. 

The Big Ten's star was Brandon Lowe, who homered twice in the game to make it six straight times he had reached base in the losing efforts.

Below is the original blog setting up this matchup.

 The one regret we have in our just concluded season between conference alumni all-star teams and international teams, is realizing we did have enough Big 10 and Big West players to add them. This would have created two divisions of 6 teams each - one for the all-conference teams and one for the international teams. Looking through the Statis-Pro cards, here are the teams we see. The Big Ten would have been tight with only one bench player, but we have a standard replacement card we can use to fill rosters with minor league players from the conference. Perhaps we will put these two teams on the field for a few games for fun. 

Big 10 Line-up	Pos	MLB	OPS	School
LaMonte Wade Jr	1b	Min	0.688	Maryland
Brandon Lowe	2b	TBR	0.828	Maryland
Todd Frazier	3B	NYM	0.723	Rutgers
Kevin Plawecki	C	Bos	0.719	Purdue
Alex Gordon	CF	KCR	0.624	Nebraska
Alex Dickerson	LF	SFG	0.864	Indiana
Kyle Schwarber	RF	CHC	0.807	Indiana
Jake Cronenworth	SS	SDP	0.745	Michigan
Big 10 Rotation	L/R	MLB	ERA	School
Rich Hill	LSP	Min	4.14	Michigan
Tony Watson	LRP	SFG	4.27	Nebraska
Travis Lakins	RSP	Bal	4.68	Ohio St.
Anthony Misiewicz	LSP	Sea	4.97	Michigan St.
Big 10 Bullpen	L/R	MLB	ERA	School
Adam Kolarek	LRP	LAD	3.58	Maryland
Aaron Bummer	LRP	CWS	3.88	Nebraska
Nick Wittgren	RRP	Cle	4.01	Purdue
James Bourque	RRP	Wsn	4.31	Michigan
J.A. Happ	LSP	NYY	4.66	Northwestern
Big 10 Bench	Pos	MLB	OPS	School
Josh Phegley	C	CHC	0.654	Indiana

And here is our Big West Roster.

 

Big West Line-up	Pos	MLB	OPS	School
J.D. Davis	1b	NYM	0.818	Cal Fullerton
Keston Hiura	2b	Mil	0.813	Cal Irvine
Justin Turner	3b	LAD	0.864	Cal Fullerton
Kurt Suzuki	C	Wsn	0.71	Cal Fullerton
Jeff McNeil	CF	NYM	0.885	Long Beach
Khris Davis	LF	Oak	0.779	Cal Fullerton
Mitch Haniger	RF	Sea	0.867	Cal Poly
Matt Chapman	ss	Oak	0.872	Cal Fullerton
Big West Rotation	L/R	MLB	ERA	School
Shane Bieber	RSP	Cle	2.92	Cal Santa Barbara
Noe Ramirez	RSP	LAA	4.42	Cal Fullerton
Nick Ramirez	LSP	Det	4.44	Cal Fullerton
Andrew Vasquez	LRP	Min	4.35	Cal Santa Barbara
Big West Bullpen	L/R	MLB	ERA	School
Joe Kelly	RRP	LAD	3.6	Cal Riverside
Dylan Floro	RRP	LAD	3.95	Cal Fullerton
Chris Devenski	RRP	Hou	4	Cal Fullerton
Austin Davis	LRP	Col	4.19	Cal Bakersfield
Nick Vincent	RRP	Mia	4.34	Long Beach
Kyle Nelson	LRP	Cle	4.39	Cal Santa Barbara
Joey Gerber	RRP	Sea	4.39	Illinois
Matt Andriese	RSP	LAA	4.44	Cal Riverside
Tanner Roark	LSP	Tor	4.5	Illinois
Dillon Tate	RSP	Bal	4.59	Cal Santa Barbara
Joe Biagini	RRP	Hou	4.75	Cal Davis
Thomas Eshelman	RSP	Bal	5.29	Cal Fullerton
Big West Bench	Pos	MLB	OPS	School
Kolten Wong	2b	Stl	0.753	Hawaii
Evan Longoria	3b	SFG	0.748	Long Beach
Josh Rojas	2b	Ari	0.727	Hawaii
Michael Lorenzen	CF	Cin	0.7	Cal Fullerton
Kyle Garlick	CF	Phi	0.682	Cal Poly
Greg Garcia	2b	SDP	0.671	Hawaii
Garrett Hampson	2b	Col	0.669	Long Beach
Mark Mathias	RF	Mil	0.661	Cal Poly
Dustin Garneau	C	Hou	0.596	Cal Fullerton