Self's Tulsa Plays Like Kansas in 10th Biggest Blowout

Bill Self's breakthrough season was this Tulsa team that finished #7 in www.kenpom.com including a run to the Elite 8 through a previous No. 1 Cincinnati and a near upset of UNC in the Elite 8. Tulsa has never finished in the top 40 since, as Self then went to Illinois for three dominant seasons and then Kansas for national championships. Self reached No. 7 and the Elite 8 with this team despite not having a single future NBA player.

Tulsa was the second team in a row in our current tournament of 16 new teams to produce one of the biggest 10 blowouts in the history of our Value Add Basketball Game - both by teams now in the American Athletic Conference. In the 245th all-time great men's team game we ever played, Cornbread Maxwell led Charlotte to a 95-68 win over New Mexico for a 27-point margin that was our 10th biggest blowout ever in the game.

They stayed in the top 10 for only one game, as Tulsa's 92-64 win over Washington State topped the margin by one point as the 10th biggest blowout in the history of our game.
 

Margin	All-time great teams	Score	All	Marg	Opponent	Yr
1	Houston - 2021 - Grimes - B12	102	50	52	Princeton	2023
2	Connecticut - 2023 - Sanogo - BE	77	39	38	St. Peter's	2022
3	Villanova - 2018 - Bridges - BE	106	72	34	Creighton	2020
4	Gonzaga - 2017 - Williams-Goss - WCC	81	48	33	UCLA	2006
5	Virginia - 2019 - Guy - ACC	97	64	33	Maryland	2002
6	Duke - 2010 - Scheyer - ACC	89	57	32	Wake For	2005
7	Kansas - 2008 - Chalmers - B12	83	52	31	St. Joe's	2004
8	Memphis - 2008 - Rose - Amer	82	52	30	Louisville	1980
9	Villanova - 2018 - Bridges - BE	89	60	29	Butler	2010
10	Tulsa - 2000 - Shelton - Amer	92	64	28	Wash St.	2008
11	Charlotte - 1977 - "Cornbread" Maxwell - Amer	95	68	27	New Mex	2019

The two performances pushed both teams slightly ahead of Memphis among all our American Athletic teams, at 33rd and 38th in our standings based partly on the cards but also on the results of game so far. We track all results and ratings on this google sheet. These are just the six teams who will be in the American Athletic out of our 200 great teams.

 

Rnk	American Athletic	Year	Player	W	L	Score	Allow	SOS
33	Tulsa	2000	Shelton	1	0	92.0	64.0	-9.0
38	Charlotte	1977	Maxwell	1	0	95.0	68.0	-3.0
44	Memphis	2008	Rose	4	2	68.7	65.8	-0.3
73	Temple	1958	Rodgers	0	0	NG	NG	NG
140	Wichita St.	2013	VanVleet	1	2	64.3	71.3	1.7
179	Florida Atlantic	2023	Davis	0	1	64.0	77.0	-2.0

Here is the box score from Tulsa's blowout win.

 

Pos	Washington St. 2008	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Season Actual
1-PG	Taylor Rochestie	6	2	0	0	0	2	1	0	5	6'1,10.4 ppg
2-SG	Derrick Low	16	3	3	1	2	1	1	0	1	6'2,14.1 ppg
3-SF	Kyle Weaver	13	1	4	2	4	6	0	0	3	6'6,12.2 ppg,NBA
4-PF	Robbie Cowgill	10	0	5	0	1	4	0	1	2	6'10,7.3 ppg
5-C	Aron Baynes	7	2	0	1	2	4	0	1	3	6'10,10.4 ppg,NBA
1-PG	Thomas Abercrombie	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'6,1.2 ppg
2-SG	Stephen Sauls	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'3,2.1 ppg
3-SF	Daven Harmeling	6	0	3	0	0	1	0	0	3	6'7,5.6 ppg
4-PF	Caleb Forrest	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'8,3.4 ppg
5-C	Nikola Koprivica	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'7,2.5 ppg
	14 Turnovers	64	8	18	4	9	22	2	2	21
Pos	Tulsa 2000	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Season Actual
1-PG	Marcus Hill	19	2	4	5	6	3	2	0	1	6'5,11.2 ppg
2-SG	Greg Harrington	11	0	5	1	2	4	1	0	4	6'2,10.8 ppg
3-SF	David Shelton	16	1	4	5	5	6	0	0	1	6'6,13.5 ppg
4-PF	Eric Coley	14	1	4	3	3	6	2	1	1	6'5,11.3 ppg
5-C	Brandon Kurtz	10	0	3	4	4	7	0	1	3	6'10,11.2 ppg
1-PG	Tony Heard	8	0	3	2	2	1	0	1	1	6'0,9.7 ppg
2-SG	Dante Swanson	8	0	4	0	0	4	0	0	3	5'10,5.5 ppg
3-SF	Antonio Reed	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	5'10,1.8 ppg
4-PF	Kevin Johnson	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'7,2.4 ppg
5-C	Charlie Davis	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'7,2.5 ppg
	6 Turnovers	92	4	30	20	22	34	5	3	17

On the flip side, the blowout loss plunged Washington State to the bottom of our combined Pac-12/MWC conference. Oregon State's earlier win against James Madison moved them up to within one spot of the top of the new combined conference, just behind UNLV's dominant 1991 team.

Rnk	P12/MWC	Year	Player	W	L	Score	Allow	SOS
41	UNLV	1991	Johnson	1	2	72.7	76.3	0.7
42	Oregon St.	1982	Green	1	0	81.0	68.0	-12.0
103	San Diego St.	2011	Leonard	2	2	69.3	71.8	-0.3
126	UNLV	1987	Gilliam	0	1	64.0	82.0	-6.0
138	Nevada	2004	Fazekas	0	0	NG	NG	NG
168	Wyoming	1943	Sailors	0	1	60.0	73.0	1.0
174	San Diego St.	2023	LeDee	0	1	78.0	84.0	-1.0
193	New Mexico	1974	Hardin	0	1	68.0	95.0	-3.0
196	Washington St.	2008	Weaver	0	1	92.0	64.0	0.0

Here is the actual scoresheet with Tulsa dominating from the outset.

NBA's Most Famous Virgin Leads Oregon St. 1982 Past JMU 2024

Oregon State's AC Green set some amazing streaks, perhaps most incredibly staying a virgin through a 16-year NBA career and until his marriage in 2002 (see Fox Sports story). As a freshman on this Oregon State 1982 team he stepped in as the starting center and helped lead the Beavers to a third straight Pac-10 championship, No. 4 ranking, and Elite 8 run.

This card was from Green's freshman season, so he was good but not yet dominant, and his the other future NBA players Lester Conner and Charlie Sitton have stronger cards. Green stepped in to a void the year after Oregon State lost three players from their defending Pac-10 champs to the NBA in Ray Blume, Steve Johnson and Mark Radford. Later the great Gary Payton and his son Gary Payton II went from Oregon State to the NBA.

Patrick Ewing finally shut Oregon State down in the Elite 8, holding the rest of the team to 35% shooting, but the only one unfazed was Green who hit 3 of 4 shots in a 10-point performance. Two games later, Georgetown led UNC in the title game 62-61 when Jordan hit the first of many game-winning shots. More famous still were the following few seconds as the Hoyas worked down for a potential game-winning shot only to have Fred Brown, thinking a teammate was behind him, pass the ball back to James Worthy who ran out the clock. Coach John Thompson famously hugged Brown to let him know all was ok.

Green went onto finish second all-time in career rebounds and fourth all-time in scoring and then won multiple titles with the Los Angeles Lakers. Anyone who has talked to an NBA player about the number of suitors who come to their hotel doors at night can appreciate what it took to stay a virgin as a star in Los Angeles.

This great Oregon State team ranks 47th of the all-time great teams in our score tracker, behind those two (Jordan's UNC is ranked 7th and a Ewing Georgetown team 33rd), and was seeded No. 2 of our new 16 teams and thus drew the newest team and 15-seed, James Madison University 2024, which started this season with an upset at Michigan State to start a 13-0 start that propelled them to No. 20 in the AP rankings, though www.kenpom.com is not as impressed with them at 62nd. This is the same year the JMU football team debuted in the Top 25 in only their second year at the top level of football.

Oregon State dominated this match-up, but JMU keep within range during an incredible streak of 20 possessions during which JMU scored an incredible three or more points on 7 possessions to get within 66-71 with only eight possessions or 4:35 to play.

However, the Beavers clamed down on the defense with steals and blocked shots by Conner, Danny Evans and a stop by Green to only allow 2 points the last eight possessions to win 68-82 win and advance to the second round.

The following is the box score, followed by the scoresheet to show the running score, and then some screen shots to show the set up. The bottom image shows the setup with a game note. Games typically start with each of the 10 players having 2 points each for the 20-20 tie. However, if some players averaged less than two points per game (such as Oregon State's Alan Tait, Jamie Stangel and Jeff Wilson) then you can start them at 0 points and give those extra points - 6 in this case - to other leading scorers. 

In this case we started the 2nd NBA player on the team Connor with 5 points - added a 3-pointer made to the 2-pointer made that most teams start with in the game. We changed Evans starting 2-pointer with a 3-pointer so he starts with 3 points instead of 2. Finally we gave Green a 2nd basket at the opening to start him with 4 points instead of 2. As long as your total is 20 points at the outset, you can tweak but only if some of the 10 players averaged less than 2 points per game.

One strategy note from the game, with 12 possessions, JMU switched to a "try for 3-pointers" strategy to try to catchup from a 54-65 deficit. This should only be used if a team is running out of time to catchup or needs a 3-pointer on their final trip down the court to tie.  It gives a team a chance for the bigger come-from-behind, but on average you will lose 2 points for every 1 point you gain from changing a 2-pointer to a 3-pointer.

It paid immediate dividends on possession 12 when Noah Friedel had a "5" on the 20-sided die, which would normally be in his 5-8 2-point shot made range. However, when the strategy is used then half the numbers in this range are changed to a 3-pointer made (5-6 for Freidel) but the other half are changed to missed 2-point shot and rebound to the high defensive rebound rating. The 3-pointers can no more than double the number of 3-pointers on the card, and any numbers remaining in the range stay a 2-pointer made. Changing it to a 3-pointer cut the Oregon State lead to 57-66.

The only other possession the strategy effected was with 3 possessions left when JMU's Terrence Edwards drew a "6" on the 20-sided die. Due to the strategy, his normal 3-7 range for 2-pointers made was adjusted to a 3-4 for 3-pointer made (it can no longer double the original 1-2 3-pointer made), with a 5 still a made 2-pointer, and then his 6 on this roll falling within the 6-7 range a missed 2-pointer with AC Green getting the rebound as the high rebounder and never a chance for the offense to grab an offensive rebound when they miss in this range. 

Here is the box score:

Pos	JMU 2024	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Height, PPG
1-PG	Michael Green	10	2	2	0	0	1	1	0	1	6'0,11.5 ppg
2-SG	Noah Freidel	8	2	1	0	0	1	1	1	4	6'4,10.9 ppg
3-SF	Terrence Edwards	12	2	2	2	2	2	1	0	1	6'6,17.2 ppg
4-PF	Julien Wooden	5	1	1	0	0	2	3	0	1	6'8,9.8 ppg
5-C	TJ Bickerstaff	14	0	6	2	2	2	0	12		6'9,15.8 ppg
1-PG	Bryant Randleman	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'4,1.7 ppg
2-SG	Xavier Brown	7	1	2	0	0	1	1	0	2	6'2,7 ppg
3-SF	Quincy Allen	2	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'8,3.8 ppg
4-PF	Raekwon Horton	4	0	1	2	2	1	1	0	1	6'6,7 ppg
5-C	Jaylen Carey	6	0	3	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'8,6.8 ppg
	15 Turnovers	68	8	19	6	6	13	7	1	10
Pos	Oregon St. 1982	Pts	3pt	2pt	FT	Att	Reb	Stl	Blk	Fl	Height, Season
1-PG	William Brew	11	1	4	0	0	1	2	0	1	6'1,9.2 ppg
2-SG	Lester Conner	21	3	3	6	7	1	4	0	1	6'4,14.9 ppg,NBA
3-SF	Danny Evans	14	1	5	1	1	2	2	0	1	6'5,11.3 ppg
4-PF	Charlie Sitton	13	1	5	0	0	2	2	0	2	6'8,12.9 ppg,NBA
5-C	A.C. Green	10	0	5	0	0	2	0	1	3	6'9,8.6 ppg,NBA
1-PG	Alan Tait	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'2,0.5 ppg
2-SG	Jamie Stangel	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'7,1.4 ppg
3-SF	Jeff Wilson	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'7,1.2 ppg
4-PF	Rob Holbrook	6	0	3	0	0	1	0	0	2	6'86.7 ppg
5-C	Greg Wiltjer	6	0	3	0	0	1	0	0	1	6'11,5.4 ppg
	13 Turnovers	81	6	28	7	8	13	10	1	10

College Hoops 5th Best Conference History - Pac-12 (2nd Best with All UCLA Teams)

Going purely by the mathematical ratings, the top six Pac-12 teams in our game rank as the 5th best conference of all time. 

However, subjectively it is clearly the 2nd best conference of all time for the following reasons:

1. In the game we made a point of only including a couple of teams from each program, and trying not to include teams from the same school within a few years of each other. We could have easily included another half dozen teams from the John Wooden years that would have made the Pac-12 the second greatest basketball conference of all time. The same applies in our all-time Statis-Pro Baseball Game where we only include a few New York Yankees teams - and UCLA is the Yankees of college basketball.

2. The 2nd through 5th greatest conferences of all time based on our rankings are all within 1.2 points of each other anyway, so a virtual tie, 

3. The top six Pac-12 teams in the game have dominated all-time great teams for an 18-6 mark, but for some reason several surprise blowout losses among those 6 losses - such as Kareem's UCLA team getting shocked by double digits again 1980 DePaul, have held the overall rating down just a bit.

Bill Walton's 1972 UCLA team so far has been 10 points better than the rest of the conference and in fact ranks #1 of our 135 great all-time teams. Their 6-0 mark was in the tournament of our first 96 teams, where they took the title with a win against Michael Jordan's UNC. 

In addition to the great UCLA teams of the past, that 2017 Oregon team was the best in the country - and I believe would have been the clear No. 1 if their one big guy Chris Boucher (a star) was not injured at the end of the regular season to miss March Madness.

Arizona's great teams include the 1997 squad that beat Kentucky for the national title. I also really meant to include Utah's more recent team with Delon Wright, the subject of 2014 articles on my Value Add basketball ratings system, but forgot to make the team so we actually have 135 teams instead of 136. 

Rnk	Great Team	Year	Key Player	W	L	Pts	Allow	Rate
	Top 6 Pac-12			18	6	74.6	71.2	4.6
1	UCLA	1972	Bill Walton	6	0	72.0	62.0	15.5
2	UCLA	1967	Kareem Abdul-Jabbar	2	1	83.0	87.0	5.6
3	Oregon	2017	Dillon Brooks	4	3	71.9	69.9	2.7
4	Arizona	2015	Stanley Johnson	3	1	75.3	70.5	2.6
5	Arizona	1997	Mike Bibby	2	1	68.7	71.0	1.0
6	USC	2021	Evan Mobley	1	0	77.0	67.0	0.0
7	Colorado	2021	McKinley Wright	1	0	86.0	82.0	-0.6
8	Utah	1998	Andre Miller	0	1	69.0	79.0	-4.6
9	UCLA	2006	Jordan Farmar	2	3	66.0	72.4	-5.2
10	California	1959	Jack Grout	0	1	69.0	71.0	-5.8
11	Arizona St.	1980	Byron Scott	0	1	64.0	79.0	-10.0

We invented the Value Add Basketball Game, and since then have grown it to to 135 teams of all-time great teams and players. We have played 188 games to date, and 63,000 unique visitors have clicked on the game. 

Seven current conferences have at least six all-time great teams in the game. We decided to rank those conferences based on the average rating of their top six teams so far in our games against other teams.

Click on the game to play yourself - it contains everything you need to play the Value Add Basketball game, which lets you pit any of 136 great all-time college teams against each other. To pick your two teams it is best to click on this Google doc and print the pages of the teams you want (each team is one page). I track my games on this google sheet, but play your own for free!

Pac 12 Conference Top 15 Men’s Basketball Players To Date

 For Immediate Release

John Pudner, 404.606.3163, johnp@takebackaction.org

Pac 12 Conference Top 15 Men’s Basketball Players To Date

“Value Add Basketball is happy to provide the early list of the conference’s top 15 men’s  basketball players based on proven analytics used by NBA teams for draft prep,as well as writers at Sports Illustrated, ESPN, NBC Sports, Fox Sports,” said John Pudner, the inventor of the system.”

“Last year we calculated that Isaiah Mobley’s brother was actually the National Player of the Year over Luka Garza, and this year Isaiah himself is dominating as the 3rd most valuable player in the Pac-12 to give USC a chance to compete against loaded UCLA and Arizona teams. In addition to placing Jaime Jaquez and Tyger Campbell as 4th and 5th for 1st team all-Pac 12 status, note that we listed Peyton Watson and Johnny Juzang among likely future NBA players, and for Arizona both Christian Koloko and

Bennedict Mathurin are likely to end up in the NBAand give the Pac-12 an impressive seven of the top 100 players in the country.”

“While Washington is unlikely to challenge Pac-12 powers for the title, Arizona transfer Terrell Brown is playing at an All-American level in leading the Huskies. His ranking as the 13th best player in the country is calculated based on incredible numbers of steals and assists with very few turnovers, and of drawing fouls while rarely fouling.”

In addition to the top 15 players, we list five other outstanding defenders in the conference, and several other players likely headed to the NBA who could begin to dominate at some point this season.

You can click on this google doc with information on all 4,000+ players prior to it being posted on www.valueaddbasketball.com. You can also click here for the top 100 players in the country.

Information includes each player’s chance of making the NBA, his Value Add Rating for how many points he impacts a typical game (roughly 10 points is All-American level). The key to the table is: Rank = the player's conference ranking, Value Add = how many points he improves his team over a replacement player, Class = if he is in his 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th and final year of eligibility, Ht = his height, AdjD = how many points he takes away from opponents, and NBA = his percent chance of making the NBA.

Feel free to use any information contained in these statements as wanted, and email (johnp@takebackaction.org), or text/call 404.606.3163 for any questions or additional quotes from John Pudner.

Rank	P12	Team	Value Add	Class	Ht	AdjD	NBA
1	Terrell Brown	Washington	8.93	Sr	6'3"	-2.04	1%
2	Andre Kelly	California	7.66	Sr	6'9"	-2.22	1%
3	Isaiah Mobley	USC	7.24	Jr	6'10"	-3.11	17%
4	Jaime Jaquez	UCLA	6.98	Jr	6'7"	-3.5	56%
5	Tyger Campbell	UCLA	6.96	Jr	5'11"	-0.89	1%
6	Christian Koloko	Arizona	6.65	So	7'1"	-3.96	43%
7	Bennedict Mathurin	Arizona	6.61	Fr	6'6"	-1.83	94%
8	Michael Flowers	Washington St.	6.28	Sr	6'1"	-0.97	1%
9	Jules Bernard	UCLA	6.11	Sr	6'7"	-1.08	26%
10	Azuolas Tubelis	Arizona	5.95	Fr	6'11"	-2.6	5%
11	Chevez Goodwin	USC	5.49	Sr	6'9"	-1.46	1%
12	Will Richardson	Oregon	5.48	Sr	6'5"	0.25	30%
13	Kimani Lawrence	Arizona St.	5.42	Sr	6'6"	-2.42	1%
14	DJ Horne	Arizona St.	5.22	So	6'1"	0.18	1%
15	Harrison Ingram	Stanford	5.05	Fr	6'8"	-1.36	41%
Def	Myles Johnson	UCLA	5.01	Sr	6'10"	-3.8	1%
Def	Marco Anthony	Utah	3.2	Sr	6'5"	-2.8	1%
Def	Kim Aiken	Arizona	3.05	Jr	6'7"	-2	1%
NBA	Jabari Walker	Colorado	4.6	So	6'9"	-2.27	74%
NBA	Peyton Watson	UCLA	1.68	Fr	6'8"	-2.1	66%
NBA	Dalen Terry	Arizona	4.4	Fr	6'7"	-1.8	48%
NBA	Boogie Ellis	USC	4.68	Jr	6'3"	-1.63	45%
NBA	Warith Alatishe	Oregon St.	3.82	Sr	6'8"	-1.35	22%
NBA	Johnny Juzang	UCLA	4.06	Jr	6'7"	-1.28	57%
NBA	De'Vion Harmon	Oregon	2.81	Jr	6'2"	-0.4	14%
NBA	Marcus Bagley	Arizona St.	0.35	So	6'8"	0.18	37%