Friday, April 8, 2011

A Few Final Men's Basketball Numbers

I’ll have our usual full season in review on the main website over the next few weeks, including updated player notes, photo galleries and more. I also have a few thoughts from Rob Jeter looking back and ahead that I’ll put up on the main site, too.

But, with the men’s college basketball season officially ending Monday night, here are a few final tallies and rankings.

Schedule Notes

Milwaukee wound up finishing 94th in the official final NCAA RPI and played 11 games against teams in the top 100. The Panthers went 5-6 against those teams, including two wins over #19 Butler. With the Bulldogs advancing to the championship game, this was the fourth time in the last seven seasons the Panthers have played against a team in the title game – Illinois 2005, Florida 2006, Butler 2010, Butler 2011.


National Rankings

The final NCAA statistics landed a few Panthers in the top quarter or third of the national rankings.

Kaylon Williams finished 32nd nationally in assists per game (5.4) while Anthony Hill was 42nd nationally in field goal shooting (52.9 percent). Tone Boyle wound up 63rd in three-point field goal percentage (35.3 percent) and 68th in three-point field goals per game (2.5).

As a team, Milwaukee finished up 63rd nationally in three-pointers per game (7.6).


League Numbers

Williams did wind up winning the Horizon League assist crown, leading the league with his 5.4 assists per game. In all, he had 178 assists in 33 games. Remember, he led the Missouri Valley Conference in assists when he was at Evansville as a freshman. I’ll look into it, but I’m guessing there haven’t been too many college players to lead two different leagues in assists. Williams also finished 10th in the league in rebounding.

The Panthers wound up with three players in the top 20 in the league in scoring, as Hill finished eighth (15.3 ppg), Boyle 17th (12.9 ppg) and Tony Meier 18th (12.0 ppg). Hill also finished fifth in rebounding (6.6) and fifth in field goal percentage (52.9 percent).

Meier was also second in three-point field goal percentage (44.3 percent), fifth in three-pointers made (2.0) and seventh in free throw percentage (80.6 percent).


Senior Career Tallies

Hill and Boyle finished their careers with some notable numbers.

Hill ended with 1,022 points and 513 rebounds, becoming one of just six Panthers to join the 1000-500 club. He also wound up shooting 49.1 percent for his career and averaged 8.5 points per game. Hill played in 120 games, tied for the second-most in school history.

Boyle finished with 149 three-pointers, 823 points and a 13.1 points per game average.