Stat Chat - Round 4, NBL24 (What's Hot and What's Not)

Statistics ... whether you love them or hate them, stats play a huge part in sport.

Whether it's when recruiting a player, how teams prepare, how a starting five is set up, or just about any facet of the game, numbers are crunched and relied upon as fact. 

This year, 2018 NBL Champion and expert commentator Pete Hooley will once again be our resident stats man on NBL.com.au to provide a rundown of all the key numbers heading into a new round of games. 

Keep an eye out after every round for the latest edition of 'Stat Chat'. 

What’s Hot – 16
After splitting the round, Adelaide showed some flashes of brilliance against the Wildcats in front of a great crowd. This game was all about Isaac Humphries, who straight up dominated with 26 points and eight rebounds. What stood out most to me was that he had 16 more FG attempts in this game than their loss to the Phoenix two days earlier. Sixteen! From a 1-1 game where he scored just two points, he went 12-17 against Perth and carried them to a win.

What’s Not – 24
Adelaide brought in DJ Vasiljevic to bolster their offence, especially from the perimeter. Unfortunately, the 36ers still struggled in that department across the weekend and shot just 24 per cent from the three. It’s not complete panic stations yet in Adelaide, but they made just 13 of 54 attempts from distance in Round 4.

Isaac Humphries.

What’s Hot – 14
Isaac White is never short of confidence and right now that’s what Brisbane need. White came in and scored 14 points in just 16 minutes of action to give the Bullets some life against South East Melbourne. I would not be surprised if we saw a lot more of White in the coming games.

What’s Not – 0
It’s always a challenge to have to adjust your role when key players are missing – and that’s exactly what we are seeing here in Brisbane without Aron Baynes. The one thing that is concerning is the need for other players besides Sobey to be aggressive on the offensive end, as he was the only player to shoot double digit field goal attempts in their loss. Sobey was 7-18 from the field, and the player with the next most attempts was Chris Smith with nine.

Isaac White.

The Taipans didn't take to the court last week, but are returning to NBL action this weekend against Illawarra and Sydney.

What’s Hot – 18
The Hawks needed to show some fight after a poor weekend prior, and that’s just what they did against United. Illawarra ripped down 18 offensive rebounds against one of the best defensive teams in the competition. This isn’t particularly new for the Hawks against Melbourne, as they seem to always do some damage in this aspect every time they play.

What’s Not – 3
For as good as the Hawks looked themselves on the offensive end, they weren’t able to get enough stops to get a win on their home floor. For the third time in five games the Hawks gave up 100+ points. Unfortunately, that is just not going to get it done this season on that end of the floor. In their two games prior to the loss to Melbourne they gave up 96 in a lostt to Sydney and 89 to Adelaide - in another loss. They need to find their defensive identity.

Sam Froling.

What’s Hot – 35
United are flying right now and there are many reasons they look to be the team to beat early in this season. Perhaps the most important part of their double-win weekend was the 35 minutes they got from star big man Jo Lual-Acuil Jr in his return from a wrist injury. In the best of these performances, Lual-Acuil Jr had 16 points in the win against the Breakers in just 20 minutes of court time. As if this team needed any more firepower.

What’s Not – 33
I can guarantee you that one of the major points of emphasis this week at practice for United will be boxing out. Across their two games, United gave up 33 offensive rebounds to their opposition and were probably lucky that it didn’t hurt them any more than it did. They are too strong defensively to be consistently giving teams more opportunities after a miss.

Jo Lual-Acuil Jr.

What’s Hot – 39
What a blistering return to NBL action for Zylan Cheatham. It had been a while since we saw the Breakers in action and it may have been easy for some fans to forget just how good he looks on the floor. Cheatham had 39 PRA (points, rebounds and assists) against Melbourne United and looked completely unstoppable.

What’s Not – 13
No one really knew what to expect from the Breakers after they returned from a long trip in the USA. They won’t make any excuses for their slow start, but the 13 points in the opening quarter put them on the back foot against the title favourites. They responded in emphatic fashion with a 30-point second term, but they’ll be thinking they let one slip after that poor first 10 minutes.

Zylan Cheatham.

What’s Hot – 450
Big shoutout here to one of the NBL greats, Jesse Wagstaff, for notching up an incredible 450 games. Wagstaff’s role goes way beyond the court, but if you look back at every championship he’s won he was one of the most important pieces to the Wildcat's success. It’s hard to look back at the last 15 years of Perth’s dominance and not think of Jesse Wagstaff.

What’s Not – -48
It feels like deja vu to be talking about the struggles Perth are having on the glass. Through their opening six games, the Wildcats have been outrebounded by 48. That’s a major concern, no matter how you want to look at it. They lost the battle of the boards to Adelaide by 11 and have only managed to win one rebound count all season long – that was by two against United back in Round 3.

Jesse Wagstaff.

What’s Hot – 34
Not everyone rates the +- numbers as an important factor on the box score, but sometimes there is just no overlooking it. Alan Williams returned to action this round and looked like a man amongst boys across the two wins for the Phoenix. Williams was a combined +34 in his minutes, which basically highlights that whenever he was on the floor South East Melbourne were in complete control.

What’s Not – 17
There weren’t too many negatives about the impressive weekend from South East Melbourne, however they need to be hitting the free-throw line in practice. The Phoenix missed 17 free throws in Round 4 and would be feeling pretty thankful that it didn’t come back to bite them in either of their wins.

Alan Williams.

What’s Hot – 44
Sydney will still take a lot of positives out of its loss to Tasmania, including the fact that they scored 95 points whilst only shooting 27% from deep. The major reason why was the 44 points scored in the paint, which may not seem like a big deal, but the way Tasmania play defensively, makes it even more impressive. The Kings are a team that gets a lot of shots up, so they’re not far away to finding their offensive groove.

What’s Not – 2
The Kings are still working on their new defensive identity for the season, which is predominantly a switching one that when they figure it out, is going to be really tough to score on. Growing pains are expected, for sure, but they still need to find a way to get enough stops in the meantime. Sydney had two quarters in their loss to Tasmania in which they gave up over 30 points. That’s just too many.

Denzel Valentine.

What’s Hot - 7
Call me crazy, but I’m going away from Jordon Crawford’s brilliance here. He was outstanding, but the more impressive thing for me was the fact that they only had seven turnovers for the entire game against Sydney. That’s going to put you in a position to win a lot of games on your opponent’s court, because it means you’re getting opportunities to score nearly every single time down the floor.

What’s Not – 4
The third quarter for the JackJumpers was completely contrasting to their brilliance in the rest of the game. Thankfully they came home strong in the fourth, but Tasmania managed to hit just four field goals for the entire third term, which led to just 18 points. Thankfully, those four field goals were all threes, which means they went an entire 10-minute span without scoring inside the perimeter.

Jordon Crawford.