Breaking down the loss to Tulane

The Patriots dropped their first road game of the season to Tulane 76-71 Saturday, committing 20 turnovers and despite Cam Long scoring 24 points. Good to see that perhaps the leg cramp issue is behind him, at least for now. Luke Hancock was only other Patriot to reach double figures with 14. Mason had some impressive scoring runs in this game but defensively had way too many break downs. They kept it close but couldn't get the stops when they needed it. Long and Hancock were leaned on towards the end but maybe too much. Mike Morrison and Ryan Pearson were noticeably absent for end of the 2nd half and I am not sure why. The Patriots front court defense was less than impressive as Tulane's big men got way too many easy scores. Overall there was just sloppiness everywhere even with guys like Andre Cornelius who in the second half got a steal seemed about a mile ahead of everyone but fumbled the scoring opportunity. You can't blame the atmosphere, anyone watching the stream I posted would say that most of these guys played in front of bigger crowds in high school. Perhaps Larranaga was trying to see what he has in freshmen Wright, Vaughns, and Williams but this game was never out of hand and their miscues were costly. I think a lot of the freshmen saw in this one the meaning of home court advantage by how many calls they didn't get. The fouls and the turnovers devastated the team.

Below is a chart from StatSheet.com and it highlights the "Four Factors to Winning at Basketball". If you have never heard of this statistical breakdown before read more about what they mean here. The key stat that stands out is the rate at which each team went to the free-throw line.

NCAA Basketball Stats