Who knew?

Dear October version of me,

You turned out to be wrong about a lot of things this season. Yes, on some other things, fine, your were  right. Still, the largest category of all takes in the weird and funky surprises of 2016-17.

Weird and funky surprises of 2016-17
In order of mayhem….

South Carolina made the Final Four. An offense that scored a mere 1,317 points in (well, what do you know?) 1,317 possessions in SEC play hummed along at 1.16 points per trip in the tournament. Sindarius Thornwell continued his SEC player of the year ways, and for the balance of the tournament P.J. Dozier was replaced with an NBA player who had undergone meticulous cosmetic surgery in order to look like the Gamecock sophomore (though even the doppelgänger continued to miss threes so as not to raise too much suspicion). On defense South Carolina forced its first four tournament opponents into giving the ball away on 24 percent of their possessions. You’re not supposed to be able to do that — panicky, error-prone guards should all be at home by late March — but Frank Martin’s men got it done.

Duke wasn’t as good at basketball as you and everyone else thought they’d be. Luke Kennard exploded much like Grayson Allen had in 2016 and Jayson Tatum came on strong after the NC State debacle, but — whether due to injuries, chance, or both — the combined output on both offense and defense of Amile Jefferson and Harry Giles was way, way below what was expected.

Tom Crean was fired. One year removed from Indiana’s 15-3 tear through the Big Ten, Crean was sacked after the loss of OG Anunoby and lackluster play from the remaining healthy players combined to seal the coach’s fate.

Archie Miller was hired. Dayton was the best per-possession team in A-10 play this year by a nose over VCU (Will Wade also got called up), and Miller radiates a youthful can-do brand of tireless basketball wonkery without taking that whole work ethic thing too far into Billy Gillispie land. When IU made the hire I was reminded of how in 2015 Miller imposed a total and (as such prohibitions always are) costly offensive rebounding ban in a bid to preserve a very small rotation created by the dismissal of two players. The coach was kind enough to grant me an interview about his decision after that season, and the next time our paths cross I want to ask what he thinks of SMU’s even smaller rotation having excelled in 2017 on both the offensive glass and on defense. See you soon, Coach, and best wishes for a long and successful gig.

Bill Self lost in the Elite Eight again. The head coach is now 2-7 in regional finals (although I don’t really hold that loss to North Carolina while he was at Tulsa against him), and at Kansas he’s 2-5. People again yelled and screamed about how he’s a terrible coach, yet, strangely, no single coherent proposal for how the coach should “change his approach” ever emerges from such screaming. Odd. (My proposal: Have players make more than 20 percent of their threes.)

Teams decided to stop missing shots. The Big East as a whole shot 52 percent on its twos in conference play, a mark that would have come with 0.2 percent of qualifying as No. 1 in the league as a team as recently as 2011. The other major conferences, mostly, followed suit.

Things you were right about
This won’t take long.

NC State. Woo. That’s about it.

Just to amaze and astound you
Here are the tournament-games-only stats for the players at the Final Four. Pay particular attention to the biblical suffering being endured by Nigel Williams-Goss inside the arc, the possibility that Justin Jackson and Sindarius Thornwell have in fact become the exact same player, Tyler Dorsey’s personal tribute to Kemba Walker, Jordan Bell’s uncanny imitation of DeJuan Blair, and, lastly, what Luke Maye is doing in terms of workload.

NCAA tournament games only
                     %Min  %Shots  OR%   DR%  Blk%  2PM-2PA Pct  3PM-3PA Pct
Nigel Williams-Goss  92.5   29.1   2.2  16.8         14-46  30.4   5-15  33.3
Jordan Mathews       75.0   25.8   4.5   9.2          5-12  41.7  11-32  34.4
Przemek Karnowski    53.1   22.4  10.1   7.6         16-27  59.3
Johnathan Williams   73.8   20.3  12.7  13.2         17-28  60.7    2-6  33.3
Josh Perkins         74.4   12.4   0.9  10.0           2-4  50.0   6-17  35.3
Zach Collins         44.4   14.9  10.6  18.1  12.4    9-13  69.2

                     %Min  %Shots  OR%   DR%  Blk%  2PM-2PA Pct  3PM-3PA Pct
Sindarius Thornwell  88.1   29.2  10.8  13.7         19-34  55.9  11-26  42.3
P.J. Dozier          76.3   27.6   1.9  11.3         24-36  66.7   2-13  15.4
Duane Notice         88.8   16.9   4.9   9.0          9-15  60.0   7-20  35.0
Chris Silva          63.8   20.2  12.6  20.8   6.1   14-30  46.7
Rakym Felder         45.0   17.2        14.7          6-10  60.0    3-8  37.5
Maik Kotsar          68.1   13.9   6.8   8.6         10-22  45.5 

                     %Min  %Shots  OR%   DR%  Blk%  2PM-2PA Pct  3PM-3PA Pct
Justin Jackson       82.5   29.7   8.2  11.9         18-35  51.4  11-27  40.7
Joel Berry           77.5   23.5         6.7          9-25  36.0   6-21  28.6
Luke Maye            46.3   29.9  13.2  25.4         14-25  56.0   5-10  50.0
Kennedy Meeks        65.6   14.5  15.5  29.9  10.0   13-24  54.2
Isaiah Hicks         52.5   21.8   5.2  12.4         16-29  55.2
Theo Pinson          66.3    8.4   3.1   9.9          4-10  40.0    0-4   0.0

                     %Min  %Shots  OR%   DR%  Blk%  2PM-2PA Pct  3PM-3PA Pct
Dillon Brooks        83.8   32.2   5.6  12.1         16-39  41.0   9-23  39.1
Tyler Dorsey         86.9   25.5   1.8  13.3         17-25  68.0  17-26  65.4
Jordan Bell          76.3   17.1  24.6  24.7  11.5   22-30  73.3
Dylan Ennis          93.1   14.0   1.7  13.2          9-18  50.0   3-12  25.0
Payton Pritchard     70.6   15.4        15.4          5-12  41.7   4-13  30.8 

Right, I forgot to tell you about Luke Maye. He’s kind of a big thing. Next letter.