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This is a thread I'm making for the playoffs for me and anyone else interested in joining in to do game previews and recaps, along with some predictions. Good luck to all!

I decided to do my previews a little early for myself. I'm not gonna cover relegation so..predictions in short: Snake River wins series 2-0, O'Ballers win series 2-0, AC Bellem wins series 2-1. That's my predictions on those. Now, for a full game by game breakdown:

Great 8:
1v4: Raleigh Capitols(21-1) vs Jersey Blazing Heat(11-11)
Jersey has had a wild season that culminated in slipping by into the playoffs for the last game of the season! Raleigh, meanwhile, has been a dominant force for most of the season and is the favorites to win it all, though unlike last year's frontrunner going in, Mof State, that doesn't entirely feel like a foregone conclusion. This game, however, is not the reason for that. I'm predicting about a 35 point win for Raleigh in this game.
2v3: Hard2Guard(21-1) vs Duck City Ninjas(16-6)
Hard2Guard looks about as strong as ever. Despite having an older team, they know how to play together and within their roles. They're the other strong contenders to come out of the league on top. Duck City, meanwhile, had another solid season and is a very capable 3 point shooting team which makes them dangerous against anyone. That being said, I pick Hard2Guard to come out with a 15-20 point win.

Big 8:
1v4: BPE Bombers(20-2) vs Big Beavers(14-8)
BPE is probably a distant 3rd in the odds to win a championship. They seem to be a lot closer to it than they were last year, though. The Big Beavers won't be an easy out by any means though; they seem to have gotten stronger down the stretch and they're a much more balanced team than in years past. All that being said, I pick BPE to win by 15-20 points.
2v3: Gators(17-5) vs WildHoochieKoos(15-7)
This game, out of all the playoff games, is the one that seems to truly be a toss-up. The Gators come in on a 2 game losing streak, including a game to this WildHoochieKoos team, but both teams are known to make adjustments on the fly, whether that's WildHoochieKoos doing something like playing full-court press on defense or the Gators who, especially this season, have toyed with lineups endlessly, playing Lackey anywhere between the 2 and the 4 and have recently seem to shift towards the younger, higher upside bigs in their lineup. With all this being said...I predict the Gators win but by less than 10 points, maybe even the game goes to OT.

With the first round of the playoffs done, let's recap the games and how they went down. The first game I'm covering...is Raleigh vs Jersey. Jersey came out fairly strong in the first quarter but found itself down 7...from there, it didn't get much better. By the end of the game, free throws, field goal percentage, assist to turnover ratio and rebound margin all contributed to a blowout win for Raleigh. Great season to Jersey though; I cannot stress enough how difficult it is to even make the playoffs in your inaugural season! Next up we have Gators vs Hooch. Hooch and I had a short BB Mail convo and said that in addition to what he'd done when he beat me this past week, he had another trick up his sleeve. I had an idea of what I thought that trick was and decided to start Jon Basham over Gomez at the point based on my confidence in that idea due to his ability to pass the ball. Indeed, I was right, but I was not expecting to see a playoff win of this magnitude. Field goal percentage and the rebounding margin seem to make the difference in a game that I was very surprised to see be decided by such a wide margin. Up next we have a game between the late season surging team aka the Big Beavers and the constant in the Big 8, BPE. The game was a very close game but in the end, BPE was just too good on defense for the Big Beavers to overcome and actually pull the upset. The Big Beavers may be onto something, though. I'm quite excited to see how next season goes for them because promise like this at the end of a season has its way of carrying itself over into a really good full season in the next one for teams like Big Beavers or myself back when I was starting. Finally, we have the closest game of the 4, Hard2Guard and Duck City. Maybe if Pai doesn't get hurt, maybe that makes a difference; either way, his replacement played valiantly, but it wasn't enough as Hard2Guard once again out-team played an opponent to victory. The main thing that jumps out to me, though, is that despite his major 30 point contribution, Tilge may have also hurt their upset bid some by shooting 16 3's and not getting to the foul line once. Maybe if he passes up three to six of those 3's he missed, as in the ones that were probably closely contested, and maybe made it a priority to get five to eight free throws, maybe they pull it off...but that's neither here nor there. Rebounds and assist to turnover ratio also played a big factor in Hard2Guard's win. With that all said, we have "chalk" playing out for the semi-finals, and I'm excited to see what happens!

We're down to the semifinals! So far chalk has played out, but this is where things could get really interesting. Let's preview these games, shall we?

BPE Bombers(21-2) vs Gators(18-5):
In the regular season, BPE swept the series, though the second of those matchups could kind of be tossed out the window because the Gators weren't really putting a lot of effort into that game with the playoffs around the corner. With the difference in points between the playoff game against Hooch and the second regular-season game against Hooch, it's obvious that the Gators found their next gear for the playoffs; obviously, I don't expect a 40 point swing for the BPE matchup as their defense is too good for that and they're not gonna full-court press as they saw how that turned out last game. I do expect some tactical shake-ups for the Gators, though nothing too drastic, however. Going into a breakdown position by position, since the Gators seem to have settled into a Basham-Bayramov-Lackey-Pihrohnen-Calderon starting five, I give BPE an advantage at their point guard spot, I'll give BPE a combined small edge at the post positions, and I'll call the wing positions a draw. With all this being said, this game will likely come down to the wire...and despite BPE winning this matchup the past 3 times including playoffs, I feel that this will be an even closer game than last year's 5 point playoff game with the Gators getting the surprising victory.

Raleigh Capitols(22-1) vs Hard2Guard(22-1):
the matchup we've all been waiting for! Part III of this instant classic series that probably never happens again unless they meet up in the same III league in the future or decide to scrimmage each other a lot. For the positional matchups, I have to give Hard2Guard the post positions and Raleigh the point guard and wing positions. That being said, it was Hard2Guard's guards who came up big in their regular season win against Raleigh while Raleigh's likely MVP point guard missed several shots and committed a seemingly unnecessary foul in the last 2 minutes of that game. Unlike the Gators, these teams don't seem to shake up their tactics at all, though I wouldn't be terribly surprised to see Hard2Guard maybe go to a more balanced offense so they can shoot a few more 3's. Either way, this looks like an instant classic...but if this is a close game, I wonder if Jandula's late-game struggles in their loss show up again. That being said...as much as I want to see H2G finally move up, a player like Jandula is too good not to show up in a big playoff moment like this. I say all that to say that I think this ends up being definitely less than a 10 point game, probably less than 5, and Raleigh moves on to the championship series where they are likely to win and move up.

Dont H2g regulate to 3 league they won 21+ games.. I think all 20+ in teams should and need auto regulate up.

Gators wont beat BPE, I couldn't beat them but i did beat Gators, Gators will get blown out. Bpe has deeper experience in the players. i think the capitals will sweep the title match. But I hope BPe wins it for conference sake.. I also hope all 3 regulate to 3 division.

I'm running smaller roster, maybe 9 man next year.



Last edited by john otters at 07/08/2018 10:04:36

Recap time. I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on the Big 8 championship. Here's what happened in a nutshell: BPE showed up while on the other side Bayramov showed up with a bunch of guys looking like he'd gotten them from the local YMCA. I think the Gators are never gonna play BPE man to man again and will stick to inside box and one. Now let's get to the game we really wanted to see recapped. The Great 8 championship game. And it lived up to the hype and then some. Neither team had a huge statistical advantage in any one area; Hard2Guard played their usual team ball, while Bouquillon had himself a legendary performance. As I usually do in games like this, I re-watch the last 2 minutes to see who came up huge. Despite a night where he struggled shooting, make no mistake about it; Jandula absolutely was clutch with both of his offensive rebounds coming in the last 2 minutes of the game. Another key moment was when H2G's starting small forward, whose name I won't attempt to spell, fouled out. What made Bouquillon's night special in addition to 53 points was him seeming to make all his clutch shots with the exception of one or two which Jandula had covered. The final dagger came when Bouquillon, with the game tied, rose up to hit a go-ahead 3 that turned out to be the game-winner with 4 seconds left. Who knows how OT would've gone, but that was quite a send-off for what I cannot stress enough was a legendary, legendary performance. I just hope H2G can somehow be promoted; the team as is clearly is good enough to compete at the III league level.

Last edited by Rob Da Man at 07/10/2018 14:46:50

It's time for the finals series! First, let's look at the positional breakdown; overall I give a fairly large advantage to the Raleigh Capitols (23-1) in the 1-3 spots while the BPE Bombers (22-2) have a small advantage in the post. That being said, let's look at their matchups and these teams only met once; at the time, they were the last two standing unbeaten teams, but Raleigh won by nearly 30 points. While I do think BPE has improved since then, I can't help but think that Raleigh is going to sweep this series and win both games by at least 15, and the first game at home, depending on how the first and second quarters go, may end up getting ugly is BPE can't keep up. Raleigh's small forward literally just won the last game basically by himself and unless Baldriz or one of BPE's guards goes on a scoring rampage a la Cousido against most teams, I don't see anyone on their team who can keep up; I also don't see them shutting down Jandula scoring wise like Hard2Guard (22-2) was able to do in the conference championship game.

Here's my recap of game one of the finals! Despite similar numbers in rebounding, assist to turnover ratio, and FG%, the score ended up not being very close; this can likely be attributed to 3's (1-8 vs 6-18) and free throws(12-18 vs 30-35). Baldriz was also held in check on the boards, though did chip in 5 assists with only 1 turnover and 21 points. Bouquillon, meanwhile, has continued to be the "MVP of the playoffs" so far as he went off again, this time going for 37 points, including 5 of their made 3-pointers and going a perfect 6-6 from the free throw line. Looking ahead to the next game, though, if BPE can hit some more 3's, foul a little less while maintaining their solid defense, and get to the free throw line a little more, probably through Baldriz, then they may have a chance to set up a winner take all game 3. In this game, BPE did a good job in the 1st and 3rd quarters of playing Raleigh close, they just weren't able to maintain that going into the half or as the 4th quarter was played. Home court can really make a difference, though.

Okay, so I'll recap these two games one at a time, starting with game two of the finals series...Raleigh fought back after a strong first quarter from BPE, but they seemed to find another gear in the fourth quarter as they force a game 3. BPE was in total control of the boards in addition to taking and making more free throws and having a more efficient night from the field. The one thing to take away from game two was just how much the guards seem to have taken control of the offense; usually, BPE wouldn't win if Baldriz was their fifth-leading scorer, but between BPE's guards, they were more than fine. WHat Baldriz and Oakley at power forward and center did, however, was facilitate the offense, combining for 11 assists and only 3 turnovers. Boquillion played great again, but it just wasn't enough...even though at this date we know what happened already, there was definitely some intrigue going into game 3, but I'll cover that in a few minutes.

Going into game 3, the way BPE had played the game before left this game as possibly a bit of a toss-up. The edge would probably go to the home team, but when a team catches fire, you never know. After the first quarter, though, things didn't look so great for BPE. In the next two quarters, however, they played lights out and cut the lead to 1 going into the fourth quarter. From there, however, I have to guess Bouquillon went into Kevin Durant/LeBron James mode as he has all throughout these playoffs and your season 42 League IV.64 champions are the Raleigh Capitols. It didn't come without some challenges at the end, but they move back up behind the guy who seems to be the undisputed playoff MVP, who hit big shot after big shot down the stretch in the semis. The one thing that stood out in this game for Raleigh was field goal efficiency, as they shot well over 50 percent from the field while BPE was just under. Bouquillion in particular shot 56% in scoring 47 points to close the series out; he's a real assassin on offense. Great season everyone and good luck next season!