ECU dodged one season killing Tulsa loss, but they will have another on the road in a month they must win. The only interesting development I would take from this game is again Debaut has fully overtaken Ausar in the line up. Debaut had 0 points and took one shot but played 28 minutes last night. Ausar has had a better season but even if you think Debaut is slightly better recently what message are you sending to Ausar?
There is a portal, and he can leave for free. These NIL agents will certainly be in his ear contacting him. Players that are playing leave for less reason than this. This season is already at a point, maybe you want to invest in the most promising freshman and keep him happy so he will stay.
When they didn't take transfers who couldn't leave and went this freshman route that's part of what comes with it. Keeping a smile on their face. I don't think getting benched vs a #275 team does that. I fail to see how playing a 5th year senior in a cupcake game is best for the program at this point. If Ausar leaves this likely is a contributing factor.
Tabbs
Apparently, Tabbs has already left the team. Maybe he's hurt again but this seems more playing time related. He wasn't playing much anyway before even a hint of an injury surfaced. I've thought for a long time that ECU fans put way too many savior expectations on him. The reality was that he wasn't good when he came back years ago at this point at Boston College from his first knee injury. They were 2-10 with him on the court and he had one of the worst defensive ratings I've ever seen.
I never believe he would stay on the court for that basketball reason this year even if he was healthy. He was always a risk to get hurt again too. Unfortunately, that's exactly what happened I don't think he was ever going to play much here moving forward, and when he did play, he wasn't playable (7.7 PER, .446% TS, 108 DRTG)
I'd look at this is a good development for both parties. Maybe he can continue his career at a level he can play more. I don't think he would have played moving forward here anymore than this year, especially if ECU is improving from its 215 current NET ranking. Someone said he looked dejected on the bench not getting in the game a few times this year. After all he's been through to get back playing time is probably the priority you need to assure if you are going to put the work in to rehab. Good luck to him.
SOS
The SOS is 265th right now in RPI.
This is an incredible stat, and the metric the ncaa used for 40 years. It is still useful to compare vs previous seasons at ECU under the same formula. I have that data back 31 seasons.
I dug up the SOS after I saw the clown at the other place was spouting off about Lebo vs Dooley's SOS. They can't move on. He and Oasis were having their now every 3 post Dooley boner predictably where they try to rewrite history.
He was going off about how Lebo didn't play schedules like Dooley in CUSA. It's just completely inaccurate. They try to post things like part of a schedule that generally might sound true on the surface, but that wasn't reality. Dooley was the worst coach not named Stokes here those years by RPI. Stokes had half the time too. Thats the facts.
SOS is exactly what the RPI was created to adjust for. It's to compare different schedules and the quality of wins. They never acknowledge that when they talk about the fluff wins with no context or try to bring up one part of a schedule and sell the misinformation, cluelessness or straight lies.
What's interesting is it put my attention on how bad the SOS is this year. This is a level not seen since the CAA days pre-VCU when Ace of Base was still big. All the stats probably need to be adjusted down considering how bad the SOS has been relative to other ECU seasons. When you understand it in that context it starts to make more sense how Small and Johnson's numbers have looked pretty strong to this point. They have played a Big South or ASun type of SOS.
Josh King played 362 minutes vs the 48th SOS and has more impressive stats than most of ECU's bench today vs the 265th. That pretty much sums it up.
