Rival week for Lightning vs. Sudbury

Around the Perimeter: Parity a plus for league; Nothing ‘free’ from the line for London; Godfrey an impact add; We’re at the midpoint; Up next: It’s two straight against rival Sudbury …

Big man Calvin Godfrey has been a big addition for the London Lightning. (Photo: Jade Sumpton).

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WHAT HAPPENED.

London (8-6, 9-6) 127 – Pontiac 116 | Wednesday, Jan. 29 in London 15

London (8-6, 10-6) 143 – Rhode Island Kraken 103 | Saturday, Feb. 1 in London*

Jamestown 127 (8-7, 10-7) – London 109 | Sunday, Feb. 2 in Jamestown, NY

* Reminder, only conference standings (meaning BSL vs. BSL opponents) will determine the playoff standings. I am going to list both records but know that the bold is the one to care about.

WHAT WE LEARNED.

London is officially at the halfway point – 17 games into the season with 17 to go. But the end is closer than it appears, as only 14 of those games count towards the playoffs. (The other three games are against TBL opponents.)

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Nobody is running away with this thing.

The gravitation pull of parity is something new for fans of a lot of these teams. Currently, one win can shuffle the top three teams, and two or three wins will mix up the next three teams. Seven of the eight teams have a shot at the playoffs as of today.

“It’s a good thing for the league, for sure, but it’s a frustrating thing for teams that are used to winning that aren’t winning right now,” Lightning head coach Jerry Williams said. “At the end of the day, fans want to see a competitive league. They want to know when teams come in that it’s not just going to be a blowout. Any team can win on any given night.”

Reminder: Six teams earn a playoff spot. The top two teams get first-round byes. That means the first round features No. 3 hosting No. 6 and No. 4 hosting No. 5 in one-game play-in games. The Final Four and Finals will be best-three-out-of-five series.

One-game playoff series are scary, especially in a league where anyone can beat anyone anywhere. If the season ended today, London would face Jamestown in Canada Life Place. The Lightning have lost their only matchup to the Jackals this season.

“As a coach – and I think you would hear this from any of us – you recognize there are a lot of really, really good players, really, really good teams, and you’re going to go into some places and it’s going to be hard to win. That’s a real basketball league,” said Williams.

(Photo: Jade Sumpton).

WHAT WAS AWESOME.

Centre Calvin Godfrey has been an incredible addition. Arriving Jan. 16, the Wisconsin native has played six games, averaging 12.7 points and 7.7 rebounds in 17.3 minutes per game. He has been a menace down low on both ends of the court, and he’s given London a true one-two centre punch.

“Calvin fit in right from the beginning because he knows how to play the game of basketball,” Williams said.

Another huge piece of Godfrey’s addition is the easing of burden on fellow centre Corey Boyd.

Since Godfrey’s arrival, Boyd has been able to maintain his same level of production – 16.2 PPG and 8 RPG in the 11 games BG (Before Godfrey) vs. 15.2 PPG and 7.5 RPG AG (After Godfrey). That’s incredible, when you consider the St. Louis native is maintaining those numbers with 10 minutes less playing time per game (30.3 MPG BG vs. 20 MPG AG).

Those minutes played (and not played) by both men count for a lot as the season drags on.

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The Sudbury-London series will be fun Saturday and Tuesday. 

These are two teams that need wins. The Five (10-5) have slipped from the top spot; the Lightning (8-7) are fighting to break from the messy middle. The two teams will match up only one other time in the regular season (March 5 in London).

London is 1-2 against Sudbury this season, with a total of 14 points separating them across the three games.

(Photo: Jade Sumpton).

WHAT NEEDS WORK.

What this parity also means is that London finds itself in a new era – and it’s totally weird for all involved. Players and coaches. Fans. Ownership. Gone are the days of dominating wire to wire. Gone are the days of an intimidation factor simply by donning the Yellow and Black.

But this is a new league, with new teams, in a new era of play. Those facts have been hard for former NBLC teams to accept, especially London.

“We just have to change the narrative,” Williams said. “Our guys have got to come in ready to go to war every single game. You can’t take a night off. Some of these teams are used to taking a night off, especially when a TBL team comes in. Not anymore. Jamestown. Glass City. Pontiac. Those are real teams that can play basketball. The league made a great choice by picking those three teams to come in. They belong.”

The Lightning have lost seven games through their first 17 – and they will lose more. That’s hard to take in the Forest City. Heck, the 2012-13 team only lost seven games all year en route to a championship. But this franchise and its fans need to understand that Royce White ain’t walking through that door. (And if you have kept up with Royce – thank god he isn’t.)

“It’s a growing pain for us. Especially being a first-year coach, losing seven games, I don’t know even if they lost seven games this early – ever. It’s a lot of pressure; it’s stressful,” Williams said. “But you have to maintain perspective, look at the totality of it. The league is growing, and you have to grow with it. Nobody is going to sit around watching one team continuously blow out everybody every single year.”

He continued, “It’s like death when we lose here. It’s the weirdest feeling in the world. It’s not something I ever want to get used to, but I am a realist. Teams are coming for us; they are coming to play. We have got to stand up and play. London Lightning doesn't scare anybody anymore. We have got to step up and play basketball.”

(Photo: Jade Sumpton).

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Ain’t nothing free when the Lightning steps to the free throw line. While taking a league-high 576 attempts as of Feb. 7 (77 more than second-place Sudbury), London is shooting only 71.4% from the line – next to last in the league. That said, the league as a whole is shooting only 73.6%.

Paul Parks (36-43, 83.7%), Jachai Taylor (25-30, 83.3%), and Joel Kindred (45-54, 83.3%) lead the active roster in free throw shooting percentage.

A big part of the problem is that Corey Boyd leads the team in attempts with 129 (37 more than the next player on the list) – and he’s shooting a team-low 52.7%.

Yes, that’s embarrassing for Boyd, and frustrating for his coaches. But it’s also a huge problem for the team. That number isn’t simply bad; it is the kind of number that will land an impact player on the bench late in tight games.

Why give Boyd an easy dunk for 2 when you can take your chances sending him to the line where he may get 1.

For perspective, when Dallas Mavericks head coach Don Nelson deployed his ‘Hack-A-Shaq’ philosophy against Shaquille O’Neal in 1999-2000 (meaning that his team intentionally fouled the dominant big man because of his poor free throw shooting), Shaq shot 57.4% that season.

They call it the charity stripe, but it has been London giving away points (and, arguably, games) by being so ineffective form the line. Let’s look at the number of free throws missed in the team’s seven losses:

Missed 16. Lost by 1 vs. KW.
Missed 13. Lost by 8. At Windsor.
Missed 14. Lost by 1 vs. Sudbury.
Missed 4. Lost by 17. At Sudbury.
Missed 12. Lost by 9 vs. KW.
Missed 11. Lost by 13. At KW.
Missed 10. Lost by 18. At Jamestown.

They miss at home. They miss on the road. They miss a lot. The problem is that there are no easy solutions. You can’t coach, diagram, or trade your way out of this one; it’s all on the players to make shots.

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Nobody will be making excuses for this weekend. But London needs to question any future league schedules that include wild back-to-back, cross-border, interleague, home-away games.

That’s a mouthful, right?

Last weekend, the Lightning wrapped up a game at around 11 p.m. Saturday night in London, then hopped on a bus at 7 a.m. Sunday to Jamestown, N.Y. (350KM and a border crossing away) for a 2 p.m. game. That would be a pain in good times, but the weirdness of this one is that Saturday night’s game against the Rhode Island Kraken didn’t count in the playoff race while Sunday’s backend matchup did.

Listen, I get that TBL home games are meant to help BSL teams increase home revenues, but they shouldn’t be crammed in in a way that penalizes teams. In a tight race, this one might hurt looking back.

STORIES YOU MISSED.

‘Turbo’ more than a nickname — it’s a lifestyle for Taylor

Defense! Defense! A (fun with numbers) breakdown …

WHAT’S NEXT.

at Sudbury | Saturday, Feb. 8 | 7 p.m.

Sudbury | Tuesday, Feb. 11 | 2 p.m.

KW | Sunday, Feb. 16 | 7 p.m.