There's been a lot of chatter about the rotation -- and in particular -- Sheldon's role in it.
Most people seem to fall into one of two camps:
(1) Sheldon's been awful and giving a healthy portion of his minutes to other guys (Conners, Elliott, Burris, Fisher) has nothing but upside.
(2) Sheldon's been awful, but there aren't options and we're stuck with him. And meanwhile, at least he tries hard on defense.
Noticed in our lineup data that if you look at linups that have had 30+ offensive & defensive possessions together, we now have a new best lineup based on observed efficiency (which corrects for quality of opponent on the floor):
Pavs/Conners/Kelly/Hadaway/Simmons
It's actually almost 3x as efficient as the next best lineup.
Some other interesting advanced stat tidbits:
-- Kuany is now leading the team in TS% at .629%
-- Defensive Box Plus Minus numbers like Sheldon, which probably explain why Boals plays him so much.
Without even diving into some advanced stats - which to your point like Sheldon at least defensively - just look at what our "shooting" guards have done from 3 this season.
1. Sheldon 38-109 .349
2. Kelly 15-44 .341
3. Burris 10-33 .303
4. Conners 18-60 .300
5. Elliott 5-21 .238
6. Fisher 1-5 .200
Everybody (including Boals) knows we need better floor spacing to allow Pavs to create in the lane/mid-range (his bread and butter) and also to give Hadaway and Simmons room to create in corner and post touches.
Absolutely nobody is providing it. Sheldon is actually the best of a bad bunch. In fact, everyone NOT named Sheldon is a combined 49-163 .301 and that's including Kelly who is really our SF not SG.
Go all the way back to pre-season prediction thread. I thought Sheldon would be Pavs backup at PG - but even then admitted ONE OF Kelly/Burris/Conners/Elliott/Fisher HAD to emerge as a consistent/solid 3pt threat. None have consistently. Why I keep saying Boals doesn't have a ton of good options right now which is why he's sticking with the Senior with good defensive metrics.
Sidenote:
FWIW, last I checked our tempo was ranked #82 yet our per-possession metrics for both offense and defense are below average. I tend to think Boals might want to consider pulling a Charlie Coles and slowing the game WAAAAAY down. Limit possessions. Know you're a bad shooting team - and not great on D either - and hope to win some 60-58 games instead of losing 85-75.
Last Edited: 1/30/2026 2:43:11 AM by GraffZ06