Friday, February 1, 2013
Len's importance
By Matt Giles
For a player who is projected as a first round pick in the NBA draft, Alex Len certainly does not spend much time on the court. The big only uses 66 percent of Maryland's available minutes, per Ken Pomeroy, and it would appear his playing time is correlated to Maryland's depth -- the Terps have several quality bigs, and Mark Turgeon wants to afford them all minutes.
However, Len may be the most important Terp on the squad. UM recently lost to Duke, and Patrick Stevens of the Washington Times broke down the Blue Devils' scoring when Len wasn't on the floor. Len does have a pretty substantial block rate, and his defensive rebounding rate -- 19 percent -- is second on the team, but Mike Krzyzewski's squad was able to manhandle the Terps without Len, scoring 22 points in the roughly five minutes Len sat on the bench.
The beneficiary of Len's absence? Rasheed Sulaimon. The guard scored a season's best 25 points, in part, because he was able to notch eight points while Len rested.
