Butler could make waves

Twitter isn’t just for political bickering.

It goes well beyond that.

The social media service is great for sports fans on the go. It’s an easy way to get updates on scores, keep up with the news from your favorite outlets or columnists and banter with fans across the country.

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve stumbled upon a new favorite account. (Actually, not so much stumbled upon it, but noticed it because it gets retweeted frequently by Jay County High School graduate Emma Laux.)

The account’s handle — @dawgs_butler — doesn’t give away much. It’s really all about the account’s name — “Did The Dawgs Win?”

It’s that simple. On game days, the account posts simply “yes” or “no” depending on whether or not the men’s basketball team won or lost.

These days, it’s “yes” far more often than it is “no.”

I found myself thinking about the Twitter account Monday. 

I had checked my phone around lunchtime and had an ESPN update — I get them for all of the teams I am a fan of in addition to those I keep track of for work — and saw that Butler was getting clobbered by Marquette at halftime. It was down by 16 in its Martin Luther King Jr. Day matinée and looking at the possibility of a second loss in the last three games.

But a while later I flipped through my Twitter feed and saw several mentions about the level of noise at Hinkle Fieldhouse. The Bulldogs must be coming back, I thought.

I was wrong. They weren’t coming back. They had already done it and were up by eight, a 24-point swing. They won by that margin — 88-80 — to improve to 16-3 overall and 5-2 in a strong Big East that has four of the top 22 teams in the country.

So after that latest comeback, I found myself wondering, just how good is this 13th-ranked Butler team?

It’s a little bit hard to tell.

On one hand, the Bulldogs have defeated No. 1 Villanova, No. 8 Arizona, No. 15 Xavier and No. 22 Cincinnati. Oh, and don’t let me forget the win over then-No. 9 Indiana in Indianapolis.

On the other hand, they have losses to St. Johns (9-11) and Indiana State (7-11). It’d be easy to overlook one of those, especially since loss No. 3 is to ninth-ranked Creighton, but two defeats to such sub-par teams is tougher to justify.

Let’s look deeper.

Butler is solid defensively, allowing 66.2 points per game. It’s good on offense — 77.2 points per game — but not high-scoring enough to be considered prolific.

Perhaps the team’s best feature is that it makes the most of its possessions, shooting 48.2 percent to tie for 33rd in the nation out of 351 Division I squads. It is tied for 21st in “true shooting percentage” and 24th in “offensive efficiency.”

What I like most about the team is its makeup. Of the nine players who are key contributors, six are upperclassmen. Four of those are seniors. You don’t see that much anymore at big-time programs.

Junior Kelan Martin, who is averaging 16.6 points per game, gives the Bulldogs a legitimate No. 1 scorer. Andrew Chrabascz joins him in double figures, and four more players average at least seven points per game.

After wins over five top-25 teams, any Butler fan, diehard or casual, would be lying if they said they weren’t at least thinking a little bit about the dream tournament runs of 2010 and 2011. Their team has shown the ability to beat any team on any given night.

So, how good are the Bulldogs?

Is this a good regular-season team that will falter come tournament time, as its 2-3 road record might indicate? Or is this a team that has what it takes to rise to the occasion in front of raucous crowds in a one-and-done situation?

Time will tell.

Let’s just say I won’t be surprised if I scroll by the @dawgs_butler account in late March, or even early April, and still see it tweeting an emphatic:

Yes!