gary-7 said:

I did notice that. This team is uncomfortable due to the factors I mentioned.

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NathanFielder said:

This isn’t related to your question but every game I would run the first play specifically for the starting 5. Just to get them engaged right away. Preferably you have something designed for a layup or something in the paint. But get the 5 involved and engaged right away.

What I see is UNC doesn’t really run any kind of PG-big ball screen early in the possession. The screen is usually for RJ or Seth and then UNC does that reverse the ball around the perimeter thing they've down for 50 years that's quite honestly outdated unless you're going to run good action off that. And good action isn't simply a back screen lob IMO.

Alabama usually runs some kind of action for their primary ball handler. It isn't overly complicated to run a 1-5 drag screen and get the PG going towards the basket, or at least towards the paint. From there, Alabama can run action off the ball or if the ballhandler has an advantage, their corner shooters can either stay in the corner, or relocate to the wing. That depends on the angles that are created from the downhill drive.

If you can have some success with that, it IMMEDIATELY opens up your offense. Because if teams overcommit, then you can clear one side and slip screen that look too.

This isn’t an effective freelance team because Cadeau, RJ, and Seth need the ball in their hands and need to dribble it to score in the half court. So in the halfcourt there needs to be some basic action to help the primary ball handler get into the paint IMO.

Right now, this offense is more designed for Cadeau to beat his man 1 on 1 and kicking it out to RJ after he relocates usually towards the corner. Well Cadeau isn’t always winning his matchup and that’s a lot to put on him. Give him some help.

Alabama has a fair amount of structure to their 5 out. Especially compared to UNC. There’s too much depending on winning 1 on 1 right now. It’s like when an Offensive Coordinator in football needs their WRs to win 1 on 1 all the time as opposed to scheme and design helping.

At least that’s how I see it.

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NathanFielder said:

@gary-7
There was a play in the 1H that got under my skin. GT was zoning and UNC broke it. Good ball and man movement and Seth got it on the left wing and had RJ in the corner next to him and it was a 2 on 1 situation where the defender was frantically recovering to Seth. Instead of swinging it for an open 3, Seth hesitated and may have taken a dribble before swinging it. And RJ was cooked and had to create something out of garbage. Must be a lot of things going through their heads. A confident and well schooled team swings that thing without any hesitation.

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gary-7 said:

...and this will be a bit longer for those who get it.

So... once again we come out flat, but most noticible is that nobody (other than maybe Seth) is playing anywhere near their abilities right now. Bigs aren't looking to score, we don't finish with any consistency, Drake looked lost, RJ is forcing shots and Eliot is forcing passes. Ultimately, it does no good to scapegoat individual players --- as I've tried to explain, the underlying issue here is SCHEME.

- Before I get into that, two 2nd half moments exemplified our struggles: EC hits ahead to RJ in transition wide-open at his favorite Wing 3 spot, and misses pretty badly. Moments later, RJ on a called play (same spot) freezes his man with his patented step-back, but again, clang. I'll bet I wasn't the only one here saying "last year RJ makes that", huh? OK, so reality is RJ is in a bad shooting slump right now --- slumps happen --- but what it should expose is that we shouldn't HAVE to rely on RJ to shoot us out of trouble.

What's getting us in this trouble is scheme. THAT is the catalyst for most of the issues we're (painfully) watching.

- To wit: Since I started keeping specific game notes back in 2014, I create a grid to track our scores by 4 categories:
Fast Break (primary with number advantage or ahead of the defense)
Secondary Break (including iterations and reversals)
Half Court (Freelance or player-called actions on the fly)
Set Plays (Called from bench or OB situations)

- As an example of how things CAN work, during the last Natty season 16-17 there were some games in which there were more points in the Secondary box than any other (all wins, unsurprisingly). Most of those points won't show up in box score "fast break" stats, but it has been the key to our success.

- In stark contrast, today (aside from 4 FTs in late Press Offense, we had 5 --- count'em FIVE --- Secondary points (and 7 vs bama). Folks, that dog ain't gonna hunt. Look, I've already explained exactly how we've f***ed up the Secondary scheme, so I won't revisit it, but it also has a ripple effect by making us start Freelance from a static set vs an unstressed defense.

- That then leads us into the foibles of unsound 5-out offense. Yikes. Unless you're raining in Steph Curry range 3s, 5-out actually creates LESS perimeter space than 4-out, and makes us just too damn EASY to defend. Moreover, there's a reason coaches have long preached "inside-out" --- it's basic applied geometry. The ball has to periodically go inside WITH A PURPOSE. The Big needs to look to score (and not just be a passer), because even if it's not always successful, it STRESSES the defense vertically thus making it difficult to track perimeter motion. Right now, defenders are just anticipating and swarming RJ's cuts without having to look over their shoulders, and they're also anticipating Eliot's PnR dishes. We are easy to scout.

- Our impotency in inside threat also showed up vs their 1-1-3 matchup --- and jeez, can't even flush a perfect lob play. It's not good when our "paint" points are almost all from Guards driving.

- OK, some positives: I still can't believe we out rebounded them. It was definitely a group effort, which it will need to be going forward for sure.

- Starting just after the under-8, we legtimately turned up some defensive intensity and shut them out of FGs for a long stretch. Seth was a terror, and gotta give a shout-out to EC here, who despite apparently fighting a virus, was also key. In particular, when EC was out Stoudamire was having his taller PG iso RJ, but Eliot absolutely stoned him with some damn good footwork.

- Although we missed three front-end FTs, Seth and Ian knocked down the big ones in crunch time. Now, why we were somehow still in 1-and-1 so late is a whole nuther issue, but we'll leave that for another day.

- Finally, bottom line is there's no way this Tech team should lead us during the 2nd half of a game. I mean, they are competitive but their most dangerous shooter transfered to Auburn --- speaking of whom, found out what the ACC knows about the striped treatment at HIS, the sort of home-cooking we can never seem to get --- but I digress. Our issues these days are self-inflicted.

Anyway, we toughed out a win that shouldn't have been so hard, so there's that. And I don't mean to down-play this win --- Lord knows a loss would've been disastorus --- as the guys sucked it up and fought for 8 key minutes down the stretch for the W. The bad news is that right about now, we're Fast Break or "Hoo-Boy", so I've said it before --- December is for adjustments, and we are in dire need of doing just that. The upcoming practices and LaSalle would seem to be the ideal time. I'd rather not wait untiI UF and UCLA. I suppose we shall see...

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heelmanwilm said:

Each Oregon player gets 7 different helmets, 6 diff jerseys, 6 diff pants. They use a different combo each game.

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GoNtheDistance said:

his pressers are comical honestly. he just doesn’t get it….at all.

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