...and I hope everyone had a happy Thanksgiving nonetheless.
OK... sometimes you get to witness in real-time one of the generations-old basketball adages that coaches throw around actually play out right in front of our eyes, and that was certainly the case tonight. So rather than go through the statistical minutiae, I'll use it to kick off my points.
- "Making shots makes up for a lot... until it doesn't". The things it can make up for include poor execution, poor shot selection and myriad other bugaboos... well, temporarily anyway, until ya don't make the shots. We witnessed both ends of that from both teams. Texas started off cold, largely due to awful shot selection, and then missed even when they took good ones --- to the extent that it looked to the casual observer as if UNC might pull away for an early night. Meanwhile we made shots --- and by "we" I mean Coby White --- some of which were improbable or not always well-conceived, but they were going in.
- I've often said that Dean Smith's last invention among his many was the (counterintuitive) tactic of using Zone to come from behind in the shot-clock era. It often works beause it takes a hot team out of their rhythm, and forces them to run a different offense and they thus tend to get themselves in a hurry. Roy employed that tactic just as it looked like we were about to be run outta the gym down the stretch. Wouldn't ya know it, Texas canned a 3 first time down but I was proud of Roy for sticking with it, and sure enough they lost their offensive movement and damned if we didn't crawl back into the game. Of course, the other reason it was a good move was we sure as hell weren't stopping them in Man.
- Speaking of which, it needs to be said that bad D was a team effort, but it started at the top. Matt Coleman just flat wore us out --- he got wherever he wanted, whenever he wanted --- and he consistently got his guys into good scoring ops. If he didn't help us out by missing FTs the game would've been over sooner. I cannot overstate what sort of pressure that unimpeded movement puts on our off-ball defenders. Meanwhile, Roach was heat-checking, but worse, we enabled his drives with some gawdawful attempts at help rotations, and those were killers. There's no way in hell we should be allowing that team to score 92 on us --- especially in a game that was mostly played in the half-court --- the only Fast Breaks they got came when we just threw the ball to them in the backcourt (ugh!). But even when we stopped doing that in the second half they still scored 49!
- On a related note, I'm shocked we out-rebounded them, because it sure seemed we couldn't get a clear when it counted. Their backup Big (Hayes?) ate our lunch with put-backs and keeping the ball alive, but y'know what? A lot of that was just poor/no blockouts. Roy might take the rims down next practice.
The rest of this stuff will be about learning --- because in the early season that is certainly a premium for later. And I do this fully aware that some aren't gonna like some of it, but as always, I'm calling it as I see it.
- I could go into gory details about why so many possessions on offense went awry, but I'll just point out one "teaching moment": At a key time late Nas had the ball in transition at the key with no numbers advantage and 2 defenders already set. He tried to take it in and picked up a Charge call and thus a lost possession. Granted, it was a pretty terrible call on an obvious flop, but he brought it on himself by not giving up the rock to a wide-open KW for a rhythm-3 or to get a return pass for a layup. This was just one of many moments that hopefully the younguns will learn from in film sessions.
- Roy will have to learn some things about this team as well, and one was painfully apparent. There are some lineup combinations that should just never see the floor together again. Granted, yes, we missed 7th but being brutally honest, a Leaky/BRob backcourt just ain't likely to end well... and didn't. I love both of those guys, and it ain't their fault --- they're both 3s.
- And speaking of inconvenient observations, here ya go: What you saw from Coby tonight is just what the book on him coming in would predict. Kid is a stone-cold scorer and a fierce competitor and we just saw those scoring chops in full bloom --- he made shots and made FTs --- and when his shots fall he'll put up some impressive point totals. Unfortunately, the other side of that book was displayed as well, in that every other aspect of playing the position of PG was, well, pretty bad... on both ends --- passing, spacing, floor-generalship, on-ball D, off-ball D. And again, I can't blame Coby --- young fella is a warrior, but the subtle-but-vital aspects of UNC PG just don't come naturally to him. In fairness (and contrary to some revisionist history that is occasionally posted here) this time a year ago Coby had no idea he would be thrust into anything close to this current role, so it's gonna be about learning.
Anyway, there ya go. Take it as you will. I'm not upset about this game --- other than the fact I hate losing, and especially losing to friggin Texas --- because these losses were assuredly coming. I just hoped we'd at least hold off on that til Friday... or longer . So welp, I guess the best way to cure that is to do some quick learning and snag a win tomorrow...
OK... sometimes you get to witness in real-time one of the generations-old basketball adages that coaches throw around actually play out right in front of our eyes, and that was certainly the case tonight. So rather than go through the statistical minutiae, I'll use it to kick off my points.
- "Making shots makes up for a lot... until it doesn't". The things it can make up for include poor execution, poor shot selection and myriad other bugaboos... well, temporarily anyway, until ya don't make the shots. We witnessed both ends of that from both teams. Texas started off cold, largely due to awful shot selection, and then missed even when they took good ones --- to the extent that it looked to the casual observer as if UNC might pull away for an early night. Meanwhile we made shots --- and by "we" I mean Coby White --- some of which were improbable or not always well-conceived, but they were going in.
- I've often said that Dean Smith's last invention among his many was the (counterintuitive) tactic of using Zone to come from behind in the shot-clock era. It often works beause it takes a hot team out of their rhythm, and forces them to run a different offense and they thus tend to get themselves in a hurry. Roy employed that tactic just as it looked like we were about to be run outta the gym down the stretch. Wouldn't ya know it, Texas canned a 3 first time down but I was proud of Roy for sticking with it, and sure enough they lost their offensive movement and damned if we didn't crawl back into the game. Of course, the other reason it was a good move was we sure as hell weren't stopping them in Man.
- Speaking of which, it needs to be said that bad D was a team effort, but it started at the top. Matt Coleman just flat wore us out --- he got wherever he wanted, whenever he wanted --- and he consistently got his guys into good scoring ops. If he didn't help us out by missing FTs the game would've been over sooner. I cannot overstate what sort of pressure that unimpeded movement puts on our off-ball defenders. Meanwhile, Roach was heat-checking, but worse, we enabled his drives with some gawdawful attempts at help rotations, and those were killers. There's no way in hell we should be allowing that team to score 92 on us --- especially in a game that was mostly played in the half-court --- the only Fast Breaks they got came when we just threw the ball to them in the backcourt (ugh!). But even when we stopped doing that in the second half they still scored 49!
- On a related note, I'm shocked we out-rebounded them, because it sure seemed we couldn't get a clear when it counted. Their backup Big (Hayes?) ate our lunch with put-backs and keeping the ball alive, but y'know what? A lot of that was just poor/no blockouts. Roy might take the rims down next practice.
The rest of this stuff will be about learning --- because in the early season that is certainly a premium for later. And I do this fully aware that some aren't gonna like some of it, but as always, I'm calling it as I see it.
- I could go into gory details about why so many possessions on offense went awry, but I'll just point out one "teaching moment": At a key time late Nas had the ball in transition at the key with no numbers advantage and 2 defenders already set. He tried to take it in and picked up a Charge call and thus a lost possession. Granted, it was a pretty terrible call on an obvious flop, but he brought it on himself by not giving up the rock to a wide-open KW for a rhythm-3 or to get a return pass for a layup. This was just one of many moments that hopefully the younguns will learn from in film sessions.
- Roy will have to learn some things about this team as well, and one was painfully apparent. There are some lineup combinations that should just never see the floor together again. Granted, yes, we missed 7th but being brutally honest, a Leaky/BRob backcourt just ain't likely to end well... and didn't. I love both of those guys, and it ain't their fault --- they're both 3s.
- And speaking of inconvenient observations, here ya go: What you saw from Coby tonight is just what the book on him coming in would predict. Kid is a stone-cold scorer and a fierce competitor and we just saw those scoring chops in full bloom --- he made shots and made FTs --- and when his shots fall he'll put up some impressive point totals. Unfortunately, the other side of that book was displayed as well, in that every other aspect of playing the position of PG was, well, pretty bad... on both ends --- passing, spacing, floor-generalship, on-ball D, off-ball D. And again, I can't blame Coby --- young fella is a warrior, but the subtle-but-vital aspects of UNC PG just don't come naturally to him. In fairness (and contrary to some revisionist history that is occasionally posted here) this time a year ago Coby had no idea he would be thrust into anything close to this current role, so it's gonna be about learning.
Anyway, there ya go. Take it as you will. I'm not upset about this game --- other than the fact I hate losing, and especially losing to friggin Texas --- because these losses were assuredly coming. I just hoped we'd at least hold off on that til Friday... or longer . So welp, I guess the best way to cure that is to do some quick learning and snag a win tomorrow...