In the fourth quarter I finally saw from Minnesota what I expected to see much more often this season, Minnesota playing their five most talented players. Minnesota closed the game playing Whalen, Wiggins, Augustus, Moore, and Brunson and it worked pretty well.
It's not a lineup you want to start a game with, but it is a lineup Minnesota should have used far more often this season. The Indiana Fever with their star wings Catchings and Douglas regularly go to a similar lineup during games. That is unless Reeve is an evil genius saving her best stuff to the end of the season. The key feature is Maya sliding to the 4 where suddenly her entire offense role completely changed. She hadn't been the screener in a single high screen and roll all game, but she shifts to a post position and she's suddenly involved in that. Now that she's playing a post position Maya suddenly gets to grab low post position even though she was guarded by a significantly smaller player for the previous 30 minutes of the game.
This is more about how Maya's offensive role suddenly changed than it is about what position she is playing. Maya was the most devastating screener in the high screen and roll that WCBB has ever seen because when she faded for an open jump shot she was taking a 3-pointer not a 15-18 foot shot. The defense had to stretch to stop her from getting an open three and if they did Maya was also one of the best entry passers in WCBB history. She would make a pass into the exposed paint to a post player or cutter. Yet Minnesota practically never puts her in that situation. The same is true of posting up. Maya has had countless opportunities to post up up smaller defenders, but it almost never happens because she's running to the weakside corner to balance the floor for her teammates. And maybe Maya is just not recognizing these opportunities and being too dutiful as a teammate, and her coach would like Maya to break the offense to get scoring opportunities. But it would be that, breaking the offense which also drives me a little nuts. There's nothing that stops a basketball team from running a PG/SF screen and roll. Or a SG/SF screen and roll. Certainly the Celtics fans on the Boneyard have seen Paul Pierce and Ray Allen run it or Rondo and Pierce/Allen. I find it frustrating that the Lynx have gone nearly an entire season without employing Whalen/Moore or Augustus/Moore screen and rolls in any memorable way let alone significant way. Minnesota has the ability to do this with their starting lineup as Brunson and McWilliams-Franklin are both decent shooters.
I'm from the Chicago area and my basketball views were heavily shaped by Phil Jackson as he came in and made changes that resulted in Six NBA championships. And a big part of that shaping was the triangle offense. I'm not sure I would have become a UConn fan in 1995 if they weren't running the triangle at the time. Because it was my first hook into the game I was watching on TV, and because Geno's use of the triangle offense was representative of Phil and Geno's overlapping basketball philosophies. Geno admired the New York Knicks growing up and Phil Jackson actually played for those Knicks. That's just one common overlap that helped shape their basketball philosophies into something similar.
One of the principles of the triangle offense was that any player could replace any other player in the offense. There were nominally two posts and three guards, but the offense demanded interchange between the posts and the guards because they were supposed to react to the defense. Often the PF or occasionally even the C had to come out beyond the 3-point line to receive the wing entry pass with a perimeter player then assuming one of the post spots. Watch a Bulls game from the 90's and you would see everyone from the C to the PG play the high post, and often the low post as well at some point in the game. I was watching an old game recently and there was a play where there was a loose ball and once the Bulls recovered they got right into the offense based on where they were standing without any regard for what traditional position they played. The C and PF were outside the three point line in the base of a sideline triangle with the SG in the low post at the point of the triangle. The SF was on weakside wing and the PG was in what's called the pinch post or high post. Then they ran the offense as normal, and eventually recognized the opportunity they had with the PG in a post position and got him the ball where he quickly scored. That's the basketball I love, when there are five players on the floor with the versatility to do that and a offensive system that both allows and provides a structure to do that.
Geno moved on from the triangle offense itself unlike Phil, although Geno didn't have the creator of the offense sitting next to him on the bench like Phil did. But the offensive principles that Geno believed in and that attracted him to the triangle offense have never left (I think this is the way to frame it; Geno is a coach that had his center taking 3s on his first final four team and over a decade before it became fashionable). And one of those principles continues to be that all five players can occupy any position on the floor, and that it can happen naturally as a reaction to the defense. That demands recruiting versatility to the point of passing up really good players. There are numerous Hall of Fame players that couldn't excel in the triangle offense because they lacked that versatility. And for UConn that really effects recruiting at the ends of the spectrum, point guards and shooting guards. UConn passes all the time on great point guards that aren't comfortable playing without the ball. And they have to pass on centers that aren't skilled enough to be comfortable with the ball away from the basket. The principle of offense versatility is that important to Geno. And while there are other ways to be successful on offense, there are none I would prefer to watch.
It's not a lineup you want to start a game with, but it is a lineup Minnesota should have used far more often this season. The Indiana Fever with their star wings Catchings and Douglas regularly go to a similar lineup during games. That is unless Reeve is an evil genius saving her best stuff to the end of the season. The key feature is Maya sliding to the 4 where suddenly her entire offense role completely changed. She hadn't been the screener in a single high screen and roll all game, but she shifts to a post position and she's suddenly involved in that. Now that she's playing a post position Maya suddenly gets to grab low post position even though she was guarded by a significantly smaller player for the previous 30 minutes of the game.
This is more about how Maya's offensive role suddenly changed than it is about what position she is playing. Maya was the most devastating screener in the high screen and roll that WCBB has ever seen because when she faded for an open jump shot she was taking a 3-pointer not a 15-18 foot shot. The defense had to stretch to stop her from getting an open three and if they did Maya was also one of the best entry passers in WCBB history. She would make a pass into the exposed paint to a post player or cutter. Yet Minnesota practically never puts her in that situation. The same is true of posting up. Maya has had countless opportunities to post up up smaller defenders, but it almost never happens because she's running to the weakside corner to balance the floor for her teammates. And maybe Maya is just not recognizing these opportunities and being too dutiful as a teammate, and her coach would like Maya to break the offense to get scoring opportunities. But it would be that, breaking the offense which also drives me a little nuts. There's nothing that stops a basketball team from running a PG/SF screen and roll. Or a SG/SF screen and roll. Certainly the Celtics fans on the Boneyard have seen Paul Pierce and Ray Allen run it or Rondo and Pierce/Allen. I find it frustrating that the Lynx have gone nearly an entire season without employing Whalen/Moore or Augustus/Moore screen and rolls in any memorable way let alone significant way. Minnesota has the ability to do this with their starting lineup as Brunson and McWilliams-Franklin are both decent shooters.
I'm from the Chicago area and my basketball views were heavily shaped by Phil Jackson as he came in and made changes that resulted in Six NBA championships. And a big part of that shaping was the triangle offense. I'm not sure I would have become a UConn fan in 1995 if they weren't running the triangle at the time. Because it was my first hook into the game I was watching on TV, and because Geno's use of the triangle offense was representative of Phil and Geno's overlapping basketball philosophies. Geno admired the New York Knicks growing up and Phil Jackson actually played for those Knicks. That's just one common overlap that helped shape their basketball philosophies into something similar.
One of the principles of the triangle offense was that any player could replace any other player in the offense. There were nominally two posts and three guards, but the offense demanded interchange between the posts and the guards because they were supposed to react to the defense. Often the PF or occasionally even the C had to come out beyond the 3-point line to receive the wing entry pass with a perimeter player then assuming one of the post spots. Watch a Bulls game from the 90's and you would see everyone from the C to the PG play the high post, and often the low post as well at some point in the game. I was watching an old game recently and there was a play where there was a loose ball and once the Bulls recovered they got right into the offense based on where they were standing without any regard for what traditional position they played. The C and PF were outside the three point line in the base of a sideline triangle with the SG in the low post at the point of the triangle. The SF was on weakside wing and the PG was in what's called the pinch post or high post. Then they ran the offense as normal, and eventually recognized the opportunity they had with the PG in a post position and got him the ball where he quickly scored. That's the basketball I love, when there are five players on the floor with the versatility to do that and a offensive system that both allows and provides a structure to do that.
Geno moved on from the triangle offense itself unlike Phil, although Geno didn't have the creator of the offense sitting next to him on the bench like Phil did. But the offensive principles that Geno believed in and that attracted him to the triangle offense have never left (I think this is the way to frame it; Geno is a coach that had his center taking 3s on his first final four team and over a decade before it became fashionable). And one of those principles continues to be that all five players can occupy any position on the floor, and that it can happen naturally as a reaction to the defense. That demands recruiting versatility to the point of passing up really good players. There are numerous Hall of Fame players that couldn't excel in the triangle offense because they lacked that versatility. And for UConn that really effects recruiting at the ends of the spectrum, point guards and shooting guards. UConn passes all the time on great point guards that aren't comfortable playing without the ball. And they have to pass on centers that aren't skilled enough to be comfortable with the ball away from the basket. The principle of offense versatility is that important to Geno. And while there are other ways to be successful on offense, there are none I would prefer to watch.
