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Message: [QUOTE="Bone Dog, post: 5039860, member: 12088"] Let me see if I can put this really precisely. Geno often jokes that he doesn’t believe in analytics. One thing he might mean by analytics is what you hear about Lynne Roberts at Utah and other coaches, that they discourage midrange jump shots in favor of only 3s and layups. Geno seems to really like the midrange game, and the only reason I think this is because he recruits kids who are really great at it, like Sue and Diana and Pheesa and Paige and Azzi and Ash and now Allie and Kaitlyn. Don’t get me wrong. Geno also loves back cuts and layups and 3s and the transition game. I’ve said before that the midrange jumper is the stock in trade if the bucket-getter. And it’s really valuable for stopping runs by the other team. Against Syracuse and Duke and USCw, how many times did Paige hit an effortless midrange shot to reassure her teammates and to demoralize their opponents? How often has Azzi done the same thing to bail us out? And it’s the effortlessness of it that’s part of the point. In March defenses are tuned to shut down the paint and the perimeter. But this often leaves the midrange vulnerable to someone like Paige or Azzi. The point of this digression — maybe it’s an analogy — is that a similar style of thinking seems to lead Geno to prefer HS recruits to portal transfers. Some sort of analytics might tell a coach that you can build a talented team quickly with transfers. But you probably can’t build a program that way. HS recruits are like the midrange game for coaches. To switch metaphors for a second, you can’t swing for the fences all the time (contrary to Earl Weaver). Mostly you just want to get runners on base and I to scoring position. Switching back to basketball, Geno often says he’d like the team to take 20-25 3s in an ideal game. If they hit 35% of those, that amounts to 8 extra points, and a total of ~24 points. For a team that usually scores ~85 points/game this leaves 60 points, and probably ~40 of these will come from layups and the free throw that will often accompany them. This leaves 20 points from the midrange, and given how efficient Paige and Azzi and Ash tend to be from there, this may only require ~15 shots. Clearly from a beancounter’s standpoint, those 20-25 3 point attempts would have been better spent on midrange attempts, since the point yield would be higher given the difference in efficiency. But in reality, the impact on team morale from a well timed dagger or a seemingly effortless midrange shot can be quite different. Similarly, snatching a superstar from the portal may satisfy the fans and the AD for a season or two. And waiting on a HS recruit may try the patience of the fans. But the long game and the slow program building game may be the better play. There’s room for a few portal stars in a solid program but you don’t want to rely on them to build it. [/QUOTE]

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