Chief’s Briefs - Butler Edition

[Chief00]

We foul. No excuse. We don't rebound well. We're not tough.

We lead our opponents in rebounds 657 to 564 (by 93), our opponents lead us 432 to 330 (by 102) in foul shot attempts. Again, the numbers tell the story. I am trying to focus on the data not emotions and I try to be consistent win or lose.

Toughness is always great unless it leads to dumb fouls - but it’s also an emotion, which is needed but there’s limits to it if we don’t focus on the numbers too. Butler was grabbing multiple times on each of our possessions and we shot in the paint - yet this huge foul shot disconnect impacted the strategy of the game late in the game once again.

Many here need to believe the numbers, I am just a messenger of them. I know this bias is not suppose to consistently happen but it is.

An uninformed SI writer has already written an article last night about how Hurley was rude to the official when the real story should be how the officials personal feelings about Hurley makes them do their job in an unprofessional manner and they should be investigated as a result.

Last night Pat Driscoll’s crew once again delivered a 2 to 1 foul shot advantage for our opponent.

 

[Chief00]

I will stand up for our players about this criticism about us not doing things well, when every major statistics category, other than foul related ones show that they do:

Assists: UConn (368) to Opponents (188). That’s almost 10 more unselfish assists per game. An unbelievable unselfish #!

Steals: UConn (108) to Opponent (93). Isn’t that toughness along with rebounding?

Rebounds: UConn (657) to Opponents (564). Is that toughness?

Shooting %: UConn (49.4%) to Opponent (42.5%). This clearly shows both our offense AND defense are much better than our opponents !

The truth is absent the Syracuse native Pat Driscoll crew games and another crew we would only have 1-2 loses. It is tough to overcome 14-16 less foul shot attempts per game, foul trouble reducing player minutes, and opponent going into bonus early storm. So the impact is even bigger than the direct FT points.

 

[Chief00]

Another dumb post.

You are very good at calling someone dumb, not so good at researching the data and applying critical thinking to those results.

 

[Sea Goat]

Chief seems to think fouls are like jump balls: you get one, they get one. That's not how it works. Some teams foul more than others. Unfortunately, UConn is one of those teams.

We stop moving our feet - a dead give away that a foul isn't far behind... Sometimes it becomes assumed unfortunately.

 

[Sea Goat]

You are very good at calling someone dumb, not so good at researching the data and applying critical thinking to those results.

We are devolving in to internecine warfare here - not good. Hurley needs to step up and bring this group along. The talent is there, but is the heart there too?

 

[Tyler2Rings]

Rebounds: UConn (657) to Opponents (564). Is that toughness?

Chief I appreciate your data but rebounding has absolutely been an issue over the last few games. Vs Creighton Ashworth gets a huge 3 off an offensive rebound we didn't box out. Final moments of regulation yesterday JStew let's one go off his fingers and out of bounds, or how about the out of bounds after Telfort missed a second FT.

Even some of the rebounds we get when we are in good position can turn into a scramble. I'd like more Big Hoss Tarris to help us out with that. No doubt when he gets his paws on it

 

[ableton04]

Hurley needs to re-rethink playing his centers at half court on defense - way too
many fouls and mismatches result with this team.

Same goes for how a lot of the plays on offense are run - you can really see how much better Clingan was at operating at the top of the key. Neither of our centers screens as well and they almost never pull off the occasional pass to a cutter that Clingan was great at. Samson in particular is just a head scratcher on offense - he should be the ideal pick & roll big man for a college team but it's almost like he's regressed this season at times.