LSU Game Thread

[hoophuskee]

I'll also add you can't be playing a packed in zone when you have one player guarding the ball 20 feet and another guarding KLS 20 feet too. That's not a packed in zone. And if KLS's defender leaves her and swarms to the ball while KLS is near the corner - physically how can the defender get back to KLS if another pass to KLS is made? There isn't enough time. So GG goes on to say "they lost her." Noooo - the defense was "swarming." When it swarms it does so with intent to stop the ball or steal it etc and is willing to live with the consequence of a 3pt shot. By swarming you double or triple team hoping for a turnover or forced shot with multiple defender s on you or hope a 3pt shooter ultimately misses. If you get beat by the pass- which is a main idea of an offense -- if they are double-teamed then ofc it can lead to wide open 3's.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

Geno definitely gives KLS the green light to shoot, but he wants those shots in the flow of the offense, and I thought most of hers Sunday were. And I agree that it's not easy to defend the perimeter while playing zone, but I didn't think LSU's zone was a pack-it-in type. I thought they played relatively straight up until the ball got within, say, 17-18 feet when they'd often swarm the player with the ball. I'd have to watch a third time, but it felt like they did lose her a few times. She did take eleven threes after all. But if they were intending to leave all shooters open for the sake of the zone perhaps they felt that was the best of bad options, but I'd still make sure I had a player on KLS.

 

[Icebear]

Another comment GG made was UCONN using more screens this year. Has she ever watched UCONN play? Picks and screens have always occured constantly. 3-4 or more to a possession.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

Another comment GG made was UCONN using more screens this year. Has she ever watched UCONN play? Picks and screens have always occured constantly. 3-4 or more to a possession.

If anything, seems like fewer screens to me so far. Used to be a lot in the KML/Dolson days.

 

[UcMiami]

HH - I like your comments, but I do think there are subtitles involved that you gloss over. In general, in a half court set, Geno wants his offense to make the defense work for an appreciable amount of the shot clock. He prefers they expend energy defending, and with good offensive rhythm feels that while you may get an open shot in the first five seconds, chances are you will get a better on at 15 seconds or 20 seconds, and you will have sapped a little bit of the opponents energy as well, which may slow them down on the other end. The ball moving in and out and side to side makes it harder for the defense to maintain its shape.

Another consideration on shots, is not just whether the shooter is open in one of their 'spots' but also where their four teammates are on the floor - a shot taken and missed, when no one is near the basket, is unlike to result in an offensive rebound, or one taken when everyone is near the baseline is much more likely to lead to a fast break opportunity at the other end - that as well as just the movement of the players is part of what being 'in the flow' entails. The opposite is also true - not taking a shot when you have two players with inside position to contest for a rebound can be just as bad, and is often the reason for 3 second calls.

Giving someone the 'green light' for a good coach includes trusting them to take not just every open shot they get, but to know which of those shots are the right ones to take. And the recognition that they will not be 100% correct in their assessments during a game - I thought a few of Lou's shots were not good shots, but most of them were - I suspect there were a few comments on that during the film review session - 'Lou, not the best choice there.' kind of things.

 

[phil sampieri]

I don't think that was the strategy, just that they lost track of her a few times. A couple of her other makes were from five feet behind the line with her defender sagging off not expecting the shot.

The Huskies are capable of moving the ball quick enough to get shooters open, at least against most teams. That said, I do think sagging in and swarming players who get the ball from the elbow in is a solid strategy against UConn. I will say this about LSU: they swarmed well at times and made ball movement inside the arc tough. UConn rarely went to the high post to pass over the zone as Goestenkors mentioned. That's where having those tall, quality passers come in handy.

I would suggest to the mis-informed to read all the posts by hoops huskee. His analysis of the game shows a true understanding of the game ..there are many types of zones and a packed-in zone as opposed to a match up zone does not allow the wing defender time to
Go out on the shooter. That coach picked their poison on hoping UC was off on the 3's

 

[Sonny44]

Um ... Nurse made one shot in the lane - her other three were 3 pointers. She as well as Gabby, Napheesa, and Lou all tried to make shots in the lane but were whacked and scored from the charity strip instead. While Uconn made more three pointers than two pointers a lot of the reason for that was because whenever they shot in the lane they mostly got whacked - hence 21 free throws.

Butler is likely to struggle against smaller teams all year.

Uconn got 62% of their defensive rebounds, and LSU only got 56% of theirs - both teams were playing a lot of zone defense and rebounding out of a zone is often an issue, but Uconn did OK.

The team was lose with the ball, but the freshman all played significant minutes and accounted for half of the turnovers. Gabby alone account for almost half of the remaining half and yeah, offensive fouls are turnovers. Dangerfield shot the ball well again and looked confident, but she was careless with the ball in this game - not surprising because this is all new to her.

Last year Uconn beat up on a 'walking wounded' LSU - they were pulling players off the street to play because of injuries - by 46 points at the XL - this years edition of LSU is a much better team, and we won by 23 at their house, while the coaches experimented with the roster - Lawlor Pulido and Ekmark played 19 minutes last year, this year Irwin, Bent, and Lawlor played 34 - last year the game was played after finals on Dec 21, this year it was the third game in the first week. It wasn't a pretty game - it was a classic SEC slugfest with 38 fouls called and 38 foul shots - that kind of game is never going to 'flow'. But it was a comfortable win this early in the season with a lot of good minutes for the bench.

I think Butler needs more playing time. Even if she's struggling, she needs to work things out herself, learn her capabilities.

 

[JoePgh]

UConn made 14 of 26 3-point shots in this game. It would not be unusual for UConn to shoot 25 to 30% from 3-point range in a particular game -- that is low but far from unknown. If that had happened in the LSU game (i.e., if they had gone 7 for 26), UConn would have had 21 fewer points, and they only won by 23.

It's not a sound strategy against the zone (even if the zone is determined to pack the paint) to just rely on shooting threes until they cry Uncle. You have to be able to beat the zone even if you are experiencing a 25% shooting night from 3-point land. Last year's team could do that, but I'm not sure about this year's team.

 

[UcMiami]

UConn made 14 of 26 3-point shots in this game. It would not be unusual for UConn to shoot 25 to 30% from 3-point range in a particular game -- that is low but far from unknown. If that had happened in the LSU game (i.e., if they had gone 7 for 26), UConn would have had 21 fewer points, and they only won by 23.

It's not a sound strategy against the zone (even if the zone is determined to pack the paint) to just rely on shooting threes until they cry Uncle. You have to be able to beat the zone even if you are experiencing a 25% shooting night from 3-point land. Last year's team could do that, but I'm not sure about this year's team.

We can play this game but it is a game - if they were only hitting 25-30% of their threes they probably wouldn't have taken so many, but they were hitting them so they did. Also, if they missed 7 more of the threes they took, they would have had three more rebounds (they were getting 44% of the rebounds at that end of the floor, and would have scored another three or four points off those boards, plus would have run another minute off the game clock, reducing the number of shots LSU got.
NB. There is only one DT who misses her first 7 threes and decides it is a good idea to jack up seven more in a championship game! (Geno is forever thankful they broke that mold after she was 'made'. )

 

[Suebird10fan]

HH - I like your comments, but I do think there are subtitles involved that you gloss over. In general, in a half court set, Geno wants his offense to make the defense work for an appreciable amount of the shot clock. He prefers they expend energy defending, and with good offensive rhythm feels that while you may get an open shot in the first five seconds, chances are you will get a better on at 15 seconds or 20 seconds, and you will have sapped a little bit of the opponents energy as well, which may slow them down on the other end. The ball moving in and out and side to side makes it harder for the defense to maintain its shape.

Another consideration on shots, is not just whether the shooter is open in one of their 'spots' but also where their four teammates are on the floor - a shot taken and missed, when no one is near the basket, is unlike to result in an offensive rebound, or one taken when everyone is near the baseline is much more likely to lead to a fast break opportunity at the other end - that as well as just the movement of the players is part of what being 'in the flow' entails. The opposite is also true - not taking a shot when you have two players with inside position to contest for a rebound can be just as bad, and is often the reason for 3 second calls.

Giving someone the 'green light' for a good coach includes trusting them to take not just every open shot they get, but to know which of those shots are the right ones to take. And the recognition that they will not be 100% correct in their assessments during a game - I thought a few of Lou's shots were not good shots, but most of them were - I suspect there were a few comments on that during the film review session - 'Lou, not the best choice there.' kind of things.

Awesome post!

 

[Icebear]

HH - I like your comments, but I do think there are subtitles involved that you gloss over.

I, usually, only need subtitles when playing foreign teams.

 

[Sluconn Husky]

I would suggest to the mis-informed to read all the posts by hoops huskee. His analysis of the game shows a true understanding of the game ..there are many types of zones and a packed-in zone as opposed to a match up zone does not allow the wing defender time to
Go out on the shooter. That coach picked their poison on hoping UC was off on the 3's

Perhaps LSU's head coach is misinformed about her own decisions because it doesn't sound as if the plan was to let Samuelson shoot unimpeded.


"She lit us up from the 3-point line," LSU coach Nikki Fargas said. "I didn't feel like we had the awareness that we needed to play somebody of her caliber as far as shooting the 3."

 

[hoophuskee]

I think Butler needs more playing time. Even if she's struggling, she needs to work things out herself, learn her capabilities.

I would say no for the time being. We also need ot have basically the other 5 players improve their overall team defense too. Guards penetrating is a problem. That means the back line needs practice in learning how to deal with it. Also on the other side of the ball - the offense- imo let's try to see more how they can click vs the top teams. Especially as Danger gets better.

 

[hoophuskee]

UConn made 14 of 26 3-point shots in this game. It would not be unusual for UConn to shoot 25 to 30% from 3-point range in a particular game -- that is low but far from unknown. If that had happened in the LSU game (i.e., if they had gone 7 for 26), UConn would have had 21 fewer points, and they only won by 23.

It's not a sound strategy against the zone (even if the zone is determined to pack the paint) to just rely on shooting threes until they cry Uncle. You have to be able to beat the zone even if you are experiencing a 25% shooting night from 3-point land. Last year's team could do that, but I'm not sure about this year's team.

I never agreed with this thinking. When a team deliberately packs in a zone and leaves a player such as Lou open a lot, a player compared to KML, you don't get 27% shooting when you leave the team - especially player wide open and dare them to beat you. Lou is compared to KML as a shooter that has the benefit of 5 inches vs KML. Why would you look to harness that when a team is deliberately giving her open looks?

The point is, we got Lou for several reasons. Her #1 strength is to shoot the ball - especially when she is open. If a team's defense is designed "to force her" to shoot the ball, why would you run away from it? Wasn't there a stretch of games last year where Morgan Tuck couldn't hit anything from the inside? Yet as long she is playing decent going forward- if the opposing team used someone basically not very capable of guarding her inside, wouldn't you go to her a lot even though she had a few off games? SO even if Lou doesn't hti when she is wide open, why run away from it?

The way LSU was playing zone, UCONN is going to look for Lou. And if she is open, the chance she shoots 27% is possible but slim being consistently open for an entire but you let take her take several shots and if she is hitting, why would you stop it? Because another day she might miss? If she misses - several sure - but it is as UCMIAMI said- they would have played different.

I wish I had the quote handy somewhere but I lost it. But Geno said he was a bit grateful that the 2nd qtr they hit so many 3's so the game never really had to be a grind game. You shouldn't deliberately SEEK grind games if you aren't a strength-grind team especially with a thin bench. I don't see what's wrong with having your "super-shooter" keep firing away if the opposing team isn't concerned much with winning but just wants to keep the score close. Why play into their hands and deliberately slow the game down when you can use the skills of the number1 h/s recruit from a year ago to win comfortably?

This now "sends a message" to all teams- we shot like this away from home- you pack it in- this is what you might get. Let's see who will do a pack in zone again. And wait until CD learns a bit more. Late in the year she isn't going to get 5 turnovers in a game like this.

 

[hoophuskee]

HH - I like your comments, but I do think there are subtitles involved that you gloss over. In general, in a half court set, Geno wants his offense to make the defense work for an appreciable amount of the shot clock. He prefers they expend energy defending, and with good offensive rhythm feels that while you may get an open shot in the first five seconds, chances are you will get a better on at 15 seconds or 20 seconds, and you will have sapped a little bit of the opponents energy as well, which may slow them down on the other end. The ball moving in and out and side to side makes it harder for the defense to maintain its shape.

Another consideration on shots, is not just whether the shooter is open in one of their 'spots' but also where their four teammates are on the floor - a shot taken and missed, when no one is near the basket, is unlike to result in an offensive rebound, or one taken when everyone is near the baseline is much more likely to lead to a fast break opportunity at the other end - that as well as just the movement of the players is part of what being 'in the flow' entails. The opposite is also true - not taking a shot when you have two players with inside position to contest for a rebound can be just as bad, and is often the reason for 3 second calls.

Giving someone the 'green light' for a good coach includes trusting them to take not just every open shot they get, but to know which of those shots are the right ones to take. And the recognition that they will not be 100% correct in their assessments during a game - I thought a few of Lou's shots were not good shots, but most of them were - I suspect there were a few comments on that during the film review session - 'Lou, not the best choice there.' kind of things.

Thank you for elaborating. Much of what you say I agree. However I am cognizant that sometimes I type too much while sluuconn was calmly responding in a paragraph I was writing a novel as a reply.

One of the points I made mention of - it wasn't clarified and you did so perfectly. When I said Geno "trusts KLS" I meant that he also trusts her to know when not to shoot. If he is letting her take 9 3's vs FSU and two games later he lets her take 11, imo he wouldn't let a gunner fire up so many shots.

I can't remember the specifics of the LSU game anymore but I agree with your point sometime Lou can take bad shots- I saw vs Dayton she was backing up to the 3pt line and sort of took an off-balance 3. But I'm still a fan more - so I don't get upset. Geno is getting paid the big bucks to make the decisions I just enjoy the product. I happen ot agree overall with letting Lou shoot a lot. So yeah there will be some bad shots on occasion especially from 20 year olds but - from the style and pace perspective I love it!!!

As for the 1st paragraph- I agree "in general." It comes down to what both of our definitions of "in general" are. I think we are in agreement or maybe very minor it's not worth elaborating? I believe a player like Lou- if she is open on the 1st pass in a half court set- you give her the green light. I don't believe an open Lou is any more or less likely to hit or miss after the 1st pass or 5th pass. If she is open. And is she is guarded? It depends what "guarded" means. Anyhow as we listened to Lou's postgame interview on the floor on SNY - to paraphrase she specifically said "If I'm open I'm going to shoot."

She didn't differentiate half court or full court which imo means green light both halfcourt and full court.. If Geno fully intended only during fastbreaks should she be allowed to shoot after one pass, then there is no way she would still be doing it now. So I think we are in agreement?