Question about our Man to Man defense | The Boneyard

Question about our Man to Man defense

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SaeHusky

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Have watched a ton of college basketball this year. I know our teams defensive metrics are up there ( Has gradually been dropping) but when I watch it always seems guys get past their defender and into the paint or to the rim easily against us. It seems we pickup up our guys very tight and so much further behind the 3 point line than other teams who are higher on KenPom like Duke and Nebraska. Is this part of the problem? Curious what some other posters thoughts are on this
 
SaeHusky said:
Have watched a ton of college basketball this year. I know our teams defensive metrics are up there ( Has gradually been dropping) but when I watch it always seems guys get past their defender and into the paint or to the rim easily against us. It seems we pickup up our guys very tight and so much further behind the 3 point line than other teams who are higher on KenPom like Duke and Nebraska. Is this part of the problem? Curious what some other posters thoughts are on this
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It's always been deliberate. We sell out to run teams off of the three point line. It's just less effective when you're not funneling the penetrating guards into elite rim protectors. Reed is pretty good, and Reibe is developing in that department, but neither are Clingan or Johnson.
 
It's intentional, despite all the seemingly easy drives into the paint we have the 14th best 2P FG% defense in the country
 
SaeHusky said:
Have watched a ton of college basketball this year. I know our teams defensive metrics are up there ( Has gradually been dropping) but when I watch it always seems guys get past their defender and into the paint or to the rim easily against us. It seems we pickup up our guys very tight and so much further behind the 3 point line than other teams who are higher on KenPom like Duke and Nebraska. Is this part of the problem? Curious what some other posters thoughts are on this
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Depends on what KenPom metric you like. It certainly helps in 3pt pct defense but suffers from guys getting by us too.

Motion offense gets us top 25 offense at the cost of low free throws per game and slow pace of play with less possessions.
 
We run tight on the perimeter on purpose and it is exceptionally effective. We limit 3s and make getting assists impossible. We high hedge to the same effect and this puts a lot of pressure on the 3 and 4 to help.

Our problem is, frankly, our starting SG can't guard a 3rd-grade girls team. And our bench isn't as deep or talented as we thought. Reibe is pulling his weight overall but struggles with the PnR at times. Stewart and Ross are decent. Malachi tends to be our second worst perimeter defender after Solo IMO.

Frankly that we're ranked the 11th defense in the NCAA is a testament to the effectiveness of the system and just how good of defenders Silas and Tarris have been. Silas is particular is crazy underrated defensively on here. And Tarris leads the conference in defensive rating. Head and tail of the dog are phenomenal.
 
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Excalibur said:
It's always been deliberate. We sell out to run teams off of the three point line. It's just less effective when you're not funneling the penetrating guards into elite rim protectors. Reed is pretty good, and Reibe is developing in that department, but neither are Clingan or Johnson.
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It'll be interesting to see what Hurley goes after in the portal as the other 5, as it hasn't seemed apparent that Reibe is not what you would call a rim protector.
 
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Lafayette said:
Depends on what KenPom metric you like. It certainly helps in 3pt pct defense but suffers from guys getting by us too.

Motion offense gets us top 25 offense at the cost of low free throws per game and slow pace of play with less possessions.
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Just wondering, is our motion offense the reason we can’t get to the line? And on defense, is focusing on running 3 pt shooters off the line the reason we give up so many FTs? Were like close to last in both FT attempts and FTs allowed, and probably would be dead last in both if you took out the buy games.

I feel like it’s been like this every year recently, especially in Big East play. Personally I blame it on the refs, but curious to see if someone smarter and less biased sees it differently
 
FlippinCrazy! said:
Just wondering, is our motion offense the reason we can’t get to the line? And on defense, is focusing on running 3 pt shooters off the line the reason we give up so many FTs? Were like close to last in both FT attempts and FTs allowed, and probably would be dead last in both if you took out the buy games.

I feel like it’s been like this every year recently, especially in Big East play. Personally I blame it on the refs, but curious to see if someone smarter and less biased sees it differently
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Yes, motion offense mixed with screens, etc, leads to an open shot for a shooter based on matchup exploitations and screens. So for example, Ball gets an open look so is not fouled. He makes it (great), misses (not great) but on a miss we have a 20% chance of a put back or 10% chance of a fouled put back.

And since off-ball fouls are largely not called, it would take us driving and being fouled to go to the line.

Versus St. John's, a more traditional Big East front court led team crashing the glass, and dishing down low and post up moves, generally are always on-ball so fouls get called more.
 
RuffRuff said:
It'll be interesting to see what Hurley goes after in the portal as the other 5, as it hasn't seemed apparently that Reibe is what you would call a rim protector.
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Agreed it’ll be interesting, Reibe has the build and talent to be an elite rim protector but he’s just been overmatched strength-wise against high major bigs and also seems to lack that defensive instinct. Clingan was a bit different in terms of potential going into the second year, and especially so since we had Samson off the bench, we could afford to gamble on Clingan breaking out.

I think our staff will go after a 1 year guy that will split minutes evenly with Reibe, thinking someone like on Purdue or slightly below that (in terms of talent level, not playstyle). Obviously Hurley loves his 2+ year guys, but he’d definitely want to minimize the risk of losing Reibe as much as possible.
 
husky429 said:
And our bench isn't as deep or talented as we thought.
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This has been a theme since the '23 team.

I'm really shocked at the regression of Jaylin Stewart. He's been relegated to a 3 and D guy, and he's not particularly adept at that. He's been largely invisible for the past month. In our last 10 games, he's at 2.3pts, 1.3 reb, 0.4 assists in 13 minutes per game, with just 25 total field goals attempted. He had an opportunity to distinguish himself when Braylon missed the early part of our schedule and he did fine, but at this point in his career, I expected him to force his way onto the court. He's got a fiery, nasty demeanor that could serve this team really well if he could channel it. Fewer "goggles" celebrations for your sporadic assists; more rebounds and physical play.
 
Mike Honcho said:
This has been a theme since the '23 team.

I'm really shocked at the regression of Jaylin Stewart. He's been relegated to a 3 and D guy, and he's not particularly adept at that. He's been largely invisible for the past month. In our last 10 games, he's at 2.3pts, 1.3 reb, 0.4 assists in 13 minutes per game, with just 25 total field goals attempted. He had an opportunity to distinguish himself when Braylon missed the early part of our schedule and he did fine, but at this point in his career, I expected him to force his way onto the court. He's got a fiery, nasty demeanor that could serve this team really well if he could channel it. Fewer "goggles" celebrations for your sporadic assists; more rebounds and physical play.
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He doesn't have a fiery, nasty demeanor though. Coach has called him too laid back a number of times.
 
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husky429 said:
He doesn't have a fiery, nasty demeanor though. Coach has called him too laid back a number of times.
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I think both can be true. When he gets angry he barks, talks trash, and plays with energy. I always played sports better when I was mad.
 
RuffRuff said:
It'll be interesting to see what Hurley goes after in the portal as the other 5, as it hasn't seemed apparent that Reibe is not what you would call a rim protector.
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We will clearly need size and athleticism at the 4 and 5, though Reibe has improved greatly in the rim protection department from the beginning of the year.
 
SaeHusky said:
Maybe against teams that dont shoot well from 3 like St Johns we should adjust how high we guard or am i off base ?
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We changed up our looks against St. John's quite a bit. As ineffective as our hard hedge was against them, we were even worse in drop or trying to switch entirely. Reed in particular seems to get caught in no man's land.
 
It’s purposeful. It can work quite well when you have a 7-2 monster back there or athletic/smart players who can rotate. When you don’t, you have last years defense. It’s better this year, but we still have a sieve at 2g, a weaker player at the 3, and usually a less athletic player at the 4.
 
boog204 said:
It’s purposeful. It can work quite well when you have a 7-2 monster back there or athletic/smart players who can rotate. When you don’t, you have last years defense. It’s better this year, but we still have a sieve at 2g, a weaker player at the 3, and usually a less athletic player at the 4.
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And they're still the 10th best defense in the country on kenpom. How is that possible with a team as you described?
 
HooperScooper said:
And they're still the 10th best defense in the country on kenpom. How is that possible with a team as you described?
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LOL I think it is in the book "How to lie with statistics" or Mark Twain's comment: "There's lies and there's damn lies and then there is statistics"
 
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Well folks, it’s late..ish Feb so whatever tricks Danny and the coaches have in their bag they need to pull them out..now. We’ve had a great season beating ranked teams and record wise so far but even the coach admits all is not completely well. Can start by beating St. John’s.
 
dennismenace said:
LOL I think it is in the book "How to lie with statistics" or Mark Twain's comment: "There's lies and there's damn lies and then there is statistics"
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So just to be clear, you think we are 24-2 with a bad defense?
 
dennismenace said:
LOL I think it is in the book "How to lie with statistics" or Mark Twain's comment: "There's lies and there's damn lies and then there is statistics"
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The tried and true argument of the defeated . . . The defense is good. It has gaps, and our opponents in the last few games have found some ways to exploit them (namely the short roll), but this is a very good defensive team with at least two top tier defenders in the starting lineup.
 
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We have a pretty good history of turning it on in March though...I got no problem if we womp teams by 40 in the dance round 1 and 2.
 
navery12 said:
So just to be clear, you think we are 24-2 with a bad defense?
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No, not at all! It's just that statistical data is only as good as it's underlying assumptions and rationale. Your not going to make everyone happy but at least it creates friendly debate. Kind of like NCAA tourney seedings.
 
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