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Yesterday's game was far from a clinic, but it was probably the most focused I've seen the team all season. By that I mean they were willing to fight for every inch and detail on every single possession, and over the course of a game, those small battles that aren't depicted in the box score make a huge difference. All the little things yesterday - from Kromah fighting so diligently over every screen designed to free Kilpatrick, to Samuel, Boat, and Bazz harassing the hell out of Cincinnati's guards the entire game, to Nolan sacrificing his body in the biggest moment of the game - were accomplished with such voracity, that ultimately it didn't matter that we missed a ton of open shots.
Great defensive teams basically run an open dialogue every single possession. A quiet defensive team is a bad defensive team, and for much of the season, despite possessing as much defensive talent as almost anybody in the country, breakdown in communication and off-ball coverage's prevented them from reaching the heights contending teams need to get to at some point. And although Cincinnati is a thoroughly mediocre offensive team, and they helped UConn's cause with many self-inflicted errors, the fact that UConn put together a wire-to-wire, kick-ass defensive performance gives me a lot of hope moving forward.
The offensive output actually didn't bother me as much as the stats would suggest it should. Yeah, they shot 31% from the field, but Cincinnati plays an inherently ugly brand of basketball, and you're not going to escape with a victory against them unless you match there frenzied physicality. Plus, I thought UConn actually executed reasonably well - they just didn't make shots. They were extremely patient and purposeful offensively (almost to a fault at times), and I thought Ollie constructed an excellent offensive game plan, drawing up a lot of counters, off-ball flares around the elbow area, and even post-ups to keep a very destructive defense from blitzing ball screens with too much ferocity.
Thankfully, tcf has compiled a nice highlight package, so I can briefly direct you to a couple such instances. Take the possession about 1:42 into the video as an example of some savvy, deceptive counter-action. It starts out as a basic 1-4 set, with Boatright at the top of the key, Napier and Nolan on the right side, and Kromah and Giffey on the left side. Napier cuts across the paint and all the way up to the left wing, and naturally attracts a lot of attention (pause at about 1:45 for a good snapshot, you've got three Cincinnati players all very concerned with Shabazz). All the while, Kromah slips out the backdoor, and Nolan - who barely moves for the entire possession - sets a solid screen, freeing Kromah. who is able to receive the ball in an ideal scoring position. Nothing extraordinary going on, but it's a good example of Ollie using the attention a great player demands to create an opportunity for somebody else.
UConn runs a variation of the same play at about 2:19 in tcf's video, except this time, the goal is to free Giffey. Boatright holds the ball at the top of the key, while four Huskies are dispersed across the paint, lined up in an orderly fashion so as to create as much traffic as possible. Once again, Napier's shiftiness away from the ball creates a lot of concern among the Cincinnati defense, and as Napier pops up again to the left wing, Giffey dashes to the right wing uninterrupted for a wide open three. UConn ran a lot of similar action for Lamb in 2011, with Kemba operating off the ball and Napier in the game as the point.
Pause the video at about 7:39 to see how effective UConn's floor spacing is in this set. Everybody is spread across the three point line, and as Brimah prepares to screen for Napier a couple feet behind the right wing, you can see Cincinnati's dilemma beginning to come to fruition. Obviously, with Napier handing the ball, Jackson has to hedge hard on the ball screen, stripping Cincinnati's primary rim protector from the paint. With Giffey merely one pass away, his man can't help, either, leaving a pronounced vacancy in the paint. On this particular play, Kilpatrick overplays Napier (again, a recurring theme throughout the game), and Boatright is able to glide to the basket for an effortless dunk. Even if Kilpatrick had defended the play properly, though, he would have been forced to stay glued to Boatright, a dangerous three point shooter, which would have opened the gates for a Brimah roll to the paint.
You may watch the play unfold and say, "well, if Samuel's man had defended the play properly and sagged into the paint, that would have probably blew up the play". That's probably true. But in almost every efficient play call, there is a defensive breakdown along the way. Great offensive coaching is being able to identify potential weak links (watch the Syracuse tape from a year ago to see how Ollie toys with James Southerland), force multiple players within the same possession into instantaneous decisions, and provide multiple viable options as means of strengthening the offenses diversity and making yourself harder to defend. Again, I'm not going to pretend Ollie is some offensive wizard at this stage in his career, but any offensive shortcomings yesterday were a product of UConn missing a lot of open shots, and not Cincinnati blowing up the offense every time. At this point, I'll have to concede that this offense isn't nearly as good as I thought it could be, but if we return to hitting shots at the rate we're capable of, this offense should be more than adequate in junction with our stellar defense.
About that defense, though, for the best encapsulation of how much this team has progressed in terms of cohesiveness, pause the tape around 8:10. Giffey plays phenomenal individual defense at the elbow, Kromah recovers back to Kilpatrick on the kick-out (pause at 8:12, you won't see better execution of a pack-the-paint philosophy), Giffey holds his ground in the paint to help, and then Brimah emerges at the last second to swat the shot out of bounds. Kilpatrick has to penetrate two formidable layers of the defense just to get to the rim, and when he does get there we have a seven foot shot blocking machine in the paint waiting for him. We have skyrocketed to 12th in defensive efficiency, and are in good company with only Arizona, Ohio State, Virginia, Cincy, St. Louis, VCU, Louisville, Wichita State, San Diego State, Clemson, and Florida ahead of us. If you get stops in March, you have a chance.
Player notes:
Bazz - Despite only shooting 4 of 13 from the floor, I thought he played a really strong game. Unlike the last time we played Cincinnati, he didn't force anything, he took all his shots within the flow of the offense, and as highlighted above, UConn certainly reaped the benefits of his constant activity off the ball. Plus, any shots he missed, he compensated for by getting the line 10 times. And the fact that he grabbed eleven rebounds in a game where nobody else was rebounding speaks to his anticipatory soundness and outright desire to win. It's not just the long caroms he gets, either, he's always been willing to mix it up inside for the tough boards.
Boat - I thought his excellent all day (and has been all season, really), which was why I was kind of surprised Ollie went offense/defense with him and Samuel down the stretch. He's just so disruptive, both guarding the ball and in the passing lanes. He's come a long way in terms of eliminating all of the fundamental imperfections that used to cost the team. In other words, he's found a perfect balance between discipline and aggressiveness. I'm not going to look too far into his 3 of 12 shooting. Good looks are hard to come by against that team.
T-Sam - Speaking of disruptive, Samuel seems to have found a niche on this team, and that is to hound opposing ball-handlers for 90 feet, anchor the 1-2-2 press Ollie likes to experiment with when he's in, and look for any opportunity to cut or drive to the basket when teams overplay Bazz and Boat. I tell you, he's going to be a really good player. He's very well built for somebody his age, he's got good size, he can move his feet laterally with the best of him, and his first step is way quicker than I thought it would be. As of today, he's probably a rich man's Beverly. Some day, if he develops a reliable jump shot, he'll be much more than that.
Omar - Count me as somebody who thinks his defense has come a long way from where it was a year ago, and even earlier in the season. He seems much more comfortable in his stance, he's not biting on pump fakes and mis-direction as much, and he's not falling asleep off the ball. Offensively, this was a step in the right direction for him. He took a couple dribbles, kicked the ball out (something that doesn't seem like much, but is crucial in his development as a player), and later received it back for an open three. Both of his shots rimmed out, and being in my seat at the XL, it was the most frustrated I'd been for a player in some time. The kid deserves something good to happen more than anybody right now, and he just can't seem to catch a break.
Kromah - If Bazz was the MVP of this game, there is a good case to be made for Kromah as second. For the second straight game, his individual defense on Kilpatrick was phenomenal, except this time, his teammates helped him out a little bit. He fought hard though the maze of screens Cincinnati ran him through off the ball, and on the other end, he released a lot of tension with those jumpers he hit in the first half when it was looking like it might be SMU all over again.
Giff - Niels played possibly his best defensive game of the season, IMO. His on-ball defense was fantastic per usual, but he returned to his 2013 form in terms of stifling pick and rolls with his quickness, providing timely back line help, and aiding Kromah more than anybody in holding Kilpatrick in check (which is truly a collaborative effort). Not much to write home about on the other end, but Cincinnati did a good job on him.
DD - Wasn't a pretty game for him. Turned it over three times in the first five minutes, missed a couple bunnies near the rim, and just seemed to struggle leaving his mark on the game. UConn made a concerted effort to establish him early on in the post, unfortunately, he still just doesn't have the lower body strength to win the territory battles inside that you need to win to be a reliable back-to-the-basket threat. When you're not strong enough to play inside, and your handle/vision isn't good enough to take guys off the dribble, you're going to struggle to be much more than a spot up guy on offense. Nonetheless, he was really coming along before his injury - I have to believe that is holding him back at this point, because there is no other explanation for him being so ordinary at this point.
Phil - The charge he took on Kilpatrick may have been the defining moment of the game, and the two free throws he hit after being knocked to the ground were just as big. Phil seems to be the first UConn big man in God knows how long that is willing to take charges. I like it, because although he's fairly athletic, he's a bit more earth-bound than guys like Brimah and Facey. Regardless, what Phil gave us today is about what we can expect from Phil for the rest of the year. He played his role.
Amida - One rebound in 17 minutes is a bit of a disappointment, especially in a game where we were plastered on the boards, but aside from that he was his usual self, swatting three shots, and a fourth that was wiped off the board because of a bogus foul call. One observation on Brimah: he's a lot smoother in the post at this stage than people give him credit for. On his two post up opportunities today, he hit one, and the other spun around the rim. The little flip shot over his head is impossible to block at his size. The reason he's not more of a factor down there is for the same reason Daniels isn't: he struggles to win positioning on the block.
You can pick nits in the win all you want, but a win over the #11 team in America is highly encouraging after we played three pretty bad games in a row. With how much better this team has managed to get defensively, they're going to be a handful in the tournament if they can start knocking down shots again. There's Florida, Louisville, Kansas, and Arizona...then there's probably a group of 20 or so teams that can make it to the final four if everything breaks right. Yesterday re-established my faith that UConn is one of those 20 or so teams. Senior day Wednesday should be awesome, and I can't wait to take another shot at the defending champs Saturday. Go Huskies.
Great defensive teams basically run an open dialogue every single possession. A quiet defensive team is a bad defensive team, and for much of the season, despite possessing as much defensive talent as almost anybody in the country, breakdown in communication and off-ball coverage's prevented them from reaching the heights contending teams need to get to at some point. And although Cincinnati is a thoroughly mediocre offensive team, and they helped UConn's cause with many self-inflicted errors, the fact that UConn put together a wire-to-wire, kick-ass defensive performance gives me a lot of hope moving forward.
The offensive output actually didn't bother me as much as the stats would suggest it should. Yeah, they shot 31% from the field, but Cincinnati plays an inherently ugly brand of basketball, and you're not going to escape with a victory against them unless you match there frenzied physicality. Plus, I thought UConn actually executed reasonably well - they just didn't make shots. They were extremely patient and purposeful offensively (almost to a fault at times), and I thought Ollie constructed an excellent offensive game plan, drawing up a lot of counters, off-ball flares around the elbow area, and even post-ups to keep a very destructive defense from blitzing ball screens with too much ferocity.
Thankfully, tcf has compiled a nice highlight package, so I can briefly direct you to a couple such instances. Take the possession about 1:42 into the video as an example of some savvy, deceptive counter-action. It starts out as a basic 1-4 set, with Boatright at the top of the key, Napier and Nolan on the right side, and Kromah and Giffey on the left side. Napier cuts across the paint and all the way up to the left wing, and naturally attracts a lot of attention (pause at about 1:45 for a good snapshot, you've got three Cincinnati players all very concerned with Shabazz). All the while, Kromah slips out the backdoor, and Nolan - who barely moves for the entire possession - sets a solid screen, freeing Kromah. who is able to receive the ball in an ideal scoring position. Nothing extraordinary going on, but it's a good example of Ollie using the attention a great player demands to create an opportunity for somebody else.
UConn runs a variation of the same play at about 2:19 in tcf's video, except this time, the goal is to free Giffey. Boatright holds the ball at the top of the key, while four Huskies are dispersed across the paint, lined up in an orderly fashion so as to create as much traffic as possible. Once again, Napier's shiftiness away from the ball creates a lot of concern among the Cincinnati defense, and as Napier pops up again to the left wing, Giffey dashes to the right wing uninterrupted for a wide open three. UConn ran a lot of similar action for Lamb in 2011, with Kemba operating off the ball and Napier in the game as the point.
Pause the video at about 7:39 to see how effective UConn's floor spacing is in this set. Everybody is spread across the three point line, and as Brimah prepares to screen for Napier a couple feet behind the right wing, you can see Cincinnati's dilemma beginning to come to fruition. Obviously, with Napier handing the ball, Jackson has to hedge hard on the ball screen, stripping Cincinnati's primary rim protector from the paint. With Giffey merely one pass away, his man can't help, either, leaving a pronounced vacancy in the paint. On this particular play, Kilpatrick overplays Napier (again, a recurring theme throughout the game), and Boatright is able to glide to the basket for an effortless dunk. Even if Kilpatrick had defended the play properly, though, he would have been forced to stay glued to Boatright, a dangerous three point shooter, which would have opened the gates for a Brimah roll to the paint.
You may watch the play unfold and say, "well, if Samuel's man had defended the play properly and sagged into the paint, that would have probably blew up the play". That's probably true. But in almost every efficient play call, there is a defensive breakdown along the way. Great offensive coaching is being able to identify potential weak links (watch the Syracuse tape from a year ago to see how Ollie toys with James Southerland), force multiple players within the same possession into instantaneous decisions, and provide multiple viable options as means of strengthening the offenses diversity and making yourself harder to defend. Again, I'm not going to pretend Ollie is some offensive wizard at this stage in his career, but any offensive shortcomings yesterday were a product of UConn missing a lot of open shots, and not Cincinnati blowing up the offense every time. At this point, I'll have to concede that this offense isn't nearly as good as I thought it could be, but if we return to hitting shots at the rate we're capable of, this offense should be more than adequate in junction with our stellar defense.
About that defense, though, for the best encapsulation of how much this team has progressed in terms of cohesiveness, pause the tape around 8:10. Giffey plays phenomenal individual defense at the elbow, Kromah recovers back to Kilpatrick on the kick-out (pause at 8:12, you won't see better execution of a pack-the-paint philosophy), Giffey holds his ground in the paint to help, and then Brimah emerges at the last second to swat the shot out of bounds. Kilpatrick has to penetrate two formidable layers of the defense just to get to the rim, and when he does get there we have a seven foot shot blocking machine in the paint waiting for him. We have skyrocketed to 12th in defensive efficiency, and are in good company with only Arizona, Ohio State, Virginia, Cincy, St. Louis, VCU, Louisville, Wichita State, San Diego State, Clemson, and Florida ahead of us. If you get stops in March, you have a chance.
Player notes:
Bazz - Despite only shooting 4 of 13 from the floor, I thought he played a really strong game. Unlike the last time we played Cincinnati, he didn't force anything, he took all his shots within the flow of the offense, and as highlighted above, UConn certainly reaped the benefits of his constant activity off the ball. Plus, any shots he missed, he compensated for by getting the line 10 times. And the fact that he grabbed eleven rebounds in a game where nobody else was rebounding speaks to his anticipatory soundness and outright desire to win. It's not just the long caroms he gets, either, he's always been willing to mix it up inside for the tough boards.
Boat - I thought his excellent all day (and has been all season, really), which was why I was kind of surprised Ollie went offense/defense with him and Samuel down the stretch. He's just so disruptive, both guarding the ball and in the passing lanes. He's come a long way in terms of eliminating all of the fundamental imperfections that used to cost the team. In other words, he's found a perfect balance between discipline and aggressiveness. I'm not going to look too far into his 3 of 12 shooting. Good looks are hard to come by against that team.
T-Sam - Speaking of disruptive, Samuel seems to have found a niche on this team, and that is to hound opposing ball-handlers for 90 feet, anchor the 1-2-2 press Ollie likes to experiment with when he's in, and look for any opportunity to cut or drive to the basket when teams overplay Bazz and Boat. I tell you, he's going to be a really good player. He's very well built for somebody his age, he's got good size, he can move his feet laterally with the best of him, and his first step is way quicker than I thought it would be. As of today, he's probably a rich man's Beverly. Some day, if he develops a reliable jump shot, he'll be much more than that.
Omar - Count me as somebody who thinks his defense has come a long way from where it was a year ago, and even earlier in the season. He seems much more comfortable in his stance, he's not biting on pump fakes and mis-direction as much, and he's not falling asleep off the ball. Offensively, this was a step in the right direction for him. He took a couple dribbles, kicked the ball out (something that doesn't seem like much, but is crucial in his development as a player), and later received it back for an open three. Both of his shots rimmed out, and being in my seat at the XL, it was the most frustrated I'd been for a player in some time. The kid deserves something good to happen more than anybody right now, and he just can't seem to catch a break.
Kromah - If Bazz was the MVP of this game, there is a good case to be made for Kromah as second. For the second straight game, his individual defense on Kilpatrick was phenomenal, except this time, his teammates helped him out a little bit. He fought hard though the maze of screens Cincinnati ran him through off the ball, and on the other end, he released a lot of tension with those jumpers he hit in the first half when it was looking like it might be SMU all over again.
Giff - Niels played possibly his best defensive game of the season, IMO. His on-ball defense was fantastic per usual, but he returned to his 2013 form in terms of stifling pick and rolls with his quickness, providing timely back line help, and aiding Kromah more than anybody in holding Kilpatrick in check (which is truly a collaborative effort). Not much to write home about on the other end, but Cincinnati did a good job on him.
DD - Wasn't a pretty game for him. Turned it over three times in the first five minutes, missed a couple bunnies near the rim, and just seemed to struggle leaving his mark on the game. UConn made a concerted effort to establish him early on in the post, unfortunately, he still just doesn't have the lower body strength to win the territory battles inside that you need to win to be a reliable back-to-the-basket threat. When you're not strong enough to play inside, and your handle/vision isn't good enough to take guys off the dribble, you're going to struggle to be much more than a spot up guy on offense. Nonetheless, he was really coming along before his injury - I have to believe that is holding him back at this point, because there is no other explanation for him being so ordinary at this point.
Phil - The charge he took on Kilpatrick may have been the defining moment of the game, and the two free throws he hit after being knocked to the ground were just as big. Phil seems to be the first UConn big man in God knows how long that is willing to take charges. I like it, because although he's fairly athletic, he's a bit more earth-bound than guys like Brimah and Facey. Regardless, what Phil gave us today is about what we can expect from Phil for the rest of the year. He played his role.
Amida - One rebound in 17 minutes is a bit of a disappointment, especially in a game where we were plastered on the boards, but aside from that he was his usual self, swatting three shots, and a fourth that was wiped off the board because of a bogus foul call. One observation on Brimah: he's a lot smoother in the post at this stage than people give him credit for. On his two post up opportunities today, he hit one, and the other spun around the rim. The little flip shot over his head is impossible to block at his size. The reason he's not more of a factor down there is for the same reason Daniels isn't: he struggles to win positioning on the block.
You can pick nits in the win all you want, but a win over the #11 team in America is highly encouraging after we played three pretty bad games in a row. With how much better this team has managed to get defensively, they're going to be a handful in the tournament if they can start knocking down shots again. There's Florida, Louisville, Kansas, and Arizona...then there's probably a group of 20 or so teams that can make it to the final four if everything breaks right. Yesterday re-established my faith that UConn is one of those 20 or so teams. Senior day Wednesday should be awesome, and I can't wait to take another shot at the defending champs Saturday. Go Huskies.
