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As a hoops junkie who loves talking Xs & Os, I thought I'd throw this one out there and share some of my thoughts on the topic. What are some areas of weakness that can make a great team good and a good team bad. There's probably no finite list of correct answers in any order of magnitude but here are some of my thoughts. I'm interested in your's as well.
Bad Point Guard Play: Since there have been many posts on UConn's plight to land a 2014 PG and the quality of the returning options we might have at that position, I'll start with the lead guard play. Not having good PG play, which usually means having a solid starting lead guard and at least another guard who can fill in while your number one guys is on the bench or fouled out at the end of the game, is at the top of my list. I recall one of the talented MSU Sparty teams that had a ton of talent at the 2 through 5, but no PG. It killed any chances they had for a deep March run. I'm sure we can all point to this talented team or that one that just couldn't get things done due to poor PG play. You don't need to have one of the best in the country or a do-it-all (handle, pass, drive, 3-ball, defend, etc.) to make a deep March run, but you do need one that knows how to run the offense, sets the temperament of the team (i.e. doesn't panic when things aren't going well or during the most important moments such as winning time). Heck we won it all with Taliek Brown who had some holes in his game, but learned to be a mentally tough leader who took care of the ball and got it to the right teammates at the right time. I wouldn't say he saw the floor at an elite level, but had just enough lead guard ability to make the other very talented players around him get it done. He wasn't an elite defender, but good enough to not let his guy blow by him and blow up the D, which leads me to my next area of exploitation.
Poor Perimeter Defense: Possibly equally crippling to team is having a backcourt that cannot contain their opposing guards. You could throw the 3 into this mix since the perimeter can be exploited at the SF spot as well. I remember a stretch for UConn where we didn't have athletic 3s that struggle to keep the other team's wing(s) from going off. But let's focus on the backcourt duo. I can remember one or more of our talented UConn teams getting exploited due to our guards simply not quick enough to stay in front of the opposing guards. Even the best Team-D scheme can get blown up if the guards can't stop the opposing guards from blowing right by them and forcing the bigs to have to step up and close off shooting and passing lanes. It's one way that you can get your bigs, who might be the strength of you team, in early foul trouble and let the game get out of hand real quickly.
For those who hate long posts, feel free to skip this section: A particular UConn team that comes to mind was the one where we had Marcus Williams at the 1 and had to use two players who were more suited for the wing, and were borderline defenders against that position to begin with, unable to prevent the smaller and quicker 2Gs from blowing right by them. The two that I'm alluding to happen to be players that I really liked in Shad and Denham. Don't get me wrong! They were a very good team and won a load of games, but they had to do a lot to make up for this weakness to win many of their games and many of their losses were due to this being exploited. Note that I don't blame the loss to an inferior GM team on our guards alone, though that was a problem in that game. GM had a couple bigs that outplayed our bigs, one if which I think went perfect or close to it from the field who couldn't seem to miss big shot after big shot. I haven't had the stomach to ever re-watch that game...maybe I watched parts of a recording shortly afterwards...but I remember a lot of our defensive breakdowns were due to our guards unable to check GM's guards leaving our bigs to have to play their's straight up. It seemed when we tried to cheat with help D, they'd exploit it, and playing them straight up didn't seem to work well either during stretches of that game. Some might not remember this, but AJ Price would have been on that team if not for his AVM disorder and a combination of AJ and Marcus Williams would likely have been a better defensive guard-duo than any combination they were able to throw out there that year. Not that I can stave off a debate on the demise of this particular team, I do realize that their backcourt defensive deficiencies wasn't their only issue. The front court played soft toward the end of that season. Boone had a very up-and-down year and got shoved around in the blocks. Hilton who had come on strong was injured in the prior game and tried to give it a go and was completely ineffective. I can't remember if Charley was on that team or not, but they really lacked post toughness. And honorable mention as part of the dysfunction of what was a very talented team was the late game disappearing acts by Rudy Gay. Without looking, I can't remember the specifics as to how the draw to the championship had thinned out, but I along with the rest of Husky fandom saw a wide path to the finals with Mid-Major GM in the E-8 and I think a team we had beaten 2 or 3 times that season awaiting in -4 (Syracuse maybe?). I still don't buy the prevailing reason for their upset loss, was that many of the members of that team were selfish, had the NBA on their minds and took GM for granted. I still see it as a case where a less talented team played the game of their lives with a game plan that exploited UConn's weaknesses, one of which was a slow and defensively challenged backcourt.
Lack of Front Court Size: Another area that is hard to overcome at the high-major level is not having enough size to defend the paint and get some easy points in there. I always say, "You can never have too many bigs!" The only reason why I don't place this at the top is some teams can masque and overcome this weakness with well coached team-D that makes it difficult for the opposing team from getting the ball to their bigs deep in the paint. One team that comes to mind was the one that didn't let LSU get the ball to Shaq in the paint. If they had, he would have done some big time damage. JC was a master in the 90s at this area. It wasn't until the late 90s that we began to get bigs who had prototypical size, starting with Travis Knight, who wasn't exactly a wide body or banger. Jake might have been the first Big with legit 5-man size, and coincidentally was the big-man in the middle for our first NC. After those two, the program began to get bigs with prototypical size Emeka, Boone, Hilton, Hasheem to name a few. Interestingly, the defensive philosophy shifted from lock down perimeter D to funneling the offense into the Bigs to create contested or blocked interior shots. That seems to have chanced lately, in part due to the lack of dominating shot-blockers. I can't remember the exact number, but I'm still amazed that we led the nation in blocked shots for something like 6 or 7 years in a row. I doubt we'll ever see that a kind of run ever again from any program. Getting back to my point, you can have a team with a ton of talent at the 1, 2 and even 3, but if you don't have enough big bodies to defend the paint and make the other team even worry about defending it on their end, well coached teams can take away your perimeter strength. When you make a team worry and game-plan to prevent the bigs from getting the ball in the blocks, they can't commit as many players to close off driving and passing lanes, and prone to giving up a lot of good perimeter looks. I was amazed at how well last years team was able to execute their offense, considering how little they got out of their front-court. Our guards and wings had to work their butts' off to generate their offense. If we had some legit bigs and were eligible for the post season, that team had the pieces for a very deep March run. I hope we get enough out of this year's group of bigs to open things up more for our skilled perimeter players. We won't need All-American play from our bigs, but just a little more than what we got last season to see big things from this team. Bazz, Boat, Omar, Daniels and Niels will be a handful to stop this coming season, especially if teams will also have to worry about our bigs doing any sort of damage if they get the ball in the paint. If Daniels can hold his own at the 4 against most teams and score from anywhere on the floor including the paint, this team is going to be dangerous and fun team to watch.
Lack of Perimeter shooting: This one is obvious. JC was able to overcome this at times in the early 90s by deploying pressure full court D (2-2-1 full court press) and making it a transition game. The philosophy was to try to create more shots, especially easy ones (transition layups & dunks), than the opponent. Try to tire out the other team, especially their bigs. Try to make the other team rush their offense. You rarely see this work now, mainly due to how athletic even the average D1 baller is these days. Many teams are much better at breaking the press now than they were 20 years ago. And even back then, it was hard to win it all with that type of game. UNLV sort of won it that way, though they had some shooters. Arkanas is another team (They called it 40 minutes of Hell, if I remember correctly). Houson's Phi-Slama-Jama was another up-tempo style team, though I think they had some shooters. It would have been fun to see how far UConn could have gone if they had gotten past Dook during the Dream Season. I don't recall who we would have faced after that. I thought UNLV cut down the nets that year and I don't think we would have fared well against them. Getting back to my point here, teams that can't hit Js make it easier to defend them. You can get away with it to a point if you have some athletes that can drive it into the paint and finish in traffic and have bigs that can clean up the misses or catch the dish and throw it down. But eventually teams that don't have a sharp-shooter or two, usually meet their match along the way.
Lack of Athleticism: This one probably belongs above the prior one. Good coaching, especially on the offensive side (example the Princeton offense) can make up for a lack of athleticism. Some coaches work the clock for long stretches to decrease the possessions and make the more athletic teams work hard on D and frustrate them. But in most cases the less athletic teams tend to run out of gas at the end of games and get clipped at the wire. Well coached less athletic teams can get some early round tournament upsets but rarely get past the S-16. Hoops has become a game of athletes. You just don't see Hoosier type teams having much of a chance these days. Although the lumbering, methodical and frustrating hold-the-ball teams like the old Wisconsin Badgers have had some success, their style of play would only get them so far.
That's all I got. Agree? Disagree? Ones I missed.
Bad Point Guard Play: Since there have been many posts on UConn's plight to land a 2014 PG and the quality of the returning options we might have at that position, I'll start with the lead guard play. Not having good PG play, which usually means having a solid starting lead guard and at least another guard who can fill in while your number one guys is on the bench or fouled out at the end of the game, is at the top of my list. I recall one of the talented MSU Sparty teams that had a ton of talent at the 2 through 5, but no PG. It killed any chances they had for a deep March run. I'm sure we can all point to this talented team or that one that just couldn't get things done due to poor PG play. You don't need to have one of the best in the country or a do-it-all (handle, pass, drive, 3-ball, defend, etc.) to make a deep March run, but you do need one that knows how to run the offense, sets the temperament of the team (i.e. doesn't panic when things aren't going well or during the most important moments such as winning time). Heck we won it all with Taliek Brown who had some holes in his game, but learned to be a mentally tough leader who took care of the ball and got it to the right teammates at the right time. I wouldn't say he saw the floor at an elite level, but had just enough lead guard ability to make the other very talented players around him get it done. He wasn't an elite defender, but good enough to not let his guy blow by him and blow up the D, which leads me to my next area of exploitation.
Poor Perimeter Defense: Possibly equally crippling to team is having a backcourt that cannot contain their opposing guards. You could throw the 3 into this mix since the perimeter can be exploited at the SF spot as well. I remember a stretch for UConn where we didn't have athletic 3s that struggle to keep the other team's wing(s) from going off. But let's focus on the backcourt duo. I can remember one or more of our talented UConn teams getting exploited due to our guards simply not quick enough to stay in front of the opposing guards. Even the best Team-D scheme can get blown up if the guards can't stop the opposing guards from blowing right by them and forcing the bigs to have to step up and close off shooting and passing lanes. It's one way that you can get your bigs, who might be the strength of you team, in early foul trouble and let the game get out of hand real quickly.
For those who hate long posts, feel free to skip this section: A particular UConn team that comes to mind was the one where we had Marcus Williams at the 1 and had to use two players who were more suited for the wing, and were borderline defenders against that position to begin with, unable to prevent the smaller and quicker 2Gs from blowing right by them. The two that I'm alluding to happen to be players that I really liked in Shad and Denham. Don't get me wrong! They were a very good team and won a load of games, but they had to do a lot to make up for this weakness to win many of their games and many of their losses were due to this being exploited. Note that I don't blame the loss to an inferior GM team on our guards alone, though that was a problem in that game. GM had a couple bigs that outplayed our bigs, one if which I think went perfect or close to it from the field who couldn't seem to miss big shot after big shot. I haven't had the stomach to ever re-watch that game...maybe I watched parts of a recording shortly afterwards...but I remember a lot of our defensive breakdowns were due to our guards unable to check GM's guards leaving our bigs to have to play their's straight up. It seemed when we tried to cheat with help D, they'd exploit it, and playing them straight up didn't seem to work well either during stretches of that game. Some might not remember this, but AJ Price would have been on that team if not for his AVM disorder and a combination of AJ and Marcus Williams would likely have been a better defensive guard-duo than any combination they were able to throw out there that year. Not that I can stave off a debate on the demise of this particular team, I do realize that their backcourt defensive deficiencies wasn't their only issue. The front court played soft toward the end of that season. Boone had a very up-and-down year and got shoved around in the blocks. Hilton who had come on strong was injured in the prior game and tried to give it a go and was completely ineffective. I can't remember if Charley was on that team or not, but they really lacked post toughness. And honorable mention as part of the dysfunction of what was a very talented team was the late game disappearing acts by Rudy Gay. Without looking, I can't remember the specifics as to how the draw to the championship had thinned out, but I along with the rest of Husky fandom saw a wide path to the finals with Mid-Major GM in the E-8 and I think a team we had beaten 2 or 3 times that season awaiting in -4 (Syracuse maybe?). I still don't buy the prevailing reason for their upset loss, was that many of the members of that team were selfish, had the NBA on their minds and took GM for granted. I still see it as a case where a less talented team played the game of their lives with a game plan that exploited UConn's weaknesses, one of which was a slow and defensively challenged backcourt.
Lack of Front Court Size: Another area that is hard to overcome at the high-major level is not having enough size to defend the paint and get some easy points in there. I always say, "You can never have too many bigs!" The only reason why I don't place this at the top is some teams can masque and overcome this weakness with well coached team-D that makes it difficult for the opposing team from getting the ball to their bigs deep in the paint. One team that comes to mind was the one that didn't let LSU get the ball to Shaq in the paint. If they had, he would have done some big time damage. JC was a master in the 90s at this area. It wasn't until the late 90s that we began to get bigs who had prototypical size, starting with Travis Knight, who wasn't exactly a wide body or banger. Jake might have been the first Big with legit 5-man size, and coincidentally was the big-man in the middle for our first NC. After those two, the program began to get bigs with prototypical size Emeka, Boone, Hilton, Hasheem to name a few. Interestingly, the defensive philosophy shifted from lock down perimeter D to funneling the offense into the Bigs to create contested or blocked interior shots. That seems to have chanced lately, in part due to the lack of dominating shot-blockers. I can't remember the exact number, but I'm still amazed that we led the nation in blocked shots for something like 6 or 7 years in a row. I doubt we'll ever see that a kind of run ever again from any program. Getting back to my point, you can have a team with a ton of talent at the 1, 2 and even 3, but if you don't have enough big bodies to defend the paint and make the other team even worry about defending it on their end, well coached teams can take away your perimeter strength. When you make a team worry and game-plan to prevent the bigs from getting the ball in the blocks, they can't commit as many players to close off driving and passing lanes, and prone to giving up a lot of good perimeter looks. I was amazed at how well last years team was able to execute their offense, considering how little they got out of their front-court. Our guards and wings had to work their butts' off to generate their offense. If we had some legit bigs and were eligible for the post season, that team had the pieces for a very deep March run. I hope we get enough out of this year's group of bigs to open things up more for our skilled perimeter players. We won't need All-American play from our bigs, but just a little more than what we got last season to see big things from this team. Bazz, Boat, Omar, Daniels and Niels will be a handful to stop this coming season, especially if teams will also have to worry about our bigs doing any sort of damage if they get the ball in the paint. If Daniels can hold his own at the 4 against most teams and score from anywhere on the floor including the paint, this team is going to be dangerous and fun team to watch.
Lack of Perimeter shooting: This one is obvious. JC was able to overcome this at times in the early 90s by deploying pressure full court D (2-2-1 full court press) and making it a transition game. The philosophy was to try to create more shots, especially easy ones (transition layups & dunks), than the opponent. Try to tire out the other team, especially their bigs. Try to make the other team rush their offense. You rarely see this work now, mainly due to how athletic even the average D1 baller is these days. Many teams are much better at breaking the press now than they were 20 years ago. And even back then, it was hard to win it all with that type of game. UNLV sort of won it that way, though they had some shooters. Arkanas is another team (They called it 40 minutes of Hell, if I remember correctly). Houson's Phi-Slama-Jama was another up-tempo style team, though I think they had some shooters. It would have been fun to see how far UConn could have gone if they had gotten past Dook during the Dream Season. I don't recall who we would have faced after that. I thought UNLV cut down the nets that year and I don't think we would have fared well against them. Getting back to my point here, teams that can't hit Js make it easier to defend them. You can get away with it to a point if you have some athletes that can drive it into the paint and finish in traffic and have bigs that can clean up the misses or catch the dish and throw it down. But eventually teams that don't have a sharp-shooter or two, usually meet their match along the way.
Lack of Athleticism: This one probably belongs above the prior one. Good coaching, especially on the offensive side (example the Princeton offense) can make up for a lack of athleticism. Some coaches work the clock for long stretches to decrease the possessions and make the more athletic teams work hard on D and frustrate them. But in most cases the less athletic teams tend to run out of gas at the end of games and get clipped at the wire. Well coached less athletic teams can get some early round tournament upsets but rarely get past the S-16. Hoops has become a game of athletes. You just don't see Hoosier type teams having much of a chance these days. Although the lumbering, methodical and frustrating hold-the-ball teams like the old Wisconsin Badgers have had some success, their style of play would only get them so far.
That's all I got. Agree? Disagree? Ones I missed.
