Quality article. Probably the best preview I've seen on the internet. A lot of embedded video examples as well. Subscribe to the Athletic already.
Film room: How San Diego State hopes to stop the UConn juggernaut
The Huskies have rolled opponents throughout the NCAA Tournament. Can San Diego State's defense and physicality make the title game close?
theathletic.com
“They have five guys on the court that can always be a threat in different ways, and they run stuff for all five guys,” said a Big East assistant coach, given anonymity to speak openly about the Huskies. “They run more set plays than any team that I’ve seen.”
That’s any team. Like ever. This is the impossible task of defending Connecticut. So many weapons. So many plays, and the Huskies aren’t scared to run something they’ve never shown on film all year and they execute it to perfection. How in the heck do you prepare for that on a one-day turnaround?
“What teams are doing and failing is, they’re trying to front [Sanogo], and what he’s so good at is using his size and physicality to kind of wedge you up the lane and get passes over the top. And then you’re screwed.”
If you front him, “it’s over,” SDSU assistant Chris Acker said. The Aztecs will not play exclusively behind Sanogo; rather, the plan is to discourage his catches and try to get him as far off the block as possible. What makes that difficult is Sanogo is “always swiveling and moving,” Acker said. Fighting him on the block is exhausting, because he wins those leverage wars.
Mensah has allowed only 37 points on post-ups all season, per Synergy. Try to put the ball on the floor against him, and that can spell trouble.
UConn could help Sanogo get angles by getting him on the move. Murray, who had already watched 11 SDSU games by Saturday night, noticed that Creighton had some success rolling Ryan Kalkbrenner toward the basket and getting SDSU’s centers to chase during the Elite Eight.
“On misses, they play really fast and they obviously hunt transition 3s,” one of the Big East coaches said. “They’re probably the best in the country at getting transition 3s. You really got to take that away; like, I would start there. Go find their shooters in transition.”
“He probably has the fastest push in college basketball,” Murray said. “Our guys are greedy in those opportunities to get ahead of the ball and really sprint hard and keep our spacing in the open court, and he does an unbelievable job of putting pressure on the defense. There’s nothing he’d rather do than get somebody an open shot.”
The Aztecs are still alive because of offensive rebounding — at the turning point against Florida Atlantic, they grabbed nine offensive boards in the span of two minutes and four seconds — but they’ll need to be careful in how aggressively they crash the glass, because getting back on defense needs to be the utmost priority against UConn.
San Diego State is built to destroy ball-screen offenses. The Aztecs have switchable defenders who can contain dribble penetration. Opponents shoot only 28.1 percent from 3 against them, because “They keep the ball in front of them, and you never touch the paint,” the Mountain West coach. “The best 3s you get are paint touch kick-outs, and they just don’t give those up.”
This is where Connecticut is different. Hurley built this offense to be different than the typical college basketball team. In the last few years, Hurley had relied mostly on ball-screen offense, just like everyone else. This offseason he set out to load his roster with shooting, making it so he could run off-ball screening actions to get guys like Hawkins shots and then stretch defenses out so Sanogo could get easier opportunities.
The Huskies do not have to rely on dribble penetration to get their looks. It’s all about the actions. They’ll off-ball screen you to death until something opens up.
“[SDSU is] pretty good at blowing stuff up like that,” the MWC coach said. “I think what they struggle with the most is just a team that free flows. If they know where you’re trying to direct the ball, they can do a good job of taking stuff away.
“What’s unique about [UConn] is they can run the same play for Jordan Hawkins and then three possessions later run the same play for Alex Karaban,” one Big East coach said. “That interchangeableness is really unique based on set plays. Sometimes if you’re in like a flow-type system, where the game is just going and it’s all concept-based, interchangeableness is normal. Their set plays are interchangeable. That’s really unique, and it makes it hard to prep for.”
The Aztecs switch a lot of ball screens but usually do not switch off-ball screens. It’s possible they do not switch much of anything in this game. In the first half against Creighton, they switched less to try to keep a big on Kalkbrenner. Sanogo could get similar treatment.
Everyone but the Mountain West coach picked UConn to win by double digits, and everyone agreed for SDSU to have a chance the game must be low-scoring.