Thoughts and Areas for Improvement

[nelsonmuntz]

UConn is better with Bouk. Duh.

Martin has been tremendous. He has saved UConn's season.

UConn should play at least 10 minutes a game with 2 of the bigs on the court together. UConn is a better team when it is a bigger team, especially on defense. I think Carlton, Whaley and Sanogo have all played well and deserve significant minutes. UConn beat PC by 10 on the boards, which is almost a guaranteed victory.

Adams 2 DNPs in a row obviously raise the question of why he was playing so many minutes earlier in the season.

Cole is a really good shooter off the catch. He is not as good a shooter off the dribble and he has a tough time finishing at the hoop because he isn't that quick and he is short. 13 shots is too many for Cole. He needs to run the offense, not look to score himself unless it is off the catch.

Two good games in a row.

Area of Improvement:

Does Hurley realize that every team opens their offense against us with a center screen so Whaley/Carlton/Sanogo will do that ridiculous hard hedge 10 feet above the 3 point line? Our weakside guard rarely rotates to the middle, so the middle is always wide open for the screener on that play. Then Whaley/Carlton have to sprint back, and sooner or later they will pick up a cheap foul.

I have an idea, why not just let Cole run under the screen? If PC's point guard wants to take a 24 foot pullup 3, let him. Or, alternatively, play the screen any way other than what UConn is doing. The hard hedge doesn't work and other coaches are taking advantage of it.

 

[auror]

The Adams question has pretty easy answers. We had 3 total players healthy that were natural 2 or 3s (Adams, Martin, and Polley). And Jackson wasn't ready for the early season due to his offseason injury, so Adams was needed then too.

 

[3rdbass]

UConn is better with Bouk. Duh.

Martin has been tremendous. He has saved UConn's season.

UConn should play at least 10 minutes a game with 2 of the bigs on the court together. UConn is a better team when it is a bigger team, especially on defense. I think Carlton, Whaley and Sanogo have all played well and deserve significant minutes. UConn beat PC by 10 on the boards, which is almost a guaranteed victory.

Adams 2 DNPs in a row obviously raise the question of why he was playing so many minutes earlier in the season.

Cole is a really good shooter off the catch. He is not as good a shooter off the dribble and he has a tough time finishing at the hoop because he isn't that quick and he is short. 13 shots is too many for Cole. He needs to run the offense, not look to score himself unless it is off the catch.

Two good games in a row.

Area of Improvement:

Does Hurley realize that every team opens their offense against us with a center screen so Whaley/Carlton/Sanogo will do that ridiculous hard hedge 10 feet above the 3 point line? Our weakside guard rarely rotates to the middle, so the middle is always wide open for the screener on that play. Then Whaley/Carlton have to sprint back, and sooner or later they will pick up a cheap foul.

I have an idea, why not just let Cole run under the screen? If PC's point guard wants to take a 24 foot pullup 3, let him. Or, alternatively, play the screen any way other than what UConn is doing. The hard hedge doesn't work and other coaches are taking advantage of it.

I actually think we play better with just one big on the floor. With Jackon on there it might be good for D but it kills our offensive flow. I like seeing one center and Martin/Polley, Jackson, Bouk and Cole on the floor together.

 

[jkfer98]

Fouling is the biggest lingering issue for me. Even with a quick whistle, it’s been a recurring theme all season long. Especially far from the basket/in areas where they aren’t looking to shoot.

We put them in the bonus with 13 minutes (!!!) left in the 2nd half. A good team would use that to their advantage to chip away at the lead. Not going to get away with that in March!

 

[Huskyforlife]

I wouldn't go under screens against Nova, but I agree that Carlton and Sanogo shouldn't hedge as hard as they do.

 

[SlicinNDyson11]

I actually think we play better with just one big on the floor. With Jackon on there it might be good for D but it kills our offensive flow. I like seeing one center and Martin/Polley, Jackson, Bouk and Cole on the floor together.

This is exactly the lineup that gets the most out of this team at the moment, with a trio of Bouk, Martin, Polley or Jackson on the floor it gives us more flexibility defensively to switch things off ball (we did a lot of this pertaining to Duke tonight) while providing spacing offensively to open up driving lanes for Bouk.

 

[BlueDogs]

I’m just happy to see us attacking early in the clock. It makes a huge difference. I do think we have to be careful about going into slowdown with too many minutes on the clock. We are a terrible offensive squad burning clock.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Fouling is the biggest lingering issue for me. Even with a quick whistle, it’s been a recurring theme all season long. Especially far from the basket/in areas where they aren’t looking to shoot.

We put them in the bonus with 13 minutes (!!!) left in the 2nd half. A good team would use that to their advantage to chip away at the lead. Not going to get away with that in March!

I meant to bring up fouling in my op. Young teams will foul, but it was really bad tonight and I didn't think the refs were that bad. UConn fouls a lot.

 

[jkfer98]

I meant to bring up fouling in my op. Young teams will foul, but it was really bad tonight and I didn't think the refs were that bad. UConn fouls a lot.

Yep, we're 293rd in the country in opponent free throw rate. Hard to blame the refs when it's been a consistent issue all season.

 

[UconnU]

Fouling is the biggest lingering issue for me. Even with a quick whistle, it’s been a recurring theme all season long. Especially far from the basket/in areas where they aren’t looking to shoot.

We put them in the bonus with 13 minutes (!!!) left in the 2nd half. A good team would use that to their advantage to chip away at the lead. Not going to get away with that in March!

Hurley’s teams have always fouled a lot, his best URI teams committed a lot of fouls. It’s nothing to be alarmed at. For example we’re one of the only teams that will hard hedge all the way to mid court to eliminate the PnR. Why don’t many other teams do it? In large part because you end up committing too many stupid fouls away from the basket.

 

[Ratso]

distribution

the pc game was completely different to the xavier game. i get bouknigh’s return, but the sharing, focus & efficiency of the xavier game was off the charts.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

We put them in the bonus with 13 minutes (!!!) left in the 2nd half. A good team would use that to their advantage to chip away at the lead. Not going to get away with that in March!

Similarly, we also won't get away with late game free throw lapses. Stakes get higher, error margins slim, competition improves.

Lots of puzzles pieces, things starting to come together, but we're looking to do more than just make the tourney and crack the Top 25. It must stay one game at a time, but each game has a growth purpose toward a larger whole.

OP has all apt points.

 

[SlicinNDyson11]

The hard hedge has worked for us most of the year, we rank in the 76th percentile defending pick and rolls per Synergy pretty good. Typically our weakside defender does a good job by rotating to the paint preventing an easy pass, and the pressure from the hard hedge makes it difficult for the ball handler to find the roll man and forces him to swing the ball around the perimeter to find the big. There has been occasions I've seen the weakside defender leave a second or two before our big gets back to his man and that leads to a layup but we've been successful at this more times than not thus far. Where this can get us into trouble is if we run into teams that have a big that can pop out for a three and hit a consistent rate but against the pick and roll we've been very good at weakside rotation while our big is hedging.

 

[djct1999]

Coach Hurley spelled it out perfectly in his press conference last night. In year 3 of the rebuild, coming from how depleted this roster was, he simply doesn't have the program depth to replace athletic talents like Bouk and Jackson. Adams played a lot of minutes simply because he had to. It may not be a popular opinion on here, but for the most part Adams is more consistent and is more of a threat than Gaffney. I don't think this can be understated. In a weird year filled with disruptions, this team can't afford to lose its best player and another with top 3 upside.

 

[MTBingNinja]

The big man hard hedge is infuriating, especially around the three point line. If I was the opposing coach, I’d run a pick and roll all day long off of that. I’d rather see the bigs stay in the paint, especially Sanogo. He especially never looks comfortable doing a hard hedge.

 

[Husky25]

UConn is better with Bouk. Duh.

Martin has been tremendous. He has saved UConn's season.

UConn should play at least 10 minutes a game with 2 of the bigs on the court together. UConn is a better team when it is a bigger team, especially on defense. I think Carlton, Whaley and Sanogo have all played well and deserve significant minutes. UConn beat PC by 10 on the boards, which is almost a guaranteed victory.

Adams 2 DNPs in a row obviously raise the question of why he was playing so many minutes earlier in the season.

Cole is a really good shooter off the catch. He is not as good a shooter off the dribble and he has a tough time finishing at the hoop because he isn't that quick and he is short. 13 shots is too many for Cole. He needs to run the offense, not look to score himself unless it is off the catch.

Two good games in a row.

Area of Improvement:

Does Hurley realize that every team opens their offense against us with a center screen so Whaley/Carlton/Sanogo will do that ridiculous hard hedge 10 feet above the 3 point line? Our weakside guard rarely rotates to the middle, so the middle is always wide open for the screener on that play. Then Whaley/Carlton have to sprint back, and sooner or later they will pick up a cheap foul.

I have an idea, why not just let Cole run under the screen? If PC's point guard wants to take a 24 foot pullup 3, let him. Or, alternatively, play the screen any way other than what UConn is doing. The hard hedge doesn't work and other coaches are taking advantage of it.

Rebounding is important?

Are you sure?

Regarding Adam's: He has a big heart, no doubt but tries to out play his role.

I reminds me of 2017 (IIRC), When UConn had injuries to their three best players. Some here were lamenting why they couldn't win with an 8 man rotation like other programs, paying no mind to who made up that rotation.

Of course that was before considering Ollie's downward transformation.

 

[Psolo12]

Coach Hurley spelled it out perfectly in his press conference last night. In year 3 of the rebuild, coming from how depleted this roster was, he simply doesn't have the program depth to replace athletic talents like Bouk and Jackson. Adams played a lot of minutes simply because he had to. It may not be a popular opinion on here, but for the most part Adams is more consistent and is more of a threat than Gaffney. I don't think this can be understated. In a weird year filled with disruptions, this team can't afford to lose its best player and another with top 3 upside.

Adams is not better than Gaffney. Stop.

 

[auror]

The big man hard hedge is infuriating, especially around the three point line. If I was the opposing coach, I’d run a pick and roll all day long off of that. I’d rather see the bigs stay in the paint, especially Sanogo. He especially never looks comfortable doing a hard hedge.

As @SlicinNDyson11 mentioned, our pick and roll defense has been very good this year. The hedges have been solid from everyone all year (much better than the 1st 2 years of Hurley overall). We picked up a couple cheapies yesterday, but it's generally worth it to prevent ball handlers from turning the corner and getting into the paint with a full head of steam.

The weakness to this D is that the opponents Big screen setter often then has a mismatch on the switch. However, our rotations and denials have been rock solid. Now that we're healthy, we have shot blocking from 3 or 4 positions on the court at a time. And when the big recovers we have an easy double/shot block help. We have the 4th best FG% defense in the entire country for attempts near the rim. So them taking advantage of the "weakness" of the D is actually playing to our strengths.

 

[Palatine]

We are improving in our assist numbers and fast break points. Two areas that have been weaknesses.

We ran a beautiful break set up by Jackson's outlet pass. Nice to see. Our assist numbers were down from Xavier but Cole was above his season average which he needs to be.

 

[djct1999]

Adams is not better than Gaffney. Stop.

Fair enough. Show me then where Gaffney has been better.

 

[freshler40]

I’m just happy to see us attacking early in the clock. It makes a huge difference. I do think we have to be careful about going into slowdown with too many minutes on the clock. We are a terrible offensive squad burning clock.

We did play with more rhythm and quickly got the ball over half court, more passing downcourt helped rather than dribbling up again double teams. The players had smiles on their faces, a good sign. I totally agree that running the clock down is not our best choice and often resulted in rushed shots or Cole having to penetrate with little success. By putting Martin inside the key, we got many more opportunities and opened up the inside.

 

[3rdbass]

Fair enough. Show me then where Gaffney has been better.

The Seton Hall game.

 

[navery12]

Fair enough. Show me then where Gaffney has been better.

• Jalen Gaffney has a BPM of 3.3, good for 8th on the team. Brendan Adams has a BPM of -0.3, good for 13th on team.
• If you like win shares better, Jalen Gaffney has 0.9 compared to Brendan Adams' 0.5.
• If you like PER better, Jalen Gaffney has a 13.2 compared to Brendan Adams' 7.8
• Or if all those advanced stats are too much we can look at shooting percentages. Jalen Gaffney is shooting 36.2% overall, 37.8% from 2, 34.4% from 3, 81.8% from the free throw line compared to 30.6%/29.6%/31.4%/65.2% for Adams

 

[djct1999]

• Jalen Gaffney has a BPM of 3.3, good for 8th on the team. Brendan Adams has a BPM of -0.3, good for 13th on team.
• If you like win shares better, Jalen Gaffney has 0.9 compared to Brendan Adams' 0.5.
• If you like PER better, Jalen Gaffney has a 13.2 compared to Brendan Adams' 7.8
• Or if all those advanced stats are too much we can look at shooting percentages. Jalen Gaffney is shooting 36.2% overall, 37.8% from 2, 34.4% from 3, 81.8% from the free throw line compared to 30.6%/29.6%/31.4%/65.2% for Adams

Thanks. Stats don't lie but I am honestly a bit surprised by this. To me, they seem to contribute about the same.