Use the Purdue/Zach Edey strategy against opposing Bigs

[MexicoHusky]

There's a log of concern about our low post interior D. Rightfully so. I say we adopt the same strategy we used against Purdue and Zach Edey. Tell Johnson and Reed to play them straight up. Do their best to not foul (too much). Then try to outplay the other 4 guys on the floor. It's worth a shot in my opinion. hopefully Singare works his way into the lineup and can help keep Johnson and Reed out of foul trouble. But worst case Karaban moves to 5 and we put 5 shooters on the floor.

My suspicion is, this is already the plan of DH and Staff. Bama made the final four with a similar strategy. Illinois made the final 8 with a similar strategy.

 

[KemBuckets21]

There's a log of concern about our low post interior D. Rightfully so. I say we adopt the same strategy we used against Purdue and Zach Edey. Tell Johnson and Reed to play them straight up. Do their best to not foul (too much). Then try to outplay the other 4 guys on the floor. It's worth a shot in my opinion. hopefully Singare works his way into the lineup and can help keep Johnson and Reed out of foul trouble.

My suspicion is, this is already the plan of DH and Staff. Bama made the final four with a similar strategy. Illinois made the final 8 with a similar strategy.

Not a bad idea. And the good thing is, there are zero zach edey's or players remotely comparable to him in college basketball this coming season.

Gang rebound, keep your man in front of you, rotate.

 

[Iluvsuebird]

In my view the bigger problem is protecting the rim when opponents penetrate. While you are correct in what you said, protecting the rim will still be an issue. HOWEVER, opponents are gonna have to score 80 plus points to beat us. And our teams under DH have always been defensively adequate, if not awesome. And our guards and wings will have a lot of blocks too

 

[MexicoHusky]

In my view the bigger problem is protecting the rim when opponents penetrate. While you are correct in what you said, protecting the rim will still be an issue. HOWEVER, opponents are gonna have to score 80 plus points to beat us. And our teams under DH have always been defensively adequate, if not awesome. And our guards and wings will have a lot of blocks too

Johnson is not Clingan, but of the things he does well defensively, off the ball shot blocking is actually something he does ok. So hopefully Johnson can keep opposing guards honest. Also, looking at the size, speed and abundance of our guards. We may do a better job keeping opposing guards out of the paint than we did last year.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

Only works if you have a Clingan that can go 1-1 and not give up 100 points

Samson fouled out in literally 5 minutes in the title game and Edey scored 37 on 15-25 from the floor with Clingan on him for 30 min.

 

[Scot-e]

I had the same thought and I think there is definitely something to that strategy. I’m sure if us fans had the thought the coaching staff certainly had had it as well.

 

[MexicoHusky]

Only works if you have a Clingan that can go 1-1 and not give up 100 points

Samson fouled out in literally 5 minutes in the title game and Edey scored 37 on 15-25 from the floor with Clingan on him for 30 min.

I think you are missing the point. We don't have a dominant big. In this case you either send help or you don't send help. I'm suggesting we don't send help. I know it will work if you have great guards and a dominant big... that works amazingly well.. nothing in fact works better.

 

[ddent68]

There's a log of concern about our low post interior D. Rightfully so. I say we adopt the same strategy we used against Purdue and Zach Edey. Tell Johnson and Reed to play them straight up. Do their best to not foul (too much). Then try to outplay the other 4 guys on the floor. It's worth a shot in my opinion. hopefully Singare works his way into the lineup and can help keep Johnson and Reed out of foul trouble. But worst case Karaban moves to 5 and we put 5 shooters on the floor.

My suspicion is, this is already the plan of DH and Staff. Bama made the final four with a similar strategy. Illinois made the final 8 with a similar strategy.

Totally agree. Play straight up and rebound. That's really all we need out of our bigs. I think Reed and Johnson can offer more than that but this team is still going to win by big margins if that's all they do. Other teams are going to be asking themselves how do we defend UConn? I think this team averages 85-90 points a game.

 

[Palatine]

Looking at some rough numbers from last year.

DC played 22 MPG, 13 PPG, 7.4 RPG, 2.6 blocks.
SJ played 16 MPG. 5.4 PPG, 2.8 RPG, 0.9 blocks

So our bigs played 38 minutes a game, scored 18.4 points, grabbed 10.2 boards and blocked 3.5 blocks. Replacing those numbers would be very good.

Of course, it is impossible to calculate the number of changed shot and shots that were not even attempted because of the presence of Clingan.

 

[jake14mw]

Interesting idea, but I think that title game was unique. Edey was a dominant force that was practically unstoppable. Clingan was good enough defensively to make it at least challenging for him. And we had defenders at the other positions that could make things very tough for the other four. Purdue shot 40% from 3 last year, a lot of that had to do with guys being open because of help to Edey. It was smart to say we weren't going to allow that. Whether we help down into the 5 this year depends on similar situations. For teams that don't shoot it as well from 3, maybe you help more. It varies.

 

[awy]

i'm not that concerned about post defense. reed will be asked to do that vs post oriented bigs. it's whether the loss of elite rim protection can be made up by offensive improvement and whether that loss of floor makes them more fragile vs elite scoring threats.

 

[superjohn]

Only works if you have a Clingan that can go 1-1 and not give up 100 points

Samson fouled out in literally 5 minutes in the title game and Edey scored 37 on 15-25 from the floor with Clingan on him for 30 min.

This is inaccurate, Edey was 15-25 fg's for the game. Edey was 10-19 fg's with Clingan guarding him. Edey started the game 7-9 fg with Clingan guarding him and then Edey went 0-6 with Clingan guarding him as UConn took control of the game and turned it into a blowout.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

This is inaccurate, Edey was 15-25 fg's for the game. Edey was 10-19 fg's with Clingan guarding him. Edey started the game 7-9 fg with Clingan guarding him and then Edey went 0-6 with Clingan guarding him as UConn took control of the game and turned it into a blowout.

Post wasn't meant to state he scored every single point with Clingan guarding him. Rather just that Clingan was on the floor for 31 minutes and had enough ability to guard Edey 1 v 1 and eventually wear him out.

I haven't seen Reed play whatsoever but leaving Johnson to defend the post without any help is a foul out waiting to happen. Even with help Johnson fouls like crazy.

 

[HuskyCLT]

Samson would need to stay out of foul trouble for that to work, which he hasn’t shown yet.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Post wasn't meant to state he scored every single point with Clingan guarding him. Rather just that Clingan was on the floor for 31 minutes and had enough ability to guard Edey 1 v 1 and eventually wear him out.

I haven't seen Reed play whatsoever but leaving Johnson to defend the post without any help is a foul out waiting to happen. Even with help Johnson fouls like crazy.

Good news is SJ didn't have any fouls defending URI's 7ft/255# center during "classic" post matchups. And he played him 1-on-1 straight up all night.

He's still not perfect, but I think the extra muscle he put on and better technique might decrease those fouls in 24/25. Time will tell.

 

[UConnStats]

IMO with Johnson in they should be hedging big time and using ball pressure to force difficult passes. With Johnson’s athleticism he can react and get back down low quickly to contest if passes find an open man down low. Hurley talked about potentially taking a page out of Houston’s book in the URI postgame, and this is what they do.

If they want to put Reed drop coverage that could potentially work, but it won’t for Samson.

 

[MexicoHusky]

IMO with Johnson in they should be hedging big time and using ball pressure to force difficult passes. With Johnson’s athleticism he can react and get back down low quickly to contest if passes find an open man down low. Hurley talked about potentially taking a page out of Houston’s book in the URI postgame, and this is what they do.

If they want to put Reed drop coverage that could potentially work, but it won’t for Samson.

hedging has been a point of contention on this board in the past. It probably makes sense with team. It seems like a thing you do because metrics tell you it makes sense. Just like shooting a lot of threes. But at the same time I remember some of our very mature guards from years past allowing the hedging big to switch onto them. Then taking advantage of the slower player.... our old way seemed so macho. I loved watching Khalid, Kemba, Bazz calmly staring down the larger player then abusing him. But modern basketball is all about metrics. Maybe this team is team metrics. Lots of three and lots of hedging.