Game thread vs. Providence

[GatoLouco]

I don't think it was a bad game plan to limit Watson's shots and make bad shooters hit 3's (those bad shooters ended up shooting 70% on 13 3-pointers).

I understand that view. It was a decision based on Watson. Personally I think resorting to zone defense is bad 95% of the time. It can be disruptive, surprise the other team, but it’s not sustainable in most cases. Good teams tend to figure it out.

I will not forget Mark Turgeon being down big in the first half, a couple of years ago in Evanston, and going to a zone. It worked really well. And when being interviewed before going to the locker room for half time saying they would not be sticking to the zone. In contrast, last night, the zone worked for about 3-5 minutes early in the 1st half. Stopped working long before half time, we even went to man. And what did we do? Came out of the locker room in a zone.

Why? Because CC can’t get to terms that Young is one of his best players. He does not want to play him. So he understands that a man to man is risky, is likely to get his stud, Pete Nance, in foul trouble. He prefers rolling the dice with a zone over putting Ryan Young in.

One last thing, the idea that it makes sense to roll the dice because Providence is a bad 3 pt shooting team… they were a 33% team from 3. Not great, not horrible. Give 33% shooters more time and they become 40% or better shooters. A zone can close on shooters, but hard to do that when you want to make sure the ball does not get inside.

Again, I don’t know if we’d have won the game without the zone. No one does. But I know Young helped us getting back in the fight in the first half. And he barely played in the 2nd, despite being our leading scorer going into the break.

 

[freewillie07]

I understand that view. It was a decision based on Watson. Personally I think resorting to zone defense is bad 95% of the time. It can be disruptive, surprise the other team, but it’s not sustainable in most cases. Good teams tend to figure it out.

I will not forget Mark Turgeon being down big in the first half, a couple of years ago in Evanston, and going to a zone. It worked really well. And when being interviewed before going to the locker room for half time saying they would not be sticking to the zone. In contrast, last night, the zone worked for about 3-5 minutes early in the 1st half. Stopped working long before half time, we even went to man. And what did we do? Came out of the locker room in a zone.

Why? Because CC can’t get to terms that Young is one of his best players. He does not want to play him. So he understands that a man to man is risky, is likely to get his stud, Pete Nance, in foul trouble. He prefers rolling the dice with a zone over putting Ryan Young in.

One last thing, the idea that it makes sense to roll the dice because Providence is a bad 3 pt shooting team… they were a 33% team from 3. Not great, not horrible. Give 33% shooters more time and they become 40% or better shooters. A zone can close on shooters, but hard to do that when you want to make sure the ball does not get inside.

Again, I don’t know if we’d have won the game without the zone. No one does. But I know Young helped us getting back in the fight in the first half. And he barely played in the 2nd, despite being our leading scorer going into the break.

Not sure on what basis you can assert that CCC “can’t come to terms with the fact that Young is one of his best players.” Ryan fights extremely hard in the post when he’s in the game — maybe his ability to do that would diminish if he plays 30+ minutes per game? There’s also no question that having him in the game vs. Nance/Beran limits a run-and-gun type offense, which we just about have the personnel to run.

On Greer, I agree he was a solid contributor and I like him in general. Still doesn’t dispute the fact that having Audige on the court instead would have been a net positive

 

[GatoLouco]

Greer was one of the best players on the court yesterday. A lot of people bitch about mistakes and then at the same time complain about Greer who doesn’t make many. Greer has developed into a. b1G ten contributor. Great kid, and takes too much gruff on this board.

Greer played decently. But it’s 100% clear the bar is low for him. If Chase Audige played the same game most ppl would say he played a disappointing game.

I agree the Greer might have developed into a B1G contributor. And that’s no small feat. It’s actually amazing. But if our hopes rely on playing Greer 26 minutes a game as a 2 (an adaptation driven by need) we are in deep trouble.

 

[GatoLouco]

Not sure on what basis you can assert that CCC “can’t come to terms with the fact that Young is one of his best players.” Ryan fights extremely hard in the post when he’s in the game — maybe his ability to do that would diminish if he plays 30+ minutes per game? There’s also no question that having him in the game vs. Nance/Beran limits a run-and-gun type offense, which we just about have the personnel to run.

On Greer, I agree he was a solid contributor and I like him in general. Still doesn’t dispute the fact that having Audige on the court instead would have been a net positive

I can confidently say it based on the time he has RY on the court. As a first year that time was 26 minutes.

When you have just one player who penetrates, Buie, you can’t say you have the roster to play “run and gun” (Audige helps and hoping for much better shot selection this year). You can be happy about the effort after being 18 down. But that’s a low bar. Every year there are hundreds of games where that happens with teams that just keep losing. It’s not that impressive to keep fighting when you have given away 80 to 90% of your chances at winning.

 

[ricko654321]

When we were being steam rolled only 3 players seemed to “want” to take shots: Nance/Buie/Young. Later, as we were playing catch up, others joined the party. It’s not unexpected, Berry/Roper/Simmons are young and without much experience in this type of game. It’s a game it’s not that big a deal to lose. It’s not a bad loss. As long as we learn from it, it’s growth. Those guys will be steadier from the start in the future.

Strategically, Nate Watson starts killing us, we went to zone. We could have fought size with size, but we chose the zone. We chose it again to start the 2nd half. It might be a glimpse of how we will try to stop big men from abusing our Nance at the five. CC really does not believe In RY.

Not a terrible loss, but it is compounded by now we play Georgia instead of Virginia. I didn't realize UGA was so bad - they are #167 in KenPom. UVA is not great this year, but at #60 in KenPom (feels slightly light, but in the right range) is a good comp for us (#44 our ranking is prob a bit too high). So now instead of getting a second decent test matchup, we play a downright crappy team. Our OOC schedule is weak enough as it is, and now we lose that. I guess we just have Wake and DePaul, and then we have to wait until B1G season...

 

[Troy4L]

Not a terrible loss, but it is compounded by now we play Georgia instead of Virginia. I didn't realize UGA was so bad - they are #167 in KenPom. UVA is not great this year, but at #60 in KenPom (feels slightly light, but in the right range) is a good comp for us (#44 our ranking is prob a bit too high). So now instead of getting a second decent test matchup, we play a downright crappy team. Our OOC schedule is weak enough as it is, and now we lose that. I guess we just have Wake and DePaul, and then we have to wait until B1G season...

Also Maryland on december 5th. Hopefully Audige is back by then but who knows.

 

[PurpleWhiteBoy]

C’mon White Boy you watched the game. You know better than this. Young was not stopping them on D. For as good and crafty as he is around the basket he is challenged on Defense. This doesn’t mean just guarding his man, but help D as well. Greer got more rebounds than him. The argument that Young and the other teams big neutralize each other in rebounding is a fallacy not supported by any evidence. You pick your spots and Young is effective.

MN is not going to play much in close games. Get used to it. Your fascination with MN is mind boggling at this stage of his career. Just because the team struggles to rebound, doesn’t mean MN can come in and be Dennis Rodman.

NU lost the game. PC made shots. The game plan made sense.

Honestly, almost everyone here will disagree, but one of the most encouraging things in the first 4 games has been CCC. He has had a plan, adjusted when necessary, let guys play through some things, actually kept players in that were playing well, ran plays for Pete when he should and mixed up the D on a team that is Defensively challenged where some of our best defenders have limited experience. I have criticized CCC for all those things at one time or another during his 8 years.

I realize we will hear after EVERY loss that 1) Young needs to play more with Pete, 2) MN would have made a difference, and 3) we played the wrong defense. Of course all three of these things are controllable by the HC and leads to the campaign to blame CCC for all things NU basketball.

PPD:

I'm confused as to why you addressed your comments to me specifically. For one, I didn't bring up Nicholson at all! I didn't criticize our defensive strategy. I didn't talk about Young's defense.

Last night, CCC did the exact same thing he did to ruinous effect last year. He started Beran and Nance. Again we fell behind badly. Why does he keep doing that?

If we played Young with Nance against most teams we would do significantly better.

It is almost guaranteed. The only unresolved issue is "Are we worse defending the perimeter than last year?" if that answer is No, then we have to play Young and Nance together.

If Collins does that and we still can't win, I will admit I was wrong.

 

[clarificationcat]

I understand that view. It was a decision based on Watson. Personally I think resorting to zone defense is bad 95% of the time. It can be disruptive, surprise the other team, but it’s not sustainable in most cases. Good teams tend to figure it out.

I will not forget Mark Turgeon being down big in the first half, a couple of years ago in Evanston, and going to a zone. It worked really well. And when being interviewed before going to the locker room for half time saying they would not be sticking to the zone. In contrast, last night, the zone worked for about 3-5 minutes early in the 1st half. Stopped working long before half time, we even went to man. And what did we do? Came out of the locker room in a zone.

Why? Because CC can’t get to terms that Young is one of his best players. He does not want to play him. So he understands that a man to man is risky, is likely to get his stud, Pete Nance, in foul trouble. He prefers rolling the dice with a zone over putting Ryan Young in.

One last thing, the idea that it makes sense to roll the dice because Providence is a bad 3 pt shooting team… they were a 33% team from 3. Not great, not horrible. Give 33% shooters more time and they become 40% or better shooters. A zone can close on shooters, but hard to do that when you want to make sure the ball does not get inside.

Again, I don’t know if we’d have won the game without the zone. No one does. But I know Young helped us getting back in the fight in the first half. And he barely played in the 2nd, despite being our leading scorer going into the break.

As I mentioned above, the guys who took almost half of their 3-point shots (and went 9-13) were well below average. I assume that our players were told to leave them to help based off of the scouting reports. And Young was not stopping Watson when he guarded him. He's stronger than Pete and can make him work for it but he wasn't shutting him down. I think that Young does a lot of good things offensively, so I am not sure why he didn't play more in the 2nd half either.

 

[hoosboot]

They shot lights out. We would beat these guys 7 out of 10 times. And I’d play zone again.

You'd get beat. This team does not play zone very effectively.

 

[hoosboot]

Not sure on what basis you can assert that CCC “can’t come to terms with the fact that Young is one of his best players.” Ryan fights extremely hard in the post when he’s in the game — maybe his ability to do that would diminish if he plays 30+ minutes per game? There’s also no question that having him in the game vs. Nance/Beran limits a run-and-gun type offense, which we just about have the personnel to run.

On Greer, I agree he was a solid contributor and I like him in general. Still doesn’t dispute the fact that having Audige on the court instead would have been a net positive

There's really nothing to point to from this game that suggests playing Beran over Young was a present day positive. I've got no beef with the young man, but in this game Beran wasn't productive, didn't spread the floor effectively, and didn't defend effectively. He offered fewer points, the same number or rebounds, fewer blocks and steals, and more fouls (he fouled out) than Young in 40% more minutes. I guess I can see the idea that you are hoping to give Beran confidence and get him going, but it wasn't happening against Providence. What about Beran makes you think that he's equipped to be part of a "run-and-gun type offense"? And what about the roster makes you think that NU should run that kind of offense?

 

[clarificationcat]

There's really nothing to point to from this game that suggests playing Beran over Young was a present day positive. I've got no beef with the young man, but in this game Beran wasn't productive, didn't spread the floor effectively, and didn't defend effectively. He offered fewer points, the same number or rebounds, fewer blocks and steals, and more fouls (he fouled out) than Young in 40% more minutes. I guess I can see the idea that you are hoping to give Beran confidence and get him going, but it wasn't happening against Providence. What about Beran makes you think that he's equipped to be part of a "run-and-gun type offense"? And what about the roster makes you think that NU should run that kind of offense?

Not disagreeing that Beran didn't produce much but why do you conclude he didn't defend effectively?

 

[hoosboot]

Not disagreeing that Beran didn't produce much but why do you conclude he didn't defend effectively?

Much of it is his fouling out in just 22 minutes (that's almost by definition ineffective defense), but also the lack of rebounding and lack of other substantial impact on the game on the defensive end.

 

[NUThump]

Providence up 9 at the half, on the road at #20 UConn.

 

[NJCat]

Providence up 9 at the half, on the road at #20 UConn.

Yeah, watching it. Good team. NU lost to two teams 10-1 and 11-1 on the season. Not bad losses at all.

 

[MC_Cat]

Should've beaten Wake, but Providence had us under control. Audige makes a huge difference though.

 

[GatoLouco]

Yeah, watching it. Good team. NU lost to two teams 10-1 and 11-1 on the season. Not bad losses at all.

Agreed. But losing those two games also meant no having any good non con wins.

If there are two things that help on selection Sunday is good wins and no bad losses.

 

[PurpleWhiteBoy]

Agreed. But losing those two games also meant no having any good non con wins.

If there are two things that help on selection Sunday is good wins and no bad losses.

I still recall somebody writing that Young was a bad post defender because Providence's big guy scored two difficult baskets against him.