SMU

[skyblade]

I think our defense is designed to take away high percentage shots (at the rim). Every defensive scheme has a flaw and ours is the 3 in the corner or on the wing. The only way you can prevent those threes is play man 2 man and have 5 elite defensive players that can square up and not get beat off the dribble. That is highly unlikely and we don’t have that personnel.

I think Cronin has always played the percentages when it comes to D. Traditionally an open 3 is lower percentage shot that a layup. I do think that the trend in basketball to 3 point shooters is making Cronin second guess the D scheme...just from listening to him talk.

I'm not convinced the scheme is really at fault. We just have players this year who get lazy on D or try to do too much and make dumb mistakes.

We have guys helping on a driver who is already being doubled by a big or who has no shot or who is going to get a jumpshot at best. We had guys last night stuck in no mans land because they moved to help when they shouldn't be helping and left an excellent shooter wide open. Guys need to know when to help and whether they should help based on how good the guy they are defending is at 3-point shooting.

We have guys who should know better (Broome, Scott) and are plenty experienced who routinely make these mistakes. It's mental where they try to do too much and they end up giving up a wide open 3 to an excellent shooter.

 

[david aka the TYZ]

I'm not convinced the scheme is really at fault. We just have players this year who get lazy on D or try to do too much and make dumb mistakes.

We have guys helping on a driver who is already being doubled by a big or who has no shot or who is going to get a jumpshot at best. We had guys last night stuck in no mans land because they moved to help when they shouldn't be helping and left an excellent shooter wide open. Guys need to know when to help and whether they should help based on how good the guy they are defending is at 3-point shooting.

We have guys who should know better (Broome, Scott) and are plenty experienced who routinely make these mistakes. It's mental where they try to do too much and they end up giving up a wide open 3 to an excellent shooter.

Agree 100 percent. I will say though that SMU was very good at getting into offense quick and passing the ball multiple times to not let our defense get set. Mainly in the first half. I think they tired out in the second half and did more one-on-one offense. SMU is kind of different because they dont play a normal offense and that hinders our defensive effectiveness. They basically play five long guards. As Mick said in the postgame, they didnt post up once. But to your point, game in game out, we simply are not playing defense like we're used to seeing. We aren't closing the passing lanes and forcing bad shots. And nobody on the bench outside of Nsoseme maybe knows who to cover on switches, etc. This makes it easy for teams to find open shooters and why we're seeing teams shoot high percentage threes against us. Our defense is geared toward making you settle for threes and hopefully contested ones. What we are seeing is teams getting open looks after open looks. Last night we didnt step into the shooters space and continued to let them step into threes. Guards cant worry about being driven on, that's why we have athletic big men in our system. Step into the guards and take away those shots, if they drive, trust the shot blockers behind you. Mick recruits his bigs purposefully to be shot blockers. It is frustrating watching all these games being close but what can you expect when your defense continues to give up 70 points a game. We're not designed to outgun teams. I know fans hate this about Cronin but it is what it is.

 

[waterhead]

I'm not convinced the scheme is really at fault. We just have players this year who get lazy on D or try to do too much and make dumb mistakes.

We have guys helping on a driver who is already being doubled by a big or who has no shot or who is going to get a jumpshot at best. We had guys last night stuck in no mans land because they moved to help when they shouldn't be helping and left an excellent shooter wide open. Guys need to know when to help and whether they should help based on how good the guy they are defending is at 3-point shooting.

We have guys who should know better (Broome, Scott) and are plenty experienced who routinely make these mistakes. It's mental where they try to do too much and they end up giving up a wide open 3 to an excellent shooter.

I think we have the physical attributes to replace Gary and Jacob. But those two didn’t get out of position very often and they were good at helping when others did. That’s what we are missing

 

[skyblade]

Agree 100 percent. I will say though that SMU was very good at getting into offense quick and passing the ball multiple times to not let our defense get set. Mainly in the first half. I think they tired out in the second half and did more one-on-one offense. SMU is kind of different because they dont play a normal offense and that hinders our defensive effectiveness. They basically play five long guards. As Mick said in the postgame, they didnt post up once. But to your point, game in game out, we simply are not playing defense like we're used to seeing. We aren't closing the passing lanes and forcing bad shots. And nobody on the bench outside of Nsoseme maybe knows who to cover on switches, etc. This makes it easy for teams to find open shooters and why we're seeing teams shoot high percentage threes against us. Our defense is geared toward making you settle for threes and hopefully contested ones. What we are seeing is teams getting open looks after open looks. Last night we didnt step into the shooters space and continued to let them step into threes. Guards cant worry about being driven on, that's why we have athletic big men in our system. Step into the guards and take away those shots, if they drive, trust the shot blockers behind you. Mick recruits his bigs purposefully to be shot blockers. It is frustrating watching all these games being close but what can you expect when your defense continues to give up 70 points a game. We're not designed to outgun teams. I know fans hate this about Cronin but it is what it is.

Agreed, seems like a lot of it is lack of trust and wanting to do too much. It's normal this year to see our defenders cheating off a lights out 3-point shooter to try to help on a play when they have no business helping. Or being scared of being beat of the dribble, even though we've got very capable shot blockers shooters behind them.

Many of our players seem to think they need to do everything defensively. They aren't able to just play their role, do what they are supposed to and trust the players behind them to do what they are supposed to. But a bunch of individuals playing D quickly breaks down to give open shots. We need better team D. Not sure if it's communication, trust or just mental errors but the team D system breaks down way to often this year.

 

[skyblade]

I think we have the physical attributes to replace Gary and Jacob. But those two didn’t get out of position very often and they were good at helping when others did. That’s what we are missing

Yeah, athletically our team has improved over last year. Williams and Scott are equal to or better then Evans and Clark in terms of athleticism. Brooks is a major upgrade over Washington.

The mental, effort and experience side are where we lack. Clark and Evans and even to a degree Washington communicated and didn't make mental mistakes. They also covered for others mistakes. We just don't have that this year. Not sure if it is team communication breakdowns or individual mental breakdowns (probably a combination of the two).

 

[david aka the TYZ]

Yeah, athletically our team has improved over last year. Williams and Scott are equal to or better then Evans and Clark in terms of athleticism. Brooks is a major upgrade over Washington.

The mental, effort and experience side are where we lack. Clark and Evans and even to a degree Washington communicated and didn't make mental mistakes. They also covered for others mistakes. We just don't have that this year. Not sure if it is team communication breakdowns or individual mental breakdowns (probably a combination of the two).

Evans was a great defender as was Clark. We have no answer for them two this year on defense. Whereas Brooks and Scott combined might hold down the interior as well as Clark and Washington combined did based on length and athleticism, we still are missing Gary's ability to space himself right as well as lead the defense. If you ever watched him off the ball on defense he was always telling guys where to be. With him and Evans both, we were pretty much always in rhythm defensively with the starters on the floor, save for when Washington had to guard a scoring big cause he'd often let the guy get loose. But last year the guards didnt have to scramble as much as you see them doing this year. Teams aren't beating us in the paint this year. Rebounding might be lacking but again I attribute that to lots of long shots creating long rebounds.

Justin is good in Micks system but he cant cover two players. While Williams is long and quick, he still hasn't mastered where to be, but for the most part he can be effective. But he gets himself in foul trouble and Jenifer himself has been ineffective running the offense leading himself to seeing the bench more. And Jarron can be lazy on D. Last night I watched him stand and watch 3 defensive rebounds near him and not go after them. I think he is using his energy on offense and resting on D somewhat and tbh we might have to accept that. But when we go to the bench it can be a crapshoot on defense. Whereas we have quickness and athleticism off the bench, we are chasing people on D rather than being in position. There's a big difference there.

I think our defense looked so good in the nonconference because many teams were just inferior and also those teams aren't used to us. You can't scout our defense in two days and learn to beat it. Conference teams are used to us and know how to best try and expose us. And this year we have some weaknesses. I saw one play last night where SMU brought the ball up and three players ran out to guard the ball and a screener and Justin quickly had to tell guys where to go. You just cant have that in conference play. Granted that's one possession but it goes to show the lack of understanding from the younger players and the importance of having everybody on the floor on the same page.

 

[cincycpaw]

We couldn’t stay in front of anyone most of that game. Jenifer especially was awful yesterday.

But played tough down the stretch and got the W. Cumberland is soo $. And Broome and Moore made things happen in the 1st half.

Not a great win, but still a win.

 

[cincyguy13]

Take a win and stay in the hunt as long as we can. We don’t have the talent to blow every team out so I’ll take any win