UMBC Retrievers
- Thread starter MrTbone
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We made free throws! Maybe in two years we'll be watchable again! Maybe Solly is really good! Rich-what?
24 of 26 free throws including 10 in a row at the end of the game and we barely pulled it out. It amazes me (not really) that this team jacks up threes at the drop of a hat and still doesn't send anyone to follow their shots or at least go to the boards from the side opposite the shooter.
Yes, I know we got quite a few tonight against a fairly undersized team, but we continue to give away opportunity after opportunity too often in almost every game we play.
Cline is a decent offensive player but he and Wood have the worst cases of cement shoes I have ever seen on defense. Cline in particular was horrendous tonight.
I wish Mooney would sub more and more frequently. Playing someone for more than two minutes at a time might actually allow a player to get into some kind of rhythm. We certainly can't have that.
Finally, it was nice to see some really good foul shooting, some really good rebounding by Fore and Buckingham and a good comeback for the win after UMBC's star went cold.
Something to look forward to, Texas Tech is 9 and 1.
Found it funny when one of the announcers said of Cline: "He's quicker than he looks". Um, no he's not. Best player on the team by far but he's never gonna be a defensive stalwart.
Good call stat boy. Maybe if we had taken a few more mid range jumpers instead of shooting 23% from 3, we would have hit your prediction
Other than the fact that we have the POTENTIAL to be very good at the line, my major take-away from this game is that we had the right guys in there at the end. Playing JJ and Buck at "forward" (or would that be "guard" in a 4-guard line-up?) is the best line-up to have in there at the end of a close game. Or, put another way, NOT having MW or Kwesi in there at the end, even as subs, is a very wise coaching decision. SDJ, KF, TJ, and JJ and Buck are, in my view, clearly our four players who give us the best chance to win, especially at crunch time. Am hopeful that they will continue to see more playing time, especially in the closing minutes of close games. This line-up decision is a major reason why we managed to pull out this victory.
I would love to see NS and GG get increased minutes (as MW and Kwesi earn fewer minutes) but right now they are not among our top 5 contributors. Hopefully, in a few weeks they can become interchangeable with the other 5, but they will need to work hard to earn it.
I would love to see NS and GG get increased minutes (as MW and Kwesi earn fewer minutes) but right now they are not among our top 5 contributors. Hopefully, in a few weeks they can become interchangeable with the other 5, but they will need to work hard to earn it.
My observations:
1. Hustle plays by JJ and DMB are great to see; I wish they did more going to the rack stuff
2. TJ is trying to do too much still; needs to consider not getting too fancy with his dribble-drive
3. Khwan has a lot of tools, still a bit inconsistent but I think those suggesting he is a sixth man are premature in their assessment
4. We had a lot of silly turnovers
5. I am confused as to what does/doesn't constitute a charge these days; I believe I saw the same play called once as a charge and once as a block and we were on the losing end of both calls
6. A win is a win but a 3-point win against umbc doesn't bode well
1. Hustle plays by JJ and DMB are great to see; I wish they did more going to the rack stuff
2. TJ is trying to do too much still; needs to consider not getting too fancy with his dribble-drive
3. Khwan has a lot of tools, still a bit inconsistent but I think those suggesting he is a sixth man are premature in their assessment
4. We had a lot of silly turnovers
5. I am confused as to what does/doesn't constitute a charge these days; I believe I saw the same play called once as a charge and once as a block and we were on the losing end of both calls
6. A win is a win but a 3-point win against umbc doesn't bode well
It is part of his series of responses to posts that no one else sees...
I agree, if you are only going to shoot 23% from 3 then yes, the mid-range jump shot is probably a better option. We have been one of the worst 3pt shooting teams in the country this year. Very disappointing considering we take an above average number of threes. Didn't watch the game after the first 10 minutes, disappointed with the outcome. Offense and defense are just not good right now. Looking at the stats we needed to shoot 90%+ from the free throw line to win this game, it really should have been a loss. Not good.
Good game last night by our team; we are slowly finding a proper mix and continue to improve. UMBC was 7-1 and leading their conference with a solid 9 point win against Duquesne on their home floor. All three freshmen played significant minutes at crunch time which bodes well for the future. A friend said Monte was a shorter version of Moses Malone; for those of us who remember Moses this seems like a good comparison. One could see glimpses of how good Grant can be. We're not there yet but we are in the way to being a pretty good team. Roll Spide! OSC
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Cubs win the series, Army beats Navy and we make 24 of 26 Free throws,,,,,,, what is going on.
By, of all things, making nearly all the FTs in the last few minutes of the game. Hope this is a glimpse of things to come. Had cost us a few games earlier in the season.
I thought he was referring to a player wearing number 5. Doesn't make sense otherwise.
I believe UMBC will be a better team than most on here are giving credit. They are very well coached, have a few skill players, and played with intensity.
I don't think they're a bad team, but there's something to be said about us playing to the level of competition. I think my personal frustration is not whether or not we eked out a victory given our young/developing team, it's more about an expectation that we should be able to go out and comfortably beat even the cream of the crop in these conferences.
Too many of these games are close, more than should be if we played at the level we are capable of.
Our coach is not very good. I know its hard to accept because he is a cool dude with a very acceptable personality, but he sucks at his job
Yep. You see other teams with wide open looks knock them down while we routinely miss them. And this is what our offense is supposed to be based on
Yes K and 97 and you might think CM might make as least some adjustments to his offense? If he didn't last year after having 2 starters who had no chance at making the 3, I guess he never will.
The combination of taking too many threes when the team isn't hitting coupled with the sprint down the court away from your basket as fast as you can is really what makes this strategy so stupid. Missing threes hurts, getting some follow up shots and maybe some fouls because at least a couple of guys are crashing the offensive boards on every play could be something that would help. Would love to hear "the coach's" explanation for this ridiculous policy.
Well, the theory is that you minimize breaks and setting your D is more valuable than getting some offensive boards. Not saying that it works or that I agree with it, but that's the theory.
How many times in "normal" games with teams that do not employ this "everybody back on D all the time" philosophy are there a tremendous number of fast-break points? Does this really happen frequently in other games? That's what I don't get. I don't think it does. I have never once watched a game and thought to myself, 'Damn, self – that team just gave up 20 fast-break points because it was trying too hard to get an offensive rebound.'
I see a lot of our guys shooting their 3's while stepping back to run instead of staying solid through the shot. I swear it looks like they also do this on free throws. They start backing off while releasing the shot. TJ has been the biggest culprit.
Here are the percentages of our defensive possessions that were fast breaks over the past 5 years:
15.8% (lowest in the country)
15.8% (6th lowest)
20.3% (129th)
18.3% (44th)
16.2% (5th lowest in the country)
We have been top 50 in 4 of the past 5 years in preventing fast breaks, top 10 in 3 of the past 5. Running back on defense instead of going for offensive rebounds certainly has an effect.
As for the size of the effect, I don't have the numbers but can try to estimate. The best fast break defense sees ~4 fewer fast breaks than the average defense. If the fast break team scores on ~80% of their fast breaks that amounts to 6 or 7 points.
Of course this year we do not have a good fast break defense, allowing fast breaks on 20.4% of possessions.
Helpful numbers, but I would be curious how many fast-break opportunities a team gets on average in a game across all D-I games. Is it two? Twelve? Five? Knowing that would give us some sense of whether this is (in general) an issue that really needs to be addressed in such an extreme way.
In some ways it feels to me like we are basing our entire strategy on preventing something that really doesn't happen an abnormal number of times in a game. It would be like coming up with an entire defense designed first and foremost to prevent half-court shots. Of course it's not that extreme, but you get my point.
My hypothesis is that this approach is designed to stop something that happens infrequently enough that what we are giving up to prevent it (rebounds) is actually counterproductive to the end goal of winning games.
But who knows, maybe the numbers will prove me wrong.
There are ~70 possessions on average per game. For the average defense, a shot is taken in the first 10 seconds of the possession ~21% of the time. These are considered fast break possessions, and there are ~15 per game.
Thanks. That seems like a little speculative on the part of the stat-keepers, but I get that it's probably somewhat accurate in terms of how many true fast-breaks there are. So if the average team sees 15 and we are typically one of the best, then we must see about 11-12 a game and are therefore eliminating 3 or 4 a game.
You mentioned 80% as the average conversion rate of fast-breaks. Is that what it actually is or was that just a placeholder on your part? I'd be curious. If it's accurate, then on average we are probably saving about 5 or 6 points a game over what the average team does.
I suppose in some ways it's fair to say that there are many ways to skin a cat, and this is the way Mooney has chosen to try. But I can't help but wonder if we just played "average" fastbreak defense and went harder after offensive rebounds whether we couldn't more than make up those 5 or 6 points a game. Say we get two putbacks and a kick-out three-pointer on average – that would give us a net +1 or +2.
Seems the increase in fast breaks against us this year have been steal/turnover initiated rather than coming off missed shots.
Look at the effect Buckingham's work on the offensive glass had on the outcome of the game. He kept 4 or 5 possessions going and put the other team in some foul trouble. Let's see if he still has that skill by the time his career is over. Will the coaching staff eliminate that from his game? Many have came before him with that ability/aggressiveness only to end up as a shell of their former self. FCM comes to mind.
More importantly, Buckingham showed his teammates and coaching staff, the other team and all of those in attendance that he is not going to roll over like a loser just because shots aren't going in. He sent a message that he is going to do everything that he can to get the job done. It rubbed off a little on the rest of the team and they made a stand until some shots went in. They dug in and found a way to win the game instead of wilting like a bunch of pansies. I don't blame the players, the pansy attitude comes from the head man on the bench.
I don't know what the actual conversion rate on fast breaks is, so that is just speculation on my part. I agree that getting back quickly gets us at most 6 fast break points on the defensive end compared to the average team, but the opponent could score on those possessions anyway. We probably net ~3 points per game with a good fast break defense. How many points could we get by going for more offensive rebounds?
So far this year we have averaged ~36 missed baskets per game, 36 chances for an offensive rebound. The average team pulls down 29.8% of these misses for an offensive rebound, we pull down just 23.1% (the best team pulls down 43%, worst just 14%). The difference between us and the average team is 8 offensive rebounds vs 10.5 offensive rebounds per game. So by improving to the national average we would get 2 or 3 more field goal attempts per game, worth under 3 points on average. In the end it looks like we give up 2 or 3 offensive rebounds compared to the average team to prevent 3 or 4 fast breaks compared to the average team.
This year we have not prevented fast breaks as well as we have in the past, we are seeing essentially the same number of fast breaks as the average team and the worst fast break defense Mooney has had. We also have the 2nd worse offensive rebounding percentage of a Mooney team, so we are doing both things poorly. We do have our best defensive rebounding team under Mooney this year though, which is nice.
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My take on the offensive rebounding vs. taking away the fast break is that it sends a mixed message to the players. On one hand, we are constantly preaching how important rebounding and how we have to fight for every ball and every possession, yet we are telling our players on half the possessions to never mind that just get back on defense.
This philosophy takes the aggressiveness out of our players. It will be interesting to see if Buckingham "comes around" as so many other players have to Mooney's way of playing.
This philosophy takes the aggressiveness out of our players. It will be interesting to see if Buckingham "comes around" as so many other players have to Mooney's way of playing.
Well, you can't have one guy out there free-wheeling it on his own without the coach's approval to do so. So yes, he will come around as you put it, although what you may be seeing right now is a confidence that CM has in him to do what he's doing and still get back on D relatively quickly.
To fan2011's point though, it's not like we're tearing it up on either front, so perhaps ratcheting it one way or the other would benefit us.
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