Central Michigan

[skip-zip]

wadszip, I think you make some good points except that you may be looking at the last game in particular (and maybe even Buffalo) as a situation where guys were standing out on the 3-line, and deciding whether to shoot or drive. But if you look back, a lot of the easy baskets were coming early in the possessions, where guys were simply driving to the basket (and may have been looking to create space to kick out for a 3 ball) and had simply beaten their man to the basket instead. And I agree with you, as I stated earlier, that maybe some of this will correct itself when Pat is able to play 30 min. per game again.

Let me correct something on the 2013 games vs. Ohio:

Harney was matched up more against Cooper in the championship game, especially when Carmelo was not on the floor (we were playing without Abreu, remember). But, the real strategy change that year was that we were switching more often on the ball screens out top, which was something we had not done a lot in previous games. It was a whole host of much bigger defenders that ended up wearing him down and making it difficult for him to shoot.

[ace]

While I don't remember the specifics of the Zips' defense during that 2013 championship game, but I will say that that was one of the best halves i have EVER seen the Zips play. Whatever they did worked very, very well...we held them to 17 second-half points, had a team defensive rating of 67 and held DJ Cooper specifically to an offensive rating of 36. Those numbers are completely unheard of. So if switching ball screens is really what caused that, you can count me in for trying that again.

[skip-zip]

Ace...the mind-blowing statistic for me was that Cooper ended up with ZERO field goals in that game.

Switching on the ball screens only works if the big guy picking up the guard after the screen can contain him. I recall CMU taking some of our big men right to the hoop after some of those switches. So unfortunately, you still have to have the right personnel to make it work, or you just end up with some serious mismatches that will be exploited.

[ace]

I mean I am not necessarily a fan of big men switching onto guards...I have seen way too many Zeke Marshall hip-check fouls for that. But I will say, if your big guys are athletic enough to stay in front of a guard, it can completely shut them down.