Bonnies vs. Davidson (Friday 02/14/20 @ 7:00)

Every now and then, Schmidt gets outcoached. McKillop and Davidson put on a clinic.

Anybody else think the Bonnies should play predominantly zone moving forward? It would keep Shoon in the paint. Their man defense is exploited vs good teams.
I have advocated for a predominantly zone defensive philosophy for years now. Schmidt’s rosters typically seem pretty ideal for it.
 
I'm guessing it would have to be the 1-3-1 we've thrown at people sometimes, because I have no idea how a 2-3 would have made Friday night's 3-point assblasting any better.
 
I'm guessing it would have to be the 1-3-1 we've thrown at people sometimes, because I have no idea how a 2-3 would have made Friday night's 3-point assblasting any better.
In the traditional sense, yes, that would have been a problem; however, Davidson’s shots are manufactured through its razor sharp motion offense (ripe with borderline illegal screens galore). Even a 2-3 zone can muck that style up a bit... and I’m not sure the Wildcat guards have the quick twitch speed to exploit the elbow-extended gaps of our rangy zone.
 
My question is who has the best 3-point defense training camp and where can I go to make a contribution for the Bonnies to attend next summer?
 
I'm working on something special to show how Davidson gets so many 3s against us but who knows if I ever finish it, mostly because I think they just hit another one.

In the meantime I think we are focused on the wrong side of the court. McKillop has figured out Schmidt's offense. In the last 4 meetings Bonas averages 61.5 points per game. It is almost impossible to hold Davidson below 60, Loyola-Chi, Temple, and Rhode Island are the only teams to limit Davidson to under 60 this season. They are all top 60 defenses per Kenpom. So we need to figure out something different to score more and give our defense a sliver of a chance. In the past as I pointed out it has been one of our dudes putting on the superhero cape to produce offense. I don't think we have anyone ready to do that yet.

There has been some discussion about playing zone against Davidson, I can tell you that we tried that Friday for at least a couple of possessions in the first half but due where on the floor the Davidson offense lines up it was hard to see we were in our normal zone. I think you have to play a more traditional 1-3-1 if you are going to zone Davidson. If it were me I'd put OO in the middle of that zone and Welch on the bottom of it. All I know is a couple possessions playing that way can't be much worse than what we tried.

Lofton picking up a foul 2 minutes into the game moved him on to Carter Collins for a while rather than on JAG or Grady to keep him out of foul trouble or he just kept getting switched away from those guys. Either way having him away from the ball hurts our defense. He is the best on ball defender we have, and I don't think its that close.

Nelson Boachie-Yiadom hasn't gotten much run for Davidson all year but had a great game vs us. If they are going to make a run he has to get more minutes. He is their best athlete and did all the little things well. Maybe he just had a good game because our 4 situation is not great but he passed the eye test and gave Davidson an edge they have been missing this year.

I was really hard on Bobby on twitter Friday night. I hate being that guy, who trashes players. But I'm not backing down from what I said. He had a -26.3 BPM according to T-Rank and has had a negative BPM in 8 of the last 9 games. BPM is a per-100-possession stat, the same scale as Adjusted Plus/Minus: 0.0 is league average, +5 means the player is 5 points better than an average player over 100 possessions, -2 is replacement level, and -5 is really bad (per basketball reference). I also want to add that he looked completely defeated when he picked up his last foul. He saw Schmidt call Winston to come in and just grabbed Grady or JAG to get it over with. If Schmidt gets Bobby back on track I'll admit he is a wizard.

Speaking of Winston. He has come a long way and has a ways to go. I think he has fallen in love with the reverse layup even when he could go up strong on the front side and get fouled. The other mistakes that he makes are all things you expect from a young guy. He tries to do too much at times on offense but when he plays within his role the team's ceiling rises. To be honest I didn't notice him much on defense this game which normally would be a good thing but I think it was just because after 10 minutes I only half watched the defense and mostly watched Davidson's offense because they were getting whatever they wanted.
 
I'm working on something special to show how Davidson gets so many 3s against us but who knows if I ever finish it, mostly because I think they just hit another one.

In the meantime I think we are focused on the wrong side of the court. McKillop has figured out Schmidt's offense. In the last 4 meetings Bonas averages 61.5 points per game. It is almost impossible to hold Davidson below 60, Loyola-Chi, Temple, and Rhode Island are the only teams to limit Davidson to under 60 this season. They are all top 60 defenses per Kenpom. So we need to figure out something different to score more and give our defense a sliver of a chance. In the past as I pointed out it has been one of our dudes putting on the superhero cape to produce offense. I don't think we have anyone ready to do that yet.

There has been some discussion about playing zone against Davidson, I can tell you that we tried that Friday for at least a couple of possessions in the first half but due where on the floor the Davidson offense lines up it was hard to see we were in our normal zone. I think you have to play a more traditional 1-3-1 if you are going to zone Davidson. If it were me I'd put OO in the middle of that zone and Welch on the bottom of it. All I know is a couple possessions playing that way can't be much worse than what we tried.

Lofton picking up a foul 2 minutes into the game moved him on to Carter Collins for a while rather than on JAG or Grady to keep him out of foul trouble or he just kept getting switched away from those guys. Either way having him away from the ball hurts our defense. He is the best on ball defender we have, and I don't think its that close.

Nelson Boachie-Yiadom hasn't gotten much run for Davidson all year but had a great game vs us. If they are going to make a run he has to get more minutes. He is their best athlete and did all the little things well. Maybe he just had a good game because our 4 situation is not great but he passed the eye test and gave Davidson an edge they have been missing this year.

I was really hard on Bobby on twitter Friday night. I hate being that guy, who trashes players. But I'm not backing down from what I said. He had a -26.3 BPM according to T-Rank and has had a negative BPM in 8 of the last 9 games. BPM is a per-100-possession stat, the same scale as Adjusted Plus/Minus: 0.0 is league average, +5 means the player is 5 points better than an average player over 100 possessions, -2 is replacement level, and -5 is really bad (per basketball reference). I also want to add that he looked completely defeated when he picked up his last foul. He saw Schmidt call Winston to come in and just grabbed Grady or JAG to get it over with. If Schmidt gets Bobby back on track I'll admit he is a wizard.

Speaking of Winston. He has come a long way and has a ways to go. I think he has fallen in love with the reverse layup even when he could go up strong on the front side and get fouled. The other mistakes that he makes are all things you expect from a young guy. He tries to do too much at times on offense but when he plays within his role the team's ceiling rises. To be honest I didn't notice him much on defense this game which normally would be a good thing but I think it was just because after 10 minutes I only half watched the defense and mostly watched Davidson's offense because they were getting whatever they wanted.
Ahh, yess. There he is!

Agreed on everything. Kyle will probably go hero mode if we get them again. I’m with you, sometimes you just have to let shit fly against a team that has your number. Posley, Jay, Stockard, etc. won games for us that way (and lost them, too... but I’d rather go out swinging).
 
Ahh, yess. There he is!

Agreed on everything. Kyle will probably go hero mode if we get them again. I’m with you, sometimes you just have to let shit fly against a team that has your number. Posley, Jay, Stockard, etc. won games for us that way (and lost them, too... but I’d rather go out swinging).
I like to agree with you guys but what I saw in the 1st half was hero ball. As soon as we went down 5-6 points it ballooned to 20 in no time because our offense devolved into 1-1 crap. Maybe Lofton taking more control would have been nice but that is not how this teams is typically successful.
 
Hero ball for me = taking and hitting threes. They could be from sets or off the dribble. Jaren and AJ were hesitant a lot in that game. Kyle, too.
 
Also, we aren’t good enough to go that route yet (except Lofton, who is good).

I once asked a well-respected local coach about the Bonnies and their propensity to get burned on threes. His response? Well, I fully expected an awesome breakdown of a zone or pack line... but instead got “get better players.” Ouch.

Edit- I posted this on the BW last year and got called out on it. It’s still true this year.
Davidson has 4 (5?) players who can dribble, pass, and shoot at a high level. How many do you think we have this year? Because I know from practice... curious to hear what you all think.
 
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Davidson has 4 (5?) players who can dribble, pass, and shoot at a high level. How many do you think we have this year? Because I know from practice... curious to hear what you all think.
1.
I think in an another year or 2 that number can be 4 or 5 with the current roster.
But still no one has proved that they can hit the open 3 consistently.
 
I guess what I meant by superhuman performances wasn't so much hero ball, but more having a guy be in the zone (Lofton was there vs Duq a week ago). I think Lofton can be that guy but larger guards give him problems and JAG and Grady are both his size or bigger. We still need to get ball movement because no one is a dominate 1v1 guy at this point. (I have hopes that Vasquez and Winston become those guys).

I think on the defensive front and getting torched by 3s, my opinion is this is one of the spots the heavy minutes hurts us. It takes a lot of energy to help and recover multiple times on one possession. Then you add fighting around a screen each time, and doing 50-60 possessions a game. Even if guys aren't out of gas tired they are a half step to a full step slow getting out to the shooter, and with the caliber of shooter Davidson and many others in the A10 have even that half step is the difference between an open look and a contested look. I really think the best option is for us to deny the pass to the shooter

Why Welch on the bottom of the 1-3-1 I proposed? I like Winston's length on the wing and think Welch is a better rebounder and a little tougher at this point. I think the more traditional play would be to have OO on the bottom but I like the idea of him clogging the diagonal passes and being able to help from the weakside if the ball gets to the post against Welch.
 
1.
I think in an another year or 2 that number can be 4 or 5 with the current roster.
But still no one has proved that they can hit the open 3 consistently.

Agreed 100%, and would add

-3 of those 4 ‘could-be’ guys are in their first year of D1 ball and have their first full Schmidt off season ahead of them. The 4th is already twice the player he was when he came in. Wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect more and more growth

-I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that if even 2 of those 4 get there by opening night next year, were looking at Next years team with potential for the same level of success we experienced 2 years ago.
 
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