If you have time and are interested in Xs and Os. Hoopvision did a good breakdown of the
Princeton offense a year ago and Richmond is heavily featured. If you don't want to watch the video read below I try to describe some of what Richmond does since some people seemed to like what I wrote about Davidson (the video does a much better job explaining the intricacies of the offense). Sorry in advance for the long winded post. Also don't expect this for other teams Davidson and Richmond are just the teams that have been explained like I'm 5 to me.
My starting point for a Richmond breakdown is a thesis statement from Petey Buckets. Richmond is a better version of Davidson and is the team everyone thought Davidson would be preseason. Which is true in the sense that both teams have great guards, shooters and passers and Richmond has more depth than Davidson now that Prichett and Frampton are out. Before you think I'm going to gush over Richmond like I did Davidson, think again. Bonas matches up better with Richmond than with Davidson. Both teams have similar skillsets and get open shots from similar areas however how Richmond gets its open looks is much different than Davidson.
They run the Princeton offense like I said above and it is predicated on entry into Golden in either the high or low post and him passing out of it or making a 1v1 play. The post Aldridge version of Davidson rarely plays through their 4s and 5s. After watching the Richmond vs VCU game on Saturday, I believe Grant Golden is the most important player on Richmond. Against VCU it seemed like he made the right decision everytime either finding the open shooter (Sherrod was hot in the first half) or used his speed to get by MSS and attack the basket. I think keeping OO out of foul trouble will be huge as always (duh!) but mostly because his length cuts off a lot of the cross court passing lanes that Golden takes advantage of and his lateral speed will keep Golden from rumbling down the lane. This is the perfect situation on paper to get Carpenter minutes over Ikpeze as the backup 5 because he can stay with the quicker 5s on Richmond. Golden is also skilled at grabbing an offensive board and kicking to an open shooter. He isn't a great offensive rebounder but when he gets one they make you pay.
How else does Richmond differ from Davidson? They set fewer flare screens. In Davidson's offense the weakside wing is almost always getting a flare screen or backdoor cutting if you are overplaying the pass to the shooter. Richmond however does more twist action, imo. This is not to say Richmond doesn't incorporate any flare screens they just aren't constantly setting up the flare like Davidson does.
My understanding of twist action is when there are two guys on the weakside one in the corner one on the wing swap places. With the guy who was on the wing cuts towards the baseline to give a pseudo screen to the guy in the corner who moves to the wing. The defender of the player in the corner is almost always sagging off in help position as his man is two passes away. By making the baseline cut the corner defender has to get through the cutter and the cutter's defender on the way out to his man now on the wing. This often leads to an open look for the guy who just popped from the corner to the wing, but what ultimately happens is the ball is passed to the wing and both defenders move to the ball and the cutter is either open on the post or drifted to the corner for the extra pass uncontested 3.
When Sherrod and either Francis or Gilyard are on the same side you see them twist often because all 3 can shoot really well. The Bonnies can switch those actions in normal man to man because Welch/English/Lofton/Vasquez will have those assignments. I think Welch can handle being on Gilyard when he has the ball just because Welch is so much bigger, but I worry if he gets switched on to Francis that could be trouble. The other option is we can play our normal 2-3 zone vs Richmond. Because there first option is to get the ball to Golden in one of the posts our zone can deny that entry pass especially when the off guard drops to the free throw line. I think we could see Winston and Welch playing much higher than they would in a traditional 2-3 to make it almost a 1-3-1 because Richmond uses two high guards (Gilyard and Francis). Two high guards means instead of one PG having the ball in the middle third of the floor, they split the floor in half and have essentially two point guards, one for each half of the floor.
Other quick notes:
Cayo gets the majority of Richmond's minutes at the 4 and I would compare him to Griffin as a junior. He does the dirty work for Richmond. Cleans the glass, blocks shots, and finishes around the rim when his man doubles one of the guards and they drop it off to him.
The Bonnies should be careful with dribble handoffs or any other time they are passing back to Lofton to reset. Gilyard is one of the best thieves in college hoops and likes to pounce on lazy passes or dig down on guys dribbling in the post. Which is why I see English having to create more in this game.
I plan on watching Richmond play Mason tonight with a focus on their defense. So maybe tomorrow or Friday I will have more thoughts on how to attack on the Richmond defense.