Pace of Play / Emphasis on Offensive Rebounds
I'm slightly concerned about our ability to score in the half court. And suspect that we'll see a faster paced offense as a result.
That is likely to have a negative impact on our defense. The most efficient shots in college basketball are taken in transition and/or at the rim.
Tech's last two defenses were elite at preventing those types of shots altogether. But there's a strong correlation between offensive pace and ability to defend or prevent those shots.
Culver/Keenan/Mooney worked uber methodically in the motion offense and, for the most part, only took predictable shots late in the clock -- the type of shots that rarely result in runouts and transition opportunities for the other team.
Can we still bog down opponents in the halfcourt while ratcheting up our pace offensively so we can score enough points to win?
Similarly, last year's team nearly eschewed offensive rebounding altogether. Mooney, Francis & Morro weren't going to out leap anyone for boards, so it made sense to forego those opportunities to better set up a halfcourt defense.
But last year's team was one of the best shooting teams in Tech history and could afford to disregard the offensive glass. This year's team probably can't. And that's okay, because I expect Ramsey, Shannon, Holyfield, and Clarke will be incredibly difficult to box out.
In an interview after the first Mega Bemax game, Ramsey said that Beard challenged him to show that he was a "crasher" or Beard would relegate him into being a "get back" guy. Ramsey answered the call and looked like a blur that game attacking the offensive glass. Watch him tomorrow when he crashes the board from outside the three point line... it looks impossible to block out.
If we change philosophies w/ respect to offensive rebounding to increase offensive efficiency, will that come at the expense of transition defense?
What All Can Holyfield Do?
I'm not sure that there are more contrasting styles of defense than the system Brad Underwood ran/left at SFA compared to Tech. Underwood's SFA teams pressured the ball way out to half court and left on-ball defenders completely on an island. Zero help if you get beat, and most potential helpers wouldn't know anyways because they're facing their man to deny the ball.
I think opposing teams thought SFA's bigs were vulnerable to ball screens which, because of the pressure SFA's guards put on the ball, would occur really far from the basket. Not exactly where most people want their bigs defending in space.
In sum, a lot was asked defensively of Holyfield when he played for Underwood and two things came to mind watching him play:
(1) Those SFA teams played incredible halfcourt defense, and it's safe to say that Underwood knows what he's doing as a coach. Holyfield's role in Underwood's system was very difficult, required a lot of energy/effort, and seemed critical to their success. Thus, the fact that Underwood was content placing Holyfield in precarious spots hedging ball screens at halfcourt and then sprinting back to find the screener indicates that Underwood thought Holyfield was pretty damn good.
(2) Underwood's bigs are at a major disadvantage boxing out on the defensive glass. A product of Tech's variation of the packline means that our bigs (1) are watching the shooter when the attempt goes up, (2) tend to be close or under the basket during shot attempts, and (3) are normally positioned between their guy and the basket. All those things make it easier to box out, but Underwood's bigs rarely received those luxuries. And yet, Holyfield was a more than adequate rebounder (top 20 rebound rate in the conf). I expect him to rebound at a really high level in our system.
SFA had a post player with a little more girth than Holyfield, and he would often defend the other team's true 5... not all the time, but some of the time. I assume that Holyfield will almost exclusively defend back-to-the-basket centers in the Big 12, which is a tough task for anyone, much less a PF from the Southland conference. What will that look like? Lucky for him, Mark Adams is the best in the country at denying passes into the post entirely.
Beard said in a presser the other day that we "played a lot of guys" against UTEP. That may be true but we also played our starters a ton. Kyler, Ramsey, & Morro played 34 or more minutes. Clarke played 28. But Holyfield only 18 minutes. Seems like he played a similar amount of minutes in the Bahamas, too. There's no way he plays that little going forward, because we are alarmingly small/light in the paint.
Offensively, Holyfield is so much more skilled than the other posts we've seen in Beard's motion offense. Will be interesting to see what that looks like.
The Evolution of Morro
Arguably the best shooter in the country. And after being challenged by Beard last season, he might also be the most underrated defender in the country. Morro backs down from no one, has a nose for deflections, and is crafty at drawing charges & becoming light on his feet in an instant.
One of my fav Morro sequences from last year was at home against UT. Courtney Ramey, who might be an NBA player, has the ball at the top of the key. He sees Morro defending him and waives off a screen in a way that says... this white Euro can't stop me off the dribble. Two bounces later, Morro senses exactly where Ramey's driving, gets his feet set, and then absorbs an arbitrary bump that sends him flying like a bowling pin into the tech bench. Morro then pirouettes up into an Andre Agassi fist pump before the ref even processed what looked like an obvious charge. Plays like that swing momentum more than a dunk or transition three.
The next evolution of Morro's game should be creating more shots for himself (anywhere on the floor) or for others at the rim. Morro was 3rd on the team in total shot attempts last year, but 8th in attempts at the rim (which he made at a 68% clip). Morro was assisted on over 80% of his 3-point makes, compared to approx. 50% for Culver. I'm not saying that Morro can create space like Culver, but he's a good enough shooter to attempt more difficult threes off the dribble -- especially since our offense won't be as efficient as it was last year.
Stated another way, Morro's ridiculous 53% from 3 during conference play is almost too high and reminds me of touts in the sports betting industry that claim to win 65% of their bets. If you have a model that is spitting out bets at a 65% win rate, you're losing money by not betting sides that have a 55% of hitting. I feel the same about Morro and would rather see him make 43% on 150 attempts in conference, instead of 53% on 80 attempts.
I'm slightly concerned about our ability to score in the half court. And suspect that we'll see a faster paced offense as a result.
That is likely to have a negative impact on our defense. The most efficient shots in college basketball are taken in transition and/or at the rim.
Tech's last two defenses were elite at preventing those types of shots altogether. But there's a strong correlation between offensive pace and ability to defend or prevent those shots.
Culver/Keenan/Mooney worked uber methodically in the motion offense and, for the most part, only took predictable shots late in the clock -- the type of shots that rarely result in runouts and transition opportunities for the other team.
Can we still bog down opponents in the halfcourt while ratcheting up our pace offensively so we can score enough points to win?
Similarly, last year's team nearly eschewed offensive rebounding altogether. Mooney, Francis & Morro weren't going to out leap anyone for boards, so it made sense to forego those opportunities to better set up a halfcourt defense.
But last year's team was one of the best shooting teams in Tech history and could afford to disregard the offensive glass. This year's team probably can't. And that's okay, because I expect Ramsey, Shannon, Holyfield, and Clarke will be incredibly difficult to box out.
In an interview after the first Mega Bemax game, Ramsey said that Beard challenged him to show that he was a "crasher" or Beard would relegate him into being a "get back" guy. Ramsey answered the call and looked like a blur that game attacking the offensive glass. Watch him tomorrow when he crashes the board from outside the three point line... it looks impossible to block out.
If we change philosophies w/ respect to offensive rebounding to increase offensive efficiency, will that come at the expense of transition defense?
What All Can Holyfield Do?
I'm not sure that there are more contrasting styles of defense than the system Brad Underwood ran/left at SFA compared to Tech. Underwood's SFA teams pressured the ball way out to half court and left on-ball defenders completely on an island. Zero help if you get beat, and most potential helpers wouldn't know anyways because they're facing their man to deny the ball.
I think opposing teams thought SFA's bigs were vulnerable to ball screens which, because of the pressure SFA's guards put on the ball, would occur really far from the basket. Not exactly where most people want their bigs defending in space.
In sum, a lot was asked defensively of Holyfield when he played for Underwood and two things came to mind watching him play:
(1) Those SFA teams played incredible halfcourt defense, and it's safe to say that Underwood knows what he's doing as a coach. Holyfield's role in Underwood's system was very difficult, required a lot of energy/effort, and seemed critical to their success. Thus, the fact that Underwood was content placing Holyfield in precarious spots hedging ball screens at halfcourt and then sprinting back to find the screener indicates that Underwood thought Holyfield was pretty damn good.
(2) Underwood's bigs are at a major disadvantage boxing out on the defensive glass. A product of Tech's variation of the packline means that our bigs (1) are watching the shooter when the attempt goes up, (2) tend to be close or under the basket during shot attempts, and (3) are normally positioned between their guy and the basket. All those things make it easier to box out, but Underwood's bigs rarely received those luxuries. And yet, Holyfield was a more than adequate rebounder (top 20 rebound rate in the conf). I expect him to rebound at a really high level in our system.
SFA had a post player with a little more girth than Holyfield, and he would often defend the other team's true 5... not all the time, but some of the time. I assume that Holyfield will almost exclusively defend back-to-the-basket centers in the Big 12, which is a tough task for anyone, much less a PF from the Southland conference. What will that look like? Lucky for him, Mark Adams is the best in the country at denying passes into the post entirely.
Beard said in a presser the other day that we "played a lot of guys" against UTEP. That may be true but we also played our starters a ton. Kyler, Ramsey, & Morro played 34 or more minutes. Clarke played 28. But Holyfield only 18 minutes. Seems like he played a similar amount of minutes in the Bahamas, too. There's no way he plays that little going forward, because we are alarmingly small/light in the paint.
Offensively, Holyfield is so much more skilled than the other posts we've seen in Beard's motion offense. Will be interesting to see what that looks like.
The Evolution of Morro
Arguably the best shooter in the country. And after being challenged by Beard last season, he might also be the most underrated defender in the country. Morro backs down from no one, has a nose for deflections, and is crafty at drawing charges & becoming light on his feet in an instant.
One of my fav Morro sequences from last year was at home against UT. Courtney Ramey, who might be an NBA player, has the ball at the top of the key. He sees Morro defending him and waives off a screen in a way that says... this white Euro can't stop me off the dribble. Two bounces later, Morro senses exactly where Ramey's driving, gets his feet set, and then absorbs an arbitrary bump that sends him flying like a bowling pin into the tech bench. Morro then pirouettes up into an Andre Agassi fist pump before the ref even processed what looked like an obvious charge. Plays like that swing momentum more than a dunk or transition three.
The next evolution of Morro's game should be creating more shots for himself (anywhere on the floor) or for others at the rim. Morro was 3rd on the team in total shot attempts last year, but 8th in attempts at the rim (which he made at a 68% clip). Morro was assisted on over 80% of his 3-point makes, compared to approx. 50% for Culver. I'm not saying that Morro can create space like Culver, but he's a good enough shooter to attempt more difficult threes off the dribble -- especially since our offense won't be as efficient as it was last year.
Stated another way, Morro's ridiculous 53% from 3 during conference play is almost too high and reminds me of touts in the sports betting industry that claim to win 65% of their bets. If you have a model that is spitting out bets at a 65% win rate, you're losing money by not betting sides that have a 55% of hitting. I feel the same about Morro and would rather see him make 43% on 150 attempts in conference, instead of 53% on 80 attempts.
