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[GoCats]

Early Season Thoughts:

* KP is moving much better this year and his defense and rebounding are noticeably improved.
*Our motion offense sometimes lacks motion. Often 2 or 3 players are watching rather than setting picks or using picks. This away from the ball play is an area we can improve a lot.
*Dusan is playing pretty good on offense. Keep shooting the 3s big guy.
*Frampton and Grady shoot too many difficult jump shots where they are not square. Some of these shots seem early in the shot clock. These are probably are best shooters but a little adjustment here will help a lot.
*Step back jumpers are probably not our best offensive option - ok some of the time just not a steady diet.
*Carter deserves more minutes. Defense, rebounding, good shot selection. He is doing a lot of good things.
*Luka can shoot the 3, he should try it sometime. Nate and Luka not shooting the 3 has allowed their defender to guard the paint. It also means they really can't play at the same time.
*Moving screens, We have a lot of these violations. I don't know if this is a point of emphasis but we need to stop moving. Many times the cutter is the problem - cutting too early or not using the screen properly: Fake one direction and run right next to the screen please. This is another away from the ball issue to improve.
*Team defense has been better this year. Pleasant surprise. But against lower level competition, we need to know who the shooters are and not leave them to "help" against guys who aren't likely to hurt us.
*Luka - plays good defense on his man. Get's burned regularly by his man when he helps on defense. Helping too early and too far and needs recover faster. I am confident he will get this fixed as the game slows down for him. Overall Luka has exceeded expectations and has a nice offensive post game.
*Frampton does a lot of good things on defense.
*Team rebounding will be an issue this year. Coaches will need to continue to remind this team to do it - particularly since we are playing 4 guards so much.
*When we fix some of the above, we will hit more cutters. We need this.

Should be fun season. Love being 5-1 and seeing how we can be so much better.
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"That wasn't an upset tonight," Kansas coach Bill Self said glumly. "They controlled the game," Self said. "They whipped us."
Davidson 80 Kansas 74

[DCA06]

This is awesome! Thanks. Away from LG and Luke hitting more shots, I think improving big play is imperative versus are tougher schedule games. We don’t have a replacement for Aldridge and I think that’s hurting us on 3s. Team needs to find a new identity upfront and in games where we have lead we should encourage more aggressive play from Nate to find a range where he feels comfortable hitting a midrange shot Or getting to basket. He’s got great mechanics / execute. Dusan too.

[tennis08tarheels]

Great insights! I think Carter Collins has been the story of the season so far. He's doing so many things so well. The easy comparison is Jason Morton. Thinking beyond that though, who was the last guard we had running the point with that much speed?

[MikeMaloy15]

I don't think the coaches are shorting CC's minutes all that much. In Northeastern 1.0 he had more minutes than 3 starters. In Northeastern 2.0 he played half the game (20 minutes).

We won't have to wait long for the next number.

[catseye]

[Bill Cobb]

The entire key to the offense right now is that our bigs need to hit 3s. Otherwise the lane is clogged and our motion offense lacks motion.

We are also athletic enough to extend the defense if we want. Nice to have that option available.
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"I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter."
Crash Davis

[wildforthecats]

Elephant in the room is that McKillop's second best all time player is missing this season. Cats are adjusting. They will get there. May have a few loss bumps on the road to victory.

[quickcat]

Given that Bob has commented on the difficulty it presents the offense when the 5 doesn't shoot the 3, I don't think we'll see 2 bigs on the floor. Kishawn and Luke are our 4's this year.

Hopefully the distance shooting will pick up as guys figure out what to expect better, and gain confidence. If I recall correctly, Peyton (a 40% 3 pt shooter) struggled a lot as we got into the season without Jack last year. Seems like he was shooting around 30% from 3 thru about mid-January but he ended at 37% or so.

[wildforthecats]

"I don't think we'll see 2 bigs on the floor. Kishawn and Luke are our 4's this year."

Mike Jones had worked himself into the rotation to play some minutes at the 4 prior to his injury.

[stan]

As always, GoCats offers great insights.

--Moving screen is very often a foul caused by the cutter. Especially frustrating when it's the second foul of the first half called against the screener and he has to go to the bench for the rest of the half.


If the 5 in the game can't shoot the 3, we need an alternative offensive set that allows that 5 to work and screen around the lane without moving out past the 3 point line. Most college teams have one (probably 95+% I would guess).


Or simply use the 5 on the high ball screen and roll while spacing and spotting up the other shooters. When our 5 rolls to the hole as the big defender hedges, some defender has to leave his shooter at the 3 line and rotate to the lane until the hedger gets back. That opens up our shooter if we get him the ball. It's really simple and really effective.
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"Then they started making 3s. A lot of 3s. We're talking more 3s than a bad dating site."

[bvgerd]

[Dr. Bliss]

How are we defining "bigs?" To this point in the season, Dusan, Nathan, and Luka have attempted a grand total of 10 threes. They've made exactly 2. So we have six points on the season from our 5s shooting threes. (It's possible that Kishawn has made a three when he was playing the 5, which he has done a little bit, but I don't remember it.)

I don't expect this to be a big part of our offense this year. Luka often has an open shot on the perimeter but he doesn't even look at the basket most of the time--seems reluctant to shoot. Dusan is 1-7, so why do we think he will or should take more shots? Coupled with the fact that we are not a great offensive rebounding team, having our 5s shoot a lot of threes looks like a recipe for a lot of empty offensive possessions--unless Luka can start taking and making more threes.

As a result, teams are collapsing in the lane, and this is making it more difficult to run our traditional offense, where the cuts are happening mostly in the lane area. It's crowded in there.

I think the key is Luke. If he can get his 3-point percentage up to a respectable point, he, and the team, can benefit by teams overplaying Kellan, much the same way Kellan benefited from teams overplaying Peyton. It was clear in the last game that Bob told Luke to go out firing. If teams have to respect him, it opens up the game for others.

This might also open the possibility of Bates earning more minutes as it looks to me that he has a good stroke. Without our 5s shooting threes, we need to have shooters on the floor at the other positions. Dang, we miss Mike Jones in this regard.

I'm reading what I just wrote and scratching my head. How are we 5-1?
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"There ain't no sanity clause!" Chico Marx

[CatsUpNorth]

I think one important to remember is three-point percentage is often more indicative of an overall quality of offense/shots than quality of shooters. The 5s not shooting threes and the resulting clogging of the lane are definitely a part of this, as is our lack of chemistry on offense at times that Coach cited as "not being in sync yet." We are taking tough shots, and when the offense is not humming on all cylinders and in rhythm, even open shots go in less for everybody. Someone like Luke specifically is also coming off a leg injury.

I'd love for us to go off, but I think once we sort out some of our overall offense and flow issues, everyone's numbers from the outside will improve.

[Dr. Bliss]

I think of our offense as mostly an equal opportunity one, where the ball moves until it finds the best shot. I think the more stuff we can run to get Luke free for open shots on the perimeter, the better. I'm loving the way Luka is seeing the floor when he gets the ball in the post and kicks it out. He has a real nice understanding of how to play with his back to the basket.

One thing that sometimes goes uncommented on is Jon Axel's play. Offensively and defensively, and controlling the game, he is superb. We are not the same team when he is not on the floor--witness NE's comeback in the last game when JAG was sitting with 3 fouls.
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"There ain't no sanity clause!" Chico Marx

[ac3983]

The confidence and leadership Collins has shown on the floor has been awesome to see, he has stepped into his new role very nicely. Couple that with the athleticism and we've got something. This has been showing itself many times so far but stood out to me in Charleston especially when JAG went out with 2 fouls early in 1H. Huge for a squad adjusting to life without #23.