+++++ Vandy vs Boogs (HYGs) Official Game Thread +++++

[Denim Vest]

Yeah Mac been out of position a lot this year. Late, handsy, picking up a lot of cheap fouls. Our guards do a really good job mostly of fighting over the top of screens but that opens up the drive. Austin surprisingly been much better than Mac.

I think in general we were out of position a lot on D last night but then again their 2 guys are super legit and they shot it completely out of their minds.

 

[Fatz Geronimo]

Yeah Mac been out of position a lot this year. Late, handsy, picking up a lot of cheap fouls. Our guards do a really good job mostly of fighting over the top of screens but that opens up the drive. Austin surprisingly been much better than Mac.

I think in general we were out of position a lot on D last night but then again their 2 guys are super legit and they shot it completely out of their minds.

Austin gonna fvck around and play himself into the draft... NBA guys look at FT% as a predictor of longterm shooting potential... between his FT shooting and shockingly improved defense 25-35 feet from the basket, Austin gonna be a bench Brook Lopez type, shooting 35% from 3 in the NBA in 4 years

 

[Denim Vest]

Austin gonna fvck around and play himself into the draft... NBA guys look at FT% as a predictor of longterm shooting potential... between his FT shooting and shockingly improved defense 25-35 feet from the basket, Austin gonna be a bench Brook Lopez type, shooting 35% from 3 in the NBA in 4 years

There’s was a play against Miss St where he got switched onto Nick Weatherspoon and checked him to oblivion. Could not believe my eyes. He’s so much more athletic than I ever dreamed he could be.

I feel like a couple years ago when Mac was dominating the game we’d just let him switch one on one with anybody. Then he’d either let them think they had space and block their shit or he’d wall up on the drive and block their shit. Now it’s like he gets stuck in no mans land between switching and jumping the screen.

 

[WDE_Tarp]

Austin gonna fvck around and play himself into the draft... NBA guys look at FT% as a predictor of longterm shooting potential... between his FT shooting and shockingly improved defense 25-35 feet from the basket, Austin gonna be a bench Brook Lopez type, shooting 35% from 3 in the NBA in 4 years

Also, he has some crazy number in points per attempt. Not sure how much NBA guys care about that, but it couldn't hurt.

 

[Van Gorstache]

Austin gonna fvck around and play himself into the draft... NBA guys look at FT% as a predictor of longterm shooting potential... between his FT shooting and shockingly improved defense 25-35 feet from the basket, Austin gonna be a bench Brook Lopez type, shooting 35% from 3 in the NBA in 4 years

Doesn't hurt that Austin is top 20 in both offensive and defensive rebounding percentage, top 40 in block percentage, #3 in the nation in fouls drawn per 40 minutes. And his offensive efficiency numbers are much improved this year.

 

[DM8]

Agree with Bruce. It's just so weird seeing the "best" boog shooters get good open looks from 3 and just brick them hard. Obviously missing Jared nad Bryce is gonna hurt, but I wonder how much that moved back 3 line is affecting Danjel and Samir. We gotta have them shooting at least upper 30s from distance late in the season for this squad to go far

Disagree on the 3%. Shooting is down across the country this year. We are at 31.8% as a team. That's not great, but we also aren't relying on the 3 to win. We can beat most anyone we will face attacking the basket and playing good D. If we start hitting 3s at a higher rate, we are going to be blowing teams out.

 

[DufnerFanBoy]

I had a longer message about that typed out above and deleted because the post was getting too long already

I don’t know what’s going on - it could be any or all of the things you mentioned... to me, with absolutely no knowledge of the coverage and how he’s being coached to play it - he’s playing for a trail block and just not quite explosive enough to play it that way

I’d love to see him hedge hard early and trust that we can recover and scramble well enough, but that requires a LOT of communication and with so many young guys and guys in new roles, we may just not be there yet

we don’t have to full out switch and expose Mac to a quicker guard or JVon/Samir to a big in the post - watch how Austin plays them... he steps out, forces the ball handler to stop or move away from the basket, and even if they switch he’s so effing big and gets low (for him) that he pushes the guy towards more help and then we switch AGAIN and end up with Isaac or another wing back on the ball handler... that’s what I’m talking about when I say scramble mode - we’re switching on and off ball, all over the court, multiple times after the initial switch, and we’re athletic enough to do it, but all 5 guys have to communicate constantly which is the hard part for inexperienced guys

we’ll be much better a month from now, 6 weeks from now... but for now, it’s definitely a weakness that can be exploited

I think something hurt us early against Vandy that affected how we dealt with the hall ball screen. Early, we hedged a couple too hard and allowed the ball handler to get through and into the lane. Then the weak side defender had to step into the lane to stop the ball, leaving open shooters in the corner. They hit 2 or 3 of them early and had a couple more opportunities. I wondered if we changed things up because of that. Whatever it was, that was one of the worst games I remember us having in regards to defending the high ball screens. J’Von especially struggles to fight through them. Samir and Okoro are a lot better at creating enough space and slipping by the big setting the screen. Definitely an area where we have to make some adjustments.