So what do you do when switching on ball and off ball aren’t working? People complained and complained about our drop coverage for two years, then the moment we get beat switching, we are supposed to change it? Most coaches don’t change their defense considerably during a game—they simply coach their guys to do it better. We just didn’t, and a lot of that has to do with a UK team that hit a ton of contested 3s. And you can’t take away 3s by switching ball screens or hedging and recovering without giving up their off ball cuts, which lead to rim 2s. That’s why we were switching off ball, too, but that puts us in a ton of mismatches across the floor and it is invariable that you will have some miscommunication. We missed on lots of switches and help because UK’s actions are really tough to pick up in real time (especially with young, raw bigs like Condon and Chinyelu and smaller wings like Richard and Martin). But that’s execution, not scheme.
I would also add that this is a national top-5 offense we were playing on the road in Pope’s first conference game. It’s not Colorado, or even UNC. UK has some exceptionally skilled veteran players and a great offensive system. We just aren’t the kind of defense yet that can stop them, especially given our pace offensively. We will lose games on the road to elite offenses—you can count on that. But we are still light years better than we were last year. We rebound much better defensively, we contest shots better, we force turnovers better we prevent threes better, and we cut off dribble penetration better. Where we struggle right now is in help, especially against cutters and off switches. That’s an issue primarily with our fairly young, inexperienced bigs, and they will get better.
Last year, we just couldn't stop any quick guards from getting all the way to the hoop any time they wanted. UK did a couple of times, but not many. It was finding the open man and us not closing on them that beat us.
Looking back on the game my only REAL concern is that we went 7 deep. Alexis was in there for 5 minutes, had 1 assist and 1 foul. UK went with a legit 9 man rotation. They had one player log more than 30 minutes - we had FOUR. Condo (32), Richard (36), Clayton (34) and Martin (36) all logged BIG minutes, and when you play that much and with that much intensity (206 game points scored), you can get a little gassed and perhaps not as sharp, which leads to turnovers and missed FTs. Clayton had 3 turnovers in about minutes at the end of the half. When was the last time he missed 4 FTs? Or Martin going 3-7. Condo was 3-8. My guess is it's not just a coincidence that the guys who played almost every minute of the game were also missing FTs they usually make, or making other mental mistakes. We need Alexis to be able to give us better minutes in big games like this and at least one other player outside the 8-man rotation to give our starters a breather in games like this. 1 rebound total between Haugh and Alexis. It's unfortunate that Urban isn't quite there and Brown is still a bit too green. Playing 7 guys is asking a lot, regardless of how good they are. We need other guys to step up
Well it wasn't all bad, I watched most of the first half with my 5 yr old granddaughter. She really liked Richard's pink shoes and wondered why everyone didn't wear them.
The rout of UT was helped substantially by them being ice cold from outside even though they were getting some decent looks from outside. On the other hand, I thought our interior help defense was magnificent against UT. When we doubled on pick and roll plays, someone always seemed to be there for us to cover the roller as needed (best I've seen us do that since Horford and Noah were doing it to perfection). Also, loved how we were consistently challenging lob passes and just doing a lot of timely switching/helping when UT got anyone into the lane. Their cold outside shooting may have been a help to our inside defense, but I don't think that was the whole cause by any means.