In the first game especially I think we saw a failure of execution on the part of our defense. You can choose to stop Pickett or you can choose to stay at home on the shooters, but we had a bunch of guys who were trying to half-cheat off of the shooters to help and it just didn't work. Pick a lane and stick with it and you'll do much better regardless of which way you go.
Pregame: Illinois vs Penn State, Thursday, March 9th, 5:30pm CT, BTN
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Illini poor defense this season has been exposed by NW, Penn State, Iowa, and Indiana.
Part of problem is all 5 players have to commit. We have some good individual defenders but rarely all 5 making the effort. When we do you saw some nice runs vs. Nebraska, NW and Rutgers.
Too many times we let people beat us back door or fail to stay with shooters at the 3 point line.
Last season everybody said we did not have enough length. Well we got bigger but we traded 6'2" and 6'4" players who busted their !!! on defense for 6'6" to 6'9" players who can't stay in front of anybody.
Part of problem is all 5 players have to commit. We have some good individual defenders but rarely all 5 making the effort. When we do you saw some nice runs vs. Nebraska, NW and Rutgers.
Too many times we let people beat us back door or fail to stay with shooters at the 3 point line.
Last season everybody said we did not have enough length. Well we got bigger but we traded 6'2" and 6'4" players who busted their !!! on defense for 6'6" to 6'9" players who can't stay in front of anybody.
These are all good ideas. But how about we stay/get between the guys we are guarding and the basket. I just re-watched the highlights of these PS-vs-IL games. It made me ill watching how many times we let Pickett and others go around us, how many times we flew past shooters going for blocked shots. I really don't like watching MM fly by offensive players when he should stay home and put a hand their face. Is that Big12 hero ball? To me, it's disgusting. If you can't get the block or the steal, then don't try. Stay home and make them earn it. We aren't doing that enough, and it is bad defense. It's gambling.
I honestly don't think Penn State is going to have a 3rd game with about 50% shooting for 2s/3s, if we play better defense. Yes, it will help that we are in in the United Center and not on their home court (like our last game against them). And there is NO WAY we are letting Andrew Funk go 6 for 9 from 3, like he did in the SFC. That will not happen again, since we simply won't allow this! Yeah, Picket is tough, but let's make him earn every one of those tough shots by making him shoot over us. And Coleman can't fall asleep and give Pickett open 3s. And Sencire can't be reaching on the far side of offensive players, giving them and open lanes to the basket. Everyone has to know where Pickett is at and make him earn every shot. And we'll need to score too, of course, so Shannon and Mayer must drive the rim in the 1st half, not wait until the 2nd half to get it in gear.
We definitely can beat this team, and Thursday will be our chance to show it!
Exactly. Gotta pick whatever poison you're choosing each possession and stick to it. Trying to do a little bit of both will get us torched in this one. PSU is too good at finding the open shooter and efficiently shooting the ball to have our players a step behind constantly chasing everyone because they can't make up their minds on who to cover.
That's kind of silly. Matchups and style of play are important in basketball. Some teams struggle defending the 3, others struggle defending the paint. Some teams struggle handling pressure, other teams struggle breaking down a conservative pack line defense. Some teams struggle guarding a good post player, others struggle guarding a good PG. I can go on and on, but you get the idea.
As for Dain, while he's been struggling of late and this is definitely not a good defensive matchup for him, I don't think sitting him the entire game is the right answer, but I do think Brad needs to give him very sheltered starts. Whenever Brad sees Njie go to the scorer's table, he should mirror by sending Dain to the scorer's table. Dain should be able to hold his own against Njie. But once PSU goes 5 out again, Brad has to similarly counter by subbing in for Dain. Dain can do some good work for us, especially on the offensive end and getting some boards, but it's going to take some care by the coaching staff to get him in those beneficial scenarios.
danielb927
Orange Krush Class of 2013
- Rochester, MN
If i get some more time in the next couple of weeks I'd love to try to do a more rigorous analysis of whether this effect really does exist. The 538 article's approach of putting games into "bins" is decent but still not as good as a game-by-game adjustment for expected vs. actual outcome.
This is actually a test for Underwood. We’ve been beaten soundly twice by Penn State. Seems as if he needs to go deep into the ideas well for this one. If I were a Penn State fan I would probably be a bit worried about beating a good team for the third time on pretty much their home turf. Personally I’m banking on Underwood’s planning and the three times win jinx. Go Illini
Big Jack
- Decatur
I love Harris and his hustle but he is not going to stop Pickett when he posts up he will get ate up and foul to much. He would vbe good pressing the ball up the court and guarding some one who camps out on the 3 PT line like Dredd.. Think you got to put Ty or CH on him.. I would do my best to stop him from getting the ball as much possible and not give him chances to score.make the others beat us.. But you will have to crash the boards
I'm sorry, I love Dainja, but BU can't start him or play him more than 15 mins vs PSU.
PSU starts 4 guards and a 6'10 PF who avgs 14 mpg. Pickett is gonna destroy the drop coverage.
Also, having Goode back in the flow for a month now is a huge x-factor compared to the previous matchups with PSU. Having another 6'7 guard to throw at Pickett is an asset.
I wouldn't mind seeing a starting lineup of:
Harris
Shannon
Goode
Mayer
Hawkins
With Rodgers, RJ 1st off the bench and inserting Dainja at moments in the game to see if he can take advantage of matchups and not be a liability defensively.
To close out the game I'd probably swap in Rodgers for Harris and play whoever is more effective between Goode and RJ.
PSU starts 4 guards and a 6'10 PF who avgs 14 mpg. Pickett is gonna destroy the drop coverage.
Also, having Goode back in the flow for a month now is a huge x-factor compared to the previous matchups with PSU. Having another 6'7 guard to throw at Pickett is an asset.
I wouldn't mind seeing a starting lineup of:
Harris
Shannon
Goode
Mayer
Hawkins
With Rodgers, RJ 1st off the bench and inserting Dainja at moments in the game to see if he can take advantage of matchups and not be a liability defensively.
To close out the game I'd probably swap in Rodgers for Harris and play whoever is more effective between Goode and RJ.
RichardKeenesCousin
Richard Keene's Cousin
Can anybody explain why Dain drops so far in the "drop coverage." He is almost at the front of the rim sometimes. He cant even contest a short jump shot.
Is he being coached this way? By his choice?
I could see if he had absolute lead feet and couldnt move at all but I refuse to believe he couldnt step out a bit further.
Is he being coached this way? By his choice?
I could see if he had absolute lead feet and couldnt move at all but I refuse to believe he couldnt step out a bit further.
LaTulip speculates in his weekly spot with Jeremy Werner that it's due to a lack of confidence right now.
Can't argue with that because back in January it seemed like he was active and dominating in drop coverage and he looks like a shell of that lately.
Bigtex
- DFW
Harris is great applying pressure (full court) but his man regularly scores in half court
Our desire to block shots or try to block shots gives up easy offensive rebounds.
Man/ball/basket - keep your man from beating you and requiring help from your teammates.
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Pickett is too strong for Harris. Harris would be in foul trouble and with our lack of depth at guard we need him badly on the offensive side of the ball.
CH is best bet to stop Pickett IMO. If he happens to get switched to another defender he has to be doubled on the post. Hope BU employs the press in spots throughout the first half to try to avoid a half court game and to bleed clock so Pickett doesn't have the time to back guys down. No excuse to lose to this team 3 times in a season.
Fighter of the Nightman
- Chicago, IL
I honestly think our OFFENSE getting off to a decent start will be extremely important to stopping Pickett, as well. It seems that way too often when an opposing player goes off on us, we are in a huge funk on offense, turn it over or throw up a brick quickly, have to rush back on defense again and seem to be discombobulated.
Ransom Stoddard
Ordained Dudeist Priest
- Bloomington, IL
Totally agree. We need to come out and play our game, not get sucked into their tempo. We've seen what this Illinois team is capable of when they stick to the game plan and follow the scout.
I agree that there are bad matchups. Without a doubt, that's a real thing. However, what team hasn't been a bad matchup for us, especially when it comes to guards getting into the lane and us being unable to contest the three point shot? In conference alone, Northwestern, Penn State, Purdue, Iowa, Ohio State, Michigan and Maryland have all had their guards go off on us. Every post game thread would have a "why do we always have a guy who has a career night against us" in it.
Again, with Pickett and Buie potentially lined up next....is playing Penn State, then potentially Northwestern a bad draw for us? What team in conference this year hasn't been a bad draw?
If that's where we're at with our level of concerning matchups, I can pretty much assure you that we're going to have a bad draw in the tournament.
All year we've been holding out hope that this team has a monster run in them. I've cosigned to that. In doing that, I'm not going to look at Penn State and say....oof, I'd rather have played Michigan or Indiana.
I think CoHawk and Ty are the only two players on our roster who have some semblance of a chance to limit Pickett though to be fair, Pickett torched both of them. From what we've seen CoHawk seems more adept at limiting Pickett from three (while getting burned from two) whereas Ty was more effective of making Pickett work and physically body him from two (while he didn't get the stops or offensive charge calls, the opportunity is possibly there with some timely well coached flops.) and is the better rebounder, while struggling hard to cover Pickett from 3. I think really pressing and faceguarding the ballcarier to try denying good passes and entries is probably our best bet outside of that. From a pride standpoint, I'd love to see CoHawk come out and treat Pickett like he did Malachi Smith of Chatttanooga in the tourney last year. Just no effs given a dominant angry focused force on defense. They're almost exactly the same size and have similar efficiency metrics and shooting percentages, so he has it in him, but he needs to find that mentality and level of play. Should be an interesting matchup for sure.
I'm scared
Harris cant really guard Pickett. He is to strong. Harris does his best work against smaller, fast guards.
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