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Message: [QUOTE="RF2044, post: 849483, member: 40"] You are comparing two wildly divergent data points. I'm not sure that referencing the late 80s proves your point--at all. That was arguably the golden era of our program's peak from a talent standpoint, in an era where the game was played differently. If that is your baseline, then it isn't a persuasive argument. It demonstrates that you are focused upon the wrong unit of analysis. You mean Wisconsin, the ultimate slow down team? Do you really need me to go through the process of explaining why there were fewer possessions and consequently less fast break opportunities when playing against Wisconsin, who utilizes every second of the shot clock? The fact of the matter is that Wisconsin that year was also statistically one of the top defensive teams in the country. And we carved them up with a great game plan that emphasized guard penetration against their strong half-court m-2-m defense. But again, you are cherry picking data. This was an NCAA single elimination game to advance to the elite 8. You don't just take the hardest game or two of the year and hold up that data as extrapolatable for the entire season, while ignoring the entire rest of the year's data. Frankly, I'm at a loss to understand how anyone could look at that year and claim that we didn't have an exceptional transition game. We had zero low post offense. Nada. Zip. Zilch. And we weren't that strong of an outside shooting team [relatively speaking--a bunch of solid guys statistically, but no superior three point shooter]. All year long, we compensated for those limitations by forcing turnovers and getting easy scoring opportunities in transition that offset our relatively pedestrian half court offensive capabilities. Sherman Douglas is my all-time favorite SU player. Bar none. I don't ever think we'll see another offense that is that high powered, in large part because we don't have the rebounding we did back then. Seikaly, Coleman, and Owens--incredible rebounders, amongst the best in program history--who keyed the fast break. You need to get stops and get the ball back to run. Another key factor is that we play zone exclusively now, which wasn't the case prior to 1996. It is much tougher to secure defensive rebounds out of zone than it is m-2-m. Sure, we played SOME zone back then, but it was more like 33% of the time--maybe even less--and much more situational. But those teams utilized primarily man, and our current teams are entirely zone. The rebounding differential speaks for itself. [/QUOTE]

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