General20
Basketball Maven
- Joined
- Aug 28, 2011
- Messages
- 1,740
- Like
- 11,769
Long Beach has the reputation of being a good mid-major, but I just dont see it. Seems to me like they are living off the reputation of last year's team.
Their strategy was to pack the lane tight with three and sometimes four guys (sometimes in a zone and sometimes in a man to man that played like a zone), preventing any scoring around the basket, and letting anyone not named Southerland shoot as much as they wanted from three. Its a strategy that makes sense if you look only at statistics. Its a strategy I hope other teams try. This game was proof that it wasn't a very good strategy - not that there was much Long Beach could have done to keep the game close, I simply think SU is a very good shooting team even if the numbers have not bared that out yet.
Syracuse took what the defense gave them (something I suspect will be a trademark of this team) was hot from three early, and put the game away early. In the second half Long Beach abandoned their "pack it in" strategy and actually played SU a lot closer.
Onto some player notes. This was the kind of game where points came fast and fluid and as a fan its fun to speculate about just how high up the mountain this team can climb. So my analysis will be tinged with that kind of thinking.
Carter-Williams - Same old - with the exception that he knocked down a few threes. Really this is huge because with the way he dominates driving the lane, and with his height, he will never be covered from three, even against the best competition - any team that plays up on him is crazy and will get destroyed by penetration. If he can master hitting the three from the top of the arc by the end of the season Carter-Williams will be pretty much unarguable. People point out the turnovers, but I dont think the turnovers he is making are egregious. Almost literally all the offense goes through him when he is on the court, even for a point guard that is unusual. In this game for instance, Carter-Williams took 16 shots and still had 10 assists. With that kind of burden on his shoulders, four turnovers seems a pretty small to me.
Triche - This game was really more about the young players than the veterans but I thought Triche looked good playing point when Caeter-Williams sat. He racked up five assists in that time, the best of which was a lightning quick recognition that a small guard was down low with Keita, and a smooth entry pass to him.
Fair - Broke out of his slump with a very quiet 16 points and 13 rebounds in only 21 minutes. Remember, 20 minutes is half of a game. That means Fair was on a 32 point 26 rebound pace! And I hardly noticed him out there. That is what happens when Fair is at his best. He can be some kind of super role/garbage player eating up rebounds, scoring around the basket and in mind-range.
Coleman - Long Beach's leading scorer was their big man Dan Jennings who is a transfer from West Virginia. Jennings might be mediocre by Big East standards, but he is probably the first Big East quality big man SU has seen this year. He absolutely dominated Coleman. Most of his twenty points came with Coleman guarding him, and he got them far too easy. It got so bad that Boeheim relegated Coleman to the wing of the zone (a position he cannot defend) in favor of Christmas and Keita. There are many advantages to playing zone over man, but one of the disadvantages is that in man you can hide a poor defender, but in zone if you have one poor defender the whole thing falls apart. Tonight showed that Coleman is nowhere near ready for top competition. Unless he makes huge strides between now and January, he's not going to play much, which is too bad, because I continue to really like his game offensively. He has the ability to get a lot of opposing centers into foul trouble - and actually hit the free throws.
Christmas - Looked good today, and shined on defense where Coleman and Keita both struggled. If Coleman is as far away as I think he is from being ready, the season may hinge on Christmas turning into a big time center. I like Keita a lot as a back up, but championship caliber teams dont start guys like him. Ideally, I want to see Christmas and Coleman eat up the vast majority of the center minutes because their upside is so vastly greater than Keita's is, but I can live with Christmas getting the majority of the minutes and Keita as his back up if that is what it comes to. I dont like to judge players or teams over individual games. I think its more accurate to judge across lengths of games looked at as a whole. We are in one of those lengths of games now, and it culminates with Syracuse's game against Temple. By the time Syracuse plays Temple (who has a 6'6 "power" forward) I'd like to see Christmas ready and able to dominate smaller weaker defenders on offense. I will hold back any major judgments about him until then.
Grant - Syracuse hasn't seen a player as long and athletic as Grant since Hakeem Warrick graduated. He is an absolute physical presence when he is out there, on both ends of the court. My gut still says he doesn't play much when it counts, but if Coleman falls out of the rotation and Christmas starts playing almost exclusively at center (which I hope doesn't happen but is a possibility) there will be available minutes at forward. We can do worse than fill those minutes with Grant who is ready to contribute now athletically, and seems to be learning rapidly.
Cooney - At the beginning of the season I predicted that people would fall in love with him early in the season and be disappointed late in the season when he's not getting much playing time. I have to admit that I am falling into this trap. Cooney is better than I expected defensively, and seems to handle the press better than I expected. His release on his jumpshot is lightning quick, and you have to think that with the players he is going to be surrounded by, open looks will be available all year long - for this reason alone I like seeing Cooney on the floor. I did notice that his shot looked good everywhere but on the baseline - still too early to judge on that front, but I'm going to keep my eye on it.
Southerland - Interestingly, both teams that played SU since Southerland's 35 point outburst have made him the focal point of their defense. I really dont think this is sound strategy because it opens things up for other players too much (defenses are built to overextend on guards but when they do it with forwards rotations start getting messed up). And even with Long Beach overplaying Southerland he was two threes that were half way down from scoring 8 points in 16 minutes. At this point I'm wondering if major conference teams will feel the need to deny Southerland and sometimes even double him beyond the three point line like these mid-majors have. It wont be good for Southerland's stat line but it will be great for Fair, Christmas and the rest.
Keita - Is the definition of consistency, which is a great thing with the young big guys he has around him. Jennings - the Long Beach big guy - was able to bully him and I suspect several Big East teams will have bigs that can do the same. Keita works best when used in short spurts of high energy, or in ultra high tempo games.
Their strategy was to pack the lane tight with three and sometimes four guys (sometimes in a zone and sometimes in a man to man that played like a zone), preventing any scoring around the basket, and letting anyone not named Southerland shoot as much as they wanted from three. Its a strategy that makes sense if you look only at statistics. Its a strategy I hope other teams try. This game was proof that it wasn't a very good strategy - not that there was much Long Beach could have done to keep the game close, I simply think SU is a very good shooting team even if the numbers have not bared that out yet.
Syracuse took what the defense gave them (something I suspect will be a trademark of this team) was hot from three early, and put the game away early. In the second half Long Beach abandoned their "pack it in" strategy and actually played SU a lot closer.
Onto some player notes. This was the kind of game where points came fast and fluid and as a fan its fun to speculate about just how high up the mountain this team can climb. So my analysis will be tinged with that kind of thinking.
Carter-Williams - Same old - with the exception that he knocked down a few threes. Really this is huge because with the way he dominates driving the lane, and with his height, he will never be covered from three, even against the best competition - any team that plays up on him is crazy and will get destroyed by penetration. If he can master hitting the three from the top of the arc by the end of the season Carter-Williams will be pretty much unarguable. People point out the turnovers, but I dont think the turnovers he is making are egregious. Almost literally all the offense goes through him when he is on the court, even for a point guard that is unusual. In this game for instance, Carter-Williams took 16 shots and still had 10 assists. With that kind of burden on his shoulders, four turnovers seems a pretty small to me.
Triche - This game was really more about the young players than the veterans but I thought Triche looked good playing point when Caeter-Williams sat. He racked up five assists in that time, the best of which was a lightning quick recognition that a small guard was down low with Keita, and a smooth entry pass to him.
Fair - Broke out of his slump with a very quiet 16 points and 13 rebounds in only 21 minutes. Remember, 20 minutes is half of a game. That means Fair was on a 32 point 26 rebound pace! And I hardly noticed him out there. That is what happens when Fair is at his best. He can be some kind of super role/garbage player eating up rebounds, scoring around the basket and in mind-range.
Coleman - Long Beach's leading scorer was their big man Dan Jennings who is a transfer from West Virginia. Jennings might be mediocre by Big East standards, but he is probably the first Big East quality big man SU has seen this year. He absolutely dominated Coleman. Most of his twenty points came with Coleman guarding him, and he got them far too easy. It got so bad that Boeheim relegated Coleman to the wing of the zone (a position he cannot defend) in favor of Christmas and Keita. There are many advantages to playing zone over man, but one of the disadvantages is that in man you can hide a poor defender, but in zone if you have one poor defender the whole thing falls apart. Tonight showed that Coleman is nowhere near ready for top competition. Unless he makes huge strides between now and January, he's not going to play much, which is too bad, because I continue to really like his game offensively. He has the ability to get a lot of opposing centers into foul trouble - and actually hit the free throws.
Christmas - Looked good today, and shined on defense where Coleman and Keita both struggled. If Coleman is as far away as I think he is from being ready, the season may hinge on Christmas turning into a big time center. I like Keita a lot as a back up, but championship caliber teams dont start guys like him. Ideally, I want to see Christmas and Coleman eat up the vast majority of the center minutes because their upside is so vastly greater than Keita's is, but I can live with Christmas getting the majority of the minutes and Keita as his back up if that is what it comes to. I dont like to judge players or teams over individual games. I think its more accurate to judge across lengths of games looked at as a whole. We are in one of those lengths of games now, and it culminates with Syracuse's game against Temple. By the time Syracuse plays Temple (who has a 6'6 "power" forward) I'd like to see Christmas ready and able to dominate smaller weaker defenders on offense. I will hold back any major judgments about him until then.
Grant - Syracuse hasn't seen a player as long and athletic as Grant since Hakeem Warrick graduated. He is an absolute physical presence when he is out there, on both ends of the court. My gut still says he doesn't play much when it counts, but if Coleman falls out of the rotation and Christmas starts playing almost exclusively at center (which I hope doesn't happen but is a possibility) there will be available minutes at forward. We can do worse than fill those minutes with Grant who is ready to contribute now athletically, and seems to be learning rapidly.
Cooney - At the beginning of the season I predicted that people would fall in love with him early in the season and be disappointed late in the season when he's not getting much playing time. I have to admit that I am falling into this trap. Cooney is better than I expected defensively, and seems to handle the press better than I expected. His release on his jumpshot is lightning quick, and you have to think that with the players he is going to be surrounded by, open looks will be available all year long - for this reason alone I like seeing Cooney on the floor. I did notice that his shot looked good everywhere but on the baseline - still too early to judge on that front, but I'm going to keep my eye on it.
Southerland - Interestingly, both teams that played SU since Southerland's 35 point outburst have made him the focal point of their defense. I really dont think this is sound strategy because it opens things up for other players too much (defenses are built to overextend on guards but when they do it with forwards rotations start getting messed up). And even with Long Beach overplaying Southerland he was two threes that were half way down from scoring 8 points in 16 minutes. At this point I'm wondering if major conference teams will feel the need to deny Southerland and sometimes even double him beyond the three point line like these mid-majors have. It wont be good for Southerland's stat line but it will be great for Fair, Christmas and the rest.
Keita - Is the definition of consistency, which is a great thing with the young big guys he has around him. Jennings - the Long Beach big guy - was able to bully him and I suspect several Big East teams will have bigs that can do the same. Keita works best when used in short spurts of high energy, or in ultra high tempo games.
