NC State Postgame Thoughts 2

[TheCusian]

Really good analysis here. Agree. I also think it's where the value of sometimes simply moving the ball is underrated. When Mintz gets that tunnel vision a bit and starts probing for a lane to the hoop, it bails teams out a bit. Sometimes simply moving the ball and moving off the ball can open things up even if you have a guy who really excels getting into the lane.

Yes. This is a different argument. Is the staff utilizing the best skills of the players in combination? Judah and to a lesser degree Starling and Q can get into the lane at will - which is a desirable skill. How is the rest of the team moving to take advantage of that? Can moving the ball get Judah moving towards the hoop off of screens and take his level of difficulty down a couple of notches?

the best coaches take the elite skills of their players and find combinations that make them greater than the sum of their parts. Red has done that at times, but it’s not been sustainable. Some of that is on young players and some of that is on a 1st year HC. Both will get better, IMO.

 

[billsin01]

Yes. This is a different argument. Is the staff utilizing the best skills of the players in combination? Judah and to a lesser degree Starling and Q can get into the lane at will - which is a desirable skill. How is the rest of the team moving to take advantage of that? Can moving the ball get Judah moving towards the hoop off of screens and take his level of difficulty down a couple of notches?

the best coaches take the elite skills of their players and find combinations that make them greater than the sum of their parts. Red has done that at times, but it’s not been sustainable. Some of that is on young players and some of that is on a 1st year HC. Both will get better, IMO.

Agree with all of this and I'll admit -- I didn't read through the whole thread. A little late to comment on the NC State game due to other stuff. So, regardless, I agree. I think that will be the key next year as well if Q returns and is maybe the focal point of the offense to some degree. Trying to attack from the top of the key off a high ball screen 90% of the time won't work for him either. Have to find other ways and other spots to get him a step here or a step there and make the defense move and work and communicate. Definitely an area Red needs to work on (though i agree, he's done some nice things too so not trying to crush him).

While I'm at it, couple other thoughts from Tuesday (if anyone cares anymore):

• Thought Taylor played tough. Offense is still a total zero from him, sadly, but he moved well on defense, battled against NC State's second big, but moved his feet well against Horne. He got a pull-up three on Taylor, but it wasn't bad defense. Maybe a touch too much room, but the kid battled. Nice hustle on the play where Q missed the layup (or got blocked, I forget) to clean up the offensive rebound. Been a tough year but seems like a kid who works hard.
  
  
• As I mentioned earlier, though Judah was masterful in his 10 first-half minutes. His play was the key to opening Bell up for at least three of those threes. Huge layup/take late in the game, should have probably gotten at least a couple more calls, hit two huge free throws and grabbed a key board with a nice box out at the end. Kid takes a crazy amount of criticism here. Much of it is valid, but it's like people here are taking the anger they had stored up for JB and have unleashed it on this kid. He overdribbles, the defensive effort has been maddeningly inconsistent, his shooting has gone backwards. But he's not exactly surrounded by talent and this offense and defensive approach could use a few tweaks. It's easy to point to the best player having a tough night and blame him for everything but there's a lot that needs to be cleaned up that judah has little or nothing to do with.
  
  
• Bell was incredible, obviously. Loved to see him hit that screen off the pin down in the first half. Thought he did a nice job of getting back after his makes too (sometimes a weakness for him). Played decent defensively. Really nice game for him. One nit I'll pick, however, is just the way he moves without the ball. Draymond was right -- we needed more shots for him in the second half and that is on Red and the staff. But there were a couple plays where we had turnovers in part because copeland was a little out of control and we made a bad pass, and also in part because bell doesn't read plays terribly well and move. Copeland drew help from Bell's man and thought he was going to leak to the corner. Bell didn't and copeland threw it out of bounds. There was another that looked like a pass just sailing into the crowd, but I think (JJ, don't totally remember) thought Bell was going to float up to the wing. He just doesn't do that stuff very well. Something to work on.
  
  
• We played the high ball screen well again. That's something we've seen recently even as we've had uneven or sometimes downright brutal defensive performances. Good for Red working on it and good for Brown, who struggled a bit at times early in the season with it, but has really improved in that area.
  
  
• There are some rumors and discussion of this team and their attitude. I don't really know much about it but thought that was a pretty quality win for a team that is really thin. Congrats to the kids for battling. We'll take it.