Random Hofstra Thoughts

[Niastri]

I really needed a day to shake this one off.

Hofstra is such a high profile school that Autocorrect wants to change it to anything else whenever I try to type it into my phone.

In the first 7 minutes of the game, JJ Starling was great. He was 5 of 6 with two made 3pt shots and 12 points. At 12:41 in the first half, he missed a 3 and Red pulled him. After Starling's very hot start (5-7, 2-3 on 3pt shots) Red gave him 5 minutes on the bench to cool off. Starling ended the game 6-15, only attempting one more 3. Starling played 19 minutes in the second half. But he had lost that "can't miss" moment in the game he was having to start. It became obvious that whatever Hofstra was trying to do to guard Starling wasn't working... I don't think Hofstra ever really stopped Starling, though he did get blocked a few times getting to the rim.

I'm watching replays to see how it is that we let Hofstra shoot 12-18 from 3pt range after being one of the best in the country covering the 3 pt line up till now this season. Even after the surge we gave to Hofstra, we are ranked 53rd in 3 pointers allowed per game, but have dropped to 169th in percentage allowed, at .325 per game. After holding Tennessee to 4-13 from 3, a very low number of attempts and a solid .308 percentage, and St. Joseph's a 5-26, a stellar .192 defensive 3pt%, we get destroyed by Hofstra in this defensive category and that was the game right there.
I don't really see anything systemic that would have changed our effectiveness at defending 3 pointers. Rewatching the condensed game (who has the heart to watch the whole game again? Not this fan.) I am seeing a lot of half hearted challenges from guys who normally play good defense.

George was a major culprit, which might be part of why he only played 22 minutes. He had three 3s shot right over him where he never got his hand above the shooter's waist. A couple others came on switches when Kyle and White were on perimeter players and sagged back too far to give up open 3s for fear of giving up dribble penetration. I am not sure if that is scheme related, but our early season defense seemed entirely focused on not giving up 3pt shots. In this game, some of the threes were good offense, but far more were bad defense. And Starling wasn't really the culprit for once. He did give up a few baskets, but was challenging well and seemed in position. Hofstra did a good job getting decent shots, but they weren't wide open. A couple nice transition passes to get open threes you can accept, but poor challenges aren't acceptable, especially over and over.

George was just bad against Hofstra. I hope he really is sick and not having a collapse of his effectiveness. Statistically he came away with 6 assists and a couple of steals with no turnovers, but watching the game, it felt like he wasn't a positive factor. I was very excited to get George as a true point guard this off season, and he was terrific against the early cupcake schedule before getting exposed a bit against Houston. He held his own, but wasn't amazing vs. Kansas, and was overrun by Iowa State. We beat Tennessee in spite of him. We need more from George going forward.

Free throw shooting. No comment. 8-2 looks a lot better as a record than 6-4, and we would be ranked if we could make free throws at even a bad rate. Our .568 rate is tied for last (365th) in the NCAA. We are 131st in free throw attempts, in spite of missing a number of front end of one and ones each game. If we were 300th, shooting .670 instead of .568, we would have 23 additional points on the board this season. We also would have beaten Houston and Hofstra. Instead we're out on the wrong side of the bubble. (Ok, I guess that's a comment)

At 4:34 of the second half, we were down 57-67. Over the next 3+ minutes, we went on an 11-0 run to take the lead 68-67 at 56 seconds remaining. On two Kyle free throws, of all things.

After we gave up another three to lose the lead (to a guy shooting 43% on the season), our next offensive possession was a Sadiq White high post at the top of the key with 24 seconds left. White and Anthony were the only Orange that touched the ball that possession. Betsey and Starling were standing outside the arc waiting for a pass, and Kyle was deep in the paint in a high low. Not the play I would have called, but White got to the line, hitting one of two.

We foul a couple times (still way under the bonus) and actually force a turnover at 15 seconds left. Red ends the game with Kingz and George on the bench. Betsey, Anthony, Starling, Kyle and White are out there, when one basket wins the game. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Carmelo Anthony was sitting behind the bench, and got more TV time than Red did in this game... Kingz is a 112.7 ORtg player this season, Kiyan Anthony is a 98.5 ORtg player this season. Kingz played 34 minutes, and unlike George, seemed in good health and effective. Why have Anthony out there instead of Kingz?

Anthony inbounds the ball to Kyle, who is only being guarded by his own offensive limitations. The defensive player guarding Kyle is at least two dribbles away from Kyle, and Kyle could probably take him off the dribble if he tries, or at least draw defenders. Instead, Kyle holds it for 6 seconds as both Anthony and Starling were ineffective at beating their face guard ball denial defenders. It is hard to overstate how long those 6 seconds feel when you are watching the video.

During the time out, Red must have painted little circles on the court at the top of the key and the far corner, and instructed White and Betsey to leave their circles only if zombies attacked.

Neither even take a step towards the play while Kyle was desperately looking for somebody to give the ball to. It is clear this is a three person end of the game play and they were merely there for "spacing." Eventually, Anthony gets the ball at the top left of the key in what looked like a broken play from the moment of inbound. Kyle sets a screen and Anthony makes a nice play to get into the lane where he is clearly fouled. He should have been going to the line with 3.5 seconds to go, shooting two for the lead or at least a tie.

I don't know what play was supposed to be run, but I can't figure out why Starling didn't get the inbound. I can't figure out why Starling didn't go get the ball. I can't figure out why Kyle never even looked at the other two players on his team, and why those two guys didn't move even an inch from their metaphorical circles on the court.

The last two plays of the game offensively made no sense to me. We made a great comeback to take the lead and just couldn't finish because we couldn't get a basket.

A very disappointing loss, in a few ways. Hofstra is a decent team, but one that lost to UCF, Iona, Temple and Columbia this season. We were double digit favorites going into the game. We had a chance to win with under a minute to go, and couldn't pull it out.

I'm still shaking this one off, because it doesn't make sense.

 

[Oakland]

Niastri, I think you maybe missed the key to the game; Cruz Davis, who was the best player on the court. Red knew he had just scored 36 against Pitt and Red decided to continuous double team Davis up top after he often beat the base defense early. This left open guys hanging around the 3pt line and they made those shots at a high rate.

 

[rocklloyd]

Zombie comment is instant classic

 

[phsyra]

We are going to lose more close games to bad teams this year...this is a symptom of teams who dont do the little things right...missed free throws keep bad teams in games...it will be a long painful season...should have moved on from Red last year obviously

 

[Niastri]

Niastri, I think you maybe missed the key to the game; Cruz Davis, who was the best player on the court. Red knew he had just scored 36 against Pitt and Red decided to continuous double team Davis up top after he often beat the base defense early. This left open guys hanging around the 3pt line and they made those shots at a high rate.

This is a good point. Davis is a very good player, averaging 20.8 points, 5.3 assists and 3.3 rebounds at 6'3 175 lbs. I think George being ineffective on defense in this game hurt the team defense a lot. George was very good defensively earlier this season. But we shouldn't be getting smoked by a guard from Hofstra, unless he scores an inefficient 20 in a 20 point loss.

Which is kind of what I would have expected him to do.

But if you take away his 8-14 and 2-2 from 3, the Hofstra team still shot 10-16 from 3pt range. Without going back to watch, I am guessing Davis was assisting on a lot of those Hofstra 3s that Syracuse poorly defended.

In the end though, looking at all the stats of the game, and the game flow, the one really big aberration was Hofstra hitting such a high rate of 3s. Syracuse up to this point was really good defending the 3 ball. Hofstra is good 3pt shooting team, 56th in the country (boosted by their great showing against Syracuse, of course) but nobody ever expects to hit .666 on high volume.

 

[DCUNITED13]

I believe this game demonstrates how much we have missed Donnie Freeman in the lineup. We have no consistent scoring threat on the inside and looking at this game we do not feed the ball to the post as a set play. Difference between mid-majors and P4 is that generally guard play may be even but Big Men at P4 level have more skills on offence. We do not have that in White and Kyle. (I like them both by the way).

We had to drop down as Kyle was not able to get the interior shut down. White was taken away from the post requiring a drop down from one of our 3 guards leaving 3 point shooters open or limited pressure. This was an extreme game where matchups really hurt us.

We can say all we want about making FT, but being a fan from 80s on, FT will not get better this season. I think we should shoot for 365th place in FT and win 22 games.

Again, we are missing a big piece of our lineup in Donnie. Maybe he is not a shut down defender, but having at 6'10" Power Forward assisting the center and having White instead of Anthony guarding someone on the outside is a huge difference. We will continue to have problems stopping teams on defense until Freeman is back 3-4 games. I do hope we get him back next week.

Another concern I have is that outside of our JJ, Nate & Nate, we do not have players that played major minutes last year. (including William Kyle). We may see a drop in performance as these players hit a wall due to extensive playing time. It take a while to get used to the full season routine and many time we saw drop in performance come late January/early February.

Lets get back to full strength by Clemson and see what happens. I would love to get to the NCSt. game with a nice winning streak.

GO CUSE

 

[Blanko97]

This is a good point. Davis is a very good player, averaging 20.8 points, 5.3 assists and 3.3 rebounds at 6'3 175 lbs. I think George being ineffective on defense in this game hurt the team defense a lot. George was very good defensively earlier this season. But we shouldn't be getting smoked by a guard from Hofstra, unless he scores an inefficient 20 in a 20 point loss.

Which is kind of what I would have expected him to do.

But if you take away his 8-14 and 2-2 from 3, the Hofstra team still shot 10-16 from 3pt range. Without going back to watch, I am guessing Davis was assisting on a lot of those Hofstra 3s that Syracuse poorly defended.

In the end though, looking at all the stats of the game, and the game flow, the one really big aberration was Hofstra hitting such a high rate of 3s. Syracuse up to this point was really good defending the 3 ball. Hofstra is good 3pt shooting team, 56th in the country (boosted by their great showing against Syracuse, of course) but nobody ever expects to hit .666 on high volume.

Good players hit wide open shots and we gave them a ton of those.

Syracuse is seems to be the king of being unable to hit shots when no one is within 5 feet

 

[upperdeck]

You really think JJ wants to have to shoot FTs in a clutch spot?

 

[RedtheGOB]

This is a good point. Davis is a very good player, averaging 20.8 points, 5.3 assists and 3.3 rebounds at 6'3 175 lbs. I think George being ineffective on defense in this game hurt the team defense a lot. George was very good defensively earlier this season. But we shouldn't be getting smoked by a guard from Hofstra, unless he scores an inefficient 20 in a 20 point loss.

Which is kind of what I would have expected him to do.

But if you take away his 8-14 and 2-2 from 3, the Hofstra team still shot 10-16 from 3pt range. Without going back to watch, I am guessing Davis was assisting on a lot of those Hofstra 3s that Syracuse poorly defended.

In the end though, looking at all the stats of the game, and the game flow, the one really big aberration was Hofstra hitting such a high rate of 3s. Syracuse up to this point was really good defending the 3 ball. Hofstra is good 3pt shooting team, 56th in the country (boosted by their great showing against Syracuse, of course) but nobody ever expects to hit .666 on high volume.

The 3's raining down on us and teams having career shooting nights was a concern for me starting this year.

I thought Autry had nipped at least that one issue from the last many SU seasons even going back to the old man and was giving him major props as recently as St Joes.

You could really see the lacking mental toughness play out in real time on the court though Saturday. Kyle seems to be the only guy that has the killer instinct.

All we can hope is that the Staff and team can find it, but not optimistic. Like what's being said it will be a very up and down year and that's just not good enough

 

[Niastri]

Good players hit wide open shots and we gave them a ton of those.

Syracuse is seems to be the king of being unable to hit shots when no one is within 5 feet

Regarding the bolded: Yes. We did. I was trying to get the bottom of why... Clearly it was bad defense some of the time, and good offense others. George personally gave up 3 wide open threes he would normally have challenge way better. I went over it in my original post.

Syracuse actually shot about average for NCAA shooters, and better than we have for most of the season. We just gave up more points than we expect from 3. If Hofstra only shoots 50%, we win by 8.

 

[Nicknack]

I really needed a day to shake this one off.

Hofstra is such a high profile school that Autocorrect wants to change it to anything else whenever I try to type it into my phone.

In the first 7 minutes of the game, JJ Starling was great. He was 5 of 6 with two made 3pt shots and 12 points. At 12:41 in the first half, he missed a 3 and Red pulled him. After Starling's very hot start (5-7, 2-3 on 3pt shots) Red gave him 5 minutes on the bench to cool off. Starling ended the game 6-15, only attempting one more 3. Starling played 19 minutes in the second half. But he had lost that "can't miss" moment in the game he was having to start. It became obvious that whatever Hofstra was trying to do to guard Starling wasn't working... I don't think Hofstra ever really stopped Starling, though he did get blocked a few times getting to the rim.

I'm watching replays to see how it is that we let Hofstra shoot 12-18 from 3pt range after being one of the best in the country covering the 3 pt line up till now this season. Even after the surge we gave to Hofstra, we are ranked 53rd in 3 pointers allowed per game, but have dropped to 169th in percentage allowed, at .325 per game. After holding Tennessee to 4-13 from 3, a very low number of attempts and a solid .308 percentage, and St. Joseph's a 5-26, a stellar .192 defensive 3pt%, we get destroyed by Hofstra in this defensive category and that was the game right there.
I don't really see anything systemic that would have changed our effectiveness at defending 3 pointers. Rewatching the condensed game (who has the heart to watch the whole game again? Not this fan.) I am seeing a lot of half hearted challenges from guys who normally play good defense.

George was a major culprit, which might be part of why he only played 22 minutes. He had three 3s shot right over him where he never got his hand above the shooter's waist. A couple others came on switches when Kyle and White were on perimeter players and sagged back too far to give up open 3s for fear of giving up dribble penetration. I am not sure if that is scheme related, but our early season defense seemed entirely focused on not giving up 3pt shots. In this game, some of the threes were good offense, but far more were bad defense. And Starling wasn't really the culprit for once. He did give up a few baskets, but was challenging well and seemed in position. Hofstra did a good job getting decent shots, but they weren't wide open. A couple nice transition passes to get open threes you can accept, but poor challenges aren't acceptable, especially over and over.

George was just bad against Hofstra. I hope he really is sick and not having a collapse of his effectiveness. Statistically he came away with 6 assists and a couple of steals with no turnovers, but watching the game, it felt like he wasn't a positive factor. I was very excited to get George as a true point guard this off season, and he was terrific against the early cupcake schedule before getting exposed a bit against Houston. He held his own, but wasn't amazing vs. Kansas, and was overrun by Iowa State. We beat Tennessee in spite of him. We need more from George going forward.

Free throw shooting. No comment. 8-2 looks a lot better as a record than 6-4, and we would be ranked if we could make free throws at even a bad rate. Our .568 rate is tied for last (365th) in the NCAA. We are 131st in free throw attempts, in spite of missing a number of front end of one and ones each game. If we were 300th, shooting .670 instead of .568, we would have 23 additional points on the board this season. We also would have beaten Houston and Hofstra. Instead we're out on the wrong side of the bubble. (Ok, I guess that's a comment)

At 4:34 of the second half, we were down 57-67. Over the next 3+ minutes, we went on an 11-0 run to take the lead 68-67 at 56 seconds remaining. On two Kyle free throws, of all things.

After we gave up another three to lose the lead (to a guy shooting 43% on the season), our next offensive possession was a Sadiq White high post at the top of the key with 24 seconds left. White and Anthony were the only Orange that touched the ball that possession. Betsey and Starling were standing outside the arc waiting for a pass, and Kyle was deep in the paint in a high low. Not the play I would have called, but White got to the line, hitting one of two.

We foul a couple times (still way under the bonus) and actually force a turnover at 15 seconds left. Red ends the game with Kingz and George on the bench. Betsey, Anthony, Starling, Kyle and White are out there, when one basket wins the game. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Carmelo Anthony was sitting behind the bench, and got more TV time than Red did in this game... Kingz is a 112.7 ORtg player this season, Kiyan Anthony is a 98.5 ORtg player this season. Kingz played 34 minutes, and unlike George, seemed in good health and effective. Why have Anthony out there instead of Kingz?

Anthony inbounds the ball to Kyle, who is only being guarded by his own offensive limitations. The defensive player guarding Kyle is at least two dribbles away from Kyle, and Kyle could probably take him off the dribble if he tries, or at least draw defenders. Instead, Kyle holds it for 6 seconds as both Anthony and Starling were ineffective at beating their face guard ball denial defenders. It is hard to overstate how long those 6 seconds feel when you are watching the video.

During the time out, Red must have painted little circles on the court at the top of the key and the far corner, and instructed White and Betsey to leave their circles only if zombies attacked.

Neither even take a step towards the play while Kyle was desperately looking for somebody to give the ball to. It is clear this is a three person end of the game play and they were merely there for "spacing." Eventually, Anthony gets the ball at the top left of the key in what looked like a broken play from the moment of inbound. Kyle sets a screen and Anthony makes a nice play to get into the lane where he is clearly fouled. He should have been going to the line with 3.5 seconds to go, shooting two for the lead or at least a tie.

I don't know what play was supposed to be run, but I can't figure out why Starling didn't get the inbound. I can't figure out why Starling didn't go get the ball. I can't figure out why Kyle never even looked at the other two players on his team, and why those two guys didn't move even an inch from their metaphorical circles on the court.

The last two plays of the game offensively made no sense to me. We made a great comeback to take the lead and just couldn't finish because we couldn't get a basket.

A very disappointing loss, in a few ways. Hofstra is a decent team, but one that lost to UCF, Iona, Temple and Columbia this season. We were double digit favorites going into the game. We had a chance to win with under a minute to go, and couldn't pull it out.

I'm still shaking this one off, because it doesn't make sense.

Nice recap.

Was I the only one who was concerned when JJ was scoring most of the team's points in the first half? While it's great to see one of our guy's go off like that but what happens often is that it takes others out of the offense and the guy cools off and comes back to earth.

 

[kuethstheman]

One reason for Hofstra's 3-point percentage was our inability to cover the PnR. Kyle kept leaving the guard open at the 3-point line to sag back to the middle even though the picked defender hadn't recovered. Poor communications between Kyle and the other guys, or just poor decision making.

 

[MikeSU02]

Nice recap.

Was I the only one who was concerned when JJ was scoring most of the team's points in the first half? While it's great to see one of our guy's go off like that but what happens often is that it takes others out of the offense and the guy cools off and comes back to earth.

I was concerned. I've been pretty hard on JJ. I think there should always be some allowance to let a guy do a heat check / contested shot or two if they are on a heater like how JJ started. That's normal I would say.

But he seems like he has Kobe's old adage in his head, "I would go 0-30 before I would go 0-9. 0-9 means you beat yourself, you psyched yourself out of the game"

And up until two games ago, JJ was keeping his shots down (albeit the first game was due to injury).

We need JJ. Just need JJ to have awareness if he starts missing to help us in other spots when he is on the floor.