General20
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The short version of what you need to know about Virginia Tech is, they are the best three point shooting team in the ACC, they are a tall team that plays small, they play a basic man to man defense, and they lack elite athleticism. If you want a more detailed description of how they play, check out my Pre-Virginia Tech Thoughts where I think did a passable job of breaking down their personnel and strategy.
How Virginia Tech guarded Syracuse:
Virginia Tech stayed with their base man to man defense for most of the game, but switched to a 2-3 zone every time Cooney went out (which was only for 5 or 6 non-garbage time minutes). As Boeheim has always said, the problem with playing both 2-3 and man to man, is that you don't have enough practice time to perfect both, so neither is as good as it can be. He has chosen, instead, to only play zone, and put all his resources into it, thus making it as good as possible. If Virginia Tech did the same, I actually think they'd be an above average zone team. They have a lot of size (their starting line up is 6'5,6'4,6'7,6'8,6'10) and the zone would help mask their lack of athleticism.
Their coach uses zone as more of a gimmick, so even though they have the physical tools to succeed at it, they were not nearly practiced enough to make it work. The first time they tried to zone, Ennis drove right down the middle for an open lay up, which lead the announcers to mention that “the reason you play zone is to stop that from happening.”
Gbinije was also able to hit a three against it, and that was all the offense Syracuse needed against the five minutes of zone or so that they saw.
Virginia Tech's man to man defense (which they played the majority of the time) was nothing to fear. They just don't have the athletes to play great defense. Syracuse looked comfortable, and had little trouble, getting into the positions they wanted to offensively. The stats back this up. Syracuse shoots an average of 46.7% for the year, and they shot 46.7% in this game. Evidence that they were doing exactly what they wanted to do and are comfortable doing.
Virginia Teach's strategy was to back off Grant and Ennis, giving them open shots in order to stop them from getting to the basket. Now, when I say they backed off Grant and Ennis, I mean they backed WAY off. They had as much time as they wanted to set their feet, square up, and get a clean look. I admit that neither Grant nor Ennis are great shooters, but giving them that much space seemed excessive to me. Neither are so bad that you can just let them shoot like its practice. Ennis responded quite well going 3-6 from three, and Grant shot just a little worse, going 2-5 from his mid range shots.
Hitting these shots helped open things up a little going down the stretch, and I thought Syracuse took advantage of the confusion with excellent ball movement. Guys were moving exceptionally well without the ball and making some great cuts to the basket. I have always said that the more comfortable you are against a defense the better you move the ball, so my guess is the good passing was more a product of Syracuse feeling comfortable exploiting Virginia Tech's poor defense, than it is a sign that our passing has improved overall.
How Syracuse guarded Virginia Tech:
Putting together a Virginia Tech preview was fun because they have compiled some of the weirdest stats I have ever seen (how many teams can shoot 43% from three for the year, while holding their opposition to 38% shooting from two, and still manage losses to UNC Upstate and UNC Greensboro?). The reason they complied these weird stats is because they are a weird team, and Syracuse had to play a weird zone to stop them. Maybe the weirdest zone I have ever seen.
Syracuse prefers to keep their defenders within twenty feet of the basket if they can get away with it. Against hot shooters with some range they will extend out to twenty-five feet.
Viringia Tech played three guard who could really shoot the ball (Emelugo, Smith and Eddie). And one who really couldn't (Wilson). When Wilson had the ball, both of Syracuse's guards retreated to the high post, giving him ten or fifteen feet of open space to shoot, which he did not take (he went 0-1 from three for the game).
But when Smith or Eddie (probably the two best shooters we will see all year) had the ball, Syracuse was forced to start their zone thirty feet from the basket, sometimes extending it out to thirty-five and even forty feet (which I don't recall ever seeing before) to cover them.
You can imagine how much unguarded space Syracuse surrendered inside by needing to extend two and sometimes three defenders out to within ten feet of half court. To Virginia Tech's credit, they made it a priority to get the ball down low. Passing to a guy in the high post who was told not to shoot but to either penetrate or pass to a big man stationed on the baseline.
Usually, in this situation, Syracuse's center will cover the high post and they will send one of their forwards bombing in to help cover the low post, but as spread out as they were against Virginia Tech, their forwards were never able to help in time.
This left Syracuse's center in a bad position, needing to cover two players on an island (maybe I should call it a continent because he had to cover about a fourth of the court). More often than not Virginia Tech had 6'8 CJ Barksdale in the high post and 6'10 Joey Van Zegren in the post. Neither of these guys are world beaters, but they are legit D1 players with good size, and they had the equivalent of a 2 on 1 transition opportunity against Syracuse's center every time down the court.
Christmas started at center, and got the first shot at defending this situation. For a center, Christmas is really quick as we know from seeing him play the wing of the zone, but he was not quick enough to stop two players by himself, and he surrendered a lot of easy baskets. Most of his playing time came in the first half, and not coincidentally Virginia Tech shot 42% from the field in the first half, and only trailed by 6 at half time.
In the second half, Chirstmas only played 3 minutes. Keita was in the rest of the time, and his play in the center of the 2-3 zone was inspired. He was able to blanket the high post player so tightly that he could not get a pass into the low post (at least not until help came) while simultaneously being quick enough to prevent dribble penetration. As a result, Virginia Tech only shot 32% in the second half, and Syracuse was able to extend its 6 point lead to a 20 point lead. I really don't think there is another center in the country who could have done as good a job as Keita did in such a difficult situation. He was really a one man difference between a close game and a blowout.
Player evaluations:
Ennis – 1-1 on layups. He didn't have much of a chance to finish around the basket because Virginia Tech was backing way off him and daring him to shoot from distance. In answer, he went 3-6 from deep. I don't think his shooting hurt Virginia Tech the most though. Most guards make a few turnovers without pressure, and get frazzled when pressured. Ennis makes a few turnovers when pressured, and plays absolutely flawless when you don't pressure him. I understand giving Ennis room to shoot and trying to stop him from penetrating, but there are consequences to this defensive strategy beyond how many points Ennis scores. By giving Ennis space to observe the Virginia Tech defense and time to process it, they allowed him to play as close to a perfect game (from a decision making standpoint) as I have ever seen. The guy knew where everybody was going to be, and made all the right moves. Long story short, I hope more teams play off him and allow him to shoot in an effort to stop his dribble penetration . . . I don't think many will.
Cooney – His laser accuracy returned for this game. He was “only” 3-8 from three, but two of his misses were almost all the way down before popping out. Some bad luck, but there was no doubt he was dialed in, both offensively and defensively. On defense, he really showed a lot of intensity when it came to extending out of the zone and pressuring shooters.
Fair - Hit a bunch of mid range shots, drove to the basket . . . in short he did what he does. Syracuse as a team had a very typical offensive game, doing essentially what you would expect them to do. Fair exemplified that, by shooting his season average from the field and scoring his average number of points as well.
Grant – When you look at his numbers (he had a double/double with 12 points and 10 rebounds) you might think he had a good game, but he made three of the worst defensive mistakes I have ever seen a Syracuse player make, and sure enough they lead to nine Virginia Tech points. Boeheim was NOT happy and benched him for close to ten minutes in the first half as punishment. Grant also only managed 4-12 shooting from the floor, which against a team like Virginia Tech is not good enough. On the plus side he had the play of the day (as he always seems to) blocking Virginia Tech's 6'10 center in spectacular fashion on a dunk attempt where he thought he was wide open. Grant brings a lot to the table; he is the most athletic player on the court, he rebounds well, he draws fouls. But right now he is taking too much off the table as well. He needs to cut down on the mistakes. We are going to need him to play better against North Carolina and their army of elite athletes.
Christmas – 10 minutes at center - He didn't play many minutes and he sure looked bad defensively, but I'm not inclined to hold that against him. There are few players who will look good when constantly put in 1 on 2 situations. On the plus side, he hit the boards really hard while he was in the game. Going into the season my hope was that Coleman and Keita could make a kind of thunder and lightning combination where Coleman provides the muscle when we need it and Keita provides the speed when we need it. Looking back on this game and the Miami game gave me a bit of a revelation – we actually have that with Christmas and Keita. Miami was a big strong team who was able to bully Keita, but Christmas out bullied the bullies, dominating the boards down the stretch, and scoring in the post. Virginia Tech was a much more finesse team, and it took Keita's speed and guile to stop them. As a fan it sure is nice to know that no matter what the other team brings to the table, Boeheim has an answer.
Gbinije – Every time Cooney went out, Virginia Tech switched to zone, so Gbinije had a few open looks from deep. Its encouraging to see him pull the trigger and bury the shots. Would have played more if Cooney wasn't so good on defense.
Roberson – Got some decent minutes in the first half when Grant needed benching, and played again in garbage time. In my opinion this was the best game of his short career. He didn't do anything exceptional (4 points, 3 rebounds), but he looked like he belonged out there. Up until this game he might as well have been wearing a sign that said FRESHMAN with the way he was playing.
Keita – 26 minutes at center - If he had not played, this game would have been close. There was a long stretch in the second half were he had to cover two guys by himself and absolutely shut them down every time. He also rebounded well and scored a basket, but those things are of secondary importance to his defensive effort.
Coleman – 3 minutes at center - Got some garbage minutes and looked relatively healthy. Its hard to tell at this point if he is going to go back to his starting role or stay on the bench.
Johnson and Patterson – Got some garbage time ACC minutes which is nice. Patterson hit a three and Johnson missed one, but they didn't play enough for me to make any meaningful observations.
How Virginia Tech guarded Syracuse:
Virginia Tech stayed with their base man to man defense for most of the game, but switched to a 2-3 zone every time Cooney went out (which was only for 5 or 6 non-garbage time minutes). As Boeheim has always said, the problem with playing both 2-3 and man to man, is that you don't have enough practice time to perfect both, so neither is as good as it can be. He has chosen, instead, to only play zone, and put all his resources into it, thus making it as good as possible. If Virginia Tech did the same, I actually think they'd be an above average zone team. They have a lot of size (their starting line up is 6'5,6'4,6'7,6'8,6'10) and the zone would help mask their lack of athleticism.
Their coach uses zone as more of a gimmick, so even though they have the physical tools to succeed at it, they were not nearly practiced enough to make it work. The first time they tried to zone, Ennis drove right down the middle for an open lay up, which lead the announcers to mention that “the reason you play zone is to stop that from happening.”
Gbinije was also able to hit a three against it, and that was all the offense Syracuse needed against the five minutes of zone or so that they saw.
Virginia Tech's man to man defense (which they played the majority of the time) was nothing to fear. They just don't have the athletes to play great defense. Syracuse looked comfortable, and had little trouble, getting into the positions they wanted to offensively. The stats back this up. Syracuse shoots an average of 46.7% for the year, and they shot 46.7% in this game. Evidence that they were doing exactly what they wanted to do and are comfortable doing.
Virginia Teach's strategy was to back off Grant and Ennis, giving them open shots in order to stop them from getting to the basket. Now, when I say they backed off Grant and Ennis, I mean they backed WAY off. They had as much time as they wanted to set their feet, square up, and get a clean look. I admit that neither Grant nor Ennis are great shooters, but giving them that much space seemed excessive to me. Neither are so bad that you can just let them shoot like its practice. Ennis responded quite well going 3-6 from three, and Grant shot just a little worse, going 2-5 from his mid range shots.
Hitting these shots helped open things up a little going down the stretch, and I thought Syracuse took advantage of the confusion with excellent ball movement. Guys were moving exceptionally well without the ball and making some great cuts to the basket. I have always said that the more comfortable you are against a defense the better you move the ball, so my guess is the good passing was more a product of Syracuse feeling comfortable exploiting Virginia Tech's poor defense, than it is a sign that our passing has improved overall.
How Syracuse guarded Virginia Tech:
Putting together a Virginia Tech preview was fun because they have compiled some of the weirdest stats I have ever seen (how many teams can shoot 43% from three for the year, while holding their opposition to 38% shooting from two, and still manage losses to UNC Upstate and UNC Greensboro?). The reason they complied these weird stats is because they are a weird team, and Syracuse had to play a weird zone to stop them. Maybe the weirdest zone I have ever seen.
Syracuse prefers to keep their defenders within twenty feet of the basket if they can get away with it. Against hot shooters with some range they will extend out to twenty-five feet.
Viringia Tech played three guard who could really shoot the ball (Emelugo, Smith and Eddie). And one who really couldn't (Wilson). When Wilson had the ball, both of Syracuse's guards retreated to the high post, giving him ten or fifteen feet of open space to shoot, which he did not take (he went 0-1 from three for the game).
But when Smith or Eddie (probably the two best shooters we will see all year) had the ball, Syracuse was forced to start their zone thirty feet from the basket, sometimes extending it out to thirty-five and even forty feet (which I don't recall ever seeing before) to cover them.
You can imagine how much unguarded space Syracuse surrendered inside by needing to extend two and sometimes three defenders out to within ten feet of half court. To Virginia Tech's credit, they made it a priority to get the ball down low. Passing to a guy in the high post who was told not to shoot but to either penetrate or pass to a big man stationed on the baseline.
Usually, in this situation, Syracuse's center will cover the high post and they will send one of their forwards bombing in to help cover the low post, but as spread out as they were against Virginia Tech, their forwards were never able to help in time.
This left Syracuse's center in a bad position, needing to cover two players on an island (maybe I should call it a continent because he had to cover about a fourth of the court). More often than not Virginia Tech had 6'8 CJ Barksdale in the high post and 6'10 Joey Van Zegren in the post. Neither of these guys are world beaters, but they are legit D1 players with good size, and they had the equivalent of a 2 on 1 transition opportunity against Syracuse's center every time down the court.
Christmas started at center, and got the first shot at defending this situation. For a center, Christmas is really quick as we know from seeing him play the wing of the zone, but he was not quick enough to stop two players by himself, and he surrendered a lot of easy baskets. Most of his playing time came in the first half, and not coincidentally Virginia Tech shot 42% from the field in the first half, and only trailed by 6 at half time.
In the second half, Chirstmas only played 3 minutes. Keita was in the rest of the time, and his play in the center of the 2-3 zone was inspired. He was able to blanket the high post player so tightly that he could not get a pass into the low post (at least not until help came) while simultaneously being quick enough to prevent dribble penetration. As a result, Virginia Tech only shot 32% in the second half, and Syracuse was able to extend its 6 point lead to a 20 point lead. I really don't think there is another center in the country who could have done as good a job as Keita did in such a difficult situation. He was really a one man difference between a close game and a blowout.
Player evaluations:
Ennis – 1-1 on layups. He didn't have much of a chance to finish around the basket because Virginia Tech was backing way off him and daring him to shoot from distance. In answer, he went 3-6 from deep. I don't think his shooting hurt Virginia Tech the most though. Most guards make a few turnovers without pressure, and get frazzled when pressured. Ennis makes a few turnovers when pressured, and plays absolutely flawless when you don't pressure him. I understand giving Ennis room to shoot and trying to stop him from penetrating, but there are consequences to this defensive strategy beyond how many points Ennis scores. By giving Ennis space to observe the Virginia Tech defense and time to process it, they allowed him to play as close to a perfect game (from a decision making standpoint) as I have ever seen. The guy knew where everybody was going to be, and made all the right moves. Long story short, I hope more teams play off him and allow him to shoot in an effort to stop his dribble penetration . . . I don't think many will.
Cooney – His laser accuracy returned for this game. He was “only” 3-8 from three, but two of his misses were almost all the way down before popping out. Some bad luck, but there was no doubt he was dialed in, both offensively and defensively. On defense, he really showed a lot of intensity when it came to extending out of the zone and pressuring shooters.
Fair - Hit a bunch of mid range shots, drove to the basket . . . in short he did what he does. Syracuse as a team had a very typical offensive game, doing essentially what you would expect them to do. Fair exemplified that, by shooting his season average from the field and scoring his average number of points as well.
Grant – When you look at his numbers (he had a double/double with 12 points and 10 rebounds) you might think he had a good game, but he made three of the worst defensive mistakes I have ever seen a Syracuse player make, and sure enough they lead to nine Virginia Tech points. Boeheim was NOT happy and benched him for close to ten minutes in the first half as punishment. Grant also only managed 4-12 shooting from the floor, which against a team like Virginia Tech is not good enough. On the plus side he had the play of the day (as he always seems to) blocking Virginia Tech's 6'10 center in spectacular fashion on a dunk attempt where he thought he was wide open. Grant brings a lot to the table; he is the most athletic player on the court, he rebounds well, he draws fouls. But right now he is taking too much off the table as well. He needs to cut down on the mistakes. We are going to need him to play better against North Carolina and their army of elite athletes.
Christmas – 10 minutes at center - He didn't play many minutes and he sure looked bad defensively, but I'm not inclined to hold that against him. There are few players who will look good when constantly put in 1 on 2 situations. On the plus side, he hit the boards really hard while he was in the game. Going into the season my hope was that Coleman and Keita could make a kind of thunder and lightning combination where Coleman provides the muscle when we need it and Keita provides the speed when we need it. Looking back on this game and the Miami game gave me a bit of a revelation – we actually have that with Christmas and Keita. Miami was a big strong team who was able to bully Keita, but Christmas out bullied the bullies, dominating the boards down the stretch, and scoring in the post. Virginia Tech was a much more finesse team, and it took Keita's speed and guile to stop them. As a fan it sure is nice to know that no matter what the other team brings to the table, Boeheim has an answer.
Gbinije – Every time Cooney went out, Virginia Tech switched to zone, so Gbinije had a few open looks from deep. Its encouraging to see him pull the trigger and bury the shots. Would have played more if Cooney wasn't so good on defense.
Roberson – Got some decent minutes in the first half when Grant needed benching, and played again in garbage time. In my opinion this was the best game of his short career. He didn't do anything exceptional (4 points, 3 rebounds), but he looked like he belonged out there. Up until this game he might as well have been wearing a sign that said FRESHMAN with the way he was playing.
Keita – 26 minutes at center - If he had not played, this game would have been close. There was a long stretch in the second half were he had to cover two guys by himself and absolutely shut them down every time. He also rebounded well and scored a basket, but those things are of secondary importance to his defensive effort.
Coleman – 3 minutes at center - Got some garbage minutes and looked relatively healthy. Its hard to tell at this point if he is going to go back to his starting role or stay on the bench.
Johnson and Patterson – Got some garbage time ACC minutes which is nice. Patterson hit a three and Johnson missed one, but they didn't play enough for me to make any meaningful observations.
