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Let’s talk style of play...will(should) this team turn up the pressure?

Aike

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Mar 18, 2002
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Here’s what I see...4 pretty good guards (possibly 5, depending on Baker). Decent but not elite shot blocking potential.

Shouldn’t this be a team that pressures to create turnovers and transition opportunities?

We don’t have a situation where there are one or two clear backcourt leaders that we have to keep out of foul trouble.

We don’t have a shot blocking freak that would motivate us to make it a halfcourt defensive game where everything is funneled to the rim.

What say ye? Not really asking what Cal will do. What do you think would work best? Talk me in or out of this thought process.
 
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Implement some 40 minutes of hell, imo. Need to get some of these younger guys just playing without thinking. Herro, Montgomery, Hagans etc. Especially with our guard depth.
 
This is kind of an answer-non-answer, but Kentucky doesn't get in passing lanes.

Like, ever. Never. The only time I've seen it this year, and this is including Transy and the other exhibition game, was against North Dakota, and it was only in spurts. Otherwise, we're in this like pure base man-to-man that SWITCHES EVERYTHING (pure Cal MO) and that sort of just sits back on its heels and tries to play people into shot clock violations.

Needless to say, this is a recipe for an undoing. Because you're going to let teams play themselves into shots; you'll get no steals, no deflections, no panicked dribbles--you'll just end up with a shot being put up against you. And with the way teams can reverse the ball these days, those shots are a lot of times going to be threes.

People give last year's team hell, but the dirty secret about last year's team is that it could really close out. It guarded the three-point line all year. This team? Not so much. We play that bend-but-don't-break nonsense m-2-m, and then we get a team deep into the clock and they just put the ball into the corner and...well, we all know what happens.

So yes, we should be pressing. Basically we should be doing *something* different than what we're doing. But I doubt if we will, so we can all basically hope that we somehow find some energy on that end of the floor or we're going to see many more record-breaking nights.
 
^ Going further with that: I watched bits and pieces of five games last night. Every team lived in passing lanes. They rushed in and out of lanes, they hedged like madmen, and then they scrambled back hard to get back in position. Rinse and repeat.

This idea that you can just get on your haunches and force a team to hit a tough shot with under five on the shot clock comes from the logic that you're going to have elite length out on the court. And/Or that you're going to have these super-fast, interchangeable studs guarding every spot.

This team doesn't have that, and so you get these wild shooting performances.
 
Not 100% sure how this team should play by what I’ve seen thus far (besides better defense) but PJ and Reid have to stay out of foul trouble as much as possible in every game
 
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Shouldn’t this be a team that pressures to create turnovers and transition opportunities?
I think it was to this very thing that Cal was referring when he infamously said in the Bahamas "something is missing."

I think your point is well made in terms of the personnel we have and what style might arguably suit them best. But right now they just have no idea and no commitment on the defensive end. Employing a style where you crank up the pressure without guys who are committed to it and can do it would just create open seams and uncovered players and, in the end, I fear you'd just have a lay-up line for the opponent. Which, come to think of it, sort of resembles what we're seeing now from time to time......
 
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Play 4 guards and run and gun with our big subbing out every couple minutes?

I’m thinking more playing 2 or 3 guards tops, but pressuring a lot without fear of burning fouls, and running them in and out.

I’m not sure I would ever go with 4 guards, unless you want to call Keldon Jonhnson a guard. A lineup with Keldon at the 4 at times would be fine.
 
Here’s what I see...4 pretty good guards (possibly 5, depending on Baker). Decent but not elite shot blocking potential.

Shouldn’t this be a team that pressures to create turnovers and transition opportunities?

We don’t have a situation where there are one or two clear backcourt leaders that we have to keep out of foul trouble.

We don’t have a shot blocking freak that would motivate us to make it a halfcourt defensive game where everything is funneled to the rim.

What say ye? Not really asking what Cal will do. What do you think would work best? Talk me in or out of this thought process.
Agree with what you're saying. I'll just throw this out there. I've been wondering if we could change defensive sets between m2m and zone much more often just to keep things more chaotic on opponents. Maybe we don't need to play harder as much as we need to play smarter.
 
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How about a novel concept of a scouting report on the opponent, nah, that takes effort and film study. Trap the opposing team's best player, it leads to chaos and turnovers.

Cal ought to try it sometimes, but he won't out of fear of leaving a 3 pt shot open, of course, teams penetrate and pitch to stationary spot up shooters all day which is fine with the master technician..
 
A team that can't defend half court can't defend full court.
There is little to gain by extending bad defense. It just creates more gaps, more screening opportunities, more chances to beat a guy with a drive to the basket. Even against VMI, Kentucky's guards let their guards go pretty much wherever they wanted to go. How are players like that going to generate pressure?

I'm not sure what the problem is, but part of it is that Kentucky's guards, for elite, 5-star players, aren't really very athletic overall. That has surprised me.

I didn’t say anything about full court. I said pressure. Occasionally that could be full court, but I’m more thinking about trapping in halfcourt, and playing for deflections.

I would rather create havoc and turnovers than what we have been doing. But it will take effort.
 
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How about a novel concept of a scouting report on the opponent, nah, that takes effort and film study. Trap the opposing team's best player, it leads to chaos and turnovers.

Cal ought to try it sometimes, but he won't out of fear of leaving a 3 pt shot open, of course, teams penetrate and pitch to stationary spot up shooters all day which is fine with the master technician..

It would be a lot cooler if this didn’t devolve into Cal bashing. Pretty sure we watch film. I agree that trapping the other team’s best player is sometimes a good strategy.
 
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Here’s what I see...4 pretty good guards (possibly 5, depending on Baker). Decent but not elite shot blocking potential.

Shouldn’t this be a team that pressures to create turnovers and transition opportunities?

We don’t have a situation where there are one or two clear backcourt leaders that we have to keep out of foul trouble.

We don’t have a shot blocking freak that would motivate us to make it a halfcourt defensive game where everything is funneled to the rim.

What say ye? Not really asking what Cal will do. What do you think would work best? Talk me in or out of this thought process.
Of course they should. We saw some of that in The Bahamas, but now we’re back to normal.

Cal needs to step up his game a bit. The same ole business as usual is cutting it anymore.
 
Here’s what I see...4 pretty good guards (possibly 5, depending on Baker). Decent but not elite shot blocking potential.

Shouldn’t this be a team that pressures to create turnovers and transition opportunities?

We don’t have a situation where there are one or two clear backcourt leaders that we have to keep out of foul trouble.

We don’t have a shot blocking freak that would motivate us to make it a halfcourt defensive game where everything is funneled to the rim.

What say ye? Not really asking what Cal will do. What do you think would work best? Talk me in or out of this thought process.

Question, we can't play man to man defense and stay in front of lower D1 guards how are we going to play 40 minutes of full court and stop them from scoring?????
 
Question, we can't play man to man defense and stay in front of lower D1 guards how are we going to play 40 minutes of full court and stop them from scoring?????

Find where I said anything about full court and get back to me.
 
My answer still applies, how the hell are you going to pressure the ball when you can't guard lower D1 guards????? Still the same problem full or half.

I don’t think the issue is that we can’t guard. It’s early, and we haven’t put much in or shown proper effort on the defensive end.

What’s your strategy suggestion?
 
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I don’t think the issue is that we can’t guard. It’s early, and we haven’t put much in or shown proper effort on the defensive end.

What’s your strategy suggestion?
Teach them how to play defense or sit them down, this has become a common theme over the last 3 or 4 years, either they can't play defense which I highly doubt or they won't sit down and play good defense. But until they start staying in front of their man they will not be pressuring any team, we would just foul out all our bigs trying to rotate over.
 
Full court pressure for 40 minutes is a gimmick defense that any well-coached team that isn't completely overwhelmed athletically will tear to shreds.

We can't even play defense 25 feet out, now you want them playing it 94 feet out?
 
Teach them how to play defense or sit them down, this has become a common theme over the last 3 or 4 years, either they can't play defense which I highly doubt or they won't sit down and play good defense. But until they start staying in front of their man they will not be pressuring any team, we would just foul out all our bigs trying to rotate over.

I agree that they need to play better D...would imagine that’s part of the plan.

Assuming they check that box, are you in favor of the idea of applying more pressure or no?
 
Full court pressure for 40 minutes is a gimmick defense that any well-coached team that isn't completely overwhelmed athletically will tear to shreds.

We can't even play defense 25 feet out, now you want them playing it 94 feet out?

You’re at least the third person who has talked about full court pressure. I never said that. Does anyone ever read anymore?
 
You’re at least the third person who has talked about full court pressure. I never said that. Does anyone ever read anymore?
So you want more general pressure, on a team that can't keep stop dribble penetration. That makes dribble penetration easier if you aren't turning them over. Brilliant strategy.
 
So you want more general pressure, on a team that can't keep stop dribble penetration. That makes dribble penetration easier if you aren't turning them over. Brilliant strategy.

No reason to be a jerk.

I’m not sure how hard we’re trying to stop dribble penetration. We’ve had a general philosophy of knocking teams off the three point line and funneling drivers toward a shot blocker at the basket. We actually encourage dribble penetration.

I’m saying it might be more effective to trap, back tip, scramble, and get in passing lanes.

You might get burned more, but do you create enough transition opportunities to make up for it? And does running our guards in and out lead to more fatigue and mistakes for our opponents?

As it is, we are eventually leaving shooters open after a penetrate and kick anyway.
 
Implement some 40 minutes of hell, imo. Need to get some of these younger guys just playing without thinking. Herro, Montgomery, Hagans etc. Especially with our guard depth.
Like West Virginia right? The same team we always talk about being good but not being able to win a championship with that style of play? Right?

A good ball handling team can beat the press. Have to be able to grind it out in the half court against a good team in the tournament. That’s what Cal is prepping them for. Do I think they should press more? Yes I do. But only situational pressing to build momentum after a big play or something to that effect. More like 15 mins per game instead of all 40.
 
It starts with effort. Right now, we just have too many guys that don't play hard enough, particularly on the defensive end. If you try to pressure without maximum effort, it's just a recipe for a layup line. The flip side, however, is that playing that style may be viewed as a little more exciting by the players, and thus bring out a better effort.
 
This is kind of an answer-non-answer, but Kentucky doesn't get in passing lanes.

Like, ever. Never. The only time I've seen it this year, and this is including Transy and the other exhibition game, was against North Dakota, and it was only in spurts. Otherwise, we're in this like pure base man-to-man that SWITCHES EVERYTHING (pure Cal MO) and that sort of just sits back on its heels and tries to play people into shot clock violations.

Needless to say, this is a recipe for an undoing. Because you're going to let teams play themselves into shots; you'll get no steals, no deflections, no panicked dribbles--you'll just end up with a shot being put up against you. And with the way teams can reverse the ball these days, those shots are a lot of times going to be threes.

People give last year's team hell, but the dirty secret about last year's team is that it could really close out. It guarded the three-point line all year. This team? Not so much. We play that bend-but-don't-break nonsense m-2-m, and then we get a team deep into the clock and they just put the ball into the corner and...well, we all know what happens.

So yes, we should be pressing. Basically we should be doing *something* different than what we're doing. But I doubt if we will, so we can all basically hope that we somehow find some energy on that end of the floor or we're going to see many more record-breaking nights.
Great post - Cal more conservative than Stoops-Blows me away we play in front of 20K and don't play a style to utilize it. We never create easy baskets
 
We made a concerted effort to spring halfcourt traps on North Dakota, and we won that game by 40.
 
Like West Virginia right? The same team we always talk about being good but not being able to win a championship with that style of play? Right?

A good ball handling team can beat the press. Have to be able to grind it out in the half court against a good team in the tournament. That’s what Cal is prepping them for. Do I think they should press more? Yes I do. But only situational pressing to build momentum after a big play or something to that effect. More like 15 mins per game instead of all 40.

I think that’s probably a good mix...something like 1/3 of the time. It’s like mixing in a blitz in football. To stretch that analogy, some years we are so much bigger and more athletic that we’re like that dominant D-line that can overpower you without blitzing.

But again, I’m talking about halfcourt/three quarter court pressure as much or more than full.
 
I realize that this conversation is at least a second cousin to the, “Why doesn’t Cal play more zone?” talk that we get 19 times a season.

I also realize that any defensive system requires commitment and effort. And that Cal is unlikely to suddenly change his methodology.

I guess I would just like to see what it would look like. It isn’t like teams with fairly high steal rates are universally unsuccessful.

And the trend that makes me nervous about Cal’s style of D is that teams seem to keep backing up deeper and deeper on threes. You can’t really stop a team from taking threes if that’s what they want to do.
 
I don’t know if we have the PG play or guards who are good enough at finishing to play more uptempo. I would like to see us run more half court sets for Quade & Tyler open looks instead of the typical motion until we pick and roll at the end of the clock. If we run P&R at the end I’d like to see Keldon & PJ doing it more. Defensively we have to communicate better. Our help defense is horrible & our bigs get lost in the P&R. I don’t think it’s effort as much as not talking or understanding what to do. I guess we’ll see how the season pans out.
 
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