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Why'd Pope go 100% away from Williams?

I kind of figured it was also to avoid giving Louisville an opportunity to deploy a “hack-a-Amari” strategy late in the game. Sometimes Amari appears capable at the FT line, and other times he appears shockingly horrendous. Garrison seems more reliable. Given that Louisville kept hanging around within one or two possessions, they only needed to steal a couple of opportunities to possibly sneak away with a win today.
 
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This is going to be a big issue in the SEC, so Pope basically is trying to get at least one of them to step up. I'd be fine with Garrison if he wasn't such a black hole on offense. He's GOT to either make a quick and decisive move and a good shot or pass it. Right now it's zero passes and half the time it's a forced shot. He's playing for his NBA stock IMO.
Our bigs are an issue at this point. BG wants to shoot anytime he gets the ball on offense when he should be the fifth option no matter what. At the same time Williams seems lazy as all get out on D, which is weird considering he was supposed to be one of the best defensive bigs out there.
 
I said after the Gonzaga game, he needs to watch some film of Jamaal Maguire on how to physically protect the rim. I like the rest of his game, but needs to be nasty when a guard tries to drive to the basket, currently too soft in this area.
 
Was NOT protecting the rim on defense and was watching the ball come off while the Card players grabbed offensive rebounds.

If you're not going to do what Coach expects out of you, you will be sitting next to him.
Plus he should have had several dunks, but he put up soft layups instead
 
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I’m not happy with a lot of things Amari does, especially his lack of hustle.

Look at that stat line though. In 16 mins. Imagine if we got 30 productive mins a game from him?

He’s key for this team to go far.
He can definitely do it and we need him too. I do like our 2 headed monster though. Each one picks the other up when they are down.
 
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The bigs should try to dunk instead of shoot anything else. Awful offensive touch. Also the lack of rim protection this year is painful to watch. Several times Williams just watched guards lay the ball up without attempting to contest them. I do like their passing though.
 
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Plays defense with his down by his side. Such an odd thing when a 7 footer looks like he has no interest in blocking shots
I was yelling at tv on one play where a smaller guy did a little jump hook over Williams and Amari’s hands never went over his head to contest it.

But Williams is an elite rebounder, whereas Garrison is not a good rebounder, so we need that fixed.
 
Amari did not come out to hedge on a screen for Chucky who then drove down into Williams for the bucket and 1.

He was subbed out at that point and I don’t think he came back in.
Williams watched at least three guys shoot bunnies over him w/out even raising his hands to contest. No idea what he was doing last night.
 
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I love Pope but I don't understand why we didn't go small with Carr at center some today, we didn't rebound well with the bigs out there anyway so I'm surprised he didn't at least try it.
I agree I was terribly frustrated with the passive defense we played
We basically allowed UL to get off 39 threes by them setting a high ball screen we switch a big on there guard …our big gives ample room not wanting to get blown by and they shoot a wide open three. We never fought through a screen we never hedged we basically went pack line and dared Louisville to shoot wide open 3’s. Yes they only hit 27% on the year but other teams guard them they have no post play so not sure why Pope thought that was best way to defend them. Only thing I can think is that he wanted to stay out of foul trouble and knew he could out score them but damn we had same game pressure
 
The whole brewhaha with their bench was caused because he didn’t dive on the ball. If he’d gotten slapped then I would have said he had it coming. We are too soft.
Yeah noticed that also- Garrison was looking down at the ball instead of initially going after it hard
 
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Our bigs are an issue at this point. BG wants to shoot anytime he gets the ball on offense when he should be the fifth option no matter what. At the same time Williams seems lazy as all get out on D, which is weird considering he was supposed to be one of the best defensive bigs out there.
I still say the best version of the Cats is with Carr at the 5. They are WAY better offensively. The issue is rebounding and getting enough stops. Pope got burned with that small lineup at Clemson and now I think he’s a little gun shy. I think less of Williams and BG is a good thing, at least until one of them figures out they’re out there to defend the rim and rebound. Too many “my turn” shots from them when they get touches on offense.
 
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