Its Over---Now What?

[LittleBrave]

What starters would you like to have seen take more shots?

When your players don't have diversified skills it makes creating "diversified scoring opportunities" kind of tough. At least that's how I see it.

I have zilch coaching experience, but comparing our offensive sets this year to other Valley teams, there was no comparison.
Ours was stagnant and relatively predictable - even to the common fan such as myself. And with JP not scoring in the low post, you could count on him moving to the arc to set a screen and then rolling away, but not getting the ball back. Just seemed the defense knew our offense as well as we did.

I will say that we had many open shots that we just couldn't knock down, which makes our offense look that much worse. If we had AW this season, or a pure outside shooter (that plays significant minutes), I bet we score 10 ppg higher than we did this year.

[Beninator]

What starters would you like to have seen take more shots?

When your players don't have diversified skills it makes creating "diversified scoring opportunities" kind of tough. At least that's how I see it.

Well that is where we disagree... Why not run some set plays to get Shayok involved in the flow of things? The end of the season would have been a perfect time to implement some baseline screens etc to take advantage of his athletic ability rather than place SS in continuous one-on-one situations that didn't really make use of his skills and opened him up for fouling! The same thing could have been done for TB.

[Beninator]

I have zilch coaching experience, but comparing our offensive sets this year to other Valley teams, there was no comparison.
Ours was stagnant and relatively predictable - even to the common fan such as myself. And with JP not scoring in the low post, you could count on him moving to the arc to set a screen and then rolling away, but not getting the ball back. Just seemed the defense knew our offense as well as we did.

I will say that we had many open shots that we just couldn't knock down, which makes our offense look that much worse. If we had AW this season, or a pure outside shooter (that plays significant minutes), I bet we score 10 ppg higher than we did this year.

I completely agree! What also alarmed me is that we frequently took shots early in the shot clock cycle, often did very little passing in half court situations, and never (or rarely) got JP's positioned properly in the paint when we did pass the ball to him.

[Hello Newman]

I completely agree! What also alarmed me is that we frequently took shots early in the shot clock cycle, often did very little passing in half court situations, and never (or rarely) got JP's positioned properly in the paint when we did pass the ball to him.

Good discussion.

I think fans sometimes forget that the other team on the court has a 50% say in what goes on. It's not like the offense has free will to do what it wishes.

I think JP's lack of positioning falls on him, not on the game plan.

There is a problem with your early shots premise...statistics and studies have always shown that shooting earlier in the shot clock produces higher shooting percentages than shooting later in the shot clock. I know people like to think that passing the ball 4 or 5 times a possession, working the ball around for 25-30 seconds, etc. leads to better shots. Unfortunately, evidence does not back this up. Generally speaking, teams should take the first available open shot.

All that said...I think any coach should attempt to structure his offense based on the skill set of the players on the team. Bradley's team this year was not skilled enough to become a motion offense, run a lot of cuts, pass the ball around, type of team. As a result, the coaches didn't force that on them.

Lastly, it's always much more about the talent and skill of the players than any schemes the coach designs. The old saying is "it's more about Johnny and Joe's than X's and O's."

[SFP]

Getting a chance in practice is NOT the same as getting a chance in games...I can remember many, many players that did not practice all that well, but when it came to games...they were just fine...its an odd situation...but it happens all the time...at all levels...

I've also seen some players perform like all world players in practice and fail miserably during games and others that for some reason raise their concentration effort during games and become fairly good players during game situations. I would have thought that DS could have played a bit more this year regardless. I'm not sure what harm it could have had in the blow outs. I'd be pretty pissed off if I was him perhaps that is the point.

[tornado]

What starters would you like to have seen take more shots?
...

I would always want to get the ball into the hands of the players who are closest to the hoop...and in the best position to score....
..and I think we all know where I am leading.....
In other words we needed a PG who could get the ball down low when it mattered ..and feed guys who were open.
We did not have that all year long and yet we continued to start and play the same guys...kinda like the old Einstein argument that if we keep doing it yet expect different results...
There's a reason Bradley was dead last or nearly last in scoring, scoring margin, shooting pct., 3-pt shooting pct., assists, A/T Ratio, and any other offensive stat you can find.
We simply didn't do what virtually every other D-I team does - use their point guard to get the ENTIRE team scoring - instead of using our PG to jack up awe-inspiring twisting turning highlight shots 15-17 times a game..
If you love the style of ball we played and want to see more of it next year - look for smaller crowds and more 11-game losing streaks..

[Beninator]

Good discussion.

I think fans sometimes forget that the other team on the court has a 50% say in what goes on. It's not like the offense has free will to do what it wishes.

I think JP's lack of positioning falls on him, not on the game plan.

There is a problem with your early shots premise...statistics and studies have always shown that shooting earlier in the shot clock produces higher shooting percentages than shooting later in the shot clock. I know people like to think that passing the ball 4 or 5 times a possession, working the ball around for 25-30 seconds, etc. leads to better shots. Unfortunately, evidence does not back this up. Generally speaking, teams should take the first available open shot.

All that said...I think any coach should attempt to structure his offense based on the skill set of the players on the team. Bradley's team this year was not skilled enough to become a motion offense, run a lot of cuts, pass the ball around, type of team. As a result, the coaches didn't force that on them.

Lastly, it's always much more about the talent and skill of the players than any schemes the coach designs. The old saying is "it's more about Johnny and Joe's than X's and O's."

I agree with some of the things in your post. I disagree on a couple of things though... First, I think a motion offense would have been the thing to do with this team. By saying this, I am not stating that we would have had dramatically more wins. I do think a motion offense would have made better use of our players though. I thought that we started playing better around the Michigan game when we slowed things down and were more patient. The other aspect is that good teams, especially teams in an uptempo style that Geno wants to utilize, don't shoot the ball early, they pass the ball.. and they pass the ball a lot.

[lefty]

If you lack talent any offense is tough to run.

[SFP]

If you lack talent any offense is tough to run.

Yea, let's face it we did not have guys who consistently were able to hit mid-range open jumpers. I also believe we need an athletic big who can just jam the ball in the hoop or take up space and is hard to move around.

[Hello Newman]

If you love the style of ball we played and want to see more of it next year - look for smaller crowds and more 11-game losing streaks..

So the style of play was the reason for the tough season? I don't think Geno's preferred style of play got worse from two straight COY seasons in the MAC to his first year at Bradley. Nor do I think he forgot how to coach in a years time.

The "style" of play had nothing to do with the W/L record. It had to do with the skill and ability of the guys playing that style.

[Hello Newman]

If you lack talent any offense is tough to run.

+1

[Hello Newman]

The other aspect is that good teams, especially teams in an uptempo style that Geno wants to utilize, don't shoot the ball early, they pass the ball.. and they pass the ball a lot.

I disagree with this. Teams that want to play fast, prefer shooting earlier in the shot clock. The more possessions the better.

The book Seven Seconds or Less about the Phoenix Suns is a good read related to this. Some of the best uptempo teams (or best teams in general) prefer shooting earlier rather than later in the shot clock.

Again...percentages say it makes more sense to shoot earlier if you get a decent shot. If you try and wait for a good shot, chances are you won't get one.

[JMM28]

Glad to see the ol "we didn't run an offense and we missed too many open shots" statements come back. Give me a non-offense that gives us a chance to miss those wide open shots any day. I'd suggest replacing the bricklayers with shooters. Crazy idea I know.

If Donivine wasnt from Limestone, no one would care. Where is everyone championing Milos's cause? Hodges's?

Also- did someone really site stats from exhibition games versus d2 and lesser opponents? I think you said it all right there.

Classic stuff guys. I needed a few laughs today.

[TNel]

If you lack talent any offense is tough to run.

Amen. And my definition of "talent" would include "basketball IQ."

[tornado]

If you lack talent any offense is tough to run.

I definitely disagree...here we go again - we're just terrible victims of a lack of talent...
..if you watched Mo's game last night - South Dakota State is not only going to the NCAA Tourney but they beat BIG TIME BCS teams this year by 20 pts and virtually not one of their players got a single D-I offer..they are all kids who went D-II when a D-II program was transitioning to D-I.

I doubt Geno or anyone else would have offered any of them...so in your definition - they "lacked talent" - yet they have been coached into a GOOD team...
Same with Mo's guys....who lost by 2 to Michigan...