Mid Season Decision Cost Us

[cowboysooner]

Kids just wouldn't work defensively for most of the first part of the season, and Lon tried a number of things, including a variety of zones. However, he sensed that the kids would be lazy almost on purpose in order to get Lon to turn to a zone, where they wouldn't have to work as hard. So about mid season, he told the kids that they were going to play man defense the rest of the year, and nothing else -- and if they embarrassed themselves defensively and lost, then so be it. He discussed this very decision and situation on one of his shows.

Not saying I disagree with this approach, but I think it did cost us the game last night.

Pack in a tight zone, don't ever double, prevent their post and cut offense, make them shoot contested jump shots, close out on a couple of their outside shooters, and they don't score 50 points and we win going away.

Instead, we played body up man on a bunch of kids that could create their own shots, only had a couple of kids that could hit an outside shot, and got us scattered, due to ineffective and unnecessary double teams, which allowed an inordinate number of layups and offensive rebounds. They must have set an NCAA record for layups in a game. It was embarrassing.

If we hit a few more jumpers, or a few more free throws, or grab a few defensive rebounds, or make a few better judgments with the ball, we win anyway. Cudos to the bison that they caused us to play a poor game.

For next year, I would like to see Woodard learn to keep his feet on the ground and keep his dribble alive, buddy improve on his ball handling and judgment, spangler improve on this jumper from 15 feet and in, and everyone work on their defense.

I haven't been this encouraged about OU basketball in a long time. Hopefully, the new kids will be good and the returning kids will all take a step forward. I think they will.

 

[WTSooner]

This team isn't built to play a zone. And in a lot of ways, to play a good zone, you have to put out more effort than in man.

Zones are hard to rebound out of, and we are undersized, and outside of Spangler, not great rebounders to begin with.

Also, it's more difficult to get steals and turnovers in a zone, something we can do in man, that fueled our break/offense, especially early in the year.

I'd rather be able to go zone in a few situations, or to throw a team off for a possession or two, but this team needs to learn to play man.

 

[BoulderSooner]

the D was not at all the problem yesterday ... the other team had 66 points in regulation ..

our d forced turn overs and got us points .. and our players were never "lazy on purpose"

 

[SoonerBounce13]

the D was not at all the problem yesterday ...

It was part of the problem in the first half.

 

[inoref]

IMO..this is OU basketball, they will get in the 64 or 68 most of the time. But having deep runs will only happen once a decade or so. If you really look at this team, Lon got about all you can get from the talent on board.

 

[WTSooner]

It was part of the problem in the first half.

Exactly. And that is where we dug our hole, and gave them the confidence that they could beat us.

And pace, I imagine, had something to do with their total as well. Because they didn't turn it over a ton, and shot the ball great.

 

[MercedeSooner]

It was part of the problem in the first half.

It was a major problem the whole game - I know people are pointing out that they didn't shoot as well in the 2nd half but they missed a bunch of chippies and still had a bunch of wide open looks.

 

[garyeb2]

For months I have been wanting to make this post. But, was reluctant because of my admiration for and appreciation of the job Kruger and his staff have done. But, the season is over now.

I can pinpoint the day it started and the reason we defended poorly this season. Before that day the defense was stunningly good in practice. Coach Hill made the comment to me one day that he thought the team was light years ahead defensively from where they were the season before. Anyone watching would have agreed with that.

Then it happened. They brought the refs in and held a meeting at center court and had all the new rule interpretations explained. Starting that day and for weeks afterward they had two staff members with whistles calling fouls in practice. The intent was to have our players more prepared to defend under the rules than our opponents. There were unintended consequences.

First, the staff members calling the fouls didn't have the first clue how the refs in games would call fouls. They called too many fouls, too often, and for too little reason. They had the players afraid they were going to foul, afraid to defend, and in fact trained them to play bad defense.

Kruger caught it eventually. They had gone too far. They tried to reel in back in. He said that on one of his shows too. The practice whistles were finally thrown away. They tried their best. But, they couldn't get a complete reset accomplished in mid season.

We are in the offseason now. Everyone will start fresh. I'll make this prediction. That playing bad defense crap is over.

 

[DenverSooner]

It was part of the problem in the first half.

I agree but had OU scored in the final five minutes of the half, the poor defense would not have been noticeable and scoring allows the press and OU is better when pressing.

 

[SoonerBounce13]

For months I have been wanting to make this post. But, was reluctant because of my admiration for and appreciation of the job Kruger and his staff have done. But, the season is over now.

I can pinpoint the day it started and the reason we defended poorly this season. Before that day the defense was stunningly good in practice. Coach Hill made the comment to me one day that he thought the team was light years ahead defensively from where they were the season before. Anyone watching would have agreed with that.

Then it happened. They brought the refs in and held a meeting at center court and had all the new rule interpretations explained. Starting that day and for weeks afterward they had two staff members with whistles calling fouls in practice. The intent was to have our players more prepared to defend under the rules than our opponents. There were unintended consequences.

First, the staff members calling the fouls didn't have the first clue how the refs in games would call fouls. They called too many fouls, too often, and for too little reason. They had the players afraid they were going to foul, afraid to defend, and in fact trained them to play bad defense.

Kruger caught it eventually. They had gone too far. They tried to reel in back in. He said that on one of his shows too. The practice whistles were finally thrown away. They tried their best. But, they couldn't get a complete reset accomplished in mid season.

We are in the offseason now. Everyone will start fresh. I'll make this prediction. That playing bad defense crap is over.

very interesting

 

[MercedeSooner]

For months I have been wanting to make this post. But, was reluctant because of my admiration for and appreciation of the job Kruger and his staff have done. But, the season is over now.

I can pinpoint the day it started and the reason we defended poorly this season. Before that day the defense was stunningly good in practice. Coach Hill made the comment to me one day that he thought the team was light years ahead defensively from where they were the season before. Anyone watching would have agreed with that.

Then it happened. They brought the refs in and held a meeting at center court and had all the new rule interpretations explained. Starting that day and for weeks afterward they had two staff members with whistles calling fouls in practice. The intent was to have our players more prepared to defend under the rules than our opponents. There were unintended consequences.

First, the staff members calling the fouls didn't have the first clue how the refs in games would call fouls. They called too many fouls, too often, and for too little reason. They had the players afraid they were going to foul, afraid to defend, and in fact trained them to play bad defense.

Kruger caught it eventually. They had gone too far. They tried to reel in back in. He said that on one of his shows too. The practice whistles were finally thrown away. They tried their best. But, they couldn't get a complete reset accomplished in mid season.

We are in the offseason now. Everyone will start fresh. I'll make this prediction. That playing bad defense crap is over.

Thanks for sharing - however the refs started the season calling armbars etc they definitely were letting teams play yesterday and letting a lot of contact go. Woodard got fouled at least 3 to 4 times going to the basket that in November would have given him FTs - could see he was getting frustrated in the no calls.

Instead of looking at the refs our guys need to learn how to go up strong at the rim.

 

[JBaker]

For months I have been wanting to make this post. But, was reluctant because of my admiration for and appreciation of the job Kruger and his staff have done. But, the season is over now.

I can pinpoint the day it started and the reason we defended poorly this season. Before that day the defense was stunningly good in practice. Coach Hill made the comment to me one day that he thought the team was light years ahead defensively from where they were the season before. Anyone watching would have agreed with that.

Then it happened. They brought the refs in and held a meeting at center court and had all the new rule interpretations explained. Starting that day and for weeks afterward they had two staff members with whistles calling fouls in practice. The intent was to have our players more prepared to defend under the rules than our opponents. There were unintended consequences.

First, the staff members calling the fouls didn't have the first clue how the refs in games would call fouls. They called too many fouls, too often, and for too little reason. They had the players afraid they were going to foul, afraid to defend, and in fact trained them to play bad defense.

Kruger caught it eventually. They had gone too far. They tried to reel in back in. He said that on one of his shows too. The practice whistles were finally thrown away. They tried their best. But, they couldn't get a complete reset accomplished in mid season.

We are in the offseason now. Everyone will start fresh. I'll make this prediction. That playing bad defense crap is over.

I had said from the beginning of the season that it looked like a big part of our problems defensively were caused by overcompensation to the new rules. Too many guys that work hard appeared to regress on defense this year.

 

[ouwxman]

I think we were pretty lucky to have such consistent outside shooting for much of the season, and that was a catalyst of our success. But, we were too dependent on it. We have no scoring threat inside, and the guards frequently get blocked when they try to score in the paint. Until we get a legitimate scoring threat in the paint, we're going to have to either shoot very well outside or won't be able to get to the next level. Thankfully, we have some nice talent coming in at PF/C next year and hopefully they can make an impact right away. The guards will be very strong, especially offensively.

 

[BoulderSooner]

I think we were pretty lucky to have such consistent outside shooting for much of the season, and that was a catalyst of our success. But, we were too dependent on it. We have no scoring threat inside, and the guards frequently get blocked when they try to score in the paint. Until we get a legitimate scoring threat in the paint, we're going to have to either shoot very well outside or won't be able to get to the next level. Thankfully, we have some nice talent coming in at PF/C next year and hopefully they can make an impact right away. The guards will be very strong, especially offensively.

that is not luck ..

 

[tsou89]

It's hard not to notice when a team makes lay up after lay up.

 

[cowboysooner]

First, I think Gary is right on. Several of lon's comments through the year essentially spoke to this. I firmly believe that Lon is a good defensive coach and we will be markedly better next year.

Mercedes is correct as well, Jordan and others had their dribble penetrations stopped with physical contact designed to impede movement. Their entire team would have fouled out early in the year. However, I don't believe there was a change in officiating for this game. It has seemed to me that the officials loosened up a long time ago. We just never adjusted back to what I would call "grab-azz" defense, like everyone else.

I thought the game was called fairly. In the end, Woodard and Buddy had poor games (it happens, they are good players) and, in my opinion, we had a poor game plan (again, I love lon and don't mean to diss him, I think his game plan was in part driven by his trying to make a point and/or his lack of success in adjusting the team to the officiating this year)

Don't mean to get negative, just talking, I am pumped for next year,.

 

[NickZepp]

Actually I think Kruger did a great job to make us better on defense which led to us being 2nd in the conference. And we played good in spurts last night no defense too. Held NDSU to under 30 2nd half points. Basically had the game won if Woodard or Cousins make free throws. In our 3 losses the last part of the season we couldn't play a full game's worth of defense. We played good parts of the game on defense which led us to come backs and near wins. But just had too many lapses to win. Some of that is just on the youth of the players. Some of that is just that we have too little size. We'll see if the new comers next year change that.

Spangler needs to be the guy he was early last year that pretty much seemed to dominate things in some ways. Not the one that basically disappeared toward the end of the season.

 

[ben]

It wasn't defense that lost the game because we actually caused some turnovers...it was all the missed threes. If hield hits two more, it's a completely different game. Or if Neal hit his second.

 

[Stikboy]

What a fail for NCAA officiating. They scare everyone into believing they have to change their very styles, then revert right back to calling it the same. And one of the few teams, OU, who earnestly tried to prepare for the new rules at the beginning of the season suffered the most. Sounds about par for the course.

 

[steverocks35]

It's also hard to adjust when from night to night the officiating drastically changes. In the Big 12 tournament Baylor was allowed to manhandle us and we are not a team that can play that physical style to start with.