My Fiver on WVU's loss to Kansas in Lawrence on Saturday....
1. 24.7 seconds...no shot attempt. In this scenario, you must have a go-to play. Catlett had a play called "Quick" for this scenario, which he sometimes also ran out of a timeout. The point guard would hold his thumb up in the air, and it was on. Beilein often went to a two-man pick and pop with Pittsnogle and Herber, which we used to perfection vs. Texas in the Sweet Sixteen, down 3, clock winding down. (Why Beilein didn't go to this in our final regulation possession in the Elite Eight Louisville game mystifies me) But, you want the players to be reacting, not thinking. It just appeared that we didn't have a plan for that final down-2, last possession scenario. And Joe Toussaint turned into a spaz. Jerking back and forth, dribbling the ball like it was on fire, even the Kansas players seemed like they were thinking "WTF is up with this Cat???" This was as frustrating a finish of a game I've endured in a long time. It would've been far less frustrating to get up a shot and miss, like we did at Oklahoma State. But, to turn it over and not get a shot up...wow. We had a shot at doing something really special, punching our ticket, and we didn't even get a shot up. It was very WVU.
2. We lost this game because of turnovers. Some were forced, like Dejuan Harris ripping the ball from multiple WVU players. Some were not forced, like Joe T. on our last possession. We cut our TOs down to a still-not-great 15, and we win. Juxtaposition the two point guards: KU's Harris: 16 points on 7/9 shooting, 6 assists vs. 1 TO, 6 steals. WVU's Johnson: 15 points on 5-11 shooting, 0 assists vs. 8 TOs, 2 steals.
3. Going small may be the way to go from here on out. Tre Mitchell is playing well, and making plays from the "5" spot. Bill Self admitted after the game that he could not play any of his true bigs because they could not stay with Mitchell on the perimeter. If Mitchell is hitting from beyond the arc, which it appears that he's found his stroke there, and we can force opposing teams to match up with him...we can take advantage of putting multiple shooters on the floor, creating space for guys like Keddy and Joe to get to the hole, and put stress on a defense. We're not putting any stress on defenses with Jimmy Bell.
4. One thing we did that I liked was we gave Kansas's bigs room. On several possessions, we did not have Bell and Okonkwo chasing KU's bigs around the perimeter. Instead, they were actually sagging back into the lane, and taking away the driving lanes for KU's guards. I've been calling for this all year, and I don't know what precipitated the change, but we did it Saturday. Now, KU still shot 55% from the field, 50% from "3", and we had multiple defensive breakdowns. But, there were several possessions of solid "D", where our "5's" weren't attached at the hip with KU's bigs, and that was not only logical, but benefitted our other four defenders as well.
5. We haven't stolen one this year. A win in Lawrence would've been a "Steal" of the higher proportions. But, we blew it. We've won the games we should've won, and we've lost a few we should not have lost (Texas Tech, at Oklahoma State, at Oklahoma, at TCU with their best 2 players out, and I'm still salty about how we finished that Xavier game). I don't want to hear our players and coach try to politic our way into the Tournament. I'm sick of hearing about strength of schedule. You want in? Go win a game. This is the schedule you signed up to play. Don't complain about it. We've had our chances, and we blew an 8-point lead at home to Texas Tech, and we had one whale of a chance to steal one in Lawrence, and couldn't even get a shot up. If we are left out, we only have ourselves to blame. I give the guys credit - they are playing hard. But, at some point, you have to be able to win a few games in a row.
A win tonight in Ames wouldn't necessarily qualify as a "steal", but it would be huge. If we do not, then everything will be riding on the K-State home finale, and that is a hell of a lot of pressure for one game. One gets us in, two W's gets us past the play-in games in Dayton.
1. 24.7 seconds...no shot attempt. In this scenario, you must have a go-to play. Catlett had a play called "Quick" for this scenario, which he sometimes also ran out of a timeout. The point guard would hold his thumb up in the air, and it was on. Beilein often went to a two-man pick and pop with Pittsnogle and Herber, which we used to perfection vs. Texas in the Sweet Sixteen, down 3, clock winding down. (Why Beilein didn't go to this in our final regulation possession in the Elite Eight Louisville game mystifies me) But, you want the players to be reacting, not thinking. It just appeared that we didn't have a plan for that final down-2, last possession scenario. And Joe Toussaint turned into a spaz. Jerking back and forth, dribbling the ball like it was on fire, even the Kansas players seemed like they were thinking "WTF is up with this Cat???" This was as frustrating a finish of a game I've endured in a long time. It would've been far less frustrating to get up a shot and miss, like we did at Oklahoma State. But, to turn it over and not get a shot up...wow. We had a shot at doing something really special, punching our ticket, and we didn't even get a shot up. It was very WVU.
2. We lost this game because of turnovers. Some were forced, like Dejuan Harris ripping the ball from multiple WVU players. Some were not forced, like Joe T. on our last possession. We cut our TOs down to a still-not-great 15, and we win. Juxtaposition the two point guards: KU's Harris: 16 points on 7/9 shooting, 6 assists vs. 1 TO, 6 steals. WVU's Johnson: 15 points on 5-11 shooting, 0 assists vs. 8 TOs, 2 steals.
3. Going small may be the way to go from here on out. Tre Mitchell is playing well, and making plays from the "5" spot. Bill Self admitted after the game that he could not play any of his true bigs because they could not stay with Mitchell on the perimeter. If Mitchell is hitting from beyond the arc, which it appears that he's found his stroke there, and we can force opposing teams to match up with him...we can take advantage of putting multiple shooters on the floor, creating space for guys like Keddy and Joe to get to the hole, and put stress on a defense. We're not putting any stress on defenses with Jimmy Bell.
4. One thing we did that I liked was we gave Kansas's bigs room. On several possessions, we did not have Bell and Okonkwo chasing KU's bigs around the perimeter. Instead, they were actually sagging back into the lane, and taking away the driving lanes for KU's guards. I've been calling for this all year, and I don't know what precipitated the change, but we did it Saturday. Now, KU still shot 55% from the field, 50% from "3", and we had multiple defensive breakdowns. But, there were several possessions of solid "D", where our "5's" weren't attached at the hip with KU's bigs, and that was not only logical, but benefitted our other four defenders as well.
5. We haven't stolen one this year. A win in Lawrence would've been a "Steal" of the higher proportions. But, we blew it. We've won the games we should've won, and we've lost a few we should not have lost (Texas Tech, at Oklahoma State, at Oklahoma, at TCU with their best 2 players out, and I'm still salty about how we finished that Xavier game). I don't want to hear our players and coach try to politic our way into the Tournament. I'm sick of hearing about strength of schedule. You want in? Go win a game. This is the schedule you signed up to play. Don't complain about it. We've had our chances, and we blew an 8-point lead at home to Texas Tech, and we had one whale of a chance to steal one in Lawrence, and couldn't even get a shot up. If we are left out, we only have ourselves to blame. I give the guys credit - they are playing hard. But, at some point, you have to be able to win a few games in a row.
A win tonight in Ames wouldn't necessarily qualify as a "steal", but it would be huge. If we do not, then everything will be riding on the K-State home finale, and that is a hell of a lot of pressure for one game. One gets us in, two W's gets us past the play-in games in Dayton.
