Defense vs MD?

[.Gerdis]

I missed the game.

I’ve seen some posts here talking about the end of the game. And I read this https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-s-loss-to-maryland-stings-now-will-in-retrospect-too which mentioned a bunch of things that we did well.

I haven’t really seen any discussion of our D. Looks like smith lit us up, and we gave up 45 first half points. Was this the case of an on fire player / team, not matching up well, or did our D take a step backwards in the game? Pretty surprised we gave up that many points, our D had been much improved lately.

 

[fkfootball]

Terrible defense. Maryland came in struggling on offense. You can’t let a Turgeon team do that. He’s Tom Crean level of bad on the sideline.

 

[reabhnt]

Terrible defense. Maryland came in struggling on offense. You can’t let a Turgeon team do that. He’s Tom Crean level of bad on the sideline.

I think this is the second game in a row yhat they have shot the ball well. We couldn't contain Smith, he killed us.

 

[baileyiu]

I think this is the second game in a row yhat they have shot the ball well. We couldn't contain Smith, he killed us.

TJD foul trouble & no Race really hurt us

 

[.Gerdis]

TJD foul trouble & no Race really hurt us

Race DNP (injury?) after falling late in the game versus MSU? Any update?

 

[baileyiu]

Race DNP (injury?) after falling late in the game versus MSU? Any update?

He was in street clothes, took a few shots.

hopefully he is ready to play against psu - we definitely need 4 bigs

 

[kkott]

I missed the game.

I’ve seen some posts here talking about the end of the game. And I read this https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-s-loss-to-maryland-stings-now-will-in-retrospect-too which mentioned a bunch of things that we did well.

I haven’t really seen any discussion of our D. Looks like smith lit us up, and we gave up 45 first half points. Was this the case of an on fire player / team, not matching up well, or did our D take a step backwards in the game? Pretty surprised we gave up that many points, our D had been much improved lately.

Honestly, for me there was alot to be positive about, aside from the fact that we are still just a bit passive when we need to go for the throat. In the first half, I felt it was more MD shooting out of their asses. They hit 3s like no bodies business... but then so did we in countering. In the 2nd half they cooled off... everyone except for Smith and Cowen and some of that was better D on our part. I actually thought Justin Smith did a decent job of checking Smith for stretches of the 2nd half. I really don't know why we didn't start with TJD on Smith. He's got good range and it's uncomfortable for Brunk to guard that far out. Their first possession I was screaming at Brunk, "get out on him"... boom, Smith for 3. I guess he was worried about TJD getting in foul trouble, but he did that anyway. I don't know if Archie's just coaching them that way, but we don't really get out and pressure anyone on the perimeter. I think our 0 steals and their low TO #s demonstrate that. We've all known that if we play lackadaisical for stretches as we are prone to do, it will eventually cost us a game. Yesterday it did. This is still a young team, if they learn from yesterday, that's the best we can do after missing such a golden opportunity. How they respond will tell a lot.

 

[HoosierAlum07]

Our perimeter D is awful! Giving teams way too much space, not contesting shots with any effort, and lazily fighting through screens is the problem!

 

[frikkenfrakken]

I missed the game.

I’ve seen some posts here talking about the end of the game. And I read this https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-s-loss-to-maryland-stings-now-will-in-retrospect-too which mentioned a bunch of things that we did well.

I haven’t really seen any discussion of our D. Looks like smith lit us up, and we gave up 45 first half points. Was this the case of an on fire player / team, not matching up well, or did our D take a step backwards in the game? Pretty surprised we gave up that many points, our D had been much improved lately.

They played a lot of 5 out and drew Brunk out into space. He was slow to closeout and Smith, who doesn't have a great percentage from 3, was burying them.

It got contagious. We started pressuring the ball well and got stops running from about 5 mins left in the first half until about 5 mins left in the game. Then we started trading buckets, and when our offense disappeared in the last two minutes, theirs didn't and we gagged.

We don't have the offensive firepower to just trade buckets, but not everyone on the team seems to understand that. They can't play D for 20 mins a game, take the other 20 off, and expect to win anywhere, even in Assembly. It was kinda like the Nebraska game, except MD is better than Nebraska.

 

[Cavanagh]

Our perimeter D is awful! Giving teams way too much space, not contesting shots with any effort, and lazily fighting through screens is the problem!

for sure the glaring flaw of yesterday’s game. The second half they were just missing wide open threes. It is a miracle we kept the lead around 8 for about 4 minutes. We really were looking to give it away at about th 6:30 minute mark they just weren’t hitting anything.

we have to fix our help/hedging. If Brunk does it and is leaving a shooter like stix we are straight ****ed. He is way too slow. I bet they had 15+ uncontested threes.

 

[minneman]

He was slow to closeout and Smith, who doesn't have a great percentage from 3, was burying them.

Coming in to the game he was just under 40% from 3s for the season and 54% in conference play. Brunk did a poor job guarding him on those shots and it was a coaching mistake to start the game with him guarding Smith and another to not make the change sooner. In 2 games he's now lit up IU shooting 6 of 9 from 3.

I agree with the rest of your statement, though.

 

[kkott]

Our perimeter D is awful! Giving teams way too much space, not contesting shots with any effort, and lazily fighting through screens is the problem!

I think the same overall, but I also wonder if that's how they're coached? Drives me crazy that we always sit back and never seem to pressure the ballhandler outside the 3 pt line. ) steals yesterday and they had what 6 turnovers. I always wanted to attack my man if he picked up his dribble and contest the pass. Durham is especially easy to get by. It seems to me his lower body needs to be strengthened. I think some yoga might do him a world of good.

 

[kkott]

for sure the glaring flaw of yesterday’s game. The second half they were just missing wide open threes. It is a miracle we kept the lead around 8 for about 4 minutes. We really were looking to give it away at about th 6:30 minute mark they just weren’t hitting anything.

we have to fix our help/hedging. If Brunk does it and is leaving a shooter like stix we are straight ****ed. He is way too slow. I bet they had 15+ uncontested threes.

Everyone jumps on this, but Brunks' specifically and our other bigs' generally hedging is not responsible for them getting open 3s for their shooters most of the time. Smith is an anomaly for post players in the way he shoots and, while I agree, Brunk takes 1-2 too many steps out when he hedges, most of the time their big is diving to the post, not spotting up for 3s. The fault in them getting open 3s lies mostly with our guards and wings, not a post helping. I'd further question why we had Brunk on their post who is known to shoot 3s? I think that should have been TJD's assignment to start with. I don't think Brunk should be guarding the other team's post if he's a threat to take 3s. Put TJD on them. I think the way our posts recover from hedging is actually something they do pretty well.

 

[mushroomgod_1]

I missed the game.

I’ve seen some posts here talking about the end of the game. And I read this https://indiana.rivals.com/news/indiana-s-loss-to-maryland-stings-now-will-in-retrospect-too which mentioned a bunch of things that we did well.

I haven’t really seen any discussion of our D. Looks like smith lit us up, and we gave up 45 first half points. Was this the case of an on fire player / team, not matching up well, or did our D take a step backwards in the game? Pretty surprised we gave up that many points, our D had been much improved lately.

I thought the defense was bad most of the game, and its gotten a pass from most on this board.

I think there was something of a let-down in intensity from the MSU game. Would not have been surprising even from a legitimately good team, so a near certainty with our group.

In the first half, we left 3 point shooters wide open until they had hit 9/12. Smith doesn't take lots of 3s, but he hit 38% of them going into the game....now he's at 43%. Once Smith got going the others followed.

In the second half we closed up, and they went around us to the basket at will. Seemingly every time they did that, it was an automatic foul (why do we have so little home court advantage to Purdue, Iowa? Is that on Average Archie?).

Until last night, Maryland had been a little above average team offensively----109th out of 353 in OE). Unfortunately, we are 110/353 defensively. Our much-maligned offense has ranked ahead of our defense the whole year. MD may have turned the corner on their season last night-----MT seemed to think so.

I was surprised to see that MD's D is ranked 30th/353 in DE this year.......so we won the battle there because we hit shots and took care of the ball (22 a/6 TOs), but lost the war due to bad defense and very poor coaching in the final 3 minutes.

 

[victorbear]

for sure the glaring flaw of yesterday’s game. The second half they were just missing wide open threes. It is a miracle we kept the lead around 8 for about 4 minutes. We really were looking to give it away at about th 6:30 minute mark they just weren’t hitting anything.

we have to fix our help/hedging. If Brunk does it and is leaving a shooter like stix we are straight ****ed. He is way too slow. I bet they had 15+ uncontested threes.

Watching the game live though if we press them I think they dribble around us and get to the rim we have a tough time stopping the ball.

 

[Cavanagh]

Watching the game live though if we press them I think they dribble around us and get to the rim we have a tough time stopping the ball.

cowan is the quickest and best ball handler in the big ten, maybe that was the problem. Winston couldn’t run around any of our guards.

 

[kkott]

Here's something I haven't seen discussed on here, but it looked to me like there were some recruits behind the bench who looked like they were really in to the game and environment. Anyone know who they were?

 

[BaxterIU]

Our defensive failure was centered around very weak guard play. MD's guards drove past our guards at will, causing our bigs to leave their man to prevent an uncontested layup, creating wide open 3s. Durham was the worst offender, but no IU guard was good defensively. We got a little better stopping their guards in the 2nd half. But mainly benefitted because, unlike the 1st half, MD missed their 3s.

 

[victorbear]

cowan is the quickest and best ball handler in the big ten, maybe that was the problem. Winston couldn’t run around any of our guards.

They had 5 ball handlers we have like 2.

 

[kkott]

cowan is the quickest and best ball handler in the big ten, maybe that was the problem. Winston couldn’t run around any of our guards.

I agree about Cowan, although don't fully agree about Winston and our guards. Phinisee is our best perimeter defender (but I think even he can improve), and I'd say he's adequate to good at staying in front of his man. Our other guards are poor perimeter defenders and not good at staying in front of their man. That's the core of our problem I believe.

 

[Cavanagh]

I agree about Cowan, although don't fully agree about Winston and our guards. Phinisee is our best perimeter defender (but I think even he can improve), and I'd say he's adequate to good at staying in front of his man. Our other guards are poor perimeter defenders and not good at staying in front of their man. That's the core of our problem I believe.

Last year before his concussion Rob was a far better on ball defender then he is now. There were a few games early in the year I thought he was amazing as well. 50/50 on if that was the competition or he was actually playing great. Ok, maybe 70/30..

So he has lots of room to improve, I mean this team just neeeds to make the tourney. Im gonna get greedy and say they really need to make the tourney and win a game. I mean that isnt too much to ask. They do that, they have a real shot at being a contender every year going forward.

Winning yesterday would have been so good for this damn program. We cant seem to win any of those games ever.

Recruiting is gonna go with winning, they all like Archie I am sure, but they aint coming to a loser.

 

[mushroomgod_1]

I agree about Cowan, although don't fully agree about Winston and our guards. Phinisee is our best perimeter defender (but I think even he can improve), and I'd say he's adequate to good at staying in front of his man. Our other guards are poor perimeter defenders and not good at staying in front of their man. That's the core of our problem I believe.

Here's some stats from college reference.com, which is a great site:

IU defensive efficiency overall 110/353

IU guards individually, in-conference (where 100 is average, and the lower the better)

Al: 108.5
Rob P: 102.7
Devonte Green: 106.2
Aarman Franklin: 107.6

Comment: I don't think people realize, for the most part, how awful Al is and has always been on defense. It's not through lack of effort.....he just has no strength and no balance.

Purdue defensive efficiency overall: 38/353. Purdue guards individually, in-conference:

Nojel Eastern: 94.3
Eric Hunter: 100.8
Isiah Thompson: 100.8

Hurray for the famed Packline D!!!!!

 

[Brockway]

Last year before his concussion Rob was a far better on ball defender then he is now.

It's obvious that Rob is playing the season out with some kind of nagging injury / condition in his mid section. Rob is not able to move at full speed and with full freedom of movement.
We won't see Rob at his best until next season, after he get his condition fixed, either from surgery or full rest and rehab.

 

[kkott]

Last year before his concussion Rob was a far better on ball defender then he is now. There were a few games early in the year I thought he was amazing as well. 50/50 on if that was the competition or he was actually playing great. Ok, maybe 70/30..

So he has lots of room to improve, I mean this team just neeeds to make the tourney. Im gonna get greedy and say they really need to make the tourney and win a game. I mean that isnt too much to ask. They do that, they have a real shot at being a contender every year going forward.

Winning yesterday would have been so good for this damn program. We cant seem to win any of those games ever.

Recruiting is gonna go with winning, they all like Archie I am sure, but they aint coming to a loser.

It is frustrating, but I think it's a learning process. Leadership generally comes from upperclassmen and none of them imo, truly understand what CAM is looking for. Leadership, I believe, will have to come from RP or TJD. But I think the smarts and toughness to close out a game like yesterday has to come from someone on the floor, who leads by example and by voice. Cowan to me looked like that person for MD, but I don't see that on our roster at the moment. Still, this team is way more fun to watch than last year to me.

I agree RP was a better defender last year, but I also give him some slack because I still think he's playing injured. Frankly I'm surprised he's played as well as he has, after watching him at times on the bench. Still looks to be struggling with something (someone said a hernia and that would probably make sense).

 

[kkott]

Here's some stats from college reference.com, which is a great site:

IU defensive efficiency overall 110/353

IU guards individually, in-conference (where 100 is average, and the lower the better)

Al: 108.5
Rob P: 102.7
Devonte Green: 106.2
Aarman Franklin: 107.6

Comment: I don't think people realize, for the most part, how awful Al is and has always been on defense. It's not through lack of effort.....he just has no strength and no balance.

Purdue defensive efficiency overall: 38/353. Purdue guards individually, in-conference:

Nojel Eastern: 94.3
Eric Hunter: 100.8
Isiah Thompson: 100.8

Hurray for the famed Packline D!!!!!

well, is it the recipe or the ingredients? Your post to me says ingredients, but you're complaining about the recipe. I agree with others, Rob is still hurting so I'll cut him some slack. Franklin is a freshman and I think will improve. That leaves Devonte and Al. I have no excuse for them. I do think Al just seems to have extremely weak legs and poor balance. I'd get him in some yoga classes lickety split over the summer. I've never seen a player fall as often as he does, and I think it's the same issue.

 

[mushroomgod_1]

Everyone jumps on this, but Brunks' specifically and our other bigs' generally hedging is not responsible for them getting open 3s for their shooters most of the time. Smith is an anomaly for post players in the way he shoots and, while I agree, Brunk takes 1-2 too many steps out when he hedges, most of the time their big is diving to the post, not spotting up for 3s. The fault in them getting open 3s lies mostly with our guards and wings, not a post helping. I'd further question why we had Brunk on their post who is known to shoot 3s? I think that should have been TJD's assignment to start with. I don't think Brunk should be guarding the other team's post if he's a threat to take 3s. Put TJD on them. I think the way our posts recover from hedging is actually something they do pretty well.

I agree it was an obvious coaching mistake to have Brunk, rather than TJD, on Smith.......I'd say the two are roughly equal as defensive rebounders, if that was a concern....otherwise, maybe he was concerned about TJD getting into foul trouble? Made no sense.

 

[mushroomgod_1]

well, is it the recipe or the ingredients? Your post to me says ingredients, but you're complaining about he recipe. I agree with others, Rob is still hurting so I'll cut him some slack. Franklin is a freshman and I think will improve. That leaves Devonte and Al. I have no excuse for them. I do think Al just seems to have extremely weak legs and poor balance. I'd get him in some yoga classes lickety split over the summer. I've never seen a player fall as often as he does, and I think it's the same issue.

I think it's both.......overall our D is rated 110/353 in efficiency. I haven't checked out all the BT teams, but that has to be on the low end.

So lets look at our starters......you have two, TJD and Smith, that are really good defensive players. I would say TJD is elite, and Smith well above average. And Race is an above-average defender, no doubt, although he struggles against ultra-quick wings. So it's not a situation like Iowa has been in recent years (not this year), where you don't have an above-average defender on the court.

So the answer has to be the guards.....who seem to be bad at both closing out the 3s and not allowing drives to the basket. I blame the pack line D for the former problem. The latter problem seems to be about Ron being hurt, Devonte being dumb, Franklin being new, and Al lacking balance and strength. Al. I think, just should not be a starting guard in the BT. Think of it this way.......if Al was playing for Minnesota or Iowa, is he a guy you'd spend much time game planning for? Obviously not.

And let me tell you a Devonte story, one no one mentioned on here at the time......I think it was the OSU game, which was one of his big games......late in the game someone put up a jump shot, and their off guard easily rebounded the ball and put it back in......something like a minute left in the game....so I later re-watched to see what happened, which was DG stood 15 feet from the basket while his man went right around him for the rebound basket. The morale of the story is that even when he's playing well, you are foolish if you count on Green in winning time. I guess Archie had to learn that for the 30th time last night.......

 

[victorbear]

Last year before his concussion Rob was a far better on ball defender then he is now. There were a few games early in the year I thought he was amazing as well. 50/50 on if that was the competition or he was actually playing great. Ok, maybe 70/30..

So he has lots of room to improve, I mean this team just neeeds to make the tourney. Im gonna get greedy and say they really need to make the tourney and win a game. I mean that isnt too much to ask. They do that, they have a real shot at being a contender every year going forward.

Winning yesterday would have been so good for this damn program. We cant seem to win any of those games ever.

Recruiting is gonna go with winning, they all like Archie I am sure, but they aint coming to a loser.

Dude we beat Michigan STate??? In beginning of the year when both Maryland and Sparty were top 5 did you think we'd win both games at home?

 

[fkfootball]

I wish we would play some zone. Like a 1-3-1 or something. Our length would bother teams.

 

[frikkenfrakken]

Coming in to the game he was just under 40% from 3s for the season and 54% in conference play. Brunk did a poor job guarding him on those shots and it was a coaching mistake to start the game with him guarding Smith and another to not make the change sooner. In 2 games he's now lit up IU shooting 6 of 9 from 3.

I agree with the rest of your statement, though.

Play by play guy said on CBS said he was shooting 30% ish from 3, I thought. Sorry if I misheard or repeated his error.

 

[minneman]

Play by play guy said on CBS said he was shooting 30% ish from 3, I thought. Sorry if I misheard or repeated his error.

He may have been looking at old or possibly career data. Last year he wasn't a very good 3-point shooter at 27% so he's now at 33% for career. So, yeah, if you go by those he doesn't look like a very good shooter. He's obviously improved that shooting tremendously as he's hitting them at a pretty good rate this season and even better in conference.

https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/players/jalen-smith-1.html

 

[T.M.P.]

Here's some stats from college reference.com, which is a great site:

IU defensive efficiency overall 110/353

IU guards individually, in-conference (where 100 is average, and the lower the better)

Al: 108.5
Rob P: 102.7
Devonte Green: 106.2
Aarman Franklin: 107.6

Comment: I don't think people realize, for the most part, how awful Al is and has always been on defense. It's not through lack of effort.....he just has no strength and no balance.

Purdue defensive efficiency overall: 38/353. Purdue guards individually, in-conference:

Nojel Eastern: 94.3
Eric Hunter: 100.8
Isiah Thompson: 100.8

Hurray for the famed Packline D!!!!!

We've extended the defense since the 2nd game of the season. If you extend a pack line it's no longer a pack line..its straight m2m. And you can't cross compare teams using sportreference they dont adj for SOS. Use kenpom.

 

[RickyRoe]

Brunk seems to help and hedge too much on defense. Every time his man sets a pick, Brunk follows him all the way across the court, before finally struggling to recover. We saw this several times against Maryland, leading to easy opportunities from Jalen Smith. I realize that the pack line relies on hedging, but Brunk overdoes it and is not athletic or quick enough to recover.

 

[T.M.P.]

Brunk seems to help and hedge too much on defense. Every time his man sets a pick, Brunk follows him all the way across the court, before finally struggling to recover. We saw this several times against Maryland, leading to easy opportunities from Jalen Smith. I realize that the pack line relies on hedging, but Brunk overdoes it and is not athletic or quick enough to recover.

That's by design (and we do a great job of it) and no a packline does not rely on strong hedging (at least not on high ball screens, orPnR) plus we're not playing much packline this year, or better said, it's been extended. I know the announcers haven't told you guys that yet, but you can simply watch the defense and see how far it's extended at at the wings at times and see we are playing as much straight man this year, especially against spaced offenses..

 

[RickyRoe]

That's by design (and we do a great job of it) and no a packline does not rely on strong hedging (at least not on high ball screens, orPnR) plus we're not playing much packline this year. I know the announcers haven't told you guys that yet, but you can simply watch the defense and see how far it's extended at at the wings and see we are playing a lot of straight man this year, especially against spaced offenses..

https://collegebasketball.nbcsports...ack-line-defense-work-and-how-do-you-beat-it/
"Virginia’s method of defending ball-screens is to hedge hard, to have the man guarding the screener step out of prevent the ball-handler from turning the corner"

Straight up man-to-man defense or pack-line, the point is that Brunk is leaving his man and following the ball-handler all the way across the court. He's just not athletic enough to recover on D, which leads to open shots for Smith. Hedging and helping on D is one thing, but Brunk is overdoing it.

 

[T.M.P.]

https://collegebasketball.nbcsports...ack-line-defense-work-and-how-do-you-beat-it/
"Virginia’s method of defending ball-screens is to hedge hard, to have the man guarding the screener step out of prevent the ball-handler from turning the corner"

Straight up man-to-man defense or pack-line, the point is that Brunk is leaving his man and following the ball-handler all the way across the court. He's just not athletic enough to recover on D, which leads to open shots for Smith. Hedging and helping on D is one thing, but Brunk is overdoing it.

It still doesn't rely on it, I do believe I highlighted that word originally. You can hedge or not and still play packline. It's coaches philosophy or personnel based. We hedge so well we always impact the dribbler, disrupt the opposing offense and make them reset and they have not burnt us on rotation. TJD more so than Brunk. He pushed Winston to the half court line more than once.

The weaknesses are not in the high hedge .. they're elsewhere. Mainly the ability to control dribble penetration, the only thing we do well against the dribble is hedge. It's gotten better but we still have too many breakdowns and straight line drives, and also have an issue and have had one in secondary transition with quick hitters..

 

[snarlcakes]

That's by design (and we do a great job of it) and no a packline does not rely on strong hedging (at least not on high ball screens, orPnR) plus we're not playing much packline this year, or better said, it's been extended. I know the announcers haven't told you guys that yet, but you can simply watch the defense and see how far it's extended at at the wings at times and see we are playing as much straight man this year, especially against spaced offenses..

Can you dorks retire the words “pack line” now?

 

[Harry Hondo]

Terrible defense. Maryland came in struggling on offense. You can’t let a Turgeon team do that. He’s Tom Crean level of bad on the sideline.

Oh come on, the announcers kept saying how good Maryland’s defense was, but IU never shot better. The 3’s Maryland hit in the first half weren’t falling in the second. What cost IU the gsme was guard play down the stretch, turnovers and taking bad shots. They had a 7 point lead with just over a minute to play.

 

[go_iu]

Race DNP (injury?) after falling late in the game versus MSU? Any update?

Does he even play for us anymore?, wish they would have given me a medical redshirt scholarship for 4 years, would have helped with student loans

 

[MrBing]

Does he even play for us anymore?, wish they would have given me a medical redshirt scholarship for 4 years, would have helped with student loans

WTF man. Race has been playing all year and had his best game of the year against MSU but you feel like you should give him some sh!t. Don't be a dick.