Our defense might've had a LOT to do with WVs poor offensive performance. Our half court offense is what it is. We do shoot a lot of 3's but we do drive to the basket quite often...but again, the key is our guys in the paint. If we are comfortable getting tha ball in their hands in the paint or dishes off drives, our 3-pt shooting accuracy is less of a factor. However, we're a good outside shooting team that can play defense. Again, our chance at winning it all is dependent on our paint play. Beating a top 10 team on the road is big. I like what I saw...a lot.
I agree with what you say about our defense against WVU and posted as much above. When we outrebound our opponent, our chances for winning increases. I disagree, however, that we drive quite often to the basket. We do when transition dictates but mostly avoid it as a viable option of adjustment to our poor arc shooting. We, instead, seem to embrace that classic definition of insanity.
Why do you post our half court offense is what it is? It IS what we make it (including adjustments)and we've made it defendable and exponentially high risk. We usually weave aimlessly around the perimeter until the player with the ball within 5 seconds of the shot clock throws one up. Nice strategy and not too creative in my book making it an exploitable weakness.
In the 1st half of the season when we were dominant, we were clicking in all phases of the game including the half court and we would open up healthy double-digit halftime leads that would eventually expand. That trend has evaporated in the 2nd half because our often cold half court game has either been defended well through adjustments or our shot selection/shooter from the arc has gone/continues to go awry.
A reduction - no matter how marginal it seems - in our 3 point accuracy is an unfavorable trend that has come back in the 2nd half of the season to bite us deep. Missed 3 pointers usually bounce farther away from the rim making Spangler and Lattin less effective in the paint with put back attempts and rebounding - their specialty.
Rebounding is a major defensive key and favorable stats most often correlates into a better transition game. Easy points for sure. That favorable statistical trend which has been absent in recent weeks suddenly returned against a frigid shooting WVU in a big way despite our continuing unfavorable 3 point shooting trend. Seems we 've decided to live and die by the 3.
Our two top FG % shooters are Lattin (56%) and Spangler (55%). Neither takes enough shots (combined 11 shots/game) as opposed to 38 shots/game from our starting guards. Spangler gets most of his points in the transition game as he runs the court well in such situations and when he misses, he usually shoots FT's. Both positives.
In the 1st half of the season, Spangler was shooting 3's with the accuracy of our guards. In the 2nd half, he has all but abandoned the shot because of a string of horrible misses. No confidence anymore and his forte is not driving to the basket so he doesn't pick up any self-created scoring, fouls, or kick backs to an open arc shooter.
Spangler is not a terrible shooter and it seems his game from 8-12 feet from the basket is available at will right now. I'd rather see a miss here that can be rebounded by Lattin or others and put back for points than a wildly attempted and missed 3 that bounds far off the rim (fueling our opponents transition game) negating the strengths of our big guys under the bucket.
I feel similarly about Lattin and his scoring ability. He's not going to attempt any 3's (hasn't taken one all season) so his best opportunities are those that are designed (such as the inbound lob pass underneath the basket late against WVU) or created through his tenacious effort under the basket off a short and soft miss. He would benefit significantly and be more of a scoring force if we had our guards drive to the basket more often. He has super leaping ability and seriously long arms. I also believe his eventual niche will be as a shooter from 8-12 feet from the basket.
If we go up against a bigger front court game, we're in trouble since we have not established Spangler and Lattin as potential mid-range shooting options. This is fatal, IMHO.
Boomer Sooner