Florida St another Arkansas?

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march madness

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So this florida st. team beats #10 VCU, a pressing team, by 18. They shot 54% from the floor, outrebounded VCU 50 to 34, but also commited 25 turnovers. They held VCU to 29% FG percentage. They also took Michigan to overtime and lost by 1 at florida!

This same team needed a last second shot to beat a 2-4 Northeastern team. Where they were outrebounded, outshot, and where FSU only had 6 assists the entire game.

Here is the problem playing this uptempo pressing style against teams with more athelticsm and depth! To beat this team you would slow it down and play half court basketball. I hope the Hollins' are on because it will take one heck of a game to beat this team. MO and EE will need to play well as well. But more importantly i think Pitino may have to coach a great game and maybe even not press full court as much and make this team beat you in the half court. Half court traps might cause more turnovers.

Florida St. is lead by 6'3" SR Ian Miller, a combo guard putting up 15 a game, and a very good shooter. Joining him in the backcourt is 6'3" SO Devon Bookert another good 3pt shooter. PF Okoro White (6'8" 205)leads the froncourt with 14 and 7 a game. 6'5" SO A. Thomas plays the sf and chips in with 10pts, 3 stls per game, he is not a shoooter. Ojo is a large 7-1 292 SO center who puts in 4 and 6 with a block a game. 6'7" SO wing Montay Brandon also contributes with 10 and 6 a game and he is also not a shooter. 6'9" 220 SR Gilchrist helps with 7 and 3 and can hit from outside.

Overall, Miller, Bookert, and Gilchrist can shoot the 3, but the rest of the team is pretty poor. They have made just 30 in 7 games. They are an ok rebounding team, a very good defensive team averaging 9 stls and 6 blocks per game. 50% fg, 72% ft, and 35% 3pt. As a young team they do turn it over 17 per game as they don't have that pure pg and they feed off the defense!
 

Not sure how this game is going to go, but I think Pitino would like to play that Arkansas game over again, so this is the next best chance to do that.

The thing I find interesting is people's opinions on the effectiveness of Pitino's style. We've heard since he was hired how the style can't possibly work against slow-it-down Big Ten teams. Now the drumbeat of how we can't play this style against faster teams. Well, which is it? Is it just that people don't subscribe to this style one way or another, or that they don't think this group of players can play it, or that they don't trust this coaching staff to coach it, or...?
 

Bad Gopher said:
Not sure how this game is going to go, but I think Pitino would like to play that Arkansas game over again, so this is the next best chance to do that.

The thing I find interesting is people's opinions on the effectiveness of Pitino's style. We've heard since he was hired how the style can't possibly work against slow-it-down Big Ten teams. Now the drumbeat of how we can't play this style against faster teams. Well, which is it? Is it just that people don't subscribe to this style one way or another, or that they don't think this group of players can play it, or that they don't trust this coaching staff to coach it, or...?
Click to expand...

At the end of the day- if you have the players, you can impose your will on the other team to a large degree. The challenge this year is that they only have some of the players needed to do this- we are about two guys from being there. Therefore the style will come into question from time to time. It's okay to take some lumps year one if you can go get the players and then teach them how to win in the system.

We have seen two guys come into U of M sports over the past 10 years with unique styles of play. Monson came in with the Gonzaga up tempo style -but could never get enough players nor could he develop a defensive mindset. Several years in, he found himself changing styles and hiring Molinari to coach defense. In the end the lack of good players killed him. Brewster brought in the run and shoot offense and a lot of talk, but couldn't get the players, nor coach the discipline, then he went into panic and switched systems confusing everyone- including the players.

I expect that Pitino will resolve all of the problems these other two gents dealt with. I think he willl get the players he needs and I therefore I think he will be able to stick with the system. I do hope that he finds games where he needs to adapt and does so in order to win that game while not dumping his system for the long run. In any sport the better the players you have the more possessions you want to have- this makes the odds turn in your favor. In the short run this may be tough because we won't have many games this year in conference play where we have the superior talent.
 

march madness said:
Here is the problem playing this uptempo pressing style against teams with more athelticsm and depth! To beat this team you would slow it down and play half court basketball. I hope the Hollins' are on because it will take one heck of a game to beat this team. MO and EE will need to play well as well. But more importantly i think Pitino may have to coach a great game and maybe even not press full court as much and make this team beat you in the half court. Half court traps might cause more turnovers.
Click to expand...

Pitino has not hedged on his commitment to this style of ball. He has had a few opportunities to back-peddle or state excuses why he might not go all in on his philosophy, but he has stayed the course. I see no changes in the near future...we are going to press you all game, we will change things up in half-court situations, zones, traps, basic man to man and a few things in between. But, we will press you all game, not always the same way but after a made shot etc. we will press you.
Tonight is a big game, the biggest remaining on the nonconf schedule. Enjoy.
 

Bad Gopher said:
Not sure how this game is going to go, but I think Pitino would like to play that Arkansas game over again, so this is the next best chance to do that.

The thing I find interesting is people's opinions on the effectiveness of Pitino's style. We've heard since he was hired how the style can't possibly work against slow-it-down Big Ten teams. Now the drumbeat of how we can't play this style against faster teams. Well, which is it? Is it just that people don't subscribe to this style one way or another, or that they don't think this group of players can play it, or that they don't trust this coaching staff to coach it, or...?
Click to expand...

Sorry to draw a football analogy, but it reminds me of when Brewster was hired and talked about how we were going to run the spread. I think everyone knew that the team was not recruited for that purpose and thought we would struggle. Everyone talked about patience and waiting to get the players to fit his system, etc., but it never worked out (okay, there were a million other reasons as well).

I think the same thing is happening here, where Pitino is trying to institute something but does not have the players to do it. However, I am not so sure Pitino can get the players. If he had snagged Whitedhead, Travis, Jones and Vaughn, I would say he was definitely on the right track. However, without the high level talent, I am not so sure he can do what he is trying to do and I think next year we are going to be in the same situation as this year.

If you put Louisville's or Kentucky's roster here, no problem running the system Pitino wants to run, but he is nowhere near that talent level currently and it will take several good recruiting classes to get there. Keeping my fingers crossed it happens.
 


goldy93 said:
Sorry to draw a football analogy, but it reminds me of when Brewster was hired and talked about how we were going to run the spread. I think everyone knew that the team was not recruited for that purpose and thought we would struggle. Everyone talked about patience and waiting to get the players to fit his system, etc., but it never worked out (okay, there were a million other reasons as well).

I think the same thing is happening here, where Pitino is trying to institute something but does not have the players to do it. However, I am not so sure Pitino can get the players. If he had snagged Whitedhead, Travis, Jones and Vaughn, I would say he was definitely on the right track. However, without the high level talent, I am not so sure he can do what he is trying to do and I think next year we are going to be in the same situation as this year.

If you put Louisville's or Kentucky's roster here, no problem running the system Pitino wants to run, but he is nowhere near that talent level currently and it will take several good recruiting classes to get there. Keeping my fingers crossed it happens.
Click to expand...

Right track! With that class and the returning Gophers we'd be ranked in the top 10 in the country next year. He'll get the players-but it will take a little time.
 

goldy93 said:
Sorry to draw a football analogy, but it reminds me of when Brewster was hired and talked about how we were going to run the spread. I think everyone knew that the team was not recruited for that purpose and thought we would struggle. Everyone talked about patience and waiting to get the players to fit his system, etc., but it never worked out (okay, there were a million other reasons as well).

I think the same thing is happening here, where Pitino is trying to institute something but does not have the players to do it. However, I am not so sure Pitino can get the players. If he had snagged Whitedhead, Travis, Jones and Vaughn, I would say he was definitely on the right track. However, without the high level talent, I am not so sure he can do what he is trying to do and I think next year we are going to be in the same situation as this year.

If you put Louisville's or Kentucky's roster here, no problem running the system Pitino wants to run, but he is nowhere near that talent level currently and it will take several good recruiting classes to get there. Keeping my fingers crossed it happens.
Click to expand...

Basketball isn't football. You need far fewer players to run your system. In football, it can take three or four years to get your system in place. In basketball, it will take one or two. There are also far more players to be had in basketball to run your system than in football.
 





goldy93 said:
If you put Louisville's or Kentucky's roster here, no problem running the system Pitino wants to run, but he is nowhere near that talent level currently and it will take several good recruiting classes to get there. Keeping my fingers crossed it happens.
Click to expand...

I've seen this sentiment shared on here before; that younger Pitino can't succeed without the sort of talent that his father has at Louisville. While elder Pitino certainly has talent, I think it's a great exaggeration to say that he's winning with elite prep talent. Here are the RSCI rankings for his current rotation, in descending order of PPG:

Russ Smith not ranked in the top 100, 2010
Chris Jones #59, 2011 (went Juco route)
Montrezl Harrell #85, 2012
Wayne Blackshear #26, 2011
Luke Hancock not ranked, transfer
Chane Benahan #24, 2011
Terry Rozier #75, 2012; #53, 2013
Stephan Van Treese not ranked
Mangok Mathiang not ranked
Kevin Ware #74, 2011

Certainly some highly ranked recruits in there, but no "super elite" talents. Benahan & Blackshear were the highest ranked and have made it to their junior years, and they certainly don't appear to be tracking as early entrants to the NBA. In fact, elder Pitino, among the elite coaches, has seemed to master the ability to recruit the mid-100 talent really well-very good talent, but likely to stick around for three or four years. Hopefully our Pitino can do the same.
 

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