What kind of team is the toughest matchup for the gophers?

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march madness

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I think Syracuse and their 2-3 zone. They are a very good rebounding team also (5th in nation). Sometimes no one can shoot on our team. They have excellent athletes that probably could negate some of the matchups Rodney and Trevor get in our favor. They are super deep. pg M. Carter-Williams at 6'6" is a tough matchup for anyone. They are unbeaten, but only have played one top 25 team in San diego St.

The other type of teams that would be a touch matchup would probably be Louisville and Florida. They are very uptempo with athletes, can press fullcourt. I think after streaky outside shooting, the next weakness for the gophers is ball handling.

I am not ripping on the gophers. I think they can match up with almost anyone pretty well. They have quickness at every position, decent depth, 3-4 different guys who can get you 25. One who can get 41. They are excellent on defense and on the boards. I just think matchups matter especially during tourney time.
 

Any team with a strong, well-built center (see Plumlee with Duke). I'm not certain that Eliason even knows what a barbell looks like and it is woefully apparent against stronger opponents. If they are 6'10''+, Trevor and Rodney will have trouble guarding them and we can lose that way.
 

march madness said:
I think Syracuse and their 2-3 zone. They are a very good rebounding team also (5th in nation).
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Syracuse tends to be awful at defensive rebounding (zone is partly to blame), but I would agree their defense overall would be tough for the Gophers to score on.
 

Teams that press and trap, definitely.

Agree with march madness, not sure about our guards yet as it pertains to handling serious pressure. I thought if the Gophers played VCU in the Bahamas that would not have been a good match-up for us
 

SelectionSunday said:
Teams that press and trap, definitely.

Agree with march madness, not sure about our guards yet as it pertains to handling serious pressure. I thought if the Gophers played VCU in the Bahamas that would not have been a good match-up for us
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Agreed. That is my biggest concern at this time.

My other major concern is as PeanutButter said - the team with tall, athletic scoring center.
 


So a team with great guards and a top end athletic scoring center...sounds like a matchup problem for almost any team?;)
 

PeanutButterTubbyTime said:
Any team with a strong, well-built center (see Plumlee with Duke). I'm not certain that Eliason even knows what a barbell looks like and it is woefully apparent against stronger opponents. If they are 6'10''+, Trevor and Rodney will have trouble guarding them and we can lose that way.
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But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
 


Bad Gopher said:
But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
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Zing!
 



Great question and one that leads us to MSU and the many questions built within that match up.
 

gopherbadgerman said:
So a team with great guards and a top end athletic scoring center...sounds like a matchup problem for almost any team?;)
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Not necessarily great guards. More like, defensive-minded guards who can create havoc with their quickness, especially against teams who don't really have a true PG.
 

Bad Gopher said:
But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
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Agreed. But what about his offense?
 

Bad Gopher said:
But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
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This board doesn't make me laugh very often, but this one got me. The only other time was the one last year where everyone was photoshopping the zombies onto that picture with Bo and the clowns in the crowd behind him.
 




Let's see good 6'10" and bigger centers. Yes you have: Plumlee, Zeller, Noel N., Iverson, Berggren, I. Austin,Withey, Muscala, Cohen and Dieng. Almost all of these are projected NBA players, lottery, first round, second, or free agent. And they all are all conference type players. Luckily only 2 are in our conference, which is the best conference in the country. So yes this would be a problem, but my point is really quick skilled guards are everywhere. Good 6'10" players are one and dones and there just aren't that many of them.
 

Bad Gopher said:
But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
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:clap::clap::clap:
 

A team that can reduce our dribble drive and kick out to the perimeter will likely cause us troubles. We are built on pounding it in down low and then passing out to the perimeter for an open 3. If a team forces us to run that "wheel" offense and limits the dribble penetration it will make it hard for the Gophers. Unless Andre is in one of those zones, we have no one who can create his own space to hit from 3 point range or even mid-range with consistency. Zone defenses can sometimes cause this effect if they deny the pass down low.
 

tinyarch said:
A team that can reduce our dribble drive and kick out to the perimeter will likely cause us troubles. We are built on pounding it in down low and then passing out to the perimeter for an open 3. If a team forces us to run that "wheel" offense and limits the dribble penetration it will make it hard for the Gophers. Unless Andre is in one of those zones, we have no one who can create his own space to hit from 3 point range or even mid-range with consistency. Zone defenses can sometimes cause this effect if they deny the pass down low.
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All of the bolded parts hold true for any team in any game, anywhere.
 

I would agree with the guy who said Syracuse. I don't think we would stand a chance against that zone. Other than that, I can't think of a team that we couldn't beat. I think we beat Duke if they shoot like humans next time.
 

Dr.Don said:
All of the bolded parts hold true for any team in any game, anywhere.
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True. I wrote it that way because there aren't a lot of teams that the Gophers have faced so far who could do those things. As others have said, a zone like Syracuse plays would likely give problems. Matchup zones like Temple plays would also be difficult for this team. I'm curious to see what Izzo does with the amount of time he has available to plan. The distinct advantage the Gophers have over MSU is that the game is being played at the barn. The home court advantage should play a significant positive factor for the Gophers.

Trying to think of a team that is clearly inferior to the Gophers, but may cause us problems...it may be a team like Iowa. They were effective against us last year with less athletic players.
 

I don't disagree, tiny. But all of the "if's" "but's" "unlesses" etc hold true for big games between any two good teams. What it boils down to is whichever team wins all of the "if's" is the better team for that day, and that day only.

How good are the Gophers? How good is MSU? We will find out which of the two is the better team in this one, and one only, game.

I, in my heart, believe we have a very good team and will win this game. But will we be better than MSU on the 31st? I can't wait to find out.

Go Gophers!!!
 

Bad Gopher said:
But Elliott has also had trouble against a smaller, quicker center. So generally he has trouble with other players. If we could play a team without players, Elliott would be in better shape defensively.
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Dynamite drop in!
 

tinyarch said:
Trying to think of a team that is clearly inferior to the Gophers, but may cause us problems...it may be a team like Iowa. They were effective against us last year with less athletic players.
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Iowa has some athletic players: White, basabe, May, Marble. They lost their most skilled player when Gatens graduated and their 3pt shooting has really suffered. Iowa is starting 3 freshmen. The gophers were a bit of a mess last year. I don't think teams will look past Iowa which seemed to happen some last year. Any team that has a great pg who can limit turnovers against us, and one with big bodies who can negate our offensive rebounding could spell trouble, especially if we aren't hitting 3's ourselves.
 



One huge advantage MSU has on the Gophers...They can match us inside AND they have a proven closer in Appling who beat us before, 2 years ago as I recall. He also beat Kansas this year with an acrobatic move down the lane. If the game is close, that guy is tough to stop. Hopefully, we'll have a solid lead by the last 5 minutes.
 

Michigan State commits a lot of sloppy, unforced turnovers. This is a team I think the Gophers can turn over a quite a bit if we apply occasional full-court pressure. We do not want to get into a half-court game with MSU. Advantage Sparty if this is a bare-knuckles Big Ten scrum.
 

Might not be a bad idea to get the Spartans running, because they are horribly inefficient in fast-break situations. And look at that most efficient transition team!

transition_scatter_medium.JPG

http://www.theonlycolors.com/2012/12/20/3787726/post-patsy-plottin

For comparison, for all types of possessions, the Spartans average 1.08 point per possesion, so their transition offense is much worse than their regular offense.
 

Recently Izzo has started giving the freshman Costello good minutes off the bench. He and Gauna are others bigs Izzo can go to when he needs to spell Payne and (especially) Nix. Another reason we don't want this game to be a 50's or 60's fistfight.

Warning: If Russell Byrd hits a couple threes for Sparty, that's a really bad omen for the Gophers. He was recruited as a shooter, he's had tons of injury problems, and now he can't hit the broad side of a barn (6 for 32 from 3). Izzo has given Byrd (a co-captain) every chance in the world to snap out of it, but Byrd has lost all confidence in his shooting stroke. He better not discover it Monday.

I still have visions of Sean Harrington deflating a raucous Williams Arena crowd with a plethora of 3-point daggers in a previous Big Ten opener (2002-03 season). No repeat performance, please.
 

If I just pick the team that I think the Gophers will really have a tough time with, then I'd pick Michigan. I know we get them at home, which is a huge bonus for us, but Michigan can light it up in a hurry and has just enough strength inside to cause us problems down low. Once those shooters start hitting 3's, however, it's awfully hard to match them. Look for Michigan to play a zone and make us chase them in the half-court. Against Beilein it seems that the Gophers have really struggled. In the past 4 years we're 1-7 against Michigan.
 

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