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For a team that prides itself on defense it is hard to understand why we are rated so poorly for our 3 point defense.

https://www.ncaa.com/stats/basketball-me...eam/518/p5

It is like Mick simply dares teams to beat us with 3s. Then guess what, when we play a team that shoots the 3 we lose.

My memory is that ECU beat us when even that poor team beat us with the 3 ball.

While the boards are full of speculation as to why we lost yesterday- look no further than 3 point D - a problem all year.

Bohn should challenge Mick to fix this problem.

Problem is we have a defense predicated on switching. It worked brilliantly last year with arguably the two smartest defenders I've ever seen here. This year we had so many breakdowns when switching it was demoralizing to watch.

Another issue was playing JJ and Cane together. If you're going to switch small unathletic guards are not going to be great closing out. There was a shot yesterday where one of them closed out on a shooter and actually closed out pretty well but because of size just got shot over. We need intelligent guards with size and athleticism for this to work. Logan will help immensely next year.



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As I've said in a couple other threads, our pride in our 2 point defense is the starting point for our problems with three point D. When we collapse on the single big guy in the middle that free at least one and many times multiple shooters on the perimeter. As several regular posters on this board have shown, a team that shoots even 35% on 3's, means the other team must shoot at least 52% on an equal number of 2 point possessions. That's a huge % difference, one that may be able to be consistently overcome in league play... especially a league like ours but it's a formula that breaks down quickly in a series of win or go home scenarios.

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(03-23-2019 11:45 AM)RealDeal Wrote:  Problem is we have a defense predicated on switching. It worked brilliantly last year with arguably the two smartest defenders I've ever seen here. This year we had so many breakdowns when switching it was demoralizing to watch.

Another issue was playing JJ and Cane together. If you're going to switch small unathletic guards are not going to be great closing out. There was a shot yesterday where one of them closed out on a shooter and actually closed out pretty well but because of size just got shot over. We need intelligent guards with size and athleticism for this to work. Logan will help immensely next year.



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Agreed. Cronin needs to make a decision, if he is dedicated to running a certain offense, he needs to only recruit guys who are capable of playing it. Cronin seems to want to be like Jim Boeheim and have a certain defense be the staple of his program. And if he wants to do that and can succeed at it (which he mostly has), that's fine.

But that means we shouldn't be going after guys like Broome, Jenifer or Kyle Washington (3 recent examples). Skilled players who don't have the physical abilities to play his defense. It seems like most years there's at least one square peg Cronin is trying to fit into a round hole and refusing to change the defense to compensate.

Next year everyone on the roster should have the size and athleticism to run Mick's defense and run it well. With 3 senior starters there should be no excuse for mistakes.

I posted this in the thread I started, but think it is an interesting enough stat to be posted here. Of the 200 (out of 353, so over half the teams in the NCAA) worst 3 point percentage defenses only 17 made the NCAA tournament and only 5 are still playing (Baylor, Minnesota, Kentucky, Tennessee and Auburn).

Of the 30 best 3 point percentage defenses, 12 made the NCAA tournament and 10 are still playing. This include 3 1 seeds (Duke, Virginia and Gonzaga), a 2 seed (Michigan) and 2 3 seeds (Houston and Texas Tech).

^^=== This!

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The matchup zone works when you have a bunch of versatile defenders that can guard 3-4 positions. It doesn't work when you have Broome and Jennifer in the game, and Brooks. The best coaches know how to adjust their personel and schemes game to game, and in game as well. See Bill Belechick. Roy Williams does a really good job of this as well.

(03-24-2019 10:53 AM)jarr Wrote:  The matchup zone works when you have a bunch of versatile defenders that can guard 3-4 positions. It doesn't work when you have Broome and Jennifer in the game, and Brooks. The best coaches know how to adjust their personel and schemes game to game, and in game as well. See Bill Belechick. Roy Williams does a really good job of this as well.

I guess it depends what you mean by "works". They were still a top 30 defense this year so it was mostly effective. However, unlike last season there were glaring weaknesses (3 point defense and defensive rebounding). I'm not sure they had the personnel to be any better in man to man defense either. Mick has adjusted his defense at times over the years. The SK team had a ton of long, versatile defenders so they played a switching man to man defense. This team may have just lacked the defensive talent, particularly with their wings and their backup big men.

(03-23-2019 11:29 AM)Bcatbog Wrote:  For a team that prides itself on defense it is hard to understand why we are rated so poorly for our 3 point defense.

https://www.ncaa.com/stats/basketball-me...eam/518/p5

It is like Mick simply dares teams to beat us with 3s. Then guess what, when we play a team that shoots the 3 we lose.

My memory is that ECU beat us when even that poor team beat us with the 3 ball.

While the boards are full of speculation as to why we lost yesterday- look no further than 3 point D - a problem all year.

Bohn should challenge Mick to fix this problem.

it will never change...its by design. Mick has stated numerous times in interviews....he said in the Big East he learned if you run around trying to defend both the 3pt AND the paint, you end up defending neither. So he decided that he would defend the 2pt/paint shot at all cost even if it means giving up a little on the 3pt line. He does this because of statistics. I think its dumb, but Im not the coach.

So, it won't change until/unless he changes his philosophy. But he's stubborn so, don't hold your breath.


It wouldn't be a bad idea if Mick's teams scored a lot themselves. But we give up a lot of three's and we don't 'return fire' because Mick can't coach offense. So every game is a rock fight. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The biggest concern to me is that it was a problem all year and Cronin never adjusted. UC finished dead last in the AAC in defending the three and played the Big Ten's best three point shooting team and did NOTHING to adjust. Cronin just ran out the same defense he had been using all year and Iowa made them pay for it. How does that happen? Cronin knew it was a problem all year and never adjusted.

In all of his interviews all year long he would talk about how he was continuing to teach guys to be in the right position. At some point as a coach you need to come to the realization that your players aren't capable of running that defense so you try something else. Nope, Cronin continued to run that switching defense which put guys like Broome, Jenifer, and Brooks in bad mismatch situations. Hey Mick, Gary Clark and Jacob Evans aren't hear anymore. You might not be able to run the same defense this year that you did last year with the two best defenders in your tenure at UC gone.

So frustrating. I like Mick but his inability or unwillingness to change is maddening. UC desperately needs a need assistant coach that isn't a "yes man" and is willing to challenge Cronin ... and coach some offense.

(03-25-2019 02:49 PM)nachoman91 Wrote:  The biggest concern to me is that it was a problem all year and Cronin never adjusted. UC finished dead last in the AAC in defending the three and played the Big Ten's best three point shooting team and did NOTHING to adjust. Cronin just ran out the same defense he had been using all year and Iowa made them pay for it. How does that happen? Cronin knew it was a problem all year and never adjusted.

In all of his interviews all year long he would talk about how he was continuing to teach guys to be in the right position. At some point as a coach you need to come to the realization that your players aren't capable of running that defense so you try something else.

Honestly, and without casting aspersions, this could be a bball IQ thing. You drill a certain set of principles day in and day out for years and all of the sudden you switch schemes? i imagine that wouldn't have worked well.

(03-25-2019 02:49 PM)nachoman91 Wrote:  Hey Mick, Gary Clark and Jacob Evans aren't hear anymore. You might not be able to run the same defense this year that you did last year with the two best defenders in your tenure at UC gone.

i think a lot of about this season would have looked very different if JEIII was here on both sides of the ball. He did what was best for him and i certainly don't begrudge him that but imagine if we went small with JJ, Jarron, Keith, JEIII and Tre or you could have had a more conventional lineup with JEIII and Jarron handling the ball and Tre, Keith and Nysier.

(03-24-2019 10:13 PM)Bearcats#1 Wrote:  it will never change...its by design. Mick has stated numerous times in interviews....he said in the Big East he learned if you run around trying to defend both the 3pt AND the paint, you end up defending neither. So he decided that he would defend the 2pt/paint shot at all cost even if it means giving up a little on the 3pt line. He does this because of statistics. I think its dumb, but Im not the coach.

i don't have as big a problem with this as you do. Statistically this is probably right. Shooting at the collegiate level is probably getting better but still not good enough that given the choice, generally speaking, you are going to sacrifice 2 pt defense over 3 pt defense. As noted by many others, we'll have more size on the perimeter because of the departures. That said, i feel that we got killed in transition and that the bearcats didn't take time to identify shooters in the Iowa game. That's an entirely different problem then defending the three pointers against our set defense.

One of the big keys to 3 point defense is preventing penetration. When you make that first step toward collapsing on the penetration, something on the outside opens up.

The team of Broome, Jennifer, and Cumberland were not that great at stopping penetration. (Not awful, mind you - just not that great.) Last year, Evans was very good at both denying the ball and stopping penetration. And Gary Clark was pretty good against those who did penetrate without getting himself into foul trouble. While Brooks and Scott age good defenders, they are not quite in Clark's class as yet.

I am hopeful that Johnson will be a little better on D than JJ and Broome were this year. That and even a marginal improvement elsewhere should combine to make a real difference on defense. (Hopeful, not convinced.)

(03-26-2019 10:49 AM)eroc Wrote:  

(03-24-2019 10:13 PM)Bearcats#1 Wrote:  it will never change...its by design. Mick has stated numerous times in interviews....he said in the Big East he learned if you run around trying to defend both the 3pt AND the paint, you end up defending neither. So he decided that he would defend the 2pt/paint shot at all cost even if it means giving up a little on the 3pt line. He does this because of statistics. I think its dumb, but Im not the coach.

i don't have as big a problem with this as you do. Statistically this is probably right. Shooting at the collegiate level is probably getting better but still not good enough that given the choice, generally speaking, you are going to sacrifice 2 pt defense over 3 pt defense. As noted by many others, we'll have more size on the perimeter because of the departures. That said, i feel that we got killed in transition and that the bearcats didn't take time to identify shooters in the Iowa game. That's an entirely different problem then defending the three pointers against our set defense.

This is a good point and something that plagued this UC team all year. UC has mostly been good to very good at defending 3 point shooters under Mick. They'll sometimes give up looks but they are usually scouting report looks where they give the shot to a guy who isn't one of the guys that typically kills you from out there. This year I felt they would often help off of good shooters or fail to identify the shooters and get burnt. I think that's also reflected in that UC let teams not only make, but take a ton of threes. Usually UC is middle of the back in three pointers allowed, but this year because they gave up good looks to good shooters, teams took more of them. Their 3 point defense was a real issue this year.