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Defense

M

mooresville hawk

HB All-American
Feb 4, 2004
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I hope Fran learned his lesson about playing Joe T, Tony and even Ahron more to help the team play better defense. That being said, I am encouraged that Fran is trying some different things as I do not recall seeing the march-up zone in previous years.

Fran knows that his starters do not play good defense and I do not think he is OK with that. I have read on here frequently that Fran does not know how to coach defense. We seem to forget that Fran had teams that were top 35 in defensive efficiency between 2012 and 2016. This team is not going to get back to those levels, but they can be better than they have shown so far.

Fran constructed this team, so he is ultimately responsible for their play. The college basketball season is a long one and the most important thing is to be playing well in March though. Iowa has some time to figure it out, but they do make it more difficult with each loss. Hopefully we see this team get back on track again this year and we see Fran mixing in the offensive and defensive players better starting with today’s game. We will see.
 
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I will add that the BIg is the definition of a meat grinder league, can’t rely on refs to make calls.
 
General Tso said:
The team needs to plaster the Cobra Kai motto on their walls.
Click to expand...

2907-parent__02769.1551756644.jpg
 
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So I fell down the rabbit hole of Sports Reference.com and decided to rate every Big Ten team's main contributing big men/forwards who I think are their team's version of centers/post players. This is a ranking of a player's defensive rating per 100 possessions.

I probably missed some and probably added some that fans of those teams would probably say don't qualify for that position.........I say deal with it.

With that said, here's what I see as a need for improvement based on these stats:

Jack Nunge is 23rd out 34 players rated in overall defensive rating, and 22nd in the Big Ten.

Luka Garza is 27th out of 34, and 30th in conference.

We know how bad our guards are defensively, which is funny when fans of other teams overlook that fact when bashing us.

But I think that Garza and Nunge's defense also tends to get glossed over at times.

Garza gets a pass because he's our top scorer and we need him on the floor to facilitate our offense. We know he's slow and really just good for taking some space in the lane (he is underrated as a shot blocker), and hopefully getting rebounds, though he is not quick enough to beat anyone to a ball in a foot race, and I do feel that he will be content with giving up baskets so as to not pick up the cheap contact fouls that refs are looking for because of Garza's size and strength. (and that also does go back to Fran's 2 foul rule, because you really do see it, especially in the 1st half with guys choosing not to risk leaving the benefit of the doubt to the crappy officials and just conceding baskets......which is a "playing not to lose" mentality, but that still goes back to the coaching philosophy).

Nunge, on the other hand, does need to step it up a little more, even though he is ahead of Garza, statistically. Nunge's issues are more on reaction to what's happening around him (which is an issue with every player we have on the floor that's playing defense at a given time anyway, fwiw....................just sayin), and the fact that he still needs to get stronger and gives up too many rebounds to our opponents or just loses the ball through his hands. If Nunge can't be a presence as a defensive rebounder, then that is a problem.

He doesn't have to excel at shot blocking. We just need him to be good at shot bothering, at least right now, and that would go a long way to making a difference. But that goes back to what his limitations are and why that's easier said than done......but it'd be really nice if it did get done.

Please?....... ☹
 
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BlackNGoldBleeder said:
Yep. Unfortunately, you can't make chicken salad out of chicken shit.

The only way this team is defending better is if Perkins, Ulis, and JT get a lot more minutes.
Click to expand...

This makes sense but they did play the last game against Indiana and not score a point. So, better defense would mean holding the opponent to negative zero.....🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️
 
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HawkRugged17 said:
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There's still some breakdowns (young guys and recognition issues), and some shortcomings that they can't physically overcome (Bohannon and giving up easy rebounds because we stand and watch the ball....I'm convinced that's not gonna stop), but they have been getting better (subtly) each game.

Fran botched the OSU game, switching out of man when we were effective. We held Indiana to 67, and Rutgers to 66.

For Iowa, that should be easy wins if our offense is doing its job..........Tonight it did.
 
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EvilMonkeyInTheCloset said:
So I fell down the rabbit hole of Sports Reference.com and decided to rate every Big Ten team's main contributing big men/forwards who I think are their team's version of centers/post players. This is a ranking of a player's defensive rating per 100 possessions.

I probably missed some and probably added some that fans of those teams would probably say don't qualify for that position.........I say deal with it.

With that said, here's what I see as a need for improvement based on these stats:

Jack Nunge is 23rd out 34 players rated in overall defensive rating, and 22nd in the Big Ten.

Luka Garza is 27th out of 34, and 30th in conference.

We know how bad our guards are defensively, which is funny when fans of other teams overlook that fact when bashing us.

But I think that Garza and Nunge's defense also tends to get glossed over at times.

Garza gets a pass because he's our top scorer and we need him on the floor to facilitate our offense. We know he's slow and really just good for taking some space in the lane (he is underrated as a shot blocker), and hopefully getting rebounds, though he is not quick enough to beat anyone to a ball in a foot race, and I do feel that he will be content with giving up baskets so as to not pick up the cheap contact fouls that refs are looking for because of Garza's size and strength. (and that also does go back to Fran's 2 foul rule, because you really do see it, especially in the 1st half with guys choosing not to risk leaving the benefit of the doubt to the crappy officials and just conceding baskets......which is a "playing not to lose" mentality, but that still goes back to the coaching philosophy).

Nunge, on the other hand, does need to step it up a little more, even though he is ahead of Garza, statistically. Nunge's issues are more on reaction to what's happening around him (which is an issue with every player we have on the floor that's playing defense at a given time anyway, fwiw....................just sayin), and the fact that he still needs to get stronger and gives up too many rebounds to our opponents or just loses the ball through his hands. If Nunge can't be a presence as a defensive rebounder, then that is a problem.

He doesn't have to excel at shot blocking. We just need him to be good at shot bothering, at least right now, and that would go a long way to making a difference. But that goes back to what his limitations are and why that's easier said than done......but it'd be really nice if it did get done.

Please?....... ☹
Click to expand...

Yes, Nunge plays soft at times, he needs to slug some Red Bull
 
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goodbyebobby said:
He rolled it in the second half I believe? Both he and CJ did something stupid, defensively believe it or not, really early and Fran yanked them both.
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Yeah early on in the second. I wasn't sure what was going on so I rewinded it and he came up limp after stepping on Harper's foot. Fran took him out right after.
 
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I couldn't believe it one time on defense. Garza literally stood under the basket. I think it was Murray was on the lower block. They just stood and watched Rutger's center get the ball and stand for a second around 10 ft from the basket in the lane. They never took one step towards him!
 
Since the Ohio State game, Iowa has allowed: 67, 66, and 58.

The last time they have done that in a 3 game stretch was towards the beginning of last year in wins over North Florida (68), Cal Poly (59), and Texas Tech (61).

The last time they held teams under 70 pts in 3 consecutive Big Ten games was 2015-2016:

at #14 Purdue W 70-63
Nebraska W 77-66
at #4 Michigan State W 76-59

And this run was on the heels of a 78-70 win over then-#1 Michigan State, which was also in the middle of a 6-game stretch where Iowa's defense allowed 70 pts or less.

This was also the last time Iowa swept the season series with Michigan State.
 
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Ralph Miller was a defensive coach too, until he had the “six pack”. He realized scoring was their forte. Good coaches adjust.
 
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