Welcome!

By registering with us, you'll be able to discuss, share and private message with other members of our community.

SignUp Now!

Duke Basketball 2014-2015 Discussion thread

His first year of eligibility, though, would include a senior Jefferson, junior Ojeleye, senior Plumlee and (likely) freshman Jeter, no? Maybe he's better than Plumlee and Jeter, but that's a bit of a crowded frontcourt. His last two years, however, would be a different story.

Not sure if he's an NBA prospect or not.
 
Yes
9614851.jpeg

622x350.jpg

628x471.jpg
 
If he was your doctor, you'd make sure you had a good bowel prep.
 
This is as close as we'll get to a great writer writing about an issue specific to Duke basketball. Very insightful with respect to Duke's drastic end-of-game dropoff in defensive efficiency this season.

But blaming crunch-time performance on bad luck doesn’t pass the smell test anymore. It’s true that team clutch performance tends to regress to the mean over long samples; ask this season’s Blazers. Some teams and players chronically over-perform in crunch time, and others chronically shit the bed.

This is Minnesota’s third consecutive season of catastrophically bad crunch-time play. This is no longer a blip we can assume will self-correct. This is a disturbing trend, one that infects both sides of the ball.

The Wolves are a sound defensive team overall, but they’ve been bad on that end in crunch time, and one trend has surfaced across all three seasons: A team that rarely fouls in the first 45 minutes can’t stop fouling at the end of games. Only Denver has allowed more free throws per field goal attempt in the last three minutes of close games this season, per NBA.com, a carryover from the two prior seasons. Overall, the Wolves have allowed 116.1 points per 100 possessions in crunch time, the third-worst mark in the league, and one that would rank miles below the NBA’s leakiest overall defense.

Some of this is noise. The minute samples are small, and when Minnesota falls behind, it has to foul to prolong the game. About half the fouls it’s committed inside the three-minute mark of close games have been intentional.

But some of it is not noise. I’ve watched every crunch-time Minnesota foul over those three seasons, and a few trends emerge:

• Love and Pekovic tend to reach in against paint scorers. It’s as if they know they can’t block shots, but are so desperate to stop any potential scoring opportunity that they’ll risk fouls in chasing knockaways. Love has gotten better about this — it was a plague two seasons ago — but it still happens:

love1.png


(Note: I’d link to clips of these plays, but NBA.com’s public stats sites allow for such links on almost every play type but personal fouls.)

• Corey Brewer and Kevin Martin, two key wing free agents, gamble their way into crazy fouls all over the floor. Like, there’s no reason for Martin to be crowding Ben McLemore away from the ball here:

martinfoul.png


These guys are serial gamblers, and a lot of their crunch-time fouls happen before Minnesota’s opponent is in the bonus. But those fouls also put opponents in the bonus.

• Quick opposing point guards can puncture Minnesota’s scheme. The Wolves play a conservative pick-and-roll defense in which Love and Pekovic hang near the paint to corral ball handlers instead of chasing them far from the hoop. It works in the aggregate; neither big is a major plus defender, but they both understand the scheme and approach it with solid footwork.

But when Ty Lawson/Chris Paul types dial in late, they’ve been able to either blow by those guys or bait them into fouls. Ricky Rubio is a steals hound, and his chest-to-chest defense has also cost Minny a few whistles.

That’s really the main problem here. Opponents don’t shoot a high percentage against Minny in the clutch, kill the offensive glass, or nail a huge number of 3s.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-q ... evin-love/
 
After watching Tyus Jones last night, I actually think that next year Duke could play at a faster tempo next season if only as a result of Jones being able to initiate offense and/or make entry or other passes earlier in the shot clock than our guards typically did this year. At least I think we'll play quicker against zones as a result of this.

Of course, it will be almost all half-court, but that's kind of what we did this year too despite predictions to the contrary.
 
For anyone who didn't watch, Tyus actually hit the screener on a couple of screen-and-roll/pops.
 
StopThePumpFakesShav said:
After watching Tyus Jones last night, I actually think that next year Duke could play at a faster tempo next season if only as a result of Jones being able to initiate offense and/or make entry or other passes earlier in the shot clock than our guards typically did this year. At least I think we'll play quicker against zones as a result of this.

Of course, it will be almost all half-court, but that's kind of what we did this year too despite predictions to the contrary.

I disagree on the "almost all half-court." Tyus and Quinn are both good on the break, and, I think we'll do a lot better getting defensive boards next year, which will start more breaks. Regardless of the quality of our defense, we should have a very good rebounding team next year with Justise, Amile, and Okafor (plus Plum3, Semi, etc). Even if Jahlil only hangs out at mid-court, the rest of our team is built pretty well to run.
 
Tyus actually looks to push the ball more than Quinn. I don't understand why Quinn doesn't do that more, given that's where his real strength is. Maybe it's because we've been so poor on the defensive glass? Basically, the only way Coach K is going to allow a fast break is off of forced turnovers or a long rebound. And we weren't very good at getting either of those.

Next year, we should at least be a pretty dominant rebounding team. I'm trying not to think about it, but if Jabari returns...Heck, even if he doesn't, we've basically got three guys capable of going for double digit boards every night between Winslow, Amile, and Okafor. If he Jabari stays that just means we have Amile as a rebounder off the bench.
 
I would expect some decent contributions from MP3 as well. At minimum, I think he'll be an awesome help defender
 
Duke didn't push as much as expected last season because our guards are not smart. Tyus seems brilliant on the break.
 
The only person who pushed off of long rebounds was Jabari. And it worked every time for seven games or so. And then it just stopped working completely.
 
rome8180 said:
The only person who pushed off of long rebounds was Jabari. And it worked every time for seven games or so. And then it just stopped working completely.
Those and any hilarious MP3 extreme hustling moments were my favorite plays of the season.
 
Need to read that tweet in context.

So Quinn will play the role of Boatright and Tyus the role of Shabazz?
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Chat users

  • No one is chatting at the moment.

Chat rooms

  • General chit-chat 0
  • NCAA Tournament (Non-Duke) 0
  • Duke vs Houston 0

Forum statistics

Threads
1,056
Messages
417,266
Members
623
Latest member
ScheySchey30
Back
Top Bottom