Posted by ScooterDevil on March 27, 08 at 03:05:20:
In Reply to: Whatever . . . posted by ASULaw82 on March 26, 08 at 20:09:48:
I have not contradicted myself. I recognize that due to personel it made sense to play a zone defense as the primary defense. But when a team is lighting you up from beyond the arc there is nothing wrong with giving them a new look. It's called an adjustment. Herb even stated that Florida did a "masterful job of changing defenses to keep us off balance". Well the question begs then why didn't we attempt to keep them off balance.
Once again I never said that we should have played mostly man-to-man. But ask 100 coaches at any level what they would do if they were in a zone and a team was shooting 50+% from behind the arc, they would all say that they would come out of the zone. But I think ASU's complete reliance on it during the entire season made it difficult to play it in this game.
Why is labeling it a copout stifling conversation. You sure had something to say about it. Obviously the "lack of talent" was going to be the answer. I was just addressing the obvious to try and initiate some more creative responses.
: (82): Not sure where anybody criticized your patriotism or leveled anything close to that cirticism. It's simply that you contradict your arguments in your own posts and try to stifle discussion by labeling as a "copout" the basic reason Herb doesn't use man-to-man.
: As an example, you said this in another post:
: "This point was also not meant to say I think Herb is a bad coach, rather I believe he got more out of this team in the past two years than most coaches would have."
: Right there you are recognizing the very reason Herb has used the zone (where you note that he's getting more out of what were not generally recognized as elite players).
: It is simply this -- Herb has one and one-half big guys he can use in the middle, and they are foul prone as it is. If somebody drives by Glasser because Glasser has to be up on him in man-to-man defense, that leaves Pendergraph to try to deny the layup. That leads to fouls that will take JP out of the game quicker than he does already with his fouls.
: It's a trade off, and with the personnel he has had, Herb has decided that the best way to protect one of his two best players and keep him in the game is to make the other team beat ASU (if they can) shooting long threes. Most times that hasn't been successful for the opponents or has succeeded only in spurts (as in the last Oregon State game). Florida just had too many good shooters and shot about 50% from the three point line. ASU running man-to-man in the game would not have changed the outcome. It just would have meant that one of ASU's two best offensive players would have fouled out of the game long before it ended.
: Herb has always loved to use man-to-man. He wouldn't be using zone now if he thought he had the guys to match up man-to-man.