I love the zone we run, and the numbers speak for themselves, we are second in the country in points allowed per 100 possessions, and we aren't beating teams because we are outscoring them, thats for sure.
Jacksonville did a great job attacking our zone last night and I am scared that other teams are going to see the tape and really understand how to attack us right now. Jacksonville had a lot of 3 guys out top, one high post, one low post and when our backside forward would come up guard the high post they would cut their backside wing down and rotate their top of key guy to the baseline corner and we wouldn't rotate well and leave one of the two of them open. Our bigs, specifically Dallas and BJ, it looks to me like they are still really struggling with understanding who to cover based on where the other team's 5 players are on the court. Thats the thing about the zone, it requires a lot of quick thinking and not as much just playing as man, and DL and BJ are struggling to rotate in the zone sometimes, or are rotating to the wrong player, thats what scares me most about having both of them in the game at the same time. When Lighty is in he really gets the zone and you see him switching sides with DL and BJ all the time because he understands where he needs to be and where the big guys need to be, I just dont see that understanding out of DL and BJ yet.
That said, I completely agree with 40 that you are going to have lapses in a 40 minute game, we cant play perfect D every time down the court but more often than not teams are taking bad shots against us and not getting great looks. Also last night was I think the first time this season we didnt force a shot clock violation.
Madsen got some quality minutes, and he plays a very Twig-like game with his good high ball screens, but he isn't the perimeter shooting threat that Twig was and I dont like not having either DL or BJ in, we have 0 offensive post presence when Madsen is in.
Lighty had a great first half and a good game overall, when he gets involved early he stays involved but he isnt quick enough with the ball to be a true slasher and his jumper hasnt been that consistent yet this year, I agree with JO that he needs to get his points in transition, outside of offensive sets, at least early to give him confidence.
Diebs- you know I love him, he plays so smart and he seems to be the only one who looks to feed the post consistently. Threw one really lazy pass out top that they took back for a steal and dunk but for the most part he had a solid game. If he can continue to shoot 40% from three, with the threes he is taking, we will be golden, cause he isn't shooting a lot of wide open spot up threes, teams respect his shooting ability and he is shooting 40% from 3 curling off screens and those are really tough shots but they are backbreakers when you hit them cause at times you really cant defend it any better, and he is still hitting, can really break their spirit.
Lastly, DL, he struggled some last night for sure, and he isn't going to block 4 shots a game every game, especially against smaller teams who arent going to try to just post up on him, he needs to be in better position on defense and not try to rely so much on his shot block as his only defense. But his free throws are looking much much better, I am continually impressed with how much he has improved so many facets of his game.
im pretty sure Indiana was up by 20 at some point in that game