Basketball Breakdown Duke vs Louisville

[deeejazzy]

Today the youtube channel basketball breakdown released a video breaking down the Duke vs Louisville game, making some interesting points as to why Duke was unable to keep up with Louisville. The coaching strategy seemed simple; take advantage of Duke's inferior quickness, but this video shows with great replays how exactly Pitino orchestrated it. I love this sort of thing, enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Nqfg8tXxBU

[duke09hms]

Wow this youtube video was EXTREMELY illuminating. Basically tears apart our defense, and the title "Pitino outcoaches K."

Pretty tough on Mason too, but you can't argue with the video evidence of his lackluster defense. "Louisville picking on Plumlee over and over again."

The guy does back it up well with evidence though - why didn't we adjust our defense to their high screen and roll play that they ran over and over again? Why didn't we send more cutters into the middle to help with their press?

[sporthenry]

Amazing to see how several of the breakdowns led to fouls by Kelly which doomed Duke even more. I disagree with many before who said it was our guard's lack of quickness when we have Sheed and TT who I consider both to be above average defenders in terms of staying in front and quickness. But our pick and roll defense was just lost. Whether they were supposed to hedge hard or not, it just seemed that the guards didn't know if they wanted to go under/over and the forwards weren't sure to hedge hard or sag off so both were kind of left in no man's land.

[Billy Dat]

The video is really well done - painful to watch - but it does demonstrate how well Louisville executed. Pitino, in the post game press conference, talked about how his son Richard suggested adding that wrinkle of screening the ball screener to negate the hedge. Once they had that established, they showed additional looks off the pick and roll, so we were always kind of guessing what to do. As the video showed, they also varied the full court press to keep us guessing.

[NSDukeFan]

The video is really well done - painful to watch - but it does demonstrate how well Louisville executed. Pitino, in the post game press conference, talked about how his son Richard suggested adding that wrinkle of screening the ball screener to negate the hedge. Once they had that established, they showed additional looks off the pick and roll, so we were always kind of guessing what to do. As the video showed, they also varied the full court press to keep us guessing.

The screen for the screener play was the best thing I got from this video as I didn't notice this when watching the game and explains why the team had such difficulty defending the high screens.

[g-money]

The video is really well done - painful to watch - but it does demonstrate how well Louisville executed. Pitino, in the post game press conference, talked about how his son Richard suggested adding that wrinkle of screening the ball screener to negate the hedge. Once they had that established, they showed additional looks off the pick and roll, so we were always kind of guessing what to do. As the video showed, they also varied the full court press to keep us guessing.

Yeah, "Ouch" was my first reaction to that video. I do think Louisville benefited by setting a lot of illegal screens, but that is never called in college so why not try for it. Beyond that, the lack of quickness from our big men was really exposed on defense.

I also suspect that several of Louisville's offensive and defensive wrinkles were intentionally held back in the game in the Bahamas. Smart strategy by Pitino if so.

To me it's a bit unfair for the YouTube guy to claim that Pitino outcoached Coach K, simply because it's impossible to tell if these breakdowns were the result of poor coaching or poor decisions/actions by the players.

Anyway, I can't wait to see Coach K get Pitino back the next time we play Louisville.

[moonpie23]

i need a few more days before i watch it...

[FerryFor50]

I didn't realize Pitino invented the high screen offense (or illegal screens).

Having athletic guards who can finish consistently and a deep team that allows you to press constantly would make anyone seem like a coaching genius...

[dukelifer]

I didn't realize Pitino invented the high screen offense (or illegal screens).

Having athletic guards who can finish consistently and a deep team that allows you to press constantly would make anyone seem like a coaching genius...

I would like to see the first Duke Louisville game again to see if they did something different with regard to using the high ball screen and just failed to execute or if the screening the screener was the difference.

[PSurprise]

I didn't realize Pitino invented the high screen offense (or illegal screens).

Having athletic guards who can finish consistently and a deep team that allows you to press constantly would make anyone seem like a coaching genius...

Not trying to be snarky or anything here, but with your second point, isn't that recruiting, which is a significant part of coaching? And playing to your strengths, which obvious Louisville has.

[FerryFor50]

Not trying to be snarky or anything here, but with your second point, isn't that recruiting, which is a significant part of coaching? And playing to your strengths, which obvious Louisville has.

As Mark Gottfried has illustrated, recruiting has very little to do with coaching.

[freshmanjs]

As Mark Gottfried has illustrated, recruiting has very little to do with coaching.

not sure i follow. recruiting is obviously a huge component of the college coaching job.

[Newton_14]

As Mark Gottfried has illustrated, recruiting has very little to do with coaching.

To add to that, Duke started a Freshman, and Sophomore in the backcourt Sunday, who were going against two very experienced and talented Louisville backcourt players. It matters. One day a Senior Cook/Junior Suliamon backcourt will have their way with a rookie backcourt as well.

Lousiville is on a roll right now and playing at a very high level. I will be shocked if they do not cut the nets down Monday night.

[rsvman]

Whatever.

There's nothing in the video that I didn't see on my television in real time except for the screen of the screener, which apparently was not even Pitino's idea.

[FerryFor50]

I would like to see the first Duke Louisville game again to see if they did something different with regard to using the high ball screen and just failed to execute or if the screening the screener was the difference.

Well, what I recall of the game in Atlantis was this:

- Quinn Cook played well, with confidence
- Ryan Kelly was not in foul trouble early
- L'ville didn't get to the line nearly as much
- smith didn't shoot that well
- no Deng to block shots and hit foul line jumpers

I still contend that L'ville got away with a lot of hand checks and holds, which makes your press defense way more effective. Duke stuck with them until the 16 min mark and then panicked, settled for contested jumpers and didn't get Plumeee involved. They should have kept pounding it inside, especially when Deng got his 4th foul.

[freshmanjs]

do folks here not think Pitino did a good job coaching his team? several of the comments in this thread seem to be very dismissive of that. i thought he did a fine job and is an excellent college coach.

[FerryFor50]

not sure i follow. recruiting is obviously a huge component of the college coaching job.

It is a part of the job, but says nothing about your coaching ability. The premise of the video was that Pitino "out coached" K, which is silly.

[FerryFor50]

do folks here not think Pitino did a good job coaching his team? several of the comments in this thread seem to be very dismissive of that. i thought he did a fine job and is an excellent college coach.

I don't think anyone is saying Pitino is a bad coach. My point is that you can't confuse coaching and recruiting. K was not out coached. He just didn't have the athletes to match L'ville.

[luburch]

It is a part of the job, but says nothing about your coaching ability. The premise of the video was that Pitino "out coached" K, which is silly.

While I think Coach K is a better coach than Pitino it is not unreasonable to say that Pitino outcoached K this last game. Obviously there are other factors that contributed to the loss as well, but K is mortal.

[FerryFor50]

While I think Coach K is a better coach than Pitino it is not unreasonable to say that Pitino outcoached K this last game. Obviously there are other factors that contributed to the loss as well, but K is mortal.

So if Pitino doesn't have Russ Smith, does L'ville win? They already showed they couldn't win without Deng...

Having elite athletes affords a coach a lot more room for error.