DukieUGA
03-01-2007, 12:46 PM
I noticed several times in last night's game (the parts of it that we could actually watch) that Josh won't shoot the ball from the elbow out, although he did miss his only 3pt attempt. A couple of times he was around the elbow wide open and wouldn't shoot, the defender would just sag off and JM couldn't drive around him. If he has no confidence in that shot, it's probably better for him not to take it. I think teams have figured out how to defend Josh effectively, which essentially turns him into a garbage-points scorer. Josh has become an offensive liability in that he is a focal point of the O and is not able to put up the points expected of him. Although to his credit he has no big-man to help take pressure off of him and Duke's O just isn't effective enough to force teams to take their focus off of him. Other people have pointed out that touch is something that has to be worked on in the offseason, so there's probably not much chance of Josh all of the sudden turning into an outside threat this year. However, w/o that shot Josh has become easy to defend and McClure, Thomas and Z have provided very little cover for Josh in the post. One thing that could restore some of Josh's offensive efficacy would be penetration into the lane from a) DN and then pass to Josh off of his drives BEFORE hitting the double/triple team seal and b) GH doing essentially the same thing or hitting his little floater above the D. Although GH has shown more propensity to avoid the double/triple teams he has not shown much more passing proclivity. Just the driving and drawing defenders makes the whole Duke O more effective, but Josh in particular, by freeing him up for a strong move to the rim or clearing lanes for an offensive reb and putback off a miss.
Josh brings other things to the table as well, but i think that the system needs to be tweeked a bit to take the focus off of him as a one-on-one scorer. He could be very effective but something is missing from the O that Josh needs to achieve his potential. Part of that is Josh not having all the tools himself, but these deficiencies can be masked and his strengths built up, but he needs for other parts of the O to get stronger.
Josh brings other things to the table as well, but i think that the system needs to be tweeked a bit to take the focus off of him as a one-on-one scorer. He could be very effective but something is missing from the O that Josh needs to achieve his potential. Part of that is Josh not having all the tools himself, but these deficiencies can be masked and his strengths built up, but he needs for other parts of the O to get stronger.