PHASE II - Indiana through Evansville

[NashvilleDevil]

First what a great showing for Duke at the PK80 tournament! Kids showed a lot of heart coming back from 2 tournament teams. I hope they realize that they cannot always start slowly and it requires a concerted effort for 40 minutes. On to Phase II.

This is a 5 game phase which includes the BIG/ACC challenge game at Indiana and the first conference game at Boston College. We then get the long break for exams and after an 11 day layoff they play Evansville which is then followed by another 10 day layoff when they welcome Florida St to Cameron and start Phase III.
Duke has a quick turnaround flying back from Portland after the PK80 and then going up to Bloomington for a Wednesday night game.
As usual use this as jumping off point to discuss this portion of the season.

Health

Can we just make this a sticky on the board’s 1st page? Kidding aside, Grayson is dealing with a wrist injury post-Michigan St and Javin has a nagging injury as well. I thought Grayson’s shot looked much better in the 2nd half against Texas so hopefully he has adjusted to the pain. If Duke stays relatively healthy this year I really like them to do what the last 2 healthy Duke teams did in ‘10 and ‘15. I think Duke will take about a half to get their legs against Indiana but I anticipate Duke winning the 5 games of this phase with relative ease. 5-0 and zero injuries headed into conference play will be fantastic.

Rotation

We know the starters and we know once we hit conference play they will play between 35-38 minutes a game. Alex O’Connell has been the first guy off the bench and I think that is what we will see for the rest of the season. Alex has also been a revelation, he has shown that he will be successful at the college level and I think as the season goes on he will hunt his shot a little more. This will be nice because Duke needs another 3 point shooter after Grayson and Gary.

Javin and Marques are the first bigs off the bench. Goldwire will be an emergency sub if Grayson and Tre have 1st half foul trouble. I think the starting pieces work well together and will continue to mesh as the season progresses. During the PK80 he relied on 8 players but I think he will extend the bench a bit during the games against South Dakota St and St. Francis.

Defense

Defense is a work in progress as it has been once Duke started getting the OAD players. This team has brilliant stretches of defense like they did to close out the Texas and Florida games. Then they have the lapses that you come to expect from freshman. It seems that K uses the zone in the 1st half to calm the young men and then uses man to man in the 2nd half. I expect him to continue to switch defenses as game flow dictates and I think this team will find a defensive identity during this phase.

I expect to see a lot of man to man and the press in the games against South Dakota and St. Francis so the youngsters can work through some things.

Offense

I think this offense needs to flow through Bagley he is such a matchup nightmare. Dump it into him in the post and he will either score or he can pass to an open shooter. I was happy that Gary and Grayson were hitting their shots against Florida because that will make defenses not key entirely on Marvin. I think this is also the phase that can help Trevon get back to the distributor he was during the first few games of the year.

Exam Break
As we have seen in the past Duke has a tendency to play lethargically when they come back from exams. I will be curious to see how they handle playing 3 games in 20 days.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and look forward to the discussion about Phase II.

[SkyBrickey]

I'm confident our defense will continue to improve a lot this season. Not that we won't have some poor defensive nights along the way, but I think a lot of our M2M issues are very fixable - and we've got the best coaching staff in the country to do it. The starting 5 plus Javin are all good to great individual defenders and should be a lock-down unit late in the year.

I'll stick with what I said before the season. For this team to be great, we need Trevon to be very good. We don't need him to score a lot. We don't even need him to hit open 3s (although that would be icing on the cake). We just need him play great defense, take care of the ball, and find the open man to the tune of 6-7 assists per game. If he can grow into that type of consistent performance, we will be really tough to beat in March...

[SCMatt33]

I'm confident our defense will continue to improve a lot this season. Not that we won't have some poor defensive nights along the way, but I think a lot of our M2M issues are very fixable - and we've got the best coaching staff in the country to do it. The starting 5 plus Javin are all good to great individual defenders and should be a lock-down unit late in the year.

I'll stick with what I said before the season. For this team to be great, we need Trevon to be very good. We don't need him to score a lot. We don't even need him to hit open 3s (although that would be icing on the cake). We just need him play great defense, take care of the ball, and find the open man to the tune of 6-7 assists per game. If he can grow into that type of consistent performance, we will be really tough to beat in March...

I think for Trevon a big key is recognizing which threes he should take and which he shouldn't. He's just not a catch and shoot type of guy and there's a big difference between catch and shoot, and catch, set, and shoot when they play off of you. He's also had a tendency to be more trigger happy from three in the bigger games. In the three games against Michigan State, Texas and Florida, he took 13 threes, while combining for just 10 in the other 5 games. In the Texas and Florida games, nearly half of his total shots came from three. I think if he can recognize his shots better and even pass up some seemingly open ones just to reset things, it will help our half court offense a good bit.

I worry less about the defense as 1) I think we've seen enough with the freshman over the years that mastering defense over the course of a single season doesn't really happen and 2) we've also seen that mastering it isn't necessary, just be decent and then get hot at the right time.

[Kedsy]

If Duke stays relatively healthy this year I really like them to do what the last 2 healthy Duke teams did in ‘10 and ‘15.

Nice phase post, ND. Though I would point out that our 2014 team was also healthy (and that sort of ruins the implication).

What I'd like to see for the rest of the season is Javin getting more minutes. I don't know if it was the nagging injury, but he only played 8.3 mpg at PK80, and I think some of our defensive struggles came from that. DRtg isn't the greatest of stats, but on this year's Duke team Javin's is by far the best. Personally, I think having Javin's defensive energy is more important than either Marques's increasing productivity or Alex's hustling offense. But we won't get an answer to that in this phase, when all three of them should get plenty of court time.

[53n206]

SCMatt
[QUOTE= just be decent and then get hot at the right time.


Now that makes a lot of sense to me. Whether you're preferring to offense or defense.

[Henderson]

I'll be really interested to see how the free throw percentage goes in the next few games. A few games back, a frequent poster noted our low-60's % numbers and suggested that is who we are. I'm not so sure. Will we revert to the mean established over just 4-5 games, or have we moved the mean for purposes of expectations going forward? The samples were too small when the poster made his point, and they're probably still too small. But the needle is wavering like a politician's lie detector test.

[flyingdutchdevil]

I think for Trevon a big key is recognizing which threes he should take and which he shouldn't. He's just not a catch and shoot type of guy and there's a big difference between catch and shoot, and catch, set, and shoot when they play off of you. He's also had a tendency to be more trigger happy from three in the bigger games. In the three games against Michigan State, Texas and Florida, he took 13 threes, while combining for just 10 in the other 5 games. In the Texas and Florida games, nearly half of his total shots came from three. I think if he can recognize his shots better and even pass up some seemingly open ones just to reset things, it will help our half court offense a good bit.

I worry less about the defense as 1) I think we've seen enough with the freshman over the years that mastering defense over the course of a single season doesn't really happen and 2) we've also seen that mastering it isn't necessary, just be decent and then get hot at the right time.

Easy. He should recognize taking zero 3s. He's shooting 13% from 3 right now. That number will likely improve, but he needs to work on his shoot.

I want Duval on the court for as many minutes as possible. I do not want Duval shooting outside of 12 feet.

[COYS]

Easy. He should recognize taking zero 3s. He's shooting 13% from 3 right now. That number will likely improve, but he needs to work on his shoot.

I want Duval on the court for as many minutes as possible. I do not want Duval shooting outside of 12 feet.

The thing is, even if he isn’t good at threes, he really truly does need to take the occasionally three to avoid having defenses completely stop guarding him. As long as they are completely wide open and generally later in the shot clock after we’ve run actions for other guys on the court, I’m fine with it. If his wide-open, set-shot three point percentage is 30% and he takes them under these relatively restrictive conditions, it won’t be such a terrible shot, especially with our offensive rebounding ability. And it will prevent defenses from completely leaving him alone on the perimeter to double/triple Marvin and Wendell.

It’s finding that game theory equilibrium sweet-spot where taking a couple threes per game is worth the times he misses because it does just enough to keep the floor spaced and also allows for the possibility that he’ll improve and/or have a good game at just the right time.

Overall, though, I’m more excited about Trevon’s contributions so far than some. In two games against top ten competition, he’s averaging 8 assists, 2.5 turnovers, 14 points and 4 steals per game. Considering how much room he has to improve, that is an impressive baseline!

[Matches]

My big takeaway from PK80 was that Grayson is better than ok as a backup PG. He did a very good job running the team when Duval was on the bench. I wouldn't want him in that role full-time but he is fine there for stretches when needed.

That really allows AOC to crack the rotation because K can play him alongside either Grayson or Duval (or briefly all three together). That probably relegates Goldwire to a mop-up role but AOC seems to make good things happen when he's in the game, and it's cool that he's, at least for now, carved out a rotation spot.

[Spanarkel]

First what a great showing for Duke at the PK80 tournament! Kids showed a lot of heart coming back from 2 tournament teams. I hope they realize that they cannot always start slowly and it requires a concerted effort for 40 minutes. On to Phase II.

This is a 5 game phase which includes the BIG/ACC challenge game at Indiana and the first conference game at Boston College. We then get the long break for exams and after an 11 day layoff they play Evansville which is then followed by another 10 day layoff when they welcome Florida St to Cameron and start Phase III.
Duke has a quick turnaround flying back from Portland after the PK80 and then going up to Bloomington for a Wednesday night game.
As usual use this as jumping off point to discuss this portion of the season.

Health

Can we just make this a sticky on the board’s 1st page? Kidding aside, Grayson is dealing with a wrist injury post-Michigan St and Javin has a nagging injury as well. I thought Grayson’s shot looked much better in the 2nd half against Texas so hopefully he has adjusted to the pain. If Duke stays relatively healthy this year I really like them to do what the last 2 healthy Duke teams did in ‘10 and ‘15. I think Duke will take about a half to get their legs against Indiana but I anticipate Duke winning the 5 games of this phase with relative ease. 5-0 and zero injuries headed into conference play will be fantastic.

Rotation

We know the starters and we know once we hit conference play they will play between 35-38 minutes a game. Alex O’Connell has been the first guy off the bench and I think that is what we will see for the rest of the season. Alex has also been a revelation, he has shown that he will be successful at the college level and I think as the season goes on he will hunt his shot a little more. This will be nice because Duke needs another 3 point shooter after Grayson and Gary.

Javin and Marques are the first bigs off the bench. Goldwire will be an emergency sub if Grayson and Tre have 1st half foul trouble. I think the starting pieces work well together and will continue to mesh as the season progresses. During the PK80 he relied on 8 players but I think he will extend the bench a bit during the games against South Dakota St and St. Francis.

Defense

Defense is a work in progress as it has been once Duke started getting the OAD players. This team has brilliant stretches of defense like they did to close out the Texas and Florida games. Then they have the lapses that you come to expect from freshman. It seems that K uses the zone in the 1st half to calm the young men and then uses man to man in the 2nd half. I expect him to continue to switch defenses as game flow dictates and I think this team will find a defensive identity during this phase.

I expect to see a lot of man to man and the press in the games against South Dakota and St. Francis so the youngsters can work through some things.

Offense

I think this offense needs to flow through Bagley he is such a matchup nightmare. Dump it into him in the post and he will either score or he can pass to an open shooter. I was happy that Gary and Grayson were hitting their shots against Florida because that will make defenses not key entirely on Marvin. I think this is also the phase that can help Trevon get back to the distributor he was during the first few games of the year.

Exam Break
As we have seen in the past Duke has a tendency to play lethargically when they come back from exams. I will be curious to see how they handle playing 3 games in 20 days.

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and look forward to the discussion about Phase II.


Enjoyed your excellent summary!

[superdave]

To me, the biggest thing that needs to happen in this phase is for Duval to come to a healthy balance between passing first and hunting his shot. He gets guys easy shots when he orchestrates the offense. He also gets into some trouble when he over-penetrates. His decision making could use some adjustments, and he should err on the side of feeding Bagley and Allen..

I assume this is a big focus with the coaches, so will be interesting to see if he can become more efficient the next month.

[Troublemaker]

The thing is, even if he isn’t good at threes, he really truly does need to take the occasionally three to avoid having defenses completely stop guarding him. As long as they are completely wide open and generally later in the shot clock after we’ve run actions for other guys on the court, I’m fine with it. If his wide-open, set-shot three point percentage is 30% and he takes them under these relatively restrictive conditions, it won’t be such a terrible shot, especially with our offensive rebounding ability. And it will prevent defenses from completely leaving him alone on the perimeter to double/triple Marvin and Wendell.

It’s finding that game theory equilibrium sweet-spot where taking a couple threes per game is worth the times he misses because it does just enough to keep the floor spaced and also allows for the possibility that he’ll improve and/or have a good game at just the right time.

Overall, though, I’m more excited about Trevon’s contributions so far than some. In two games against top ten competition, he’s averaging 8 assists, 2.5 turnovers, 14 points and 4 steals per game. Considering how much room he has to improve, that is an impressive baseline!

Game theory equilibrium sweet-spot! Love it, and I think that's exactly right. I feel, as you do COYS, certain that the correct number is above zero.

Also, we have to keep in mind that all offensive possessions are played under a shotclock. If we didn't score in early offense in transition, then we move into halfcourt ball movement, and if the flow of ball movement gives Trevon a wide-open three with 10 seconds left on the clock, he really should take it. Maybe he makes it, but if not, we have a great chance at an offensive rebound when shots are taken in the normal flow of ball movement that allows Wendell and Marvin to anticipate a shot going up.

Before I forget, well-done Phase post, Nashville!

[DukieInBrasil]

one thing i'd like to point out is FT shooting. Marivn Bagley really turned around his FT shooting during Phase 1, and as a team Duke is now shooting 69% from the charity stripe. That's not as good as i'd like, but the fact that our best FT shooters are not shooting the most FTs, it's a great sign that Duke has improved so much during the early part of the season.
3pt shooting was also not as good as we'd like, moreso due to it being so erratic. 33% isn't terrible, but is below what Duke's norms. Part of it is shot selection: we just don't need Bagley dribbling into 3s or Duval shooting 3s in almost all situations. Perhaps the larger part is that we just don't have many good shooters. Grayson clearly is shooting well. AOC and Wendell are also shooting well on just a few attempts. Our only other volume 3pt shooter is Gary Trent Jr and he's slumping pretty hard lately.

In Phase II, i'll be looking to see if Duke continues to improve from the FT line, and whether Duke can become a more consistent 3pt shooting team.

[Saratoga2]

To me, the biggest thing that needs to happen in this phase is for Duval to come to a healthy balance between passing first and hunting his shot. He gets guys easy shots when he orchestrates the offense. He also gets into some trouble when he over-penetrates. His decision making could use some adjustments, and he should err on the side of feeding Bagley and Allen..

I assume this is a big focus with the coaches, so will be interesting to see if he can become more efficient the next month.

I agree that he has a lot of talent but is making freshman mistakes like driving into a crowd and making inadvisable passes like the no look in the last game. The team has so much talent it allows him to stick with fundamental basketball and avoid trying for the spectacular. He has the ability to lead us into the final 4.

[Saratoga2]

one thing i'd like to point out is FT shooting. Marivn Bagley really turned around his FT shooting during Phase 1, and as a team Duke is now shooting 69% from the charity stripe. That's not as good as i'd like, but the fact that our best FT shooters are not shooting the most FTs, it's a great sign that Duke has improved so much during the early part of the season.
3pt shooting was also not as good as we'd like, moreso due to it being so erratic. 33% isn't terrible, but is below what Duke's norms. Part of it is shot selection: we just don't need Bagley dribbling into 3s or Duval shooting 3s in almost all situations. Perhaps the larger part is that we just don't have many good shooters. Grayson clearly is shooting well. AOC and Wendell are also shooting well on just a few attempts. Our only other volume 3pt shooter is Gary Trent Jr and he's slumping pretty hard lately.

In Phase II, i'll be looking to see if Duke continues to improve from the FT line, and whether Duke can become a more consistent 3pt shooting team.

Having watched O'Connell shoot, I can see very good form and the likelihood he could help in the 3 point area. Like the primary post indicates, he needs to seek out his shots more often and that will probably happen more frequently as he gains experience. Clearly he will not get starter playing minutes but his offensive contribution could help this team and I expect him to be a major contributor in future.

[devilsince1977]

This might not be the right place for this post.

I don't think this has been brought up, but I could be wrong. Do you all think this team is similar to the Michigan Fab Five team of 91-92?

Bagley = Weber
Carter = Howard
Trent < Rose
Duval = Key
Allen > Jackson
Bolden < Riley
Delaurie > Voskuil
O'Connell = Pelinka
Goldwire < Talley


Coach K >>>>> Steve Fisher

Calling certain match-ups equal may be simplifying some of the comparisons; but I think they match up pretty close. It would be a heck of a game.
Feel free to critique my match-ups. Michigan had more final four experience on the bench, but they were not significant players in 1989.

[brevity]

I don't think this has been brought up, but I could be wrong. Do you all think this team is similar to the Michigan Fab Five team of 91-92?

Bagley = Weber

Let me stop you right there. Marvin Bagley III is a much more talented post player and dunker than Bruce Weber (http://www.kstatesports.com/coaches.aspx?rc=136&path=mbball).

[devilsince1977]

Let me stop you right there. Marvin Bagley III is a much more talented post player and dunker than Bruce Weber (http://www.kstatesports.com/coaches.aspx?rc=136&path=mbball).

Webber - darn you guys don't miss a thing.

[devildeac]

Webber - darn you guys don't miss a thing.

Yep, no time outs on DBR...

[TruBlu]

Yep, no time outs on DBR...

Not so sure about that. If I posted what I really feel about unc, there would be a time out for me.

[devildeac]

Not so sure about that. If I posted what I really feel about unc, there would be a time out for me.

That distinction is more than a time out, it's labeled "On Holiday." Heard/read about it from a friend ;). Never experienced it myself. Yet :o.

[Mtn.Devil.91.92.01.10.15]

Yep, no time outs on DBR...

I had a couple of time outs lying around here, but I sold them to Ol' Roy.

[Natty_B]

I didn't want to start a new thread, so I'm just bumping this phase one as I always enjoy these, but sheesh there is some downtime coming up. I know there is always a long break for exams and then the holidays but sometimes there are two games between breaks (this year just one against Evansville who will play on the 16th and 17th at home and likely come to Duke 10-2). Also after the FSU (who play the 16th, 18th and 21st before 9 days off) game there is another week off until NC State. So over 4 weeks (Dec 9 - Jan 6) Duke plays just two games. I went through all schedules this century and the only similar year was 07-08 when Duke only played two games between Dec. 8 and Jan. 6.

The optimist would say this would give Duke a lot of time to practice but my understanding is that usually there isn't much practice during this time and the team looks rather disjointed upon a return to the court (the Elon debacle from last year being a prime example and yes I realize this was the 2nd of two post exam games but the other one wasn't pretty either). I don't know what to make of this and some of it was due to the ACC scheduling lords. But it's kinda odd. MSU, UK and KU each play 5 games between this past weekend and the weekend of the 6th. With this young team another cupcake, somewhere in there, might have been nice.

[superdave]

Two games in the next month or so. That's a long break!

Things that are working - Offensive Rebounding, Scoring in the paint, Depth. Grayson from 3.

Things that improved already - Bagley from the FT line, Bolden & DeLaurier from last year.

Things that need to improve - Shot selection, Ball movement, Defensive communication/intensity.

After the comebacks they have had, this team can play fearless basketball. But they need play defense like their life depends upon it out of the gate. This is a good time to re-group and work on some things and get sharper.

[Kedsy]

Things that need to improve - Shot selection, Ball movement, Defensive communication/intensity.

Assist and turnover data for the last 20 seasons:



Year Assts TOs FGA A/to %assisted
2018 239 147 413 1.63 57.9%
2017 470 409 986 1.15 47.7%
2016 469 336 962 1.40 48.8%
2015 583 407 1079 1.43 54.0%
2014 509 334 929 1.52 54.8%
2013 500 389 960 1.29 52.1%
2012 423 415 874 1.02 48.4%
2011 524 445 1040 1.18 50.4%
2010 546 444 1044 1.23 52.3%
2009 492 454 971 1.08 50.7%
2008 497 462 964 1.08 51.6%
2007 433 509 822 0.85 52.7%
2006 546 494 979 1.11 55.8%
2005 421 449 853 0.94 49.4%
2004 536 510 1018 1.05 52.7%
2003 444 460 897 0.97 49.5%
2002 625 500 1093 1.25 57.2%
2001 701 531 1217 1.32 57.6%
2000 584 472 1045 1.24 55.9%
1999 633 567 1244 1.12 50.9%
1998 514 444 1081 1.16 47.5%


If this season's numbers hold up, we will have Duke's best A/to ratio and Duke's highest percentage of baskets assisted since at least 1998. Seems to me we're moving the ball pretty well so far.

[Kedsy]

Things that need to improve - Shot selection, Ball movement, Defensive communication/intensity.

This one's a little harder to quantify. But if your eFG% is high, that means you hit a lot of shots and your two/three balance is at least somewhat optimal, right? Best way I could think of to measure shot selection. So, here's 20 years of data on that:



Year eFG%
2018 56.5%
2017 54.5%
2016 53.7%
2015 56.8%
2014 53.8%
2013 53.9%
2012 52.8%
2011 53.7%
2010 50.3%
2009 50.5%
2008 53.6%
2007 52.5%
2006 55.5%
2005 52.1%
2004 53.2%
2003 51.4%
2002 56.2%
2001 56.1%
2000 54.7%
1999 57.4%
1998 53.4%


This year's team's performance so far ranks 3rd in the period, just a fraction of a percentage point behind the 1999 and 2015 teams:

1999: 57.4%
2015: 56.8%
2018: 56.5%

All three would round to 57% if we weren't using the decimal place. Again, I suppose there's always room for improvement, but I'd say our shot selection is fine, outside of the occasional error of judgment, which you see in pretty much every college team performance.

[superdave]

This one's a little harder to quantify. But if your eFG% is high, that means you hit a lot of shots and your two/three balance is at least somewhat optimal, right? Best way I could think of to measure shot selection. So, here's 20 years of data on that:


My point on shot selection and ball movement is that we are playing one on one a lot in the half court. We're passing the ball well in transition and getting some quick buckets. But the half court can get bogged down into "clear out for the guy with the ball". Guys are putting their head down too often, especially when the other 4 guys on the court can all carry a scoring load.

The two anecdotal plays were Marvin hoisting a long contested 3 at the end of the Texas game and Treyvon hoisting a corner 3 with a lot of time on the shot clock vs BC.

The team shares the ball well, but can lose focus and not find the best shot. Hitting those tougher shots is only going to get harder in conference play. Also, Duval needs to hunt his shot a little less. He's taking 10.6 FGA per game. Chris Duhon is a good pass-first comp for him and he averaged 5.6, 7, 8 and 8.3 FGA per game. It's not hard to see him averaging 10 assists if he goes deeper into the shot clock setting up a play (and keeping our guys from playing too much iso).

[Kedsy]

My point on shot selection and ball movement is that we are playing one on one a lot in the half court. We're passing the ball well in transition and getting some quick buckets. But the half court can get bogged down into "clear out for the guy with the ball". Guys are putting their head down too often, especially when the other 4 guys on the court can all carry a scoring load.

The two anecdotal plays were Marvin hoisting a long contested 3 at the end of the Texas game and Treyvon hoisting a corner 3 with a lot of time on the shot clock vs BC.

The team shares the ball well, but can lose focus and not find the best shot. Hitting those tougher shots is only going to get harder in conference play. Also, Duval needs to hunt his shot a little less. He's taking 10.6 FGA per game. Chris Duhon is a good pass-first comp for him and he averaged 5.6, 7, 8 and 8.3 FGA per game. It's not hard to see him averaging 10 assists if he goes deeper into the shot clock setting up a play (and keeping our guys from playing too much iso).

I understand. I wasn't being critical of you, but I think the idea that we go one-on-one too much isn't really borne out by the data. Or, put another way, based on the high percentage of our baskets that are assisted and our high eFG%, it's probable that we go one-on-one less and have better shot selection than any (or almost any) Duke team of (at least) the past 20 years.

Did Grayson go "hero ball" a little in the second half against BC, trying to win the game by himself? I thought so. Were the two shots you gave as examples taken in poor judgment. Sure. But every Duke team (I'd argue every college team) has or has had similar occasional lapses.

Put another way: we have the best offense in the country (by a fair amount), possibly the best ball movement of any Duke team in at least the past 20 years, and are one of the best Duke teams at shot selection/conversion in at least the past 20 years. If ball movement and shot selection are two of the three things we most need to improve, we're doing pretty darn well.

[superdave]

If ball movement and shot selection are two of the three things we most need to improve, we're doing pretty darn well.

Yes, very true. I see the offense as still settling into more defined roles. I think we will see some additional sets and quick hitter type plays added as the season progresses.

The defense has much more room to improve, and I will be curious to see how that unfolds. Are we going to be a zone team? Can our big guys communicate and rotate? What happens when Miami spreads us out for 40 minutes?

[Kedsy]

The defense has much more room to improve, and I will be curious to see how that unfolds. Are we going to be a zone team? Can our big guys communicate and rotate? What happens when Miami spreads us out for 40 minutes?

Yes, I agree. We need to improve our help rotations in both M2M and zone. When Marvin and Javin are both flying through the air swatting things at the rim, we look really hard to score upon. But too many times nobody rotates and the opponent is free under the basket (after drive or pass). If we're not going to turn our opponents over, while also allowing them to take 38% of their shots from three, we have to shut down the paint.