calumnus said:
sluggo said:
Bearprof said:
Was anyone reminded of Ben Braun's offenses the last few games? Moving the ball around the perimeter with no penetration for long periods, and no plays to get anyone open. Did not see a lot of open shots, which can explain the poor production from Betley and Foreman. This was the norm with Braun teams, which is why Montgomery's teams were a breath of fresh air.
There should be contingency plans to run plays to get open looks when the motion offense is just not working.
Bradley gets a little space one on one because he is a drive threat.
Grant did have some open shots, but after inspired play against the so-Cal teams he has slumped badly.
No, I have been reminded of Ben Braun every game Fox has coached. The other team always gets easier shots.
We rank in the 300s in pace of play, just like Fox's teams at Georgia. Braun's teams were similar. On defense it is deny any shot until the defense breaks down and they get an easy shot and on offense it is pass it around to burn clock then let get it to your best player to play hero ball as the shot clock expires. Helped get guys like Gray, Lampley, Shipp, Powe and for Fox, KCP, and now Bradley score lots of points on underachieving teams. Not really fun basketball to watch or play in either. However, it is better at keeping the games "competitive" and minimizing the margin of losses with an occasional upset. Wyking Jones tried to push pace which is disastrous with an inferior team. So slow is better than that. The problem with playing slow ugly ball is players who have NBA aspirations will avoid you. You plateau at meh. Braun would annually announce we were going to push pace and probably told recruits that, but eventually coaches who play this way are known for playing this way and the "we are going to play fast" pronouncements are taken with a lot of skepticism.
Honestly, I don't think your examples are good ones. Lampley was by far the best scoring option on a young team. Gray and Powe scored a lot of points on teams that were otherwise very offensively challenged and Gray was an incredible scorer. Shipp actually played within a good offense with Wethers and Tamir, at least when those three and Midgley were on the floor together (given that absolutely no one else on that team could score a lick).
I'm not defending Braun's offense, which was bad. But those are not the years I would have changed things.
Also, for as much some here claim Braun was a great recruiter/poor coach, the great recruiter part I will never understand, for most of the years he had a defective roster where he could rarely put 5 on the floor that were even competent scorers. His offense was equally challenged by the fact that he rarely recruited enough weapons. A lot of the times he took the air out of the ball it was because he had 0-2 scorers on the floor and sat on it and played defense while the 1 or 2 other scorers were resting on the bench.
