They are tied with Cal for 16th. Teams are shooting 39.1% against us in conference games. Miami is 18th at 41.4%. That is bad.
VT, with its $0 NIL is 5th, only allowing 32.9%
VT, with its $0 NIL is 5th, only allowing 32.9%
Pitt is 16th in the ACC in defending the 3
- Thread starter Sean Miller Fan
- Start date
This team is poor fundamentally in every aspect of the game….not just defending the 3.
Teams shooting over 40% on 3s against Miami seems wild to me. Wild. That's like elite shooting. We're hanging in there with our own flabbergasting 39%, though. Nothing to sneeze at there.
Yeah, if an individual player is shooting at a 39.1% clip, teams would be all over him. Pretty incredible to concede such a percentage as a team.
But, as we know, this isn't simply a refusal to guard the perimeter. A large portion of this problem starts on the inside. No rim protection and guys constantly needing to help inside = one or two passes and a wide open three.
Still, I wouldn't exactly label our guards as sticky defenders either. Guys shake Lowe off like a fly.
Unfortunately, this Pitt team totally lacks fundamentals and coaching. The 3's defense is just one aspect of it. Name any other aspect of the game and Pitt is terrible at it. I think we have at least marginally talented players who could be coached to perform acceptably in at least a few parts of the game. But with the present coaching we have, that won't happen.
The size of our guards also plays a big factor Lowe ish and Cummings are all tiny compared to a lot of the guards shooting over them. Also we constantly sag and double team on defense and then try to dive in a late close out.
In our history, I dont think we've had many individual players shoot 39% on volume for a season. Somehow, are allowing every ACC player to shoot 39% against us on average. It's nearly impossible for this team to win if teams get off the bus shooting 12 for 30 on 3s. And then there's the rebounding issues.
VT actually has a coach who knows what he’s doing. He’s doing a hell of a job with no NIL. If Young was the coach at Pitt this team would make the NCAA Tour. If JC was the coach at VT they would be in last place in the ACC.
Exactly, Ronald Ramon (a very good 3-point shooter) shot like 39% for his career. Allowing every player you face (on average) to shoot at that level is digging yourself a huge hole every game that's very hard to climb out of. It's a good way to lose 11 out of 15 games.
Big problem is they aren't capable of double teaming anyone effrctively, and should never even try. They don't know, or don't care to know, how to rotate on D. Once someone gets the ball out of the double team, it leads to a wide open look. Better off taking your lumps playing one-on-one.
I want to pull my hair out every time this team doubles or helps off a shooter? Why? Why do that? See if the guy can make a tough 2. No help. Teams are shooting 39% against for a reason. They are wide open. It would be great to have 1 guy on your team shooting 39%. The entire league shoots that against us.
I've watched games where someone posting GDG would catch a pass inside and two other guys would leave their man to help. As if they were covering for a midget they had playing center.
Not complaining about him because he's the only one worth his weight in salt on defense, but Austin is the king of helping. He usually plays like he's responsible for three guys.
The sad part, though, is that the help defense is warranted a lot of the times because guys like Lowe are getting beat so badly off the dribble. Can't just give them free layups the whole game, although we tend to gift more than our fair share of those as well.
We need to get much more physical in the portal. As I say every game, every team we play is so much thicker than us. We probably grade out well in height, but we have 7-footers who play like they're 5'11". And it's not we make up for it by being an extremely fast/skilled team. This is a defective bunch that has very few strengths.
It all does start with our inability to guard on the ball. We can’t stop penetration, and sometimes look like we don’t care. But it all goes downhill from there and any help defense leads to a wide open 3. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many wide open 3’s, where the player has enough time to get set without any pressure.
We might be better off not guarding the 3 at all and hoping that being that wide open makes them think about it a little more. There have been a few times these past few games when they opposition was so wide open from three that it almost caused a double take that made them miss. Could we actually do any worse than 40% under this method?
It looks to me like we don't guard the 3 at all right now.
Stop sagging because it’s not like we are stopping drives to the basket!
