Three games in one – we made a run to the ACC Tournament final before a four-point loss against Duke. For games bunched together like this, I’m going to write about the whole event and relevant things heading into the NCAA Tournament – so that means games against Duke, Miami, and N.C. State all incorporated. The most content will be from the Duke game because that’s the most informative against the best competition; but there will be plenty from the others as well.
I can’t talk about everything again, but we’ll get into a lot including player form and where we might want to make some tweaks headed into our final set of games for the season. Although, it would have been awesome to get that game over the finish line, and we certainly didn’t play our best against Duke – we played two strong games prior, with the Miami game potentially being our best of the season, and the fact that we competed so well against Duke, even though they didn’t have Ngongba, was a very welcome improvement from when we visited Cameron just a couple of weeks ago. Basically, if we play like we did in most of this tournament, we should be competitive against most competition – and I’m looking forward to seeing that come together in one final push where everything needs to click.
Let’s go ahead and get into the meat, here, starting with:
Finishing/Growing Pains
Everything was right there in front of us but, unlike the majority of the season where we’ve closed incredibly well in close games, Duke just made the plays down the stretch to take this one. The obvious two pays, and man, the thin margins, were Malik Thomas missing the front end of his one-and-one that would have tied it and then giving up the offensive rebound to Cam Boozer after his miss on the subsequent defensive stand that forced us to foul. Isaiah Evans made both of his and the rest was history. Small differences fully decided the game in those moments.
But those were mostly just moments of individual execution. Not much to be learned from a missed free throw aside from hopefully having the experience make you stronger moving forward. Getting pushed under the rim via momentum when contesting the Boozer shot and the ball coming right back to him – a few split-second differences in how that played out could have changed things. So it goes – they earned those moments and made (most of) their free throws.
I want to focus on two plays before those, though, that also set the tone and stage for the finish and were more within our control. In the first, the game was tied at 66 with just under 3 minutes to play. Duke made the savvy adjustment in the second half of going small. With Malik Brown off of the floor, Ugonna Onyenso, who was dominant all tournament and we’ll talk about him a ton later, could no longer sag into the lane. Instead, he had to come out to defend Cam Boozer on the perimeter while our 1-4 had to guard the rest of Duke’s shooters. Ugo still did a great job defending this matchup, but it certainly was an improvement from Duke’s perspective and was really good coaching from Scheyer.
So, this was the action and play they ran quite a bit against us. It got Isaiah Evans a three not much earlier, it was what created their winning shot against Florida earlier in the season, it was where TDR fouled Evans later in this game, giving him free throws. Boozer handles the ball, bringing Onyenso away from the hoop. Duke spreads flat, notice two players in each corner, and actually Cayden Boozer cuts down toward the weak side block. Isaiah Evans (#3), their sniper, sets a ball screen on Onyenso. Now we’ve got a problem. Firstly, Onyenso is not used to having the ball screen set on him, he’s used to being in the Sam Lewis spot there in drop coverage. If we switch, now you’ve got Onyenso in space chasing Evans and you have the ACC Player of The Year who has the best whistle in the game driving downhill right at Sam Lewis with only Dallin Hall there to pinch in. What’s the best thing to do here? I think you’re probably best off with a fairly complicated rotation where Sam stays home momentarily, Ugo recovers, De Ridder sprints out to Evans, Mallory lingers and jumps to the corner, and Lewis slides down into the lane. That’s not really in line with how we’ve covered most of the year, though. Secondarily, you’re still probably better with Lewis sprinting out to Evans, Hall trying to aggressively stop the drive while Ugo recovers, and living with a Sarr (#7) three-point attempt from the corner. Instead, Sam and Ugo both stay on Boozer and the return pass to Evans happens. De Ridder sees this a little too late (but normally we’d be switching on this because our 5 would be in the drop coverage slot) and runs over to contest. So does Ugo. Ideally, again, with him seeing TDR charging out, he should turn and crash the glass. Either way, all of this has given Evans a clean look and has created an imbalanced situation where Chance Mallory (good design by Scheyer, again) has to try to box out two Blue Devils crashing. He picks the taller one, the shot misses, unfortunately in that direction, and Cayden Boozer cleans up the easy board.
It was easy live to watch this play and think someone just missed a box out. No, it was an opportunity created by smart play design, putting our Center in an uncomfortable defensive position he wasn’t used to and then forcing unnatural rotations off of that. This is one of those things that a team like Duke is pretty uniquely suited to attack – but there may be other circumstances where teams try to go small against us and play through their 5 as a hub on the outside. We’ll need to remember this lesson and prep for how we want to counter.
Okay, then this was our offensive response, below. Mallory, Hall, Lewis, TDR, Ugo are on the floor. TDR and Lewis start in the corners, Mallory passes to Hall on the wing, then runs off of an Ugo screen and flares back out to take the return pass. Nothing really there, we’re basically at square one. Ugo then sets and slips a ball screen and Duke blitzes Mallory. He can’t get the ball to Ugo (despite it being a good opportunity) due to the Boozer brother’s double team. He dribbles out and passes it to Hall while Cam sprints back to Ugo. Hall, quickly now, gets the ball to TDR in the corner, hoping to take advantage of Duke’s defensive sag. De Ridder catches and attacks the close out. We’ll talk about this later in the piece, but watch how Sarr (#7) and his 7-foot wing-span shade De Ridder on his drive – really eliminating any path through the right hand into the lane. Thijs could have potentially spun back to his left and continued to attack away from the defense, but his idea is to pitch out to Hall and screen Sarr. Just kidding, he represents the screen and then attempts to post Sarr after the switch – taking the fight to him directly rather than allowing him to clog driving lanes. Hall doesn’t take him up on this, though, and also isn’t looking to shoot over the cushion he’s being given, and instead passes over to Sam. At that point, all of their work was mostly a wash and things were reset again aside from having more favorable matchups on TDR and Hall… but Dallin passed away from that. Now, we’re down to 8 seconds to shoot and Lewis is in isolation with Evans far beyond the three-point line. He passes back to Hall, who is far too passive from there with an Ugo ball screen, doesn’t seem aware of the shot clock, and passes back to Sam without enough time to get his shot up.
Ew.
It was a really unfortunate time to lose track of how much time we had to shoot… and it also showed a lack of urgency or willingness for someone to step up and make a play. I was disappointed that Hall, who has been the epitome of aware throughout most of the season had this lapse in such a big moment. I was also disappointed that there was no real purpose to this play – and the one thing we developed (a mismatch for both De Ridder and Hall) we didn’t even look to attack and passed out of. It felt alarmingly like a possession from Cameron where we were giving Duke a little too much respect and were afraid to go at them here. I hope we learn from this that we can’t really dance around and defer and hope something opens up in big moments – someone’s going to have to go and try too make a play.
This is also why I appreciated so much what Malik Thomas brought to this tournament on the whole, and how aggressive he was down the stretches of these games. He seems to be rounding into his postseason form a bit and I thought walked that line between aggressive and control better than he has all year throughout most of his time – including when he drew the free throws that he missed.
So, sure, it wasn’t the most important thing that came out of the weekend but, since we’re talking about it, let’s pivot into that now….
Malik Thomas – Closer/Playmaker
Malik Thomas had a great tournament – finished on the Second All-Tournament Team, and scored 16, 15, and 18 points respectively – the latter representing our leading scorer vs. Duke and the former our leading scorer vs. N.C. State. What I liked most about Thomas’s game, though, is that he was unafraid to try and go make a, sometimes spectacular, play – especially near the end of the game. But, in doing so, he was good about limiting his turnovers and played much more in control than he has at times during the season. In fact, he only had two turnovers all tournament. He was engaged and confident, shared the ball well, and I also loved that he scrapped and was playing fully alert, hungry, basketball.
Basically, this was the Malik Thomas I think we came into the season expecting – and he did it on the biggest stage yet and against the best competition we’ve faced this year (especially bouncing back against Duke’s athleticism and length). Let’s take a look at a few of my favorite moments (certainly can’t get into all 49 points… well, you know we could… but we have time constraints and other things to talk about).
In most sections, I’m probably going to start with the Duke game and work backward, but here I want to set the tone with Malik early on because I thought he did that. This first play, below, was such a fundamental thing that is easy to go lax on when you’re playing too casually. It came at a timely moment in the game as we were down five points to the Wolf Pack over 8 minutes into the game. Hall inbounds the ball and takes it back in the corner, where he’s easily trapped. Unable to find an easy pass, he tries to get the ball across the court to Thomas, but can’t get much mustard on it and ends up throwing a duck. This could have easily been picked off by McNeil (#2) if Thomas doesn’t come to the ball and close hard on it. Instead of potentially a fast break the other way and the lead ballooning to seven, Thomas is able to hit the midrange jumper and get fouled, trimming things to two. It’s a likely 5-point swing that is primarily driven by hustle.
What I absolutely loved, though, is how Thomas played just 20 minutes in this game but still became the closer. That wasn’t as relevant in the Miami game, but in both of the others, when we needed offense down the stretch, Thomas was often the guy hunting his shot – and effectively.
Here we are up 6 with under 2:30 to go. It’s an opportunity to get some distance between us and State to try to close out the game. Thomas plays off of the vacancy and recovery from a TDR drive to take McNeil off of the dribble and hit a turnaround jumper in the lane.
This wasn’t pure isolation basketball, but it was attacking a slight advantage generated through the offense, and it required the confidence to just hunt this turnaround and to take it without hesitation.
Then, not long after with the margin the same, we see even more aggression and creativity. This time it is in isolation – which is not something we ran a ton in this tournament – so notable that he took it on in this moment. What I like about this is the marked improvement in purpose, deception, and distinct lack of panic. Earlier in the season, even up until recently at times, Thomas would often get himself stuck in these situations after stalling on a drive. Sometimes he’d pass out of it, but often he’d travel or turn the ball over trying to pass out of it. In this tournament, and we’ll see it again soon, he was much more purposeful about his pivoting in the lane. It was more crisp and he wasn’t doing it just trying to throw something up and/or draw a foul, he was more intentional in how he was setting up his defender. Here he does draw a foul, but it’s after getting his man to jump completely by him after the second fake at the turnaround jumper.
I really like how much more confidently and calmly he approached those moments. He actually had another good one against Miami, below, when they’d cut the lead from 18 down to 11 that went for another three-point play. It’s similar, but with a crafty dribble to the baseline, and then he lures his defender into thinking he’s going to pass it back out before pivoting back and up into the shot, through the contact in the process.
These are the kinds of buckets that go a long way toward building or reclaiming momentum in a game.
Okay, back to the N.C. State game for a moment, I also wanted to call out how important his scrapping for this offensive rebound was at the end of the game after the front end of a one-and-one miss.
He juked the box out and one-handed that ball with his left hand in traffic to take the situation from sweaty to comfortable once again.
Perhaps the thing that most impressed me was how he played 30 minutes and was the lead scorer on the team with 18 points against Duke after going 0-8 from the floor at Cameron. There was a whole narrative about how his athleticism translated against the length of Duke. Well, on the bigger stage in the more important game, he shot 46% from the floor and 5-6 from the FT line (we already talked about the 1).
It wasn’t even that he just got hot from the three-point line, either. He went 4-11 for the tournament from out there, but was 1-4 in that game… the one was this really confident little number after a rebound, though:
But, when it came to trying to close things out, I love his aggression in this one, too.
This drive and finish, for example was awesome. Often this year, when he’s pushed his control this much on his dribble it hasn’t always gone well. I thought his creativity with his handle and his comfort in traffic was much more reminiscent of what he showed at San Francisco. Perhaps he was just on, or perhaps he’s adjusting to the speed at the major conference level… hopefully the latter. We saw the possession earlier in the piece where we stalled out with our driving options and weren’t very aggressive. This possession is a little more active with the weave and reverse action, but it still doesn’t make much hay until Thomas finishes up by moving toward the rim on the catch, as he does, using that behind-the-back dribble, and then finishing with a crafty reverse layup in traffic.
I think he’s hunting fouls a little less, which is helping him to focus on his finishing a little more.
The other thing I’ll say about this clip, especially when contrasted with the clip we stalled out earlier, is that I don’t think we need to close with both point guards on the floor quite as often as we have them out there. It’s definitely been our closing package throughout the season and Odom is clearly comfortable with it – but when two of Thomas, White, or Lewis are playing really well, I think it benefits to have both out there often. They often have the willingness to create and shoot that helps when they are feeling it.
Okay, and this one…. So, a huge strength of our team is that we so often create our offense through team play and getting the ball to the open man. Sometimes, though, especially in clutch games, it helps to have a guy or two you’re willing to let clear out and operate. De Ridder has been this for us much of this season, but he wasn’t playing well in this game as we’ll talk about soon. In this tournament, it was Thomas, and I think that’s great for us as a development heading into the NCAAs. Not to go away from De Ridder; he’s had a lot of big moments himself, but to have another guy willing and able to step up in isolation if he’s not on or doesn’t have the favorable matchup. This is with 4 minutes to play, down 3-points. Thomas gets the 6’8″ Nikolas Khamenia (#14) matched up on him. He signals to clear out and allows a quick screen from Hall to get the 6’5″ Darren Harris switched onto him. Thomas proceeds to… back him down from the mid-post just like TDR might, moves into a pump fake, knocks Harris back with his shoulder (very Boozer-esque but guard-style) and hit the midrange shot.
That play was like… ooh, we might have a little something going on here. One of the best defensive teams in the country and Thomas is calling for an iso in a huge moment and going to work. I like what that could mean for us and I think we should consider when he plays accordingly.
So, yeah, I absolutely loved what I saw from Malik Thomas in this tournament. It feels like he’s getting more and more comfortable playing the role that was always imagined for him but he hasn’t quite filled out, at least fully and efficiently, this season.
Sam Lewis – 1st Team All-Tournament
It’s wild, to me, that after the game @ Duke, Thomas and Lewis were the two players I called out for their effort. Lewis had a legit hangover through the Wake Forest game, but he’s fully back now. He was 7-11 from the floor and 3-5 from deep against Duke after going 0-6 in the first meeting. His confidence in his shot all tournament was awesome – none more on display, I thought, than this jab step pull up over Cam Boozer to claim the lead early in the second half:
He was a scary conversion point when the ball would get to him organically in the offense, too. Here’s a nice look, below, at some pretty ball movement from us, I thought. Hall passes to Lewis and takes a screen away from TDR. Thomas runs up from the corner and then moves into a pick and roll, again with De Ridder. Malik threads a nice pass through, leading Thijs toward the hoop into the help defense. Sarr and Brown rotate over, leaving Hall alone in the corner (Grünloh dives in because his wrist isn’t allowing him to shoot, and in case TDR put a shot up). Instead, De Ridder kicks the pass to an open pass to Hall in the corner who could have shot but, instead, baits the close out from Cayden Boozer and swings it back to Sam for the clean three.
That’s really pretty basketball, although I think Duke would have preferred to stay home on Sam and force Dallin to shoot that one… there’s still always the impulsive need to close out on the open shooter (and it’s not like Dallin can’t and hasn’t been hitting that – he hit one earlier in the game in front of Duke’s bench).
I’ve said this many times before this year, but I’ll reiterate and it’s only gotten better throughout the season – I’ve been impressed with Lewis’s ability to make something happen off of the bounce and around the rim this season. I didn’t think that was necessarily a strength of his game prior, but he’s really been doing a nice job of not simply being a spot up shooter and demonstrating a suite of finishes around the rim. Here’s a great example, below, and Sam got us on the scoreboard early, but with a nice baseline drive late in the shot clock and a good Euro-step into a finish over the contest of the ACC Defensive Player of The Years (eye-roll), Maliq Brown (#6).
Here was something that I really liked from early in the Miami game, as well – this little tear drop floater in traffic. Gorgeous touch and something he hasn’t shown off a ton (normally it’s a layup or jumper off the bounce).
But, the other thing that really encouraged me about Sam in addition to his wealth of scoring (45 points for the tournament) was how engaged he was again on the defensive end and how active. We looked at Cam Boozer playing the point earlier in the piece… well here he is again. This time it’s a rejected ball screen to attempt to take Onyenso off of the bounce. Ugo held up to this really well, I thought, when Duke didn’t layer Evans into the mix, but this time Boozer loses him with a jump stop and pump fake at the rim. Here’s where Lewis leaves Dame Sarr, who shoots under 29% from three, in the corner and absolutely swats the unsuspecting Boozer from behind.
Sarr was 1-6 from three in the game – and I really thought he was a good opportunity to leave and help off of more often. I love that Sam had the ability to go and get this block, and the sharpness to go for it.
I was just really impressed with Lewis throughout the tournament – he played better as the games progressed – and not only was his outside shooting scorching (an insane 11-15 across the three games), but his finishing and general ability to use his length to his advantage were on display regularly.
Where Was Jacari White In The Duke Game?
So, this is a question I’ve seen a lot in the aftermath of the Duke loss and it’s mostly tied to the two previous pieces, but it also stands alone. Jacari White only played 9-minutes against the Blue Devils despite going 2-4 from the field. Why? Well, Thomas and Lewis were playing well and we still used Hall and Mallory a lot together is one element of the explanation. The other, though, was that really throughout the tournament but especially starting from the Miami game, Jacari was a little off his game. Not necessarily his shooting percentage, which was 38% on 13 attempts. Not up to his own lofty 43% standard on the season, sure, but perfectly acceptable.
Jacari still had some absolutely electric moments like he is wont to. Flamethrower shots, big momentum plays like this one, below, that he is often so good at making. In this one, he gets his quick hands on a pass in transition and then turns it into a bucket the other way with a pull up in the lane.
He’s both quick and fast.
But the thing that kept him off of the floor was that he was just a little too careless and tried to do just a little too much. He turned the ball over in ways that typically should have been avoidable and his shot-selection felt even more aggressive and ill-advised than normal.
Here’s an early example from the Duke game. Here, we work to get TDR the ball in the post. He loses his dribble on the back down so White wraps around and takes the dump off with Cam Boozer trailing him. If you pause at 13 seconds into the clip, you’ll see that White has the ball with good momentum and Boozer has been caught out of position. Boozer gave up the baseline a couple of times to drivers in this game, he’s gettable here, and White would have been well-served going to the rim and trying to make something happen or dishing (assuming it happened quickly, there were only 5 seconds on the shot clock). Instead, he wildly veers off course and takes a crazy fadeaway three from the corner that misses.
Now, I know as well as anyone that he can make this shot – I’ve seen him hit a couple of gorgeous fading threes from the corner this season. That’s not the point, though. The point is that he gave up an advantage that was there, or at least a more promising opportunity, played scared of Boozer, and took a much more challenging shot.
This was the stretch of the game where, after he left, he didn’t return. It was also a costly stretch because we went up 4-points, 49-45 after a Mallory three and went on a stretch over the next three minutes of the game or so where Ugo was blocking everything, Sam got a block, we were stealing the ball… and Duke’s offense hadn’t yet adjusted. At the end of that three minutes, Duke led 50-49. We just didn’t seize the opportunity on the offensive side and White being a little too frivolous in the moment was a big part of that. For example, here, stepping on the sideline after a kick out:
And then this shot selection, below, which, again, we know he can make, but isn’t really the level of high-difficulty shot we wanted to be taking while trying to extend a lead.
Note Odom’s reaction on the sideline after this shot, too, very visibly frustrated with the decision.
With our other four guards playing pretty well, especially Thomas and Lewis who often most compete for his time, Odom (who clarified after the game it was just a game flow decision) didn’t turn back to White in this one. It should also be stated, though, that this wasn’t an overreaction to what was just happening in this game. He’d been playing like this throughout much of the tournament.
Playing too fast and stepping on the sideline:
Taking some really bad shots, even though he’s got a pretty long leash in that regard, some that just were not even close and were just, frankly, overly-aggressive:
So, yeah, I had no beef with the in-game coaching decisions around White at the end of the Duke game. I don’t think it’s an indication of his longer-term favor and we’ll absolutely need him to have his moments moving forward. We are going to need him to just be a little more mindful of that sideline when he’s looking to attack and be a little more judicious with his shots.
Now, my lone quibble about Odom’s decision-making in the Tournament, specifically with regard to the Duke game relates to…
The Remarkable Ugonna Onyenso and How It Relates To Time Distribution
I blocked out everything I want to write about, but I had no idea how it was going to flow together – just kind of free-wheeling where it feels right to go based on vibes and limited time. But if I was going to prioritize probably the most important development for our team from this tournament it would be Johann Grünloh injuring his shooting wrist in the N.C. State game after being in foul trouble all game, and the crushing impact Ugo was able to have on play during his increased minute-share.
He was incredible. Like, ACC Tournament record 21 blocks – SEVEN more than the next closest (Tim Duncan) – incredible! It was really remarkable to see how he was able to bend the games to his will on the defensive side of the ball – and he was actually really good offensively too as a rim runner and with his ability to collect himself and finish. He shot 67% from the floor, scored 31 points, and was 1-3 from deep during tournament play.
Onyenso made 1st team All-ACC Tournament and would have been our MVP if we had won the game. In fact, he was SO good (held Boozer to 3-17 from the field and blocked NINE of Duke’s shots) that one could argue he was deserving of MVP even for the runners-up. Therein lies the criticism, though. He played 30 minutes against N.C. State due to the foul-trouble and injury. He played 27 minutes against Miami because Grünloh was still working through the injury. He played only 22 minutes against Duke despite the 9 blocks, 8 rebounds, and 6 points. We were +1 during his time on the floor and -5 during Grünloh’s. I realize that we prefer more of a timeshare at the position due to fatigue and the challenges of getting up and down the floor from that position – but he already proved he can handle closer to 30 minutes. Now that any game can send you home, even if Johann’s wrist is back to full health, I think you have to really consider playing Onyenso as many of the minutes as he can handle in basically any game after the first (and the first, too, as long as it’s close).
Of course, if he cools off or stops playing as the same dominating force, then you can switch that up – but give him every opportunity to be that same dominating force for the rest of the year. Those minutes are too good and are just locking down the paint on the defensive end.
Let’s just show some of this awesome tape – and we’ll jump right into a possession against the projected lottery pick. The possession starts with Duke bringing the ball up the floor and Boozer (I’m just going to say Boozer for Cam from here and will specify if it’s his brother) being covered by Lewis; a mismatch. Onyenso is covering Darren Harris off of the pick up, but sagging off of him significantly. Boozer, used to being able to bowling ball his way through the lane, asks for the lob pass as Lewis fronts him. He gets it… and runs into Onyenso in the paint. Now, Boozer is used to being able to pump fake, use his strength and whistle to finish when he gets the ball this deep, but Onyenso is excellent about not falling for pump fakes and absolutely swats this shot. After the scramble around the loose ball, for some reason Khamenia thinks he’ll have better luck, and he gets sent as well.
That is the kind of rim protection that very few, if any, other teams in this tournament can replicate to this level of dominance, discipline, and mobility.
This alone probably makes the point – but I want to demonstrate how, when he was out there, teams constantly had to be aware and it just made their offensive game plan so hard to execute. This play, below, is when they started to shift to the strategy of playing Boozer at the point to pull Ugo away from the rim. All things considered, they adapted pretty quickly which, I think Scheyer is actually a better in-game adjuster than K was but I’m sure some who know more about that program will take me to task for that. Based on what I’ve seen scouring them playing Virginia, that’s my hot take. Anyway, here they run the same pick and pop action they ran later in the game, it’s just less threatening with Harris (#8) instead of Evans. Thomas switches this time, with Ugo switching. Boozer is a smart player; he calls for the clear out and takes the ball away from Onyenso; but Ugo is undeterred and sags aggressively off of Harris. I love this game of cat and mouse, by the way. Boozer identifies and passes to Harris, which Lewis almost steals and Chance closes out on. Probably better for Ugo to allow Chance to close and go in for the rebound here, but he closes on his assignment as well. Harris misses the shot, but Cayden Boozer crashes and gets the rebound due to Mallory having to leave him. No matter. Ugo erases the put back attempt after following the ball into the lane and then plays sag defense on the next pick and roll attempt and blocks Cayden at the rim a second time.
This was some strategic basketball. It was cool seeing how Scheyer was able to cook something up, using his best player, to create some mismatches, but how Onyenso just being an absolutely elite defender was still able to erase many of the advantages.
Next, we see him in simple one-on-one defense out of the post against the ACC POTY (which I keep reminding everyone simply to point out that this has been THE most efficient player in college basketball this season that Ugo is dominating – so there really shouldn’t be anyone out there who gives him fits around the rim). It’s a nice move and spin back away from the drive, but Onyenso has the reach and reaction to swat it off of the backboard. Continuation bonus coverage to show Sam Lewis’s nice take in transition to bolster that section above about is impact outside of just spot up shooting.
Grünloh was injured during the N.C. State game, and so a major part of his game and an area that had been improving significantly as the season closed was unavailable to him. He simply wasn’t taking shots from distance (he did finish a few around the rim after the injury):
He still made a fine play to drive the space and Thomas executed well in continuation of that with the pump fake and drive, but you can’t get more wide-open than Grünloh was on the perimeter after that set up from TDR. If he’s not willing or able to take that shot, then it’s hard to justify keeping him in the equal time share.
Johann is a very skilled shot blocker in his own right, but it’s not at the same level of Ugo in terms of what he can get to. In the second half, Duke played Boozer at the point, in the first half they used a lot of Spain screens to put our rotations in flux. Spain screens have many different ways that you can run them, but the over-arching classification for them is a ball screen followed by a back screen on the defender of the initial screener. Check out how Duke uses it here with Maliq Brown (#6) screening Dallin Hall to put Grünloh in drop coverage, but then Darren Harris setting a back screen on him. Hall ends up in recovery taking the popping Harris and Lewis has to make a decision whether to stop the ball or take Maliq Brown on the roll. He ends up dropping to take Brown and letting Grünloh try to get to the shot, but he’s unable to accelerate and get there.
We can never guarantee these things but, given how he was playing all tournament, Ugo is likely to either get to this shot or at least alter it. He’s also more difficult to obstruct on that back screen.
The biggest difference between the two in that area, though, is the response to the ball fakes. While Onyenso is a master at neither biting nor fouling, Grünloh has a much harder time keeping himself out of foul trouble. Consider the clips of Onyenso resisting the Duke pump fakes above, and this foul from Johann against Miami where he bites and jumps forward, allowing a much smaller guard to draw a body foul.
Meanwhile, against Miami, Ugo was still on the prowl. Watch him on this play and compare directly to the two plays above. Here, he’s guarding Ernest Udeh (#8) on Miami who isn’t a shooting threat. This allows him to camp the lane on these pick and roll actions and he starts by absorbing the spin move and swatting the shot of Shelton Henderson (#7). The next part is even more impressive as Miami drives on Thomas, Ugo shades to that side to help contest another shot opportunity. The ball crosses under the hoop back to Henderson again. Watch how much space he covers without having to move much; he’s planting to jump to contest a shot on one side of the rim. When the pass comes, he just basically takes a step and pivots back, already in position to contest the shot from the other side of the rim. He refuses to bite on the shot fake, and then blocks Henderson’s shot again.
It’s amazing to watch how angles come into play in this game vertically as well as horizontally. Onyenso’s ability to high point the ball means he really doesn’t have to move his body as much to be obstructive; which also helps him have the confidence to wait on the jump to try to block the shot. Grünloh in that situation is much more likely to concede a foul.
Now, one line of thought might be – okay, if Johann’s wrist is better and he’s shooting again, that kind of solves this issue and you can return to the way things were. I say that ship has sailed… or at least should have sailed. Its departure time was around 9:30pm on Saturday night. Because here’s the thing – it’s not like the offense suffers when Ugo is out there lately. He’s not as efficient at it, but he’s still knocking down open threes:
He’s been the better lob threat – our guards have had a tendency to throw these too high over the span of this season and he’s better at getting up high and finishing. Here he had to really stretch to tip this one in:
And, lately, he’s been a calm presence with some opportunistic and, at times patient finishing around the rim. This clip below isn’t the patience part, but was really impressive. He swats the McNeil (#2) putback attempt, which is great and aligned with what he’s seen… but watch him sprint the floor and follow up on this offensive rebound putback of his own.
I want to put a little more perspective on that. It’s two-way impact and is valuable in the transition game, for sure. It helped to put the game in a good position down the stretch, also great…. But Ugo played 30 minutes in this game. He averages 18.6 minutes this season – tied for his most ever – and he still had plenty of energy to go chase this play down. I am not worried about his fatigue for one final tournament where he’s still only playing two games a week if all goes well. It’s time for the plan to be to ride with his minutes going up to how they were around the State and Miami game and then adjust from there. Close the season out with your biggest advantages logging the most time! You can always scale it back if he’s playing tired or if Johann returns playing really well.
Two last points I just wanted to make before closing here. It’s not just the 21 blocks, it’s also the countless shots altered at the rim and made harder. Sometimes those are even better because it’s easier to rebound a miss than a block. Those show up in the stat sheet as misses, but his contribution is hidden until you watch. Here is a great example against Miami at how they successfully got into the lane but stalled out three separate times in one possession. The end result was a desperation, high-arcing turnaround over his reach.
This is what he means when he says he loves seeing the fear in their eyes as they see him.
His presence back there also makes our lives easier when it comes to Chance Mallory’s defensive matchups. Chance has done a nice job all year of not making things easy on bigger players when he guards them – and we switch screens 1-4 so this happens frequently. It was only a matter of time, though, before some teams especially familiar with us started making it a strategy to attack this. N.C. State played us for the third time in this tournament, and they did do this – especially with Quadir Copeland and Darrion Williams.
Here’s a look below, and Onyenso is still on the floor here, where N.C. State hunts getting Mallory matched up on Williams (#1) who at 6’6″, 225lbs plays that kind of tweener 3/4 role. Watch after the dribble interchange and Mallory is switched onto Williams. He immediately starts pointing for the ball to come back his way so that he can post up. He then works his way into the lane, draws Ugo, and gets the easy assist to Lubin.
Okay, that’s unfortunate and potentially a bit of a vulnerability. But I will say this – Chance did a really nice job throughout most of the game at occupying his man’s attention in harassing the dribble so that they weren’t as aware of Ugo’s help. And the fact that Onyenso was on the floor so often allowed him to help a lot.
Here was probably the most emphatic one, below, that illustrates that perfectly. The Wolf Pack get the switch they want with Mallory on Williams around the elbow. Mallory dislodges the ball at first and then forces Williams to put his head down and drive with strength to protect the ball. As he works his way in, Onyenso has simply taken a couple of steps across the lane and swats the shot.
A symbiotic relationship that’s much more impactful with Ugo in support – also a big reason I’ve liked keeping the two of them together off of the bench all season so they enter at roughly the same time.
And, it’s incredibly valuable to have Mallory on the floor because of…
Mallory’s Basketball IQ
I wrote before the tournament that Mallory was the player most out of form to close the season. And, while his shooting percentage from the floor still wasn’t where we want it (28% on 18 attempts), I thought he found his form throughout the tournament – especially in the Miami game here he was excellent. He had 13 assists over the three games and no turnovers, which was fantastic. As we learn in math… you can’t divide by zero.
So, this was absolutely the kind of play we need from Chance, but what really stood out to me was his headiness on the court, especially for a Freshman. Here’s a great example, below, from the Miami game. We ended up running away in this game and winning by 22, but this was when the game was still close. First, this is an excellent save from Chance to Thomas, falling out of bounds to start the break. Mallory is behind the play, laying on the camera man. We run the floor, Miami gets back. Somehow, Henderson (#7) trips over his own feet, far away from the play, at the bottom of the screen. Odd. But Chance takes advantage of it, trailing the play, he takes the pass back, realizes that Henderson is out of position and doesn’t have a good angle, and just forces the issue down the lane, drawing a shooting foul on the block.
That’s a winning kind of play that generates two free throws simply by recognizing an unforced error and pressing the advantage/forcing a call. When I was watching live I made a note to myself and time stamped and just wrote and circled “smart/opportunistic.”
Of course, we have to show his play of the tournament, where, defending at the end of the first half, he picks the pocket of Tre Donaldson (#3) cleanly. As he runs out the other way, it’s possible he could have gone in for a finger roll or something, but he’s aware of the time and pulls up for the demoralizing three!
Aside from Ugo making Boozer’s life miserable, this was my favorite play of the tournament. Electric – but it happened because he’s just very aware at all times.
This also applies to his playmaking and his ability to identify where and when to get the ball to his teammates. I mentioned the 13 assists across the tournament, but this was my favorite as he beautifully hit Grünloh in stride after pushing the pace after a missed shot. N.C. State’s defense is mostly back on this, but Grünloh beelines toward the rim and Chance sees it and gives him a great pass. This was my favorite play from Grünloh of the tournament, while we’re discussing it.
I do hope that he can clean up some of his finishing for the home stretch – but he shot 40% from three for the tournament – so it’s encouraging that element is improving. Either way, if he can carry this momentum forward, play making, ball protection, and smarts will go a long way.
Alright, let’s wrap things up here with the last, but probably most involved section.
Thijs De Ridder Is Our Most Important Player
In our first game against Duke, De Ridder was really the only one who showed up. Against Duke, in this tournament, he was one of the few who didn’t. He was 1-6 from the floor, scored a season-low 5 points (tied-two other times), and had three turnovers. The thing was, we had quite a few guys who had their A games in this contest (Lewis, Thomas, Onyenso) and Mallory and Hall were playing well too. Even just a normal game from Thijs and that outcome is surely different.
Now, let me start by saying that some of the discussion I’ve seen in the fallout is ridiculous. De Ridder has been our best and most consistent player all season. The fact that it’s clearly SO painful when he has a bad game which, make no mistake, he did, proves how important he is. When other players have gone into funks (or been injured), we’ve had the ability to withstand – next man up. The problem is that not only is he our best player, but there’s also the biggest drop off behind him. Consider, he played probably his worst game of the season, and we were outscored by more points in the 11 minutes Tillis was on the floor (three) than in the 29 De Ridder was (one). This is not a talent cap thing. He was efficient in the second-best domestic pro league last year. He matched or surpassed players like Caleb Wilson and Malik Reneau head-to-head throughout the season. He’s very consistently hit big shots in big moments. It just didn’t happen on this night, unfortunately.
Duke’s game plan was about as focused on De Ridder as ours was on Boozer. They were primarily having to guard him with Khamenia or Sarr and then would send doubles or shade driving lanes aggressively. Here’s a look where we get TDR switched onto Sarr. Thijs goes to work his way into the lane, but notice how much Khamenia sags, eventually springing for the double team. Thijs struggles to get the pass out but eventually does and Thomas gets a decent look out of it after the shot fake.
Now, especially early, he turned the ball over a couple of times against this, but I think we would have been better served trying to punish the double team and help more than we did – instead we kind of went away from it.
In general, it just looked like TDR was off his game. He was more hesitant to make plays, he deferred more, and he just wasn’t making shots we’re used to him making. For example, here’s an opportunity in transition that he just misses at the rim.
I kept the great defense on the following possession to show how his defensive baseline is so good, though. Duke actually had a good game plan to keep his impact limited on the defensive end, too. Once they started playing through Boozer at the point, De Ridder was always matched up on a shooter. They’d mostly just station his man in the corner away from the play, force him to stay home, and attack elsewhere.
But, tell me this clip, below, isn’t that exact play in transition against Miami… he just makes it. This one is against a better defender, too.
Possibly it was frustration from being minimized on both ends of the floor in this game; but sometimes you’re just off. Like, he makes this hook shot, below, around the rim all of the time. There was no daunting contest here to throw him off. He collected the offensive rebound, got good separation from Evans and was in very close to the rim… and he just short-armed it:
Like, we just weren’t this kind of confidence from him, below, despite the fact that it should be much easier to execute in the post there vs. Evans than this nice spin against Reneau.
Hopefully, it wasn’t the stage… and I don’t think it was considering how well he played against N.C. State and Miami (he still made 2nd All-Tournament Team). Perhaps he was thrown by being out of rhythm and how he was being defended – which Duke was uniquely well-suited to do with players like Sarr making it so that driving lanes like this weren’t there:
Due to their ability to shade with length and recover.
But, perhaps he just had an off night like all players do from time to time. I’d have liked to see us be more intentional about forcing the double team and finding the open man off of it against Duke. Like, here’s a great example of N.C. State going to the double to help out Williams, De Ridder passes the ball out at first… but we go right back to him and he’s able to swing it to the opposite corner to Hall for the touch pass back to Lewis:
Or here, below, where we had Mallory be the one to set the ball screen for him, which caused confusion in N.C. State’s coverage. Much like when we screen 4-5 and make Centers defend him, having the opposition’s player defending the PG have to either pick up or switch is also a mismatch. And then when Thijs gets going downhill hill he is hard to stop – great finish below:
My point is, even if it has some rocky moments, I don’t think we should go away from some of these isolation plays or creative screening plays if he’s not starting well. His ability to casually chip in double figures most games is too important to our baseline point total. And HE needs to trust himself and be more aggressive too.
Because, in addition to our needing his scoring and the way he scores/influences an opposing defense, HIS defense is too important, as well. Just because Duke mostly tried to dodge him doesn’t mean that’s not impactful. Firstly, it means they just aren’t using a player/area of the floor, but there are still also plenty of moments where he was able to have an impact. The transition defense above, for one, but check this when Cam Boozer was off the floor. At the beginning TDR is on Khamenia, Lewis on Brown, and Grünloh on Sarr. Not ideal, but workable given that neither Brown nor Sarr are good shooting options. Watch how TDR locks down and disrupts the point while switching. First, he deflects the ball away from Cayden Boozer, disrupting the play flow, then he jumps and delivers a brutal contest on the three-point shot by Darren Harris:
The reason teams game plan to avoid him or hep on him is because he is such an asset. The problem is, when he’s not playing well offensively like in this Duke game, his defense is still too valuable.
Devin Tillis has still done some pretty nice things offensively lately – primarily passing the ball (he was just 0-1 from three this tournament) – but his defense has become too big of a concern to play him too much. He averaged over 16mpg this season, in the ACC Tournament he was under 12… and really probably should be closer to 10 or under in the NCAAs. He gets buried on the glass against athletic teams, for one. Check out this play, below. TDR didn’t have a good offensive day, but he made the 6’8″ Khamenia (#14) look small on this end all night. As Boozer just plants his shoulder right in the middle of Grünloh’s chest (nice job standing up to that, by the way), Tillis is shading Sarr in the corner. He doesn’t actually do anything, though, except spectate. He turns his back to both Sarr and Khemenia, who is pressing in to rebound. He does nothing to help on Boozer, and then when the rebound comes off, there’s no box out or awareness there, he just gets jostled out of the way by Khemenia who tips it back in.
That’s bad, physically limited, and not mentally locked in defense right there. We can’t afford it. We’ve got to be able to clean up on the inside hen we force misses against good players.
And then here he is matching up against Boozer in the full court, something that we needed to try to avoid at all costs, and he simply just gets beaten in a sprint toward the hoop after being spotted a huge head start – leading to help needing to come and facilitation at the rim:
Inexcusable and WAY too easy. Duke didn’t actually have to do anything to get this advantage other than run past him.
Meanwhile, here’s TDR’s defense in actual transition against Malik Reneau, backing up while he’s at full-sprint – cutting him off, being physical, forcing the travel:
Speed and physicality.
Tillis is all over the bottom of our most efficient two-man pairings on EvanMiya – including three of our bottom four (he doesn’t play well with Thomas, Mallory, or Ugo… and isn’t much better with White or De Ridder himself – the latter makes sense because the exercise at the SF didn’t work). It started to happen in the ACC Tournament – but I really think it’s time to lean into as many TDR minutes as his endurance can handle headed into the NCAA Tournament. The baseline of him being out there is too valuable and we need him more than anyone to play at least up to his average standard.
In Conclusion
Games have already started on Thursday so I’m not going to spend a ton of time wrapping this. You get the point! Trust whichever of our five guards have it going and take this closing stretch to prioritize De Ridder and Onyenso as much as you reasonably can while playing at the same style. Maximize their minutes.
Enjoy the tournament, everyone! GO HOOS! Let’s start by getting past this weekend!
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