Thoughts on the Penn game

JeffwallaceUA · Nov 7, 2019

I was there. The first thing I noticed was the frenetic energy we were playing with. I've never seen an alabama team play that hard. I was excited to see that. The next thing I noticed, soon after the energy, was the sloppiness. I think we were just not ready to try to play at that pace.

The offense looked odd at first. It felt like we were just doing ISO. I didn't love the feel of it at first. Plus our offensive skill level looked subpar. The more I watched though, the more I started noticing the spacing. My God, Kira could get to the basket every time he wanted. He had a clear lane. That was beautiful. If we could get some players around him this offense would freaking cook! But we don't.

Our defense was ridiculously bad. PENN got to the basket at will. Literally every time they drove they went right by our defense. We seemed to have never seen a pick and roll offense before. So many new faces and freshmen out there I'm afraid that wont improve enough for us to be competitive on that end of the floor all season.

What do you guys think?

Ldlane · Nov 7, 2019

JeffwallaceUA said:
I was there. The first thing I noticed was the frenetic energy we were playing with. I've never seen an alabama team play that hard. I was excited to see that. The next thing I noticed, soon after the energy, was the sloppiness. I think we were just not ready to try to play at that pace.

The offense looked odd at first. It felt like we were just doing ISO. I didn't love the feel of it at first. Plus our offensive skill level looked subpar. The more I watched though, the more I started noticing the spacing. My God, Kira could get to the basket every time he wanted. He had a clear lane. That was beautiful. If we could get some players around him this offense would freaking cook! But we don't.

Our defense was ridiculously bad. PENN got to the basket at will. Literally every time they drove they went right by our defense. We seemed to have never seen a pick and roll offense before. So many new faces and freshmen out there I'm afraid that wont improve enough for us to be competitive on that end of the floor all season.

What do you guys think?

Thought everything was fine, except our "on ball" defense and in the paint. Obviously, we need to play taller in the paint. We are playing small ball until we grow a bit, but once we get some sort of persona we might be OK. It's a matter of finding out who we are and hopefully, that should start showing around Dec. or Jan.

JeffwallaceUA · Nov 7, 2019

Hopefully you're right

Rama Jama · Nov 7, 2019

My biggest concern is simply defending inside. If Penn's center can dominate inside, imagine what teams like LSU or UK will do. I don't think we need to be great at center, but it can not be a glaring weakness either. I do agee we need to defend much better than we did, but defense will come with time and experience. I think our offense will be fine once they get more accustomed to the pace of play.

DogPatch · Nov 7, 2019

Hard to beat anybody shooting 35% from the floor. If that was just 40%, we win by 7. From what little I got to watch online, it just seemed like a bad shooting night.

BAMAVILLE · Nov 7, 2019

You know ... we've talked about the woes of defending the front court but the forward wasnt even the leading scorer, the guard was. If we could have kept him in check we would have ran away with the game. Saying that to say I think we will win our fair share of games against the taller teams if we play consistently

B1GTide · Nov 8, 2019

DogPatch said:
Hard to beat anybody shooting 35% from the floor. If that was just 40%, we win by 7. From what little I got to watch online, it just seemed like a bad shooting night.

Agree, but it comes down to play in the paint. You shot well from the outside in the first half, but when Penn realized that you simply had no presence in the paint they adjusted. After the half, they locked down on your perimeter shots. Really hard to shoot from 3 point land when they are in your face and making you move your feet.

Fix the post play and the outside stuff will open up.

JeffwallaceUA · Nov 8, 2019

B1GTide said:
Agree, but it comes down to play in the paint. You shot well from the outside in the first half, but when Penn realized that you simply had no presence in the paint they adjusted. After the half, they locked down on your perimeter shots. Really hard to shoot from 3 point land when they are in your face and making you move your feet.

Fix the post play and the outside stuff will open up.

Sounds good but how? We lack talent and experience down low.

AlexanderFan · Nov 8, 2019

JeffwallaceUA said:
Sounds good but how? We lack talent and experience down low.

Hustle and execution

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JeffwallaceUA · Nov 8, 2019

AlexanderFan said:
Hustle and execution

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Yeah. We have to assume their execution will improve. I believe in this coaching staff and look forward to seeing real progress throughout the season.

Rama Jama · Nov 8, 2019

Defense is about communication as well as on ball pressure. Players have to experience with each other to cut off drives to the basket and drop down to double a player. I think we'll shoot better as the year goes on.

TexasBama · Nov 8, 2019

BAMAVILLE said:
You know ... we've talked about the woes of defending the front court but the forward wasnt even the leading scorer, the guard was. If we could have kept him in check we would have ran away with the game. Saying that to say I think we will win our fair share of games against the taller teams if we play consistently

That kid wore us out off the high post screen and we didn't switch well at all.

B1GTide · Nov 8, 2019

JeffwallaceUA said:
Sounds good but how? We lack talent and experience down low.

Step #1 - get Herb Jones back healthy. He is probably your best defensive player and is great in the paint. You really struggled after his injury.

BamaMike05 · Nov 8, 2019

TexasBama said:
That kid wore us out off the high post screen and we didn't switch well at all.

This is exactly it. He was setting the UCLA high post screens (Mark Gottfried would have been proud) he is such a big body that you really can’t “hold” the screen because he will step out and knock down the 3. You also can’t fully switch because then they can just do a re-screen for perfect post-up position. He was just a major mismatch. You also couldn’t really double down on him because they had shooters on the floor. There is a reason why an Ivy League team usually wins a first round game in the NCAAT.

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Rama Jama · Nov 8, 2019

You have to realize that this group of players are having to integrate a completely new system both offensively and defensively. If you think about it, Galin Smith played sparingly last year and Davis not at all. It takes time to develop on the defensive end more than the offensive end IMHO. I'll leave it to someone who understands and knows the X's and O's better than I do, but if our effort is as good as it was against Penn,(assuming no injuries) well win our share of games. We just have to have someone who can rebound and defend inside. Herb Jones may be the X-factor for us. He is the only player who can defend at a high level consistently.

day-day · Nov 8, 2019

DogPatch said:
Hard to beat anybody shooting 35% from the floor. If that was just 40%, we win by 7. From what little I got to watch online, it just seemed like a bad shooting night.

Pretty much.

Bama missed slightly contested layups constantly until late in the game when mainly Lewis took the ball in.

I imagine there will be some teams in which Bama will be expected to trade 2's for 3's as the opponent will score with bigs inside and Bama will shoot (and make?) from the three.

BamaInMo1 · Nov 9, 2019

There are going to be growing pains. Plain and simple.
Consider this as well, these guys are still trying to comprehend being free to shoot and not get pulled just because you miss a shot. They are not used to that and it has an effect on the phsyche.
I didn't get to watch but did listen and I gather we played for 40 minutes. We kept fighting all game long and didn't mentally check out. We didn't have a late game collapse.
I think we'll see improvement as the season goes along and win some games we wouldn't have last season.
It's gonna be a process (much like football was) and as long as the players are buying in and working hard we will be ok.

JeffwallaceUA · Nov 9, 2019

BamaInMo1 said:
There are going to be growing pains. Plain and simple.
Consider this as well, these guys are still trying to comprehend being free to shoot and not get pulled just because you miss a shot. They are not used to that and it has an effect on the phsyche.
I didn't get to watch but did listen and I gather we played for 40 minutes. We kept fighting all game long and didn't mentally check out. We didn't have a late game collapse.
I think we'll see improvement as the season goes along and win some games we wouldn't have last season.
It's gonna be a process (much like football was) and as long as the players are buying in and working hard we will be ok.

This is a good perspective. All those things are true. Plus we'll have herb back which should help alot

NoNC4Tubs · Nov 9, 2019

I think Penn is a really good team anyways. No shame losing to them by 1 in a tight game. :cool2:

mlingerfelt31 · Nov 9, 2019

BamaInMo1 said:
There are going to be growing pains. Plain and simple.
Consider this as well, these guys are still trying to comprehend being free to shoot and not get pulled just because you miss a shot. They are not used to that and it has an effect on the phsyche.
I didn't get to watch but did listen and I gather we played for 40 minutes. We kept fighting all game long and didn't mentally check out. We didn't have a late game collapse.
I think we'll see improvement as the season goes along and win some games we wouldn't have last season.
It's gonna be a process (much like football was) and as long as the players are buying in and working hard we will be ok.

Like 2007 season in football.

Thoughts on the Penn game

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