Improved Defense?

by **MustangIcon** » Sun Mar 05, 2006 12:27 pm

I can recall countless times hearing on this board that at very least everyone must see how much better our defense is under Tubbs than it was under Dement and if you don't "you must be blind/know nothing about basketball". "Dement's 1-3-1 is terrible." "Everyone has a career night vs us."

Well we just got lit up for another career high, 40 points by Rice Junior Morris Almond, last night. The 39 put up against us by the kid from UAB was a career high too. Have we had other career high's earlier in the season that I just did not pay attention to?

Oh I forgot. It's our players. We just have inferior players compared to teams like the talent laden Rice powerhouse. Tubbs can't be expected to keep us from getting lit up by employing such tactics as a defensive scheme bc our players are so bad. What a joke.

I am interested in hearing reasons why I am so wrong for questioning Tubbs's unquestioned amazing coaching ability. Please post them here for me to review.

by **Pony_Fan** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 12:26 pm

Seems to be a trend with SMU teams...career highs for opponents.

I think the defense is different but not sure it's a huge improvement like some say on this board. He is the leading scorer in the conference but 40 pts? He only made two 3 pointers so that tells you how active he was.

Rice had 32 FT attempts to SMU's 8...big difference there.

I think Tubbs should use a little more zone than he does to change things up. There are a lot of opponent layups and the help side defense is lacking a lot this year...guys don't shift or help each other out.

by **DickerJames** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 2:39 pm

I stand by my comments at the beginning of the year and still say our defense is improved. Is it great, no, is it better, yes. Almond scored 33 against Tulane, 30 against Memphis, 36 at UAB, 31 at Tulsa, and 30 against East Carolina. We aren't exactly Lone Rangers in the Almond highlight reel. Lack of offense is the reason we have a [deleted] poor record this year.

by **Hoop Fan** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 3:18 pm

DickerJames, quit looking at this so logically. Mustangicon wants to rant and rave and tell us he knew Tubbs was a bad coach all along.

by **MustangIcon** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:04 pm

Lack of offense is a very big problem for this team but it has nothing to do with my post. I am speaking from a defensive standpoint that I, much like Pony_Fan and others, don't see the amazing improvement that others do on the defensive side of the ball.

Also, 40 points is a 33% increase in scoring from 30 points (although 36 is a very valid comparison it is his only other game that can be considerd in the same league as his 40 points vs us) and 85% increasefrom his scoring average of 21.6 a game. I don't think they can be lumped in together as one in the same. For instance if SMU had a 33% increase in scoring we would suddenly be winning games easily bc we would be averaging 88 points per game as opposed to the current 66 points we average. At an 85% scoring increase we are all the sudden out running and gunning every team in the nation by a great deal.

In addition... Hoop Fan, I really enjoy your engaging post. It really added to the discussion here. Thanks for your contributions.

by **LA_Mustang** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:11 pm

Almond was a borderline national top 100 player in HS, and was probably better than that since his HS teammate, Josh Smith (Atlanta Hawks), got most of the attention.

by **EastStang** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 4:41 pm

First, focusing on one player's scoring is not the best way to judge a defense. A great player should put up big numbers every night. Avg. Points per game is the number to look at. This year the average is 64.2 points per game. Last season under Tubbs we gave up 67.3 points per game. A clear improvement. Also, for Tubbs career at SMU we have given up 65.8 points per game. For the last four years of Dement's term (all I could find), we gave up an average of 71.1. Is that quantitative enough for you? This year we are giving up 7 fewer points per game than we did in Dement's last year and three less than last year. Note I did not deal with the effects of overtime games on that average since our SID office does not seem to do that. Theoretically OT games should be weighted according to time. On the other hand our offense has fallen off the table this year.

by **MustangIcon** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 5:40 pm

I started the thread to point out some things that people always complained about (and still do) regarding Dement, such as the career night quip posted on here often.

ESPN has us giving up 66.9 points per game this season. Not sure if those stats are correct or not. Also, although I have no stats to prove this, I would imagine our poor offensive sets in which we frequently use up most of the clock limit the opportunities of our opponents to score. Also, what is our strength of schedule this season as opposed to last season? I would take a guess it is weaker, which in turn would mean we should give up less buckets to weaker opponents. Basically everything is relative and no single stat can be taken as the bible as I attempted to point out by showing how Almond's scoring highs this season could be manipulated using percentages to make all kinds of stats screwy.

PS I do enjoy solid feedback such as this where you have rationale to what you are posting. Great information to take into consideration when you are looking at all the factors in evaluating the defense as a whole.

by **Stallion** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 6:07 pm

I think UTEP's Tofi first game against SMU-29 points was a career high at the time-I think he broke it later. Also that Tulsa big man Ransdell or something I believe had a career high against SMU.

by **Pony_Fan** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 6:14 pm

(I was on a call and posted this late..)

A clear improvement yes but I think you also need to consider the RPI's of the other teams.

Comparing this year and last year doesn't work....We were playing in a much better conference last year and the non-conference was a little better....so you can't just compare avg ppg. Doesn't work in this case.

No doubt it's better than Dement's.

by **Pony_Fan** » Mon Mar 06, 2006 6:32 pm

Stallion wrote:I think UTEP's Tofi first game against SMU-29 points was a career high at the time-I think he broke it later. Also that Tulsa big man Ransdell or something I believe had a career high against SMU.

And Hawaii, and LaTech, Nevada, and the list goes on....

by **EastStang** » Tue Mar 07, 2006 9:29 am

The fact is that we are giving up fewer points per game this year. Although I don't have time to research it, we seem to be causing a greater number of turnovers this year, blocked shots, and grabbing more defensive rebounds this year. Yes, there are a number of factors to that. However, until we can start putting points on the board defense will only serve to keep the outcome closer (as in the Rice game). However, a team that buys into a solid defensive mindset and learns a solid motion offense has a better long-term chance of winning, than a run and gun team. Players that can execute well helps that formula. But as Princeton and Temple have proven over the years a very good defensive team is always a team to be dealt with.

Improved Defense?

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