re: Matt freaking McMahon

quote:

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But he was not the reason we won Saturday,

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Defensively, probably his worst game of the season. Offensively, this is the exact reason I don’t look into “offensive rating” like most. Just him being on the court, opens everything up. You have to pick him up around half court, or at the very least 5 ft behind the 3 point line. Everything is spread out and it makes rotations more difficult and that’s what has opened it up for our other guards. I believe the Aggies were one of the best defensive teams in the country and we managed a 15 point win on the road STILL shooting 20% from 3. That’s how good teams win ball games.

The high ball screen was being set too low, ATM played drop coverage with both men and brought a 3rd to clog up the paint stifling our pick and roll with Cook. All we were getting was the corner 3 because of that 3rd man creeping in. All we needed to do was extend the offense a bit to open up options for Cook but we didn’t. He did adjust in the 2nd a bit using more pick and pop bringing Wright over to the play side to give us some space on the wing and Wright exploited it in the 2nd. Coach Mac has to do a better job of freeing up Cook up top but you’re right, we won the game because our bigs were finally physical and scrappy underneath plus our depth wore them out in the 2nd half. I think Cook is a good defender he just isn’t always aggressive because he’s trying to stay out of foul trouble.