I wasn't confident in the 09-10 or 10-11 team underneath it all. Shoddy guard play throughout both years ended it before it began for those teams. And like this year, we need(ed) a good game from our PG (Collins) to go far in 09. He sucked against UNI. We needed outstanding games from him, Reed and Morningstar those years and it didn't happen in the dance. Guard play owns.

I'm not worried. EKU is a 15 seed for a reason.

Yes, they shoot a lot of threes, but our problem guarding threes usually stems from teams driving inside, or passing inside, and us collapsing on them, and then not getting back to the guy who got the kickout. That won't be a problem with this team. They have NO inside presence. So, the guards will never have to help inside, which means they can just stay on their man. The only thing we'll have to worry about is running through screens that get the shooters open. That's not something you can really coach other than to say "Hey, don't sag off and go behind the screen; fight through it."

I'm not particularly worried. They don't rebound the ball. Like, at all. Even if they steal a few possessions and hit 45% of their threes, they will have NO answer inside. We should score on every possession. Even if we miss, they won't rebound the ball.

Right, and we have THE best guard in the nation. And another outstanding one in Selden. We'll be fine.

I hope so man. I appreciate it your post made me feel better.

I suspect EKU will use a lot of zone. I don't know how they'll be able to make any stops if they stick with mostly man defense. Ellis and Wiggins would destroy them.

And Georgetown

Not to mention, there's no way they could stop Black or Traylor using man defense either.

I think they've given up on that finally now after we've beat them the last three times we've faced them lol.

I think I speak for everyone when I say I'm shocked that this team hasn't improved that much on D throughout the year and from an effort standpoint. Self coached teams aren't supposed to be this crappy on D. Even Self said himself he's surprised that this team isn't that good on D he thought they'd be better on D than on O.

And Georgetown is NIT bound this year

There are some bright spots. Selden Wiggins and Embiid are good defenders. Black too prior to picking up his 18th foul. But **** they don't play team defense well. Rotation is bad help side is bad. Situational awareness is bad. It's the team stuff that's bad.

Ellis and Tharpe are particularly poor on defense but I think the team aspects could hide that if they were worth a ****.

EDIT. And yes. I'm surprised.

It's not right anyway, since guard play is not nearly as valuable as post play is either in regular or post season.

If that were true, I can name a number of teams that should've cut down the nets the last five years.

KU doesn't win it in 08 without magnificient guard play overall in the postseason. Same with Louisville and UConn in their national title winning years to name a few.

I don't think there's one aspect of a team that's more important than another. Balanced teams, both with a good post and good guard play tend to do very well. Unless, of course, they have Melo.

Self interview with Scott Van Pelt.

http://t.co/OMfA8kY1eT