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Horn Basketball vs. Iowa State Conference Opener

Posted by Trips Right on January 10th, 2009 under Basketball

This will be a quick one, and I’m sorry for the brevity. I’d like to give you a synopsis of Iowa State’s personnel and a few key points to look for during the game. As always we should have a pretty intelligent discussion after the game about what went down. I’d put the Barkers’ collective basketball IQ up against any other site discussing Horns Hoops out there on the interwebs.

So let’s start with the Cyclone personnel.

Any discussion about Iowa State has to begin with 6-10 super sophomore forward Craig Brackins. Kid’s nice. The former 5 star rivals recruit has really stepped up his game after a solid freshman campaign averaging 11 points and 5 boards per contest. In 15 non-conference games this year, Craig has really taken to his starring role averaging over 18 points 8 boards and 1.1 blocks. Brackins has the body of an NBA power forward and at times an offensive game to match. He’s strong enough to do work down low and skilled enough to face up bigger forwards using his quickness to get to the rim. He sometimes falls in love with his turn around jumper and half hook, but he’s certainly a good enough shooter to ring the bell from 15 feet and he demonstrates good touch around the rim. He presents a sort of poor man’s Blake Griffin audition for this Horns defense so I’ll be interested to see how Barnes plans to defend this talented forward.

Diante Garrett is a 6-4 sophomore point guard out of Milwaukee who runs the show for the Cyclones. Garrett has shown a good ability to get in the lane and score the basketball averaging 10 points per contest on the year. He is also adept at finding teammates, usually Brackins, for easy buckets after penetrating. Diante’s size makes it a lot easier for him to survey the floor and find teammates for open looks. Garrett leaves something to be desired shooting the basketball, he’s an inconsistent 36% from deep, so he usually settles on probing the defense for penetration opportunities to find his offense. He does give the Cyclones a solid presence in the backcourt taking pressure off of Brackins. We’ll have to keep him in front on defense.

Joining Garrett in the backcourt is 6-5 sophomore sharp shooter Lucca Staiger. Lucca’s all gunslinger averaging over 44% on his eye popping 83 attempts from deep this year. Compare that to just 5 attempts from the foul line and it’s easy to see where Lucca spends his time on the floor. When defending him he is not to be left. There are plenty of other players to help off of.

Bryan Petersen is the third guard, and the 6-1 senior gives the Cyclones another ballhandler on the floor. Petersen will also mix it up inside and averages nearly 5 rebounds a game. He’s ISU’s glue guy.

Joining Brackins in the frontcourt is 6-11 255 pound Justin Hamilton. He gives ISU size and some rebounding punch opposite Brackins. Justin is really not a threat offensively and probably the ideal matchup for Connor.

The Cyclone bench is deep and has 3-4 players that play starter’s minutes. Most notably is deep range specialist Eikmeier who averages about 1 3 point attemp every 2.5 minutes of floor time. Sean Haluska gives them solid senior guard play off the bench. Jamie Vanderbeken and Alex Thompson give the Cyclones size and rebounding depth off the pine. All four players are averaging more than 15 minutes per contest, so depth shouldn’t be an issue.

In terms of defensive keys to the game I could have saved about 20 minutes by just mentioning Brackins and Garrett. How Texas attacks these two budding stars will determine the outcome of the ball game. Defensive keys for Texas…

Make Brackins uncomfortable. I’m not talking about seating HenryJames and his Gothic rap-metal band directly behind the Cyclone bench. I’m talking about making Brackins work for every point he gets especially little gimmie layups and dunks that can get a precocious young superstar going in a hostile environment. Texas bigs must work to prevent Brackins from getting deep position and instead make him look for his 15 foot out offense. If he kills you from there you tip your cap and ask him to autograph your program after the game. Texas can accomplish this by throwing a bunch of big bodies at the young guy and bang him to the point where he’ll opt for the path of least resistance which is found outside the paint.

Test Brackins’ decision making. When Brackins does get deep position, the Horns would do well to send help from a variety of positions at a variety of speeds. Brackins has a propensity to turn the ball over, and this can be taken advantage of by varying defensive looks. A quick trap with a guard on one possession, a slow trap with a big after Brackins starts his move on the next, no trap on third deep catch, etc.

Keep Garrett in front. Texas has played against lead guards with more talent than Diante, but the blueprint for defending him is the same. We saw what Courtney Fortson did for the Arkansas offense when he was allowed to get into the lane and collapse the Texas defense. This will be a similar test for Texas, in that Garrett doesn’t want to pull from deep, but instead take you off the dribble and use his size to find teammates or elevate over the defense for his own looks when he gets into the lane. Texas has the luxury, however, of putting Mason or a bigger defender on Garrett, knowing they can hide AJ Abrams on Staiger who will stay on the perimeter. Or, Texas can match Abrams on Peterson who is similar in size. Texas certainly has options defensively and won’t need to sacrifice offense for defense in this ballgame because of the lack of dynamic talent the ‘Clones will roll out.

Texas Offensive keys.

I posted about some counters to how defenses have been overplaying AJ Abrams and the Horns perimeter attack in general in this article. The General had some outstanding offensive suggestions in his Arkansas post mortem piece. With respect to those to articles, I’ll be watching with interest for counters to the AJ overplay, and what we’re doing about our lack of solid lead guard play and the problems that presents. But let’s be realistic, Texas can beat Iowa State running the flex, dribble drive motion, random screening, the UCLA high post, 3 man weave, and the And 1 Mixtape offense. If Texas rings the bell at anything better than 40% it’s probably going to be a comfortable win.

I’m more interested in fixing the problems this team has going forward. Can we consistently get the ball inside? Can we find open looks for AJ? If not how are we countering? Are we patient when we need to be? Do we need to run more up tempo to find open looks? Are we taking good shots? Are we learning what a good shot is? How do we find and from whom do we find offense late in the shot clock and late in the game? Those are the issues that need to get locked down before we get into the meat of conference play. Those are the offensive keys and they’ve been the mastodon in the room since November.

See you back here after the ballgame.

Thoughts?

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14 Responses

  1. Kafka said:

    January 10th, 2009 at 10:47 am

    Connor might be a good guy to guard Brackins. They are quite similar in height and weight. Dex might foul out quickly if he has to guard Brackins.

    Hamilton is a lot heavier than Brackins and is probably best guarded by Dex. Since Hamilton is not an offensive threat, Dex should avoid foul trouble and yet still provide some help support.

    Mason has enough size and more than enough speed to guard Garret, the ISU PG.

    Abrams can guard Staiger since Staiger is always outside and probably does not have much of a post up game. Even if he does, the horns’ help defense is very good at bailing out Abrams when he gets posted up.

    That leaves Damion to guard Peterson. Damion should find lots of opportunities to help out others.

    It will be interesting to see ISU’s D assignments. Will Brackins defend Connor or Dex? When Gary is in the game at the same time, Brackins is forced to defend Gary, right? Presumably Hamilton is way too slow to guard Gary.

    Who can guard Damion in this game? If Peterson defends Abrams and Garret defends Mason, that leaves Staiger defending Damion. That seems like a tough assignment. Will Barnes invert the offense and post up Damion to take advantage of the height/athleticism mismatch? Maybe not.

    Can the 6′4″ Garret stay in front of Mason? Mason has looked good penetrating the last couple of games. I hope we see a lot more of that today.

  2. CrazyJoeDavola said:

    January 10th, 2009 at 4:28 pm

    Workmanlike win. Good stuff from our bigs. Inconsistent play from the guards. Free throw woes. Rinse and repeat.

    I liked Brackins a lot, outside of trying to figure out what he’s trying to do with his hair. It’s like some weird hybrid of a Fresh Prince fade and a mohawk.

    And Dex is pushing the 80% free throw mark. WTF?!>!!?

  3. Texoz said:

    January 10th, 2009 at 9:09 pm

    Was at the game. Decent sized crowd, but subdued. Not many students.

    A rather lethargic effort overall, but we continued the recent trend where Gary, Dex & Damian carried the team offensively. Atchley played, but he doesn’t look anything like the player of last year on offense.

    Once again our perimeter shooting was awful. I think Coach Barnes should take the guards out in to the countryside and see if they can hit the side of a barn.

    I think it’s safe to say that Dex has arrived. Saw him make a couple of nice assists to go with the smooth interior moves his racking up. The main criticism of him now is that he needs to stay away from early foul trouble. Makes me realize that next year’s team is going to unbelievably good. I still think this year has potential for FF, but our guards REALLY need to step up soon or we’ll be lucky to get to Sweet 16.

    Also, Conner 2007-2008 needs to show up. Hard to think that he isn’t fighting something physical. He just doesn’t seem to move easily down the court. Nor do his 3-point attempts seem like they’re “strong.”

    We could be in for a really tough four game sched-
    @ OU
    @ Tech
    A&M
    @ Baylor

    I’ll be very happy to go 2-2 with that.

  4. Kafka said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 3:38 am

    Dex, Damion, and Gary were a collective 19 of 31 from the field for 61%. They were collectively 9 of 12 from the line for 75%.

    Bad news for Mason that the ISU coach was smart enough to start intentionally fouling Mason at the end of the game. Mason was 1 for 8 from the line. I’m a big Mason fan but if he does not fix his free throw and shooting problems pronto, he is probably going to lose a bunch of minutes to Ward and Balbay. Barnes was forced to take Mason out at the end of the game.

    It was a beautiful sight to see Damion drove from outside to the bucket twice against ISU: two dribbles, a jump stop, and then a flush.

  5. Steve Nebraska said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 8:06 am

    It’s been said here before, but I don’t think Mason gives the team the same all around game that has been his staple when he’s asked to assume extensive ball-handling duties. I think it was Trips who pointed it out, but the example of releasing to get back in transition as opposed to crashing the offensive glass is just one example. Just an observation generally, not necessarily based on this game.

  6. OUsniffsware said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 12:50 pm

    Mason is think too much with the ball handling duties. Rick just needs to go with Balbay and Ward and run with unless the really blow things up. Mason is better being a free spirit. I am also fearfullBarnes will coach the EU out of Balbay. Big mistake let Balaby be Balbay for the most part. I think Rick can coach the creativity OUT of players sometimes.

  7. OUsniffsware said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 12:52 pm

    Sorry my key board is messed up.

    Mason is thinking too much.,…and run with it…

  8. Bob in Houston said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 1:17 pm

    “Big mistake let Balaby be Balbay for the most part. I think Rick can coach the creativity OUT of players sometimes.”

    If I have heard right, RB wants Balbay to drive. That IS what he does best.

  9. Kafka said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 1:45 pm

    OUsniffsware:
    “Rick just needs to go with Balbay and Ward and run with unless the really blow things up. Mason is better being a free spirit.”

    If Barnes is playing 3 bigs and either Ward or Balbay is at point, then Mason isn’t playing.

  10. OUsniffsware said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 2:45 pm

    well if he keeps playing like this ??? So be it.

  11. OUsniffsware said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 2:49 pm

    Bob,

    Good that is music to my ears. The gaurds need to get thier stuff togethor ASAP.

  12. Kafka said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 3:50 pm

    OUSniffsware:
    OK, so “Mason is better being a free spirit.” means that Mason goes to the bench? My bad, I didn’t get it. I thought maybe you meant that Mason should play another position other than point guard.

  13. OUsniffsware said:

    January 11th, 2009 at 5:45 pm

    He is not a point so ? Can he shoot as well as Johnson and James? There does not seem to be a spot for him . So when you are shooting bricks and not making plays? You have to make some tough calls. Barnes tried to get him to shake it off yesterday and he shoots an air ball and goes 1-8 from the line. Frankly I’d sit AJ and try to snap him out of his slump too. It worked for D McNabb in Football and it works for lots of athletes.You have to earn your starting position it might work. Although I would wait to do it at home after OU.

  14. 98 said:

    January 12th, 2009 at 4:34 am

    http://texas.scout.com/2/829371.html

    we got kabongo for 2011. barnes is tearing it up in recruiting.

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