Bear Down Wildcats

All three Cat losses this year have been characterized by poor defense.

Defensing is important.

Discuss . . .

Other teams are isolating our worst defenders, especially when they get mismatches like a 3 who is playing the 4 for them and they can use that quickness advantage in there favor.

Then it becomes drive and finish of drive and kick if we rotate and clog. We miss NJ and his ability to cut off penetrationand we miss AG at the rim.

I think when we have these smler teams using this scheme we need to go TJ at the 1, EP at the 2, SJ at the 3, RHJ at the 4 and Tarc at the 5. I,like EP's size and I think he is stronger than GY.

So BA doesn't start?

No I wouldnt say that as this is more of an in game adjustment. But once Miller recognizes where they arectaking advantage of us he must adjust.

Once we start rotating to help is not much of an answer IMO as we then give up the kick out and if we don't close quick enough we give up 3 or a dish for 2.

We do need to find a better rim protector though. AG was very good back there. Even NJ was better than anyone we have now. No one on our roster really gives us that.

You couple this defensive issue with poorer offensive rebounding and we are going to see a few games like OSU And ASSU. hopefully once we get in the tourney we can be a little more physical without whistles being called all the times. I think this would help

I'm not so sure it is a case of teams isolating our weak links on defense and attacking them. I think it's more of a case of teams just trying, trying, trying, and it's the same few guys who are getting burned or out of position on a consistent basis. Our help D is not always there either, far from last year's.

I think it's the isolations, especially against York, Pitts and Bash. High ball screen on TJ was effective, freeing Holder to operate against someone else (or against confusion). As long as Bash is winning his match-up (scoring, rebounding), leave him in. If not, get smaller.

This may be more of a conference issue, since the small bumps off the drive draw whistles. In the tournament, that may be ignored. We're the most physical team in the league. The dilemma is drawing that down while retaining the toughness.

I used to say that when Howland had it rolling at uCla, he played "They can't call everything" defense.

Well, the PAC officials apparently adjusted.

rgdeuce wrote:I'm not so sure it is a case of teams isolating our weak links on defense and attacking them. I think it's more of a case of teams just trying, trying, trying, and it's the same few guys who are getting burned or out of position on a consistent basis. Our help D is not always there either, far from last year's.

It is isolation plays on Ashley York and Pitts mostly.

Ashley used to be much better on defense. The Florida games comes to mind as evidence of this.

Gimino:

TUCSON, Ariz. -- Arizona, this is your final wake-up call.
That's three losses. That's three hard-to-figure losses. That's three losses to teams that rank no higher than No. 69 in the RPI.
Gathering up the records of the other nine teams in the AP top 10, you can find only one loss to a team rated so poorly in the RPI -- Wisconsin's defeat at No. 125 Rutgers.
Three losses. At UNLV, at Oregon State, at Arizona State. It's true, each opponent absolutely played out of its mind, its best game of the season, against the Wildcats. Upsets happen. Let's not reach for the panic button just because of that. Arizona is 20-3, tied for first in the Pac-12 and ranked No. 7 nationally.
But if you're looking for a reason to worry, to put a toe on the ledge, it's that there is a disturbing trend in those losses. And it's not us saying it, it's coach Sean Miller.
His team's defense disappeared.
"The fact that we're 20-3, a lot of us feel good about that," he said Monday on his weekly radio show. "But all three losses have come in very, very similar, if not identical, ways. ... What broke? Our defense."
Arizona allowed offensively challenged Oregon State to shoot 64.7 percent in the second half and was out-rebounded by six for the game. The Wildcats lets UNLV's Rashad Vaughn and Christian Wood carve them up on isolation plays, and were out-rebounded by 13. Arizona on Saturday allowed ASU to shoot 50 percent.
"We have to be a great defensive team," Miller said. "That's our identity. That's something that is required from our team. We're not going to hit nine 3s in a game. That's not who we are.

Read the rest here: http://www.foxsports.com/arizona/story/ ... -12-021115