The Sweet 16 Matchup
Arizona lineup/Rotation:
6’4 G Justin Kier - Good at Everything not great at anything
6’6 G Bennedict Mathurin - great all-around scorer - but not heavy on-ball
6’7 G Dalen Terry - Do it all Wing- limited handles
6’11 F Azuolas Tubelis- great cutter & floor runner, will drive and pass too (not back to basket)
7’1 C Christian Koloko - Great Shot blocker, Good Post Scorer
6’3 G Kerr Kriisa - Normal starter but dealing w/ ankle sprain- Great Passer, Good Shooter- main handler
7’0 C Oumar Ballo - Good shot blocker, okay post scorer
6’5 G Pelle Larsson- Great shooter, limited handles
Summary:
- Elite offense but a ton of the offense is system, not a lot of off the dribble shot creation
- scary good passing team - #1 in the nation in assist rate (60% of offense assisted on) -
- Expect tons of picks and cutting- their offense runs best on 2s not 3s
- insanely fast pace, scoring in transition is an integral part of their identity
- Man to Man D- good D, based around contesting with their size but not that physical
- Really Good Rebounding team, but was massacred by TCU, a similar rebounding team to us
- their one statiscal weakness is turnovers, they give up alot a game and do really get much either
heres a nice 10minute video of a breaking down what they do
Matchup thoughts:
so many angles to this game IMO this is the kind of game if played multiple times it could have a different result and style of game each time
they are not particularly great at making tough 3s, but have done so in certain games, if they come out blazing from 3, it just wasnt our night:… lets assume that we avoid one of those game
Rebounding edge: Gonzaga/Arizona’s style is to push the pace in transition, everyone including bigs is sprinting down court after every shot (not fighting for rebounds) they are susceptible to offensive rebounding teams for that reason, and just gave up 20 offensive rebounds to TCU last night… but they gave up 20 OR to TCU in a game they almost lost and are about to play “Houston”, the amount of focus they will put into rebounding this week will be large. We have an edge but likely wont be as big as many will think.
- note: that they are great offensive rebounding team themselves and we need to boxout
Our D vs their O: They are one of the nations best at getting post Points, we are one of the nations best art preventing post points. this is the distinct difference between us at TCU, tcu is bad at post D and we are elite… This is also the game for everyone to know their assignments, arizona LIVES on bad rotations and double teams (To get it to the open man), they are a great cutting team, so you have to stay with your guys offball.
I legitimately think we can defend them, we can make it physical and disrupt their “flow”, we can lower their rate of post 2s, and force them into longs 2s and tough 3s…and if they arent making those tough shots at a high rate we can win that matchup
Our O vs Their D: this is the hard matchup- we’ve only played 1 team with this kind of size (memphis) and we could barely score them the 1st 2 times, but Arizona doesn’t press or trap like memphis and aren’t anywhere as physical, so i doubt we see those kind of turnovers… we are definitely going to try and slow it down, so it’ll be our half court offense vs their D.
can edwards shoot over 6’6 Mathurin, can taze postup/drive on 6’7 Terry, can Carlton regularly score on 7’1 Koloko? not high on the confidence factor… Carlton is more physical than Koloko and though i do think he will be able to score some, we aren’t winning that way… Our ability to score in this game will likely come from 1) Shead and ball movement; drawing defenders and finding open players {UA plays help alot} 2) turnover transition points 3) putback points
team defense and team offense is likely our key to win…
