Basketball is going small, Fran is going Big

[NikeHawk21]

So watching Indiana-Purdue and I got to thinking, several B1G teams are playing “small.” Many of these teams are playing traditional 3 men at the 4 position and others are even playing 4s at the 5. Lets take a look.

Purdue: Vince Edwards playing the 4.

Indiana: Playing Juwan Morgan at the 5 and a smaller player at 4.

Nebraska: As we saw last night, going extremely small with a 4 at the 5 (Roby) and a 3 at the 4 (Copeland).

Penn State: Playing small with a 6’6 player at the 4 and several minutes with Lamar Stevens at the 4.

Maryland: basically starting 4 guards.

Rutgers: goes 6’7 / 6’9 on the frontline

Wisconsin: starts 6’5 Khalil Iverson at the 4

Michigan: 6’7 Livers starts at 4

So Iowa is basically doing the exact opposite by playing 4 men at the 3 position. The lack of foot speed has been fairly glaring. We are a bad defensive team and we know that, but we have been so unbelievably bad this year there has to be more to it. I really think this has been a big part of it. I just don’t think Fran is giving this team the best opportunity to succeed on the defensive end.

 

[lightning1]

It's a guard driven league. It has been that way for as long as I can remember. Everyone knows this but Fran....I guess.

 

[SheagleHawk]

It's a guard driven league. It has been that way for as long as I can remember. Everyone knows this but Fran....I guess.

C'mon man...Tyler Ulis almost went to Iowa!!

 

[lightning1]

C'mon man...Tyler Ulis almost went to Iowa!!

Michigan State was his 2nd choice. Iowa was 3rd. And there are plenty of other guards out there. We get our asses kicked by a handful of them every single game. Even against the lowest tier D-1 programs.

 

[ibahawkeye]

Give JBo, Moss, Dailey, Baer, Cook a try.

 

[NikeHawk21]

Iowa played small ball at the end of last year when they began playing their best ball of the season with Wagner at the 4 and Cook at the 5. Our small ball lineups this year would look more like this.

JBo
Moss / Dailey
Dailey / Baer
Baer / Wagner / Nunge
Cook/ Garza / Nunge

Basically the guys currently playing the 3, should be playing their natural position of the 4, and Cook and Nunge can even slide down to the 5. I guarantee you those units would be much better defensively than what we’ve seen.

 

[trj]

I am all for trying new things I think the roster isn’t constructed very well . No one complements the other. Everyone struggles guarding people on the perimeter. Until they get a grasp of how defensive rotation works it won’t matter who you are rolling out there.

 

[ibahawkeye]

I might even throw Uhl in the mix at the 3. I thought he looked pretty good on D. He got called for 2 fouls that I thought looked pretty weak where I thought there may have been contact but Dom was pretty straight up.

 

[NikeHawk21]

I might even throw Uhl in the mix at the 3. I thought he looked pretty good on D. He got called for 2 fouls that I thought looked pretty weak where I thought there may have been contact but Dom was pretty straight up.

I thought about that last night. He’s probably a better 3 than Wagner is.

 

[NikeHawk21]

I am all for trying new things I think the roster isn’t constructed very well . No one complements the other. Everyone struggles guarding people on the perimeter. Until they get a grasp of how defensive rotation works it won’t matter who you are rolling out there.

Well it’s one part roster construction with recruiting all the Bigs, and the second part continuing to play all these guys out of position when it’s not working. I mean do we really think Dailey is that much worse than Wagner, Nunge, and even Pemsl & Kriener to the point where we are playing guys out of position in order to get those guys minutes? I don’t.

 

[ShockHawk22]

I like the combo of cook and Garza down low. But once Garza gets his break, switching to a smaller line up would be a nice change of pace

 

[NikeHawk21]

I like the combo of cook and Garza down low. But once Garza gets his break, switching to a smaller line up would be a nice change of pace

Exactly. I’m all for keeping the starting lineup as is (although I’d like to see Baer back at 6th man), but our other lineups could look more small ballish, and it would improve defense.

 

[lightning1]

Give JBo, Moss, Dailey, Baer, Cook a try.

There's a very good reason why Fran doesn't put Dailey at the PG spot and move Bohannon to the 2G. What does he do with Connor? If Dailey has success there, how can he justify giving Connor his minutes? Or are you suggesting playing Dailey at the 3?

 

[NikeHawk21]

There's a very good reason why Fran doesn't put Dailey at the PG spot and move Bohannon to the 2G. What does he do with Connor? If Dailey has success there, how can he justify giving Connor his minutes? Or are you suggesting playing Dailey at the 3?

Dailey at 6’7 can play the 3. But I do follow your point on there being no room for Connor if others step up there.

 

[Hawkfnntn]

I thought about that last night. He’s probably a better 3 than Wagner is.

Totally agree I don't see much debate either. Neither is much of an offensive guy but Uhl at least has a handle. He's better at defending on perimeter. Not to mention he's longer. I noticed him standing next to Cook while they were on the foul line. He's taller than Cook. Uhl might be closer to 6'10.
I challenge folks to watch Baer on D. He is not a very good defender. He is good at gambling and playing off his guy and hustling. But his on the ball D isn't very good and when he sags off his guy he usually does way too much allowing his guy to catch and shoot when the ball gets swung back to him. I bet that happened 2 or 3 times the other night where his guy was able to catch and shoot easily in the half court. I bet Uhl would be no worse of an option at times at the 3. And I'd take him over Wagner for sure.

 

[Hawkfnntn]

There's a very good reason why Fran doesn't put Dailey at the PG spot and move Bohannon to the 2G. What does he do with Connor? If Dailey has success there, how can he justify giving Connor his minutes? Or are you suggesting playing Dailey at the 3?

Well with his son out as much as he's been it doesn't really matter. If CM was never sick/hurt he'd have been JBos backup and Dailey would have been a rover. He'd have played mostly at the 2 and now and then at the 3. Dailey has played a little PG recently when he's on the floor with JBo and it works ok at times. But Daileys offense the last few games has been anything but inspiring. CM has nothing to worry about in terms of where he stands within the program.

 

[lightning1]

Well with his son out as much as he's been it doesn't really matter. If CM was never sick/hurt he'd have been JBos backup and Dailey would have been a rover. He'd have played mostly at the 2 and now and then at the 3. Dailey has played a little PG recently when he's on the floor with JBo and it works ok at times. But Daileys offense the last few games has been anything but inspiring. CM has nothing to worry about in terms of where he stands within the program.

Connor is a PG. Bohannon would have slid over to the 2G. That's what's going to happen next season. The fact that we are so thin at the guard spots, you'd think Dailey would get a lot more minutes but Fran would rather wedge a 4 at the small forward and even run a line up with 4 bigs and 1 guard on the floor. It doesn't make any sense. Ellingson has missed the last 2 games with a concussion and Dailey got 10 and 12 minutes of PT in those 2 games. Explain that to me, cause I can't figure it out.

 

[Hawkfnntn]

Connor is a PG. Bohannon would have slid over to the 2G. That's what's going to happen next season. The fact that we are so thin at the guard spots, you'd think Dailey would get a lot more minutes but Fran would rather wedge a 4 at the small forward and even run a line up with 4 bigs and 1 guard on the floor. It doesn't make any sense. Ellingson has missed the last 2 games with a concussion and Dailey got 10 and 12 minutes of PT in those 2 games. Explain that to me, cause I can't figure it out.

You know what? With the way Moss has played I wouldn't be surprised if Fran would have went that route at some point this year. Moss has been terribly inconsistent and it's not like his D is any better than anyone elses. I'd have been worth a shot. But yeah with what all has happened you'd think Dailey would have played more. Since he in essence is backing up 3 positions. But it's not like he's played all that great in what time he's getting either. I think Fran is literally just experimenting out there. And frankly I wouldn't be surprised if maybe he goes smaller the next game. But who freaking knows at this point.

 

[NikeHawk21]

I think Fran is literally just experimenting out there. And frankly I wouldn't be surprised if maybe he goes smaller the next game. But who freaking knows at this point.

The strang thing is though he really hasn’t “experimented” at all with smaller lineups. We haven’t seen much of a three guard look with JBo, Moss, and Dailey. We haven’t seen Baer at the 4 at all this year, whereas he would play down there at times last year. I think at the beginning of the year Fran thought to himself how am I going to get all these bigs minutes, they decided that the only way to do it was to play Wagner and Nunge at the 3, however this was an extreme miscalculation, that has in part led to the demise of this team.

 

[Hawkfnntn]

The strang thing is though he really hasn’t “experimented” at all with smaller lineups. We haven’t seen much of a three guard look with JBo, Moss, and Dailey. We haven’t seen Baer at the 4 at all this year, whereas he would play down there at times last year. I think at the beginning of the year Fran thought to himself how am I going to get all these bigs minutes, they decided that the only way to do it was to play Wagner and Nunge at the 3, however this was an extreme miscalculation, that has in part led to the demise of this team.

I don't think I'd be a fan of that really. Baer can't defend 3s all that well let alone bigger stronger guys. He's great as a help defender but not so much on the ball if you watch him. I wouldn't say playing Wagner/Nunge at the 3 is what lead the team to demise so much. Not that it helped at all because I agree for different reasons neither of them are a fit there either. But the team overall has lots of issues all over the place. I would say D is the #1 issue with Mosses up and mostly down play being the other. He plays too much to be so inconsistently bad. It's not even just the scoring with him it's his D and lack of ball handling. He isn't able to help JBo much at all in that regard.