Shouldn't We make the tournament?

trj said:
Iowa allowed their opponents to shoot 37% from 3. That number has to come down at least 3 or 4 percentage points. Being better at switches and defensive rotation will help some of that. The backcourt is so limited on the defensive end because there is no one that is even a decent on-the-ball defender.
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Yes man to man D we just weren't any good at. I suspect they'll play more zone...
 
lightning1 said:
Really? Care to wager on whether those 4 seasons coincide with Fran's worst seasons from a Win/Loss standpoint? I'll wager on 2010-11, 2011-12, 2016-17 and 2017-18. You can have the other 4 seasons. How much do you want to bet?
2010-11. 2nd to last (record = 11-20)
2011-12. Last (18-17)
2016-17. Last (19-15)
2017-18. Last (14-19)
Those are Fran's worst seasons by record. Not a coincidence. You keep telling yourself PPG allowed is a worthless stat. I hope it makes you sleep better at night.
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The years that don't make that list, 2013-2016 happen to be the years we had the services of Gesell, Sapp and Woodbury. We also had White and Olesani three of those years. Not coincidentally, we played better overall defense those years. Not coincidentally, we made the NIT final with possibly the best multi game run of defense in the Fran era. Look at the scores and defensive FG% of our NIT run that year.
 
lightning1 said:
I'm not sure how this evidence doesn't speak for itself.
2010-11. 2nd to last (record = 11-20)
2011-12. Last (18-17)
2016-17. Last (19-15)
2017-18. Last (14-19)
I could go into why PPG allowed matters, especially in conjunction with Fran's offense. And why he'll never field a good defensive team BECAUSE of his offense....but I'm not going to.
"taking the air out of the ball" actually does allow you to play better defense. While running your tail off on the offensive end will naturally impede the amount of effort you can give on the defensive end.
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That is a very interesting, not necessarily right or wrong, take. I've always heard that the last person a defender wants to guard is someone who is always moving. I never thought about how constant movement on offense could sap a players energy to play the other end of the floor. Very interesting. I'd have to pay closer attention to make a more definitive opinion on it. I know when I was growing up no team moved more on offense than Bobby Knight coached Indiana. But they still had to save energy to play physical man to man defense or they would be wearing their coach's hands for a necktie. It can still be done, however. No team in the tournament expended more energy on both ends than Nevada when considering how deep they went (which wasn't very after their point guard Lindsay Drew went down) I saw Jordan Caroline fall into the photographers row while transition was going the other way and still get back to be a defensive factor in the play. Fran does occasionally have stretches where he fields good defensive teams (aforementioned 2013 NIT run, so he can do it) Those stretches, however, are too few and far between and I believe a large part of that is by Fran's choice.
 
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PCHawk said:
He probably also finishes first in possessions per game, or close to it, every year. I'm guessing, so could be wrong. When you run uptempo like Fran does, points per game on defense will make a great coach look good, a good coach look average, an average coach look bad, and a bad coach look terrible. It has the opposite affect on offense.
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We had this argument a couple months ago. If you can play defense for fifty possessions, you can play it for sixty, seventy, or eighty. More possessions should not constitute a decline in defensive performance. And they should not constitute more turnovers on offense. Your defensive fg % should not jump from, say, 40% to 50% just because tempo increases. You may give up a few more points, but shouldn't give up too many more if you are playing good defense.
 
deanvogs said:
I'm no Fran defender, but PPG or PPG allowed are both kind of worthless if you ask me. If you are playing at a fast pace it does actually mean little really. Just because Lick's team took the air out of the game, didn't mean they were a good defensive team, it just meant they played boring as shit BB.

'10-'11 Iowa was 56 in Adjusted D
'11-'12 Iowa was 205 in Adjusted D
'16-'17 Iowa was 123 in Adjusted D
'17-'18 Iowa was 242 in adjusted D

Outside of the '10-11 year which actually was not a terrible defense, the other years were NOT good.

It still kind of blows my mind that many on here don't understand more advanced statistics. Adjusted D and O mean a lot more than PPG or PPG allowed. If a coach decides to play at a faster pace, or course more PPG are going to be allowed as the opponents get more possessions. So that mean nothing, if you are good at stopping teams from scoring, that is what matters, not what overall points they ended up getting to.
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We ran Michigan State up and down the floor and scored at will and had Izzo about ten seconds from stangling himself when... suddenly the Spartans realized there was an important game to win. Then, when it mattered most, we executed like a Lickliter team and couldn't score to save our lives.
 
Northside Hawk said:
We had this argument a couple months ago. If you can play defense for fifty possessions, you can play it for sixty, seventy, or eighty. More possessions should not constitute a decline in defensive performance. And they should not constitute more turnovers on offense. Your defensive fg % should not jump from, say, 40% to 50% just because tempo increases. You may give up a few more points, but shouldn't give up too many more if you are playing good defense.
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I can't tell if you are agreeing with me or are confusing what I'm saying.
 
Adam said:
If Fran can't make the tournament with this group of guys then 9 million should be considered the price of admittance. I don't care what the buyout is. All the big buyout means is the dummy who gave it should also be opening a pink slip.
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Iowa isn’t paying a $9M buyout, especially after handing $6M to Meyer and Griesbaum less than two years ago. It just isn’t.
 
Northside Hawk said:
We ran Michigan State up and down the floor and scored at will and had Izzo about ten seconds from stangling himself when... suddenly the Spartans realized there was an important game to win. Then, when it mattered most, we executed like a Lickliter team and couldn't score to save our lives.
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MSU decided to clamp down on defense and did just that, at the end of that game.
 
Northside Hawk said:
We had this argument a couple months ago. If you can play defense for fifty possessions, you can play it for sixty, seventy, or eighty. More possessions should not constitute a decline in defensive performance. And they should not constitute more turnovers on offense. Your defensive fg % should not jump from, say, 40% to 50% just because tempo increases. You may give up a few more points, but shouldn't give up too many more if you are playing good defense.
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That doesn't make any sense. You're basically saying that if you can run 40, ninety foot sprints @ 5 seconds each, you should be able to run 10, 20 or 30 more at the same speed. More possessions means you are getting up and down the court faster and more frequently. If your body gets fatigued,
you can't perform with the same precision. The first thing that goes is your ability to react quickly. The second thing that shows up is laziness on your help defense. Players start picking and choosing what they have the energy for. The next thing that happens is they stop moving without the ball, making hard cuts, etc. Your players/team become easier to defend. That's when the turnovers start to become more frequent. The shots start hitting the front of the rim because the legs are gone. Does any of this sound familiar from watching Fran's teams?
 
lightning1 said:
That doesn't make any sense. You're basically saying that if you can run 40, ninety foot sprints @ 5 seconds each, you should be able to run 10, 20 or 30 more at the same speed. More possessions means you are getting up and down the court faster and more frequently. If your body gets fatigued,
you can't perform with the same precision. The first thing that goes is your ability to react quickly. The second thing that shows up is laziness on your help defense. Players start picking and choosing what they have the energy for. The next thing that happens is they stop moving without the ball, making hard cuts, etc. Your players/team become easier to defend. That's when the turnovers start to become more frequent. The shots start hitting the front of the rim because the legs are gone. Does any of this sound familiar from watching Fran's teams?
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A player may not be able to go every extra possession at same speed. But they better be in good shape to start with. And when they get tired that's when they have to really dig down and find a way. NBA announcers talk about how LeBron picks his spots to subtly take a possession off to make sure he has energy for the next ten possessions which dovetails with what you said about picking and choosing. Bottom line, and you know this because you're a strong advocate of defense. There is no excuse to not play it at any tempo. There is never an excuse to not help or rotate. If a player is too fatigued to concentrate then someone else needs to go in. I'll try to dig up the thread from earlier this spring. I think it was one of those points per possession type things. I know several of us talked about it. And yes, you're spot on about how it looks familiar from watching Fran's teams. Michigan State being a perfect example. Poor execution when it was needed most and an athletically superior team deciding it was time to play defense.
 
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The top 10-20 teams in the country have many opponents on the schedule where they know, either consciously or unconsciously, that they can "take the game off" or "coast" a bit and still win...recently, Iowa, in BB and FB has found itself on that "soft" list more often than not...whereas, they used to be one of those "black and blue" teams that, even though lacking in talent, you had better bring your best or you will pay.
 
RobHowe said:
Iowa isn’t paying a $9M buyout, especially after handing $6M to Meyer and Griesbaum less than two years ago. It just isn’t.
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Yup and by Iowa you mean Barta. If Barta were to be let go and say Iowa has a repeat of last season would new AD have the clout to do it? I'm not predicting Bartas demise (I already was wrong about guessing that happening when it didn't) I'm just hypothisizing here. Iowa has the money to do it. They could financially do it and not go broke. They just really really don't want to. Other schools have been paying multiple coaches to not coach for them anymore while paying top dollar for their replacement. This wouldn't be any different. To me it's just about actually pulling the trigger and doing it. (For the record I wasn't for Fran getting fired after this last year but I can't see another year like it again being tolerated especially with this group)
 
deanvogs said:
No reason this team shouldn’t make the NCAA’s this year. If they don’t Fran absolutely should be fired.
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Well st least a lot of us are on the same page as far as this goes.

Two years ago we wouldn’t have been surprised with the experience we have coming back to see or expect to finish in the top three in the conference. Now most are hoping just to make the NCAA tourney. If we fail to make the tourney then a lot of people are going to have cake on their face in this forum.
 
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If Fran's sons are "less than advertised" he will be on the "hot seat"...whatever that means at Iowa...LOL

If his sons are "performers"...well, it won't be an issue...and if Weiskamp dazzles...Fran will be a genius...assuming he can find a PG somewhere...

This coming year is a rebuilding year, we fans need to be patient, and not say critical things...because that will mean we will be the reason Fran can't land a PG...
 
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