Three bigs on the court: trend?

Nolen's injury obviously forced some re-shifting of the offense, but I certainly liked what I saw with Mbakwe, Sampson and Iverson on the court at the same time. Sampson plays much better and, IMO, is much more dangerous near the elbow than he is down low. He's not a grinder, so it's better to leave the physical stuff to Iverson and Mbakwe.

That said, can we expect more of this three-forward rotation to play out for the rest of the year? I'm wary of keeping Rodney exclusively at the 2-guard, and the three-forward success might have had something to do with the type of defense we were facing, but having three huge guys out there can definitely cause some serious mismatches for opposing defenses. I wouldn't be concerned with our length on defense either with those three playing at the same time.

Definitely curious about other takes on this...

A lightning fast guard (Battle, Jackson, etc.) should have easy dribble penetration with our 3 bigs and Williams playing the 2. I think we are always going to win the inside game. We have to be able to defend the perimeter with this lineup. The 2-3 zone was better than I thought it would be against Northwestern, but it would have to be MUCH better for OSU.

I'm interested to see how Tubby uses this lineup for each game, and how each opponent plans for it. Not something you see every day...only one true guard, playing out of position at that!

JGopher said:

A lightning fast guard (Battle, Jackson, etc.) should have easy dribble penetration with our 3 bigs and Williams playing the 2. I think we are always going to win the inside game. We have to be able to defend the perimeter with this lineup. The 2-3 zone was better than I thought it would be against Northwestern, but it would have to be MUCH better for OSU.

I'm interested to see how Tubby uses this lineup for each game, and how each opponent plans for it. Not something you see every day...only one true guard, playing out of position at that!

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I know its not always good to compare NBA and college, but I think the Gophers can take a Lakers approach here.

When playing quicker guards, Derek Fisher obviously has no chance, well at least the same chance as Blake. Therefore, it doesn't become Blake's job to stop that guard, but to funnel them to the bigs (like the Lakers do with Odom, Gasol, and Bynum) it then becomes the bigs job to make sure they do not finish at the hoop.

Rodney, on the other hand, has long arms and good quickness and should be able to keep the guards somewhat in front of him.

the Big 3 will have trouble with the touch passing against physical teams with an inside presence. Northwestern did a terrible job of boxing out giving the bigs a chance to demonstrate some great touch passing. It was beautiful! However, the more physical and athletic teams in the country are going to create problems for the U in that, 1) they will put schemes in place that will get the Bigs in foul trouble by boxing out and with drive penetration, 2) force the Gophers to make jump shots and free throws since we will not have the large mis-matches we have seen against the poor Big Ten teams, , 3) Will probably hit at least 40 percent of 3 pointers taking away our rebounding prow ace. 4) we should expect more traps and pressing to expose our lack of ball handling skills.

Against the good teams, it will be very difficult without any margin for error. If we can hit some outside shots opening up the middle where our bigs can get into a groove and flow and if we can improve on free throws we should be in every game. .

The good news is, baring injury, this is a fun team to watch and Tubby is doing a very good job coaching this year.

Who is our rebounding prow ace?

millions2spare said:

1) they will put schemes in place that will get the Bigs in foul trouble by boxing out and with drive penetration, 2) force the Gophers to make jump shots and free throws since we will not have the large mis-matches we have seen against the poor Big Ten teams, , 3) Will probably hit at least 40 percent of 3 pointers taking away our rebounding prow ace. 4) we should expect more traps and pressing to expose our lack of ball handling skills

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1. I'll buy that our big guys might get in foul trouble, but there is 3 of them and we only have to play 1 or 2 of them at a time.
2. We will have inside mismatches against almost any team in the country since Mbakwe is dominant and Sampson/Iverson are big and can do some things well.
3. They will probably hit AT LEAST 40% of 3 pointers? Are you serious? Only 16 teams in the country are hitting 40% or better on 3's and only 3 of them are ranked in the top 25 (OSU, Kentucky and Illinois) so to say that a good team will hit at least 40% is outrageous. If a team gets hot can they kill the Gophers from deep? Yes. But that is true in any defense.
4. We should expect that but how many teams in D1 consistently press? We played a trapping defense last night and took them for 81pts...against one of the teams shooting over 40% from 3's on the season. I don't know a lot about every team in the country but most of them don't press. If they do, its out of a made basket and the best way to beat a press is to pass.

I liked the look of the starting lineup last night, and the 2-3 was very effective for the most part. And on offense, the high-low game had it going on midway thru the 2nd half. I'm actually more surprised we struggled with the 1-3-1 as much as we did for a bit there, given that Wisconsin basically handed us the blueprint for beating it in their previous game. Not convinced yet that this lineup will work against a bigger team like Illinois or OSU.

One thing I think is happening with this team though is that Rodney is responding well to the increased minutes he's getting and is improving (especially on defense). If he can start stroking mid-range jumpers with regularity by next year, he;ll be a force.

Northwestern is not in the class of most teams the Gophers will play in the Tournament or in the Big ten. Lets see the approach Purdue takes this weekend to see how the Gophers respond as a true bench mark. I admit, this is an exciting time to be a Gopher fan! Imagine if we had a true elite point guard in this line up! Also, our Bigs are not alike. Iverson had a great 2nd half last night. However, I think overall he has been a disappointment this year, he still has stone hands and prone to critical turnovers or missed rebounds, has a hard time finishing (he puts the ball on the floor quite often) and really has not developed the way I would have expected. However, if he can play better and rodney advances, we may be able to go a long way!.

I was impressed with how unselfishly they played - a mark of maturity and good coaching. I thought the passing looked, for the most part, smart and fast. But I think that may have been a reflection of the quality and style of defense they were up against with NU. I don't expect it will look quite as good against the B10's better inside teams.

GV

Gold Vision said:

Who is our rebounding prow ace?

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Has to be Trevor!

millions2spare said:

Northwestern is not in the class of most teams the Gophers will play in the Tournament or in the Big ten. Lets see the approach Purdue takes this weekend to see how the Gophers respond as a true bench mark. I admit, this is an exciting time to be a Gopher fan! Imagine if we had a true elite point guard in this line up! Also, our Bigs are not alike. Iverson had a great 2nd half last night. However, I think overall he has been a disappointment this year, he still has stone hands and prone to critical turnovers or missed rebounds, has a hard time finishing (he puts the ball on the floor quite often) and really has not developed the way I would have expected. However, if he can play better and rodney advances, we may be able to go a long way!.

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I would imagine Purdue is afraid .... very afraid.

Other than Johnson, Purdue's size is not very good. and their guard play is going to be somewhat brought down by this line up as well.

Moore and Smith are the shooters. If we can keep them missing, the game will be fine. Jackson can try and drive, but good luck even getting a shot off down there.

The key, IMO, is to stop Moore and Smith from hitting 3's and forcing Johnson to take only contested jump shots and hope that he misses. I don't see anyone on Purdue scoring around the hoop, except maybe Jonson, which we need to keep him from doing.