Zone defense??

[massprof]

I am posting this as a serious question for the basketball afficionados out there to answer. It seems clear by now that we have little-to-no rim protection and our man-to-man defense is pretty bad. Since this has resulted in a massive number of fouls and a huge free throw advantage for our opponents, does it make any sense for the team to concentrate on zone defense and play zone most of the game? Could it be any worse than what we're seeing right now?

[MikeUMA]

huge free throw advantage for our opponents

I'm a pretty terrible analyst but I've also noticed the high rate of sending our opponents to the line.

Looked it up. Entering today's action, we're 25th our of 365 D-I teams, in terms of Opponent FTAs.
Current average is 27.5 per game
In the last 4, its 30.75
In the last 2, 32.0

[inthescoop]

Jim Boeheim would approve

[eldonabe]

Half way decent 3 point shooting teams will shred us. If they cannot perform a simple switch in man to man , they won’t be able to cover the zone switches you need.

Go watch an old temple or Syracuse game…. These guys can’t move like that.

[stevemaz]

It doesnt matter..this ship is sinking fast..an easy overal schedule will probably get us to .500 though

[eldonabe]

It doesnt matter..this ship is sinking fast..an easy overal schedule will probably get us to .500 though

Which would be the equivalent of about 13-18 if we were in the A-10.

[69MG]

Half way decent 3 point shooting teams will shred us. If they cannot perform a simple switch in man to man , they won’t be able to cover the zone switches you need.

Go watch an old temple or Syracuse game…. These guys can’t move like that.

Exactly. These guys are very slow to switch and that is why we commit so many fouls on drives to the hoop. We play defense from behind the player instead of in front of him.

[Old Cage]

^ And, today, note that when a guy drives and we are playing from behind, no one on the baseline comes to help.