Job one on the defensive end at Iowa City on Saturday was taking away the three-point shot. The Hawkeyes are one of the best perimeter shooting teams in the nation, and look for every opportunity to punish teams from behind the arc.
But Indiana allowed nine Iowa made threes in the first 26-plus minutes of the game, a point by which the Hawkeyes had put the game away.
Below we take a look at six of the Hawkeyes first seven makes, and what went wrong for the Hoosiers.
DRAW AND KICK
You’ll often hear Indiana coaches talk about “get in to get out” when talking about their help defense. The IU players have also mentioned “nail-slot-rim” help principles.
Another way to think about these concepts is leaving shooters to help stop the ball.
And that’s a dangerous proposition when defending Iowa. Payton Sandfort has one of the fastest releases in college basketball, and he only needs a split second to get his shot off.
Here you can see Mackenzie Mgbako helping off Sandfort to the nail (free throw line) and slot (free throw lane line), and then not recovering with maximum effort. It’s reasonable to question if Mgbako should be helping at all here, and perhaps instead hugging to Sandfort.
UNDER BALL SCREEN
Another no-no when guarding an elite shooter is going under ball screens.
It’s likely Trey Galloway didn’t follow the scouting report here, as he goes under a high ball screen against Josh Dix, giving him enough room to snipe from long range.
Whether this is Galloway or the game plan, it can’t happen.
HELP ON ROLLER
Teams looking to set up shooters know how to put defenses in a bind with simple actions.
It’s hard to know who is at fault here. Myles Rice goes over the ball screen, which is probably the right move against another good shooter in Brock Harding. But Oumar Ballo helps so much against Harding he leaves Owen Freeman with a clean roll to the rim. That leaves Anthony Leal in a predicament. He has to provide coverage on Freeman, but in so doing leaves Pryce Sandfort open. It’s on Harding to read that, and he’s all over it.
If Ballo is going to help this much, he has to be much more disruptive.
TOO MUCH SPACE
The trouble starts here when Mgbako ends up guarding Harding on the perimeter, a mismatch that Harding wins easily, and that gives him clear passing angles. And then Luke Goode makes what appears to be a good recovery and closeout on Dix, but even this is too much space for a shooter this talented.
Query whether Goode really needed to be where he was, vs. hugging closer to Dix.
SLOW TO GET BACK IN TRANSITION
Off makes, misses and turnovers, Iowa is looking to push the pace and find shooters before the defense gets set.
It is imperative to sprint the floor. Even a momentary lapse can mean numbers going the other way.
In the first clip it becomes a three-on-two situation as Goode hit the deck on the other end. Anthony Leal has to stop the ball, leaving Myles Rice to guard two open shooters on opposite ends of the arc — an impossible task.
In this final clip you can see Rice stop and ball watch for just a second as Iowa takes the ball out of the basket. That was just enough time for Harding to get a head of steam going the other way. And credit Freeman for sprinting immediately and putting Goode in conflict. Goode has to choose to cover Freeman before he can try to recover to Dix, and that results in yet another triple.
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