Breaking down the defense: Murray State at Xavier (Exh.)
MBB: Here's a look at how the Racers defended the Musketeers
Another one we’re just jumping into. Missed the offensive breakdown? It’s here.
Forcing bad shots?
So, like with the offensive breakdown, we’ll start with the official shot chart. In the inverse of what you want to see from your team, more mid-range jumpers is good here. And we get a bit of a tale of two halves. Left is first half, right is second:
So the first very noticeable thing is: The Racers did a much better job in the first half forcing long jumpers. In the second half, that did not go so well. This comes across in FG%, Xavier shot just 28% in the opening half to 44% in the second half from the field.
So here’s a play where things go well. One thing to watch: Murray doesn’t have to switch on a single screen here, but crucially are able to stick with the ball handler to keep them from driving into the lane. Xavier keeps four guys out for this entire possession, but they don’t leave Brock Vice entirely on an island. Look at the 10-second mark on the shot clock; with the ball on the other side of the court, Shorter cheats inward a bit to prevent any interior passes. All this results in an awful look with the shot clock expiring. (There’s another of these at the 5:20 mark in the first half where a similar last-second heave goes in)
Another good defensive setup here, where the Racers do a good job of denying the ball out of the paint. On the first drive, Vice helps off the screen, causing Xavier to reset. On the last gasp, Taylor applies pressure near mid-court — this leads to a late screen and a switch on that screen, but since it’s so far from the basket and so late in the shot clock, there’s no real time to take advantage of the speed advantage, resulting in a pretty poor 17-foot jumper
Xavier plays with a lot of high screens, which when done well can open a lane to drive in or a switch to create mismatches. But they were also doing some damage with shot fakes. This comes off a bad pass in the paint, but Shorter has plenty of time to reset here before the fake. Shorter gets off his feet, and King is really able to challenge in the paint; he’s set up in the semi-circle, so he couldn’t draw a charge. They don’t score on the drive, but get an offensive rebound and a second chance on this possession. (Honestly, that’s a shot you’ve got to make if you’re Xavier)
So, you may be looking at the stat sheet, seeing Xavier was held to 36% shooting and saying to yourself “the defense was pretty good!'“ And, it wasn’t bad. But Xavier’s offense, in that first half especially, had poor, poor shot discipline, and as demonstrated above, missed some good looks.
There are other plays later where they’re shooting a fadeaway with time left on the shot clock, they shoot a couple contested threes off screens. It really seemed they were very ‘take the first look you can get’ at times. That discipline is better in the second half; Xavier remembers that driving the basketball is a strong tactic.
This happens a few times, where Murray just got a bit too aggressive. Speaking of which…
Oh *whistle* there’s another *whistle* foul. *whistle*
To address what many of you may be thinking: from what I could see on the stream, most of the foul calls looked pretty legit. There were just a lot of them.
If you move your feet while you’re defending, you’re going to get called for a foul. Doesn’t matter if your hands are straight up. This will result in fouls every time. For example, this. This was not a one-off.
When you look at Xavier’s late-game run, transition defense was both good and bad for Murray. Example of the good: After a miss, it takes Tre Carroll a couple of seconds to gather himself before the big man starts dribbling up. KJ Tenner picks him up immediately, but it’s obviously not his guy. So past half court, he tries to turn him over, but both big men are behind the play. Shorter, though, sees this and sets up to draw a charge.
But there were also times where the transition defense struggled. Here, Tenner just gets behind the play and is forced to lunge at the ball for a bad foul with Xavier already in the bonus.
Quick notes on Andersen’s four fouls in 4:17 — two fouls are where he leaves his feet while defending not going straight up, a bear hug from behind on a rebound where he’s already got two first-half fouls, and a moving screen. Hey, it’s exhibition for everyone.
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