A Different Look At The Zags: My Take From The Chiles Center
by Max Mandel on Jan 27, 2012 11:00 AM PST
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PrintWhile watching games on TV allows any fan to follow the Zags, I'm a huge believer that the best way to evaluate a team is to watch them in person. As a resident of Portland, I was able to head over to the Chiles Center and watch the Zags in person for the first time this season. Although the game wasn't a thing of beauty, there were a few aspects of the game that I really focused on now that I was able to see the team in person. Before I get to the game, I would like to thank the great table of Zag fans I had the pleasure of dining with, who for some reason spend their time reading the thoughts of this site :). Thanks for the kind words guys!!!
What I liked: There were actually many positives I took away from this game. The first, and perhaps the most obvious, was the play of Gary Bell Jr. As a long time admirer of his game, this was my first chance to watch him in person since he was heading into his junior year at Kentridge. Needless to say, I was beyond impressed. GBJ is built like a senior in college and has unbelievable court vision coming off screens. He is just so confident with the ball and makes great decisions. I truly believe this season is just a slight glimpse into his potential, and once he fully grasps the nuances of the offense and his role in it, watch out.
Another positive aspect to take away from this game was the outstanding performance from Marquise Carter. What I found interesting is that instead of trying to force action, he has slowed the game down and started playing at his more natural pace. He was nearly unguardable off the pick-and-roll, hitting all three bigs with great passes that led to, or at least should have led to, easy layups. If Marquise can continue to contribute as he did against Portland, which means delivering solid minutes and playmaking ability off the bench, this backcourt becomes even better.
The last positive takeaway for me, and this might just be the most important, was the fact that it seems a clear 8-man rotation has formed. I thought the coaching staff did an excellent job balancing minutes and it seems clear that Bell, Pangos, Harris, Edi, Sacre, Dower, Stockton and Carter will be the guys who will determine how far this team can go. Too be honest, those would be the eight that I would choose, so this rotation, and the potential it has to improve is exciting. If you haven't had the chance to see Landry-Edi in person, it's hard to notice just how excellent of an on-ball defender he is. With his size, guards really struggle to beat him off the dribble. He does have a habit of taking risks in the passing lanes, but in general, his defensive effort was excellent.
What I didn't like: It seems odd for me to have an issue with 16 points and five rebounds from Robert Sacre, but the amount of points he tends to leave on the floor is just staggering. As evidenced by his 5/5 shooting from the floor, Sacre finished the ball very well last night, but he should have had a handful of more buckets if it wasn't for drops of passes or taking too long to go up with the ball. I'm not sure I have seen a Gonzaga team that makes such a concerted effort to give the ball to the bigs, which makes the fact that Sacre isn't ready for the ball even more surprising. Bell, Pangos, Carter and Stockton are all great passers, so it's very important that Sacre is ready for the ball at all times.
The other development that had me worried occurred in the second half and it involved Kevin Pangos. After some terrific ball movement, Pangos turned down a wide open look from the perimeter and instead took a tough floater that he missed. As Mark Few clearly pointed out after the sequence, there is no circumstance in a game, except if the team is trying to kill clock, that should have Pangos passing up open shots. This team loses its edge if Pangos isn't aggressive and begins to pass up shots. Even if he is missing, he needs to shoot from the perimeter to open up the driving and passing lanes.
Hopefully this won't be the last time I see the Zags this season. Like many fans, I'm holding out hope that this team can keep the impressive run going and earn a high enough seed to be based in Portland for the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament. The belief that I took away from this game was that I think the next six days could be the most important portion of the season. You don't typically have six days to practice during the season, but that is what the Zags have before traveling to Provo. If they can take advantage of this time to improve the offensive motion and flow, it could elevate this group to another level.
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I too was at the Chiles Center last night and am a resident of Portland
GU at UP is basically the only chance I get to see them in action as well. While I loved watching them play, I hated my seat (up high and behind the basket), but thats understandable because I bought it 3 hours before tip off for a mere $20…poor planning on my part.
Again, I loved being able to watch the game in person, but thought it was a dissappointing game overall. Lots of missed shots, unnecessary whistles (fantom fouls, traveling), turnovers, and frankly, having so few points on the board (1st half). It sucked listening to the UP fans cheering throughout the game. Usually the GU fans are louder and the UP fans are quiet, but I guess that’s expected since they were playing better basketball than us. Although, that made it that much more sweeter when GU finally started started pulling away at the end. However, after the game I overheard some UP fans state that they were surprised UP played as well as they did against Gonzaga, which, despite the win, is kind of a blow against Gonzaga.
I was happy with the short rotation. I didn’t miss seeing Hart, although he brings a certain element to the game, but I feel Edi needs the minutes. I did wish, however, Few would’ve put Hoff in since our shots from beyond the arc weren’t falling. Other than that, I liked our shortened rotation. Hopefully it will prove to be more effective down the stretch.
If you don't mind, could you give a brief outlook on how the pilots are developing this year?
It seemed they played their best game yet.
All things considered
The Pilots appear to be doing just fine. They are very young and not particularly strong — which may be their greatest weakness. The 6’5" kid (sorry cannot remember his name) is a definite keeper. I can see him being all conference and perhaps player of the year some day.
It could be a long two years before the Pilots get to the point where they are going to cause folks serious worries. You guys lost too much last year and really no one to replace them in the wings.
IMO the best part of the team is the coach. How the Pilots ever got this guy to come to Portland I will never know. Just hope you can keep him.
mjc
by quidveritas on Jan 28, 2012 2:38 AM PST up reply actions 1 recs
Zagtime
What I took away from this game is what an enigma Sam is. Last year at St. Mary’s and the game at Xavier this year he was unstoppable. Last night and in several other games he was just plain soft, dropping passes, getting bumped easily from rebounding positions. He should have dominated the smaller Pilot frontcourt but it seems his confidence is very volatile. I am hoping to see more of this eight man rotation where guys can get in a rhythm moving into the tourney. On a more encouraging note, Carter may just be a second half (of the season) player. He just seemed comfortable last night, making great decisions. Hope this continues. Lastly, Bell is turning into a stud. He seems to be getting more confident in being aggressive off the dribble. He reminds me in some ways of a young Kemba Walker, an undersized but physically solid player who can do it all. Hopefully he grows in the same way and becomes a scoring dynamo like Kemba.
Tired of the maybe's.
I think that’s just how this team plays this season. This is not the first time they have come out weak in the first have and played well in the second.
With 3 starters in their first year of D1 basketball, there are inconsistencies in our play. I think it just takes us some time to get in the groove.
It doesn’t help when the refs called phantom over the back fouls and clearly wrong travel calls on 2 of our major contributors.
Looking past Portland?
I wasn’t lucky enough to watch the game in person, but what I watched on ESPN was frustrating. I frankly was surprised that Portland was ever ahead in the score at all last night. (Even the commentators on ESPN made a big deal of Portland being ahead by 4 points at halftime). Someone commented on this site last night that maybe the Zags were looking past Portland…I agree. Maybe I was looking past Portland too and that’s why I was surprised with the score. We’ve heard it before: when teams play Gonzaga, they always bring their A-game (as proven when fans storm the court after a win against the Zags-it’s a big deal to those teams to beat Gonzaga)-you think the Kennel will empty onto the court WHEN the team beats St Mary’s in a couple weeks?
Good Second Half...
My only worry is the lack of consitency..other than a couple games we seem to never play a complete game with an elevated intensity level..if we play a first half like this against BYU/SM and LMU for that matter we would have been down 10 to 15 points… Props for Portland, they came out and played much harder than we did in the first half, hopefully we learn something from this…
It was clear in the 2nd half that we were the better team..
GB did have a great game, but there were 3 or 4 times when we had Dower or Sacre wide open in the post and they were not fed the ball, Im hoping to see some improvement there…
Honestly I would have liked to see MM come off the bench in the first half and see if he could provided us with a spark because our shooting % was atrocious…but 0 minutes registered…
First things first, we have a huge game with BYU next game, very very important for us to win that game, if not we will have an up hill battle heading in to the final stretch of the season…we will see.
JSH
I like the rotation, and the overall play of everyone (except Rob)
some people will criticize the rotation at the Portland game, but I don’t think that anyone can argue that this rotation is the best long term fit for the team. Edi needs some work, but he is getting his time now and he will continue to improve. He has a much higher ceiling than Hart, so i am glad to see him finally get significant minutes. Bell and Pangos are nothing short of amazing. They have different games, but what impresses me is that they are so comfortable in pressure situations and that they both let the game come to them. Kevin is content to distribute the ball and does not seem to care whether he scores any points. Bell continues to become more aggressive and shows his incredible ability to score while finishing at the rim. They are a perfect teammates. Harris is playing like someone lit a fire under his back side, and that is good to see. Rob is still a mystery to me. He is so inconsistent. One game he will play with great passion (last game) and then he will totally disappear against lesser teams that he should destroy. However, overall, I am still very optomistic because this team has so many different weapons and I like our chances at BYU next week, especially after I watched LMU handle them in Provo.
and another thing
Kevin Pangos is a great three point shooter. why is it that we never run plays specifically designed to get him open looks? Do you remember JJ Reddick (the cartoon character from Duke)? For his entire career he was coming off of double picks and getting open looks. He had no game beyond that, but he could shoo, and his coach took advantage of that skillt. Kevin has the same shooting skills and he is a great point guard as well. Let’s take advantage of his skills and stop trying to force the ball inside to Sacre when he has shown time and time again that he is not able to be a consistent and passionate player.
Pangos
Of all the shooting positions for Pangos: Set, Off the dribble, Catch and shoot and……. Off the screen, his off the screen is by far his weakest! He lacks strength to adjust to the bumps of the play and leg strength for the elevation and shot. It will come but most 6’1’ Freshmen are just not capable of that part of their game to be their strength of their shooting ability. Therefore, there is NO reason to use that SET in the offense when other Sets, ie, Elias, Sam, Rob are better options to score. JMO.
by mikesequim on Jan 28, 2012 9:55 AM PST up reply actions 2 recs
SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO True
We are loaded with 3 point shooters, and all we do is the weave.Weave and fake shoot it weave and fake pass it.Their game is formatted like a cheap video game.
This is why I am excited about Edi
I think he is athletic enough to be able to penetrate and kick out to a Bell or Pangos so we can get some easy looks rather than this weaving crap you eluded to
WTF is up with this UCLA weave?
C’mon…It is soooo outdated. It is effective at making us viewers dizzy watching on TV, but I doubt it does anything to the opponents defense except make them chuckle!
Final 4 or Bust!!~
by gaz-tastic on Jan 28, 2012 3:00 PM PST up reply actions 1 recs
The weave
is designed to ‘pinch’ the defenders into the middle of the floor. In theory, this will open up an outside 3 on either side.
Now whether that happens or not is another subject.
mjc
by quidveritas on Jan 28, 2012 5:11 PM PST up reply actions 1 recs
OFF TOPIC:
Anyone interested… that SMC & BYU game will be on BYU tv for you people needing a comp link.
Final 4 or Bust!!~
Absolutely fantastic post Max,
Loved your insights, which were not the typical problems that most fans (including me) have been harping on. This new material had me thinking about the Zags in a new way then I have for most of the season. Keep them coming Max, gotta love this stuff!
next to unforced turnovers
(namely traveling);
nothing frustrates me more than when a Zag passes up an open shot to take/get one or two steps closer to the basket with someone in his face.
win over ND looking better and better
Notre Dame knocked off Connecticut yesterday and is now 6-3 in Big East play.
"Cinderella Lives"
by Zagman09 on Jan 29, 2012 3:28 PM PST via Android app reply actions
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