I watched a little of this. For much of that time, we were employing a defensive philosophy which I generally like --> the Hard Hedge by the screener's man on high top of key area screens. Our Big would do this generally fine, but the guard screened (especially when it was the coach's son) seemed to not have much of a clue then what to do. This resulted in the screener's roll-to-the-paint. Many times this was unabated, or, when offside defenders did their job and stepped fast into the paint, the other help side players seemed to have no idea what to do. Particularly the guard screened has to instantly make himself useful by picking someone else up who is now in free space.
The slowness of their reactions to this (consistently) made me think that either they are basketball stupid when it comes to team defense, or they are not being taught basic principles, or that some guys are loafing, ...? This defense CAN work and with hustling five-men-at-it teams (think Houston for wild power, or Iowa State for clever sneakiness) probably is generally the finest defensive choice unless your guys are mental or physical turtles. I thought Shrewsberry JR's general effort defensively was kind of pathetic. .... but I didn't watch the whole game. There ARE guys on this team who seem to hustle a lot, so I don't think it's a turtle or loafer problem generally ... but there's sure some AWARENESS problem out there.
