I’ve been watching several of the elite teams around college b-ball this season, and Florida has something in common with Kentucky, Kansas, and Gonzaga - elite pressure defense. We simply do not play defense like the top teams. Florida pressured us man-to-man, jumped every screen, and contested almost every shot. On the other end, the Gators had wide open 3’s, or lanes to the basket over and over. I think there’s a different level of athleticism required (certainly for Trey, Dusty, Beard, and Thomas), but it’s also a method/tactics approach that’s missing, primarily around the perimeter. Florida’s approach looked like KY and Kansas last night. I’m tired of hearing about the legendary “pressure” put on by Razorback basketball teams. It’s not reality - and our full court “press” is more of an invitation to a 3 on 2 than a threat.
I love the basketball skills on this team, and I love their heart and their fight…but until we figure out how to play elite-level defense, we’ll never return to glory.
The call against Moses was the worst piece of officiating I have seen this year…and it had a material effect on the outcome.
Exactly!! all the double and triple teaming leaves guys wide open and creates poor floor balance to where you are in no position to rebound! The offense is not up to par because we stand around and watch! you are not going to beat good defenses by doing that… team will always be like this under CMA,I like the guy but not ever gloing to get over the hump because of what I just said…but this is JMO! your welcome to yours
Here is some food for thought, we have 22 regular-season wins for the second time in the last 22 years. Let that sink in…
We have a talent deficit and a scheme deficit. We keep hanging onto the 90’s style defense and it has done nothing for us since hand checks were ruled out in almost 20 years ago. Other teams have learned how to beat us and we have not changed until recently. After the last few weeks of progress with the Zone, you would think that we would start with man against weaker guards only? Theoretically Zone is terrible against a good shooting team, but our MAN defense is soooo bad that our ZONE is more effective.
In spite of this loss to the gators, “Arkansas would have 12 conference wins for the fifth time in program history and just the second time in the last 22 years (2014-15). The Razorbacks also have 22 regular-season wins for the second time in the last 22 years.”
So this is the 2nd best season in the last 22 years? That says a mouthful when you add the #1 and #3 JUCO players in the nation with Moses, Dusty and Watkins. We started winning against SOLID teams when we got away from 90’s style defense and even started playing fundamental OFFENSE when Trey was recognizing and passing to back door cuts.
CMA forgot what great adjustments he had made for the last few weeks. For Florida’s Senior Night he went back to what DID NOT work before.
I disagree with a lot of things in the post that point to defense and play calling. I do not disagree that Florida is a really good team, much better than us, and has outstanding players, also which are much better than ours. Zone/Man Man/Zone, we weren’t making shots. And, when you don’t make shots, you can’t get a defense set. They played fast. Their guards played fast. We missed shots. If we make shots, our defense would have looked better, and there FG% would have been down.
The bottom line is we look good against teams we are better than (lately) and we don’t against teams that are better than us. You can’t expect this team to hang with teams in the Top 10. WE ARE NOT A TOP 10 TEAM! We have really good players and really good coaching (IMO), but not good enough right now. I don’t care who or what you want to blame, but we should at least all agree that Florida is a better team than us and we played them even in the second half. EVEN. That means we made adjustments. That means we made shots and were able to set a defense. You can spin the first half however you want to make your point. We all can. But they way I see it is if you’re shoot under 20% to a Top 10 team playing at their house on senior night, you are going to have problems.
Kudos to this team making it interesting down the stretch. Kudos for this team playing together (except last night) the previous 5 games. Kudos for getting to the double byes.
It’s easier to put an elite defense on the court, as Florida does, when you are faster, more athletic, and at least as big at almost every position. Florida is a really good basketball team. They can go to the FF if fouls on the frontline or the odd brickfest doesn’t derail them.
Disagree, we beat Vandy, Vandy beat them, we beat SCe, SCe beat them, we beat TN, they beat KY. I think you get the point, if we beat teams that beat those teams, we should be able to beat those teams. Last night, it was the first ten minutes that doomed us, and it was simply a mismatch in player personnel. We should have started Macon, Barford, and Manny, instead of Hannahs, Barford, and Manny. Trey instead of Thomas, and started in the zone. And many on here may want to go back and watch after the first media timeout, we DID switch to zone, only issue is Hannahs and Barford stayed in man. That was the 2nd issue. I just rewatched the game to make sure I saw what I thought I did.
A lot of good points made here…bottom line, the reason we missed a lot of shots (and they made more) is directly related to the amount of defense being applied to those shots. We may not be quite as athletic as FL, but it’s more scheme and technique, in my opinion.
Point is oversimplified. Matchups are everything. Remember a few years ago when our NIT-bound team beat Kentucky twice, a Kentucky team that wound up in the NCG? We matched up very well with UK that year. We don’t match up well at all with Florida. Alabama is the fifth best team in the league, but they don’t match up well with us this year.