It was quite a week for the Cats. From a Saturday loss at home vs Texas Tech where everything seemed to be going wrong to a Saturday win at Houston that was probably the best regular season victory of the Tommy Lloyd era: maybe this is just how life goes in this conference. But with four games to go, Arizona leads the Big-12 by two games and now holds the tiebreak over Houston.
You don’t want to be a prisoner of the moment, but there is a chance we look back on that win as an Arizona all-timer. There wasn’t quite the excitement of a Salim Stoudamire game winner or a Derrick Williams block, but this one was just as big in terms of season importance.
With Houston and Arizona both entering their only matchup of the season with 11-2 conference records and with an increasingly diminished Wildcat rotation, the Cats managed to nab a gritty victory in the Coogs’ house. There was a lot to like (and some to dislike) in the last stretch of games. Let’s take a look.
I like how tough this team is.
I mean, how could you not? And if you weren’t convinced before, you better be now.1
No Koa Peat or Dwayne Aristode. Brayden Burries, clearly sick, plays 31 minutes. Anthony Dell’Orso cranks his ankle then returns. Motiejus Krivas and Tobe Awaka in foul trouble. Jaden Bradley plays 37 minutes and Ivan Kharchenkov plays 39 minutes, the majority of them at the four.
When people say “leave it all on the floor”, my mind will go to this game for awhile. And that’s after rebounding to beat BYU on Wednesday in a game that Arizona handled pretty much wire to wire down two and a half guys.2
I disliked how many fouls there were in the Houston game.
About those foul outs. Well, Awaka pretty much earned his, including three nowhere near the Cougars’ basket.
Krivas, however, I don’t think had a single absolutely unquestionable foul.
And even with that said, I think the officiating was overall very good. The first thing you ask for is consistency and this crew was definitely that in the 43 fouls that they called.
I know as is, 139 is not a lot of points scored, which means the defenses did alright in this game despite the fouls. It is just my preference to watch two of the toughest teams in the nation battle it out versus navigate foul trouble.
Four Houston players finished with four fouls. And just to be fair, here are some calls on the home team that I would like to see let go in my ideal version of a super intense basketball game.3
I liked Arizona paying a little more attention to the two-for-one.
In what will likely go down as my favorite random play of the season, Jaden Bradley prevented Texas Tech from getting an extra opportunity to end the first half, running sixteen seconds off the game clock, but not the shot clock, as was requested here months ago.4
Then versus BYU, Coach Lloyd used his first half timeout to save the clock, put in defensive subs, and set his defense with 42 seconds remaining in the half.
Anthony Dell’Orso would end up nailing a three-pointer at the buzzer on one of the Wildcats’ most frequently used baseline inbounds plays. Great call by coach to get his team an extra chance.
As long as we are on the “walking the dog” topic, Bradley and Co. are using the tactic later in games with leads as well, purposely draining the clock in both of the last two games.
For those who are still with us from last time, up four with 2:25 left and the ball is an 88.6% win probability, says inpredictable.com. After ten seconds of the ball rolling and no time off the shot clock, its 89.7%. Not huge, but something for free.
I didn’t like Houston’s end of game strategy.
Let’s keep on using that calculator. Anthony Dell’Orso gets the rebound at 1:17 up six. Houston waits 7 seconds then fouls. Of course, if they were going to foul, they should have done it as quickly as possible, but should they have?
Jaden Bradley is a 77.9% free throw shooter both this year and for his career.5 Here are the chances he makes 0, 1, or 2 with Houston regaining possession and their win probability at that point.
This all totals to only a 0.8% chance with this strategy. Without fouling, Arizona could have held the ball until 0:47-ish. A stop would have meant a 1.4% chance of winning at that point. This one’s pretty close so I think it was fine either way but I would have leaned towards trap and try to force a turnover when Arizona doesn’t want to shoot for 20 more seconds.
The issue was the next possession. The Cougars scored to cut the lead back to six with 1:02 left and called timeout to set their press.
Houston decides not to immediately foul, nor to foul on the pass out of the first trap. Instead, Kharchenkov walks the ball up the floor unimpeded and hands it to Bradley, who is finally fouled 13 seconds after the ball was inbounded. In the best case scenario where he misses both, Houston’s WP moved from 2.0% to 1.5% just losing that time.
I like some new sets that Arizona is using.
The Wildcats added a play to use Kharchenkov as the primary ball handler in the first ballscreen action coming up from the block in an “L” shape off a zipper cut.
Then versus Houston, Arizona came out of a timeout with Kharchenkov at point guard and Dell’Orso setting an INVERTED BALLSCREEN, something I have wanted to see the Wildcats toy with all year.
Unfortunately, this possession didn’t bear much fruit, leaving me worried we’d seen the last of it, only for Coach Lloyd to repeatedly call for inverted pick-and-roll actions over the next couple of minutes!
With Kharchenkov at the four, Arizona could run a 1-3 pick and roll to try to get a switch of Kingston Flemings onto Bradley and flow into a 4-1 PnR via a throw-and-chase screen to Kharchenkov.
Houston was forced to navigate this action with Chris Cenac Jr. covering the ball and Flemings covering the screener. They tried to not switch and gave up a layup; then they tried to switch and gave up a basket on a mismatch; then Emanuel Sharp refused to switch off Bradley and got whistled for his third foul.
I also want to give credit to Bradley for drawing Fleming’s third foul earlier in the half.
I liked the press break much better
Another advantage of the smaller lineup was that the Wildcats were forced into Kharchenkov being the inbounder late. In my breakdown of the end of the BYU game, I pointed out that Koa Peat rarely ran the baseline, making the first pass harder and longer. Kharchenkov did a much better job here moving the defense and creating better passing angles to start the press break.
I thought Arizona did a better job switching up their positioning, even going to the football-style inbounds in the last clip above, which I really enjoyed.
Also, who would have thought the Cats would be going to offensive/defensive substitutions of Evan Nelson and Sidi Gueye to close the game at Houston? Well, that’s how it ended up and it made perfect sense. Well executed.
I haven’t liked Arizona’s reliance on the midrange game.
Keeping this short for now as it may be a topic for a further deep dive, but as pointed out earlier this year, the Cats can sometimes settle for contested, off the dribble, midrange shots, especially against quality opponents.
There was a stretch against Houston where it looked like Bradley and Flemings might just alternate them the rest of the game. Eventually, the Wildcats got better looks while the Cougars did not.
But this was not the case versus Kansas and Texas Tech, where Arizona shot only 30% of their attempts at the rim, compared to 41% on the year and in conference wins. On those shots at the rim, the Wildcats shot a dismal 40%. Something to keep an eye on moving forward.
I liked Coach Lloyd giving credit to Coach Sampson
In his post game press conference, Coach Lloyd had effluent praise for Houston coach, Kelvin Sampson, who should be familiar to most Arizona fans dating all the way back to his time at Washington State.
Sampson, who got a raw deal how his time at Oklahoma ended, spent time in the NBA before coming back to the college game and reviving Houston into a powerhouse.
Story Time
McKale Center hosted the first and second rounds of the NCAA tournament many times between 1977 and 2011. That meant eight teams in town simultaneously so they would often use local high schools for their practice the day before their game and/or walkthrough the day of.
My dad coached high school basketball in Tucson most of my life and one perk was that, depending on the coach, they would allow us to watch. There were a lot of good coaches that came through, but no one was more grateful and kind than Kelvin Sampson when he brought Oklahoma in 1997.6
Funny enough, Coach Lloyd was also a guest. I do not remember meeting him when Mark Few and Gonzaga practiced in the gym in 2005, but I probably did. The memory that has stuck with me from that one was Derek Raivio going through almost the entire walkthrough barefoot.
Rotations
We spent a good amount of time in the last article looking at Arizona’s rotations, only for that to all go out the window with two players out for an extended stretch. Here’s how Arizona has handled it so far.
Texas Tech
BYU
Houston
Sidi Gueye has averaged 9 minutes per game in the last two and Evan Nelson 6.5. They have each held up well enough trying to soak up some of the 45 minutes Arizona is trying to replace.7
Kharchenkov, Bradley, and Dell’Orso are playing huge minutes right now to keep the Wildcats afloat. I actually think the lineup of those three, Bradley, and one post is a good one for the Cats and something they should go to even when healthy to mix it up.
For now, it is important to have one of those two posts out there at all times. Arizona was forced into seven minutes without Krivas or Awaka on the floor versus Houston. If they are both in foul trouble, I would strongly consider staggering their minutes earlier and/or not starting both posts to begin the second half.
Next Game: at Baylor on Tuesday, February 24th, 7:00PM MST.
I see Cougar “fans” saying we exposed their team as soft and that Arizona’s team is real. This is Houston! They are the defining program of the last five years in terms of toughness.
Burries sick.
Although most did end up helping Houston after Arizona missed the front end of 1-and-1’s.
There actually ended up being three possessions instead of one because of a foul but that’s not the point.
Fun coincidence.
Also thanks to 2011 Kansas State coach Frank Martin, who took a lot of time to talk with us as his team prepared for the biggest games of their season. Most of these coaches are pretty great guys in person.
I think it is a reasonable time to ask why Gueye and Nelson couldn’t have played 10-15 minutes in some of the earlier blowouts in case they were needed later.
Yooo! Let’s connect!