WHAT DO U THINK BOUT YOUR WILDCATS TODAY? I WAS LOOKING AT THEM.
PLAYING AT HOME AREN'T THEY?
WIZZ.
PLAYING AT HOME AREN'T THEY?
WIZZ.
Nickel????
- Thread starter THE WIZZARD
- Start date
Actually Wizzard, game is on a neutral court. . . I'll have a nice little writeup in a couple minutes and post it here.
To start, here's a couple quotes (obviously I cannot and will not take credit for these) from Lute Olson on tonight's game against Florida:
On the Florida Gators:
"Florida is athletic, they have really good shooters, they score a lot of points, and they like going up and down the court. It should be an exciting, fun game to watch and fun for the players to play. We will press on occasion, and I hope that they do so that we get an opportunity to work on our full-court offense. We do (press) against ourselves, but it is always different to see somebody else's (defense). They zone about half the time, and I think we need that. They have a deeper bench than we do, but if we stay healthy and don't get into foul trouble, I think that we can go deep enough on the bench to do a good job."
On opponents' attempts to slow Arizona with zone defense:
"I think there will be that attempt to do it. That is why we tell our point guards that it doesn't make any difference whether they are in a man or a zone. You have to attack and get the ball ahead and make it difficult for the zone to actually get set. I think Mustafa (Shakur) will do that. I don't think it should make a lot of difference; we just have to make sure that we don't slow down because of it, and that we continue to attack."
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Lute's mindframe is to run run run. . . this team will look to attack all the time. . .you won't see them simply walk the ball up the court very often! Florida appears to be the same as they scored in triple digits over Montana State while allowing MSU to hit over 70 which is similar to Arizona's outcome over NAU. I say appears because Florida did not exactly run like Arizona as they only attempted 67 shots in their game compared to 91 for Arizona! They did manage to hit a very high percentage of their shots (over 60%) in order to hit the 100 mark.
Arizona will try and take advantage of their speed and conditioning (which always seems to be superior in early games against good teams) while Florida will likely try and wear down the Wildcats with their slight depth advantage.
This sets up a track meet especially on Arizona's side. Total for this game is around 155 which I think is too low for two teams that scored well over triple digits earlier this week but most importantly allowed much weaker teams to hit over 70! This tells you that #1 the pace in each game was so fast to allow those teams to hit such high point totals and/or #2 neither team played great defense. Either way, both teams should have no problems getting their points in this one.
Here's the way I'm gonna play this one:
Arizona team total over (waiting on a line for this one but assume it will be around 78 or 79) for an above average play
Arizona/Florida over 155 average play
As to which team to pick. . . well, I'm not gonna be a homer yet and play Arizona even though I want to. Line started at 3, quickly got shot down to 2 and 1 at some places. Arizona always seems to have the better teams when they play quality opponents within the first month of the season and they always have the faster teams but I need to see it for myself this year. What I do know is Arizona will try everything in their power to put points up on the board and a ton of them. . . they will have no problem trading baskets early as they will simply expect to wear down the other team in the 2nd half. If the pace slows down, they will full court press. I know for a fact that Lute doesn't fear a fast paced game and I would assume that Florida doesn't either since they have a little depth on the bench. . . this is why I am playing the Arizona team total a little higher than the game total because I just don't know exactly what Florida plans to do.
On the Florida Gators:
"Florida is athletic, they have really good shooters, they score a lot of points, and they like going up and down the court. It should be an exciting, fun game to watch and fun for the players to play. We will press on occasion, and I hope that they do so that we get an opportunity to work on our full-court offense. We do (press) against ourselves, but it is always different to see somebody else's (defense). They zone about half the time, and I think we need that. They have a deeper bench than we do, but if we stay healthy and don't get into foul trouble, I think that we can go deep enough on the bench to do a good job."
On opponents' attempts to slow Arizona with zone defense:
"I think there will be that attempt to do it. That is why we tell our point guards that it doesn't make any difference whether they are in a man or a zone. You have to attack and get the ball ahead and make it difficult for the zone to actually get set. I think Mustafa (Shakur) will do that. I don't think it should make a lot of difference; we just have to make sure that we don't slow down because of it, and that we continue to attack."
------------------------------------------------------------
Lute's mindframe is to run run run. . . this team will look to attack all the time. . .you won't see them simply walk the ball up the court very often! Florida appears to be the same as they scored in triple digits over Montana State while allowing MSU to hit over 70 which is similar to Arizona's outcome over NAU. I say appears because Florida did not exactly run like Arizona as they only attempted 67 shots in their game compared to 91 for Arizona! They did manage to hit a very high percentage of their shots (over 60%) in order to hit the 100 mark.
Arizona will try and take advantage of their speed and conditioning (which always seems to be superior in early games against good teams) while Florida will likely try and wear down the Wildcats with their slight depth advantage.
This sets up a track meet especially on Arizona's side. Total for this game is around 155 which I think is too low for two teams that scored well over triple digits earlier this week but most importantly allowed much weaker teams to hit over 70! This tells you that #1 the pace in each game was so fast to allow those teams to hit such high point totals and/or #2 neither team played great defense. Either way, both teams should have no problems getting their points in this one.
Here's the way I'm gonna play this one:
Arizona team total over (waiting on a line for this one but assume it will be around 78 or 79) for an above average play
Arizona/Florida over 155 average play
As to which team to pick. . . well, I'm not gonna be a homer yet and play Arizona even though I want to. Line started at 3, quickly got shot down to 2 and 1 at some places. Arizona always seems to have the better teams when they play quality opponents within the first month of the season and they always have the faster teams but I need to see it for myself this year. What I do know is Arizona will try everything in their power to put points up on the board and a ton of them. . . they will have no problem trading baskets early as they will simply expect to wear down the other team in the 2nd half. If the pace slows down, they will full court press. I know for a fact that Lute doesn't fear a fast paced game and I would assume that Florida doesn't either since they have a little depth on the bench. . . this is why I am playing the Arizona team total a little higher than the game total because I just don't know exactly what Florida plans to do.
Apologize Wizz. . . I'm sure you expected me to say take Arizona but the value is with the total tonight. Its too early to know just how good Arizona is relative to Florida but it should be a fun game to watch with a ton of action.
Fun game to watch is right Nickelback. One-point game with a minute to go, up-and-down the court. Glad to have the game back in full-swing!!
