Texas vs Western Carolina Gameflow

Here are the game leaders (by +/- per minute)

Johnson +1.16, +22
Wangmene +1.00, +11
Mason +0.96, +22
Brown +0.86, +18
Ward +0.84, +21
James +0.79, +23
Hamilton +0.79, +11
Bradley +0.65, +11
Balbay +0.55, +11
Williams +0.50, +2
Pittman +0.47, +8

My observations after the jump:

The top performing players for the most part were the hustle players, glue guys, defensive role players. This should tell us that our defense had a bigger impact on the game than our offense, and that doesn't come as a surprise given Barnes' comments of specifically focusing on defense in recent practices. In addition, this should also explain the amount of minutes Ward and Mason earned, along with the lack of minutes of Bradley, Hamilton, and Pittman. Specifically with Mason, while his box score looks rather empty, I think Barnes likes what he sees on the defensive end.
I really want to give props to Johnson and Wangmene. Johnson was the only player to not be a part of a 5-man unit that did not accumulate a negative +/- in the entire game. It's clear based on recent articles about him that he knows his role. Don't expect him to throw up a bunch of mid-range jumpers like we saw last year. He's going to focus on his defense, rebounding, and intangibles to help the team. I'm happy to have him for two more years. Wangmene is becoming a significant defensive force in the paint with his long arms. Had a block shot in 11 minutes and altered other shots. With these two guys and Pittman, our front court defense is probably top 10 in the nation at least. The ability to limit easy baskets in the paint alone will win us a ton of games this season.
My question is how long will this minute distribution continue? Will the younger, more offensive talent players get more playing time as the season continues even if their defense fails to improve dramatically? If the offense struggles against better competition, will Barnes be willing to go to the younger guys, or be loyal to his veteran players (reminiscent to Mack Brown's decision-making a few years ago)? You would think an influx of talent would make the game easier for Barnes, but the expectations for this season and his decision-making on minute distribution and units will be a huge challenge to deal with throughout the year.
Like PB said, we did not do a good job in utilizing Pittman (only played 17 minutes), and these numbers show he was actually the most unproductive as far as +/- per minute goes. This is personally disappointing to me considering he didn't get into foul trouble, and only had 1 turnover. Before the game I looked at Western Carolina's roster and noticed a huge size advantage for Dexter, and yet we did a poor job taking advantage of it. How much of this is on Pittman (his defense, lack of confidence from other players in getting him the ball)? How much of this is on the players around him getting the ball? Does Barnes even want to revolve the offense around Pittman? Some could argue it is not a good idea because Dexy clogging the paint could take away the skill-set of some of our other players.
I liked that we didn't have a single rotation accumulate a negative +/- in the entire second half despite the game being in blowout mode the entire half. Are you watching this, UT football?

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Fantastic and fascinating

Thanks so much for this excellent analysis. I look forward to spending some quality time thinking these through as the season progresses …

Watch out, I bite.

by EddieTheAlbinoSquirrel on Nov 20, 2009 6:23 PM CST reply actions

Another observation about Johnson

You’ll notice that he had the best +/- in the 1st half, and was part of the top two performing 5-man units in the 1st half.

The best rotation was a +7: James, Mason, Brown, Johnson, and Hamilton.

It’s a pretty small lineup, but I’m not surprised it worked effectively, considering the lack of size of W. Carolina.

by goingforthecorner on Nov 20, 2009 11:02 PM CST reply actions

Thanks for putting this all together. It’s a nice clean visual presentation and I’d hate to junk it up, but it would be even better to see individual results during the intervals. For instance an assist would get the player a blue square, two assists would be a blue square with a 2, a miss would be a hollow white circle, a trey would be a solid red circle. This would show what each player is really contributing to the rotation.

No doubt Barnes is just throwing lineups out there looking for the ones he likes. I don’t expect he will have set rotations until after Christmas, since there is still Lucas to factor in.

Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. If they get mad, you're a mile away AND you have their shoes.

by Caradoc on Nov 21, 2009 10:00 AM CST reply actions

Hmm

it’s a good idea, but yeah, it’ll make the spreadsheet look pretty messy. I just want to focus on the +/- on the spreadsheet and then use the box score for all the other stats. I’m just trying to figure out which players and rotations excelled against the team we played.

by goingforthecorner on Nov 21, 2009 2:41 PM CST up reply actions

This was the first game I have seen.

This is some fine work keeping with all the waves of substitutions. With all the different roster changes this is the only way to make sense of the game. Monster job, well done.

You can see clearly Barnes intent to go defense in the way he substituted.

The problem last season the whole team lacked a clear idea of what the role of each player was. Seeing Gary Johnson having a clear idea of his role, it is makes him better able to be successful. Defining each players role is what a great point guard does, not having one means players will try doing things outside their skill set.

by Xerxes on Nov 21, 2009 10:06 AM CST reply actions

Weak Half Court

Im glad that Rick said they only worked on Defense because the half court offense was frustrating and seemed aimless a lot of the time.

The +/- really pts this out…

When a team has a huge size advantage but does not go in side its really counter productive as Dex could not get involved in the up and down game. Gary and Damion were much more effective when the game got “Junktified” as they were athletic and polished enough to take advantage of the running game.

Positives … I like that whether we go 3 guards and 2 sf/pf or Use our Length We can match up and play whatever style we want to get the job done. Or if we want to shift gears on teams and grind them down running or in the half court.

I like using our depth to push teams and keep them off balance SO LONG AS we find a rhythm and units on the floor that gel and run well together. Cant wait for the big games coming up…

OH AND OU SUCKS!!!!! VCU showed Capel what a punk he is tonight.

by HornsUpInLA on Nov 21, 2009 11:14 PM CST reply actions