02-06-2021, 05:47 PM
I don't really think the "killer instinct" is a factor in games like this. FWIW, I do think some players are more competitive than others - Brink probably being toward the top of the list. But I disagree with any sentiment that our players, especially the Hulls or Anna, are "too nice". They compete hard every game IMO.
I think what is happening in the second half of some of the games is that other teams are making adjustments that are working. In the game against Colorado it happened when they got really aggressive in the zone and pressed us full court. We were lost. To me, that had nothing to do with not having a killer instinct. We just didn't know how to handle it. We weren't organized, started jacking 3's against the zone, etc. Colorado would have beaten us if they had 5 more minutes on the clock and didn't have to foul late. We had no idea how to handle what they were throwing at us. That was really disappointing. As others have mentioned, with limited practice time maybe we really haven't worked on those things much? Still, we shouldn't have crumbled that badly.
I also wanted to bring up...Tara seems focused on a couple things in situations where we have big leads. 1) Don't foul and put them on the line 2) Work the clock. That's an approach I'm personally fine with, because it's smart basketball and you will finish games with that strategy. However, that does result in weak defense with players being afraid to foul, and weak offense when players don't push their advantage early in the shot clock. Multiple times in the 4th quarter we saw the clock shot run dry as we were content to not attack the zone and just let the clock tick down. We also saw Kiana pull the ball back out after we broke the press and didn't force the advantage to get easy buckets. So some of this is by design - the players are going to follow Tara's orders. Geno and others likely have different strategies when they have big leads.
I think what is happening in the second half of some of the games is that other teams are making adjustments that are working. In the game against Colorado it happened when they got really aggressive in the zone and pressed us full court. We were lost. To me, that had nothing to do with not having a killer instinct. We just didn't know how to handle it. We weren't organized, started jacking 3's against the zone, etc. Colorado would have beaten us if they had 5 more minutes on the clock and didn't have to foul late. We had no idea how to handle what they were throwing at us. That was really disappointing. As others have mentioned, with limited practice time maybe we really haven't worked on those things much? Still, we shouldn't have crumbled that badly.
I also wanted to bring up...Tara seems focused on a couple things in situations where we have big leads. 1) Don't foul and put them on the line 2) Work the clock. That's an approach I'm personally fine with, because it's smart basketball and you will finish games with that strategy. However, that does result in weak defense with players being afraid to foul, and weak offense when players don't push their advantage early in the shot clock. Multiple times in the 4th quarter we saw the clock shot run dry as we were content to not attack the zone and just let the clock tick down. We also saw Kiana pull the ball back out after we broke the press and didn't force the advantage to get easy buckets. So some of this is by design - the players are going to follow Tara's orders. Geno and others likely have different strategies when they have big leads.