XS and Oats: Tied on top of Sec, ‘Bama heads to Austin to meet great value ole miss

EDIT: Updated to reflect current locations and point spreading. ‘Bama -3.5 sounds fair, honest. Texas has lost these kinds of games in the 4-8 point interval. Kenpom has’ Bama with 2; Bart Torvik has’ Bama with 3.3; And the offense heavier modeling I use (which has had a little more predictable validity for all-but the most elite defensive troops) it by tidal by 5.64-own

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Texas coach Rodney Terry deserves a lot of credit for collecting Longhorns after Beard’s arrest and dismissal two plus years ago. He won nearly 30 games, secured a 2-seed and noted a sweet 16 for Texas. But it was Zenith, so it seems. Despite a high -level recruitment that has unique institutional and financial support and plays in one of the most palatial gyms in the country, it is reasonable to say that Terry has tested. And the eclectic, defense-oriented Chris Beard system, as the one-time assistant who is inherited, just doesn’t translate yet in ways that make the fans forget the old guy.

In his first full season went out 21-13, was an intermediate seed in the NCAA tournament and did not get out of the first weekend. Moving from the GRISTMØLLEN in BIG 12 has also not delivered respite. If anything, SEC has been a harder way to navigate. Texas currently sits on 15-9 and is facing six tournament teams in its last seven Matchups four on the road.

Terry’s seat would be much warmer if it wasn’t for Texas’ surprising firm home games that saw Horns Upend Mizzou and A&M, and be an absolute threat to Uconn, Auburn and Tennessee. And therein lies the problem – Longhorns is almost good enough to deal with the country’s title competitions, but not so good to land enough of their own blows to get out of the “just very good” category.

Although not as talented a team as Arkansas, the ‘horns pose their own set of problems for the tide and twice as at home. Despite fans being mad, given UT’s analytical profile, where they are in the top 12% nationally on both sides of the ball, Horns’ record is right by where it should be (even about 1 game above expected winning values).

There has been no bad loss for shortie this year. There have just not been almost enough good winnings either. Let’s hope that Bama is not the one they are hanging their hat on this year..wheat is more plausible than the items suggest.

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Story of the tape:
No. 32 Texas (15-9, 4-7 T-10TH) VS No. 1 Alabama (20-3, 9-1 T-1st)

Spread: N/A, but probably in the 5-7 point area, and Ken Pom has it ‘Bama -2.

Opponent Kenpom: 32 (36 offense, 43 defense, 206 tempo)
Opponent Evan Miya: 35 (36 offense, 38 defense, 163 tempo)
Opponent Bart Torvik: 34 (27 offense, 46 defense, 207 tempo)
Opponents Net: 31 (3-7 Q1, 6-9 Q1/Q2); Q1 opponent for the tide
Opponent RPI: 73
Opponent best winner: vs texas A&M (15)
Opponent worst loss: @ Vandy (48)

Ua Ken Pom: 6. (3 OFF, 35 Defense, 1 Tempo)
Ua Evan Miya: 5. (4 OFF, 30 Defense, 1 Tempo)
UA BART TORVIK: 4. (3 OFF, 34 Defense, 1 Tempo)
UA Net Ranking: 6 (7-3 Q1, 14-3 Q1/2)
UA RPI: 2
UA Best Winner: No. 3 (n) Houston
UA worst loss: No. 35 (n) oregon

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Want to know about Texas?

At the risk of being reductive, Rodney Terry is a Chris Beard clone, and his Longhorns is a more athletic, large batch of Ole Miss.

I’m not writing everything I wrote to Ole Miss Preview again, so let our friend copy+pasta make the heavy lift. Pull powder blue, add white and burnt orange, but otherwise the procedure is the same:

Defensively:

If you’ve never seen how Beard’s team plays and you’re a fan of old-school, attitude-based on-ball defense, you’re in treat. Both offensively and defensively, the rebels are a Throwback team. They are a setback to the basic defense that emphasizes footwork and low attitude as a means of refusing penetration and ease passports.

Because the defenders squat on the ball, the opposing guards make vigilance with even routine dribbling: Ole Miss chooses your pocket. The fact that lower rent also means that defenders do not leave their feet for every fake ball, so easy items for the post are scarce to come with. And even though the ball is shopping, his husband knocks out of a screen, he is in a treat – because he will find out that there is already at least another defender in position waiting for him.

Beard emphasizes a “no middle” strategy, which means that every entrance or cutting inside must be disputed. To achieve this, the rebels (like A&M) cheat against the basket and you do not often see them coming out over the arch to pick up a shooting game. But when they do, catching the guard in a bad decision or cutting off penetration to the curve. But unlike other on-ball-printing teams we’ve seen, Beards’ troops are so hyper-aggressive to extinguishing that it is more fair to call his defensive style more of a hybrid man zone in reality. Calling it a 2-1-2 matchup zone, with is not entirely unfair.

Alabama has been fighting mighty against the Hybrid Zone team this year, and is continuously by the rebels and being in a burkamp with Mississippi State in Starkville. Let’s hope over the past month that the experiences learned in these two meetings will help ‘Bama better to adapt to the look they see on Tuesday.

Texas does not perform the defense against the same high level as Ole Miss, and they play a little more equal male defense than the rebels. But otherwise few wrinkles have been added by ‘Horns Coaching Staff. It also means that the same problems inherently remain: tend to be exceeding, tiring a lot and sending opponents to the free-throwing line, vulnerability to the other-pass circumference shot.

Crime:

Schematic, again, the system is one that we saw vs. The rebels: Eklectic, motion-oriented violation with a lot of off-ball screens, emphasis on choosing shots, pick-and-roll light appearance near the edge and pass and screens of ball. It does a bit of everything offensively, but is a little more dynamic than the rebels.

For starters, Longhorns depends on the perimeter of a higher percentage of their violation – though they are not a good shooting team in general. Alabama currently has the country’s best 3P% defense (surprised me too), so this will be a matchup to look at. Like going Texas circumference pictures, go the horns. They have usually been good enough to keep games very competitive. But when they have not done far beyond the arch, they have been smashed.

It’s also a much higher team than Ole Miss that makes their offensive rebounding battle a bit of a mystery. This team can and will routinely hit the glass and do not follow their misses almost as well as they should.

But they are elite in hanging on to the ball, making mistakes, getting to the line and getting these freebies to count. ‘Bama will have to play position defense without enthusiasm and especially come after defensive rebounds. This team can be trouble offensively … but they can also throw a lot of reckless shots, especially when outside the paint.

The end result is a team that actually plays worse than the sum of their parts, especially an offense that looks good analytical but has too many unforeseen bad shots and too little efforts on put-backs to be as effective as they could.

If you want to know what the full schemes look in depth, you have to review Ole Miss Release.

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Key staff

Texas is perhaps the deepest team ‘Bama will meet in SEC and maybe the whole season; eleven The guys watch 15+ minutes of action, and even the starting lineup of three guards rarely logs more than 25 minutes. In fact, only two players even chop 30+. It includes this week’s Mismatch Nightmare: 6’6 ”Freshman Wingman, Three Johnson. SG/SF leads’ Hornene at. 19.2 per Night, logs 33 MP Pr. Match, is the team’s best FT shooter and hits a sizzling 38% from the three-point line. If that wasn’t bad enough, he is also an absolute volume guy: almost seven 3pa per day. Battle and he shoots 50% more than anyone else on the team. It goes without saying that he is leading the ‘horns in the scoring – and in fact the whole of Sec. ‘Bama has rarely been able to close the opponents’ star players, and I doubt Johnson will be the first for the tide this year.

SG Tramon Mark is their Chris Youngblood: A very good circumference shooter who also attacks the glass and is a good defender. He and Backup PG Jordan Pope are combined in 21 at night and both are tits-out on the free throwing line: Texas has three regular rotation players, all flirting with 87-88% from Stripe. You cannot distribute this team late in possession. They live with gimmes (4. In SEC in FT scoring). Pope is probably also the best defender at Ball in Backcourt.

6’11 ”Kadrin Shedrick is a solid all-round PF/C type. Decent enough goal scorer, but his real contribution is like a RIM defender and defensive rebounder. Participation in him in Backcourt is their more dangerous goal scorer. Arthur Kaluma is number two on the team in the scoring and first in rebounding. He is also a very good ball distributor and is number two on the team in assists. If Texas is Ole Miss You Find on Temu, Kaluma is an off-label Collin Murray-Boyles.

Honestly it is easier to find players on the guard schedule that Don’t do it contribute to the ‘Horns violation than who is doing. Shortly after the ball, who choppes a beginner, four other guys have at least 150 trials from the floor. It’s not a team that is shy about putting shots. The disadvantage is that they are only 11 in offensive efficiency and not rebound well at the offensive end. But if ‘Bama gives this team too many other chances, they will run out of the building. The horns can get warm in a hurry and know how to cheese your way to the bad line. When you combine it with their excellent ball control and floor defense, it’s a bad mix for visitors.

How to look at

Another Prime Time game, Baby: 8 Central, ESPN/ESPN2 11 February 25.

Forecast

I respect this team. I respect the way. But Alabama should Be the better team here, provided they actually close the defense. The perimeter of the tide is likely to be tested at times and I don’t think there’s a particularly good matchup for Johnson. Kaluma is probably for a good night too. But Alabama has won a lot of games this year with a rather predictable formula: Let a guy in backcourt and a guy in the frontcourt feed; Minimize everyone else’s contributions.

It can be a bit higher task than usual considering the depth of the ‘horns. But their bad choices of shots, ‘Bama’s excellent defensive rebounding, and Alabama’s better post depth and pace will all help them. Also useful for the tide is that this is now the third team that ‘Bama has seen with the same general approach at both ends of the floor – and the contemporary weaknesses that the schemes possess. Texas has not seen ‘Bama yet nor their analog in Lexington.

We will say that the third time is the charm and that there is no shameful series of laziness that allows a beaten team to hang in and almost demand a win. The tide must be on duty over exactly that: ‘the horns love Last half race; They rarely ever really put down too well. For iherig. For talented.

Let’s hope ‘Bama gets it memo. Big parties Ole Miss they might be, but ‘Bama was definitely ruined by the name-branded version.

Alabama 87
Texas 81

Hope for the best.
Rolling water.

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