Northwestern: "If only we had talent"

On Monday I wrote to John Gasaway about Northwestern's oddly high two-point field goal percentage. On Wednesday I watched with a critical eye from the nosebleeds in Welsh-Ryan. What did I learn? Basically, I learned what the Princeton offense looks like. [For anyone that knows me, this was a "brownies" moment. And for anyone that doesn't know me, it has nothing to do with weed.] I never learned, though, exactly how the Princeton offense is designed. So everything below is written as if I had never heard of the Princeton offense.

[Note that what I did learn came from the first half, as the second half turned into shooting practice for Roderick Wilmont and a fast break clinic for Northwestern. Only one of those was surprising.]

During the first fifteen minutes of the game, excluding a single five-foot hook shot from Tim Doyle, Northwestern took exactly two types of shots: three-pointers and driving layups. If a player didn't have a clear path to the rim, he didn't try to score from inside the three-point line. As layups go, Northwestern missed a lot of them, but they still shot 22-for-38 for the game on two-point attempts (this would include some jumpers after Indiana relaxed their perimeter defense).

Northwestern's offensive sets rarely kept a player in the low post. I recall Kevin Coble truly posting up no more than a couple times, and whenever Tim Doyle started in the post, it was usually so he could gain a physical advantage for getting back out to a high-screen position. Most of the time there were four players on or outside of the three-point line and a fifth player in the high post, by one of the corners of the free-throw line. To free up a three-point shooter against man-to-man defense, Northwestern primarily used screening handoffs and high screens off the ball. Most plays started with a pass into the high post followed by the passer cutting down the lane. They ran backdoor cuts, but most layup attempts came from a player getting an edge on his defender and just going to the rim.

I was surprised to find that Northwestern rarely ran into trouble with the shot clock. The only forced shot I can remember turned out to be a tip-layup. So why does Northwestern shoot so many three-pointers? Because their shooters display a Grossmanian lack of discrimination. If one of their shooters had his feet set and no defender immediately in his face, he took the three. Very few attempts were wide-open looks.

I can rationalize Northwestern's offensive actions: They look for a layup attempt or a three-point attempt; they take the first decent opportunity they're given, because they assume that a forced shot to beat the clock will deliver less than the 0.82 points they average on three-point attempts. As I said, I can rationalize it, but I don't know that Bill Carmody or any other Pete Carril disciples think of it in the same way.

Another guess is that Carmody doesn't have a backup plan. No coach expects his team to shoot under 30% from downtown, but it's not like changing up the offense can create more of the type of two-point shots they want to take. If the layups are there, they're there. If not, they can change what they do to use more of the area inside the arc, or they can keep jacking up threes. With the lack of talent on this year's team, Carmody may have felt a midrange game wouldn't have been any more successful than their current three-point game. Can't say I blame him -- I wouldn't be surprised if Northwestern's 50% on two-point attempts came from 60% on layups and 30% on jumpers. Why take 0.6 points for a two-point jumper when you can take 0.8 or 0.9 for a three-pointer?

[Okay, now you can pretend I've heard of the Princeton offense, because I'm about to make some random but related comments.]

Georgetown. I'm not at all surprised that they lead the nation in two-point field goal percentage. I (gleefully) watched them beat Duke last year when Shelden Williams perplexingly guarded his man out beyond the three-point line, and the Hokies Hoyas ran so many backdoor plays they had to put "NSFW" on the link to the game recap. So we know Georgetown likes to go to the hole. [Wow, I'll stop.] What does surprise me is how few of Georgetown's shots get blocked. I would think that block rate would increase as shot distance from rim decreased. Roy Hibbert helps, of course. But maybe I should watch a Georgetown game (ya think?) to see from where they actually take their shots.