I need some help here. I've been playing this game for a long time and this is one of few things I don't understand. Maybe somebody else can help me who may understand.

My Oregon team plays Fastbreak/FCP sets. The teams that I always struggle with is teams that play Slow Down tempo. I've tried to offset that by playing Uptempo but does not work. In the past the full court press would trounch any team playing slowdown but changes to the sim engine have changed all that. To me, it seems that slowdown tempo is a huge advantage to the SIM based engine.

Should I just start practicing different sets? Is my team really not that good in the first place? It's not just this season. Seasons in the past I notice how much my team struggles against teams playing Slow Down. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Setting to uptempo is not going to help fastbreak Offense . It's automatically doing it for you . Haven't looked at your roster, but you should be at least 11 deep with equal PT.Hopefully not to much of a dropoff with your 2nd team.

After looking, your 3 losses have come against decent teams, and only 1 played slowdown on you.Your IQ's need to be high playing those sets . Overall team speed may be a issue also.

not sure if i understood you right, dave,  but my understanding of the FB is that you can run normal tempo or uptemp,   but cant run slowdown

jag... i beat my head against that wall for about 40 seasons at tark cuse.   had some success at times, but ALWAYS felt it was in spite of FB/press.
im assuming you already get that you have to have depth and stamina.... if you didnt have quite enough depth and or stamina,  you would welcome folks to slow the tempo so your dudes wouldnt wear down quite as much.   but,  since you are frustrated by opponents slowing the pace, i assume you feel,  as i did,  that fb/press does not allow you to wear the other team down to the extent you would expect (when they do slow)

i always had the feeling fbpr was a bit of a crapshoot... could lead to huge blowout wins or great upsets,  but defintely resulted in more headscratching losses than the other offenses.  so, in the end,  we genrally had great regular season teams... but found it very tough to stringtogether 6 wins in postseason.  plus, it was way more difficult imo to put together a program that was top20ish every single year... especially in d1 with EEs,  you just HAVE to have that depth and stamina and there's gonna be at least one or two seasons out of every four where you are just to inexperienced and thin to be an NT contender.

to answer your question i think it depends wether uptempo will wear you down at all (if so, dont do it)  and how much it will wear down your opponent or allow for foul trouble.  i agree that uptempo doesnt wear them down as much as we would hope,  but it will wear them down a little and allow for more possession adn more foul trouble,,, so if thier bench is thin-ish or they really rely on a few stars, id still go uptempo


good luck with the fastbroke  ;-)

I dont think slow by itself is a potent tactic

BUT if a team isnt deep but has a superior say first 7 going slow can help it beat a team that is deep but has say 8 or 9 or 10 okay guys but not a top first 5 6 or 7

I like the FB/FCP combo at D3/D2 but haven't tried it at D1, partially because I think it would be significantly tougher to make it work to the degree that I'd like for a few reasons.  Clearly the recruiting dynamics are so much different at D1, so you're kind of limited to regional recruiting, and then prestige and conference alignments could possibly work against you in getting the kids you really need to make it work.  What if there aren't good enough kids with good enough stamina close by?  You're kind of screwed then.  The second reason is that FB/FCP really works when you can get a clear edge in ATH/SP (and ideally DEF and ST also).  At elite D1 (i.e. a BCS school), this is harder because there are only so many 90/90 kids you can  probably get.  And to get a team full of kids that have superior ATH/DEF over the A+ schools is just so tough.  I've also found that FB/FCP sure works a lot better with good IQs, but EEs hamper this ability.  So I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'm sure it's a lot tougher than building a successful D3 FB/FCP team.

Now w/r/t your Oregon team, you simply don't have the elite kids playing for you yet.  ATH/SP is meh, and REB is quite low as well.  Let's face it, this is just a work in progress right now given the prestige is a B-, you're in just your third year with them, and you changed both sets.  So you're just building a foundation.  To be 11-3 with a 21 RPI/29 SOS and beating Colorado and losing a tough one in 2OT to Ole Miss, I'd say you're doing pretty well all things considered.  Maybe you could've played better at home vs. Cal (but honestly they're a clearly superior team imo) and on the road vs. OSU (but it's tough playing on the road vs. an A+ HCA), but again that Colorado and Ole Miss games perhaps offset these 2 clunkers.

Teams that play slowdown can offset the disruptive nature of the FB/FCP combo by limiting the stamina and foul trouble problems the other team could have if they otherwise went normal or uptempo, no question.  There's no solution for that really, and sometimes I do think the engine kind of gives slowdown teams more of an advantage than it should in always controlling the pace of the game.  Just be better than them and go uptempo against those teams to try to even out the pace.  There is a difference in going FB/Normal vs. FB/Uptempo. 

Lastly, not that you asked about it, but recruiting a kid with a 44 ST -- even if you're going to R/S him like you did this season -- is almost a waste of a roster slot.  That guy will be going out the game at the very first whistle after he gets in the game.  So that's definitely one area where you HAVE to recruit with the limitations of the FB/FCP sets in mind.