First, these aren’t my recruited players so I can’t allow myself to be that heartbroken.

Buuuuttt... A few seasons back, I lost in 2nd round as a 1 seed. And now I lose in 2nd round as a 3 seed.

When I sized up my opponent, I knew the guards could be trouble. However, I seemed to have a major advantage down low. Rebounding, the opponent was terrible stats wise. Defense off the bench was also bad! I tried increasing distribution for my good offensive bench players. I felt confident about my chances.

My team’s success in the season has been on defense more than offense. In this game, my opponent shot the highest FG% all season against us.

Question... do any of you see major gameplanning errors? Is my depth chart bad? I would love feedback on gameplanning improvements I could have made. Thank you!

Box Score

With an opponent relying that heavily on perimeter scoring (and doing it effectively) I would have wanted to set up more geared toward perimeter defense, almost thinking in terms of a 3-2 zone; specifically, I would have used Shannon and Kulp as the starting interior defenders (emphasizing rebounding over defense). I’d have moved Robertson up to SF, and moved Zukas in at SG. My 2-deep lineup would be:
PG - Wright, Timpson
SG - Zukas, Cote
SF - Robertson, Taylor
PF - Kulp, Verdi
C - Shannon, Brace
+2 was probably the right setting. I’d have had Shannon as my primary scorer (which you did) and Wright as secondary, and Zukas getting plenty of 3-pt looks, among starters. Maybe something like 8-6-5 distribution for them, with the others set at 1-4 depending on IQ.

Small changes, and they don’t necessarily account for what could have just been a tough simulation for you. Just my 2c.

I'm 2-8 against shoe3, and will be 2-9 after tonight, so I'd recommend listening to him over me, but here is what I would have done:

Personally, given the opponent's perimeter propensity, I would have gone +5. For depth, I also would move Kulp to the starting lineup, but I would also keep Verdi as a starter (as well as a shared backup with Brace of PF), and keep Zukas as an off-the-bench scoring machine, but if you want a pure 2-deep, shoe3's lineup makes sense. For distro, I mostly agree with shoe3, thought I would swap Zukas and Wright's distro, and I would also give Brace about a 6. That way you have have 2 scorers in both your starters and your bench players.

PG - Wright, Timpson
SG - Robertson, Zukas,
SF - Verdi, Taylor, Cote
PF - Shannon, [Brace/Verdi]
C - Kulp, Brace

Overall, though, I think mostly you just got fairly unlucky. They have a better roster than their seed suggested, but you still should have won about 75% of the time.

I felt screwed. So good to hear. But also... neither me nor my opponent in round 1 expected that game to be close. And I barely got through... by 3 points!

I am curious though... why the high distribution for Wright? His points-per-possession was probably 8th on the team. I had 7 better offense threats than Wright.

Also my depth chart for the game was:

Shannon, Kulp
Brace, Kulp, Verdi
Verdi, Zukas, Cote
Robertson, Taylor
Wright, Timpson

Zukas turns over frequently. So I play him at the 3

Posted by gdog13cavs on 11/27/2018 3:54:00 PM (view original):
I'm 2-8 against shoe3, and will be 2-9 after tonight, so I'd recommend listening to him over me, but here is what I would have done:

Personally, given the opponent's perimeter propensity, I would have gone +5. For depth, I also would move Kulp to the starting lineup, but I would also keep Verdi as a starter (as well as a shared backup with Brace of PF), and keep Zukas as an off-the-bench scoring machine, but if you want a pure 2-deep, shoe3's lineup makes sense. For distro, I mostly agree with shoe3, thought I would swap Zukas and Wright's distro, and I would also give Brace about a 6. That way you have have 2 scorers in both your starters and your bench players.

PG - Wright, Timpson
SG - Robertson, Zukas,
SF - Verdi, Taylor, Cote
PF - Shannon, [Brace/Verdi]
C - Kulp, Brace

Overall, though, I think mostly you just got fairly unlucky. They have a better roster than their seed suggested, but you still should have won about 75% of the time.

I dunno about that +5. He was at +4 in 2nd half and got shredded in 2nd half inside. They shot like 75%

You could make a good case for switching Zukas and Robertson in my lineup. A couple very minor points in favor of what I suggested:
1. Robertson can rebound a little, Zukas will be no help on the boards. That small advantage (ath and reb) is better utilized at SF.
2. Zukas’ 3 pt shooting is likely a little better utilized at SG, given this matchup.
On the other hand, Robertson has better traditional generic offensive guard skills (speed, BH, passing). My bias here is that when all else is equal, I’d prefer scoring to come from the 2, and the SF to play a sort of point forward role. That bias isn’t necessarily rational or correct.

Regarding Wright, my distribution suggestion is based on matchup. Your opponent was defensively weak at C and PG. Wright isn’t an ideal D2 scorer, but I suspect he could have had a good night, and maybe even drawn some fouls with the IQ advantage. Again, very minor point, and may well not have made much overall difference.

Ultimately, the suggestion I have the most confidence in here is in bolstering your starting perimeter defense with the 3 guard (in whatever order, you could make a case for Robertson at point as well), and beefing up your rebounding down low with Kulp. You know he’s going to be bombs away; you want him to miss, and you want to beat him on the boards, where you have an advantage.

I haven't looked very closely into it and you may have just lost to a team that you didn't match up well with or had a bad simulation. It happens.

I may have considered running a 3-2 zone against that team. Between 45-50% of his shots are from beyond the arc. You also had some guys in the C to C- range in zone, certainly better than F's. I think trying to shoot over the top of your 3 strongest defensive guards in a 3-2 and the other team taking that many shots outside would've outweighed any IQ advantage playing man.

Posted by Benis on 11/27/2018 8:14:00 PM (view original):

Posted by gdog13cavs on 11/27/2018 3:54:00 PM (view original):
I'm 2-8 against shoe3, and will be 2-9 after tonight, so I'd recommend listening to him over me, but here is what I would have done:

Personally, given the opponent's perimeter propensity, I would have gone +5. For depth, I also would move Kulp to the starting lineup, but I would also keep Verdi as a starter (as well as a shared backup with Brace of PF), and keep Zukas as an off-the-bench scoring machine, but if you want a pure 2-deep, shoe3's lineup makes sense. For distro, I mostly agree with shoe3, thought I would swap Zukas and Wright's distro, and I would also give Brace about a 6. That way you have have 2 scorers in both your starters and your bench players.

PG - Wright, Timpson
SG - Robertson, Zukas,
SF - Verdi, Taylor, Cote
PF - Shannon, [Brace/Verdi]
C - Kulp, Brace

Overall, though, I think mostly you just got fairly unlucky. They have a better roster than their seed suggested, but you still should have won about 75% of the time.

I dunno about that +5. He was at +4 in 2nd half and got shredded in 2nd half inside. They shot like 75%

Agree w Benis here. the small point I was going to add would be don't let Sim change your defensive positioning 'when losing' (set it at by 5 or 10 or more) especially if you feel you've got the right settings, which you should. Down by 1 or 2 in NT in a game which should be expected to be reasonably close should not...well...I don't worry about that nearly as much as Sim going from +2 to +4 on my behalf based on a 2 pt deficit

Posted by duece112 on 11/28/2018 3:01:00 AM (view original):

Posted by Benis on 11/27/2018 8:14:00 PM (view original):

Posted by gdog13cavs on 11/27/2018 3:54:00 PM (view original):
I'm 2-8 against shoe3, and will be 2-9 after tonight, so I'd recommend listening to him over me, but here is what I would have done:

Personally, given the opponent's perimeter propensity, I would have gone +5. For depth, I also would move Kulp to the starting lineup, but I would also keep Verdi as a starter (as well as a shared backup with Brace of PF), and keep Zukas as an off-the-bench scoring machine, but if you want a pure 2-deep, shoe3's lineup makes sense. For distro, I mostly agree with shoe3, thought I would swap Zukas and Wright's distro, and I would also give Brace about a 6. That way you have have 2 scorers in both your starters and your bench players.

PG - Wright, Timpson
SG - Robertson, Zukas,
SF - Verdi, Taylor, Cote
PF - Shannon, [Brace/Verdi]
C - Kulp, Brace

Overall, though, I think mostly you just got fairly unlucky. They have a better roster than their seed suggested, but you still should have won about 75% of the time.

I dunno about that +5. He was at +4 in 2nd half and got shredded in 2nd half inside. They shot like 75%

Agree w Benis here. the small point I was going to add would be don't let Sim change your defensive positioning 'when losing' (set it at by 5 or 10 or more) especially if you feel you've got the right settings, which you should. Down by 1 or 2 in NT in a game which should be expected to be reasonably close should not...well...I don't worry about that nearly as much as Sim going from +2 to +4 on my behalf based on a 2 pt deficit

Yeah I don't like to auto adjust either. I always set my halftime adjustments to Never.

I know it is bad luck to be superstitious, but I think pushing out that much is only the right choice if you notice they are for sure running +2 PER shooting in their distro. Also, you were mostly outmatched with speed across the board. Pushing out puts your guards on their heels, and they are already slower to begin with. Also, your advantage on the boards is given up by pushing out, unless you expect your opponent to do the same. It's tough to game plan against a team that has great perimeter, but also great speed. It looks like you were pushed out so far in the 2nd half that your squad was just getting burned to the basket for uncontested shots.

In my opinion, this is what hurt you the most.

"CSU, Chico is playing a triangle offense and a man to man (+4)"