All these things are 110% due to coaching. The Missouri game was a summary of all of them.
Offensive Mentality
This team is not settling for near as many jump shots as they were earlier in the year. We took a step back against Bama and you can tell Donnie used it as a chance to drive home even further the importance of getting to the tin. Sitting Punter was smart. Wake up call for everyone. Punter/Reese/Richardson/Moore, hell everyone, is taking it to the rack.
Driving to the basket does so many good things - increases the number of fouls by (and on) your opponent, creates more foul shots for us, increases the chances for garbage putbacks. When you take the ball to the hoop, good things happen. It's an obvious mentality to preach given our team's skill set - former PG at the 4, undersized guy who likes the perimeter at the 5 - but not many coaches would get the same results as Tyndall. Full buy in. Can't stress enough how huge this is.
Half Court Defense
As the season's gone along, our communication and understanding is SO MUCH BETTER. Remember the backside defenders early in the year against Kansas + VCU and a few other teams?? Remember the number of open perimeter looks when shooters were able to catch and release in stride vs NCSU? Teams are not getting near as much "easy" stuff. Our opponents look more uncomfortable. Watch when the ball is swung or skipped against this defense. Watch how fast we recover. Watch when the ball goes to the wing or corner. Watch how we communicate responsibilities. I've never been much of a zone person, so I was really skeptical of our zone-only philosophy at first, but now I get it. Tyndall has done a really nice job implementing + teaching it.
Cutting Down on Fouls
Was such a killer early in the year. You could see Donnie begging the kids to cut down on fouls and play smarter from day 1. Smart decision to start bringing WC III off the bench. He was killing us early in ballgames ... we were putting teams into the bonus with 12 minutes to go in the half. Hell, the double bonus. Simply put, we're playing so much smarter defensively. Less reaching, more moving our feet. All Tyndall.
Reese and Moore
These two are so much fun to watch. Moore is moving up the ladder as one of my favorite UT players of all time. So much grit + grind. Max effort at all times. If someone who had never seen this team play walked into our locker room before a game, the number one thing they would say is "we're in big trouble on the boards". Yet, we're not. Reese and Moore are leading the charge with effort and other guys (Hubbs) are falling in line. Tyndall gets the importance of rebounding and he's doing a fantastic job getting it out of this team. Size has nothing to do with rebounding. All about heart.
Big Gulp. Nuff' said.
These are just some of the great things Donnie's doing. What an awesome season this has been. I didn't even get into the press.. Or Richardson. Or Hubbs' development. Lots of cool stuff going on.
We'll definitely take a few more lumps this year due to talent disparity, but it's a guarantee we'll continue to improve. And we know we'll always get 110% effort. That's all you can ask for.
Looks fun.
JMHO.
Offensive Mentality
This team is not settling for near as many jump shots as they were earlier in the year. We took a step back against Bama and you can tell Donnie used it as a chance to drive home even further the importance of getting to the tin. Sitting Punter was smart. Wake up call for everyone. Punter/Reese/Richardson/Moore, hell everyone, is taking it to the rack.
Driving to the basket does so many good things - increases the number of fouls by (and on) your opponent, creates more foul shots for us, increases the chances for garbage putbacks. When you take the ball to the hoop, good things happen. It's an obvious mentality to preach given our team's skill set - former PG at the 4, undersized guy who likes the perimeter at the 5 - but not many coaches would get the same results as Tyndall. Full buy in. Can't stress enough how huge this is.
Half Court Defense
As the season's gone along, our communication and understanding is SO MUCH BETTER. Remember the backside defenders early in the year against Kansas + VCU and a few other teams?? Remember the number of open perimeter looks when shooters were able to catch and release in stride vs NCSU? Teams are not getting near as much "easy" stuff. Our opponents look more uncomfortable. Watch when the ball is swung or skipped against this defense. Watch how fast we recover. Watch when the ball goes to the wing or corner. Watch how we communicate responsibilities. I've never been much of a zone person, so I was really skeptical of our zone-only philosophy at first, but now I get it. Tyndall has done a really nice job implementing + teaching it.
Cutting Down on Fouls
Was such a killer early in the year. You could see Donnie begging the kids to cut down on fouls and play smarter from day 1. Smart decision to start bringing WC III off the bench. He was killing us early in ballgames ... we were putting teams into the bonus with 12 minutes to go in the half. Hell, the double bonus. Simply put, we're playing so much smarter defensively. Less reaching, more moving our feet. All Tyndall.
Reese and Moore
These two are so much fun to watch. Moore is moving up the ladder as one of my favorite UT players of all time. So much grit + grind. Max effort at all times. If someone who had never seen this team play walked into our locker room before a game, the number one thing they would say is "we're in big trouble on the boards". Yet, we're not. Reese and Moore are leading the charge with effort and other guys (Hubbs) are falling in line. Tyndall gets the importance of rebounding and he's doing a fantastic job getting it out of this team. Size has nothing to do with rebounding. All about heart.
Big Gulp. Nuff' said.
These are just some of the great things Donnie's doing. What an awesome season this has been. I didn't even get into the press.. Or Richardson. Or Hubbs' development. Lots of cool stuff going on.
We'll definitely take a few more lumps this year due to talent disparity, but it's a guarantee we'll continue to improve. And we know we'll always get 110% effort. That's all you can ask for.
Looks fun.
JMHO.
