Watching TX play tonight

[Jaxcat]

I see them on offense doing all the things I thought a Pope-coached team was supposed to do: spacing the floor, a lot of movement with back cuts, crisp passing, guys popping out for open jumpers. Not sure what happened this year, but I too infrequently saw that offense being run. Saw it quite a bit last year, but this year's team - not so much.

Were the players unwilling or unable to run the Pope offense? Not sure we'll ever get a definitive answer.

[Pete Hogwallop]

Same with Iowa v. Nebraska. None of the guys on the floor are highly physically talented players and probably none will be in the NBA. Yet it is highly entertaining basketball and they play extremely well as a group. That's what I like and what I missed this year. We had flashes of it last year.

[EKYCat]

I see them on offense doing all the things I thought a Pope-coached team was supposed to do: spacing the floor, a lot of movement with back cuts, crisp passing, guys popping out for open jumpers. Not sure what happened this year, but I too infrequently saw that offense being run. Saw it quite a bit last year, but this year's team - not so much.

Were the players unwilling or unable to run the Pope offense? Not sure we'll ever get a definitive answer.

We missed two key pieces to be able to do that. Pope has to have a big like Amari Williams who can handle the ball and pass. Kobe Brea was also a dependable shooter from deep. We had neither this year.

[Cawood86]

We missed two key pieces to be able to do that. Pope has to have a big like Amari Williams who can handle the ball and pass. Kobe Brea was also a dependable shooter from deep. We had neither this year.

Neither Garrison or Moreno could take the ball and go length of court....Moreno was getting better half court...as was Garrison. But Williams could get the rebound and lead a break.

Brea was pure shooter. These two spots have to be filled if Pope is running offense that way.

[Jaxcat]

We missed two key pieces to be able to do that. Pope has to have a big like Amari Williams who can handle the ball and pass. Kobe Brea was also a dependable shooter from deep. We had neither this year.

^Absolutely true. Which goes back to, in retrospect, very poor roster construction by Pope and staff. I'm a little disappointed that Pope's offense depends on a good ball-handling big to be run effectively. He can't tweak it for the team's personnel? I mean, how many bigs are able to play on the perimeter and drop dimes consistently? I'd guess not that many. It would be sort of like basing your offense in football around Lamar Jackson's skillset. I mean, yeah, it works great if your QB is 4.3 in the 40 and can throw accurately 50 yards and more. But, there just aren't that many players with that skillset. Sure, having Jokic on the team would allow Pope to REALLY run his offense. But, how many Jokic's are out there that want to play for UK?