January 29, 2020 - Following are observations from last night’s 69-64 Georgetown loss to Butler

Turning them over, then not

In taking a 43-32 lead into intermission, Butler registered 12 turnovers, leading to 17 Hoya points. Those first half giveaways superseded the Bulldog’s season per game average by one, and many times led to Blue and Gray transition baskets.

Throughout the first 20 minutes Butler clearly looked out-of-sorts. Why?

“We looked a little slow coming out the game” said Butler head coach, Lavall Jordan, who also noted Georgetown’s speed and “doubling the post”, which affected “ (Bryce) Nze and Derick (Smits) when we tried to go in and play through the post a bit”. Nze, a junior forward, coughed up the ball five times in first half action, graduate student Smits once.

“I think we adjusted” said the coach. “Some of it was them, some of it was poor decisions”.

These BU mistakes were in certain measure facilitated by the absence of junior point guard Aaron Thompson, out with an injured left wrist. Thompson is the team’s floor general and makes them go; when he’s in the game, Butler has options, facilitating their offense though pick and roll/pop, post entry and other efforts such as short, controlled cutting and multiple screening.

Without Thompson the Bulldogs struggled, expectantly. Add foul trouble for senior guard Kamar Baldwin – he ended up playing less than 15 minutes in the first half - and when not on the floor G'Town scored eight of 13 points off turnovers, including several fast break buckets.

The second half was different, in that Baldwin played almost the entire last period, finishing with 12 points, three assists and two giveaways during the final 20 minutes. Not only was his offense crucial – 13 points for the game – but Butler initiated much of what they did with him in ball screen action, which is covered below.

Ball Screened

Baldwin and senior forward Sean McDermott formed a dangerous two-man game, predicated on ball-screen action, while the former also used the scheme with others to score individually. It was the bane of G’Town’s second half existence.

This was painfully obvious with 16:21 to go, Baldwin setting up left of basket, Nze approaching to screen. Baldwin rejected Nze’s attempt, drove baseline, before passing to McDermott, wide open in the right corner for a game tying three point shot.

Next time down, Baldwin split a double team before kicking the ball to McDermott, again wide open in the right corner, again swishing through the net. For added measure during the next possession McDermott nailed a third right corner three, this time via a pass from Nze, who slipped a screen. Butler was then up 50-46.

At no point was the Baldwin/McDermott/picking nexus more emblematic than with the ball game tied at 64, Baldwin found a wide open McDermott left of top of key, where he calmly drained a three ball with just 49.9 clicks on the clock. A screen the screener action, McDermott eventually set a pick for Baldwin and popped open, who in turn found him for a wide open shot.

Jordan recalled the sequence: “Great suggestion from assistants, they were trapping Kamar when we were setting it with the big guy. Go small and honestly Seanie was hot and they were going to load up on Kamar. And he (Baldwin) made a great decision, it was his choice…Sean, he had already made a couple of threes there, both (defenders) went with Kamar, he obviously made a great decision to throw it back to Seanie”.

Pat Ewing, Georgetown’s head coach said of the play, “They ran a pick and roll, he slipped it. We switched it, but we talk about when we switch we need to come together. No one’s supposed to be open like that. Got there too late”.

Cameo zone

Neither G’Town or Butler are known as zone defense deploying teams. In fact, before the contest the Bulldogs literally played man to man defense 99% of the time. The Hoyas are the same, or even more, man-centered defensively.

Both teams showed some sprinkles of zone last night.

Visiting Butler first unveiled a 1-3-1 alignment with slightly more than seven minutes to go in the first half, a scheme in which they attempted to Ice (force to baseline on one side) Georgetown's ball handler. It worked as the Hoyas missed a shot.

Jordan again deployed the alignment out with 5:39 before intermission, ceding a baseline layup by junior guard Jahvon Blair. We saw it once more around the four minute mark, resulting in graduate point guard Terrell Allen landing a three point shot. Butler only deployed that 1-3-1 after scoring themselves.

Ewing’s zone dabble took place with nearly three and a half minutes before the final buzzer, taking the form of a 2-3.

His choice of a single possession of zone occurred “out of a timeout”, coming as the Hoyas “wanted to throw them off of what they were doing”.

In terms of philosophy “I believe in man to man” admitted Ewing, yet “There are times when we’re going to play zone. But I don’t see us playing zone, particularly a lot. Maybe sometimes to give guys a break, but regardless we still have to defend out of the zone and also rebound out of the zone ”

Returning to last night’s contest, Ewing noted “And they have very good shooters…I don’t want them standing out there taking pot shots...McDermott got off today”.

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