Pacific regresses in one-sided loss at Missouri
Defense, Rebounding and Ball Safety plagues our Tigers
Admittedly, last night’s debacle at Missouri was still a game with about 7 minutes left in the first half with Pacific down only 7 at 27-20. However, it went south at an accelerating rate from there as Missouri made 9 of their final 11 shots of the first half - including five by 6’3” Caleb Grill (I would imagine the scout included Grill’s 8-10 effort from downtown in Mizzou’s most recent game against Eastern Washington) - to lead by 23 at the half and by as many as 38 enroute to 91-56 bashing, Pacific’s fourth consecutive loss.
Stating the obvious, there is a ton of work to do with this group that Coach Dave Smart has assembled. Early in the game, Pacific did a decent job guarding the ball and clogging passing lanes but committed at least two bad fouls late in the clock on needless reach ins - our Tigers had 4 fouls in the first 5 minutes of the half, too many especially given where, when and how the fouls were committed.
Things also started reasonably well on the defensive glass with 7’0” Jazz Gardner initially justifying his re-entry into the starting lineup with a couple of “area” rebounds but things regressed from there as Missouri’s 7’0” 260 lbs. South Carolina transfer Josh Gray dominantly carved out space on the offensive glass against an overmatched Jazz. Missouri had at least six early offensive rebounds that hurt Pacific.
With Pacific up one at 9-8, Missouri switched to a zone which upset Pacific’s offensive flow and our Tigers were stuck on 11 for a long period. 6’7” Elias Ralph, who was the lone bright spot overall for Pacific, found gaps in the middle of the zone but missed a couple of open 8 footers. Pacific tried to initiate some zone “o” from the soft corner/Russian spot with Gardner however our 7’0” simply was not ready to create anything from there.
The lack of scoring against Missouri’s zone allowed their Tigers to get out much more easily in transition - Pacific’s sloppiness with the basketball with tentative passes, dribbling into traffic and active Missouri hands all contributed to easy scores.
When Pacific did convert to the defensive end effectively, mental mistakes began showing up - 6’6” Elijah Fisher not chasing Grill through a screen to give the sharpshooter plenty of time to tee up one of his numerous threes and 6’3” Jefferson Koulibaly giving up another straight-line drive and then a run-by close out are some examples.
Strong, hard hedges by bigs in the mid ball screen were staples of Dave Smart defenses in prior seasons. Last night, the chosen tactic was drop coverage in that situation and at first glance I can’t think of one instance where that resulted in a positive for the Tigers - especially with sharpshooter Grill in the action - with open looks and or easy takes to the rim by Missouri being the typical results.
As the game progressed, Missouri started taking away our Tigers simple handoffs with little resistance. We have also really struggled with Baseline out-of-bounds situations on offense.
I realize this is more of a stream of consciousness set of thoughts however there is so much work to do with this group relative to what I know the staff wants to get done that it was difficult to properly organize. In the end, Pacific did not rebound with any consistency, was sloppy with the ball, struggled against the zone, gave up too many open looks and did not shoot it particularly well (6-29 from three). All of these areas and some deeper thinking into how certain actions will be defended need to be fixed if this team is to be at all relevant in the WCC going forward.
Pacific (#282 PomRoy) returns to the friendly confines of the Alex Spanos Center this coming Wednesday (Thanksgiving Eve?) against Arkansas Pine-Bluff (1-5, #362 PomRoy) - the Lions come off a 98-64 loss at Texas Tech and will meet Missouri tomorrow afternoon (note that for some reason the Arkansas Pine-Bluff site does not show the Pacific game on their schedule). Then, one week from today, Pacific hosts Cal State Fullerton (1-5, #305 PomRoy) - the Titans just lost a one-sided affair at UCLA last night. Happy Thanksgiving !