Luka Doncic & Lakers stay RED HOT vs. Rockets, Hawks win 10th straight, Arizona NCAA tourney preview

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All right, welcome to Hoops tonight here at the volume.

Happy Tuesday, everybody.

Hope all of you guys are having a great start to your week.

Got jam packed show for you guys today.

We're going to do the national TV games from last night as Los Angeles Lakers.

When they're sixth in a row and they're ninth out of 10 in a very ugly game against the Houston Rockets.

But I thought it demonstrated the Lakers ability to win without their half court offense,

which is an encouraging trend for them.

After that, we're going to talk about the Atlanta Hawks who won their tenth game in a row.

Kind of had just beaten the crap out of the Orlando Magic.

I want to talk about that game in some detail and some of the things that have been driving this Atlanta Hawks win streak.

And then at the tail end of the show, I want to give my brief thoughts as we head into the NCAA tournament.

And the Arizona Wildcats team that I grew up rooting for.

I grew up in a town that didn't have an NBA team, but we were all big U of A fans.

And I think this might be the best Arizona team of my lifetime.

So I want to talk briefly about them at the tail end of the show.

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All right.

Let's talk some basketball.

So the Lakers win their sixth in a row, 9 to 10, continuing a wild reversal of fortunes.

At one point, the Lakers had lost 12 out of 13 against teams that had at least a 60 that win percentage.

Every time they played a good team, not only would they get there, not only would they lose,

but they get their butt kicked.

Now they've won four of those in a row against the nicks, the nuggets,

the Timberwolves and the Houston Rockets.

And although last night was especially interesting because of how they won.

I remember a couple of weeks ago, I went on the herd to call and coward before these four wins.

Colin asked me, why can't the Lakers beat good teams?

And one of the things I talked about was their only real strength was their half-cord offense.

They're the second best half-cord offense in the league behind the Denver Nuggets.

It's been pretty steady with them all season, even when they haven't played super well.

They've been a pretty solid half-cord offense.

But the problem was they couldn't create margin or win anywhere else on the court.

They didn't defend, so they couldn't create margin there.

They didn't force turnovers.

They didn't get offensive rebounds, especially well.

And they didn't get out in transition very much.

It was half-cord offense or bust for them.

The great basketball teams in the league always have the ability to win in multiple ways.

And perhaps the most encouraging trend in this entire streak for the Lakers

has been their ability to make margin elsewhere on the floor.

Like on defense, there's sixth and defense of writing in this band.

A lot of success against some very good offenses.

They've been more competitive on the ball in terms of taking pride and keeping their man in front without fouling.

They've been much, much, much better in their connectiveness and rotation,

talking through rotations, making the extra efforts, the like second effort type of plays

that they were just not making earlier in the year.

They're forcing turnovers.

They have the sixth most opponent turnovers in this band.

One of the ways the Lakers have made up for their lack of high-end defensive personnel

is with an aggressive approach.

They're putting two on the ball more than ever,

which is putting an emphasis on their IQ defensively,

rather than their athleticism.

In rotation, they have a lot of players that are able to anticipate

where the ball is going next.

How many times have you seen the Lakers double-team the ball

and the pass gets made out of it,

and the neck I will attack in a four-on-three

and the Lakers just jump the next pass in the lane.

That is an emphasis on their ability to read plays

rather than being six-nine and freaking athletic.

So it's a better emphasis on the strengths in their particular roster.

Getting out in transition.

They're flying up and down the floor off of those turnovers more than ever.

They're third in the NBA and points off of turnovers in this band at 22 per game.

Overall, they're plus 1.1 points per game and fast break points

and they're now plus 1.2 points per game in this 10 games band

in second chance points.

So they're sweeping the margins now.

They're actually getting stops.

They're forcing turnovers.

They're getting out in transition off of those turnovers

and out in transition in general.

And they're winning the second chance points battle.

They are winning all the margins now.

They are building a culture where they can win games in different ways.

And that was the story last night against Houston.

The Lakers half-court offense was a bismill last night.

0.94 points per possession, which isn't terrible, terrible.

But it's almost 10% below their season average.

They've been consistently over one point per half-court possession this year.

They generated 14 wide open catch and shoot threes last night

and made three of them.

Luke Canard to wide open looks.

Missed him, Rui, at least two wide open looks.

Missed him, Austin, a bunch of wide open looks.

Those are three of the Lakers' best wide open catch and shoot shooters

and they literally went over in this game.

It was a very uncharacteristic night for the Lakers on offense.

Now, some of that had to do with Houston switching when they went to small ball.

I want to file that away for later because that's more of a big picture conversation

about the next steps for this Lakers team.

But they were able to comfortably win a game.

I mean, it was they were down in the second half and they did have to make a second half run.

But they did very much control that second half.

And when they ended up winning, they ended up winning by the end of going up by double digits

down the stretch of this game.

So they were able to win without having to worry about like a last second sequence or anything

thanks to their ability to create margin.

We've talked a lot about how bad Houston has looked against the double teams of Kevin Durant.

And we'll talk a little bit about that later in the show.

Last night might have been the worst example of this entire season that I've seen

of the Rockets actually handling double teams.

So it kind of played directly into the strengths of this Lakers defense and naturally.

But they forced 24 Houston turnovers.

They won the points off a turnovers battle by seven.

They won the fast break points battle by 12 Houston got 15 offensive rebounds

but the Lakers got 12 of their own they were able to shrink that margin a little bit.

Now one of the things to keep in mind like you know how I like people will talk about how

oh, it's harder to defense of rebound in his zone.

Why is it harder to defense of rebound in his own because you're not matched up?

That exact same thing happens in double team situations.

So even though the Lakers gave up a lot of offensive rebounds last night,

there were some specific egregious examples like Rui was really bad on the defensive glass last night.

He was killing me.

He was good down the stretch, but he was pretty bad at various points in the first half on the defensive glass.

A men Thompson in particular was just like straight up outscrapping the Lakers in a lot of spots.

So there were some that were frustrating.

But for the most part, one of the reasons why you're giving up a lot of offensive rebounds in that situation

is because you're in rotation.

When you put you on the ball, no one's really matched up.

You're kind of flying around.

So it's a similar concept to his zone where you can give up a lot of offensive rebounds in that situation.

The Lakers took relatively good care of the basketball.

And if you ugly turnovers, Reed Shepard in particular was killing the Lakers with those like swoop in steals like quick double teams like reads kind of a terrible defender.

But the one thing he's really good at is he's fast and he's got a nose for the basketball is a little bit of a scrapper.

So we can get in there and he can take the ball away.

I think he had like four or five strips on Laker double teams like that.

But overall, the Lakers only had 12 turnovers.

So they were able to avoid the catastrophic types of high volume turnovers that can cost you a game like that like it did for Houston.

So they were able to win the possession battle and get out of Houston with a must win win.

Even though their half court offense was well below what it's usually at.

Austin Reeves after the game talked about how they just didn't have their best stuff.

But they were able to win anyway, which is a really encouraging trend for that.

Now, before we go big picture, a couple of quick shout outs, Marcus smart, unbelievable hustle and energy and individual defense in this game.

And then again, in a game where nobody could hit a three, three more threes for Marcus smart.

If you look into the numbers with the Lakers, he's been by far their best on off guy this year.

And it's because you know, one of the things I talked about early in the season, if you guys remember when the Lakers were really struggling.

One of the things I talked about was like, they don't have a guy who can defend and who can hit a catch and shoot three.

Marcus smart has become that for them for a couple of months now.

He's been shooting over 40% from three and he's their best defense player on the perimeter.

So Marcus smart becoming that three in D guy that the Lakers didn't have has dramatically improved them on both ends of the floor.

And I just can't say enough about his just overall ability to lift the team with his energy like the types of plays he was making last night.

And the types of plays he made at the end of the Denver game, they don't win either of those games without Marcus smart.

I just can't say enough about it. And then the Andreid once again after a rough game.

I didn't think he wasn't playing hard. He was playing hard last night.

He lost a couple of scraps because he can get a little bit.

He can get a little bit lack of daisicle with like bringing the ball down or like not just aggressively snatching it, especially in like contested rebound or contested finish situations.

So he struggled a little bit with that last night, but his effort has been really good for a while now.

But this is back to back games now against Denvering its Houston where he struggled for the most part, but then got a late shift where he came in, kept his head in the game, found an opportunity to impact winning late in the game.

He won very rangel defensively down the stretch and then a lot of dirty work around the basket, cleaning up cuts and cleaning up offensive rebounds after guys with mishots or guys with draw multiple defenders and hit him underneath the basket without eating was excellent.

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Let's go places.

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I want to zoom in on Luca Donjets for a minute, though, because what you saw last night from Luca is a very important detail for this Laker team and their ability to beat different types of defensive schemes.

So Houston ends up playing obviously without Shang-Goon some of their minutes with Clint Capella, but a big chunk of their minutes small ball, including the majority of the tail end of the game, right.

So one of the things we've talked about a lot is like Austin Reeves in particular is very much a drop coverage beater because it allows him to get a screen.

He's very good at using his handle to set his defender up for screens.

Once he gets his defender caught on the screen, he can get into his spots and kind of cook in a variety of different ways.

He didn't even have a good drop coverage game in this one, so it was just a rough night for Austin.

And honestly, specifically with the switching, the big thing that I noticed is like Austin was able for the most part to get to his spots.

I thought Austin got a lot of good looks in this game.

So I think for Austin, especially the next step is more of a physical thing.

It's like a little bit more muscle, a little bit improvement in his conditioning so that he can deal with these really physical, really athletic teams, but not lose his ability to finish plays.

And I think like that was the main thing that stood out to me last night. I thought he was just a little off on some pretty good looks, which is a testament to that like next step for him, which is mostly going to be a physical conditioning piece.

But LeBron's 41 Austin isn't the best switch beater in the world when it comes to playing super athletic perimeter teams like Houston.

So what does that do? It puts a lot of pressure on Lucodonchich to create offense against switches and like look at the end of that game when it's bogged down in like Kevin.

Can't do anything Kevin. It's like soiling himself against double teams and Austin's having this brutal night is like literally can't hit it wide open three LeBron's not able to get much going offensively.

It just was a game where nothing was going in, but like Lucodonchich's ability to just take Jabari Smith down into the post and hit a little short shot over him.

On the block or to hit a step back three here there to get to the foul line here there like Lucodonchich's ability to beat switches saved the Lakers ass last night.

And one of the big things I've talked about is like Lucodonchich has been playing at like that top tier superstar real MVP level for most of the season.

But like he had had a couple of rough patches right surrounding the Slovenia trip surrounding the all star break.

But as of late he's been at that level and that just is the world beating talent that gives you a solution to the majority of problems that most NBA defenses can present.

And like again like rock fight game Houston's only shot to win is by going small and switching and guarding the hell out of the basketball.

And Luca had a solution for it because of his ability to score one-on-one against the elite athletes against elite perimeter defenders.

I just can't say enough about how good Luca was last night. They just do not win that game without Lucodonchich.

Now what do the Lakers have to do to beat these switching schemes in the future? That's why I was zooming in on a couple of these concepts in the last few days.

If you guys remember I talked about how LeBron really needs to start converting more of these post ups.

And LeBron's done a lot of really good things offensively the connective playmaking a lot of light.

He made a really nice pass to Marcus Smart in the left corner of Luca was drawing double teams attacking ISOs off the right wing late in the game.

And he made a couple really good decisions off the left wing off of kickouts from Luca.

He's doing things that are helping the team scoring and transition like hitting the jets and generating an open three for Austin Reeves in the left corner hitting the jets and drawing a foul on Joshua Kogi at the rim.

But he's unable to convert his one-on-ones right now LeBron getting to the point where he can convert a one-on-one in the post against a smaller defender.

It would go a long way towards helping the Lakers not having super rough offensive nights against some of these smaller switchier teams.

Same goes with what we just talked about earlier with Austin.

Austin getting to that next level of physical conditioning so that he can be in a game like that but hit the open threes so that he can be in a game like that but hit those little short floaters in the lane that he was missing last night.

That is the next step for the Lakers in their star power to be able to have more success against these switching games.

And then lastly, it's a active Aitin.

The Andreid was really, really good last night at the end of the game.

Whenever LeBron or Austin in particular would get into the paint and miss a shot but they would draw help Aitin was there to either clean up on cuts or offensive rebound putbacks.

Aitin when he's active is a very gifted switch beater because he is the biggest strongest fastest player on the floor in terms of like total physical presence.

He has the ability to be a monster around the basket when he's active when he's high motor when he's very engaged and I thought he did a really good job at the tail end of the game last night.

But again, when the Lakers play better versions of small ball switching groups.

So like let's say they end up in a series against Oklahoma City and they're switching with chat at the five with no heart and sign on the floor and it's like Jada and Shay and you know Alex Caruso on the floor with Ludo or whatever it might be.

The Lakers are going to have to be able to deal with some switching and it's going to put a heavy I trust Luca.

Luca has just been amazing. He's locked in in that regard but they're going to need more out of LeBron out of Austin and especially out of Deandra Aitin in order to capitalize against some of those switching teams.

Now the Wednesday rematch you know how this goes like you know that Houston is going to come with a ton of ball pressure a ton of intensity.

If Houston wins on Wednesday it erases this loss it gives them the tiebreaker puts them back in a strong position to be able to get back up into that three seed.

It's going to be a really tough game but the Lakers have a lot of things that they can clean up and this is the last thing that I would say as it pertains to the Lakers.

Whether it was the Denver stretch in a second half where they got really sloppy with the turnovers against ball pressure some of the issues they had against ball pressure last night against Houston some of the little scrappy details where they would just lose out on 50 50 balls.

That is to me the next step for the Lakers to get from a team that can compete in the first round or win a first round series to being more of a legitimate punches chance contender that can win two series and end up in a Western conference finals.

They've got to trim the fat a little bit with some of these mistakes.

They need to trim some of the fat with some of their mistake making because the better teams around the league will make them pay for that.

Denver basically did if it wasn't for Austin being able to make that free throw play so a lot of room for improvements still but a lot of upward trending things for the Lakers that are pretty exciting.

Really quickly on the Houston handling double teams part I don't even know where to start with this because there's literally so it was so bad that there are a million ways to distribute blame or to try to improve this like Kevin Durant has to do better like walking the ball across the court and getting an eight second violation.

Like getting a double team and the just backpedaling across half court throwing the ball directly into the hands of the trapper like some of this stuff with KD is like he just simply has to do a better job of handling the double team handling the physicality using pass fakes doing the things that he needs to do to get the ball out without turning it over.

The second piece of this is it's become abundantly clear over a very large sample now that the rockets really struggle to convert the four on threes because they don't have enough jump shooting talent and they don't have enough playmaking talent.

So like Kevin Durant after the game was like oh maybe I should just go spot up in the corner and set screens and blah blah blah and it's like yeah maybe you should not because you need to not have the basketball but this thing where you dribble across half court and get doubled and then turn it over is not fucking working.

So like the next step there is like find some other way to attack the defense.

Go set screens for a men Thompson let him drive get the defense compromised initially and then play off of that advantage have a men kick it out have KD come back to the basketball off of like a dribble handoff from Tari Sin or from Dorian Finney Smith or whoever it might be do something different than whatever the hell that was last night.

Because it's been like that all season this Kevin Durant dribble across half court and get double thing is not working and they've got to find some way to attack the defense in a way that gets KD the basketball after that initial bring the ball across half court situation because it is simply not working.

He doesn't handle the double teams well the team can't convert four on threes they don't shoot the ball well enough or play make well enough their entire offense right now is predicated on getting out and transition off of turnovers or offensive rebounds.

To Katie's sarcastic point after the game yeah dude it's time for you to start setting screens and spotting up because it's the only way you're going to get shots up.

I don't remember the exact south out my head I don't think you got a shot up over the final like 15 20 minutes of that game like it just isn't working they've got to try something different I'll be curious to see what they do on Wednesday.

All right quickly before we get out of here today the land of hawks of 110 games in a row they beat the crap out of the Orlando Magic yesterday.

I don't want to stay too long on that particular game because Orlando pretty much no showed.

I thought it was one of their worst defensive performances of the season their transition defense was terrible.

They straight up didn't pick up the ball like a dozen times they botched so many simple interchanges like the amount of times in lana would just run a basic two man game like just a ball screen.

They either not switch so the guy with the ball would just drive down hill and get or like get into an easy jump shot or they throw like this weak soft hedge essentially putting two on the ball but without any ball pressure.

So the screener would just slip out for like a three year for a short role it was a very unserious defensive effort for more land.

I would add that Atlanta's offense is built to kind of chew up and spit out a poor defensive effort simply because of how many attacks they make you guard.

The obviously pushing transition constantly the fourth and transition frequency.

But even when they get in the half court there's no standing around they're constantly running action and they run it quickly.

Side to side flow out of dribble handoffs lots of actions at the top of the key with Jalen Johnson in the guards.

They're second in the NBA and field goal attempts it's a numbers game for them.

They know they don't have the most refined offensive talent in the world but they do have a ton of athleticism so they're capable of playing fast.

So they know their best chance and I want to say fast I don't just mean a transition I mean in the half court they're fast in the half court.

So they know their best chance to score effectively is to play super fast in bank on you making a lot of mistakes in the face of a relentless wave of attacks.

So when you have a night like Orlando had last night where you're not particularly sharp you're going to give up a million points and they did.

Atlanta had 85 points through 28 minutes of basketball last night as they won up by 29 a few minutes into the second half.

Couple of the quick takeaways on that game before we go big picture.

I got Jalen Johnson did a phenomenal job in individual defense on Palo Bunkero.

I've been critical at times of Jalen's defense this year.

But Palo is making a point to try to prove early in the game especially that he could score on Jalen Johnson one on one and Jalen was not having it.

He was stonewalling him beating him to spots and taking contact on the chest.

He was keeping his hands back so when Palo would go for his grifts he wouldn't pick up calls there.

I just thought it was really impressive individual defense from Jalen Johnson.

And then he killed Alexander Walker.

What an amazing season he's having.

I mean he's never averaged over 13 points per game and he's averaging 20 this year but he had 41 last night.

Just torching Orlando and catching shoot situations shooting 40% on him this season on massive volume.

He's made 158 catch and shoot threes this year which is third in the entire NBA trivia for you guys.

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So good win for Atlanta kind of an embarrassing performance for Orlando but I want to turn our attention to the Hawks and the big picture because they want 10 in a row.

Now the schedule has been lighter.

Last night's win versus Orlando was their first win in this entire streak against the team that was a top six seed in either conference.

The previous best win out of the nine was against Philly obviously a Philly team that's been falling apart down the stretch of the season here.

But they did blow the magic out and the magic of him playing very well and wins our wins.

This was like their first like legitimizing win of this streak.

So let's dig into some of this stuff that has been working for them in this streak.

First is the obvious part.

They've been defending really well.

They have a defensive rating of 103 in this 10 game span which is the best in the league.

They're forcing 17 turnovers per game.

That's the third best in the league in this span.

So they're getting out on the transition off their turnovers scoring 24 points per game off those turnovers which has been best in the league.

So that's the first piece of it.

Fuelling that transition attack with their defense and their ability to force turnovers.

One of the things they've been doing in the half court defensively to help force turnovers is they're kind of like modified high drop coverage.

We talked about this earlier this season when we were talking about an yakka kongu in Muhammad gay in the way that they would.

Kind of like do this like back and forth kind of slalom approach to pick and roll defense with a kind of covering each other's back when the other guy comes up higher to the level.

But what they're doing is they're running kind of like a modified high drop and what I mean by that is like the big is coming up high.

So a kongu for example is coming up high enough that the big is getting behind him.

But he's not coming up so high that it's like a two on the ball trap situation.

I've heard this referred to as like a catch hedge before but basically it's like the big is there on the other side of the screen a little bit back.

So you can't just like drive into him you're just driving right into a defender but at the same time he's not so extended that it's really difficult for him to rotate out of it.

What it does is it creates a little bit of marginal indecision with the ball handler where he's like okay like I kind of can drive forward like there's some space here for me to drive a little bit forward because the kongu is not all the way up.

But there's not like an obvious kick out rate for me to make right away.

So I kind of have to attack and then when you attack that gives them the opportunity to get in their strip and attack the basketball trying to force turnovers or force you to make these kick out passes across the court over their length and over their speed.

And so it kind of creates this marginal indecision that puts the ball handler in a position where he kind of has no choice but to either drive into traffic or throw across court pass that isn't really that open.

And so it sparks a lot of their turnover opportunities.

It's been a coverage that's been working for them pretty well for the majority of this season.

Their offense is predicated on playing driving kick off of an advantage.

Whether it's Nikhil Alexander Walker, CJ McCollum, Jayla Johnson, whoever it is.

They're looking to attack gaps constantly get an open three they're going to take it but they're constantly driving and making that next kick out pass.

Why like we mentioned earlier they want to rack up as many attacks as possible in order to cause you to make mistakes.

So they have an action when they when they get into the half court but they also have the transition situations to create advantage, right?

So like in order to spark that driving kick you've got to have that first advantage.

Whether it's a transition kick ahead where the defense is closing out on a trailing shooter or a guy is driving down the slot in the entire defense collapses on him because he's driving in transition.

They can get into their driving kick and transition but when they get into the half court.

This is where the Jalen Johnson impact has been felt as an advantage creator.

Thanks to his ability to run effective inverted action with the guards.

They are constantly having guards screen for Jalen whether it's Dyson Daniels slipping into the lane because he's just really good at that little floater.

He's over 50% on this year really strange. He's like the worst jump shooter in the league this season but he's deadly on floaters.

So it makes sense that that that he doesn't have the ability to translate that touch to the three point line.

But whether it's CJ McCollum or Nikhil Alexander Walker slipping out to the three point line or it's Dyson Daniels slipping in.

They they even run like a like variations with two guards like stack picking rolls or like they'll have Dyson set the first screen and he'll roll while like CJ or Nikhil will like back screen for Dyson before they slip to the three point line.

Once again creating that in decision on the defensive end of the floor where defenses can make mistakes like Orlando did so many times and it all works really well because teams are trying to stop Jalen Johnson from getting ahead of steam down hill.

They do that by showing high or by hedging or coming up higher to the level.

It's effectively like a version of two on the ball and Dyson can beat you from floater range.

He's also a very gifted short role passer. He can make that next read. He's been one of their higher assist guys this year and then CJ and Nikhil can shoot the hell out of the basketball or drive closeouts to spark their driving kick.

So they actually perform pretty well and they have like their mediocre half court offense which again considering they don't have like a super super high level like star level offensive talent.

I think it's a testament to to coincider in the job that he's done creating a system that accentuates the strengths that this particular team has.

I've really enjoyed watching Atlanta. They're a fun team. The schedule does get tougher in the next couple of weeks so we'll get to see how much of this stuff translates.

Before we get out of here really quick shots on the NCAA tournament again all of our lines are provided by hard rock that Arizona right now is minus one fifty five to win their region or make the final four and there plus three fifty to win the tournament now I grew up in Tucson Arizona again there's no major team there like professional sports team.

We had the Tucson side winters for a long time a triple a affiliate of the Arizona Diamondbacks. The Phoenix Suns when I was very young would occasionally come down to play a preseason game but then they stopped doing that for a while so like the Suns didn't really cater to the Tucson community very much so there it's really just college town.

It's very much a university of Arizona town and so when I was a kid like the city stopped for you of a basketball games in particular the football teams been better as of late but especially for basketball games.

And I've I've rooted for a lot of really good Arizona teams like teams that have really really high in town a lot of like like blue chip talent whether it's like Derek Williams in the year that they ended up making it to the lead eight or you know Stanley Johnson air and Gordon take Caleb Tarsusky a lot of like really talented teams but teams that were deeply flawed and that for the most part under achieved under Sean Miller in the NCAA tournament Tommy Lloyd has done a fantastic job of more heavily emphasizing college ready talent.

Not that there's not high level NBA talent coming through the program but there's much more of an emphasis on finding basketball players that can play at this level.

I think this might be the best Arizona team of my lifetime now disclaimer I was born in 1991 so I was six years old when the 97 team won the title.

Don't remember anything about them 2001 I would have been 10 and I didn't grow up in a basketball house so like I didn't really get into basketball until about five years after that the 2001 team I mean so.

The 1997 2001 teams may have been better than this team but I just don't really have any recollection of them but this team to me brings the best combination of talent at all the levels of the roster so Krivas for example an excellent rim protector a rim protector that is generating some NBA buzz because of his size at the rim at seven foot to very gift to drop coverage big right so like Krivas anchors the defense at the rim but then you also to be a walko brings more of this like switchy athletic.

Super physical offense of rebounding monster around the basket as like a different punch with Krivas either as a too big look or as single big looks which Arizona's used more over the tail into the season to try to emphasize three point shooting.

So you've got this dominant front court I'd even echo a peat in there too like he's been up and down the season started really hard think I really cold had a really big game against Houston his ability to just attack the basket viciously and get to the foul line has been very valuable to them as of late but then you've got the guards.

At various points this season Braden burries has been fantastic and then gone cold obviously had a rough stretch there during the conference tournament that he found it in a big way against Houston and then Jaden Bradley like he's been around for a while and I liked him a lot when he was younger and like a role player type of guy but now he's become just like one of the best guards in I mean literally one conference player the year just this phenomenal guard that can get to his spots in the mid range that's super competitive that defense that leads the team that keeps the team grounded in the moment so they've got two awesome.

Guards this awesome front court and then the in between players are perfect Anthony Delaware so that's just like knock down catch and shoot three point shooter super competitive that's shown the ability to hit shots at the intense environments like.

CarChankov like CarChankov's ability to just get downhill against Houston and get to the foul line was huge you can also shoot the three CarChankov is a very good mid range player you can like stop and pop in the middle of the four is very big and strong at his position it's a very well rounded team that has the guards you need to succeed in the tournament the bigs you need to be great defensively in the tournament and the off ball scoring talent to capitalize on the advantages that other players create I think this is the best errors on the team of my lifetime i'm super excited to watch on this year little worried about them being.

With a cup in Arkansas in there in their bracket but I think this is their best chance to win in my lifetime i'm very excited again minus one fifty five to win the region or make the final four plus three fifty to win the tournament.

Alright guys it's all I have for today is always this sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting us and supporting the show will be back tomorrow with our contender rankings of second to last contender rankings of the season i'll see you guys then.

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