Hogs hope to pick up the tempo against Ole Miss
Posted on Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Even Nolan Richardson’s vintage Razorback teams often found it more difficult to speed the tempo in conference games as opposed to outside the league.
So it’s not just a snap your fingers and it will happen thing for Arkancoach Stan Heath mandating his Razorbacks return to the uptempo ways in SEC games they showed going 11-2 nonconference.
Teams tend to play harder yet more deliberate once league play begins. The offense becomes more deliberate because the
defense has more on which to deliberate and vice-versa. "That’s because of scouting," Heath said, "and league play things get a little bit tighter. Still, I like for things to open up a little bit and for us to get down the court a lot more."
Heath’s Hogs, 13-5 overall, 2-3 in the SEC going into Wednesday’s 7 p.m. SEC West game with Ole Miss at Walton Arena, were able to run and play more transition ball in their two SEC victories over Vanderbilt at Walton and at Auburn last Saturday than in SEC losses at Mississippi State and at Alabama and at home to LSU.
However, Arkansas had opportunities to win all three of those close SEC games lost.
Every SEC team has played Arkansas zone. "In conference when teams play us," Arkansas junior guard Ronnie Brewer said, "they know our personnel. So they try and slow its down and sink back into zone so you don’t get as many fast-break opportunities. Teams sit back in a zone and try and make us beat them knocking down shots."
Zone-busters popping treys are an obvious way to shoot defenses out of a zone, but there are other ways, and the Hogs are showing them. Though they lost the 78-75 overtime game, they appeared ripe to win at Alabama, and they did force the Tide to abandon the zone. "In practice," Brewer said, "we’ve been doing a lot of zone stuff and working on attacking the gaps, and hitting players on the perimeter and throwing it inside to get the big guys to score. We’ve been successful, and teams have been switching back to man. We don’t think teams can match up with us personnel to personnel in man because we have so many athletes."
Taking only five treys, and hitting three, Brewer mostly drove the gaps in the Auburn zone to score a career high 26 points.
Sophomore 6-8, 245-pound power forward Charles Thomas has been hitting them where they ain’t, too, scoring 15, 12 and 12 his last three games with 4, 8 and 12 boards. On the offensive glass, he’s netted 5 and 7 rebounds at Alabama and at Auburn. "Charles has put together his best trio of games as a Razorback," Heath said. "He’s taking advantage of what’s given him and he’s being more aggressive putting back shots. He found seams in the zone and flashed in there and made a play. And he got a lot of offensive putbacks."
That’s the unstructured scoring Heath wants from Thomas as the offense generates around guards Brewer and Modica and center-power forward Darian Townes. "He’s going to find ways to score," Heath said. "I don’t think all of a sudden Modica, Brewer or Townes is going to stop taking shots."
Thomas can pop a midrange jumper and even the occasional 3-pointer (3 of 5). He even dreams of playing small forward, though for him, Heath nods approvingly, that white-collar dream reverts to his blue-collar roots. "Charles has always said he is a small forward," Heath said, laughing, "but to score he goes down low. He just thinks small forwards play on the block. What I like is he was going after rebounds ferociously. He needs to continue that ‘Manimal’ play which is the nickname he brought with him."
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