More ACC men’s basketball match ups this weekend!

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Call clickgrainger.com or just stop by. Grainger. For the ones who get it done. As always, on a Friday, we have a big weekend of ACC basketball. And for a lot of teams, it's, you know, they've only got a few more cracks at good winds to get themselves on the right side or even onto the bubble in many cases. But North Carolina is not on a bubble.

We're going to start with the Tar Heels. If you don't mind, Brian Geisinger, how are you? I'm doing well. How about you guys? Doing very well.

All right. Are you concerned about the Tar Heels? I'm not. I'm just saying that. But are you concerned about the Tar Heels?

No, I'm not. I mean, I think I said this a few times earlier in the season. I did think that the defense was sort of like performing a little bit above expectations and not just sort of like preseason expectations, but just sort of like looking at the personnel, the strategy, the way teams are getting shots. I thought at some point teams would start making more looks against them. And that would cause defense that had been playing at an elite level in terms of points allowed per possession would sort of, you know, regress to the mean a little bit, which is still pretty high for them.

Right? I mean, they've got, I think kiddo has given them a nice point of attack defender. Harrison Ingram can do stuff. Uh, Cormac Ryan, good perimeter defender. And you know, I'm on a big hot may not be the most like bouncy rim protector, but he's, he's really tough. He's strong. Um, and when they're in that drop coverage, when their guards are making sure to funnel ball handlers in the right direction, they're tough.

So like, I'm not worried about it. And I just think ultimately we're getting closer to sort of the, what should be expected performance level of the defense, which is still good. It's just probably like not the best defense in the country. Good. It's not quite Virginia and keep in mind everyone that the ACC, right?

The ACC runs through Armando Baycott based on what I've heard. And honestly, good. I'm glad. I'm glad it does.

Um, here's the thing that I've thought about. Like, yes, of course they were not going to be a team that holds oppositions to under 30% three point shooting for the bulk of the season. And during that nine game winning streak, that's basically where they were. Those, if you look at, I use Bart Torvik a lot, their defensive scores for those, for that nine game winning streak were absolutely off the charts. They, they were the best defense of the country for, uh, for nine games in the first nine or 11 or whatever it was. They were not the, not the best defense by any stretch of the imagination. Um, and in this last five games, it's, it's been, eh, and that's, they can't just be eh. So people have asked, well, are they tired? I guess it's possible because defense is effort, right?

Defense is effort, but, um, so, but I don't know that they're, they don't play enough really to be tired at this point without the ones like you who work tirelessly to keep things running. Everything would suddenly stop hospitals, factories, schools, and power plants. They all depend on you no matter the weather emergency or time of day. You're the ones who get it done at Grainger. We're here for you with professional grade industrial supplies.

Count on real time product availability and fast delivery call click Grainger.com or just stop by Grainger for the ones who get it done. This is like, this is my favorite part of every season because this is where like, there's like somewhat of a sample size of, of, of, of, of a team's performance, but really like the 30 games these teams played, like it's only somewhat of a good indicator. Like it's not perfect. So like stuff changes frequently. And instead of like being like, Hey, you know, sometimes shots go in.

It has to, you know, like, um, to like effort or to fatigue or something like we've got to find something intangible that we can't even explain this right. Uh, describe what is just the fact that like North Carolina's defense, which I love the steam they play. If I were head coach and ACC, I would do a lot of what UNC does personally. Um, but because they play that drop coverage, it allows them to stay home on shooters. So like they're going to take away spot up threes, which are, you know, kick out threes, sort of like the best looks. And they're going to try to force you into taking off the dribble threes, which are, unless it's RJ Davis shooting them, you know, not a great shot.

And guess what? He plays for UNC, not for the opponent. So you're forcing teams to take more of an inefficient type of three. But that doesn't mean teams are going to shoot 25% of those looks off season. Like you just sort of said, like you might get a nine game stretch where that's the case. And then guess what? Like you might get a nine game stretch where teams shoot 34% on that. And all of a sudden that changes like the numbers quite a bit. So I think there's no need for them to have to rethink things here. Like the defense it's effective.

It works. They've got the personnel, they've got the pieces. And like, you know, we'll see how it goes down the stretch once postseason play rolls around. But I think they're set up quite well to be a good defense. And they're making teams take the kind of shots that I guess that UNC staff wants them to take.

My read is, I'm going to move to Duke here, but my read is that honestly that North Carolina, I think their defense will get marginally better than it has been over the last five games or so. But what they really need is their offense to be better. Because other than the, you know, I think for as good as Harrison Ingram is, he's very much an up and down shooter. He has great nights and he has bad nights. Cormac Ryan has not been consistently good in terms of shooting the basketball. So right now, their most consistent source of offense and the ACC's player of the year is RJ Davis. Even Armando has not been consistently good offensively. I think North Carolina's offense improving is probably their best ticket to becoming, again, one of those final four favorites. As for the Blue Devils, I don't know if they're ever going to be even a very good defensive team, but they can be better offensively. And I think Kyle Filipowski went through a rough stretch offensively.

Do you see him coming out on the other side? Yeah, I think he's played really well the last two games. I thought he was great against Wake Forest the other night.

I thought it was just a really good two-way performance. I thought kind of the key to victories for them earlier this week against Wake was just the defensive versatility of Flip and Mark Mitchell, who's also playing really, really well. And that's huge for them because, as we've discussed, the whole point of this, the whole concept of this Duke team, this five-out machine on offense that's going to be able to space the floor, but then be versatile defensively hinged on Flip and Mitchell being able to do a bunch of stuff. And those guys are really talented.

They're good lateral athletes for their size. It's got complicated, though, when this gets complicated, though, when Flip gets into foul trouble and when Mark, at times, has been, the liabilities may be too strong of a word, but has been a hindrance on the half-court offense. And they just couldn't find the right lineups for chunks of the season. I think recently, the way Mitchell's playing, not just hitting threes, but the way he's slashing and cutting, because that's what he does best.

It's the dirty work stuff. And I thought those guys did a terrific job switching out onto Cam Hildreth and Kevin Miller. I know Salas got his, but they made it tough, too.

And I just thought the help, those guys switching out and then the help was really, really strong. Then yeah, Philipowski, I think it's important to remember what this guy does best, I think, is he is a connective passer. He can really play finish. He's still in a bit of a cold snap, shooting, pick and pop. Maybe he'll back up a little bit. He's pretty streaky in terms of that.

But his passing, his playmaking is huge. And when you get, when you got Mitchell's screening and cutting, like he has been, and you've got Jared McCain floating around out there, all of a sudden, like he's got some big time targets to throw the ball to and in good areas of the floor, you know, Mitchell at the rim or, you know, Jared floating for an open three. And I just thought the wake Duke game in general was super fun, like well played, you know, like well coached games, both teams.

It was incredibly fun basketball game to watch. Look, I like, I think Wake is good. Wake just hasn't beaten anybody good. They haven't beaten anybody, at least away from home. I think they beat Virginia in Winston-Salem, but they've got to figure out a way to win a game away from home. Don't they get Duke out there tomorrow?

Well, yes. And look, it's winnable. I think Virginia is good, too, which I'm going to ask you before we get out of here about about Pitt. But let me get to the Wolfpack. DJ Horn has had just a tremendous year.

I don't know if you can say anybody else has had anything better than like a B minus. Where does the Wolfpack improve so they can maybe make some sort of a ripple in the water here? Yeah, I mean, I think it comes down to doing stuff that they really haven't done at a consistent level all season, which is finding other ways to get the ball to the rim more frequently in the half court, which is not something you can just snap your fingers and do.

You know, you either need like special talent. You need the shooting to complement that kind of ball handling or that low post presence. That's something state really doesn't have outside of horn.

I think more cells are pretty good shooter. It's a tough season from deep this year, and that's going to be tough for them to figure out because they have an offense that's set up that's designed to take a lot of like mid range shoes, whether it's the pick and roll with Horn, Taylor, more cell, or it's in the low post with DJ Burns. Like DJ is only Zach Ed of Purdue has used more post up possessions than DJ has this season. He draws only about three fouls for 40 minutes with a post up guy with a 27% usage rate.

That's just nothing. So like this team, they don't really get to the line. There's not a lot of rebounds. They don't take a ton of threes. They don't make a lot of threes and they don't get to the rim.

Um, I looked this up on CBB analytics last night. Um, only 20% of States field goal attempts this season have come at the rib, like 20.4%, which is in the lowest percentile nationally. Um, and until they're able to like find a way to do that, the half court offense is always like to improve that half court offense is always going to be just like a bit of a slog and stuck in the mud a little bit, regardless of how good DJ horn is. Because like he can occasionally, I think geek out coverages and get teams to switch up. He did that during the wind over wake and Raleigh, but he's not a room pressure guy. You know, like he's a, he's a shooter from a couple of different levels, but he doesn't get downhill and get to the ribbon force teams to depend and break.

And DJ burns as great as he is in the low block. He's not a screen roll guy. Like he doesn't get downhill and he's not a chicken pop guy either. He literally hasn't made a three, his entire career as a college lawyer. So I don't know.

It's, it's tough to sort of like find the right blend with them. I think it just comes down to one. Can you just generate a ton of turnovers? Like, can you force more turnovers and get more fast break opportunities?

And then when you get, when you get the chance, can you run in secondary situations as much as possible? And then when you get to half court, like they just got to do everything faster. It just, everything has to, everyone's gotta be running and screaming and cutting at 110%.

Because like anything less than that, they don't have enough. They don't have like the right pieces to just like immediately. Uh, start, you know, generating the kind of work that they haven't been able to do for 30 games so far this season.

So they gotta find the right blend. It'd be nice if they could get, you know, Taylor Morsell to, um, get hot. I do think it's important for them to play a Connell a lot here because I think he's crucial for picking up their pace, um, for igniting their secondary offense, for getting their transition game going with those hit head passes.

And so far, he's been a huge, like on off piece, uh, for States so far this season. So like, I find more utility for a Connell. I would run at every single opportunity and I would be begging guys to screen and cut and do so at 110%. 110 miles per hour, like whatever, whatever numerical cliche you want to use because they just got to pick it up a little bit. You described the Carolina hurricanes power play when it's not going well, uh, like everything looks too slow.

We just have to, everything has to be done at a quicker pace. Uh, you got about a minute left here. Pitt, um, or anybody else in that next tier of ACC team. And I single out Pitt because they've won six of their last seven, four of those six wins have come on the road. Uh, and they are threatening. They are scaring the top 50 right now. Uh, according to the metrics, uh, do you like them or is this just, Hey, they've won six out of their last seven because somebody has to. Yeah.

I mean, it is one of those things you probably don't want to overreact to like, uh, you know, two and a half, three weeks stretch or whatever. But as far as like pick goes specifically, I mean, gold, I think we've talked about them a couple of times on the like in text or on the air this season. Like I've liked this team from the jump. Oh, and three, I was like, they're good.

Actually. They've got legitimate, their personnel's really, really good. Bub Carrington is awesome. Jalen Lowe's often freshmen guard to Blake Hinton's one of the craziest shooters in the country. Um, total irrational confidence guy with crazy range, shoot off movement, you know, six, seven, 240 pounds or whatever. Um, the front courtroom was Federico Federico, uh, the Diaz grand brothers, like mobile six 11, seven footers that could do a bunch of stuff.

Um, and in the Diaz grand brothers can also like space and it'd be mismatched pieces too. So I like this team a lot. I think Jeff cable is an awesome coach and like, not just like a recruiter, like the stuff they run offensively. And, uh, they're, they're playing with confidence right now too. So they should scare you because like they've got a bunch of different guys who can beat you offensively. And if you can score like that in score against a bunch of different defenses and you've got a big time shooter like that in Hinson, um, yeah, they, they're pretty, I think they're like a pretty potent team. Um, it's just like, can they get the, uh, the defense to be there with an office that I think has as like a lot of dudes and a lot of ways in which you can attack their defense is not great, but, uh, Louisville this weekend.

Then, uh, the game Tuesday in Winston Salem is going to be, uh, a, I think a very important game for both them and wake forest. Brian Geisinger at big guys, underscore bird on Twitter knows more about basketball than anybody I know. I appreciate your time, my man. Uh, we'll talk to you next week.

Yeah, you guys have a great weekend. Brian Geisinger here on the Adam gold show for the ones who work hard to ensure their crew can always go the extra mile and the ones who get in early so everyone can go home on time. There's Granger offering professional grade supplies backed by product experts. So you can quickly and easily find what you need. Plus you can count on access to a committed team ready to go the extra mile for you call click ranger.com or just stop by Granger for the ones who get it done.