Last year LU on defense finished 17th best of the 358 Division I schools
holding opponents to 61.7 ppg
in 2020-2021 LU finished 1st holding opponents to 56.1 ppg
in 2019-2020 holding opponents to 62.7
In 2018-2019 holding opponents to 60.8
In 2017-2018 holding opponents to 62.6
In short we have been one of the nation’s best defensive teams.

This year in our French trip against the French pros we gave 84.0 ppg.

We have lost our 2 star defensive players from last year, Aher Uguak & Lucas Williamson.

We have returning only starting 6-0 point guard Brandon Norris; our 7th in minutes played, the often-injured, 6-1 Marquise Kennedy; and Jacob Hudson who averaged 11.5 minutes a game. No other returnee averaged 10 ppg or better.

We have a lot of talented offensive players now. The question is whether they can meld together as a defense with upcoming practices & further.

The coach will have his hands full molding his talented new team together. Hopefully his second season will be as successful as his first.

GO RAMBLERS!

CORRECTION:

NOT : We have returning only starting 6-0 point guard Brandon Norris; our 7th in minutes played, the often-injured, 6-1 Marquise Kennedy; and Jacob Hudson who averaged 11.5 minutes a game. No other returnee averaged 10 ppg or better.

RATHER: 10 mpg

I don’t think you can really glean much comparing ppg in France vs our previous seasons. For one, we were playing against pros. For another, and correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe the rules were geared more towards the pro than college game. IE there were quarters instead of half’s, and I believe the shot clock was 24.

When looking at last year’s A10 tournament, Richmond won it by defense.

2021-2022 Defenses of the 14 A10 teams with winning conference records:

1 Dayton 18 14-4 1041 57.8
2 VCU 18 14-4 1139 63.3
3 St. Bonaventure 17 12-5 1112 65.4
6 Davidson 18 15-3 1204 66.9
7 Saint Louis 18 12-6 1222 67.9
9 Richmond 18 10-8 1239 68.8

RICHMOND’S DEFENSE IN THE FINAL 3 ROUNDS:

Game 10: #6 Richmond 75, #3 VCU 64

SEMIFINALS - Saturday, March 12
Game 12: #6 Richmond 68, #2 Dayton 64

CHAMPIONSHIP - Sunday, March 13
Game 13: #6 Richmond 64 #1 Davidson 62

I think LU will have a good offense this season.
Hopefully by this year’s A10 tournament, LU’s defense will be ready.

Go Ramblers!

Well, just a couple of thoughts on defense.

First we lost a lot guys who were used to playing together on defense. The comment you heard a lot the last few years was how “connected” we were on defense. Our help, switching and rotations were always tight and the guys knew the system inside and out. It takes time to get a group that type of coordination.

Second, Drew plays a more uptempo offense and we have guys that run the floor. We are gonna take more shots earlier in the clock than we have in the past. It’s an unrealistic expectation to think we are gonna hold people to the same point totals as we have in the past.

It’s OK to give up a couple of more points if we are scoring more than in the past. We can still play tough defense and make the opponent work to score. We have the depth where max effort should be be expected/demanded. We can keep people fresh by rotating guys in and out. It’s the old Nolan Richardson theory at Arkansas…40 minutes of Hell!

I miss watching Ben RIchardson play defense....he was fly paper

After 3 Division 1 games, the Ramblers are currently giving up 76.7 ppg.

In the last 5 years the most points we gave up per game for the season were 62.7 ppg

The only team in the Atlantic 10 who gave up more points per game last season than we currently are was U Mass which gave up 78.1 ppg (they had a losing record).

Our current scoring per game 74.7 would have ranked 4th in scoring in the Atlantic 10 last year.

It looks like LU style will be a big change this year.

Talented Offensive Players? With our turnovers and bad shooting from 3, I question how good our offensive players really are for D1. Even Norris is lost this year.

We’ve seen how good Norris can be when playing in a proper offensive system. He’s no longer in one anymore. Everything is rushed now, when the entire team looks lost that gets put on the coach.

It looked to me like the individual defense play - fundamental techniques - was actually better in the first 2 games in Myrtle Beach than what I’d seen going back to France, even though both Tulsa and Boise shot very well in the second half and took advantage as we began to get desperate. We even cut fouls down to a reasonable rate against Boise. The mistakes were more on team defense, ie, not filling the right space, not realizing where teammates were going, etc. If we continue to cut down on individual fundamental mistakes, the team defense has a chance to improve with experience. But we will still be missing the elite defense of Lucas and Aher.

PPG can be a misleading indicator, but I think it tracked the real quality of Rambler defense the last few years. As Yogi Berra said, you can see a lot just by observing.