Teas & Defense

#5 posting 3.18.2008
your daily dose of girls basketball news & information

TEAS AND DEFENSE

I have stated that I think there is no such thing as good defense, only poor offense skills. Now coach Teas has a response:

So, “there is no such thing as great defense. Good defense only exposes weak offensive skills” Seems this mantra you espouse rather fell apart this past weekend.

Cyonna West is not a great defender? I guess then Taylor Hill must have weak offensive skills. Gee I hope the army of D-1 recruiters does not find this out about her. The same thing could be said about the offensive skills lacking in Britney Chambers on Saturday night. Oh wait a minute; I think she broke the single game scoring record this weekend.

Come on KJA great defense was seen all over the place at the state tournament and many of us really enjoyed watching it. We watched the results of great coaching, great individual effort, and great team play on defense. Defense really helped Ada-Borup, Albany, Totino Grace and St. Paul Central win state titles year. I am fairly certain their coaches are happy a significant part of game prep was devoted to it.

For example Totino-Grace used body position, foot speed, active hands and great rebounding to frustrate all their opponents this past week. It appeared that their opponents, at the end of their games were demoralized by their inability to run their offensive system vs the TG pressure. Hats off to Totino-Grace, and Coach Shannon Hartinger, for their defense success and their state championship.

Coach Teas

To illustrate Coach Teas Remarks
Class, Champ, Dpp100, Dfloor %
A Ada-Bourp 59.18, .301
AA Albany 78.62, .379
AAA Totino-Grace 65.24, .308
AAAA St. Paul Central 87.05, .428

If we look at last week alone
A Ada-Bourp 63.56, .305
AA Albany 74.76, .364
AAA Totino-Grace 60.52, .284
AAAA St. Paul Central 74.76, .364
That translates to an improvement of +3.86/+.015 for Albany; +4.72/+.024 for Totino-Grace; and a whopping +12.29, +.064 for Central. Ada-Borup went up (barely) -4.38/-.004.
If you compare that with the defensive averages across their respective classes vs their state tournament performances.
A Ada-Borup +14.89/+.076
AA Albany +8.74/+.033
AAA Totino-Grace +18.74/+.101
AAAA St. Paul Central +5.83/+.037
All were better but TG led in both categories.

Next up: later today with the grab bag