Transition Defense

After the basketball team's loss to Boston College yesterday, I am concerned. I still believe that we will make the NCAA tournament, and we can completely cement that with one win in our next three games (four, if you count the ACC tournament). What concerns me, is our defense. Our defensive efficiency on the year is an exceptional 88.6 (this is in points per possession, adjusted for quality of opponent). Over the past four games, though, our defensive efficiency has been 109.9 (Wake), 100.0 (Miami), 104.1 (VT), and 108.9, (BC). Previously, we haven't had two consecutive outings with defensive efficiency over 100 (higher numbers are bad).

In the Miami game, I thought we actually played very well (the DE of our first meeting in Miami was a season high 110.3), and I didn't get to watch the Virginia Tech game. But one thing that I noticed against both Wake Forest and Boston College was that they were able to push the pace and get easy transition baskets against us. Boston College even fastbreaked on us after a couple made baskets. With my view tethered to the TV cameras, I wasn't able to see why Wake and BC were having such success. We certainly don't lack for athleticism, and versus UNC (a notoriously fast team) we were able to hold them to only one transition basket. This is something to pay attention to going forward.