This game is a bit tricky to analyze.
Self clearly decided that the surest way to win the game was to:
1) score through Perry;
2) speed ISU up;
3) run lots of weaves to make them slide;
4) sub freely the first half;
5) play Brannen a lot to keep the pace up the second half in order to save your bigs for the stretch;
5) try to tire their legs out to drive down their trey percentage the last ten minutes; and
6) go big the last ten minutes and wear them out inside with Wigs, Perry and Tar.
KU executed the plan pretty well, but was undermined by KU's poor shooting inside and out in part due to ISU intermittently running a kind of zone defense I was not familiar with and that the KU players seemed confused by too. Still, KU went into half time with a 2 pt lead largely because ISU got tired and missed its last six shots of the first half.
During half time it was clear what Hoiberg would have to do. He had to send his players out balls to the walls at the start of the second half in hopes of building up a lead with a mix of trey shooting and Niang's inside game BEFORE his team lost its trey shooting legs and had to narrow attack to close to the basket. Self knew this and played it close to the vest, hoping to keep it close until ten to go when KU would put its bigs back in and grind an exhausted ISU into defeat.
Alas, the second half went as scripted by Hoiberg. ISU jumped out to a lead that grew until it was double digits with 12 to go and KU had to turn on the gas to keep it from getting away from them. But KU turned out not to have a lot of gas in its tank to come from behind. By ten minutes to go, KU had barely narrowed the ISU lead. But as if on a time clock, ISU's three point game dried up at the ten minute mark as Self apparently maneuvered to have happened. It was at this point that something very strange unfolded.
ISU without its trey game had to go inside to Niang. Niang is a short, but exceptional post player and none of KU's bigs could handle him one on one. It was at this point that KU was logically supposed to do one of two things.
KU could either start doubling Niang, as it had OSU's big so well the day before.
Or KU could go zone, knowing OSU had lost its trey shooting legs, and use the zone to cut Niang off entirely from the basket down low.
Either ploy would have worked. Close off ISU's inside game, when it had no trey game, and on the other use Wigs, Perry and Tar to cram the inside offense down their throats, and KU would be a winner. And it would be a winner even though it had shot poorly. In most other stats of the line score, KU had played ISU nearly even.
But instead of doubling down on Niang, or going to zone, KU stayed in m2m, and let ISU spread it out wide and then it shushed repeatedly to the iron for high percentage two point shots and a FT on a foul.
For reasons beyond my ability to explain, Self seemed not even to consider either doubling down, or zoning. Zoning frankly, was the surest way to shut of ISU's inside game and force it to try treys on tired legs. Even Self's 3 man m2m and 2 man big man zone would have worked.
Instead Self stuck with m2m and watched Niang slice KU to pieces.
Game. Set. Match.
Clearly KU's over time game against OSU had sapped its energy budget for ISU.
But just as clearly, KU could have won the game had it been able to deny ISU some of its easy baskets.
Such was not to be.
And now it is back to the drawing board to try to figure out how to win two games in three days in the first week of the Madness, regardless of what seed kU gets,
And then hope Embiid can get back.
