Connect with us

Hoops

Doug Gottlieb Saw OSU’s Defensive Issues Coming A Year Ago

Published

on

Doug Gottlieb may be the next head basketball coach at Oklahoma State. He may not. We’ve covered it from just about every angle it can be covered.

The discussion (and Doug himself) is nothing if not polarizing. So, with the complete understanding that I will now be relegated into one of two factions, let me draw your attention to something I picked up while listening to Gottlieb’s interview with Carson and Kyle from this week’s podcast.

On the pod, Gottlieb talked about the personnel limitations one would run into when trying to play the type of pressure defense he prefers — and the type Brad Underwood uses as a staple of his system.

“We talked about this last year, guys,” said Gottlieb. “If you pull the podcast, I think you’ll remember, I said, “I want to pressure. I want to play fast but there’s certain personnel limitations.”

Well, we did pull it, Doug.

A year ago, while first campaigning for the job (and before most OSU fans really knew who Brad Underwood was), Doug foresaw that type of issue with the Cowboys’ 2016-17 roster.

“I’m a proponent of hardcore, turn your ass to the glass, man-to-man defense,” Gottlieb said a year ago.

“On the other hand, it depends on who I have, right? Like, how would I like to play? Sure. If I’m able to get the job, I want to retain as many players if not all of them if possible. I think we can get a lot more out of Mitchell Solomon and out of Phil Forte. On the other hand, I’m also reasonable to believe that it’s going to be hard to be rangy defensively and to shut off a side if I have Phil and Mitchell both out there, right? It becomes prohibitively more difficult.

“So maybe you, depending on personnel, you play some pack line, which is still very good on-ball man-to-man defense.”

Last season, Brad Underwood showed up and installed his own style of pressure defense, which is predicated on getting in passing lanes, denying the ball and forcing turnovers.

In theory, it’s a great system, but it got the Cowboys into some trouble personnel-wise and he actually had to make a change to that pack line, (or sagging) man-to-man scheme Doug mentioned above. Thomas Fleming covered the switch earlier this year.

The issue was apparent once the Cowboys got into Big 12 play (and a little bit before). Underwood’s style was getting the Cowboys lit up in the paint. It’s why OSU, at one point, had one of the worst defenses in Big 12 history. He did not have the personnel to run his style and had to adjust.

After 19 games and an 0-6 Big 12 start, Underwood changed his defensive philosophy. We praised him for it (rightfully so) and it was a big reason for OSU’s drastic turnaround.

But in retrospect there are questions. Like, did this just elude Underwood in preseason camp or was it something he was just going to try to teach because he believed in it and hoped his players would catch up? Or was it something he should have noted earlier (like Gottlieb did last spring)?

The changed helped the Cowboys turn around their season but they still struggled to slow down the best teams and got lit up by the better offensive teams they played.

“There’s all different kinds of man to man,” said Gottlieb on Monday. “As you saw with Brad this year. And I frankly think one of the reasons they struggled in man to man at the end of the season was he [Underwood] was coaching something he didn’t know. He doesn’t really know pack line and he only knows getting up in the lane and pressure, pressure, pressure, pressure.”

This not to say Gottlieb is a greater basketball mind than Brad Underwood. Underwood is one hell of a coach and if it were up to me, he’d be working on recruiting OSU’s 2017 class.

But this does help us start to form an idea of the type of coach Gottlieb could be.

“I’m a pragmatist,” said Gottileb. “I’m not a guy who, ‘This our system and we’re always going to be that system’ guy.”

Kyle Porter asked a great question during the pod about whether a coach should adjust to his players until he recruits his own roster or always be willing to change.

“Generally, you should always be pliable, right? You should be a pragmatist. You should be like “alright, what do I have? let’s run something.”

Gottlieb said that even Eddie Sutton was pliable, occasionally playing small ball with Desmond Mason at the power forward spot.

“I have a diverse background in basketball,” said Gottlieb. “Coach Sutton ran some motion but we ran different offenses every year. I think you do your best to get your best players on the floor as long as you can and then you find your system accordingly.”

We may never find out what Gottlieb could do on that GIA sideline, but it’s clear he’s studied and thought about this stuff. It’s clear that he would not only be a nice name that could recruit well but a hoops junkie willing to bend his system to whatever players are suiting up for him at any given time.

Hopefully with their shorts on the right way.

Most Read

Copyright © 2011- 2023 White Maple Media