1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - January 10th: 10am - Mens Basketball with another tough loss

Episode Date: January 10, 2022

The text line wants more Derrick WalkersNebraska's defense is not greatAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It's time to go one-on-one with D.P. Coming at you live from the Koppel Chevrolet GMC Studios, here is your host, Derek Pearson, presented by Beatrice Bakery, on 937 The Ticket and the Ticket FM.com. Happy Monday, 402, 464-5-685, the Sarder-Haman text line and the Honda-Lincoln hotline. You can follow on the Sartar-Haman live video, stream,

Facebook, YouTube, Twitch. Lots to go through and a lot going on. It is weird. I don't think I've ever been in a place where people are disinterested in the national championship game or say they're disinterested in championship game.

And that's okay. You know, I'm not telling anybody what they should like or not like. but I always look at this. This is like the highlight. This is the feature. This is the main event. And if you're disinterested, then, you know,

it must be a really tough thing to do to put college football down if your team's not doing one. You know, it's like me in Washington. Washington's done. I'm still going to watch the playoffs. I'm going to be excited. And if it's, you know, Tampa and Kansas City again, I'm okay with that. That's like me being tired of Ali Frazier. well they fought already yeah well let them fight again let him fight again let me see who the best

is today um but i understand the folks how they feel about the cc i i had several conversations with jay over the weekend about men's basketball and he was flustered and i was curious because I didn't have anger or venom about it. I just saw it as Rutgers had a night or had a day and you just write it off. We kind of know who this team is. And unless you can change it, which is, you know, bringing back Trey or changing the starters, it's going to be what it was. A lot of the discussion was whether this was a bad defensive team.

and I had not originally thought of it as a bad defensive team. I just thought it was a less talented defensive team. And I wanted to be fair to that, right? That everybody who shoots against them has a good day, which can be that you're allowing them to shoot in space that they want to shoot in, or they're making shots from shots from wherever they take them. We've seen some close-out.

I get a little frustrated with the run-by closeouts where instead of actually closing out the shooter, they run by and jump and kind of swipe and try to make that sort of play. But as a basketball coach, I don't like those plays. Never did because it puts you out of position. It puts you out of position. You can't box out if you do a run-by. Like you can't do it. And you can't take the defensive risk of trying to steal and get an easy bucket.

and then miss and put your team at a deficit. I also don't quite understand what the offensive principle is. When you say that you're running a system and within that system, there is a stop gadget to read and react. There's a way that the process is supposed to work. If somebody drives to the basket and it's cut off or defended, a jump stop is required. It's part of the actual mechanics or the offense.

Nebraska doesn't do it. The reading rack won't work if shots aren't made from three. It won't work. And the basic premise, we talked about it in the post game, Bix Sky and I talked about it, that teams that face Nebraska don't have to defend the three, which makes them much more difficult to score. It makes it more difficult for Nebraska.

Because if you're not defending the three and Fred doesn't like the mid-range game, then they're left to attack the basket at all costs. That's not what the offense is about. That's not how it's drawn up. That's not how it's supposed to work. And then they do a thing defensively where you can watch three of the five

defend at a high level on the ball. Nebraska is not a bad on-the-ball defensive team. Where Nebraska struggles is off-ball because defenders in help often get distracted or lose focus. And there was a six-possession sequence where in each of those sequences, Nebraska misidentified who the help should be helping and who they should. I'm a little curious to ask some of the guys,

I'll ask them this week, that if it felt like, uh, yeah, I'm getting several texts and tweets. Uh, the Huskers football program announces that Bill Bush is in fact, the special teams coordinator.

Bill's experience and track record as both an outstanding coach and recruiter speaks for itself. That from Scott Frost and the number of, Nebraska football program. So one down. Let's get to the running backs. Do you think, and what are they going to do with the defensive line? Do we know yet?

Is it official? It's not official, but it's... I know what the assumption is. Yeah, it's assumed. That's the assumption is that Dawson just goes to the line. Yeah. But then what do you do with the outside linebacker position? It goes to Barrett Rood, who just takes all the linebackers.

So... Or since the assumption was since the outside linebackers are used as pseudo-defense ends, that he still coaches them in a certain extent? So you didn't need an extra defensive coach last year? Look, look. Don't look, man. I'm just saying what I read. Don't shoot the messenger.

I'm curious. As you said. We don't make the news. We just reported it. We don't make the news. We just reported. From the text line, BJ in Wichita. And again, you guys know the deal.

Hit me with a what-up. DP or what's up, Rico, so we can have a conversation. This was a poorly put together team. Need more Walker-type players. Also, Hoyberg teams as a whole have never been good defensively, so I'm not really surprised. I'm not sure what Walker-type players means. Like hard-nosed, play hard. These kids play hard.

Yeah. I don't know. For the most part. Yeah, I don't know. Like they're lapses. They're certainly lapses. I understand, like, I understand, you know, BJ's probably just a really big fan of Derek Walker and wants more Derek Walker's, which, I mean, I wouldn't, you know, I wouldn't hate it. Well, but remember, we've, we've, we've, that has moved. That line has moved.

Yes. Because when, you know, when Derek got here, it was, he's not big enough. He's not talented enough. He's not good enough. He's not got to score, yada, yada. The reality is he can do those things if it's been put in, right? from the text line. And again, guys, you know, hit me with a, you know, hit me with a what-up. It's simple. You can see the fake defensive hustle. I really love the fake fighting through the screen with zero hedge help.

Okay. So this is where you get into X's and O's, and you would say in the getting through the edge defense, that the entire all season was based on a premise. that Nebraska wasn't going to be big inside, so they had to help inside. So that hedge defense, the deeper you pull somebody into deep water,

the more options the offense has. So the deeper you run through that thing. And what's required at that hedge at that mesh is communication. Some defenders on Nebraska team are really good at getting over the top and in freeing up Derek to get. get back into space again. Others are not. But that's the case for every team.

That's not exclusive to Nebraska. I think the dilemma is that several people are playing out of position and playing exclusive minutes in those spots. Anytime Kese is defending a wing, a bigger wing, he's at a four, five, or six inch disadvantage. Yeah, you don't want that. Putting Deerick, putting Eduardo Andre in the paint and then asking him to get long at the hedge takes him away from help defense, which is what required.

That's why so many shooters on the wing are there because those wing help defenders have to slide back towards the paint. So there's stuff they got to work out. So Beezer said more physical guys with muscles to have a chance in the big O. I'm not sure that that's easy to do. That is a, one, that is a part of the four and five-star recruiting process, identifying that somebody has a different body type. But then also that having people in the program long enough to change their bodies into Big Ten type bodies.

Because that is the Big Ten is a bunch of older teams with guys that have been in the programs for a while who have had chances to develop their bodies and get bigger and stronger and smarter. on the basketball court where Nebraska right now is sitting at a very young team who hasn't had a chance to develop their bodies into this Big Ten league. Yeah, it just, and I said, the bodies this year are more, more physical than they were previously, but still not to Big Ten level. Scott says, D.P. Walker is a team player and knows his role in the offense, a few of the others, not so much.

Yeah, I do have some issue with, as I open the segment, but a part of this requires that mission one on any offensive possession is the RIMP. That's mission one. Mission two, option two, is the open three if somebody's playing off of you, and that requires your ability to make said three in order for you do that. So the more threes you take and make, the easier it is, you get the rim because then defenders have to get out of that no man's land and actually commit either to defending the rim or the three point line. You can't just pack the paint. Right,

you can't pack the paint. And then Hoyberg's decision and his preference that his players not shoot the mid-range game now makes it so that defensive teams only have to defend the rim and the three. And as I said to Vicks guy Saturday, if I'm given two things to defend or three things, I'm always going to choose the two. Takes away a very large amount of real estate where you're really not worried about anybody taking a shot in the midrange. That's why you see people jumping, like jumping to defend the threes because they're not scared of somebody pump faking, taking a step in and shooting a mid-range.

Yeah, and you're smaller than. And there's no in between. Within this system, there is a decision line that sits just beyond that circle that sits underneath that when you get to that space. So it's a full dash. It should be Verge on a full sprint to the rim, right, until somebody stops him. And then whoever stops him, wherever pressure came from, you dished to that pressure. So if somebody came off Walker to stop Verge at the rim, it should be a simple distribution decision.

But in order to do that effectively, sometimes a jump stop is required. He doesn't excel at it. No. So that's a part of it. Derek, when they dish to Derek and then that additional wing defender drops down on Derek to dig to try to knock the ball away, option would be for Derek to kick that out to a shooter of the corner who's open and can get the shot off before close out. That'll go down. But since that shot isn't being made, teams don't have to make that additional defensive step.

And that's been the problem, that if you recruit to guys who can shoot, when the lights aren't on, you assume that they can make those shots when the lights are on. That assumption has not played out. So all the things that you've built in this season, the things that you were to run at third, fourth, fifth, sixth option in this offense,

it hits traffic and chaos because the shots aren't going down. So, you know, This is what this is. Let's see, where we were. Take Walker away from his team. We don't have any one player who's big and strong. Well, you can remember that Brighton Bach's not there.

Trey's not there. Errardo's big and strong. He just needs to learn more of the basics. Yeah, he needs, I mean, he needs to become efficient. He needs to become effective in his movement. What up, D.P. Enrico, Nebraska, no better than it was 10 miles, probably worse, however I keep drinking the Kool-A. I'm not asking anybody drink Kool-Aid.

I'm saying that it's not good enough. Six and ten is six and ten. Not great. Right? And yeah, you can go to, well, Trey's not playing. Bridebach, who they were counting on and relying on, isn't there. The shooters haven't shot at an effective level that you thought they were going to. But the reality is they're not playing well enough in any phase to play bad in a phase.

like if this team did everything right, it's still a grind in the Big Ten. Yeah. But if you're not going to shoot, you're going to have to defend better and score better in short space. That's how this works. So, yeah, they've got some difficulty

and that you've got to find, look, Ron Harper Jr. had a knight. What Nebraska has to figure out is why these players keep having those nights against them. there's always one. Like it's like somebody, you know, one night it's a big man. Next man it's a wing. Next night it's a point guard.

It kind of goes through. It seems as if they make adjustments to stop a certain position from going off against them after that happens. And then that leaves them susceptible to, like they'll make an adjustment for a guard not to go off. They'll, you know, send more help towards the point guards or the shooting guards, whatever. And then, you know, the big man will go off. And then they'll start sending more help to the big man the next game. And then a wing will go off. off and then they start sitting more and then it's just

it's like cyclical and it's very strange where they're making adjustments but their adjustments aren't considering considering like keeping the adjustments that they already made. Well they make in game adjustments the problem is that the adjustments that they make

is a change of focus and change of direction. I want to address this texter and again we know folks, you guys know the rules like if you want me to read your text just say hey say what's up that would be beneficial but I'm going address this one because I'm a straightforward kind of dude.

The text who said that my opinion is based on everyone else's who only watches. What inside info do you have? Have you been to practices? You don't know what they're trying to do and not do, right? No, wrong. All of that's wrong.

All of what you just typed in was wrong. Yes, I go to practices. Yes, I have insight. Yeah, I know the systems that they're running. I know what it's supposed to look like. Yes. So all of what you just said is wrong. Don't assume you can ask, but no, you're wrong. It's, B.J. asked, do you think this is a real, this is not a real coachable team?

That's a great question. That's a great question. I think we're going to find out pretty quickly whether it's coachable or not, because you're not going to, you reach a point where you get tired of getting your head kicked in. and you're either going to listen or you're going to to loot. He did just call them out. So let's see if they're accepting coach.

There are things that I know they've talked about in practice that don't make it to games. And I'm not sure why. Like I'm not sure why. I really, if you know what the systems are and then you have some expectation of what you expect to see, what they run in practice doesn't always show up in games. Certainly the shot selection and the shot making don't make it to games.

I'll say there's a certain point. And I was going to say this when we were talking to football, but it applies to basketball as well. And I know you didn't like it the last time I said it, but there's like a 1% point where all of the coaching you do, no matter what, you know, it'll fall back onto the players and the players have to do something. Like it falls back onto the players.

have to make a play and they have to do something. And the coach can be just be left there scratching their head because they've done everything they can do, put the players in the right positions, given them the correct coaching. You know, they've told them what to do, what they need to do, what they need to look for and everything. then it falls on the players to make the right decision. Yeah, it's like Jay says. Sometimes the players just have to step up and make plays.

I can tell you that there have been nights as a coach where I put a player in the game with a specific command. This is what you need to. is what I need to do. And do you understand it? Yeah. When this happens, then this, then that, okay, cool. Put them in the game. And then that situation comes up and the player does something different. And then the next time I talk to that player, I'm like, okay, so what did you see? Well, I saw what you saw? Okay, so then what were we supposed to do in that situation? Well, we were supposed to do this. So why didn't we do it? I don't know. I don't know. So then I learned that I can't trust that player in that situation. And I can't ask him to do that. But that usually takes another thing from my utility belt that oh goodness I thought this was a lockup defender and he's not or I thought this guy would go into the game and shoot jumpers and knock him down and he's not it's pretty mind-blowing if you if you've coached and in high repetition done a thing and seen the result from it and then you get in a live game and then it doesn't work it doesn't work and I can understand where coaches when that happens where, you know, you lose trust in that situation in that player. But then at the same time, you're like, you know, I know they can do this. Let's try this again.

And then maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't work. And it's just like, I don't understand. We've gone through everything. We've done all the reps. We've talked about it. You've seen this. I've seen this.

I know you can do this. Why isn't this translating? And I get curious because it's Nebraska, right? It's Nebraska basketball. So when I got here, everybody would tell me, well, it's Nebraska basketball. We've never won a tournament game. So there's something, right? It's in the heads of the people who are involved.

And then you go out, even at the program's worst, you go out and get the first five star in history. Now, mind you, you're playing the Big Ten. There are five stars all over the place. Everywhere. Everybody else has a least one. All over the place. So you're down, you're playing up anywhere. You're punching up anyway.

So then you have to do things that aren't talent-based. They're production-based, right? We're going to take better shots than they take. We're going to take quicker shots, shorter shots, whatever that is. We're going to take away some of the athletic things that they can beat us on. Right? So I'm not going to let them just run up and down the floor against us because we can't run with them. We can't run with them.

So we'll slow it down. Right. I'm going to slow it down. But at some point, if you go and get a five-star and then you go and get a bunch of four-stars to go with it for the first time, at least that is progress. Now, it doesn't show in the 6-10 record. I'll also say this.

And this is where it gets strange for me. When it comes to football, I'll speak quite first. frankly about the grown-ups, right? You've got to figure out a way to get to your kids. The same applies for basketball. The same applies for basketball. But as with football, I say this thing. These are the sons and daughters of the University of Nebraska.

And there are people that talk about, well, I don't watch and I don't care. Okay. Why? Is that the kind of thing that you, the message that you send? to your sons and daughters that you only support them and you only cheer for them like you go to your kids game whether they are on a good team or not.

Like don't be the parents of the fan base. It only goes when the game when the team's doing well. Again, they don't really need you when they're doing well because everybody loves them. But if you're a parent that shows up when your team's not very good, that's way more impressive to me.

That shows way more character and integrity in me. Like I have zero desire to beat up on the basketball players. Because those are young people who are trying to represent the University of Nebraska. The coaches, look, the conversations that I have with Buzzy and Matt, those guys, those conversations are, well, what's going on? Like, what are we, what are you guys doing and try to figure it out?

Like, that's a real talk. And they carry it that way. Like, they'd much rather you talk about them than the players. I don't get the, there are people who really. don't like this basketball team. And I don't like, if it's because they've never been good, then you kind of set the tone that

never could be good because you don't support it. Right? There are people who didn't support the women's program until they start winning. And now it's, oh, well, let's talk about it. That's a little weird to me. Like, if you're going to support it, support it. Like, these are,

the young people I that's like you the you saying well I only go to else game when they're winning well she's only going to be winning so well there's that she right there's that she doesn't know the word lose there's that there's that no I just trying to understand what what goes on in the minds of of of folks right that you know I'm never one to to to to bash like I don't want to bash the young people, it should be about the grownups. Like for me, it should be about the grownups. But we'll have this conversation. And the conversation will get a little bit better because we just got a guess.

Ashley Skaghan's, Splashley. Splashly. Skagin will join us from the women's basketball team, the 13 and two Huskers. We'll have a conversation. We'll go one-on-one here after the break. Download our app by searching 90s. 93.7 the ticket in your app store. You're listening to one-on-one with DP on 937 the ticket

and the ticketfm.com.