3 Team Basketball “Run Down”

This is just a little run down of the two games I saw Saturday and what I thought about the teams and where they are as a team going into the season and just little bits like that for you. There were only 3 teams involved and because I am new to Basketball I dont have any names but please “Tag” players and coaches if you know who I am talking about so that I can keep track of everyone through out the year. Hamilton BHS played Back to Back game winning both with a score line of 80-31 over Hastings BHS and 109-65 over Avondale College.

Hastings BHS

So with doing High School Top 200 for 1st XV I have developed this “View” of what Hastings BHS is when it comes to sports and I sort of “Blanket” it over the whole school. Hastings BHS have been just a “Monster” for breeding talented Rugby players over the last 4 years and so that’s what I think of them when I see “Akina” and that “Crest on their Chest”. Now, my understanding was that Hastings BHS had 6 of their main players sitting out due to 3×3 Nationals and so they were playing short and we would be seeing guys playing that are deep in that bench. My first thoughts when I was watching them warm up and Hastings BHS had 2 teams warming up because the U15’s were also warming up. I stood on the court looking at the two teams and I couldnt tell which ones the Prem team was and the U15’s. Then i was passed the info that the Top 6 players were missing and so I was like “DAMN Lucky!!”. My mind set was if this is what the Prems look like they going to struggle this whole year. The team wasn’t great and I really hope that these 6 players missing are strong players because Hastings BHS REALLY struggled.

My biggest down fall for this team was the fact that no one from the Hastings team stepped up and said I will take the step up. Whenever the best players are out you know there is at least 17 points for the taking so why not you take it and make the game yours? In Basketball when your on the court for your team there is only 5 players, you dont have a QB who decides if you get to touch the ball or not, if you are not touching the ball in Basketball you must be running from it. I didnt see a player wanting to take the lead, for me I would have driven it to the basket and pressured them to foul me and draw that defence in every time. It wont matter if they know that your just going to drive it every time, it matters more if they cant stop you from getting there and your getting to that line all the time for 2. If things like that happen then they will have to collapse on “D” cutting off your driving lanes which means they have come away from there man and then you pass. That is the most simple way of playing if you dont have the best players on the court. Hastings got lost on defence, they didnt know if they were playing a 2-3 Zone or a 3-2 Zone, man to man, or if they were full court trapping or “Parent Trapping”. Just wasn’t good to watch, what the coaches did find out was that they need to strengthen that bench and find them minutes in the easy games giving them experience to grow on. I hope that foul troubles to that 6 missing players doesnt come to often this year because then they will lose games they should be winning. I will wait for the 6 players to return to really put a “Ranking” on this team.

Avondale College

(Old Man Talk) Back when I was at school, Avondale College was crazy good and they were always in that top tier of best in the nation. 2018 Im not to sure what the vision is for this school or what is happening or if they are just building up again but it really was a different look Avondale College team for me, and when did they start calling themselves “Dale State”? Is that a new thing? Anyway’s despite the score of this game against 109-65 to Hamilto BHS I didnt think that they were that bad at all and the score line wasn’t showing a lot of aspects of the flow of the game. Avondale College did not have the overall tallest players on the court but they did have a very consistent height in the team where there was like 6 or 7 players all around the 6’2-6’3 range which is good for High School Prem level.

So I thought that Avondale had so real good athletes that could run the floor, moved well on their feet, wing span could cover in Zones and that they had some real good “Slashing” type players. The “Slashing” players they had worked well off the screens as decoy’s and whatever but when the “Slashing” drew attention away from the ball handler and he was given space to fire up a shot he wasn’t taking it. What he was doing was pump faking and driving it TOWARDS the defence and then passing off to another open shooter who does the same thing. Then turnovers happen with being indecisive and lack confidence in not being able to put up shots when open and that’s what Avondale was doing for 4 Quarters, I would have felt better if they wee taking the open shot and missing then wondering if they know what an open shot looks like and to take it. Kiwi players do not have knock down shooters or have that knock down go to shot that you can get every time but that’s what you need as a player, a shot or move you can fall back on. If Avondale had such a player that would have taken those open shots and were confident in “Pop’n One Off” then that game would have been a lot closer and Hamilton BHS would not have hit 100 points. I really liked No.8 “Jaga” to me he was the best player on the court along with No.10 “Childs”. Jaga had really good length in his game and he defended really well. I think Jaga should have backed himself and taken it to the hole aggressively to see how they would adapt the defence to him and then start looking for the weakness in the Hamilton BHS team. Childs I think ran well at PG and freed up a lot of room because he could go “Coast to Coast” on just 6 dribbles. I would have liked to see him draw the defence more and cheered his team mates into shooting more open shots.

Hamilton BHS

Not really that much to say to be honest because they are an easy team to sort of read. They have some height which is great with Max Stephens and Corban Mason both at around 6’6-6’8 I think. Then they have Cullen Masters at PG who has changed his game as being a scorer to a distributor first and then scorer which I think makes him a better player and that makes the team better too. Cullen should be the guy with the ball in his hands and be made to make the call on the court, I would make him take over the game by getting everyone into the game. I had seen Cullen last year and he shot a lot and to me maybe to much but this year seeing him rip up the court and seeing those PG’s struggling to stay with him made the other defenders have to slide and help which Cullen then got off the passes to the open players, and when he took the shots he went for they were smarter selection and defenders were sitting off him.

To me it wasn’t all good the whole time, because I think as a starting 5 they are very very strong, but after like maybe the 6th man they really drop to some young players. They also have two tall “Rimu’s” in that key hole but after that they dont have much, if either one of them get into foul trouble which will happen 100% this year they will struggle in the big games. I personally dont think Corban had a good game as well in that Avondale game and even with a couple of shots in the Hastings game and I expected a lot from him. Corban is a real athlete who can get up and down the court and he has a very good dribble but he misses some easy lay up’s and open shots around the basket and to me its cause he is “skinny” and cant absorb the hits when he is coming down the lane and then finishing the shot for an “And 1”. There was about 10 points that he left out there that should have been easy ones to finish, it is only the Pre Season and he could work on his muscle over the year but that’s what I saw.