For those few who insisted all year that FT's are not important, all I can say is take a look at the Kansas/Villanova game. I rest my case and there is no rational argument to be made otherwise. PERIOD!
Free throws!
- Thread starter arenk
- Start date
I've always thought toffee throws were the most important shot of the game. I enjoy our seasons more when we make them, we left a lot of games on the table this season.
There are the stat geeks on this board who believe they are no more important than other categories, not realizing that free throws at the end of tight games is all that matters. Turnovers are going to happen, bad plays are going to happen, off shooting nights are going to happen, free throws are the only aspect that can be controlled to put tight games away.
The stat geeks are just that. They aren't coaches and athletes, they don't know the game like they think they do. This is the kind of game that truly shows free throws are so important, its a necessity.
Uk would have lost this game because we wouldn't have hit those free throws that well. No offense to us, but it is what it is.
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There is a segment of this board and a radio host who go full honey badger when anyone suggests improving free throw shooting.
I don't recall the names, but several posters have said that FT's are one of the least important aspects of the game. It came up because of our poor FT shooting at various times. I'm sure there are some who will remember their names.
I'm not saying we didn't shoot them well in the tourney this year. I'm just making the point that the game today shows just how critical it is to convert FT's at all points in the game. Nova won by 4 and although I haven't checked the stat sheet, my guess is that Nova was 19 of 20 from the line. That won the game for them.
Anyone who says free throws are not important in a basketball game knows as much about basketball as a mushroom. If they are not important, why are they part of the game? Ask Cal if free throws are not important in a championship game. He lost a title game to Kansas when his Memphis team could not hit free throws. We would have beaten AZ in the '97 title game if not for missed free throws. We also would have beaten UConn in the final four when Kemba Walker took them to the title if we would have hit free throws in the final four game. Ask Kyle Macy if free throws are important and let me know what he says.
No one including our coach would argue otherwise so this thread is sorta wacky. Every team has guys who can make them , every team has guys who can't . All you can ask is that in the last few minutes of the game the guys WHO can make them , DO Make them.
Turnovers won the game for Villanova, not free throws. Villanova turned Kansas over on 25% of their possessions. That hurts both Kansas' point total and leads to easy points on run outs for Villanova. Had Kansas merely turned the ball over 15% of the time, you're looking at an additional 7 points for Kansas at the rate they were scoring on their non-turnover possessions.
Villanova also loses about 8 points off of their score because they are now running their offense against a set defense instead of in transition.
So a 4 point victory is now a likely 11 point loss if those turnovers don't occur.
Free throws in late game situations are nothing more than the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back. They are a proximate cause, but not the ultimate cause. There's a reason no coach worth their salt at the college or professional level spends a significant amount of precious practice time on free throws. You get a much greater return focusing elsewhere.
Totally wrong. Had villanova not hit every free throw they were shooting under 4 minutes, they easily could have lost.
What part of "turnovers are going to happen in every game, but free throws are the only aspect you can totally control" don't you get?
Coaches also completely disagree with you.
Free throws are one of the least important parts of the game. Period. Is it helpful to shoot them well? Duh. But go look at past NBA and NCAA champs, and tell me how much good FT shooting correlates to winning. Of course you can point to cases where missing them costs a team, but you could also point to a lot of examples where making bad plays in all aspects of the game cost a team. It's just that those aspects are less obvious than a guy standing by himself 15 feet from the basket.
And what gets irritating is that people seem to have wildly unrealistic expectations about what UK should shoot as a team. UK shot 69% this year. That ain't great, but considering that UK had 2 guys who were absolutely awful from the stripe, it wasn't that bad either. Educate yourself to the historical realities of FT% (which is that it's barely changed at all for 60 years), understand that 69% is about average for a college team (for the last 60 years), and adjust expectations accordingly.
And what gets irritating is that people seem to have wildly unrealistic expectations about what UK should shoot as a team. UK shot 69% this year. That ain't great, but considering that UK had 2 guys who were absolutely awful from the stripe, it wasn't that bad either. Educate yourself to the historical realities of FT% (which is that it's barely changed at all for 60 years), understand that 69% is about average for a college team (for the last 60 years), and adjust expectations accordingly.
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Not one person ever said they are not important. But there are plenty of other factors that are just as important. And there is very little way to know who is going to shoot well in college. Briscoe shot 70 percent in HS. Some teams excel at FTs and others just don't. I've never once heard a solution from those saying Cal needs to fix it. Would love to hear how they would.
For the record, I have been to 7 or 8 coaching clinics, 2 of them attended by Lon Kruger and Billy Donovan. Both of them stressed losses at the hands of free throws. Again, coaches will tell you, it's the only aspect of the game that can be fully controlled. Turnovers can be forced by good defense. Missed boards can be the result of great rebounders. Missed shots happen.
Tight games end on free throws, and its the only aspect that the player can fully control..
Again, it is what it is. I don't understand why stats geeks try and out think themselves so badly on this one.
Exactly. I doubt there are more than a handful of recruits in the history of basketball (in the major conferences anyway) where a recruits FT shooting was a major factor in their recruitment. If there was a solution to this problem, teams would do it. Just can't understand beating this dead horse every year, unless someone has a solution. I wish they did have one.
The alpha batas don't have time for your logic my friend. You have no clue how popular these dudes were in high school.
How can it be "fully controlled"? Where is the player that has hit 100%? Even the best shooters miss sometimes. What is it that goes wrong then? How did they not control it when they missed?
Classic example of overthinking and not allowing it to be what it is.
I'll just add, coaches do not agree with it. They stress the importance over and over. Cal has lost a title due to his team missing them.
Nova went to some sort of modified man to man/ zone. It rattled KU, it put defenders in passing lanes, it confused them.....Self did nothing to counteract the situation, and he was sitting on timeouts.
Turnovers and hurried shots resulted and thus a Nova win.
Turnovers and hurried shots resulted and thus a Nova win.
So, stressing it is the answer? Would that really help our 3 worst FT shooters this year? What goes into this "stressing"? Look, dude, I am just not seeing a solution. Coaches stress a lot of stuff, which goes right out of a player's head during games.
UConn hit close to 80% as a team. Why aren't they still in it?
UConn hit close to 80% as a team. Why aren't they still in it?
I'm not the stat guy, sorry. And why are you getting so heated? It's just a discussion.
Because Uconn got beat in other aspects, it didn't come down to free throws
Come on Silents. It's there brother, it's there.
They have no solution. Because 60 years of evidence points to the fact that there isn't one. 60 years would seem to be pretty conclusive proof that there isn't all that much you can do to improve FT shooting. I think the main thing you could do is recruit fewer big guys. They're the ones who tend to struggle from the FT line, and teams that rack up a 75%+ team FT % are usually teams with an almost complete lack of size. Something tells me that's not quite the right direction to go in.
As for free throw shooting at the end of games, no, that's not really something you can control. What you can control to a certain extent is who ends up taking those FT's. Do a good job of that, and voila, you're hitting all your FT's in tight games.
Ok, this will be my last one on this topic. What is there? The fact that they are important? I agree. Yes it can mean the difference between winning a title and not. That is not a solution though. I really don't think Cal doesn't believe FTs are important. I do believe he makes them practice them. Beyond that, what is he supposed to do? Stop recruiting the best players if they don't hit a good enough percentage? Anyway, that's enough on this. Go ND!!!!!!!
I don't believe Cal wants to miss them, I believe he recruits the types of players that struggle with them (long, lanky, defensive oriented). -----typically. But he wants to make them. Every coach I've ever come on contact with, even the clinics I spoke about paid for by our school, stresses the importance to a stupor. Cal isn't dumb, he knows they are the most important aspect at the end of tight games. Tournmanets? You've got to hit 'em, just look at memphis 2008. This is one of those instances when conventional wisdom should be followed, not these stat geeks who go overboard with their out of the box thinking. (not you), you see them.
I didn't really make this about Cal, but I do believe a Cal team would have struggled to put this particular game away.
You are right. Nova beat Kansas because of it and no one could blame the Nova coach if they had missed. It would have been on the players. Wonder if these guys are gym rats? Read one time that guys like Bird and Bryant would stay for 3 hours after a game shooting foul shots.
They are, and they do spend a lot of time on free throws. Their ayers consistently improve. Ochefu was not a great FT shooter when he arrived. This year he was 80%.
I do find their debate style to be imminently entertaining though. Confusing idiomatic adherence for critical thinking and then patting themselves on the back.
The other amusing aspect is we get to see what a love child between Mike Golic and Ray Ganong might look like.
To me it's not even simply about being able to close out close games. If we're up by 15, and could have won by 25 by hitting free throws through the course of the game, then we should have. Pitino's teams blew out a lot of squads in the 90s by virtue of great free throw shooting.
Cal's offense preaches drawing contact on driving. Why we don't stress the second part of that recipe, making free throws, is beyond me.
Cal's offense preaches drawing contact on driving. Why we don't stress the second part of that recipe, making free throws, is beyond me.
It's because it's an allocation exercise. The amount of practice time available in a given week is a fixed amount. So a big part of Cal's, or any coach's, job is determining how they will allocate that time. Any minute you spend on rebounding is a minute you can't spend on free throws or on defense.
So to decide how to split this, it becomes a matter of deciding where you think you'll get the biggest return. In the case of free throws, you'd have to ask yourself questions like:
- By how many percentage points do we need to raise our average for it to make a difference in our wins and losses?
- Then you need to ask yourself how much practice time will be required to achieve that increase
The problem with free throws is that it takes a very significant amount of practice to raise your percentage a small amount. In that same amount of time, you could've made much greater relative strides in rebounding, defense, etc.
In your example of driving, this focus increases the likelihood that a guard will be shooting free throws. Guards (Briscoe excepted) tend to shoot free throws better. You also gain the benefit of putting the other team's players into foul trouble, which either forces them to be less aggressive or put their best players on the bench. This helps your offense and defense later in the game.
At that point, are you better off spending time practicing free throws or working on defense, rebounding, offense, etc? Given the way those factors impact the game, and the amount of effort it takes to improve them, you're better off not spending too much time on free throws.
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