Drawing Board: A Deep Dive Into UST’s First-Round Performance — The Negatives
By Francis Marvin De Ungria
This is the second part of the article where we take a look into the first-round performance of the UST Growling Tigers. But this time we will focus on the negatives, problems, and issues that the team needs to fix and overcome if they want to improve their performance moving into the second round of play.
If you haven’t read the first part, click here.
We will now take an in-depth look into the numbers about what went wrong for the Growling Tigers, and watch some clips to tell us why.
Credits to Ryan Alba for the offensive and defensive ratings used in the article.
The Offense
Legend: Offensive Rating is a measure of a team’s offensive efficiency or points scored per 100 possessions. Defensive Rating is a measure of a team’s defensive efficiency or points allowed per 100 possessions.
The Growling Tigers currently have the worst offensive rating this season, but a look at the efficiency landscape tells us how bad the offense is. In fact, the league on average will score 2.1 points better if we take away UST’s offensive rating.
In comparison to last season, the offense also regressed, from an 85.3 offensive rating last year to a 77.3 offensive rating this year.
A lot of things can be pointed out as to why this is the case, first off is the three-point shooting.
Teams on the right shoot the three-point shot better, and teams at the top rely on the three-point shot more
*Three-Point Rate = Three-Point Field Goals Attempted / Field Goals Attempted
As seen in the chart, the UST Growling Tigers are currently the worst three-point shooting team in the UAAP and again, by a large margin. The percentage is so bad that teams like FEU and Adamson, who are currently in a shooting slump, are still close to the league-average three-point percentage.
The following table tallies the number of players for each team who shot better than the league average three-point percentage (currently at 16.47 percent)
UST only has five players shooting above league average so far, namely; Richi Calimag, Nic Cabañero, Paul Manalang, Ivan Lazarte, and Miguel Pangilinan.
This is a huge difference to teams who have more capable shooters because three-point shooting is essential in the modern game, and it will be hard for players to drive inside the paint without floor spacers.
Another factor why UST’s offense is this bad can be seen in the next chart.
Open shots generated and assists per game don’t fully capture how good a team’s offensive system is, but it is the two best metrics we have so far.
According to the graph, UST has the least assists per game with 12.1. How bad is it? If we take away UST’s assists per game, NU, Adamson, and FEU will be outliers in that stat.
The Growling Tigers though, are not alone as an outlier in the Open Shots Generated stat as they have 18 while the Tamaraws have 20. Still, this suggests that most of UST’s shots are of poor quality, which may explain the poor field goal percentage (32.9% which is also worst in the UAAP).
In a nutshell, UST just doesn’t shoot the three-point shots well, most probably due to the current personnel, but the execution of the system in place might also be a factor.
The Defense
As we take a look at this chart again, the defensive rating shows that UST is sixth in defense, not bad when compared to UE which is an outlier at the bottom. But for an offense that is miles apart from the competition, you’d expect the defense to at least to be in the upper tier of the league.
A good example is the UE Red Warriors. While they boast the worst defense in the UAAP, they make up for it with their incredible offense as shown in their offensive rating (second best) and their three-point shooting (league-best) which enable them to tie for the fourth spot in the standings.
The NU Bulldogs is another example, while their offensive rating is the second worst in the UAAP, their defensive rating (second best) makes up for it, enabling them to finish third in the standings this season.
By just watching the games, it’s clear that Adama Faye is the defensive anchor for the Growling Tigers. We don’t have an on/off stat yet to prove this but the best evidence we statistically have is the defensive rating of UST when they faced FEU as Adama Faye was suspended.
In that game, UST had a 112 defensive rating which is their worst defensive rating so far this season.
The eye test will also tell us the same thing, without Adama Faye, UST will compete with UE for having the worst defense in the league.
The clips also show that UST basically has no rim protection whatsoever with Faye, but even if he’s on the court, there is another glaring hole in UST’s defense.
Teams generally shot better against UST (second worst in Field Goal Percentage Allowed) and one of the primary reasons is how the corners are defended.
Most of the time, the weak side defenders lose focus on their man. There are also plays where they just didn’t close out too hard. Some of them got lost on rotations and switches while some bigs in the UAAP developed a jumper that exploits Faye who prefers staying in the paint instead of closing out. Whatever the reason is though, UST lacked discipline in defense, and for a team that lacks the offensive firepower, you’d expect them to at least tighten their defense.
Faye is no doubt the lifeline of UST’s defense, but him anchoring the defense alone is not enough. The other four players in the court should also buckle up their matchups, sadly this is not the case.
UST’s point-of-attack defense has been bad so far and the elite point guards in the UAAP took note of this. Notice how easy it is to break down the UST defense even if Faye is there to protect the rim.
Is All Hope Lost?
Well, one thing’s for sure: don’t expect the Growling Tigers to compete for the final four spot. To be frank, getting another win in round number two is a tall task for them, given how talented the other teams are in the UAAP.
What we should look forward to is how the whole team will develop moving forward. Will Cabañero assert himself as not just one of the league’s best scorers, but the best shot-creator for his teammates as well? Will Adama Faye continue to improve every aspect of his game to rival that of Ateneo’s Ange Kouame and UP’s Malick Diouf? How will the veterans approach the next games, will they show signs of improvement to be the third star for UST? Or will the youngsters be the ones to step up and take that initiative?
