Collins’ Classroom: Youth Movement

Note: This column was written before Northwestern’s game against Washington on Saturday, 1/31. For analysis of that game, come back next Friday for another edition of Collins’ Classroom.

Northwestern’s underclassmen led the way against both UCLA and Penn State with varying degrees of success. Nick Martinelli was obviously the feature against the Nittany Lions with 34 points, the young guys did just about everything right in a resounding 21-point win. Angelo Ciaravino had a season-high 20 and made both of his three point attempts. Tre Singleton put together his finest performance of the year, with 17 points on 70% shooting and a career-high 18 rebounds. Jake West displayed his playmaking abilities with 13 assists to a singular turnover. Tyler Kropp didn’t pop on the box score, but his and Singleton’s play at the five reduced Arrinten Page to a mere three minutes in the Penn State game.

Offense

Offense was the story of both games (in different ways), so we’ll start there.

This is from right in the middle of Northwestern’s 10-plus minute field goal drought in the second half against UCLA. The video starts at 14 seconds because the possession started at 20, and West dribbled around for five seconds. Northwestern gets into their empty side pick and roll, one of their favorite actions in recent weeks and one we’ve discussed at length in this column. This time, Green takes one dribble and swings it across. The ball makes its way to West, who tries the other side in an empty side pick and roll with Martinelli. That doesn’t work either. The ball hops around the perimeter and ends up in a West step back airballed three from NBA range as the shot clock expires.

Two things don’t happen in this possession. First, the ball never makes it inside the three point line. Not once was anyone a serious threat to put up a shot or get to the rim. Nobody even looked to drive. Second, the ball didn’t make it into Martinelli’s hands with time to make a move. Usually, when Northwestern has a bad possession, it is up to Nicky Buckets to bail them out. He doesn’t touch the ball here with enough time to do his signature back down into a flipper, so the shot is a much lower percentage West step back instead.

This was my favorite Northwestern possession of the week. On the surface, it starts with a Martinelli post up, but there’s some nuance to it. Jordan Clayton gets on the left block as if to set a flex screen that Martinelli would rub off of towards the left block. Singleton stares down Reid to sell that action. Then, Singleton flips towards Ciaravino’s side, which activates the sophomore guard to come up the wing to receive the pass. At the same time, Martinelli swims into a right block post up. At times, the ‘Cats have struggled with clean post entries to Martinelli but I really enjoyed this one.

Once he makes the catch, Martinelli is immediately doubled. He does a good job to dribble away from the double and bring defenders with him. Singleton had gone to set a down screen for Clayton but instead slips behind the defense. The pass skips Gelo and goes straight to Clayton, who rifles one into Singleton behind the play. Singleton gets the easy deuce and the action worked so well that Reid would’ve had a wide open three if Clayton had decided to throw it to the corner. Running a play well enough to get one look that open is hard enough, but to get two means a lot has to go right.

There’s not a lot to break down in this play, but it’s a good one and one I’m frankly surprised Northwestern hasn’t used more often. West, Singleton and Kropp roll into a horns set at the top, meaning that both Singleton and Kropp are potential screeners for West and he can decide which way to go. He elects to give to Singleton and then catch the pass moving around Kropp’s screen to the right. The horns set, though, is just a disguise to get into an elevator screen for Max Green. Green slides between Kropp and Singleton, who slide together to cut off all defenders like elevator doors closing in someone’s face (hence the name). It’s the first time Northwestern has successfully run Green through an elevator screen all year, which is a bit surprising because the dual screen is a good fit schematically with Green’s slow but pinpoint release. He has trouble getting a shot off quickly which is why he rarely shoots when curling off of floppy action, but the elevator screen buys him an extra second, which leads to a buried triple.

Mostly included this clip because Ciaravino had three or four rim-punishing dunks in the PSU game, and this was the most impressive one by far. He is an unbelievably skilled offensive rebounder, something I haven’t given enough attention to, so I thought I’d break it down here. Watch Ciaravino charge in from the weak side wing, and get his body into Freddy Dilione. Without extending his arms into a shove and offensive foul, Ciaravino slowly bullies Dilione into the paint and keeps him off balance. When the ball comes off the rim, Ciaravino is in a much better leaping position, so he explodes to grab the rebound from over Dilione, pounds one dribble and slams it home.

Defense

Just one defensive clip to break down today, since the offense was so prominent in both games.

The main reason this is the clip is to highlight Tyler Kropp, but shoutouts must be given to Ciaravino and Singleton for great on-ball defense. When you watch this clip, I want you to follow Tyler Kropp the entire time. On the initial drive, Kropp is in good help defense without losing the tag on his man, the much larger Ivan Juric. He is able to help deter a layup attempt and not give up an alley-oop on the weak side. The ball makes it back to the perimeter and Juric comes to set a screen. In recent weeks, this column has broken down how Page has struggled in ball screen actions because of his tendency to be late on the scene and over play whatever coverage Northwestern is in. Kropp does a good job of hedging without taking himself out of the play, allowing him to recover easily. While staying between his man and the ball, Kropp then plants himself in the lane, doesn’t over-help to leave Juric open, and walls up for the block attempt. As far as center defense goes, it doesn’t get better than that.

Coach Collins’ Clip of the Week

For the first time maybe all season, there were a plethora of Collins clips to choose from. The most controversial play for Northwestern this week came at the end of the UCLA game, when Max Green got hemmed in near the Northwestern bench and tried to call timeout. The timeout wasn’t granted and Green was stripped, leading to a crucial turnover in the final three minutes of a fairly close game.

Immediately after the aforementioned missed timeout, Northwestern comes down and calls timeout (again). You can see Collins bellow “TIME OUT” at the top of his lungs before the camera cuts to a tight shot of his signature ref stare down. He holds it for a few seconds and then says “That’s really bad.” The camera briefly cuts away before coming back to Collins confronting one of the refs, explaining how Green was calling timeout and pointing to the spot. (He also makes a big show of calling another timeout a few possessions later.)

What I love is the two assistant coaches monitoring the interaction. They know that Collins is heated and while they don’t say anything or get involved, they’re in place in case Collins dials up his anger another few notches. Picture perfect assistant coaching, no notes.