Thoughtfulness | A team that can only score 60 points in a game does not deserve to win

In the second round of the Basketball World Cup group stage, the Chinese men's basketball team finally defeated South Sudan 69-89, and the two consecutive defeats put themselves in a dilemma. Throughout the game, the men's basketball team performed very poorly on the offensive end, and in the international arena, with only 69 points, it is impossible to win.

Written by 丨From one dozen to five

Editor丨 Feng Xiao

Even with early awakening, a sense of despair swept through.

This sense of despair stems from the habitual "poverty attack" of the Chinese men's basketball team. From the warm-up game, offense has been the boss of the Chinese men's basketball team, and it is difficult to score more than 60 points in a single game.

In the warm-up game, 3-6, the Chinese men's basketball team scored 80 points in only two games, against Egypt and Cape Verde. Playing Croatia (64 and 61 points), Italy (61 points), Germany (58 points), New Zealand (69 points), Serbia (64 points), the Chinese men's basketball team all scored less than 70 points.

It is also based on such data observation and years of experience that in Tencent's basketball World Cup live broadcast room, commentator Yang Yi drew a life and death line on whether the men's basketball team can win: if the Chinese men's basketball team scores more than 70 points, it is hoped to win the game. However, what happened, as you can see, the men's basketball team still failed to cross this line in the end.

In the first two games of the World Cup group stage, the Chinese men's basketball team scored only 63 and 69 points respectively. After losing to Serbia by 42 points and then to South Sudan by 20 points, the Chinese men's basketball team qualified for the group was worried, and the hope of getting an Olympic ticket became increasingly slim.

In the new era, it is no longer realistic to desperately press the rhythm and fight defense like the 2004 NBA championship Pistons, and "offense is the best defense" is no longer just a slogan shouted by teams that pursue firepower, but a basketball concept common to strong teams.

Simply put, in the context of modern basketball progressing at the speed of light and increasingly strong offense, simple defense is too passive. In the NBA, teams that score 100 or even 110 points in a game have a hard time winning. In the international arena, a team that can only score 60 points in a game does not deserve to win, not to mention the Chinese men's basketball team, and even the French men's basketball team, the runner-up of the previous Olympic Games with former best defensive player Gobert.

How bad is men's basketball offense?

Before the collapse of the fourth quarter, the defensive strategy of the Chinese men's basketball team was very targeted, and the key work that could be predicted before the game was done and basically done.

Compared with the first game against Serbia, the Chinese men's basketball team reduced the number of errors to 11, the error rate dropped from 27.4% to 17%, and the error delivery point dropped from 39 points to 15 points. For a big mistake player like the Chinese men's basketball team, this tactic and execution are commendable.

——The Chinese men's basketball team defended Carrick Jones, the key man, most of the time, Jones scored 21 points, 6 assists, shooting 46.7%, compared with the previous game with 54.5% shooting rate of 35 points and 11 assists, its lethality is significantly reduced. Before replacing Zhou Qi in the fourth quarter to play a small lineup, the Chinese men's basketball team limited its two-point shooting to 0-of-5, and Zhou Qi's defense rate was extremely high, and Jones could only score by making strong three-point shots.

The cruel truth is that on the surface, the Chinese men's basketball team has lost 89 points, 16 points less than the 105 points when playing Serbia. But did the Chinese men's basketball team prevent South Sudan? The defensive efficiency of 137.3 points shows that instead of defending, it is worse than when playing Serbia, who scored 137.1 points per 100 rounds. South Sudan's ultra-high three-point crosshairs and production on 15-of-30 shooting, ultra-low turnovers, good secondary offensive output and free throws directly increased their offensive efficiency, making the Chinese men's basketball team's 89-point loss a false impression of defensive success.

The Chinese men's basketball team has done everything that should be done and can be done on the defensive end, and it is a matter of style that cannot prevent the opponent's three-point sense from playing at a high level. When you can't prevent it, you can't fight back by attacking, and the key node attack is dumb, which is a pure ability problem.

After the golden generation, the decline in the basic skills of the Chinese men's basketball team is an indisputable fact, and this fact is more cruel than expected. Mistakes in external passes, mistakes in holding the ball and losing the ball, Zhou Qi and Cui Yongxi's empty basket iron, Zhou Qi's free throws, and the team's free throw shooting rate of 62%, these are all manifestations of poor basic skills.

But in fact, with the advancement of modern basketball, the concept of "basic skills" is also enriched, holding the ball and shooting, catching and throwing in the movement, inside players receiving the ball directly and quickly handling the ball, etc., these have also been integrated into the concept of "basic skills", and the vision of the Chinese men's basketball team is still stuck in the old version, and even the requirements of the old version are not done well, and the problem of concept and ability coexist.

How can modern basketball increase points quickly and efficiently? One relies on three points, the other relies on the basket attack, and the third relies on counterattack, which is the so-called "magic ball three-board axe". The magic ball has the disadvantages of the magic ball, but the power of the magic ball to protect the lower limit of the attack is still obvious. Unfortunately, none of the three weapons of the Chinese men's basketball team is sharp enough. Shooting 8 3-pointers with 40% of the crosshairs is already an over-the-top performance, scoring 0 points on fast break and failing 22 points in the box.

The World Cup has played so far, there are 19 games where a team scored no more than 75 points, when a team scored no more than 75 points, 19 games were defeated, not to mention the Chinese men's basketball team, even France, which advocates defense and once relied on defense to suppress the American men's basketball team, is no exception.

Why is tactical literacy so poor?

In the first quarter of the match against South Sudan, 8 minutes and 40 seconds, the Chinese men's basketball team executed a signature positional battle tactic.

Zhou Peng grabbed the backcourt rebound and did not directly advance, in line with the principle of not blindly pushing the rhythm and not making mistakes, Zhou Peng handed the ball to Zhao Rui. When Zhao Rui held the ball past halftime, there were 18 seconds left in the attacking time.

Zhou Peng picked up and passed the ball back to Zhao Rui. Zhao Rui and Zhou Qi blocked and cooperated with the sideline ball, and Zhou Qi received the ball and distributed it to Zhang Zhenlin on the weak side. Zhang Zhenlin stumbled to form a shot with 2 seconds left in the attack, and his shot was a forced shot.

The pace of the first half is too slow, the ball is stopped after the half, the time to launch effective tactics is too late, and the tactical execution is not clear, and the result is that the attack time is often less than 2 seconds left when shooting.

The offensive presses the rhythm, and with a full 24 seconds of offensive time, each team will, which reduces mistakes and suppresses the opponent's counterattack. But specific to the Chinese men's basketball team, the highlighted problems are poor tactical literacy, too rigid offense, and stuttering tactical execution.

This is caused by many reasons -

Jordjevic is a typical European coach, emphasizing the implementation of tactics at a glance, not allowing blind plays, and the position and running position of other players after the defender after half time should be according to tactics. Unlike many NBA coaches, Jordjevic places less emphasis on "early offense."

The national players have long played with attacking foreign players with the ball, and there are very few scenes to handle the ball. Zhao Rui and Zhao Jiwei also prefer weak side ball carriers, and strikers and interior players mostly play sapper type or endpoint. When multitasking is required, the CPU configuration cannot keep up.

Li Kyle joined the team late as the outside core, and the team's run-in time was too short. Zhou Qi has not played high-intensity regular matches for a long time, and his inner core state is average. Coach Jordjevic's coaching time is too short, the squad configuration and rotation are not clear enough, and the second squad with Zhao Jiwei and Wang Zhelin on the field at the same time is a typical failure.

The source of the offensive problem

Jordjevic is a world-class coach, but Jordjevic cannot play the savior in the Chinese men's basketball team. There are some root causes that cannot be solved by coaches.

At its peak, the Chinese men's basketball team was mainly internal, with Yao Ming, Wang Zhizhi, Yi Jianlian and other internal killers, and any coach would take the inside as the core. Including when Jorjevic coached Serbia, he also pursued the principle of focusing on the inside and combining the inside and the outside.

But the world of basketball is evolving, "low-post offense is inefficient" has become a universal philosophy (unless you own Jokic), and there are more and more space-based centers. Coupled with the fact that Zhou Qi is not a low-post attacking interior lineman, Wang Zhelin's low-post attack and confrontation ability cannot be won in the international arena, and Giordjevic has abandoned the traditional inside-based concept of Chinese basketball.

The problem is that the Chinese men's basketball team does not connect with the world, the ability to block and dismantle + space road, modern basketball standard ball holding shot, moving catch shot, these are equivalent to high configuration for the Chinese men's basketball team. It is no wonder that many people shout "envy of the Japanese men's basketball team", and the projection ability is one of the techniques that is most unrestricted by race and physique.

The Chinese men's basketball team naturalized Li Kyle this year, but even if Li Kyle has played point guard since he was a child, even if he scored 22 points in a battle with South Sudan, and the ball possession rate of more than 37% reached the standard of the big core of the ball, but because it is neither a low-position offensive type nor a block-and-dismantle ball-holding strong attack type, there is a gap between the help that Li Kyle brings to the Chinese men's basketball team and the naturalized guard in the conventional sense. In the end, as Yang Ming said, if you want to choose between a low-post offensive type and an outside blocking and strong attack type, the Chinese men's basketball team should choose the latter, but Li Kyle is somewhere in between.

Therefore, the offensive execution of the Chinese men's basketball team is in an awkward middle ground, full of entanglements and contradictions. For a while, the Chinese men's basketball team would give the ball to Li Kaier or guards, but no one could create a good opportunity with blocking. For a while, the Chinese men's basketball team will deliver the ball low, but Zhou Qi and Wang Zhelin's backs can't make many chances, and Wang Zhelin's breakthrough dunk and Cui Yongxi's two follow-up catch-up passes are the only highlights.

For example, Jordjevic arrived with the idea of solving college problems, but he took over the Chinese men's basketball team that only needed to improve its grades to cope with the college entrance examination at the high school level. In a short period of time, ideas cannot solve the root problem.

epilogue

After two consecutive defeats in the group stage, the Chinese men's basketball team still has the hope of getting an Olympic ticket in theory, but the Chinese men's basketball team does not have control over its own destiny. Whether or not it can enter the Olympics, the Chinese men's basketball team should recognize the reality.

What Chinese basketball needs is a short-term, little by little concrete effort, and don't believe in the so-called corner overtaking. Greatness is born out, this is in line with the law, and only long-term ism can bring due results.

This path to rise is difficult, but it has to be taken.