Post#18 » by Mirotic12 » Sat Dec 19, 2020 9:58 pm
If you just look at his tactics, Kokoskov is like the EuroLeague head coach version of Giannis trying to play with FIBA rules. He is way too NBA trained to just be thrown into EuroLeague as a head coach. It's totally obvious he was completely unready for the physical play, the true zones being allowed, the hand checking, the refs allowing a lot of contact, etc.
Pitino had a much better grasp of what he needed to do, because he had so many years in the NCAA. Kokoskov, despite being from Europe, is utilizing absolutely zero European tactics or FIBA concepts. It's all NBA style. He's using De Colo as a point guard, which is just stupid, and only something that NBA coaches would do.
An NBA "point guard" just has to beat one man and/or make one move to have a wide open layup or dunk, or they can get a wide open jump shot on literally the vast majority of offensive possessions if they want from screens, they can run that very high NBA style pick and roll that usually has very little, if any at all resistance from the defense, etc.
The only one of those things a point guard can consistently get in EuroLeague is the open looks off screens, and even then, they better have a lightning quick release, otherwise they will probably need multiple screens on every possession, like Mike James and Shane Larkin typically get (the whole offense entirely built just to get them looks), combined with them being able to play as a two guard off the ball and having to do nothing but shoot, being paired with a very competent floor general (Hackett in CSKA and Micic in Efes).
To compound that, Fener doesn't even have a real point guard on the whole roster. It's all just guys that can score and dominate the ball. Dixon is a 5-10 shooting guard, Sipahi and Westermann are SF's that dominate the ball, and Brown is just a classic NBA "point guard" that only has scoring for himself as his offensive skills.
Then they just have off ball guys (Ulanovas, Barthel), some spot shooters (Mahmatoglou, Jarrell), and a big man that can really generally only score in half court as a roll man to the basket (Vesely). Then on defense, it's a clear concept of NBA, of just stick a couple of athletes in the five to "make some athletic plays on defense" (Vesely, Pierre), and then just try to outscore the opponent.
Yeah, that is how it's done a lot in the NBA, but for the most part, that pretty much won't work with EuroLeague rules. Even Coach K and Coach Pop both learned that won't really won't even work with Team USA with those rules, and Team USA never has to face anything nearly as tough as a EuroLeague season.