I've seen a lot written about the offensive side of the ball, the analytics, and the better shooting percentage guys.

Do you expect us to defend well? What's our style?

halfastros81 said:

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Full court press most of the game.

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Shaka Smart had his "Havoc Defense" at VCU. I think it was referred to as "94 feet of Hell"? Something like that. It was effective until teams figured out how to break the press.

I have been wondering the same thing. Playing "run-and-gun" on offense and then turning around and playing a full court press is going to be hard on the players.

It will be interesting to see how it comes together.

ABM

Defense is definitely the more interesting side of the ball to me. I'm confident we're going to be very good on offense. This is probably an oversimplification but I think it's going to come down to whether his style of defense can continue to force turnovers at a high rate without fouling.

While scheme-wise his defenses could not look more different than Buzz's, some of the end goals are similar, and when it breaks down it's for the same reasons.

We want to speed people up, make them take shots they're uncomfortable with, and create turnovers. As a result, just like against us, teams shoot a lot of threes against Samford. But one thing we did really well that Samford hasn't done well, is they fouled a lot.

You can live with a higher foul rate than normal if you're also creating a lot of turnovers (especially if you're scoring on those turnovers) and/or your opponent is shooting around 30% or worse from three.

halfastros81 said:

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His question could have been worded better like "what will the defensive approach be under Bucky" but my answer wasn't sarcastic. That's what they are going to do.

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My response had nothing to do with your post.

I will go ahead and go one step further. Scheme-wise, I think down the road we'll be fine on defense. I think if Bucky had the roster exactly the way he wanted it that it's possible we'd be a pretty good defensive team. Like his year four Samford team was a solid defensive team.

But with this roster I fully expect that we're going to be pretty bad defensively from an efficiency standpoint.

halfastros81 said:

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His question could have been worded better like "what will the defensive approach be under Bucky" but my answer wasn't sarcastic. That's what they are going to do.

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I'm not sure about an actual "press". Maybe. But I think it's more likely full court pressure. Not necessarily overselling but making the opposition work on every possession. That 40 minutes of hell Arkansas ran under Richardson worked then because it was new. I guess it might still be interesting but I think it's too well understood now.

I say he's gonna be a 6th man to bring some firepower off the bench, but some guys here are thinking that he is starter from Day 1. I dunno. But yes, Dominguez will play.

Full court press vs full court pressure … potatoe or potato

Man to man vs some sort of zone trapping system … probably be a mix is my guess

The point on Free throw rate is a good one. I hadn't thought of it that way. The other thing I'm really interested to see is how well we rebound.

Bucky's teams at Samford have caused a lot of turnovers (top 20 nationally in TO% forced the last two years) but really bad in defensive rebounding percentage and Free throw rate (both in the 300s nationally). And overall not particularly good on the defensive end.

BYU was the lowest defensive rated team with an at large bid last year at #82 (9th in Offensive Efficiency).

You have to figure the turnovers caused leads to scoring more points tho. The games are going to be higher scoring. Whether or not that leads to more W's and better tourney performance… only time will tell .

If you watch highlights of their game against Sparty, it's one of the more unique defensive styles I've seen. Definitely a pressing style all the way up the court.

They dominated the first 10 minutes of that game. Sparty had just 9 points in the first 13 minutes

This has very little to do with us (and is old news to most of you), but there's a Division III school that plays all-out full court press, shoot 3's as fast as you can, crash the offensive glass, and sub in 5 at a time every 60 seconds. They had a kid score 138 points in a game a few years ago. They are moderately successful at actually winning games.

For those who are less lazy than me did they figure him out last season?

I think they mostly just got NIL'd last season. They lost like six of their best players to bigger schools. It's gonna be hard for a school like Samford to recover from that.

There's a reason why there are so few examples since the 90s of press d teams making the final 4.

I haven't studied Bucky's offense yet, but do remember the Loyola of Marymount hectic, fast pace in the 80s under Paul Westhead (all offense, all gas...very little defense per say) and they made some nice runs back then (pun intended).

https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/offense/paul-westhead-fast-break-offense.html

Of course, LMU/Westhead had Hank Gathers. Think that LMU vs UNLV game back in the day was fun (with Larry Johnson at UNLV).

90ags said:

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I haven't studied Bucky's offense yet, but do remember the Loyola of Marymount hectic, fast pace in the 80s under Paul Westhead (all offense, all gas...very little defense per say) and they made some nice runs back then (pun intended).

https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/offense/paul-westhead-fast-break-offense.html

Of course, LMU/Westhead had Hank Gathers. Think that LMU vs UNLV game back in the day was fun (with Larry Johnson at UNLV).

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i have thought of the same thing. i remember watching those games as a kid. don't forget about bo kimble for LMU and stacey augmon from UNLV. what was the final score of that games 145-125. fun times

And Greg Anthony at UNLV....UNLV used to stack the teams before NIL as they paid their version of NIL (ahead of their time I suppose ).

SeattleAg05 said:

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I've seen a lot written about the offensive side of the ball, the analytics, and the better shooting percentage guys.

Do you expect us to defend well? What's our style?

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I really do see a lot of similarities to Bama as has been mentioned by many and even Bucky himself stating there is a similarity in their styles.

Defensive buy in to Bucky's style is what will determine our success. I'm not worried about scoring next year but being able to defend and rebound is what will determine if we are good or just mediocre

Offensively, for sure, I don't know that we're going to look much like them defensively.

But Alabama doesn't force a ton of turnovers and they definitely don't create many steals.

Rankings the last five years in stl%:
Alabama: 320th, 181st, 279th, 156th
Samford: 10th, 9th, 45th, 102nd

Alabama focuses a lot more on closing out on shooters and setting up their transition off the rebound.

Part of that reason is very few teams do it but there is an example of a team that did it and won a national title as well.

Bucky McMillan on @TheFieldOf68 on forcing turnovers through full court defense: "Many coaches don't think you can pick up on the other side of half court and play full court defense. We dang sure know we can. We want to be an A+ in all four phases of basketball."

— TexAgs (@TexAgs) June 25, 2025

LawHall88 said:

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Bucky McMillan on @TheFieldOf68 on forcing turnovers through full court defense: "Many coaches don't think you can pick up on the other side of half court and play full court defense. We dang sure know we can. We want to be an A+ in all four phases of basketball."

— TexAgs (@TexAgs) June 25, 2025

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He's the guy. Might not be this season, but he's going to take us further than we've ever been.

90ags said:

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I haven't studied Bucky's offense yet, but do remember the Loyola of Marymount hectic, fast pace in the 80s under Paul Westhead (all offense, all gas...very little defense per say) and they made some nice runs back then (pun intended).

https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/offense/paul-westhead-fast-break-offense.html

Of course, LMU/Westhead had Hank Gathers. Think that LMU vs UNLV game back in the day was fun (with Larry Johnson at UNLV).

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The zenith was when they beat Michigan 148 - 115 in the NCAA tourney in 1990 after Gathers died. UNLV blew out Loyola Marymount in the Elite 8, but nobody could play with them that season. However, as dominant as they were, they had a close call against Ball State in the 3rd round before trucking LMU, and eventually Duke by 30 in the national championship game. If Ball State had won that game, maybe LMU would have won the title. Also of note, after LMU destroyed Michigan, Alabama slowed them down, and much like UNLV, LMU escaped the Sweet 16 with a 2 point win, 62 -60.

Regarding Westhead, his teams were legendary for starting the season on the track with conditioning.

The current team people are thinking of is Redlands.

Another footnote is that Troy State's coach became a Westhead disciple, leading to the highest scoring game in history, a 258 (or 253?) - 141 victory over DeVry University. I first learned about DeVry in the mid-70's when they would send you a TV to assemble if you signed up for class. My dad and his buddy signed up and never attended, but got a tv to put together. It was terrible.