Play making and decision making

Last week´s Eurocup game left us with an ambigious feeling regarding the rest of Alba´s season; after tonight, it seems that pesimism becomes the dominant feeling when trying to figure the chances of the blue-yellow team from Berlin to make something significant in their european season. Yes, the defeat against Limoges is not significant. Because if losing by only 6 points, Alba will finish the table above the french. But tonight´s game in the Mercedes Benz Arena revealed, again, some disturbing problems with Aito´s team.

Limoges came well prepared to this match. They did great preperation for stopping Luke Sikma, acknowledging his contribution to Alba´s offence as a point-forward. So Sikma received traps and double ups from his weak side, making him stuck in the corner or at the base line. He finished the game with a poor 2-6 assists-turnovers ratio. Here is the first point of concern: now everyone know how Sikma can be slowed down. And Alba´s basketball IQ suffers when it happens.

Nevertheless, the berliners were able to reach the half time with a small lead, mainly due to 45% from behind the arch, and just 25% from the french side. The breakdown came at the third quarter, as Limoges used their athletic superiority to play a stright up, aggressive defence with pressure on the ball (half court). Usually this is the point when Payton Siva gets wild and does his magic, but without him, the albatrosses stuggeld.

In the first quarter the offence flowing quickly, so the lack of a playmaker was not critical. As much as the offensive pace of Alba was being slowed down, the need of an "offence master" was becoming clear. Aito tried what he had - Grigonis at some point was a medicore solution; Peno was not as good as the statistics show, as he himself slowed down the offence with over dribbling. But the other guards were a disaster when it came to decision making. Hundt, Saibou and Butterfield played almost 59 minutes combined. They had 5-8 assists-turnovers ratio, and 5 RKG. Combined. The third quarter, when Aito experimented Hundt as a play maker, finished with 29-2 for Limoges in the RKG. Here is the second point of concern: Alba does not have a reliable play maker beside Siva. They cover it up well when playing a fast game, but it comes out on the set offence.

And one more thing: Yes, Aito is a great coach who did a lot in the european basketball. Yes, he is the right man for Alba after the nightmarish last season. However, his game managing tends to be over conservative. Tonight he made some bad decision. It is not just playing with young, short, athletic inferior Hundt as PG for 13 minutes. most of them in the money time. It is not just forgetting Schneider on the bench (9 points without a miss in 6:30 minutes in the first half; received just 2 more minutes in the second. Aito said later it has to do with internal dynamic). Aito did not try anything out of the box - even when things were not going well, even when he had nothing to lose. Something like a small ball without a center, which can speed up the game and add basketball IQ to the court. Here is the third point of concern: Aito avoid risks, or out of the box solutions. When your talent is limited, you have to take those risks, otherwise you will bump into your glass ceiling.

And a bonus point of concern: just like we saw last week, Alba is still not defending well against the pick´n´roll.

But than again, looking at the other groups, maybe Aito is more sophisticated than I tought: perhaps he aims at finishing 3rd, which will paradoxically will allow an easier group at the next stage. After all, winning next week agains Rytas and finishing 2nd means playing in the next round against the mighty Bayern Munich.

#Eurocup #AlbaBerlin #Limoges