A glance at the box score from Texas A&M’s one-point victory over Florida on Saturday night reveals that it was Aggies forward Kourtney Roberson as the player with the most impressive stat line. The big guy certainly put in an impressive showing, finishing with 20 points and six rebounds in leading his team to the key win, but the game’s MVP did not even play a minute. Rather, the clear star of the evening was Texas A&M head coach Billy Kennedy, who used his whiteboard to draw up a series of highly successful out-of-bounds plays that allowed his team to secure the victory. In this edition of Freeze Frame, we will examine several inbounds plays to understand how Texas A&M got its open looks. Kennedy’s play-calling resulted in a number of valuable easy buckets against the Gators, especially in the game’s final five minutes. For a team that needs every win it can get heading toward Selection Sunday, those instructions gave the Aggies just enough offense to get past Florida and move to 8-4 in conference play.
Billy Kennedy has his Aggies 17-7 (8-4 SEC) and poised to make the NCAA Tournament (AP Photo/Orlin Wagner).
The play shown below from the first half gives us a gauge for how Kennedy has his players lining up on out-of-bounds plays from the baseline. Alex Caruso typically inbounds the ball whenever he is in the game, as the rest of the Aggies line up in a 2-1-1 formation. In this play, Danuel House (#23) moves to set a screen for Roberson at the foul line (#14).
Here is the screen by House. Roberson is the first offensive option as he comes off the screen, but Florida defends him well.
The main action below is a screen-the-screener maneuver for House. Jalen Jones (#12) immediately sets a screen for House as he cuts across the lane and toward the ball.
House receives the ball and rises for a shot. In the process, he draws three Florida defenders, leaving Jones (his screener) to roll open to the basket for an easy dunk or an unchallenged rebound in the event of a miss. Jones was not needed, however, as House sinks the jumper.
Click on the video to watch the full play.
Fast forward to the last five minutes of the game. The Aggies were up by three points, but a Chris Walker block leaves just two seconds remaining on the shot clock. Does this set look familiar to the one outlined above? The Aggies line up the same way, but this time Walker cheats down in front of the basket and leaves Roberson at the free throw line.
House has nobody to screen for Roberson, so he heads straight into the second part of the play, the screen by Jones.
Florida knows the ball is going to House and the Gators stay with him this time (screen grab via ESPN).
Florida adjusts this time around to take away the jumper, but this time Roberson seals off Walker and carves out space for himself under the basket.
Check out the full play in the following video.
The Aggies were now ahead by five, 61-56, with 3:30 left in the game, facing another inbounds play from the baseline with just two seconds left on the shot clock. House has come off the screen in both of the previous sets, so watch how he reacts here (he is circled below in the middle of the paint). Kennedy uses a slightly different formation this time around, making an adjustment to the play.
House makes a cut toward the lane, but nobody is screening his man this time. Kennedy then uses him as a decoy as he heads toward the corner. Meanwhile, Jones screens his own man, sealing off the defender in the lane.
House takes his defender with him to the corner. Jones seals off his defender and Roberson posts his man up as well, leaving a rather sizable space for senior Jordan Green to operate.
Green cuts into the lane and receives the ball from Caruso. He has an open jumper but misses the easy look.
Kennedy drew up the play to get the easy look, but the shot doesn’t go down. He used House to remove a Florida defender from the play and Jones to seal off an open lane. Check out the full play in this video.
Florida ranks 351st (or dead last) nationally in team luck, according to Ken Pomeroy’s rankings. The luck rating is an invention of the godfather of analytics, Dean Oliver. What exactly is luck, you might ask? On Pomeroy’s website, he says, “essentially, a team involved in a lot of close games should not win (or lose) all of them. Those that do will be viewed as lucky (or unlucky).” After reviewing A&M’s inbounds plays and Florida’s shaky interior defense, perhaps #TeamBadLuck just gave up too many easy points in the paint in this one. Whatever you believe, efficient inbounds plays, and a little luck here and there, have Kennedy’s Texas A&M Aggies trending toward the right side of the bubble.