Rush The Court

After last night’s 79-73 loss to Michigan State at the Champions Classic, Kansas head coach Bill Self lamented his team’s inability to score inside the paint–a staple of Self’s high-low offensive scheme. The Jayhawks astonishingly made just 13 of their 33 layups: “The one thing, in order for us to win big consistently, is we’ve got to be able to score with our back to the basket some,” Self told the media after the game. It’s not the first time he has raised this concern. After nearly every loss last season either Self or one of his players made reference to the team’s inability to play through the team’s bigs and score on the inside.

There’s a cliche for situations like this. The one about insanity being defined as doing the same things over and over and over again, and expecting different results. But nobody likes cliches. They’re overused — a less-than-nuanced way of dealing with a problem. Yet cliches are often accurate, which is really what makes us uncomfortable with them. We don’t want to be perceived as insane, so we dismiss the cliche as irrelevant, overused, or simple. For Self and Kansas, their overwheleming drive to pound the ball into the paint is quite possibly the definition of insanity.

The foremost problem is that the team doesn’t have the necessary personnel to play the high-low style that Self favors. Kansas’ roster this season is nearly identical to the one it fielded last season. Changes were minimal. The Jayhawks lost an NBA lottery pick on the wing in Kelly Oubre, Jr., and they brought in freshman Carlton Bragg to replace the maligned Cliff Alexander. So how did that roster which features big men like Perry Ellis, Jamari Traylor, Landen Lucas, and Hunter Mickelson fare in the paint a year ago? Poorly:

Kansas made just 46 percent of their two-point attempts in 2014-15. Its supposed best post option, Ellis, made only 47 percent of his attempts. Of the team’s players with more than 50 field goal attempts at the rim, Alexander was by far the best option. Lucas, the second most effective post option, finished nearly 10 percentage points behind him at a mediocre 59 percent. Simply put, Kansas’ post options in 2015-16 are not good enough finishers to play Self’s desired offensive style. Put another way, Joel Embiid ain’t walking through that door.

Self grew tired of reporters asking him last season about having his team shoot more threes, even lashing out a bit after the Jayhawks’ embarrassing defeat to Kentucky in the Champions Classic. Since the 2010-11 season, no Kansas team has attempted more than 30 percent of their shots from beyond the arc, including a low of 28.4 percent last year. There are two reasons that starting season is significant. First, it represents Self’s only top 10 offense in the last five years. That group attempted nearly 33 percent of its shots from three-point range and scored 116.2 points per 100 possessions. The second reason it’s significant is that team was upset in the Elite Eight by VCU after missing 19 of its 21 three-point attempts. It’s likely that harrowing memories of that performance have caused Self to label the overemphasis of long-range shots “fool’s gold.”

For four seasons, Self’s offensive system has been stuck in a rut. If the Champions Classic loss to Michigan State is any guide, this season looks to be headed for more of the same. The 2010-11 team worked playing that style because the Jayhawks had three future NBA big men available to draw attention away from the shooters. This season’s roster doesn’t have that same option. Self needs to adjust in order to create a team capable of a deep March run. The good news is that he has his best personnel for doing so in a long time. Brannen Greene and Sviatoslav Mykhailiuk are both quality three-point shooters with requisite length to beat outstretched defenders. Devonte’ Graham and Frank Mason are both good spot-up options as well, and even Ellis made 18 of his 46 chances last season. Finally, there’s Wayne Selden, who made 37 percent of his team-high 126 attempts last year.

By spacing the floor with shooters and operating more out of the pick-and-roll, Kansas would be in position to create one of the best offensive attacks in the country. It’s exactly this type of scheme that powers the NBA’s best offenses and there’s little reason it couldn’t work with Self’s roster this season. But for the venerable head coach to succeed, he’ll have to give up on doing the same things over and over again; something he hasn’t shown a willingness to do so far.