When you are playing against a complete roster of players that can dribble, shoot or pass, it places tremendous pressure on your defense to be good. The defense RU played was excellent all game.
The factors of Kiss and Thiam are not isolated to whether they turned the ball over themselves or had a breakdown, it comes down to whether either player is also able to dribble shoot or pass.
Neither player is able to generate offense with all 3 elements and when that happens, it places more emphasis on the opponent to focus elsewhere.
This game was more about not having a complete roster of 3 dimensional players that can place pressure on an Iowa or Illinois.
Zone offense....i would suggest a player like Mulcahy next year to be a wing player against a zone that can allow his size at 6'5 to 6'6", to be the player that flashes to high post. We had Myles there, because he's our best big man to pass, but he's not going to face the defense, square and shoot 12 to 15 footer....Or take a dribble and kick out to a shooter.
If a Mulcahy or Harper is in that spot vs a zone, that player can attack with a pass, shot or dribble to make the defense react. And having another guard like Young eliminates the unforced errors in handling the pressure defense with silly turnovers that Iowa really didn't earn offensively.
The other factor is better suited for a separate thread, but it comes down to AD Pat Hobbs....when there is a pattern, a very clear pattern of bad calls or 50/50 calls constantly going against your Head Coach, the solution isn't asking your Head Coach to give away 2 free points and the ball with a Technical Foul.
Hobbs as an AD needs to contribute by contacting the B1G office or send a specific message on Social Media or Twitter to shed light on the referees and RU games. The amount of attention that was drawn to Kentucky losing to LSU on Tuesday night wasn't about Kentucky's lack of execution down the stretch of the game, wasn't about their breakdowns of allowing open 3s.
The focus was driven towards a blown call, which didn't cost Kentucky the game...if they waive that tip in, the game goes to OT and Kentucky at home probably wins anyway. Instead, the entire program talked about how faulty the refs were.
Human nature reacts to noise and focus and Hobbs should issue a statement outlining the lack of calls to support his program, his head coach and the players rebuilding this program. If he does that, it will spread quickly in our media market and place pressure or focus on the referees assigned to the rotation of RU games.
There has to be some attention placed on the referees beyond the in game workings during the game. Referees do have an idea on who should win a game, to say they don't is false. It does impact how a 50/50 call goes.
This will slow down the amount of bogus calls constantly going against RU. I could see these calls going against RU if this game was in Iowa City, but at home, RU seemingly gets very few calls.
Doing this now or Monday will cut down on those things vs Minnesota and Penn State at the RAC and force the refs to call a fair game at Iowa and Indiana.
The difference is not asking 18 to 22 year olds to play better or micromanage the FT shooting or mistakes....if anything, Iowa was forced into turnovers and with a better whistle, RU wins by a fair margin of 4 to 7 points.
