Good questions and observations MU. I of course don't have many answers but wanted to opine that there obviously must be a strong method to Coach Kim's "madness".
As far as substitutions I have observed the early mass substitutions of 4 or 5 players even before the squad on the floor has time to accomplish much. This may be a method of "warming people up" or even sending a message to the other team that the Herd is a show of force. As the game wears on - how should I politely put it - our more effective players get more minutes and the substitutions go down in the number of actual players or at least contain more of our top 8 or 9.
As far as open looks from 8 to 10 feet that you have mentioned, I cannot tell how open they really are. Certainly some of the shots would be challenged. Mark Martin pointed out that we have the 3 of the top 4 3-pt shooters in the SBC by percentage in Oscar, Ace, and Beewoman ( if I am not mistaken ). The 3-pointer is a wea-pon if you consider that 33% from 3 is about equal to 50% from inside the arc, and as a team Herdzone had us at 34% or 34.1% as a team. Pretty darn good IMHO. Point being Coach Kim is stressing that we should be passing it around until we get an open look from 3 or Ace decides to drive the lane.
Difficult for me to even try to weigh in on the early season. ESPN+ archives only goes back a few weeks so even in my fixation on MU WBB I am too late to try to analyze the early season. Our woes were probably a combination of quite a few things. Especially when a 17-25 ( depending on point in time ) PPG player is removed. Our press requires a lot of practice and in-game experience to get right. Even when it is clicking we are still going to give up a lot of easy baskets which used to bother the heck out of me. On the season we are being outshot by several percentage points but with the 3-pointer and getting a lot more opportunities due to turnovers we still have a 13+ PPG scoring margin.
Recently ( not Senior Night ) Lawhorne was inserted and shot an airball from the corner. Then, she was left in no-man's land at midcourt setting up for the press as her "man" streaked to the basket for an easy over the top score and that was the only minute Lawhorne played. I am not sure at all that that was her assignment / "fault". I think she is taller and more talented than several in the rotation but Coach Kim is obviously in-focus on our system and Lawhorne really hasn't had the minutes to really excel in it for some reason.
I would like to see players like Maier and Scott run the baseline in the half-court and get an opposite low post screen from the likes of Redwoman, Biscuit, and Alicia Hayes. We may need something like that to get better looks for the three as the level of comp rises later this season. Other than that I think it almost like magic how we unselfishly move the basketball and there almost always seems to be someone open at the end of the shot clock. All of our players are usually playing within themselves and taking shots that they have a high chance of making.
Just my thoughts.
congrats for a great first-year regular season coaching job, including putting together a good combination of players/personalites and probably staff, as well.
there are some questions i'd like someone to ask (maybe better suited for when the sesaon has concluded)-
When the ball gets down in the paint, whether by pass or dribble, when is there a green light to shoot and when is it a red light, meaning, pass it back out to the perimeter? The reason I ask is that many times it looks to me like the best descision or option might be to take the shot. Most of the time, i'm referring to within about 5 to 7 ft of the basket. One too many passes sometimes or not?
Why do you make substitutions at aprox the one-minute mark of every game? Why so early in the game, before anybody even has a chance to warm up? Routine consistency? It's not that it's not working or really matters i guess, just curiousity.
Is the difference between the OOC record and the SBC record this year a reflection of the time it takes to figure out a new team or is it the difference in level of competition? Is it a combination of those and possibly more factors such as being a first-year D1 coach?
i'd like to see some other good questions- put to a good coach who doesn't make snide remarks and alienate the questioner?