Anytime you cover an exhibition game, you have to have a “purpose” because of how one-sided the games usually are. So when I drove through horrid DC area traffic getting from Virginia to College Park, MD, I had plenty of time to think about what my “purpose” would be.
There were a few that crossed my mind. First it was Fatts Russell and how he would fit in with Ayala? That could be one of the best backcourts in the Big Ten. I also thought about taking a look at Maryland’s man to man defense. That idea quickly dissipated when I thought about Fayetteville State’s roster and how Big Ten it isn’t. This was really my first up close look at the freshmen in a game situation. Meh… who knows how much they’ll play during the regular season.
I sighed as I took a look at Waze and it said it was going to take me 40 minutes to go between 10 and 11 miles. That’s when I stopped avoiding the obvious and decided I would focus on Qudus Wahab and take a look at the differences (and similarities) between how he was used at Georgetown and how he would be used at Maryland.
Of course, I knew Maryland head coach, Mark Turgeon, would run plays out of the vanilla portion of his playbook so I was only going to get so much but heck, it would be better than nothing.
To be honest things started off looking very Hoya-ish. Wahab was anchored in the post. The Terps had the ball at the elbow extended with a player in the corner. That would discourage the defense from sending a double. It’s hard to tell how many teams in the Big Ten will feel a need to double Wahab but we will see if teams double simply to see if he can recognize the open man/cutter and, more importantly, get the ball to him.
In the first half, there were times the ball handler missed Wahab on early touch possibilities. That could be where Wahab could be the most effective once they get into conference season.
When they did get it to him on those touches, it was deja vu. He was stripped by a smaller guy on his first touch. There was another time where a smaller guy was able to root him off the top of the box. When he received the pass, the defense doubled at Wahab recognized the cutter but the spacing was off. The ball bounced off the cutter’s chest and went back to Wahab where he got fouled and scored (he missed the free throw).
Where he was most effective was rim running. The Terps did a very good job looking for Wahab when he ran to the front of the rim in transition.
There was one play in the first half that was… well… different. Wahab set a ball screen at the top and, instead of rolling, he went opposite to set a stagger screen. That made me scratch my head a bit.
In the second half he was much more aggressive despite the first play of the half when Wahab got a good early post with his man on his hip and Donta Scott looked right at him and didn’t give him the ball.
After that there was an aggressive dive on a screen and roll with Russell followed by a physical offensive rebound that was finished with a two-handed dunk.
Russell would find Wahab again on penetration. Wahab got to the front of the rim and soon as his man went over to help on the Russell drive. More importantly, Wahab had his hands ready to catch a low bounce pass into the lane where he finished with a lay up.
Defensively, he wasn’t much different than we saw at Georgetown, even though, the easy excuse would be that Fayetteville State didn’t have anyone who could threaten him.
In the post, Wahab just stood behind his man. Again, that could have been because the offensive player wasn’t a threat but it’s a horrible habit to get into.
He looked stiff and rigid whenever he was put in a screen and roll. Sure, he could use his length to get away with recovering late but, again, what if that’s Kofi Cockburn or Hunter Dickinson? Can he recover without the weakside man having to come over too aggressive to help?
There’s plenty of time to answer questions and, like I said earlier, it isn’t like Turgeon was going to show much in an exhibition against Fayetteville but the initial look seemed rather… well… vanilla.
