What Muffet McGraw Did... or Didn't Do | The Boneyard

What Muffet McGraw Did... or Didn't Do

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With an hour to kill before fueling up and fishing, I indulged in one of my favorite pleasures... watching UConn WBB. And beating Notre Dame. Especially in National Championship games.

Regarding NC #10, one question has long puzzled me. It even got the attention of the blockhead Dave O'Brien- Why didn't McGraw have her team foul at game's end? Down 11 with over 4 minutes to go (61-50), I get it, there's enough time left for McGraw to reasonably feel she can still win it. At that point, no need to intentionally foul, put UConn at the line and stop the clock.

- But with only 1:33 left, Mabrey's 3 pointer made it 63-53. A relatively huge ten point margin, given there's only a minute and a half on the game clock. Doesn't McGraw have to realize at that point that there's pretty much no other way to win it without fouling, stopping the clock, and hoping UConn chokes at the line, giving ND the additional offensive possessions they'd need to possibly win? But ND sat back in what was a soft-ish man, and THEY DID NOT FOUL.

- Why not foul? The game is otherwise surely over. What's to lose by fouling?

- A loss is a loss is a loss. By 10 or 15 or 20 points, what's the difference? Especially in Championship games. It's all about the "W," and though it may look better, a close final score (or a rout) really means squat. The only reason I can think of for ND NOT fouling is that McGraw sensed the game could not be won, and she preferred, at that point, to have a 'moral' victory, a respectably close 10-point game, rather than give UConn another 6 or 7 points at the line which would allow the final score to belie the actual closeness and competitiveness of the Championship.

Or perhaps there's another explanation of the ND strategy for the last 2 1/2 minutes of that game? :confused:
 
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HuskyNan

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I watched the game again yesterday and was wondering the same thing, since the Huskies weren't doing so well from the line. ND was very young last year; I'm particularly surprised Muffet didn't go for the "teaching moment" especially with a championship on the line.
 
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Pride? She didn't want her team to look foolish or desperate at that point. She said several times that the pressure was on UCONN and that ND was not even expected to be here. So she chose to lose with dignity. I can see that.
 
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[Or perhaps there's another explanation of the ND strategy for the last 2 1/2 minutes of that game? :confused:[/QUOTE]

Not sure of which game it was or how much time was left but Pat Summit did the same thing. As, I believe Lawson came by the bench, you could clear see Summit wave her hand in a "no" gesture and say no fouls. The announcers commented on it. Summit knew that fouling, at that point, against the Huskies was pointless. Maybe McGraw realized the same thing.
 
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I also found this strange as in an earlier game that year against DePaul Muffet utilized the foul defense. They were losing by eight points with less then minute and a half left in the game. Notre Dame fouled and DePaul kept missing their free throws which allowed Notre Dame to tie the game and eventually win it in overtime. But although I believe that the phrase "CHOKE" is utilized more then it is warranted, in this game DePaul really did "CHOKE". If my memory is correct, DePaul missed ten out of eleven/twelve free throws. In fact I believe their best player missed six straight free throws. A complete meltdown on their part. I felt sorry for Doug as I watched him dying a little more with each and every miss. So I guess Muffet believed that UCONN was not going to miss and as stated earlier by Husky Nan and Sonny 44, the final score was the most competitive of Notre Dame's last four UCONN loses. I actually enjoyed this championship game better then last years, because although Stewart and Tuck didn't score as much as usual, other players picked up the slack and Stewart and Tuck's contributed by rebounding and playing great defense. Let the season begin.
 

Wbbfan1

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Whether Muffett's decision not to foul was a bad strategy or not, I'm glad she didn't intentionally foul. I intensely dislike teams that employ that strategy in games where they are 99.9% chance they are going to lose the game. It makes the last two or three minutes of a game unwatchable with the constant fouling and in a lot of cases timeouts being called while the strategy is being implemented. Recognizing that coaches shouldn't decide strategy based on what the viewers likes, it would not have made a difference in the game if ND had decided to intentionally foul UConn. ND needed to hit three point shots and get stops in order to cut the deficit.
 
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Wbbfan1 is probably right to echo the sentiment of others, that the game finished in an "orderly" manner and that Muffet knew that fouling was hopeless, but I (like TWG236) followed the second half of the ND - DePaul game and as painful as it was to follow, the fouling strategy worked. With the NC on the line (for the fourth time in five years) and a minute plus to play why not rage against the inevitable?
 
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Pride? She didn't want her team to look foolish or desperate at that point. She said several times that the pressure was on UCONN and that ND was not even expected to be here. So she chose to lose with dignity. I can see that.

That's not losing with dignity. That's having a defeatist attitude. Not sure if she saw it in her team's eyes or they saw it in hers. Either way not a good moment for McGraw.

Imo losing with dignity is trying to win until the whistle blows.
 
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Two things... 1.) Notre Dame had committed very few fouls. If I am not mistaken they had 3-4 fouls in the second half. They would have had to foul 4-3 times more to send UCONN to the line. While it is possible, that was a lot. In addition to that at some point would those fouls be "intentional" and could they result in foul shots and possession for UCONN? The vast majority of UCONN players on the floor were good foul shot shooters as well. Who do you foul? KML? Stewie?? Jefferson???

The second thing is more a question. I thought a couple of years back they changed the rules so that if you fouled twice in the last minute it automatically put the other team on the line regardless of how many fouls the team had. Can anyone confirm this? And is it still a rule if it is true?
 

Wbbfan1

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I remember when John Calipari decided not to implement the fouling strategy against UConn's Mens team that went on to win the National Championship by 6 points in 2014. After the game paraphrasing he said, why bother UConn would have just hit their foul shots like they have in the earlier tournament games. He did get a lot of heat in some corners for not even attempting the strategy.

In hindsight and what others have said in the thread, Muffett probably should have intentionally fouled and if UConn was making their foul shots, call it off. If they weren't then continue the strategy like she did against DePaul. In an honest moment if asked, Muffett was probably shocked the strategy worked against DePaul a team full of good shooters.
 

DobbsRover2

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There was of course a thread about the no-fouls after the game in April that basically covered the relevant points:

1. UConn had only been given 7 FTAs during the hard fought game with the refs really limiting the foul calls, and they had hit 5 FTs, so there was no big reason to think that a normally good shooting Husky team (Gabby was not on the floor at the end) would pull a DePaul, as the Blue Demons were certified freebie clankers. Four of the five Husky starters were shooting over 75%, with three over 80%, and even Kia at 72% was on a hot streak in the second half of the season and had nailed her two attempts in the game.

2. ND would have had to commit two fouls to get to the seventh one, so you can count a little more time off the clock.

3. As noted in the earlier thread, UConn's defense had been stifling with the Irish shooting about 33% and only 27% on threes, and UConn would have been clamping down even more on the perimeter in the final moments, with MoJeff looking for a few more steals. It would have been different if the score was 85-75, but after scoring 53 points in the first 38 1/2 minutes of the game, what were the chances of suddenly scoring a dozen in the final minute and a half?

4. As many said, the game had been played tough and close most of the way, and Muffett probably wanted to at least get her players a more respectable type of loss to build on for the next year when Jewell would finally take them over the hump. Oops on that one, but there's a point to end it all on a proud note instead of clanking 5 or 6 more threes and have UConn win by 18 or 21 again.

5. And of course there was the classic statement by formerlurker from the earlier thread, "I think she figured they were fouling all night and never got a whistle so it wouldn't help." Priceless.
 
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Whether Muffett's decision not to foul was a bad strategy or not, I'm glad she didn't intentionally foul. I intensely dislike teams that employ that strategy in games where they are 99.9% chance they are going to lose the game. It makes the last two or three minutes of a game unwatchable with the constant fouling and in a lot of cases timeouts being called while the strategy is being implemented. Recognizing that coaches shouldn't decide strategy based on what the viewers likes, it would not have made a difference in the game if ND had decided to intentionally foul UConn. ND needed to hit three point shots and get stops in order to cut the deficit.
Muffet, the recent past, used the fouling at games end and beat Uconn a couple of times--so she knows how and when to use it. Muffet is a coach of the highest order in WBB. I too hate watching the foul after foul after foul--while the fouled team always puts the ball into the hands of their best foul shooters--it makes for a frustrating end to some games. Since I cannot get into Muffets head--I choose to think she did it because on the Biggest Stage of WBB she didn't want to look desperate and still lose. For that I thank her!!
 
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Wbbfan1 is probably right to echo the sentiment of others, that the game finished in an "orderly" manner and that Muffet knew that fouling was hopeless, but I (like TWG236) followed the second half of the ND - DePaul game and as painful as it was to follow, the fouling strategy worked. With the NC on the line (for the fourth time in five years) and a minute plus to play why not rage against the inevitable?

 
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I remember when John Calipari decided not to implement the fouling strategy against UConn's Mens team that went on to win the National Championship by 6 points in 2014. After the game paraphrasing he said, why bother UConn would have just hit their foul shots like they have in the earlier tournament games. He did get a lot of heat in some corners for not even attempting the strategy.

In hindsight and what others have said in the thread, Muffett probably should have intentionally fouled and if UConn was making their foul shots, call it off. If they weren't then continue the strategy like she did against DePaul. In an honest moment if asked, Muffett was probably shocked the strategy worked against DePaul a team full of good shooters.

When the pressure is on, and this game is the apex of pressure, what better time is there to send a kid to the foul line, in front of 20,000 and a national TV audience with the biggest prize in WCBB at stake? Like TWG236 said, Brittany Hrynko was an excellent free throw shooter, but when the pressure was on and the opportunity to beat #1 Notre Dame was there for the taking, she blew 4 straight free throws with 22 seconds left in regulation and then missed 4 more with less than 16 seconds left in overtime to seal the defeat. PRESSURE can turn the best players' nerves to jelly, but for some reason McGraw chose not to test UConn's grit. Hmmm.
 

DobbsRover2

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Hrynko was actually a 69% FT shooter last season, and was 67% for her college career. I have been told by a learned BY poster that you have to shoot 80% to be an acceptable FT shooter (yes, I know that figure is a bit demanding), so Hrynko would definitely qualify as a clanker by that measure. Other Blue Demons also shot FTs in the ND game, and DePaul finished tied for 244th in the country at the FT line at 66.7% (in the bottom third) and were at 64% going into the ND game. So putting the pressure on DePaul at the FT line at the end of that game was kind of a no-brainer for Muffett to at least try, though obviously she was not expecting DePaul to do as abysmally as they did.

Muffett had done her homework before the NC game and she knew what the stats said. UConn was the 64th rated FT shooting team in the country at 72.6%, but the starters were averaging 77% (top team in the nation was at 78%), with KML at 89.5% and an obvious target for an in-bounds pass if the Irish start fouling, though MoJeff and Stewie were also above 80%. So naturally you may feel you should foul Kia with her 72.2%, but after early season freshmen troubles she had hit at 87.5% in her last 17 games. The Canuk was not cracking.

No, Muffett made the right and rational choice. She knew before the game that fouling to overcome even a small margin was unlikely to work, and at 10 points the gap was way too big with her team shooting 33.3%. No reason to go all ugly.
 

HuskyNan

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Hrynko was actually a 69% FT shooter last season, and was 67% for her college career. I have been told by a learned BY poster that you have to shoot 80% to be an acceptable FT shooter (yes, I know that figure is a bit demanding), so Hrynko would definitely qualify as a clanker by that measure. Other Blue Demons also shot FTs in the ND game, and DePaul finished tied for 244th in the country at the FT line at 66.7% (in the bottom third) and were at 64% going into the ND game. So putting the pressure on DePaul at the FT line at the end of that game was kind of a no-brainer for Muffett to at least try, though obviously she was not expecting DePaul to do as abysmally as they did.

Muffett had done her homework before the NC game and she knew what the stats said. UConn was the 64th rated FT shooting team in the country at 72.6%, but the starters were averaging 77% (top team in the nation was at 78%), with KML at 89.5% and an obvious target for an in-bounds pass if the Irish start fouling, though MoJeff and Stewie were also above 80%. So naturally you may feel you should foul Kia with her 72.2%, but after early season freshmen troubles she had hit at 87.5% in her last 17 games. The Canuk was not cracking.

No, Muffett made the right and rational choice. She knew before the game that fouling to overcome even a small margin was unlikely to work, and at 10 points the gap was way too big with her team shooting 33.3%. No reason to go all ugly.
Kaleena was a 92% free throw shooter but she was 1-2 in her only trip to the line during the NC game. Having a high FT percentage doesn't guarantee anything.
 

bballnut90

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I think McGraw should have 100% implemented the foul strategy. Even if UCONN has a great free throw shooting team, it's either that, or throw in the towel. It's far from unrealistic to think that UCONN could have missed the front end of 1 and 1s on consecutive trips down and Notre Dame hits back to back threes making it a 4 point game with about 45 seconds to go. It's not likely, but why not opt for that rather than just throw in the towel? It's not a regular season game, it's the freaking National Championship. You have to play to win otherwise you're wasting an amazing opportunity.

I'm assuming her logic came from the ideology that losing by only ten will beat expectations and people will view it as Notre Dame overachieved by staying that close, but that's completely the wrong attitude to have in a national title game. You have to play to win, otherwise you wont.
 
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I was surprised she didn't foul because like it or not it is part of the game.They only had 3 or 4 fouls that is when you tell your team to take the risk and go for steals especially if they are not calling the fouls.than you have a chance for a couple quick steals to cut the lead and if they call the foul you stop the clock.This is major college basketball and I don't think coaches get paid to lose with dignity rather to win.Didnt understand that strategy at all.In 2004 Taurasi missed 2 free throws with under 2 minutes to go and even though it didn't matter.You don't know if they will make or miss them.
 
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ND trailed by 8 points at the half. They were further out with a little over 1 minute left. Muffett did the right thing. They could not narrow the gap (8 points) in over 19 minutes, how were they going to get pass UConn in 1+ minute (10 points)?
They were missing everything at the time and it could get real ugly very fast.
 

DobbsRover2

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What was the point spread on the game? She may have had some money laid down.
Bleacher Report said the spread was 17 points for UConn (maybe except in South Bend where some guaranteed an Irish win). So yes, UConn lost the NC by 7 points, and ND bettors were smiling. So maybe Muffett was indeed rewarding the fans who bet on the team, and you know a lot of them would have been extra bummed if UConn indeed pushed the margin to 18 at the end.

Speaking of odds, as to the rationale that just because KML had missed one of her two FTs in the game that she would somehow go all klutzy on the Huskies and start missing a ton of late game FTs sounds really really really far fetched to me. Again she shot 88.5% on the season, missed only 4 FTs all year, and never missed more than 1 in a game. In fact, during her last three seasons she never missed more than one FT during a game. So for her to have her first game with multiple misses in the NC game is something I could not grok. Maybe others have less confidence in her FT shooting, but I certainly don't and would have expected her to nail her next dozen or so shots after the earlier miss.

And okay, let's say she for some strange reason does get stuck at 50% for the NC game, a 4-8 effort from her at the end of the game would still have been enough to probably add to the Huskies' winning margin with the Irish shooting the way they were shooting and moving (or not) the way they were moving (or not) late in the game.

And yes, in 2004 UConn was up by just 5 points at the 2:22 mark when Pat naturally told her team to foul on every play. It worked very well as both Taurasi and Turner missed 2 FT attempts. Despite the 4 misses, UConn upped the lead to 9.

But yes, you truly know that it is the height of summer and that BY fans have been deprived of WCBB action for way too long when they start imaging all kinds of weird scenarios like KML going all clanky on the Huskies and the Irish burying all their shots against some kind of stand-back-and-watch UConn defense in an NC game. November can't come fast enough.
 

Wally East

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That's not losing with dignity. That's having a defeatist attitude.

It's just realistic.

Here's a basketball win probably calculator. Yes, it's for the NBA but basketball is basketball. With 1:30 left, a 10-point deficit, and the other team having possession, there is a 1 in 500 chance the trailing team will win the game. And that 1 time? It's not going to happen against UConn, is it?

I give her credit for having a sense of the moment and just letting the game end.
 
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Here's a basketball win probably calculator. Yes, it's for the NBA but basketball is basketball. With 1:30 left, a 10-point deficit, and the other team having possession, there is a 1 in 500 chance the trailing team will win the game. And that 1 time? It's not going to happen against UConn, is it?


If McGraw is calculating something called win probability in that moment than I fault her even more. lol
 
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