Second game
#1 Play - Defense
Real liked to leave Huertas relatively open and load up on the strong side when Huertas wasn't the ball handler in their PnRs this game. Great close-out on the initial action by Luka technically, active hands and forcing Huertas' drive path left.
On the secondary action, he goes under the screen as the ball handler's PnR defender and doesn't leave Diop in a favorable position after the switch. Nice work.
#2 Play - Defense
He goes under on Huertas' PnR as the ball handler and switches to Diop again.
This is a smart play by Diop (and Janning). While Doncic has the strength to fight for position and doesn't allow any leverage for the center inside when he's switched onto him, he doesn't have any knowledge at the 5 as a defender at all. Diop answers to Doncic's effort there by sealing him inside when Luka is merely focused on Diop and cannot react as the initial help defender inside.
Nobody is stupid enough to give Doncic minutes at the 5, and Real Madrid doesn't go under screens when Huertas is the ball handler just because Doncic is horrible at navigating through screens. But still shows how Doncic's biggest weakness defensively, his inability to navigate through screens and especially on-ball ones, can affect his team's defense as they have to switch here when Luka avoids the screen by going under (again, going under there isn't solely due to Luka's inability) and Luka's lack of knowledge as a center defender is exposed by Diop's Marcin Gortatesque subtle trick with the timing and positioning of his seal which works as the assist to Janning's layup.
#3 Play - Offense
As Llull relocates to a better stop after the pass, Luka could have easily drive just a little and later find Jeffery Taylor on his backdoor cut, but he doesn't have the confidence to handle between the triangle 3 defender forms which is a tight space.
Benefiting from Ayon's screen isn't a bad decision either, but pretty subpar mechanics going to his left. As always, his upper body mechanics are almost always clean. His left leg is the issue where it's unbalanced and weird position kills lower body force generation = front rim.
#4 Play - Defense
What he can do when switched to a traditional center though, is to get the defensive rebound.
#5 Play - Offense
Bad footwork on the shot, not a 1-2 not a hop. Actually, a travel that's tough to catch in live in real time. A good portion of the blame is on the pass, but a shooter with elite footwork could backpedal and had a nice 1-2 on the shot possibly.
#6 Play - Offense
Not being aware of the shot clock is always bad.
#7 Play - Defense
Nice rotation and then good close-out technique. Real's game plan contained risking Huertas' shot and loading up on the strong side on non-Huertas pick and rolls and Huertas is up to NBA range on this one, so not contesting the shot and a non-aggressive close-out is on purpose.
#8 Play - Defense
Shot clock is running out and you bite on Ilimane Diop's pump fake? From there?
#9 Play - Offense
I liked this play, he wanted to wait for Ayon's roll initially and jailed his defender while waiting but then Diop committed to Ayon and he went for the shot attempt. If he isn't going to take that final dribble to stunt defenders in tight spaces and go for 1-2 motion finishes (which he should), at least going for these kind of shots when that space is available is better than nothing until he adds that finishing repertoire. These shots aren't in his arsenal too though, and needs to work on these finger rolls and floaters in workouts.
#10 Play - Offense
Baskonia doesn't have meaningful creation opportunities with this lineup especially with Shenglia off the court, except some flex stuff they could run with the bigs on the court which aren't exactly in their playbook. So they keep trying to take advantage of Doncic going under on Huertas & switching PnRs.
Real defense trying to compensate for Doncic's inability to navigate through screens (even if it's not the sole reason they go under Huertas) needs communication from Doncic. It isn't here and costs 2 points.
#11 Play - Defense
Meh play. Pulling the chair that close to the basket is poor post defense strategy. At least good contest allowed Ayon enough time to erase the shot though. Worth mentioning it's a goaltend in the NBA, obviously.
#12 Play - Defense
Doncic communicates this time with Ayon on the switch. Disruption eats time off the clock.
#13 Play - Offense
He's good at punishing overplaying defenders. Baskonia really loads up on the strong side on a Doncic post-up entry. Good portion of the credit goes to Ayon too, for that beautiful entry pass.
#14 Play - Offense
And we see why Baskonia loads up the strong side, Luka moves around defenders with smaller size and frame to where he wants and can finish after spinning with good arc.
#15 Play - Offense
The deceleration he created against Garino after the switch moves Vildoza over to help and Llull is open for the shot.
#16 Play - Defense
Slide your feet and don't take the contact there, that's call ball handlers get a lot in Europe. He should know, he knows to get these calls.
#17 Play - Defense
Jumpy on the pump fake again.
#18 Play - Offense
Nice to see him being able to attack on players who sit on his deceleration and dare him to drive inside. Couldn't do that quite a lot of times this season. Does it here and Vildoza fouls. But could have done it quicker with better handles. His ball handling is easily adequate but he needs work in ball control as it can be seen here. Also the infamous high-low dribble transition issue I talk about all the time is about ball control too.
#19 Play - Offense
Used a carry to transition to low dribble when accelerating to beat his defender and jumped off two feet instead of a 1-2 motion finish but nice to see him attacking into the spaced area and put pressure on the rim.
#20 Play - Offense
Much better footwork on the shot compared to 1st two 3PAs. Feet are better balanced, good 1-2, and total body motion is pretty fluid after the dip.
#21 Play - Offense
Punishing that meaningless, structureless press by two players nicely.
#22 Play - Defense
Awesome close-out technique and then forcing Timma left... Then played post defense like somebody who had 4 fouls, which wasn't the case at all.
#23 Play - Offense
Good to see him attack through a tight space like that. Vildoza was in position to take the charge so Doncic slowed down which messed up his layup attempt, which is why he needs to attack in these possessions more, gain more reps and know how to control his body while finishing the play.
#24 Play - Offense
Attacking Huertas in space is always a good idea. Can't see the ball all the time, but seems to be a perfect low-high ball transition & high-low dribble transition which accelerates him with the crossover past Huertas. Then he takes the final dribble instead of jumping early. And jumps with a 1-2 motion even if it's not great. That 1-2 allowed him to get past two defenders and throw the pass, don't think he could get past both of them with a 2 feet jump there.
#25 Play - Offense
Look at that hop on the stepback. If he didn't use the hop and instead just pull back his left foot to where his right foot is which he does almost as much as he uses the hop, I'd bet a lot this would be missed. He's good at generating force through 1-2 in certain situations too, but pulling one foot of his to where the other is to line up for the shot here isn't even a 1-2 and the hop generates much better results for him in his stepbacks while where 1-2 works for him is mostly in certain kind of off-ball shots.
#26 Play - Offense
And here while he takes the shot with the confidence of the make earlier, footwork isn't the same. Not a hop, not a 1-2. Just pulls his right foot to where the left is. Not even close to the rhythm he gets with a proper hop on off-the-dribble shots.
#27 Play - Offense
Don't let the jump pass fool you, he looks at who's open before and is confident enough on his read to adjust mid-air since he's able to throw a look-away pass on this one.
#28 Play - Offense
Good passing vision and timing, okay passing execution.
#29 Play - Offense
Where the athleticism question marks are all valid. A perimeter player with elite quick twitch athleticism would blow past around Janning's contact there before Diop was able to come.
What non-elite athletes can try to compensate with are either elite skills or elite BBIQ in certain situations. This possession requires BBIQ mainly out of that as it requires vision. Not passing vision, vision of space or vision of drive paths. There are space and drive path to his left but Doncic drives to the right even as he sees incoming Diop. When you don't have the elite athleticism, you compensate with decision making in these possessions. Doncic didn't.
#30 Play - Defense
No contest, no close-out. He's guarding Janning on top of that, not Huertas.
#31 Play - Defense
Good positioning and close-out. Is aware of the screen, Vildoza pulls-up as he looks at the incoming screen but Doncic reacts fast & it's a longish range contested 3PA.
#32 Play - Defense
Good positioning again and threatens the passing lane which eats off the shot clock a little. Was a pretty great defensive possession as a whole from Real to be honest.
#33 Play - Offense
Even though Janning slides his feet pretty well, that in-between-legs crossover done right according to defender's position allows him to accelerate around two players. For a player with Luka's range of athleticism, it usually comes down to his decision making of where to go and more importantly his ball handling which decides the margin of whether he's able to get past his defender or not since he doesn't have the margin of error of players who have elite athleticism who could potentially get past their defenders even without having great high-low dribble transition or great decision making of locating.
#34 Play - Offense
Luka loves post-ups out of BLOBs and SLOBs. Again, good to see him being able to move around players like Janning with smaller size and frame to where he wants.
That's a shitty call though which caused us not being able to see the end of the play as replay shows Janning putting his left arm in between Doncic's body but there's no contact.
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