2023/24 Defensive Preview

As discussed in our last article, the McKillop family is allergic to bad offense. Case in point, Davidson has had a top 30-ish offense more frequently than it has had a sub-100 one since joining the A10 in 2014. Defense on the other hand can be more variable. As I learned a few years ago interviewing (at the time) Head Coach Bob McKillop and (at the time) Associate Head Coach Matt McKillop for a Davidsonian article, Davidson likes to run a pack line style defense. In layman’s terms Davidson more or less tries to stuff the paint, force the other team to shoot contested looks, and then work as a unit to corral the rebound. This puts an emphasis on defensive awareness, positioning, and teamwork instead of gambling for steals and blocks. No player better exemplifies this play style than 2021/22 A10 POY Luka Brajkovic. Luka never blocked a ton of shots, but he was always in position to contest shots at the rim and the stats bear out that Davidson was a MUCH, MUCH better defensive team with him on the floor than it was with him off of it. With that context, let’s dive into what the defense did last year and what we expect it to look like this year.

The advanced stats paint a mediocre picture for the Wildcats. According to KenPom the team finished 170th on defense, not a good finish but not that out of the ordinary for a typical Davidson outfit. So what went right? Davidson was pretty decent at forcing turnovers and suppressing 3-pointers. In fact, Davidson finished about 100th in both opponent turnovers and opponent 3-point field goal percentage. To me at least it felt like the team really prioritized guarding the 3-point line and the perimeter. Of course when one prioritizes one thing, they de-prioritize others and that’s where we start to see where things went wrong last season. Opposing teams shot 51.2% against the Cats from inside the arc, good for 255th in the nation, and that number was likely even worse at the rim. Effectively, the rim was always open and opposing teams took great advantage. To make matters even worse, the Cats gave up about 10 offensive rebounds per game, good for 169th in the nation. Both of these statistics are a stark downgrade from last season when Davidson finished 19th in opponent’s offensive rebounds and 148th in opponent 2-point field goal percentage. Rebounding felt especially egregious since Davidson hasn’t been outside the top 66 in opponent offensive rebounding since 2016/17. At times it felt like Davidson couldn’t get a stop and when they did they couldn’t corral the rebound anyways.

So why did this happen? I have seen some on twitter blame Foster Loyer because he’s undersized, but he actually had a positive Defensive Performance Rating per the advanced statistics. I think that the biggest culprit was actually rim protection, or the lack of it. Last year Davidson primarily played Sam Mennenga, David Skogman, and Reed Bailey at the big man spots. These three players provided ostensibly zero rim protection; evidenced by the fact that they combined to block 0.6 shots per game. Now this isn’t to say that all three are bad defenders. Bailey is a lanky 6’11 perimeter-centric player who needs time to put on weight and build the strength needed to bang with true bigs down low. As such, Bailey is probably closer to a 3 than he is to a 5 positionally, at least for now. Bailey also struggled with defensive positioning at times, common for a freshman big. Skogman is a swiss-army knife big who can fill in at the 4 or 5 interchangeably and graded out as a positive on the defensive end according to advanced statistics but he’s never blocked more than .4 shots/game in a collegiate season. Sam Mennenga is a rugged 4 who was forced to play out of position at the 5. Mennenga has always been good at battling for boards and switching on the perimeter, but rim protection is not his forte. This is what made him such a perfect complement to the aforementioned Luka Brajkovic and led to them being an A10 Title winning big man pair. The impact of playing Sam out of position is borne out in the stats as well, as he went from having a positive DPR in 2021/22 to a negative one in 2022/23.

Explaining the rebounding problems is harder. Now Army Head Coach Kevin Kuwik, who I was once told was paramount to making Davidson an annual-top 75 rebounding team, leaving for Butler is probably one aspect but honestly the team just looked out of position at times. The good news here is that the team improved on the boards as the season went on. In non-conference play, Davidson’s first 12 games, the team yielded over 11 offensive rebounds per game. That number dropped to under 7 per game during conference play, the team’s final 20 games. That’s a really good number and in line with Davidson’s regular top 70 finishes in rebounding in the past. If the team can carry that progress into next season, then rebounding will be a strength.

So what changes are expected? First off, Foster, Des, and Sam are out and Brizzi, Schulte, Moss, Durkin, Adam, and Loughnane are in. Brizzi’s introduction is especially exciting on the defensive end as he’s a lengthy, tall point guard at 6’3, 180 lb. In a smaller sample size at Villanova he also graded out very positively on the defensive end; his rating would’ve actually been Davidson’s best, a hair better than Grant Huffman’s. That’s really exciting since we expect Huffman and Brizzi to share the backcourt for the vast majority of minutes next season. The eye test says we haven’t had as long and athletic of a backcourt before and the advanced stats back that up and tell us that they could be a really good duo defensively. Brizzi has also been practicing with the team since the start of the Spring Semester last year, so he should be familiar with the system. Moss is another positive addition on the defensive end as well. In his limited minutes at Stanford he graded out as a good defender and his defensive rating would’ve been just about second on last year’s Cats. This backs up the eye test as Moss is a bouncy, athletic 2 guard. The 4 other additions are harder to pin down since we don’t have advanced stats for high school, but sources have told me that Adam was Davidson’s BEST defender in practices last spring (and is especially PHYSICAL on that end), Loughnane provides good size (6’3) at the guard spot, Schulte provides some beef and size down low, and Durkin has the length and size (6’7) to guard on the wing.

There’s also some hope for internal improvements as well. Sean Logan was a raw freshman last season but still excited us with his shot blocking in limited minutes and graded out positively defensively. Matt McKillop has even said publicly that the Center from New Jersey has the potential to be Davidson’s best shot blocker ever. Without being hyperbolic, Logan is the best pure shot blocker I’ve seen at Davidson in my 8 or 9 years of following the program… his instincts and length are that good. If Logan has built up more strength and is more comfortable on the court, he will be a game changer on defense.

We also expect significant improvement from Reed Bailey. Freshman bigs have been statistically shown to have the steepest learning curves in college basketball and Reed Bailey, thrust into the starting lineup from day 1, was no exception. He graded out, along with Connor Kochera, as being the lowest rated Davidson defenders. With time and added strength expect that to change. If he’s added strength, then he will be better able to deal with bigs down low and with more time in the system his defensive awareness and positioning will improve as well. Kochera is a similar story. At times he found himself out of position, giving his man an easy look. It has to be reiterated though that he transferred from William and Mary, one of the worst teams in the country his last season there. It takes time to shake off bad habits and develop good new ones; last year was the embodiment of Kochera doing just that. It should also be said that Kochera was doing that and improved as the season went on. Finally, we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention Cult hero Achile Spadone. To many Spadone reminds them of a taller Rusty Reigel. He still has a way to go to reach the impact Reigel had but the stats bear out the thought as Spadone graded out as a positive defender last season. Spadone might play a smaller role as Davidson’s third lead guard but when he plays you know you can trust him and his gritty effort on defense.

So where does that leave us? Rebounding should be fine, possibly even a strength if the last 20 games are any indication. Matt McKillop, the staff, and the players deserve major praise for turning that around from a major liability to a strength by season’s end. Furthermore a Brizzi and Huffman backcourt is very exciting as well and coupled with Moss on the wing could give Davidson a legitimately good perimeter defense. Matt McKillop also knows that he can get positive defensive value from Skogman down low and Spadone on the perimeter as well. Beyond that things are less certain. Davidson needs Kochera and Bailey to improve on last year’s performance, Logan to show that he’s ready for big minutes, and the freshman to be ready. I expect Davidson to have a much-improved defense, though to be fair it’s hard to be worse defensively at the rim than the team was last season. How much the team improves will depend on Reed Bailey’s and Sean Logan’s growth.