BYU Basketball Plays No Defense

Attention BYU Basketball:  You might want to at least pretend to play defense.

Dave Rose and his Cougar basketball team were demolished Thursday night by Saint Mary’s, 98-82 The game was played at an incredibly quick pace and featured no defense by the Cougars. Not to mention, BYU had a terrible stretch to end the first half. They turned the ball over 3 or 4 times in a row with absolutely reckless passes and allowed Saint Mary’s to have their way on offense. Saint Mary’s scored 53 points in the first half!

I wrote a week ago about how fun the Cougars are to watch with their up and down style.

Dave Rose encourages a full-speed, up and down the court style of play

However, they need to start playing both ends of the court or they are never going to beat a quality opponent. Part of that defensive effort needs to be focused on stopping the three-point shot. Saint Mary’s made twelve three-pointers against BYU. Pretty safe to say you won’t win many games when giving up a dozen long balls. The 3 ball also did the Cougars in when they played Baylor. They gave up thirteen in that game, six to one guy. I’m no defensive strategist, but that just can’t happen. It’s gonna be a very disappointing season if Dave Rose doesn’t get that corrected immediately.

Jason Franchuk of the Daily Herald and Cougarblue.com sheds a little light on the problem – perhaps a lack of practice.

Lack of practice time hurting Cougars on defense

I certainly agree with the point Franchuk makes. However, practice time or not, there simply needs to be more effort from the Cougars on the defensive end. We’ll see if the Cougars can get it turned around.