I don't know about that. Iowa didn't draw a ton of fouls this year, but in the past Iowa has had some teams that were really good at drawing fouls. A lot of that is player dependent. The Aaron White and Tyler Cook teams were pretty good at it. Luka was good at it, but stopped getting as many calls as the season went on. None of the other guards or wings on Iowa's current roster really drive strong enough to consistently draw fouls.
I guess I’m not necessarily talking about a season long strategy, more that when the other teams are in early foul trouble, for whatever reason, we don’t try to take advantage of that. Yesterday their “bigs” both had 2 early fouls and they continued to play them in the first half. We didn’t attack them, even with simple stuff like forcing that player into pick and roll decisions or clear outs. When Fran essentially fouls out our best players in the first half when they pick up 2, limiting their maximum playing time, why doesn’t he try do the same to other teams when given the opportunity? Maybe he is, and we have just been inept at successfully drawing more fouls, but I just don’t see it.
The same could be said of bonus situations at the end of each half. It didn’t happen often this season, but it drives me nuts when the team is in the bonus and don’t get to the line. Especially when we have what most would assume to be good FT shooters. JoeW and Jbo should have been getting cheap fouls at least once a game on a head bob, or a pump fake and drive in those situations. Maybe they just can’t get it done, maybe they don’t know or aren’t being told that’s what they should be doing. All I know is it is frustrating.
It’s like watching the football team trying to dink and dunk with GDGD passes and dump offs on offense, when it runs in the face of their own purported strategy on defense of bend but don’t break.
