Learning a new offense is never easy in college basketball, especially one so different from the previous system. The University of Charleston men's basketball team is going through those growing pains right now, and it shows in the numbers.
UC sits last in the Mountain East Conference at 72.1 points per game, the only team in the league to average fewer than 74. And when two-thirds of the MEC scores at least 83 points per game, that can be a problem.
So it helps that the Golden Eagles own the MEC's best defense.
Charleston (4-4, 3-1 MEC) will spend the rest of a relatively quiet December - UC has just Saturday's 4 p.m. game at Ohio Valley University and a Dec. 19 game at Davis and Elkins before the new year - trying to find a better balance between offense and defense. Golden Eagles coach Dwaine Osborne feels his team is getting there.
Osborne decided this past offseason to revamp his offense, to find something that doesn't leave the players just dribbling around or running ball screen after ball screen.
"You get the old coach who's been around for 30 years that runs the flex offense, no matter if they've got five Shaquille O'Neals or five Jason Kidds, that's just what they do," Osborne said. "I'm not like that. I try to get the best players we can and find the best system to fit them."
The solution became a motion offense, taking pieces from different offenses to fit UC's personnel. It's less predictable, the players reading the defense and trying to find the best position for themselves. There's an emphasis on cutting and it leads to open looks, often from long range. The Golden Eagles, however, haven't been making the most of those looks. They're ninth in the 12-team MEC in field goal percentage (43.4 percent) and 10th in 3-point field goal percentage (33.3 percent).
"There's a lot of opportunities to score within the offense, but I don't think we've been running it well," senior guard Tino diTrapano said. "But we're definitely getting better, especially this week. We emphasized just getting down in the offense, knowing where we can score and different options we can run."
As tough as it has been for Charleston to score, it has been even tougher for other teams to score against Charleston. UC tops the conference in scoring defense (71.1 points allowed per game) and field goal percentage defense (40.3 percent), and is second in 3-point field goal percentage defense (32.2 percent). UC has ranked in the MEC's top two in scoring defense every season since Osborne became coach in 2013.
The main key, Osborne said, is that his Golden Eagles prohibit easy looks at the basket. When an opponent squares up to shoot, there's someone in his face.
"The starting point is that we don't want anyone to ever get a shot that's not contested," Osborne said. "Our league is an up-and-down, faster-paced, free-flowing league. With that, a lot of teams find ways in transition to get uncontested looks. You better be prolific yourself in scoring, or you better be able to guard somebody, so that's the approach we've taken."
Forward Aleksander Kesic said communication is of paramount importance in Charleston's defense. An offense with no easy path to the hoop is one with no easy option to score. To throw barriers into those paths takes all five players on the floor.
"We do our best to close those driving lanes," Kesic said. "As coach says all the time, the only guy who can score is the guy with the ball. That's the guy we pay most attention to. We try to protect the rim, protect the ball and have the other team take the most difficult shot possible."
The Golden Eagles have seen signs of a better melding of offense and defense in their last two games, both wins to get UC back to .500. Charleston beat Urbana 91-89 and shot 61.7 percent from the floor in the process. That's 19 points and nearly 18 percent better than its season average.
UC throttled Notre Dame's normally prolific offense in a 73-66 win. The Falcons average 91.5 points per game. Meanwhile, the Golden Eagles made 7 of 15 3-pointers (46.7 percent).
Osborne understands it will take some time for his players to get a better handle of their new offensive system. He thinks that time will come this season, and UC's defense will be there along the way, the team's safety net when shots might not fall they way it hopes.
"I would hope that late January, early Feburary, we'd be getting into some kind of groove offensively," Osborne said. "I think guys are figuring out where they can get shots and where the offense fits them, in particular. I think they're doing a good job trying to figure that out. They're executing well and now we just have to get comfortable."