BBL Week 2 Round-Up: Lions’ Dominance on Both ends, Johnson’s Statline & Eagles’ Defense
Welcome to the weekly round-up. Each week, I’ll be going through my thoughts from the week and some of the things that stood out to me the most — whether that’s specific plays, a player having an insane game, or seeing how a team dominated. The point here is to go through the film and see exactly how they did it and why it worked.
The second week of the British Basketball League is over and one thing is clear. The London Lions are on another level. They are currently 3–0 and I don’t see a reason why they will slow down any time soon.
So far, they have scored the most points in a game with 115 against the Manchester Giants, but they also have allowed the least points in the game against the Surrey Scorchers — dominance on both ends.
Eagles join them as the second team that’s yet to lose and I’ve been so impressed with their defense. I have some questions about their offense, but they can win with their defense being this good.
It’s also been 10 games so far into the season and honestly, so far, British basketball does seem quite underwhelming. I didn’t come into this expecting anything spectacular. I knew this wouldn’t have a quality of basketball similar to the NBA or even the FIBA World Cup. That was obviously not going to be anything alike.
At the same time, some of the games have been frustrating to watch. I mentioned last week that the offenses seem kind of bad. And having a more analytical approach, seeing some of the offenses and the type of shots that they try to get has been yikes. Whereas with a team like the London Lions, you can see a clear difference in their offense. They’re the only team that I can see really playing efficient offense.
That’s why they’ve been so dominant and even in games they didn’t dominate by their standards, it’s still on a different level.
With all that said, let’s pick some of the key things from a couple of the games:
- Lions’ dominance on both ends
- Jordan Johnson stat line of the week
- Eagles are elite on defense
Lions Efficient Offense
In the two games they had this week, they had a 118 offensive rating in the first game and a 132 in the second. That in itself is elite. But then you add that they had an 82 defensive rating and 87 in the second game. They’re scoring at will whilst stopping the opponent from having any type of efficient offense.
On offense, it all started with fastbreak points.
They had 33 fastbreak points. That was almost triple what the Manchester Giants had. That’s a huge advantage that will almost always be hard to beat.
It didn’t matter whether it was off of turnovers, pushing the pace off a rebound or even getting out as fast as possible off makes. They wanted to run.
And that’s where they got the easiest looks. Pushing the pace allowed them to get looks at the rim on drives. They attacked the defense before it was set, which meant open looks from the perimeter. Or it meant they had favorable matchups because the defense had to match up with someone.
In the Gladiators game, they also showed their elite 3pt pull-up threat. No idea why the Gladiators carried on going under the screens that gave the shooters all the space they needed. A lot of these shots are practice shots with no defender near them — not even a hand-up.
That 3pt shooting continued in the Giants game:
They had all kinds of 3s. That’s what was dangerous. They were getting all different types of looks.
In the first clip, it was an off-ball play for him to come off a double screen, whilst there’s a pick-and-roll happening on the other end. I liked the last clip at the 22s mark. A quick PnR. The defense switches and there’s a slight size advantage. #9 gets the ball in the post, which draws the guy from the perimeter to drop to dig. The 3 off-ball defenders are all paying attention to him. There’s also 1 defender in the paint rotating early. #9 makes an instant skip pass. That allows #6 to beat the closeout, and force another help & it’s an easy kick to the strong side corner. Also helped that #30 slipped to the rim, drawing the defense to him first.
That’s elite execution. And they end up getting easy, efficient looks.
Lions’ Elite Defense
And as good as their offense is, it’s also their defense that allows them to make this game unwinnable for the opponent.
They do everything right. Whatever it is on defense, they’re likely to execute it perfectly.
Take the first clip. The first guy gets slightly beat but is able to recover on the drive. But just in case, there was another defender next to him. They rest up top, and flow into a PnR. They ended up switching late once the guy had some steam to drive, plus another guy helping. They call another PnR and immediately switch. That stalls the offense and it’s a late 3.
The third clip was also impressive. First, the guy blows up the dribble handoff, by knocking the ball out. The defensive big is close to the screen and hedges to stop the drive. But the impressive part is the off-ball help in the paint. As soon as he makes the pass to the roll, there are two defenders waiting for him inside on the catch.
Then at the 35s mark, that was perfect defense. They try to go to a handoff on the left side, but the Lions easily call out the switch early. Doesn’t allow the initial drive. The defensive big is in a good place at the level to take away the drive and shot before the defender recovers. There’s help on the slip to allow the defensive big to recover. Then in the post, the low man rotates early to double inside.
Their communication is sharp and on point. I love how they know when to switch and when not to. They use that so well in spots. They don’t switch automatically for everything but when they do, it works exactly like they wanted. Take the last clip, one guy is chasing around the screens in the paint, but the big quickly realises and calls out the switch before he can even get the pass.
But even when you do beat them initially, they’re elite at protecting the rim:
Their rotations inside are perfect. Whenever there is a drive to the rim, there’s a guy already knowing he needs to help and he will be there early.
Jordan Johnson
Another game where I really liked Johnson on offense. In the first game, he gave the Eagles a lot of rim pressure. This time, he gave them a lot of scoring — ended the game with 26 points, 5 assists, and 5 rebounds.
He was a good pull-up threat off a PnR. If the defense ends up going under, he is comfortable pulling up from 3 or 2. He gets to his spot and knocks them down constantly. But more importantly, if the defense does carry going under, he’s able to drive at will to the rim and either finish himself or set up others.
Just an impressive game and a needed game. The Eagles struggled to score in the third, settling a lot for 3s. But in the fourth, that’s when Johnson made some key buckets to bring the Eagles back.
Eagles Carry on Winning with Defense
Similar to their first game where they struggled to get a good offense going but saved their game with their defense. Just like the Lions, they have an all-around defense that checks everything from top to bottom:
It’s so much effort on every play. In the first clip, there’s a size mismatch inside, but they do a good job fronting, then kind of switching to bait a pass. In the second clip, that rim protection by the committee was wild — that’s four guys collapsing in the paint on the drive.
These 3 plays stood out because the Bristol Flyers went to the same action and each time the Eagles stopped any advantage(you can also see that it’s a similar play Gladiators tried against the Lions).
It all starts with an off-ball play for the guy to come up, receive the first handoff to flow into a handoff on the left side to then go into a middle PnR.
The Eagles countered all of that by automatically switching the handoff and always ICING(preventing the player from using the screen and sending him to the sideline) the PnR. Once that happens, the Flyers had no answer to that and it was either a quick pull-up or forcing up a 3.
