Skipping Class

guess how this happened [Campredon]

Ever since Minnesota handed Michigan their only loss, the opponent plan of attack against Hunter Dickinson has generally been to throw some sort of double team his way. While this lessened his scoring impact until Sunday's 22-point outburst against Ohio State, the team has still scored at an impressive clip when adjusting for opponent quality, and it's in large part because Dickinson is putting opponents in lose-lose situations.

The Buckeyes decided to double when Dickinson dribbled. Keeping the cue for sending help the same for most of the game helped ensure OSU didn't blow assignments; it also made them predictable in a way Dickinson exploited from the jump. Michigan's early three-point barrage was almost entirely due to the help on Dickinson leaving them susceptible to skip passes that either immediately led to open shots or put the ball within a couple passes of an open look:

Dickinson's passes are thrown from a great height, have plenty of heat on them, and hit the intended recipient right in the shooting pocket. The first is critical for not turning the ball over, the latter two for giving teammates space to take shot that's in rhythm. This is one of the longest passes you can make in a halfcourt setting and the help defender still has a foot on the edge of the paint when Chaundee Brown catches it and goes right up with a shot:

Here's a hockey assist featuring a heads-up play by Isaiah Livers to stop his cut and move the ball to an even more open shooter:

Dickinson ran into trouble earlier in the season when he forced these skip passes through traffic. Those turnovers have disappeared since the Purdue game. He's showing more patience and an understanding of where the help is coming from, which has him picking out the correct player to hit:

Dickinson picks up his dribble and gets the ball high before Kyle Young arrives, which gives him an extra beat to survey the court. He turns away from the help and throws an overhand dart to Mike Smith. Duane Washington Jr. does well here just to run Smith off the line and limit this to two points.

[After THE JUMP: how Dickinson scores on doubles and the numbers behind opponents' post defense conundrum.]

Speed In (Tight) Space

Dickinson still has a limited arsenal of post moves. He's usually going to his left hand; when he's on the right block, that means getting to the hook shot, and on the left block he's either going with a straight backdown or a drop step.

Even with this set of moves, Dickinson has scoring ability against double teams. That drop step is useful for getting to the basket before the help arrives in the first place, as demonstrated here:

Dickinson has flashed some more advanced ability that you have to imagine comes from the Juwan Howard School of Nifty Paint Tricks. He uses a couple pass fakes here to ward off the double team before going to work one-on-one and turning to his left shoulder for a right hook(!):

Of course, that last play also shows why teams are bringing the double in the first place: Dickinson is damn near unstoppable when he's single-covered down low. When the Buckeyes didn't bring help on Sunday, he hunted his own shot with great results:

For the moment, the pick-your-poison game still favors double-teaming Dickinson, according to Synergy. The first row is Dickinson taking shots (or turning it over) against single coverage, the second is when he passes out of those situations, and the third is the combined offense of Dickinson shots and passes directly leading to shots when he's double-teamed:

The main issue preventing Dickinson from putting up equally efficient numbers against double-teams is turnovers, and since the calendar turned to 2021 he's only had two games with more than two turnovers: Minnesota and Purdue. Those pass-out numbers against hard doubles also don't include the several plays where his kickout has initiated a longer passing sequence before a bucket, so Synergy is likely understating their effectiveness a bit.

If Dickinson continues to keep the turnovers in check, defenses face an impossible choice about what to do with him. He's 10/13 from the field against zone defenses this year, so you can throw out that potential answer. Surrounding Dickinson with excellent shooters has put opposing coaches in a miserable bind. I love it.