Last year’s Men’s Basketball team was nothing short of miraculous. Winning 11 straight games en route to winning a game-winning buzzer beater at Provincial Championships in the ARC and making it to the National Championship.
READ MORE: Queen’s Men’s Basketball win OUA Championships
With nearly all five of their starters moving on to other opportunities either abroad or within the nation, there were many questions surrounding how the basketball program at Queen’s would weather this storm.
To much surprise, the Gaels have seemingly improved. Last season, the Gaels were 11-3 through the first 14 games of the season. This year, our Gaels are 13-1, sitting at the top of the OUA East, and ranked sixth in the nation.
With only eight games remaining in the 2024-25 season and the playoffs slowly approaching, The Journal thought it was a good time to compare the two squads.
Offensively, the Gaels have made significant improvements this year, shooting more efficiently and scoring more points per game.
Surprisingly, the Gaels have been scoring much more this season while being more efficient from beyond the arc.
The Gaels’ current season shows significant offensive improvements, averaging 95.3 points per game compared to 86.9 last season, along with a higher three-point shooting percentage. Interestingly, their field goal efficiency remains nearly identical—44.5 per cent vs. 44.6 per cent.
This could be the result of Head Coach Steph Barrie transitioning to what he calls The System. The System, which Barrie adopted from National Collegiate Athletics Association Division II Basketball Coach David Crutchfield, is a fast-paced style of play that takes advantage of a constant full-court press to overwhelm opposing offences into making mistakes, in turn getting the Gaels more looks at the basket.
READ MORE: ‘System’ upgrade fuels Queen’s Men’s Basketball wins
While the Gaels have definitely improved offensively, perhaps their most shocking changes have come defensively.
Here, you can see that while the Gaels are allowing about seven more points per game, they’re averaging four more steals and are forcing eight more turnovers per game this season.
This, without debate, is undoubtedly a designed product of the Gaels adopting Crutchfield’s system.
Barrie is adamant there’s much to be done in of refining the Gaels’ application of the system, and that it’s far from perfect, so I don’t think the increase in points against is a permanent product of this change.
However, the improvements in steals, forced turnovers, and points-per game averages should continue to rise alongside the Gaels comfortability running the new system.
In a previous interview with The Journal, Head Coach Steph Barrie noted the success of the system relies heavily on who’s running it, and that even the coaching staff must refine their approach.
“You have to have a certain type of team that’s comprised of certain individuals, and we felt we had that. We were very confident that it was going to be really hard. We’re going to put this to the guys, and we’re going to start training this way, and it’s going to be very difficult, but we knew that every time we have presented a challenge to them, they’ve responded,” Barrie said.
“A lot of the growth that can happen is on our end. This is our first time coaching this, it’s a very different way to coach. You have to change your mindset totally from how we’ve done in the past We’re not good at it yet from a coaching standpoint, and we’re getting better,” Barrie said. Finally, adding “there’s still probably 30 per cent improvement that’s possible to get to for this group now, whether we can get there, we’re going to fight like heck to try.”
Regardless of Barrie’s critical view, those who’ve made it out to the Men’s Basketball games can vouch for the highly demanding yet rewarding style of play they’ve adopted. Winning 13 of 14 games is no small feat, and should the Gaels find the extra 30 per cent growth noted by their Head Coach, it would be a dreaded fate to have to overcome the Gaels’ new system.
Tags
All final editorial decisions are made by the Editor(s) in Chief and/or the Managing Editor. Authors should not be ed, targeted, or harassed under any circumstances. If you have any grievances with this article, please direct your comments to [email protected].