Gonzaga stopper Emmanuel Innocenti comes up big again: ‘Incredible at pressuring the ball’
Mark Few didn’t need a specific question to be asked to offer unsolicited praise for junior guard Emmanuel Innocenti’s defensive prowess.
On Tuesday, Innocenti was a key reason why Washington State leading scorer Ace Glass and his teammates had off nights in Gonzaga’s 83-53 West Coast Conference victory at the McCarthey Athletic Center.
Glass, a talented 6-foot-3 freshman, came in averaging 16.5 points but produced only 12 points on 4 of 13 shooting, including 0 of 5 on 3-point attempts.
On Saturday, Innocenti helped limit Oregon State guard Josiah Lake to eight points, five below his season average.
“It can’t go unnoticed guys how incredible Emmanuel is at pressuring the ball,” Few noted as Tuesday’s postgame media session was winding down. “Every night we just ask him to usually get on their best player or best initiator on offense and he’s just relentless with his ball pressure, which makes all our coverages so much easier.”
“He gets over screens so much better than we have these last couple years. Again, that allows us to do coverages that maybe we haven’t done in the past. He’s fine in there (when guarding on post switches). As a coach, he just gives you so much versatility, it’s so valuable.”
Glass has eight 20-point games and a 40-point masterpiece against Arizona State. He shoots nearly 39% on 3-pointers and made four from distance while scoring 16 points in Gonzaga’s 86-65 win in Pullman last month.
“We did a great job on him,” Few said. “He’s a tough guard because he’s been shooting a lot of 3s leading up to this (game), but he has a great midrange game. They were kind of screening us with their big and he was getting to the basket. We chased him off the (3-point) line pretty good. We chased everybody off the line. Their best games have been when they’re banging in a lot of 3s.”
That occurred in the first meeting in Pullman when the Cougars went 13 of 28 from distance. They made 5 of 24 (20.8%) behind the arc in the rematch.
Innocenti had three steals to go with nine points, four rebounds and two assists. Glass, now 9 of 26 from the field in two games versus GU, had no assists and four turnovers.
“We kind of went back to where we were about a month or two ago (when Glass was struggling),” Washington State coach David Riley said. “Obviously he’s a big part of the game plan for Gonzaga. When you play a team as good as Gonzaga, if you try to attack them on the first action, the first side, it gets tough.
“Our team needs to be able to get the ball to the second side for him to have success.”
Innocenti had plenty of company from teammates contributing in several defensive stat categories. Freshman wing Davis Fogle scored 17 points but also swatted a season-high three shots and matched his season best with three steals.
Fogle blocked Ri Vavers’ 3-point attempt, leading to his dunk at the other end of the court to put Gonzaga up 31-13. Seven Zags combined for 13 steals. WSU coughed up 21 turnovers and trailed 31-8 in points off turnovers.
“They have really good hands on defense, they swipe at the ball and do a great job with that,” Riley said. “But our offense is built on connecting three or four simple passes together or connecting two ball screens or different actions together and we weren’t able to do that.
“Obviously part of that was because of their pressure and part of it was we were a little rushed.”