Why this Penny Hardaway team is unlike any other Memphis basketball team he's had
Penny Hardaway stood off to the side, scanning the scene at the Laurie-Walton Family Basketball Center.
His Memphis basketball team — in its second practice of the preseason last week, divided in half for a semi-controlled intrasquad scrimmage — went up and down the floor, trading baskets for sustained stretches, with contributions from essentially everyone. David Jones on one end, Jaykwon Walton on the other. Nick Jourdain works the ball inside to Malcolm Dandridge, who puts up points. Then, Jahvon Quinerly gets them back. Jayden Hardaway hits a 3-pointer, and Jordan Brown goes up and under for an easy layup.
Hardaway, in his sixth season as Tigers coach, hasn't seen anything quite like it. So much experience. So much versatility. So much offensive firepower.
"We've never had that," he said candidly. "That's gonna be (our) identity."
Wait — what? A statement like that from Hardaway is enough to constitute a double-take. It will be on full display at Wednesday at Student Madness. And it will likely be among the hot topics of conversation at AAC media day next week in Dallas. Especially considering how defensive-minded he's been in five seasons as a college coach. In each of the past four seasons, the Tigers have never finished worse than 38th in the country in adjusted defensive efficiency. In 2020, Memphis was fifth. In 2021, Hardaway's program was No. 1. Even in his first season, the Tigers registered the 54th-best defense in the country (the year after they were 200th).
It's not like Memphis has been routinely devoid of offense. In fact, the program has ranked no worse than No. 38 each of the past two seasons in adjusted offensive efficiency. Last season, largely thanks to Kendric Davis and DeAndre Williams, the Tigers finished 26th.
But Hardaway — an elite, generational offensive talent during his playing career, ironically enough — has always made defense his top priority as a coach. That likely won't be the case this season. Not with this group.
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“I’ve got to understand that you got a lot of guys that have averaged double-figure points (and) that have played at a high level,” he said last week.
Memphis' projected starting lineup (keeping in mind, there's still a chance Williams returns) features four players (Quinerly, Caleb Mills, Jones and Brown) who were involved in at least 23.8% of their team's offensive possessions and four players (Mills, Jones, Brown and Walton) who averaged at least 10 points per game.
“So much talent,” Walton said. “You never know who’s gonna have a big night and that’s crazy. That’s the scary part.”
Reach sports writer Jason Munz at jason.munz@commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @munzly.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: How Penny Hardaway feels about Memphis Tigers basketball new identity
