Faith. It is a characteristic not too often required of a basketball player. Speed. Strength. Stamina. These are the virtues of a basketball player. But, faith? When the Georgetown Hoyas take on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish tomorrow at Verizon Center, faith will be a central issue. Not because these are the two most prominent Catholic schools in the nation. Not because the winner will get to chant, “God’s on our side.” Not even because the fans need a boost of confidence in order to regain theirs. But, because of the backdoor cut.

As we all know, the Hoyas run what most call a “Modified Princeton Offense”. This involves screens, ballhandling, backdoor cuts, passing, and reading the defense. When an opponent is playing man-to-man defense, at some point one of the defenders is going to fall asleep, even if just for a split moment. The offense is designed to take advantage of the momentary lapse, and use it to get layups. The player guarded by the dozing defender cuts to the basket. The player with the ball throws it to where the cutter will be. The cutter catches it and makes an uncontested layup, as the defender chases him with no hope of catching up. Seems simple enough.

But, something that goes underappreciated in this offense, in my opinion, is the faith the players have in each other. When the ball handler passes the ball to the cutter, he doesn’t actually pass it to him. He passes it to where the cutter should be by the time the ball gets there. The problem is, when he throws the pass, it looks like he is throwing it directly out of bounds. And if the cutter changes his mind and doubles back, then he does, in fact, throw it out of bounds. But, the passer has faith in his teammate that he will continue his cut, make the layup, and prevent the turnover. It is a slight nuance that is overlooked a lot of the time, but if you have ever played pick-up basketball, you know what it feels like when you pass it to a cutter who never gets there.

In the Pitt game, the Hoyas struggled mightily from beyond the arc. If the same thing happens again tomorrow, and the three-point shots stop falling, the basket can begin to look awfully small. And the easiest way to make it bigger and get out of a slump is to get some easy layups to help a shooter’s confidence grow. But, how does a team go about doing that? Have faith.