Arizona State basketball’s defensive mastermind

TEMPE, Ariz. — A basketball program is only as good as it’s staff, and that extends far beyond Arizona State basketball head coach Bobby Hurley. One of the most integral members of Hurley’s coaching staff joined him in 2021, and the results have been significant.

The impact of Jermaine Kimbrough on Arizona State

Throughout the last few seasons, Hurley has hired some great coaches that have paid dividends. One of those is Associate Head Coach Jermaine Kimbrough.

Kimbrough came to Arizona State in the spring of 2021 as an assistant coach. Before coming to Tempe he spent two seasons at Loyola Chicago, helping them win 20 games in both of his seasons there. The Ramblers also reached the Sweet 16 in the 2020-2021 season.

Before that Kimbrough spent three seasons at Wyoming.

After his first season in Tempe, the defensive-minded coach was promoted from assistant coach to associate head coach. Now Kimbrough is one of the most important individuals in the entire program.

“He is my right-hand man,” head coach Bobby Hurley explained. “All of the decisions made in the program are made by myself and Coach Kimbrough. It is rare that I would make a decision of any significance without discussing it with him. He’s just had such a fantastic background with coach defense throughout his career. He knows it (defense) like the back of his hand.”

The results on the end of the defensive side of the floor have been immediate.

Defensive efficiency

One of the most important defensive metrics is adjusted defensive efficiency. Defensive efficiency was commonly used by some of the greatest coaches in the sport, including Dean Smith. It calculates points allowed per possession. What adjusted defensive efficiency does, is it adjusts the metric based on your opponent.

For example, defensive efficiency values holding Arizona to 70 points the same as it values holding Texas Southern to 70 points. Except Arizona has one of the best offenses in college basketball.

Adjusted defensive efficiency will take into account the difficulty of the opponent, as well as home, neutral, and road sites. It’s been largely popularized thanks to being a core KenPom metric as well as Torvik. Many coaches reference it as well.

In the 2020-2021 season, Arizona State’s adjusted defensive efficiency was No. 97 in the country (Torvik). The next season with the addition of Kimbrough? It skyrocketed up to No. 17 in all of college basketball. That is the highest in program history since Torvik began in 2008. It also was the first time a Sun Devil team had cracked top 30 nationally in adjusted defensive efficiency.

It wouldn’t be the last.

Last season Arizona State’s defense shined again. The Sun Devils finished No. 29 in the nation, a slight drop from 2022. However it was still the second-best mark in program history.

Now in 2023 Arizona State’s adjusted defensive efficiency is No. 23 in college basketball. The Sun Devils are projected to finish top 30 again, for the third consecutive time with Kimbrough on staff.

A reminder that Arizona State’s best adjusted defensive efficiency mark before Kimbrough was No. 38 in 2010. Since 2008 ASU has finished outside the top 100 in the metric four times, including two below 200 finishes.

Kimbrough’s impact on defense

The metrics show how vital of an addition Coach Kimbrough has been, and Hurley credits him with a lot of the defensive work.

“… the concepts, and switching, and the peels, and all of this stuff that we do,” Hurley explained. “Things we do defensively are things that are taught by him (Kimbrough).

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