Semantics, but Plumlee wasn't guarding him, Thornton (5 Star) was. Thornton got screened by Marcus Lee (Plumlee's man) and Plumlee was simply hedging Murray to allow Thornton to recover. There are a handful of guards in the country that make that move - less of a bad play by Plumlee than a great play by Murray.
If you watch the video, Plumblee steps out to block Murray's move to the wing (and makes what looks like an aborted stab at the ball). This is the wrong thing for Plumblee to do in this situation because he cannot keep up with Murray inside and the lane is the absolute wrong place to let him go (as evidenced by the result). Plumblee's assignment on the switch has to be to let Murray have the jumper, if Thornton cannot recover, but to NOT let him take the ball inside.
Don't want to derail the thread so this is the last thing I'll say, but this happens all the time. This isn't a switch - Plumlee's job isn't to guard Murray now. It's to stop him and redirect his path back to Thornton after he recovers from the screen. Once Thornton recovers, Plumlee retreats back to Lee in the paint. As a team, we (Georgia Tech) typically switch on screens. The downside of this is that it creates mismatches (big on guard and vice versa). The advantage of a hedge is that it doesn't create mismatches. You do open yourself up to occasionally having your hedge split, but overall this is a pretty effective way to deal with screens. See below.
Bryant Crawford looked really good doing it. I had visions of him beating us in a tight game as I watched, which is sad to have that precondition.
