There's some serious irony in this thread...
The hedge is a critical piece of almost every version of the pack line defense out there. Virginia, Xavier, Butler under Stephens - when you're teaching the pack line there are two drills you do pretty much every day, relentlessly. The first is the close out. The pack line establishes a perimeter that you are always below. How far you retreat depends on the ball position and where your man is. Never give up baseline. Always force middle. This means anticipating skip passes and closing out on them is the #1 requirement of great pack line defenses. The 2nd is the hedge. Extreme ball pressure is a golden rule of the pack line. Dropping under picks doesn't fit that - the defender of the screener pops out to continue pressure on the ball, forces a dribble or two away from the screen, and recovers. We're just not good at it yet. Michigan State is hedging every high Duke pick as we speak. The idea that it's some crazy, idiotic concept is absurd.
Manning is running a help-man style defense with some pack line principles. But we simply couldn't have a worse makeup of players for a true pack line. Effective closeouts require length and athleticism. Look at UVA - a true point guard and a ton of length and athleticism everywhere else, they give one player under 6'4" a lot of minutes. We have Childress, Wilbekin, Woods, and Crawford at 6'3" or under. Tack on unathletic Arians and Dinos and you really have almost no ideal pack line defenders on our entire squad until Chaundee arrives. This is not a team that can succeed playing off shooters and recovering.