Quote:
Originally Posted by Queens_NYC
Tuesday, November 9th, 2021
7:00 PM
Fifth Third Arena
ESPN+
The Purple Aces were picked to finish 8th in the 10-team Missouri Valley Conference after coming off a 9-16 season that saw them go 7-11 in conference play for 3rd-year head coach Todd Lickliter.
They finished #204 in the 20-21 KenPom rankings where they ranked #114 in AdjO, #315 in AdjD, and most notably, #355 in AdjT (tempo).
They return 4 starters who have combined to start 195 games for Evansville and who also shot a combined 38% from beyond the arc last season.
They've played two official exhibition games so far where they've defeated D3 Mt. St. Joe's 74-45 and D2 Kentucky Wesleyan 74-64.
Evansville shot an impressive 50% (12-24) from deep in the Kentucky Wesleyan win but were also outscored 36-22 in the paint.
They were one of the worst rebounding teams in the country last season so hopefully that is an area where we can dominate on both ends of the court.
Despite all the questions we have about our roster, I'm still optimistic that we win this game by double digits.
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With all of the question marks out there it still seems we should have enough to get off to a decent start. The only players I would expect it tough to find the court would be Banks and McGinnis. That leaves at least 11 players to try on the court and see who can impact the game(s). That's 6 "bigs" and 5 guards.
Play D and rebound so we don't have to score too much out of the gate until we can get into a lineup/rotation rythm.