SMU

[Queens_NYC]

Saturday, January 14th, 2023
4:00 PM
Mood Coliseum
ESPNU

The Bearcats (11-6 [3-2 AAC], KenPom #72, NET #86] travel to Dallas to take on SMU (6-11 [1-3 AAC], KenPom #176, NET #218) in an attempt to win consecutive AAC match-ups for the first time this season.

The Mustangs have certainly been battle tested under first-year head coach Rob Lanier as 10 of their first 17 games have qualified as Q1 or Q2 under the NET metric.

SMU has been without their leading scorer 6'3 sophomore guard Zhuric Phelps (17.5 ppg, 3.9 rpg, 2.5 apg) for the past two games due to an oblique injury. Those two games have produced an 85-53 loss at UCF and a 97-88 home loss to Tulane.

Over the span of SMU's last 3 games (all losses), they have been outrebounded by 32 against Houston (52-20), and by 18 against UCF (35-17), but just outrebounded Tulane by 15 (41-26).

The Bearcats are 5.5-point favorites on the road.

[waterhead]

Originally Posted by Queens_NYC

Saturday, January 14th, 2023
4:00 PM
Mood Coliseum
ESPNU

The Bearcats (11-6 [3-2 AAC], KenPom #72, NET #86] travel to Dallas to take on SMU (6-11 [1-3 AAC], KenPom #176, NET #218) in an attempt to win consecutive AAC match-ups for the first time this season.

The Mustangs have certainly been battle tested under first-year head coach Rob Lanier as 10 of their first 17 games have qualified as Q1 or Q2 under the NET metric.

SMU has been without their leading scorer 6'3 sophomore guard Zhuric Phelps (17.5 ppg, 3.9 rpg, 2.5 apg) for the past two games due to an oblique injury. Those two games have produced an 85-53 loss at UCF and a 97-88 home loss to Tulane.

Over the span of SMU's last 3 games (all losses), they have been outrebounded by 32 against Houston (52-20), and by 18 against UCF (35-17), but just outrebounded Tulane by 15 (41-26).

The Bearcats are 5.5-point favorites on the road.

If we rebound like we have the last 3 games and play D like we have the past 7 games...this should be a formality even if we aren't hitting shots at a high rate.

[sedziobs]

SMU is another bad shooting team. They are especially bad from three, where they only shoot 31%. They don't take many though, with only about a third of their shots coming from beyond the arc. More than 30% of their looks come from the midrange, which is an even higher rate than us. They only make 34% of those midrange looks, which is really terrible offense resulting in under 0.7 points per possession. The only bright spot is they take care of the ball pretty well. Add it all up and the offense is below average nationally at #181.

The defense isn't much better. SMU is a poor rebounding team and they don't force turnovers, so they usually have fewer shots than the opponent. We are the better team almost across the board, with the exception of getting to the free throw line which we don't do well at all. Unfortunately that's the one area where you can still score if you are really struggling to shoot on the road. As long as we aren't ice cold we should win this one.

[sedziobs]

SMU has a couple of good wins this year on back to back days in a tournament. They beat Iona by making 19 of 26 at the rim. Then they beat top 50 Utah St by winning the turnover battle 13-5. We are generally good at defending the rim and taking care of the ball though.

[waterhead]

Originally Posted by sedziobs

SMU is another bad shooting team. They are especially bad from three, where they only shoot 31%. They don't take many though, with only about a third of their shots coming from beyond the arc. More than 30% of their looks come from the midrange, which is an even higher rate than us. They only make 34% of those midrange looks, which is really terrible offense resulting in under 0.7 points per possession. The only bright spot is they take care of the ball pretty well. Add it all up and the offense is below average nationally at #181.

The defense isn't much better. SMU is a poor rebounding team and they don't force turnovers, so they usually have fewer shots than the opponent. We are the better team almost across the board, with the exception of getting to the free throw line which we don't do well at all. Unfortunately that's the one area where you can still score if you are really struggling to shoot on the road. As long as we aren't ice cold we should win this one.

The final stage in our development is getting to the rack for easy buckets or putting fouls on the other team. Wes has put out a lot of small fires so far but this one has yet to look very good.

[sedziobs]

Originally Posted by waterhead

The final stage in our development is getting to the rack for easy buckets or putting fouls on the other team. Wes has put out a lot of small fires so far but this one has yet to look very good.

I'm not counting on it. The highest free throw rate Wes had at UNCG was ranked #236 in the country, and that was in his very first year. His last couple years there were ranked 333 and 335. This year we are 331. It's normal for his teams. It will have to be a stage in his own development.

[Queens_NYC]

Defensive effort appears to have picked up where the ECU effort left off - which is a good thing.

[TheLongHaul]

Davenport is going to be Wes' undoing. Mind boggling he gets the minutes he does. He sets more screens for the other team than he does for UC.

And at some point Wes needs to get these guys to stop pump faking all the time. Sometimes you just have to shoot the damn ball.

[TheLongHaul]

Yikes this team is bad. Ody can't even hit the rim on a layup. Davenport dribbles out of bounds. Skilling's is good and changes the game but Miller doesn't play him. SMH.

[sedziobs]

We're getting the ball in the lane, just can't finish. Too many unforced turnovers.