2017-18 Winthrop Men’s Basketball Season – GAME #11
@ VCU Rams (Atlantic-10 Conference)
Tuesday, December 19, 7:00pm EST
Siegel Center, Richmond, VA
WU (6-4 overall record; Pomeroy/Sagarin/RPI Ranking: 170/173/181)
VCU (6-5 overall record; Pomeroy/Sagarin/RPI Ranking: 88/80/123)
Livestats
Live Video – A-10 Network (I believe it costs $$$)
VCU Profile
Head Coach: Mike Rhoades (1st season as head coach at VCU)
Probable Starters:
G Jonathan Williams, sr (6-1, 200) – 11.5 ppg, 2.5 rpg, 6.5 apg, 1.5 spg, 37.8 FG%, 40.0 3PT% (10 made threes), 78.2 FT% – 30.7 min/game
G Malik Crowfield, so (6-4, 195) – 8.7 ppg, 1.4 rpg, 1.1 spg, 42.6 FG%, 42.1 3PT% (16 made threes), 62.5 FT% – 28.6 min/game
G De’Riante Jenkins, so (6-5, 195) – 12.5 ppg, 4.4 rpg, 2.6 apg, 1.7 spg, 44.3 FG%, 40.4 3PT% (21 made threes), 62.5 FT% – 30.0 min/game
F Khris Lane, sr (6-7, 245) – 10.1 ppg, 4.3 rpg, 59.7 FG%, 44.4 3PT% (8 made threes), 65.4 FT% – 19.7 min/game
F Justin Tillman, sr (6-8, 220) – 17.5 ppg, 7.6 rpg, 56.2 FG%, 50.0 3PT% (14 made threes), 80.0 FT% – 28.0 min/game
Key players off the bench:
F Issac Vann, so (6-6, 210) – 10.0 ppg, 3.6 rpg, 45.7 FG%, 29.4 3PT% (5 made threes), 60.0 FT% – 19.6 min/game
G Mike’l Simms, so (6-5, 220) – 4.9 ppg, 1.9 rpg, 37.0 FG%, 23.1 3PT% (6 made threes), 72.7 FT% – 15.0 min/game
G Xavier Jackson, jr (6-3, 190) – 1.8 ppg, 1.7 rpg, 26.3 FG%, 22.2 3PT% (2 made threes), 100 FT% – 13.8 min/game
F Marcus Santos-Silva, fr (6-7, 255) – 4.8 ppg, 5.2 rpg, 57.1 FG%, 0 made threes, 41.7 FT% – 13.3 min/game
F Sean Mobley, fr (6-8, 240) – 4.0 ppg, 2.0 rpg, 39.5 FG%, 39.3 3PT% (11 made threes), 75.0 FT% – 12.5 min/game
G Tyler Maye, fr (6-1, 175) – 1.5 ppg, 0.6 rpg, 28.6 FG%, 25.0 3PT% (1 made three), 42.9 FT% – 8.7 min/game
WU faces its final non-conference test of the season (aside from the NCAA Tournament of course) on Tuesday at VCU. While the Rams may not be as strong as they’ve been over the past decade, it is still a very solid team, and a final chance for the Eagles to pick up an impressive victory before Big South play begins at the end of the month.
VCU is now under the leadership of Mike Rhoades, and so far, the Rams are 6-5, beating the teams you’d expect them to beat, but they haven’t been able to knock off any of the ‘big’ names on their schedule so far (their losses are to UVA, Marquette, Michigan, Texas, and Seton Hall). But this will be one of the toughest opponents WU has faced this season, and likely the toughest venue the Eagles will play in for the entire year.
Offensively, VCU is balanced, able to score inside and out (with 6’8″ Justin Tillman as the key piece to that offense, being able to score in a variety of ways). And as is typically the case with VCU teams, they rebound well on the offensive glass and do a pretty good job of limiting turnovers. Defensively, so far, this is the weakest Rams squad on that end of the court in recent memory (using defensive efficiency per KenPom). But that’s not to say that they are a bad defensive team, just not in the top-50 of the nation as they’ve been most of the time in the last decade. And a big reason for that appears to be a change from the Havoc mentality/philosophy that was seen during the Shaka Smart era. In prior years, VCU forced a ton of turnovers, made it difficult for you to get good looks, but also fouled you a bunch. This year’s team does not force turnovers that well, and opponents are shooting well against the Rams, especially from two-point range (55% so far). But the flipside to that is that opponents now rarely get to the FT line against them. So based on the numbers, the Eagles don’t appear to have to worry as much about suffocating presses and traps.
One familiar face that the Eagles will see in this matchup is Khris Lane, who transferred to VCU from Longwood. But otherwise, there should be very little familiarity involved with these teams, even as these two programs faced each other back in Pat Kelsey’s first two seasons (with VCU winning easily in both). Today’s Winthrop teams play at a much faster pace and are much more dynamic offensively than they were in Kelsey’s early years. And VCU is now two coaches removed from Shaka Smart. But either way, VCU is still one of the great programs of the region, and WU will have to play much better than they did on Saturday in order to pick up a win.
My Prediction: Winthrop 86, VCU 83
Blogging the WU 