Matchups

[BFieldHusky]

Now that we know our seed, our first round opponent, and our location, we can look at matchups. One last thing on St. Johns. They are really the type of team you would design to be able to beat this UConn team. Their strengths really play into our weaknesses. They press. They cause live ball turnovers. They are much bigger at the wing position than us. They are a good rebounding team. They have one of the few guys in the country who can match Tarris on both ends. We were able to handle them with ease when we didn't turn the ball over, and limited them to one and done. But we are not a consistent team, especially when it comes to shooting and taking care of the ball.

It appears that Furman is not the kind of team that plays an aggressive style of defense that looks to cause turnovers. If we get to the 2nd Round, the same looks to be true with UCF. UCLA is better at it, but we need to see how healthy they truly are.

 

[Marat]

Starting with Fuhrman, UConn will need to play an A game defensively against each opponent, since this is a one and done situation. That needs to be the mentality. Can they do it? If so, then it will be fun.

 

[BFieldHusky]

I didn't think our defense was bad against St. John's. We held them to 72 points, with 24 points coming off turnovers. That was the bigger issue.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Now that we know our seed, our first round opponent, and our location, we can look at matchups. One last thing on St. Johns. They are really the type of team you would design to be able to beat this UConn team. Their strengths really play into our weaknesses. They press. They cause live ball turnovers. They are much bigger at the wing position than us. They are a good rebounding team. They have one of the few guys in the country who can match Tarris on both ends. We were able to handle them with ease when we didn't turn the ball over, and limited them to one and done. But we are not a consistent team, especially when it comes to shooting and taking care of the ball.

It appears that Furman is not the kind of team that plays an aggressive style of defense that looks to cause turnovers. If we get to the 2nd Round, the same looks to be true with UCF. UCLA is better at it, but we need to see how healthy they truly are.

Nice post. Should just add the caveat that StJ was designed to beat UConn in the Big East. There's no way they win 2 of 3 vs. us in a 3-game series when their physicality is properly-called for the numbers of fouls they actually commit per possession.

Pitino and his team also lucked out in that we turned out to be a wildly inconsistent team with a very low floor and very high ceiling. That kind of thing is almost impossible to predict based on off-season and pre-season roster analysis. Though a smart coach can at least take some gambles.

It was fairly clear we built a roster to try and capitalize on getting clean open looks for 3's and easy 2's with our offensive sets. Turns out two of our sharpshooters very much underperformed (Ball & Mullins) and turned out to be redundant at the least, and perhaps even antagonistic (especially when it comes to defense. It also was clear that one of Tarris' problems was inconsistency in overall performance.

Things broke their way big-time. Kudos to them for being prepared to take advantage.

That being said, it really really annoys me that we blew both the Regular Season and BET opportunities.

Now that I got that off my chest, back to Furman and UCF/UCLA.

If the high ceiling version of this team shows up next weekend, we should be able to handle any of them.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

Watched Furman’s SoCon championship game against ETSU last night. A couple thoughts from that game.

1. The offense ran through 6’11 Cooper Bowser. Pretty much exclusively works in the paint and has a nice post game and touch. He’s going to give up a ton of bulk to Tarris, who has been excellent at keeping his man out of the deep post this year. Bowser is the only real post threat on the offensive end.
2. The rest of the offense seems to flow through their 6’5 freshman PG Wilkins. He did not play well in this game. Takes tons of contests shots and was very loose with the ball (3.6 TO per game in the season and 4 this game). He’s tall but slight and doesn’t really use his size to bully people. Demary and Malachi’s pressure defense should be disruptive. Hes the guy that can go off for 20+ if he’s locked in so they’ve got to play excellent defense.
3. The other guys seem largely to be there for spacing. Most on the perimeter and trying to get drive and dish or pick and pop 3s. They do a good job of making the extra pass to swing the ball around but doesn’t seem to be any real threats to get to the rim consistently and force contact. They start another 6’11 player (Johnston) but he pretty much exclusively stands the perimeter on offense.
4. Defensively, I think they’re a perfect matchup for us. Basically no pressure at all and Bowser is not a rim protector. He doesn’t foul much but also doesn’t really contest aggressively. IMO if Reed’s head is right, he’s going to feast. I think they’re going to have to aggressively double and deny Reed, which will open up other guys. They start two 6’11 guys but Bowser seems to play the traditional 5 defensively. I could easily see quick foul trouble with them trying to deal with Reed’s power, so will be interesting to see how they play the matchups.
5. Half their shots came from 3 and they only shot 15 FTs. That’s even more than their season average. They just do not drive and initiate contact. Honestly, kind of a poor man’s version of our offense without nearly as many actions.
6. They were +12 on the boards but had a significant height advantage in the game (ETSUs two tallest starters were 6’8). They won’t have that same size advantage against us.
7. Bench goes 3-deep, all 6’6 or 6’7. They don’t seem to really bring any different looks from the guys that start. Mostly stand around the perimeter.

Our bigs both have great matchups against Furman and I expect tons of looks from Furman to double and deny. They’ve got to be ready to kick that ball out and find the open man. Excited to see what Solo/Mullins/Karaban can do against far less off-ball pressure and I think this game sets up real nicely for Ross to be a major pest defensively, plus the lack of ball pressure should open up offensive opportunities for him. The key is going to be running all their shooters off the line and our bigs bottling up Bowser.

 

[BFieldHusky]

Nice post. Should just add the caveat that StJ was designed to beat UConn in the Big East. There's no way they win 2 of 3 vs. us in a 3-game series when their physicality is properly-called for the numbers of fouls they actually commit per possession.

Pitino and his team also lucked out in that we turned out to be a wildly inconsistent team with a very low floor and very high ceiling. That kind of thing is almost impossible to predict based on off-season and pre-season roster analysis. Though a smart coach can at least take some gambles.

It was fairly clear we built a roster to try and capitalize on getting clean open looks for 3's and easy 2's with our offensive sets. Turns out two of our sharpshooters very much underperformed (Ball & Mullins) and turned out to be redundant at the least, and perhaps even antagonistic (especially when it comes to defense. It also was clear that one of Tarris' problems was inconsistency in overall performance.

Things broke their way big-time. Kudos to them for being prepared to take advantage.

That being said, it really really annoys me that we blew both the Regular Season and BET opportunities.

Now that I got that off my chest, back to Furman and UCF/UCLA.

If the high ceiling version of this team shows up next weekend, we should be able to handle any of them.

Great point regarding the Big East. If we do end up playing St. Johns' in the Elite 8, I expect the officiating to be much different. Especially if anyone on that crew wants to be going to the Final 4/National Championship Round.

We are still getting great looks for Solo, Mullins, and Alex. They either make them and we advance, or continue to struggle, and we will get picked off by a quality opponent. Those guys just need to see the ball go through the net early.

Mullins needs to take a page out of the Georgetown game and take the mid range shots if they are falling. Mitchell was a tough matchup for him. But most teams don't have that kind of player at the 3.

It sucks we didn't win the BE regular season or tournament. That being said, we are still a 2 seed, in the East. We got a very favorable draw in my opinion. Time to move forward. This team should get to the Elite 8 with their draw.

 

[Marat]

I didn't think our defense was bad against St. John's. We held them to 72 points, with 24 points coming off turnovers. That was the bigger issue.

True turnovers was a big problem due to their aggressiveness and our lack of composure.

I said that an A game defensively needs to be played for each opponenent . I didn't want to say the offense needs to be at 'A" level because we know their shooting is not consistent, but I guess if we can say that minimal turnovers and good rebounding may be enough if our shooting goes cold (with an A game on defense).

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Mullins needs to take a page out of the Georgetown game and take the mid range shots if they are falling. Mitchell was a tough matchup for him. But most teams don't have that kind of player at the 3.

It sucks we didn't win the BE regular season or tournament. That being said, we are still a 2 seed, in the East. We got a very favorable draw in my opinion. Time to move forward. This team should get to the Elite 8 with their draw.

Agree. Given the 34-game body of work that's defined who we are, I'd be happy with getting to the Elite 8 with a chance to make Final 4.

Less than that will frustrate me immensely, but I know it's on the table with this group.

 

[Tenspro2002]

The matchup doesn't seem terrible, but a high-volume 3-point shooting team is intrinsically going to have a lot of variance in their performance, which isn't what you want as a 20 point favorite.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

I didn't think our defense was bad against St. John's. We held them to 72 points, with 24 points coming off turnovers. That was the bigger issue.

Defense was putrid the first ~15 minutes or so

 

[JustbrewitMan]

I didn't think our defense was bad against St. John's. We held them to 72 points, with 24 points coming off turnovers. That was the bigger issue.

Yep, we seem to have had an issue with silly TOs all season, but it's gotten much worse in the latter 1/3 of the season. This is one of the things we ABSOLUTELY need to clean up in the NCAAT. These stats below are disgusting:

 

[FightOnCT]

I didn't think our defense was bad against St. John's. We held them to 72 points, with 24 points coming off turnovers. That was the bigger issue.

Exactly. We played in a way that allowed St. John’s to score extra buckets along with fouls. Though the interior defense was a massive issue at the beginning

The post above pretty much encapsulates how turnovers are probably our single biggest issue. We make the game harder for ourselves by throwing the ball away; it’s probably why our offense has been rated so low too.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

I'm about to head out to SW MA for my annual pre-tournament "silent retreat" in the woods.

Expect the official Furman scouting report to drop by Thursday morning, but my initial thoughts is that, analytically, this is Bob Richey's worst team in his nine year tenure, even though they've been one of the biggest (5th tallest in the nation) and best non-Ivy/Patriot mid-majors at roster continuity. They still jack of a ton of threes, but the team's 33.3 3P% is the worst under Richey, while their OR% isn't very good.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

I'm about to head out to SW MA for my annual pre-tournament "silent retreat" in the woods.

Expect the official Furman scouting report to drop by Thursday morning, but my initial thoughts is that, analytically, this is Bob Richey's worst team in his nine year tenure, even though they've been one of the biggest (5th tallest in the nation) and best non-Ivy/Patriot mid-majors at roster continuity. They still jack of a ton of threes, but the team's 33.3 3P% is the worst under Richey, while their OR% isn't very good.

They absolutely do not play as big as the heights on the roster would have you believe.

 

[Lafayette]

2 years ago Furman, yes Furman, was a 13 seed in the South and beat 4 seed Virginia.

A fact both coaches are well aware of and talking to their players about it.

 

[HooperScooper]

A few things on Furman in this article. Most interesting part is about their freshman PG. Hopefully Demary can take the head off the snake because it sounds like he is by far Furman's most important player.

Alex Wilkins runs the show​

Furman rides a ball-dominant guard made for March into Friday's game, with freshman guard Alex Wilkins shouldering more responsibility than just about any player in America for the Paladins this season. Wilkins' 34.4% usage rate is the highest among any player participating in this year's NCAA Tournament, and he uses this outsized share of possession to break down opposing defenses as a facilitator and a scorer.

The 6-foot-5 star ranks third among all SoCon players with 4.7 assists per game — Wilkins does also lead the league in turnovers by a wide margin — while putting up nearly 18 points a night. Wilkins has struggled from 3-point range this season, but he's an extremely efficient finisher at the rim and from the foul line. And as a Boston native and last year's No. 3 overall recruit in New England, Wilkins might have some extra motivation to dethrone the region's preeminent college basketball powerhouse.

https://www.nhregister.com/sports/uconn-mens-basketball/article/ncaa-tournament-schedule-furman-stats-22078691.php

 

[RuffRuff]

A few things on Furman in this article. Most interesting part is about their freshman PG. Hopefully Demary can take the head off the snake because it sounds like he is by far Furman's most important player.

Alex Wilkins runs the show​

Furman rides a ball-dominant guard made for March into Friday's game, with freshman guard Alex Wilkins shouldering more responsibility than just about any player in America for the Paladins this season. Wilkins' 34.4% usage rate is the highest among any player participating in this year's NCAA Tournament, and he uses this outsized share of possession to break down opposing defenses as a facilitator and a scorer.

The 6-foot-5 star ranks third among all SoCon players with 4.7 assists per game — Wilkins does also lead the league in turnovers by a wide margin — while putting up nearly 18 points a night. Wilkins has struggled from 3-point range this season, but he's an extremely efficient finisher at the rim and from the foul line. And as a Boston native and last year's No. 3 overall recruit in New England, Wilkins might have some extra motivation to dethrone the region's preeminent college basketball powerhouse.

https://www.nhregister.com/sports/uconn-mens-basketball/article/ncaa-tournament-schedule-furman-stats-22078691.php

Silas being healthy seems really important here.

This kid is a frosh, looks young. I haven't seen him personally.

 

[BFieldHusky]

A few things on Furman in this article. Most interesting part is about their freshman PG. Hopefully Demary can take the head off the snake because it sounds like he is by far Furman's most important player.

Alex Wilkins runs the show​

Furman rides a ball-dominant guard made for March into Friday's game, with freshman guard Alex Wilkins shouldering more responsibility than just about any player in America for the Paladins this season. Wilkins' 34.4% usage rate is the highest among any player participating in this year's NCAA Tournament, and he uses this outsized share of possession to break down opposing defenses as a facilitator and a scorer.

The 6-foot-5 star ranks third among all SoCon players with 4.7 assists per game — Wilkins does also lead the league in turnovers by a wide margin — while putting up nearly 18 points a night. Wilkins has struggled from 3-point range this season, but he's an extremely efficient finisher at the rim and from the foul line. And as a Boston native and last year's No. 3 overall recruit in New England, Wilkins might have some extra motivation to dethrone the region's preeminent college basketball powerhouse.

https://www.nhregister.com/sports/uconn-mens-basketball/article/ncaa-tournament-schedule-furman-stats-22078691.php

I would expect Hurley to take him out of the game. Start Silas on him, have Ross guard him at times. I think Hurley will make other players beat them.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Here's Furman's basic stats for the year:

Shutting down Wilkins and also limiting Thomas' looks from 3 would seem to be most important to shutting down their offense. They only have really one very good high-volume 3pt shooter (Thomas).

 

[blkknight1]

Wilkins is the type of guy if he gets going can hang 30 on a team. Watched him do it in the socon semis. Also saw him play very much like a freshman he commits some pretty silly fouls on defense if Silas is healthy he should attack him get him into early foul trouble.

Bowser their big man scores at an extremely high clip he shot 70% in the socon tourney and that roughly what he shot from the field all year. He tall but on the slighter build side. Tarris should be able to push him off his spots

 

[Kemba15]

The matchup doesn't seem terrible, but a high-volume 3-point shooting team is intrinsically going to have a lot of variance in their performance, which isn't what you want as a 20 point favorite.

They are 51st in the country in 3P attempts and 260th in 3P%, per ESPN. Doesn't seem all that scary to me

2025-26 Men's College Basketball Team Stat Leaders - ESPN

ESPN is the place for NCAAM stats! Find a list of the team stat leaders for the 2025-26 NCAAM Regular Season.

www.espn.com

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Will be interesting to see how much Furman deviates from their usual playstyle that got them to the Dance.

Both Furman and UConn play very slow overall tempo (289th them, 322nd us) for the season. Do they pick up the pace and try to catch lightning in a bottle with more opportunities?

Both Furman and UConn have some of the lowest offensive FT rates of teams in CBB (312th them, 311th us) per Hoop Explorer.

However, Furman has one of the best and UConn one of the worst defensive FT rates of teams in CBB (36th them, 301st us) per Hoop Explorer.

 

[Tenspro2002]

They are 51st in the country in 3P attempts and 260th in 3P%, per ESPN. Doesn't seem all that scary to me

2025-26 Men's College Basketball Team Stat Leaders - ESPN

ESPN is the place for NCAAM stats! Find a list of the team stat leaders for the 2025-26 NCAAM Regular Season.

www.espn.com

It's not scary if they perform to their percentages.

But as a heavy favorite, you want an opponent who's going to be reliably mediocre, not an opponent who could be either abysmal or great depending on their shooting.

If they go the expected 9 for 27 on 3's, we'll be fine. If they go 14 for 31, then we need to be on our game. And we have absolutely had bad shooting teams go off against us recently.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

Bowser their big man scores at an extremely high clip he shot 70% in the socon tourney and that roughly what he shot from the field all year. He tall but on the slighter build side. Tarris should be able to push him off his spots

Felt like he almost exclusively killed ETSU on hook shots. He's got really great touch.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Furman has not really played many tough teams all year. They've played only 4 games vs teams ranked in the Top ~130 on Hoop Explorer (note HE rates teams similar to KenPom and NetRtg scores track closely with KP).

High Point (74), UNI (72), Illinois St (92), ETSU x2 (135)

They went 0-5 with an average loss margin of 12.6 pts.

Here's their metrics vs those teams:

Note that their offense struggled, they relied a lot more on 3pt shots (48% 3pt rate, only made 25% of them, turned it over at a very high rate, and took many fewer 2pt shots...though they actually did great on making those reduced 2pt shot attempts.

Their defense had very bad eFG%, bad TO%, and let teams have a very high Assist% (A%) on their shots. Teams basically had their way on offense vs. their defense.

Compare those stats to how they performed vs. >130 rated teams:

Interestingly, they did do a pretty nice job hitting the defensive glass no matter what the level of competition. But their offensive rebounding was not good versus better competition.


This game is all about us showing up to play at least our "C" game.

Doomed, I know.