So, how was your weekend? Mine was fine, thanks for asking. I had an unexpected snow day, some good time with my family, and several hours sitting on the couch watching the NFL playoffs. What’s that? Something about a Lobo game on Saturday? Not ringing a bell. But they do have a game Tuesday night against UNLV!
A Little About UNLV
What they’ve done so far:
The Runnin’ Rebels have had a tough go this year, with a non-conference schedule filled with games that were supposed to be marquee matchups (Duke, Oregon, Kansas) that ended up being thrashings for the Rebels. Luckily, they also had plenty of cupcakes on the schedule to pick up enough wins to come into conference play with a winning record. The start of conference play hasn’t been too kind to the Rebels either, with convincing losses to CSU, BSU, and USU already in the books. They did beat Wyoming at home, however, so they still have a better record in MW play than SDSU.
Coach:
Mick Cronin Chris Beard MARVIN MENZIES! After one of the weirdest, and most public coaching searches in recent memory, UNLV eventually found their man in the former NSMU head coach. He stepped onto campus and was greeted with fan apathy, an administration in turmoil, and a depleted roster. Because of that, he had to cobble a team together, leading to a squad with 12 newcomers. It’s not a huge surprise that the team is down this year, but he’ll be given some time to build his program.
Probable Starters:
#5 Jalen Poyser (6’4” Guard, Sophomore): One of the handful of returning players for UNLV, Poyser has moved into a starting role and has become the team’s leading scorer, at 13.5 points per game. He’s a good shooter, making 37% of his threes and 84% from the FT line, and does a good job drawing fouls and getting to the line. He also does a good job staying out of foul trouble for the most part, which is good because the Rebels need him on the court.
#2 Uche Ofoegbu (6’4” Guard, Senior): Ofoegbu is a well-traveled grad transfer, having played at both SMU and San Francisco prior to joining UNLV. He’s not shooting particularly well this season, but he was excellent from the field last year for USF and has been much better in conference play, meaning that he might have settled in a bit. He has been seeing his minutes go down a bit, so don’t be surprised to see plenty of 6’2” junior guard Jovan Mooring in his place.
#1 Kris Clyburn (6’6” Forward, Junior): Clyburn is a JuCo transfer who has started almost every D1 game in his career. He’s a good rebounder and is best inside the arc, although he’ll still shoot a few threes a game. He’s had a rough start to conference play, shooting-wise, which has knocked all of his numbers down a bit.
#20 Christian Jones (6’7” Forward, Senior): Jones is a grad transfer from Saint John’s, where he didn’t receive much playing time until last year. When he’s been healthy, he’s been playing 27 minutes per game for the Rebels, so I’m sure he appreciates that. He plays entirely in the perimeter, only attempting 4 threes in his career and none this season, and he’s pretty effective down there, making over 50% of his shots.
#3 Tyrell Green (6’7” Forward, Senior): Green is the other returning Rebel from last year’s team that will see action in this game, having come over from JuCo last season. Unlike Jones, he is more than willing to take the ball behind the arc, where he’s shooting 38%. He’s a bit of a gunner, so expect him to take a bunch of shots in this game.
Some Relevant Stats
(To read the plots, the further away from the center, the better the team is at each stat. That is, for each stat, the best team will have a value on the outside of the radar plot while the worst team will have a value on the very inside of the plot. For an explanation of the stats, click here. All stats taken from kenpom.com)
As we can see, the Lobos have the better offense overall, only trailing UNLV in the three-point categories. The Rebels don’t do anything particularly well, being a little above average in free throw rate, turnovers, and steals, and they are noticeably weak at shooting the ball overall, ranking 282nd in effective field goal percentage. If there’s a game for the Lobos to rebound defensively, it’s San Jose State, but if there’s two, this would be the other.
UNLV is slightly better than the Lobos at defense, mostly thanks to the difference in three point defense. The Rebels don’t force a bunch of turnovers, but they are solid at preventing their opponents from getting to the line, which means that the Lobos may need to find other sources of scoring. Even though they are better than the Lobos, they aren’t great at defending the three, so there may be some opportunities there. Of course, they’re not good at defending the two either, so maybe just give the ball to Tim Williams every possession.
Scattered Thoughts
- Anyway, so this weekend I planned on going for a run, but when I got ready it was 19 degrees outside and that just didn’t sound pleasant… Okay, fine, let’s talk about Saturday night. It was a terrible, terrible collapse by the Lobos and something that I’ve not only never seen before, I never expect to see it again. Nevada had basically given up, taking out starters and putting in walk-ons, but a few threes got them back into it, making them feel as though they had a chance, which obviously they did. Now, there are absolutely some things that could have been done differently, but really, there were like 100 things that had to go wrong in the last couple of minutes for that to happen, and they all did. The Lobos missed free throws and Nevada banked in prayers from well behind the line. If any of those shots had gone the other way, the outcome would have been different. Honestly, now that I’m a little removed from the raw emotion of that game, I’m not sure my opinion of the team changed all that much.
Among all the terrible things about that finish, it masked a lot of good things that the Lobos showed. They played great defense as a team for like 30 minutes, Jalen Harris is becoming Jalen Harris!, and the Tim Williams/Elijah Brown is starting to look like the potent combination that we figured it would be, rather than a one-man show. Beyond that, Sam Logwood looked pretty good coming off the bench, Damien Jefferson had moments where he was electric, and Anthony Mathis looked much more comfortable at the point. If these trends continue, this team can absolutely still compete at the top of the conference and still has a good shot in Las Vegas. This game against UNLV will hopefully serve as a reminder of just that.
Players of the Game: 1) Jalen Harris, 2) Tim Williams, 3) Elijah Brown - I’ve also been thinking about how it might be harder for us as fans to bounce back from that sort of loss than the team. That’s mainly because in our position, there’s not much we can do about it, while the team can learn from their mistakes and take steps to correct it. For example, after the game, Elijah Brown was in the gym shooting free throws well past midnight. But what can we do? It’s not like there’s really anything we can do as fans to prevent the Lobos from doing that again. So what do we end up doing most of the time? We control the only things we can: how much we care about the team and the outcome or where we set our expectations. When you don’t care, it’s a lot easier to take a loss like that. When you don’t expect much, it’s hard to be disappointed. I’m not saying that’s right or wrong for a fan to do, as I think it’s pretty natural, honestly. But, I do think that there’s reason to believe that the team will be able to come back from that loss a lot quicker than you or I will.
Prediction
No reason to get to cute here, as I just think the Lobos are going to bounce bank nicely for this one and win handily, 83-70.
Game Info
Who: New Mexico Lobos (9-7, 2-2) vs UNLV Runnin’ Rebels (8-9, 1-3)
When: Tuesday, January 10, 2017 at 7PM MT
Where: The Pit, Albuquerque, NM
Watch: ESPN3
Listen: 770/94.5 KKOB