There’s no way out but through for the 2023-24 Muskies.
“Half a league, half a league, half a league, onward,” wrote Alfred, Lord Tennyson, regarding the ill-fated Charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean in 1854. The victims of a misunderstood or miscommunicated order, the nearly 700 British cavalrymen were cut down by Russian artillery as they executed an attack that they could never hope to have completed.
Some 170 years later, the Muskies find themselves possibly facing down the basketball equivalent. Whittled to the marrow by injuries, this roster has battled valiantly to the stretch run of a season that has at times seemed like some sort of karmic bullying against kids who don’t deserve it. With six games against teams in the KenPom top 10 already in the rearview, the Muskies figure to have to take down two of the top 10 in the span of four days to secure a place in the NCAA tournament.
It’s a grim task ahead. The first hurdle is a Butler team against whom Xavier has split this season. They beat them by a dozen with what passed for a full roster this year, then lost by six just a week ago with Dailyn Swain and Sasa Ciani joining the handful of players who had already suffered season-ending injuries this year.
There’s no more bubble or resume or mitigation for this star-crossed iteration of the Xavier basketball program. It’s only win or go home from here until whenever the end comes.
Team fingerprint
You’ll not be surprised to learn that little has changed in the seven days since these teams last played, especially considering Butler had the weekend off. Their offense still doesn’t turn the ball over much and is good but not great from deep. They don’t board or get to the line and they lack strong interior scoring options. They make about 80% of their free throws as a team, which is obviously a tough hurdle to clear for a team that’s trailing late.
Their defense also isn’t lighting the world on fire. They keep opponents off the line and seal the glass pretty well. They don’t force bad shots much and can be had from behind the arc, and their turnover percentage is basically down to Posh Alexander. It’s not a great defensive unit, but they can hold their own against one-dimensional teams.
Players
Starters
| Starting matchups | ||
|---|---|---|
| Posh Alexander | Point Guard | Dayvion McKnight |
| Senior | Class | Senior |
| 6’0″, 205 | Measurements | 6’0″, 188 |
| 11.1/4.6/4.9 | Game line | 12.4/3.8/5 |
| 42.8/32.9/77.8 | Shooting line | 46.4/38.5/81.1 |
| This will be Alexander’s 9th game against Xavier; if you don’t know what to expect, I’m not sure I can help you. He’s an absolue ball hawk on defense, and if you lose sight of him, he’ll steal the ball, regardless of if you’re the 1 or the 5. He isn’t a great shooter, but he can get streaky hot and does well from the line. He rides the momentum of a favorable crowd, which he might find at MSG as a former St. John’s player. Blink and he’ll decimate your whole game plan. | ||
| DJ Davis | Shooting Guard | Quincy Olivari |
| Senior | Class | Senior |
| 6’1″, 175 | Measurements | 6’3″, 200 |
| 13.6/3.2/2.5 | Game line | 19.5/5.5/2 |
| 43.1/35/96.8 | Shooting line | 43.4/43.2/81.1 |
| Davis is an absolute sniper from the line; he barely misses a free throw under any circumstances and leads the nation’s qualifiers in FT%. Besides that, he’s a threat from deep to the extent that he needs to be checked, but he’s not an assassin from out there. He’s an okay finisher with a good mid-range game. He’s an excellent secondary option on offense, which is how Butler uses him. | ||
| Pierre Brooks | Small Forward | Desmond Claude |
| Junior | Class | Sophomore |
| 6’6″, 240 | Measurements | 6’6″, 203 |
| 14.8/4/1.1 | Game line | 16/4.1/3.2 |
| 45.8/41.1/67.7 | Shooting line | 41.5/20.6/79.2 |
| Brooks is thicker than refrigerated peanut butter, but he doesn’t use it to bang much; Posh takes a high percentage of his shots at the rim. Brooks has a pure jumper though, and he’s solid from mid-range as well as being excellent from deep. He’ll hurt you on the occasions he goes to the paint, too. He’s not a super defender or much of a rebounder, but he can fill it up on the offensive end. | ||
| Jahmyl Telfort | Power Forward | Kachi Nzeh |
| Senior | Class | Freshman |
| 6’7″, 225 | Measurements | 6’8″, 230 |
| 13.6/4.9/3.1 | Game line | 2.4/2.4/0.4 |
| 42.8/31.7/85.2 | Shooting line | 60/0/50 |
| He’s not specifically efficient – it has taken him 32 shots to score 28 points against Xavier this year – but he’s not afraid to go for volume and he makes his free throws. He’s a pretty solid defender without fouling, especially if he doesn’t have to stray too far from the paint. He’s not much on the glass, which isn’t optimal considering Butler starts him at the four. | ||
| Jalen Thomas | Center | Abou Ousmane |
| Senior | Class | Senior |
| 6’10”, 240 | Measurements | 6’10”, 240 |
| 7.5/6.1/0.7 | Game line | 6.8/6.5/1.2 |
| 54.7/26.1/78 | Shooting line | 46/25/45 |
| Is Thomas Butler’s best rebounder? Yes. Is he their only rebounder? No, not technically. He’s the only one they start though. He’s a very efficient offensive player because he shoots almost exclusively from the paint, grabs offensive boards, and doesn’t turn the ball over. He steps out and shoots it from deep, but he doesn’t really make it from there. He can also be pretty foul prone. |
Reserves
Not much. Andre Screen is a giant big man off the bench who rocks the Chris Sabo rec specs. He’ll block a lot of shots, commit a lot of fouls, and shoot 50% from the field against decent teams despite being 7’1”.
Reserve guards are Landon Moore and Finley Bizjack. Bizjack looks like the kind of weird dude who makes a ton of threes, but he actually shoots 39.6/29/80.6 on his way to 4.3/1.1/0.9 per game. Moore averages 4/1.3/1.3 per game and shoots 38.8/38/75.8 on the year, though he’s hitting 44% from deep in Big East games. Neither of these guys will be on top of a scouting report, but each can hurt you in his own way if left alone.
Three questions
-Does Xavier have any legs left? The Muskies were up 6 with 13 to play and held a lead with 4 to play against Marquette over the weekend, but they couldn’t get it across the line. That continues a trend of falling out of games late, which makes sense considering they’ve consigned half a roster’s worth of scholarship players to the season-ending injury list this year. It’s gonna take something special to win four games in four days, but that’s a moot point if they can’t get this one across the line.
-Has Lazar Djokovic arrived? After a rough start to the year and an equal rough middle part, Lazar has thrown up 16/8/2 in his last two games. Every game is, in a sense, an audition for his roster spot next year, and there’s no better place to make a name for yourself than MSG. Madison Square Garden, I mean, not monosodium glutamate, which is a seasoning. The Muskies need someone taller than Des Claude who can offer an offensive threat, and it would be a welcome development if Djokovic became that guy.
-Can Quincy Olivari hit away from home? The best player to ever don the #8 for Xavier has been a scalding 70-142 (49.3%) from beyond the arc at home, but he’s just 28-85 (32.9%) in road and neutral games combined. He has been accused of being a flat-track bully by some of the haters in our mentions, but the reality is that he’s untouchable at Cintas against any opponent. This tournament is being contested at not-Cintas though, which means Xavier’s talismanic sniper is going to need to find the range in a hurry to make this season last.
Three keys
-Play from the start. Xavier outscored Butler by 10 over the final 35 minutes of the game the last time these two teams played, including holding them scoreless for 10 minutes through the middle of the game for recorded history’s slowest 12-0 run. The problem was the first 5 minutes of the game, in which Butler went 20-4 over X and basically salted the thing away before it was clear the Muskies had arrived in the building. There’s not much more embarrassing than a complete no-show at the Mecca; Xavier needs to come out of the gates hot today, as much for the fans as for themselves.
-Protect the ball, Des. I was going to be more general in this point, but I’m going to personalize it. A week ago, X had 15 turnovers; Des Claude had 6 of them and Abou Ousmane kicked in another 4. You don’t rely on Abou to control the flow of the game, but you need it from Des. His turnovers are rarely the result of superlative defense; the dude just has a knack for coughing the ball up in weird ways or not at all. When he isn’t doing that, he can’t be kept out of the paint. If Xavier can throw him the ball and trust him to at least get it on the rim, I think this goes their way.
-Get just enough from the post. Xavier’s starting big men have scored 11 points on 5-15 shooting in the last week, which is an abysmal performance. The team leans heavily on the top three of Des Claude, Dayvion McKnight, and Quincy Olivari, but you hope to get less that 100% of your scoring from those three guys. Neither Abou nor Kachi nor basically anyone Xavier has started at the four or five is a reliable go-to scorer, but if they can kick in a few buckets just to take the load off the guards, it’s a welcome addition to the offensive output of the team.