Xavier needs this one because Xavier needs all of them. Butler is just here to spoil the fun.
You’re probably going to get tired of reading this if you haven’t already, but Xavier cannot afford to lose this game. After the loss against Villanova that I’m going to blame on influenzas A and B, anything resembling a margin for error has evaporated for X. If they don’t win out down the stretch, it’s going to take something special in Madison Square Garden to get the Muskies onto the right side of the bubble.
If they do win out though, there’s a not-too-farfetched scenario in which Xavier sneaks past UConn and into the 4 seed for the Big East tournament. It would take things getting pretty weird for that to matter, but if Villanova defends the home court against the Huskies tomorrow, just keep that in the back of your mind.
Of course, none of that matters if Xavier doesn’t get and stay scalding hot. Butler is showing signs of doing the same, and the Muskies have them twice between now and the end of the regular season. After a disastrous 2-12 stretch from early December through the end of January, Butler is 3-0 and playing like a top 25 team in February. In fact, according to Bart Torvik, the Bulldogs are the best team in the Big East since January went from present to past tense.
As Xavier attempts to claw back to the surface, the last thing they want to run into is a team with nothing to lose that is getting hot. Butler is exactly that, and if they somehow find a way to win out, there could possibly find themselves avoiding the first round of games in MSG. This is a big game for both of these teams.
Team fingerprint
Butler runs a methodical, effective offense based largely on shotmaking. They’re third in the league in EFG%, sitting second in two-point percentage and fourth in three-point percentage. Only about 38% of their shots in conference play have come from deep, which is seventh in the league. Their biggest weakness on offense is a weak showing on the offensive glass, thank goodness. They’re good at getting to the line and solid but not spectacular in ball security. They get a lot of shots blocked, though obviously not as many as Xavier does.
Their defense is poor, ninth in the league. They’re strong on keeping opponents off the line and the glass, but there are question marks in most other places. One of those is not three-point defense, where they’re first in the league in defensive three-point percentage and third in rate. Maybe teams aren’t bothering with taking a lot of threes because Butler is eighth in the conference in two-point defense and dead last in blocking shots. There are points to be scored inside the arc against these guys.
Players
Starters
| Starting matchups | ||
|---|---|---|
| Finley Bizjack | Point Guard | Dayvion McKnight |
| Sophomore | Class | Senior |
| 6’4″, 190 | Measurements | 6’0″, 188 |
| 8.7/3/2.1 | Game line | 9.9/2.4/4.4 |
| 44.4/44.3/67.2 | Shooting line | 42/34.8/78.8 |
| Bizjack is shooting a scorching 50% on 56 three point attempts in conference play. The volume isn’t huge, but when he picks his spot he tends to stick it. Weirdly for a player who profiles as a spot up shooter, he tends to turn the ball over too much. He’s a deadeye shooter, but he doesn’t add value many other places. | ||
| Jahmyl Telfort | Shooting Guard | Ryan Conwell |
| Senior | Class | Junior |
| 6’7″, 225 | Measurements | 6’4″, 215 |
| 15.9/4.6/3.5 | Game line | 15.5/2.8/2.4 |
| 44.9/35.6/78.4 | Shooting line | 42.1/38.6/80.8 |
| Telfort is the most ball-dominant player in Butler’s starting lineup. His middling three point shooting keeps him from being a truly elite scorer, but he can put them up in bunches because he scores at every level. He’s smart with the ball and leads the team in assist rate by a large margin. He’s dangerous. | ||
| Pierre Brooks II | Small Forward | Marcus Foster |
| Senior | Class | Senior |
| 6’6″, 240 | Measurements | 6’5″, 215 |
| 15.5/5/1.9 | Game line | 8.2/4.7/1.8 |
| 48.1/35.1/81.4 | Shooting line | 40.8/41.2/79.5 |
| Brooks is also dangerous. Again, he’s not a great shooter, but he’s serviceable. He shoots a lot and is seventh in the conference in true shooting percentage. His only real weakness is his A/TO is about even and he’s not a great rebounder. The man can score the ball though, and generally plays to his strength of getting inside. | ||
| Patrick McCaffery | Power Forward | Dailyn Swain |
| Senior | Class | Sophomore |
| 6’9″, 215 | Measurements | 6’8″, 220 |
| 11.8/4.8/1.6 | Game line | 10.4/5.2/2.5 |
| 44/42.3/86.4 | Shooting line | 57.6/21.4/83 |
| Has the ever been a more Butler player than McCaffery? He’s tall but he doesn’t rebound or play defense. He’s a very good three point shooter and is eighth in the conference in true shooting percentage. Functionally he’s a shooting guard in the body of a power forward. | ||
| Boden Kapke | Center | Zach Freemantle |
| Sophomore | Class | Senior |
| 6’11”, 255 | Measurements | 6’9″, 227 |
| 3.3/1.9/0.6 | Game line | 15.5/2.8/2.4 |
| 41.2/32.4/52.4 | Shooting line | 42.1/38.6/80.8 |
| Kapke starts over Andre Screen for reasons best known to Thad Matta. He’s not bad, per se, but he’s not great at scoring and his rebounding numbers leave something to be desired. He’ll play 10-15 pretty mediocre minutes and spend the rest of the game watching Screen. |
Bench
Andre Screen plays starter minutes off the bench and leads the team in rebounding and blocks. He’s a 7-1 monster on the glass and offensively in the paint. Turnovers and fouls plague him, or he’d be a starter. Kolby King also gets close to 20 minutes a game off the bench. He’s a decent shooter and has an incredible 21.5% defensive rebounding rate despite being 6-2. If he wasn’t a walking turnover, he does everything else well enough to start. Landon Moore is another backup guard. He gets to the line a lot and executes well there, but is a tragically bad shooter from anywhere else on the floor. Like 33% effective field goal percentage bad. Butler’s bench isn’t deep, but we’ll see a lot of these three.
Three questions
-Which Butler shows up? For the first month of the year this was a good team. They racked up a 7-1 record and more WAB than anyone in the conference aside from Marquette. They then went into a 14-game tailspin that left them completely out of contention for an at-large bid. They’ve only had at Seton Hall and then two home games this month, but they’ve looked lively since January passed. Whether they’re back or just feasting on the bottom of the league is a question that’s yet to be settled and could have a big bearing on the outcome of this game.
-How does Xavier match up on defense? Telfort, Brooks, and McCaffery form a weird trio of assignments for any team to sort out. Telfort is a big-body guard who can score from all over, Brooks is a mountain of a man but a more perimeter-oriented scorer, and McCaffery is the tallest of the three at 6’9” but shoots the bulk of his shots from behind the arc. Oh, and your shooting guard has to guard one of them. The starting matchups probably sort themselves out by having Conwell on McCaffery, Foster on Brooks, and Swain on Telfort, but this is a game where the ability of John Hugley IV and/or Jerome Hunter to be viable for long stretches of time would really help sort the defensive end.
-Can Xavier get to the line? No team in the Big East has a higher free throw rate or scores a higher percentage of its points from the free throw line than Xavier does. That’s obviously an asset for the Muskies, but Butler is second only to Creighton in the league in not sending opponents to the line. The Bluejays held X to a FT rate of 25.8%, their second-lowest in Big East play. If Butler does something similar, they could be right in this one.
Three keys
-Win the arc. Butler is the best three-point shooting team in the nation in February, shooting 31-63 as a team in their three games in the month. They haven’t shot a ton of them, only about 37% of their attempts, but it’s hard to stop a team when they’re shooting almost 50% from deep. The counter to that is to outshoot them, and Xavier is certainly equipped to do so, shooting over 40% from deep in February. Both defenses have allowed over 42% of opposing shots to come from behind the arc in the month, hovering around 280th in the nation. Expect to see some shots get up tonight. Making more of them is going to be a huge key to this game for Xavier.
-Do enough on the glass. These are not the Jalmesean O’Farrnolds Musketeers; they’re not going to go out and dominate the boards. As permissive as Xavier has been on the glass, the fact that Butler has posted 40%+ OReb% in two of their last three games is a potentially alarming trend. It’s more like that Butler is who they’ve been over 25 games than who they’ve been over 3, but Xavier can’t afford to let second-chance points turn into a theme tonight.
-Play through Dailyn Swain. If Xavier’s sophomore is playing as the point forward, it’s hard to say for certain how Butler can counter that. McCaffery is a proposition that’s comical on its face. Telfort or Brooks would have to get into his body, which is a possibly losing proposition against the guy who is second in the league in free throw rate and third in free throw percentage. He’s too tall and too athletic when he’s not sick; I think he’s the key to tonight’s game.