The Muskies are right back to a parade of low-majors with a built-from-scratch Siena team.
It doesn’t seem that long ago that I was young, but here we are with Gerry McNamara coaching a D1 basketball team. He’s in his first season as the head man at Siena, and he’s taking over a team that went 4-28 last year.
Actually, he’s taking over the uniforms. There was a ton of turnover in the roster, and he’s already seeing the fruits of that, having made it 75% of the way to last year’s win total just four games into this year. Siena has played an okay schedule this year, with an SoS 100 spots higher than Xavier’s according to KenPom, and their OT win at Bryant is better than anything X has done on the road so far. At 3-1, they’re off to the kind of start that teams at this level hope on with a brand new coach.
Xavier hasn’t done anything but clobber cupcakes and roll Wake Forest so far this season. Siena is somehow the more tested team in this matchup, but it would still be impossible for the selection committee to overlook this one if it goes sideways.
Team fingerprint
Their offense isn’t good, but they try to de-emphasize that by playing really slowly. They can’t shoot very well, ranking 255th in the nation with a 46.9% EFG%. They’re about mediocre from behind the arc but extremely hesitant to pull. Offensive rebounding is a strength for them, which is good, because they turn the ball over like they hate having it in the first place. They’re also 349th in the nation in assist rate; they pass more to the other team than their own. It all adds up to the 310th most efficient offense in the nation.
The defense is better, but only because there’s so much room above the bar their offense sets. Forcing turnovers is the best thing they do, sitting at 65th in the nation with a 21.4% TO rate. They don’t give up a ton of threes, but teams are shooting 40% on the ones they do get away. The defensive glass is a black hole and they foul a ton. They’re actually pretty solid in 2P% defense, but that’s undermined by how often they give up second chances and send opponents to the line. Their defensive efficiency of 107.5 lands them at 239th.
Personnel
Siena is basically rebuilding from nothing this year. They are 350th in the nation in D1 experience and 330th in minutes continuity. They are basically a patchwork of transfers – including some familiar faces – and freshmen under a brand new head coach. Considering the context, they could be doing much worse.
Starters
| Starting matchups | ||
|---|---|---|
| Major Freeman | Point Guard | Dayvion McKnight |
| Junior | Class | Senior |
| 6’3″, 190 | Measurements | 6’0″, 188 |
| 14.5/3.5/1.3 | Game line | 13.5/1.8/4.8 |
| 45.7/38.9/75 | Shooting line | 53.1/58.3/92.9 |
| Freeman played as a combo guard for Spartanburg Methodist Junior College last year and posted good numbers. He has hit the ground running at Siena, scoring well at all three levels. He’s not a true point, but there isn’t really one in this lineup. He’s a solid scorer, but turnover issues have been a problem for him through four games at the D1 level. | ||
| Marcus Jackson | Shooting Guard | Ryan Conwell |
| Junior | Class | Junior |
| 6’2″, 185 | Measurements | 6’4″, 215 |
| 8.5/7/1 | Game line | 18.8/1.3/2.8 |
| 39.1/33.3/87.5 | Shooting line | 48.9/48.5/88.2 |
| Jackson played a couple of seasons at Albany, where he was a low-usage, high-efficiency bench scorer. He has slotted into the same role except out of the starting lineup for Siena. His shooting hasn’t been much to speak of, but he’s living at the line, scoring 3.5 points per game on FT alone. He’s a really good rebounder for his size and has consistently posted solid defensive numbers, though foul trouble can be a concern. | ||
| Reid Ducharme | Small Forward | Marcus Foster |
| Freshman | Class | Senior |
| 6’7″, 180 | Measurements | 6’5″, 215 |
| 3.8/0.5/0 | Game line | 5.3/4.8/3 |
| 31.6/25/0 | Shooting line | 35/33.3/80 |
| Ducharme was plagued by injuries on his way to two points in nine minutes for Xavier last season. It didn’t cost him a year of eligibility though, and he’s starting with a fresh slate at Siena. The numbers don’t indicate that he’s off to the best of all possible starts. He has had a couple of really solid games bookended by a pair of absolutely miserable ones as a Saint. | ||
| Brendan Coyle | Power Forward | Dailyn Swain |
| Junior | Class | Sophomore |
| 6’7″, 205 | Measurements | 6’8″, 220 |
| 13.5/4.3/0.8 | Game line | 8.5/6.5/2.8 |
| 40.5/38.7/85.7 | Shooting line | 55/0/80 |
| Coyle played last year at Siena, which makes him stand out among his peers here. He’s crushing it so far this season, filling it up consistently with extremely high efficiency (131.6 ORtg). Most of his points come from behind the arc and he’s not much of a finisher around the rim. He kind of doesn’t do much else, leaving a hole on the glass when he’s in the lineup and not lighting up the stat sheet with his defensive metrics. He has had one bad game this year, and it was the one that Siena lost against Albany. Make of that what you will. | ||
| Peter Carey | Center | Zach Freemantle |
| Sophomore | Class | Senior |
| 6’11”, 205 | Measurements | 6’9″, 227 |
| 7.3/3.5/1 | Game line | 17/6.8/2.8 |
| 64.7/0/70 | Shooting line | 56.1/50/85.7 |
| Carey “played” two years at Syracuse, getting slightly more playing time than I did. His lanky frame shows up in the stat line, as he blocks a ton of shots but commits a ton of fouls; his 7 fouls per 40 this year is his career best mark. He’s purely a lane player on both ends of the floor; Freemantle is a nightmare matchup for him. |
Reserves
The Saints get just over a quarter of their minutes off the bench, hovering right around 300th in the country depending on who else has played and who is grabbing minutes off the pine. You expect some misses when you’re throwing together a roster on the fly, and it shows up in the form of a lack of depth.
That doesn’t mean there’s nothing here, as guard Justice Shoats comes off the bench to lead the team in scoring with a 19.8/2.5/4.3 game line. Shoats joins from D2 Lock Haven University, where he was also a track and field standout. Anyway, he has been an absolute menace attacking the paint on offense, but he gets more out of getting to the line than he does in actually scoring. He splits his shots between pull-ups and rim attacks, but he only shoots 37% from the rim. He has an excellent 4.3% steal percentage and a somewhat surprising – he’s 5’11” – 2.3% block rate.
And that’s about it for the bench. Former Butler forward Myles Wilmoth is averaging 2.5/4.3/0.5 on horrible shooting numbers; only really good work on the offensive glass is keeping him afloat. Big men Tajae Jones (1.5/3.8/0) and Michael Ojo (1.7/1/0.3) provide additional options in the paint and Gavin Doty (1.5/1.3/0) grabs about 8 minutes per game on the wing. It’s not a great situation.
Three questions
-How is Cam Fletcher doing? He got some run late and dominated the glass against Jackson State, but a Wake Forest game that was under no threat late saw him anchored to the bench. Maybe they’re bringing him along really slowly, maybe they’re just not quite ready for him to run against a high-major team. Xavier should be home and dry with time to spare in this game; seeing a little bit of Fletcher would be something to take note of.
-What is Marcus Foster’s long-term role with Xavier? I mean, long-term as in the rest of the year, which is all we have left of him. He scored a bunch in high volume for Furman, but he has has slotted into a low-usage glue role for Xavier. He’s not scoring or even shooting a lot at X, but he is defending and boarding well and put up his career high in assists against Jackson State. It takes a lot of discipline to play that role, especially when you were used to hucking whenever you touched the ball at your previous stop. If he can stay effective as a glue guy but hold onto that scoring upside should the moment call for it, he’s a giant weapon for Xavier.
-Is Ryan Conwell the backup point guard? He’s got solid assist numbers and isn’t turning the ball over very much at all so far this season. Siena has a defensive approach that can get teams sped up and force turnovers if they’re not careful. Obvious Dayvion McKnight is a great first option. Trey Green is a good bench guard, but he’s not been as steady with ball security as Conwell. This is something to monitor going forward.
Three keys
-Take care of business. That’s all this game is about. Xavier is the better team and should look like it for much of the game. This will be a Q4 on Selection Sunday unless something ridiculously unforeseen develops. The bottom line is that this is just a tune-up game for the Muskies, and they need to make it look like one.
-Dominate on the glass. This hasn’t been the team’s strength so far. Specifically, they’ve been pretty okay on the defensive glass and pretty poor on the offensive. Siena will give them opportunities to get second chance points, and it would be nice to see someone other than John Hugley IV popping up to corral misses on a regular basis. I don’t think this is going to be as big a part of Xavier’s offense as it was in the old Jalmesean O’Farrnolds days, but I’d be encouraged to see some signs of life on that end.
-Keep the ball hot. What is a big part of Xavier’s offense is ball movement. Siena’s gambling style defense will open up clean looks if the rotations are quick enough. For a team as talented and experienced on offense as Xavier is, this one should be a romp.