You might remember last year’s game vs. Cal, but in case you don’t, here’s a quick refresher.
- We shot 18% from the floor (4–22) in the first half, but made more than 55% in the second half and OT to spark the rally.
- Cal beat us up on both backboards and owned the paint. Malcolm Brogdon and Anthony Gill combining make just five of their 21 two point tries.
- Jarred Reuter scored 11 points in 16 minutes, keeping us afloat during the first half dry spell despite several people in my row not knowing who he was. He would score just 13 in 56 minutes played over the rest of the season.
- We trailed by two in the closing seconds, but this happened:
Three players scored 44 of Cal’s 62 points in last year’s game, but all three (Boston Celtic Jaylen Brown, D-Leaguer Tyrone Wallace, and Gonzaga guard Jordan Matthews) can all now be found playing elsewhere. The faces are different this year, but the approach is the same: three more guys are carrying the load this year, with 5'11'’ freshman Charlie Moore (17.1 ppg) showing up and 6'11'’ sophomore Ivan Rabb (15.8) and 6'6'’ Jabari Bird (15.2) stepping up. Rabb, who is a projected lottery pick in the 2017 draft, draws the headlines, but it’s Moore who has been the focal point so far.
One thing that works in our advantage: Cal’s offense isn’t really that good. Cuonzo Martin has never been renowned as a progressive thinker on that side, and this year’s team has changed nothing. In three games against teams in Pomeroy’s current top 100, they’ve gone 1–2, scored 0.88, 0.94, and 0.9 points per possession, logged 26 assists to 39 turnovers, and made 24.5% (12–49) of their threes. Moore has fattened his stat line on inferior opponents (all three of his 20+ point games have come against bad teams), Rabb, while still a cyborg athlete and much improved on that end from last year, is still painfully raw (a recent three game stretch saw him shoot 9–25 from the floor and 2–12 from the line), and Bird — a 41% three point shooter last season — has battled back spasms so frequent and painful that he’s missed most of Cal’s games (six so far) and has been limited when available (31% on threes). The team is turnover prone (Moore has almost exactly as many as he has assists this season and they’ve crossed 20% in both of their losses), is good (but not great) on the offensive glass (31.3%), and don’t shoot the three particularly well (34.5%) outside of Moore and backcourt-mate Grant Mullins (41%), who have combined to hit 14 of 21 in Cal’s last two games.
Defense is where Cal will do some damage this season. The aforementioned top-100 opponents? They only scored 1.07, 0.77, and 0.88 points per possession against the Golden Bears, thanks to an aggressive, ball-hawking man-to-man that takes teams out of their rhythm on the perimeter and the duo of Rabb and Kingsley Okoroh blocking shots (the G-Bears block 13.8%, led by Okoroh), grabbing defensive boards (the team is at 79% for the season), and contesting everything (Cal opponents are shooting just 40.3% on two pointers).
I’ve enjoyed our dabbles in socialist principles on offense so far this season, but I worry about our lack of someone who can will us a bucket when we go up against a big, athletic defense like Cal. This means we’ll have to be particularly crisp (sharp, quick cuts, good screens) and smart (no lazily lofted passes or bad ideas in the lane) to generate efficient offense for everyone and avoid the lulls we’re sometimes prone to.
Moore and Rabb will need the most attention from our defense. Moore should be denied the lane and forced to become a jump shooter off the bounce, which is the lesser of two evils when getting into the paint results in finishes at the rim, free throws, dump-offs to Rabb, and open threes for Bird and Mullins. As for Rabb, he’s long and athletic enough to either run by or jump over three of our quartet, and I’m not ready to count on Mamadi for major minutes. I can see him struggling against post doubles. He’s fouled out of their last two games and committed four in the game before, so maybe he won’t be able to stay on the court long enough to beat us.
Virginia
G: London Perrantes — 6'2'’ sr #32
Second half vs. Ohio State London is probably the closest he’s come to the player I thought we were going to see this season. That’s going to be the guy we need often when the calendar rolls over.
G: Devon Hall — 6'5'’ jr. #0.
Devon has two games without an assist this year. He was only shut out of that category three times all of last season.
G: Darius Thompson — 6'4'’ jr #51
DT has missed five straight threes over our last two games.
F: Isaiah Wilkins — 6'7'’ jr #21
Last three games: a well-rounded 5.3 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 3.3 assists per game.
F: Jack Salt — 6'11'’ so #33
Last three games: 8 ppg, 83.3% shooting, 4–6 from the line. He could do better than six boards in 59 minutes, though.
G: Kyle Guy — 6'3'’ fr #5
The shooting gets the press, but Guy has 16 assists and just two turnovers this season. His turnover rate (4.1% of possessions used) ranks 8th nationally.
G: Marial Shayok — 6'6'’ jr #4
Marial still feels like he’s slumping, which worries me — there’s no one else on our team as adept at getting a good look for their own shot.
F: Jarred Reuter — 6'7'’ so #31
Reuter will remain valuable as long as he keeps pounding the defensive glass (20.7%) and generating points around the rim, and as long as the staff doesn’t ask too much of him.
Cal
G: Charlie Moore — 5'11'’ fr #13
45.1% three point shooter is also hitting 55% of his attempts at the rim at 5'11.’’ The key is to get him lost somewhere in between, and to contest, contest, contest.
G: Sam Singer — 6'4'’ sr #2
Doesn’t score much, but he rebounds (15.3% DREB) and passes (18.6% assist rate) some and can shoot it (7–21 3PT) a little.
F: Jabari Bird — 6'6'’ sr #23
Coming off the best game (25 points, 4–7 on threes) of his season so far, Bird worries me as much as anyone Cal has if he’s feeling OK.
F: Ivan Rabb — 6'11'’ so #1
Rabb is shooting better than 80% around the rim and grabbing almost a quarter (24.7%) of defensive boards.
F: Kingsley Okoroh — 7'0'’ so #22
More games of five blocks (two) than double figure scoring (one). Big guy is grabbing 14.5% of available offensive boards and is 21st nationally in block percentage (11.8%).
F: Roger Moute A Bidias — 6'6'’ sr #12
Longtime deep bench guy has seen a big uptick in minutes this season thanks to Cal’s lack of depth. Can shoot some, rebound a little.
G: Grant Mullins — 6'3'’ sr #3
Third guard is their second-best shooter: he’s 10–26 from deep this season, which is worth keeping track of.
G: Stephen Domingo — 6'7'’ sr #31
An absolutely abysmal shooter, he’s following a year of 32.1% overall, 30.6% from three, and 3–11 from the line with 19.1% overall, 18.5% from three, and 40% from the line.
Verdict:
I keep going back and forth on this one. We have more talent, but we also traveled 3,000 miles to play at a weird hour in an unusual time zone. Cal is at home and will have a sellout crowd clad in gimmick t-shirts (it’s a white out!) spurring them on, but Virginia teams in the modern (ACCT Championship season onward) have traveled really well. When two very good defensive teams square off, the one with a singular talent dominant enough to buck the system or an offensive system full of talented complimentary options usually wins. We have a decided depth advantage, so the latter could be us if enough of these kids show up. Call this a very cautious Virginia pick. This is the kind of game I’m actually terrified of but have been brainwashed to be cooly confident in by our overly calm coach and his recent history of success. I hope he’s right.
