Final score: Furman 79 - Ohio Christian 44
Well, the Paladins got a much-deserved win last night against an overmatched and outsized Ohio Christian side. It was an adjustment game for Furman, after an extremely rough shooting performance in Northern Iowa had raised questions about the offense. Let’s look at what we can take away from this game, despite the talent gap between the two sides.
Takeaways:
New starting lineup: With Ben VanderWal out with a wrist injury, the starting lineup was going to change. Eddrin Bronson stepped in as the two guard, while Asa Thomas replaced Tom House on the wing. It certainly paid off for Thomas, which we’ll get into later.
First half vs. second half: It really was a tale of two halves offensively. The first half started off badly, with 7 turnovers in 6 minutes. It looked like Wilkins was trying too many passes that might have worked in high school, but not at this level. Regardless, the missed shots were not helping the defense, and when the shots started falling, the lead stretched very quickly.
Owen Ritger: Ritger! Owen Ritger scored his first career points last night and, at times, seemed like the only guy who could get the ball in the hoop. He played good defense against the undersized bigs of Ohio Christian and was tough inside on the offensive end.
The offense looked a bit different: It seems like some adjustments were made offensively, with fewer handoffs and more screens by the bigs. The ball moved more efficiently, and the pick-and-roll was providing open threes, even in the first half. There was a lot more movement towards the rim on back cuts as well, which Asa Thomas fed off of in the second half.
Defense really did look good in both halves. With the offense not rolling, it’s hard to stay motivated on defense, but Ohio Christian was held to 23 in the first half. Once the shots came rolling in, the defense fed off that energy. Ohio Christian was held to just 6 points in the first ten minutes of the 2nd half.
The threes! Tom House’s last-second three-pointer before halftime kicked off a streak of threes. It seemed like a mental block. Even during the 0-13 start from three, the shots were open. Then in the second half, the Dins hit three straight, from Bronson, Thomas, and Wilkins. As mentioned before, just seeing these shots go in gave the defense energy, and the lead stretched really quickly.
Asa Thomas really looked good, especially during his 18-point second half. His shots weren’t falling in the first, so he started cutting to the rim and rebounding hard. He was really active off the ball, and when the threes went in, it all came together. Thomas looks like a must start, and best of all, he’s only a sophomore.
Charles Johnston has another double-double. Rebounding was lopsided as expected, especially offensively, but Johnston just grabs everything that comes near him. He’s helped the team outbound every non-UNI opponent so far, even when his shots didn’t go in.
Something I wanted to keep an eye on was how the offense went once the threes did go in. Teams can tend to get away from what was working (12-of-14 inside the paint in the 1H) when the threes are falling. Getting it inside still needs to be a priority for this team. It looked like they weren’t posting up as much, but the back cuts were working very well. It was nice to see that the offense didn’t descend into jacking up threes once a few went in.
All in all, we saw some good changes that led to more open threes, instead of the tough ones we saw against UNI. The defense has been very solid since the High Point game, even tonight without Ben VanderWal. Coach Richey seems like he’s figuring out the bench rotation and how he can mix in the freshmen, but the game against Queens will provide a real After a shaky first half, I think the second half was really encouraging, and I’m looking forward to getting a Division 1 win against Queens.
Full box score from ESPN below:
