First off, we were clearly destined to play in Brooklyn based on the theme of the previews this year:
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That being said, while Lou and others have already started putting together some previews on FAU, I'm gonna do my thing here.
Interesting fact #1 about FAU: They are #1 in the country as far as minutes continuity - meaning they returned literally all but one player from last season's surprise Final Four team, and have replaced him with a player who was on the roster last year. No freshmen have seen any minutes for them this year.
Interesting fact #2: They haven't played a team as good as NU since December 23, when they beat Arizona by 1 in a 2OT neutral-site game. They have played 5 top-70 Kenpom teams this season, all at neutral sites, and went 4-1 with the lone loss to Illinois by 9.
Terrifying fact #1: They appear to play much better under the brightest lights. For whatever reason, they slept-walked through a large part of the conference season. They started off the year going 9-3 against the spread, but then had their own Chicago State, in a loss at FGCU that occurred the game after beating Arizona, which was the start of them failing to cover the spread in 7 straight games and 13 of their next 17. Their top players all shoot better against the best teams they've faced than against the rest of their schedule.
Now, on to the player previews.
We start with the star, Johnell Davis. One of the best shooters in the country at all three levels, and an excellent rebounder at his 6'4" size as well. He's not quite a point guard, though his assist% is the highest on the team. He's one of only 4 players in the NCAA tournament that plays >30mpg, shoots >45% from 2, >40% from 3, >85% from the FT line, a steal% of >2.0, and has a usage rate of >25%. Offensively, he's incredible, and he drives the team. Against the top 5 teams they played this year, he averaged 21.4 points per game on 56% shooting from 2, 56% shooting from 3(!) and 92% shooting from the FT line, along with 7 rebounds per game. If he does have one weakness on offense, it's that he's turnover-prone against top teams. He averaged 4.2 turnovers per game against the top 5, compared with only 2.2 turnovers per game against the bottom 23 teams. He will be a handful. Oh, by the way, another one of the 4 players mentioned above is Boo Buie.
Next up, Alijah Martin. A burly 6'2" guard who's taken a small step back this year. Last year he was the clear second man for FAU, this year he's taken a bit of a back seat to the large Russian. Regardless, like Davis, he's played his best against the best teams they've faced. Martin is a pure shooting guard; he takes the most threes of anyone on the team - 6/game, though only making 34.8%. He's a terrible midrange shooter, but pretty good at the rim and will try to dunk it if he can. He's the best defender on the team, averaging 2 steals/game against the top 5 teams they've faced.
Brandon Weatherspoon is another shooting/wing guard at 6'4", and the first one who has struggled more against the better teams. He's more of a three point specialist, but only shooting 26.7% against the top 5 teams and 32.3% against the top 10. The rare times he does shoot a 2 though, he's nearly automatic. Fortunately he only takes two of those per game, as he's one of a trio of guards that rarely shoots. He's also a solid defender.
Jalen Gaffney rounds out the starting guards. After playing 3 seasons at UConn, he transferred to FAU after seeing his minutes diminish. Last year, he played more of a backup PG role late in the year and in the tournament, as his shooting numbers were awful. This year, he's having the best season of his career, and - stop me if you've heard this already - he's played his best games against the toughest competition. Against the top 5 teams, he's scored 13 points per game on 50% shooting from 2 and 60% from 3(!), while averaging 5 assists against 0.8 turnovers per game. In the other 28 games he's played, he averages only 4.5 points per game on 46.7% from 2 and just 32.6% from 3, with only 2 assists against 0.9 turnovers per game, so hopefully we get the worse version of Gaffney on Friday.
To round out the starting lineup, we have Vlad the ImpOwler (sorry, sorry, I'm trying to delete it). Coming from the hinterlands of Russia, he played his first season in the hinterlands of Lubbock, Texas at Texas Tech before transferring to FAU. Standing tall at 7'1", on a per minute basis, he is the top scorer on FAU. His problem has been being able to remain on the court, especially against the top teams. Against the top 5 teams, he averages 4.2 fouls per game. In all other games, only 1.9 fouls per game. When he has faced a team with a starting center that's 6'10" or taller, he averages 13.8 points, 7.4 rebounds and 1.7 blocks. Against starting centers 6'9" or shorter, he averages 17.3 points, 6.3 boards and 1.5 blocks. He is an incredibly efficient scorer both at the rim and in midrange, but does not shoot 3s. He also draws a ton of fouls like some other center we've faced this year whose name I'm not going to mention, and much like that center, he's a mediocre FT shooter, at about 65%. He's also an excellent shot blocker. Really wish we had Nicholson for this one.
To the reserves we go. First up, Nick Boyd, who was a starter for the first 3 games before getting injured, then started another 11 conference games in a row before moving back to the bench for the last 7 games. Boyd is a 6'3" guard whose game is similar to Martin's and Weatherspoon's, so there's not much to add here.
Next, we have 6'0" Bryan Greenlee, who played garbage time minutes for the Gophers in 2020 before transferring to FAU. Similar to Boyd, he started the first 4 games before being benched in favor of Gaffney, but then returned to start the same 11 games in a row that Boyd did, before returning to the bench aside from a start on Senior day. Greenlee hasn't recovered the shooting touch he had last year when he was a 41.2% shooter from 3, as he's only making 34.2% this year. He's pretty average.
Giancarlo Rosado is the backup center at a hefty 6'8" 247 pounds. He was playing 15.4mpg before he got hurt in the middle of the season and missed 7 games. Since his return, he's only playing 9.7mpg, which is good for FAU because he's pretty terrible in all areas except, oddly, assists. In the last 9 games, he's only averaging 2.4 points, 1.4 boards, 1.1 assists and 0.9 turnovers compared to 7 points, 4.1 boards, 1.6 assists and 1.4 turnovers. We'll need to really attack them when he's on the court.
The last member of the rotation is Brenen Lorient, who is the only FAU player that didn't see the court during the NCAA tourney last year. He only averages about 8mpg, mostly in a PF role, though occasionally will play center. He's shown some good rebounding and shot blocking skills in his limited minutes, but not a whole lot offensively.
Stylistically, the two teams are pretty different. FAU is content to play out possessions on defense and wants to force teams to beat them off the dribble, as their A/FGM ratio is the lowest of any team in the tourney, while we like to force teams to pass it around hoping to get them to make a bad pass that we can steal. On offense, they like to go fast, so we need to prevent the transition opportunities and force them to play in the half court, and they like to crash the boards, but hopefully our height at the other four positions outside of center can prevent them from getting second chances. Meanwhile we're content to go slow and run our offense until we can get an open 3-point shot or Boo does his thing.
I don't know how this game is going to turn out. Interestingly, our defense has been significantly better away from home while our offense has been significantly worse. My hope is that Boo does what he's done all year when the attention is at a peak and balls out, Brooks and Martinelli combine to shut down Davis, 'Borg does his thing and repeats his tourney performance from last year, and a strong pro-NU crowd gives us the boost we need to get to the finish line. I'm ready to enjoy it though, however it shakes out.
Don't sleep on the Owls.
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