Longwood Lancers

Date/Time: Saturday December 28th @ 4:00 PM at The Charles E. Smith Center in Washington, DC.
Record Last Year: 16-18, 5-11 (9th in the Big South)
Preseason Ranks: 292nd (KenPom), 216th (Bart Torvik), 220th (Sports Illustrated), 215th (CBS). Feels like their performance definitely seems closer to KenPom's projections than the other outlets thus far.
Projected Record: 14-17, 9-9 (T-5th in the Big South)
Postseason Last Year: CBI; defeated Southern Mississippi 90-68 in the 1st round, then lost to DePaul 97-89 in the quarterfinals.
Coaching Record: Griff Aldrich, 2nd year at Longwood. Won 16 games last year, which is like the equivalent of winning the championship by their standards. For comparison, their previous coach Jayson Gee had virtually no success at Longwood, winning more than 10 games just once and failing to get out of the cellar in the Big South during his tenure. Things are without a doubt looking up for the Lancers under Aldrich as they look to achieve the success some of the other schools in Virginia are currently having, like rival Radford and undefeated Liberty.

All Time Record: 3-1, with us crushing the Lancers 91-66 back in the 2014-15 season. Five Colonials finished in double figures. John Kopriva led all scorers with 19 points, and KevLar (16), Pato (12), and Kethan (11) chipped in as well. We even got a big boost off the bench from Nick Griffin, who added 11 points and went to the line six times! I'm pretty sure that was his highest number of FT attempts ever in a Colonial uniform.

Offensive Efficiency: 304th (KenPom), 284th (Bart Torvik)
Defensive Efficiency: 287th (KenPom), 275th (Bart Torvik)
Tempo: 165th (KenPom), 161st (Bart Torvik)

Key Returning Players:
Lorenzo 'Shabooty' Phillips Jr. (SR; Houston, TX) 14 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 3.8 apg; 40% FG, 34% 3-pt, 89% FT
Jaylon Wilson (RS SR; Moore, OK) 11 ppg, 2.3 rpg; 41% FG, 35% 3-pt, 77% FT
JaShaun Smith (SR; Garner, NC) 10.6 ppg, 3.3 rpg; 49% FG, 37% 3-pt, 55% FT

Key Losses:
Isaiah Walton (Dismissed from team; Oberlin, OH) 17.8 ppg, 6.5 rpg, 2.1 apg; 44% FG, 36% 3-pt, 88% FT

Comments:
As mentioned, Longwood enjoyed their best season in D1 last year since the 2008-09 season when they went 17-14 as an independent. Aldrich, a former assistant at UMBC, has put his team in a great position as they enter Big South play. The conference seems a bit down from last year. Radford and Winthrop remain the guys to beat, but I'd say the conference is wide open after that. Longwood could very well finish in that middle tier with an up and coming UNC Asheville squad and Gardner Webb, who probably gave UVA UMBC flashbacks in the first half of the opening round of the NCAA tournament last year.

From Petula Clark to Macklemore, it seems like it will be pretty easy to put together a playlist for this game. If you love watching teams shoot threes from downtown, this game is for you. Don't be surprised if the two teams combine to take 60 threes, and depending how the game is going, that number could even be higher. Longwood took the sixth most threes nationally last year, and allowed their opponents to shoot the third most threes in the country - which JC will gladly do! As you can guess, Longwood runs a similar PnR offense that we run under JC.

After playing at or around a top 100 ranked tempo under Gee, Aldrich decided to slow things down a tad and turn Longwood into a perimeter-oriented attack. The Lancers will be led by their senior class. With Walton no longer on the team, Lorenzo 'Shabooty' Phillips Jr. (who may have the best nickname in college basketball, though I may still give the edge to Izayah Mauriohooho-Le'afa of Sacramento State) will be the undisputed leader of the team. Phillips, a former JUCO, led or was second on the team in points, rebounds, assists, and steals once Walton departed and the expectation is for him to have a solid senior year. He is also near automatic at the free throw line, knocking down 89% of his 118 attempts last season. Although Phillips has not put up quite the numbers he did last year so far (partly because of improved depth for the Lancers) he will remain a guy to keep an eye on during the game. His backcourt mate, Jaylon Wilson, is also a former JUCO. The senior from Oklahoma averaged 11 ppg with fairly decent shooting numbers across the board.

Aldrich will also rely on sophomore counterparts DeShaun Wade and Juan Munoz to provide supporting production for the team. Wade has had somewhat of a breakout second year with the team, and is currently third in scoring behind Phillips and Wilson. He is a bit of a high usage player which hurts his efficiency, but has quietly developed into one of their better shooters from deep at 38%. Wade is also a good rebounder for his size. Munoz is a sharpshooter who made an impressive 43% of his shots from deep, although he has struggled to begin the year. He also serves as one of Longwood's primary ball handlers, giving Phillips a break and allowing him to attack more off the ball. Another senior and former JUCO, Irishman Seán Flood, will round out their primary backcourt rotation. Flood has also gotten off to a slow start, but is yet another threat from deep. He canned 41% of his attempts last season. Should they experience any foul trouble, maybe we'll also briefly see local freshman St. Andrews Episcopal product Heru Bligen.

As you can guess by now, Longwood's bigs can also shoot it some from the outside. Most of the minutes up front will be occupied by the trio of sophomore Christian Wilson (no relation to Jaylon), junior Jordan Cintron, and senior JaShaun Smith (the third Shaun/Sean on the team). Wilson has struggled to find any consistency so far this season, but his high usage allows him to be productive. Cintron is probably one of the best finishers inside the paint/arc on the team, and leads the Lancers in rebounding. He could probably average close to a double double if he saw more minutes. Smith is actually the best shooter from distance in terms of percentage (43%). He is a bit more of a wing than a guy that likes to bang down low. Remaining minutes up front will be occupied by freshmen Leslie Nkereuwem and Sudan native Yuol 'Abraham' Deng Yuol. These two guys are probably the only ones on the team that won't try to shoot from outside. Nkereuwem is the better finisher inside at this point, but Deng provides some nice long term upside as a 3 star recruit out of HS with offers from other A10 programs like St. Joe's and VCU. The hope is that his 6'11" frame will allow him to be a potential rim protector down the road which will be a welcome sight on a Longwood team that has been one of the worst teams in blocks per game in the country.

The key player for us to watch in this game is a guy who has faced this team several times before when he was playing in the same conference. That guy is Armel. Given his scoring prowess of late, he seems like he can go off against anyone right now, but he has a great track record against Longwood in his career during his underclassmen years at Charleston Southern:

2/6/16: 21 points, 7 rebounds, 5 assists on 7-16 FG, including 5-9 from deep. This was in 50 minutes as the game went to double overtime.
3/3/16: 28 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists on 11-17 FG, including 6-9 from deep. Yes, you read that correctly. Armel went 11-18 from deep in two games against Longwood as a freshman. He actually shot 35% from deep his first year which I was surprised to find after digging into some of the stats.
1/21/17: 8 points, 2 rebounds, 4 assists on 3-6 FG, including 2-3 from deep.
2/25/17: 20 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists on 7-14 FG, including 3-5 from deep.
2/28/17: 13 points, 3 rebounds, 3 assists on 5-13 FG, missing his only three point attempt.

To summarize, in 5 career games against Longwood he has averaged 18 points, 4 rebounds, and 3 assists shooting 50% from the field (33/66) and a ridiculous 59% (16/27) from three. That's insane.

Predicted Score: GW 71, Longwood 63. 81% chance to win (Bart Torvik). ESPN also gives us exactly an 81% chance to win. Would be great to get back to .500 at 6-6.
 

dmvpiranha wrote:

We even got a big boost off the bench from Nick Griffin, who added 11 points and went to the line six times! I'm pretty sure that was his highest number of FT attempts ever in a Colonial uniform.

Incredibly, Nick Griffin had 8 career FT attempts in two years at GW. Six of them came in this game. 

No energy from GW.  Open looks from 3 for Longwood and we are getting out rebounded 8-1 giving ip several offensive rebounds to a smaller team

Amir playing today but 3 turnovers so far

Can't believe we couldn't tap that in before the buzzer.  Seems like we've missed a lot of those the past couple of years.

Amir has a couple turnovers but the team has played with more energy when he’s been  on the court (tiny sample size notwithstanding).  Harris has rebounded well and played well defensively and has shown he can shoot and get to the rim. I’m encouraged!

Paar with the Dream Shake OMG

Good win!  20 points for Maceo, 12 dimes for Armel. 

first big minutes from Chase Paar, first Colonial minutes, excellent debut from Amir. 

thoughts?

Paar looked great offensively and had some nice defensive possessions. Longwood was pretty weak in the front court but he and Ace are quicker than Toro so fit in better with JC’s pick and roll scheme. He’s going to have some growing pains once he faces the better bigs in the A-10. I left super impressed by Harris. Nelson is finding himself off the ball. Jack was money from 3. Longwood is a weak team but I’ll take it! Especially considering GW was down ten in the first half.

Excited by Amir Harris, who showed a confident, versatile game.  Liked Paar also, but from his HS bio, sounds like more of a 3 point shooter than a low post player.  Injury to Toro seemed to dictate his position today, as former Mojo players Javy and Mezzie seem to be getting buried deeper and deeper on bench. Team looked good, but let’s not forget that our opponent was a lowed D 1 team that did not have much of a front court.  Let’s see how we play on Tuesday vs Vermont.

Last edited by Long Suffering Fan (12/28/2019 9:11 pm)