By Palmer Johnson
Coming off a three-game losing streak, Mason is looking to get back in the win column against a free-falling Rhode Island Rams squad, who are 11-18 and 5-11.
After a pretty strong start to the conference season, Rhode Island has lost six games in a row. But, to be fair, they’ve gone through an absolute gauntlet, with UMass, La Salle, and VCU on the road, plus Loyola Chicago, Richmond, and Saint Louis at home. There’s really only two winnable games there.
I’ve already done one of these on Rhody, and I’ll try not to repeat myself.
Last time Mason played Rhode Island, both offenses shined. That works at home, but is more difficult to do on the road. Defense travels. The MVP of that game was Keyshawn Hall, but it will have to be someone else today.
George Mason's Ronald Polite (ankle) will be available for today's game against Rhode Island, per Tony Skinn.
Averages 7.8 PPG.
Keyshawn Hall (ankle) is OUT.
Averages 17.2 PPG and 8.4 RPG.
— Jon Rothstein (@JonRothstein) March 6, 2024
It could be Baraka Okojie, as that game was the start of his breakout stretch.
Ronald Polite is back, which is very nice to see.
Rhode Island By the Numbers
All of these numbers will be based on conference play since we’re deep enough that you can trust the volume, especially if Mason is playing a team for the second time.
Rhode Island has the 7th ranked offense, but the 13th ranked defense.
Archie Miller has the Rams playing fast, at 69.8 possessions per game, 3rd in the conference. He’s also been playing his bench a ton, as nobody has been averaging 30 minutes a game in conference play and the rotation seems to be between 9 and 10 deep, depending on the matchup.
Rhody is fourth in eFG at 52.3%, but 12th highest in turnover percentage at 17.3.%. I find this surprising, but they’re first in free throw take rate, at 41.5 attempts per 100 shots.
Who’s drawing these fouls? David Green, Jaden House, and Brandon Weston are 10th, 12th, and 14th in the conference at fouls drawn per 40 at 5.5, 5.1, and 4.8 respectively. Having three guys in the top 15 of any stat is very impressive, but having a forward, guard, and wing doing it is very unique.
Luckily for everyone else, the Rams are second to last in free throw percentage at 67.6%. Green is shooting 63.4%, House is shooting 66.2%, and Weston is shooting 77.1%. The first two’s percentages kind of explain why they get fouled so much.
So, the David Green three-point Linsanity run is probably real, as he has actually improved his shooting in conference play. Green is sitting at 46.8%, 3rd in the conference, on the second highest volume on his team.
Who has the highest volume? Jaden House, who’s shooting a very respectable 35.6% from deep in conference play. Freshman Cam Estevez is still lighting it up from three on a bit lower volume than you’d expect, but 43.8% is on 48 attempts in 16 games is still amazing for a freshman.
It’s pretty impressive that Rhody has two shooters in the top five percentage wise, but their problem is that outside of those three I mentioned, nobody else is really a threat from deep. They have a bunch of guys who can hit the three, but not many who will.
As a team, the Rams are shooting 37.5% from three, 5th, but not on very high volume, as only 35.4% of their shots are coming from behind the arc, 13th in the conference.
As you may have remembered from the previous Rhody game, David Green and Jaden House are their top shot takers at 28.8% and 27.3% of shots taken while on the court. Both are pretty effective, as they both have eFGs above 50%.
I probably pointed this out in my article for the first game, but you can tell their big man are right-handed. Straight-on and the right corner from three seem to be hot spots, that could be a problem if Mason runs some 1-3-1 zone.
On the other end, it’s rough. I mean, they just gave up 94 points in 68 possessions to Saint Louis.
The Rams are 2-0 in the conference when they hold opponents to under a point per possession. The problem is they have only done it twice.
Rhody is last in eFG given up at 55.6%…they’re also last in defensive turnover percentage at 11.8%. You can’t do both.
The Rams are also last in two percentage given up at 55.5%. And block rate at 7.2%. And steal rate at 5.8%.
I don’t get why it seems like they play such a conservative defense. Play aggressive, the shots are going in anyway.
Fuchs started last time they played Mason, but now there’s been a different starter recently, Tyson Brown. He can get in the same trouble fast, as he’s been fouling 6.1 times per 40. Nobody else really sticks out too much.
Why are they so bad at defending the left side of the court? It seems like the wing defender stays in the corner on the right side, but on the left, he helps a lot further.
Rhode Island Scouting Report (First Half vs. VCU)
I wanted to use the Saint Louis game for this, but it was on CBS Sports, who doesn’t hold the full games like ESPN+ and USA do.
I’ll focus a decent bit on Tyson Brown, as he only played 7 minutes against Mason, but has a much-expanded role now.
Brown clearly goes all out for rebounds, but has rock hands and has a tough time coming down with them, even if he gets himself into position. The junior forward is very good when he is tipping it out to a teammate. He used his positioning to beat Lawal on the offensive boards, which NOBODY can do. He may not always come down with them, but he is positively affecting them.
Tyson will have pre-determined passes that he will throw whether the guy is open or not. He threw a pass to a guy who had already fallen over before he had started passing it. Luckily for him, there was a foul called.
The Rhody forward plays drop coverage when his man is setting a screen for the ball-handler. On one of them, Brown and House seemingly accidentally guarded the same guy instead of switching. It seemed like House was supposed to switch but he was so out of position that he decided to just double the ball-handler, leaving the big wide open under the rim.
When in drop coverage on screens down the middle, he keeps backing up and backing up, letting guys take pretty easy floaters/push shots rather than challenging them.
Overall, Brown is a freak. If they didn’t throw the lob to Lawal perfectly, he was getting his hands on it. This made it so VCU couldn’t just throw it in the general vicinity of the rim and get free points. There were not many lobs after they saw Tyson tip one.
Early on in the game, Brandon Weston was looking a lot more confident and comfortable than when he put 0 everything except fouls against Mason, but then he had a rough stretch where he stepped out of bounds on offense, forgot to switch on defense, leaving Max Shulga wide open for three, and then stepped out again. Later, Weston got Bamisile in isolation, and cooked him up. At least the positive flashes are there.
Jaden House was getting destroyed by Zeb Jackson on both ends. House finally beat Jackson, and then got t’d up for screaming AND ONEEEEE at the ref. When House had Bamisile on him, he was blowing past him to the rim routinely. It was so hard to evaluate House when he had a defensive stopper like Zeb on him.
There was lots of dribble-drive from Rhody, which was getting stopped pretty easily when VCU would have a guy help off his man and swipe at the ball.
David Green’s threat from outside was the main why Rhode Island was getting offense, whether it was him making it or opening up opportunities for others due to needing help.
On defense, there were multiple clear miscommunications that led to wide open shots from both three and at the rim.
There was a cool play where they forced VCU go nearly backcourt using a double team, had guys out of position, and giving VCU a 3 on 5. Rhody did a great job rotating around to buy time until their guys go back in position and forced a bad shot.
Bamisile was on fire, but Archie didn’t change the gameplan and they were still sagging off of him and going under screens.
What Does This Mean for Mason?
This is an extremely important game for Mason, as a win and a Fordham loss on the road to UMass would guarantee Mason stays out of the pillow fight.
The Patriots have struggled on the road this season, with a 2-6 record away from home in conference play, but I think Mason is too talented to lose against a team that gives up so much inside.
I am not sure what the starting lineup will look like with Polite back. One of Woody Newton, Okojie, Polite, or Billups will have to come off the bench, and you can make a great case for each one to start. Polite coming off the bench seems like it has a decent chance of happening with him returning from injury. Mason gets to keep their size with Woody Newton at the four in this case.
Prediction: Mason wins 78-70. A combination of Baraka Okojie and Darius Maddox should be able to handle the offensive load.
