On the first weekend of the season, college basketball had to share the limelight with a different revenue sport and a certain game in Tuscaloosa that produced 87 points of its own. Nevertheless, there was certainly no lack of drama or news on the hardwood.
Here are this season's first hot takes that (I think) I can prove:
Shaka Smart has a program with length, depth, perimeter range ... and Luke Yaklich
Texas has had an exceptionally strong recruiting run under Shaka Smart, sending Jarrett Allen, Mo Bamba and Jaxson Hayes into the first round of the NBA draft as one-and-done players over the past three years. That level of talent, however, hasn't translated into NCAA tournament victories. In fact, the last time the Longhorns walked off an NCAA tournament court as the victors, it was Rick Barnes who was congratulating players such as Isaiah Taylor and Cameron Ridley for defeating Arizona State in the 2014 round of 68.
Then again, that winless streak might end in 2020 if UT's 70-66 victory Saturday at No. 23 Purdue is any guide. The Horns won in West Lafayette, Indiana, with a mix of old and new elements.
As for this program's familiar traits, Texas is, once again, blessed with size in the frontcourt. Junior Jericho Sims and sophomore Gerald Liddell haven't followed in the one-and-done footsteps of their predecessors, obviously, but the claim that they can make, along with Royce Hamm and the entire Longhorns defense, is that they held the Boilermakers to 38% shooting inside the arc. Opponents are going to find it difficult to score at the rim against this defense.
Which is all well and good, but the flashy 3-point shooting Texas displayed at West Lafayette? That was new. Matt Coleman III didn't miss a shot until deep into the second half, and the 6-foot-2 junior finished with 22 points powered by 4-of-5 shooting from beyond the arc. If Coleman, Jase Febres, Andrew Jones and the rest of the backcourt can keep opposing defenses well-stretched this season, Sims and Liddell will have that much more room to operate in the paint.
Associate head coach Luke Yaklich is also new, of course. Yaklich arrived in Austin with a well-earned reputation as the guru who worked defensive miracles for Michigan under former head coach John Beilein. The miracles aren't necessarily happening on that side of the ball at Texas just yet (the Boilers scored a quite normal 1.03 points per possession), but Smart's recruiting should give Yaklich everything he needs to work his magic.
To be sure, this team still has ample room for improvement. For starters, the Horns were eaten alive on their defensive glass by Purdue, which pulled down no less than 46% of its missed shots. Smart and Yaklich will get that number nudged toward normalcy, no doubt, and when that happens Texas will be well positioned for a postseason that could be abnormal in relation to those seen over the past few years in Austin.
Seton Hall faces a challenging schedule if Myles Powell is out for an extended period
Just five days before Seton Hall was set to host Michigan State at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey, coach Kevin Willard announced that the Pirates will likely have to deal with a "prolonged absence" from Myles Powell. The preseason All-American sprained his left ankle five minutes into SHU's game Saturday against Stony Brook at Walsh Gymnasium in South Orange.
Losing Powell is clearly a significant blow to a team that, in Big East play last season, came in well below the league average for offensive efficiency even with its star in action. Throw in the fact that Willard put together a tough nonconference schedule for his veteran team, and you have the potential for some losses without Powell.
After facing the Spartans on Thursday, the Pirates will play a true road game at Saint Louis. Then a single home game against Florida A&M is all that stands between this group and the field at the Battle 4 Atlantis. Seton Hall faces Oregon in the opener there, with the potential to play the likes of Gonzaga and/or North Carolina in later rounds.
If Powell were to be still sidelined by this point or if he returns at less than full speed, December will present its own challenges in the form of a road game at Iowa State and a home date against Maryland. Seton Hall can still do good things without Powell, of course, and Pirates specialties like offensive rebounds and forcing turnovers figure to be more important than ever.
But losing the senior for any particular game throws doubt on the Hall's perimeter shooting and indeed on this offense's potential, period. The danger isn't so much that Seton Hall would see its NCAA tournament seed drop significantly (assuming Willard's group has ample time at full strength to rehab its team sheet) as that the team itself won't progress as fast as it would have with Powell in the lineup for every game.
Jordan Roland is putting up Pete Maravich numbers
After just 80 minutes of Northeastern basketball, the Colonial Athletic Association's preseason voters are already kicking themselves.
One month ago, Jordan Roland was tapped as a second-team preseason All-CAA selection. That honor now looks rather insufficient in light of the fact that the player in question is the nation's leading scorer. Roland is averaging 40.5 points per game, and Friday night he lit up potential NCAA tournament team Harvard for 42 points in the Huskies' 84-79 victory at Matthews Arena in Boston.
Roland isn't just scoring a ton of points, he's doing so with extraordinary efficiency. The 6-foot-1 senior is connecting on 75% of his 2s and 50% of his 3s on the young season. Those astronomical success rates aren't likely to make it all the way to March, of course, but he's already recorded a two-game stretch that will be hard for any player to top this season.
Speaking of preseason expectations, Hofstra was the popular pick as the CAA favorite. If Roland can keep up his uncanny imitation of Buddy Hield, however, the Huskies could make things interesting. Northeastern has allowed its two opponents (the Crimson and Boston University) to make no less than 61% of their 2s, so, needless to say, it doesn't appear that defense is going to carry Bill Coen's team. It is instead likely that the Huskies will go as far as Roland can take them.
So far, efficiency is down in Division I but scoring is up
In Division I games during the first week of action, 3-point accuracy has been quite bad behind the new line. A dip in the success rate was expected with these shots now being taken from about 16 inches farther from the basket, but the actual decrease in accuracy has been surprising in its severity.
Going into Saturday's games, teams had shot just 31.8% on their 3s so far this season (per the numbers compiled at KenPom.com). That's a far cry from the 34.5% shooting that teams posted using this same line in the 2018 NIT, and it's even lower than the 32.6% that participants recorded in the 2019 NIT.
The issue appears to be shot selection. Look again at the number from the 2018 NIT. Teams hit close to 35% of their treys in that tournament while not attempting many shots from beyond the arc. Conversely, this season Division I is launching about 37% of its tries from behind the line. That's a slight decrease since last season, but it's still a healthy number of attempts -- and it appears Division I players collectively aren't ready to achieve an average level of accuracy at this particular volume from this distance.
Bad 3-point shooting at a relatively high volume would be expected to hurt offensive efficiency, and that's precisely what has taken place. Teams are averaging just 0.99 points per possession, which, if sustained for the rest of the season, would constitute the lowest level of efficiency we've seen since 2002-03. But the issues on offense extend beyond lackluster perimeter shooting. Teams are also missing their 2s (shooting 48.7%), and the turnover rate (19.8%) has reached its highest point since 2012-13.
That all sounds like offense is an early-season problem, and, on a possession-for-possession basis, it might indeed pan out that way in Year 1 of the new 3-point line. But scoring's actually up slightly since last season thanks to a markedly faster tempo. Teams are averaging 71.2 points per 40 minutes due in part to a pace of 71.9 possessions per game, easily the fastest tempo we've seen in the past two decades.
Again, it's (extremely) early, and these numbers will be subject to significant change until they have a critical mass of games fed into them. Still, the early indications suggest that players are a bit too cavalier about the new 3-point line. It's just a good thing, at least in terms of scoring, that said players are being overconfident at such a fast pace.