1/17 | Richmond | 7:00PM (ESPN+)

[spookydog]

University of Rhode Island vs University of Richmond
Robins Center, Richmond, VA
Tuesday, January 17, 2023
7:00PM

Media
TV: N/A
Online: ESPN +
Radio: Tune In Radio
App: Varsity Network

Previews
Richmond Fan Forum

The Rams keep their road swing going with a trip to Richmond to take on the Spiders. Both universities are coming off road losses as URI lost at UMass & Richmond lost at St. Bonaventure. The Spiders enter this contest with a 10-8 recording and are 3-2 in the conference. Looking at their schedule & who they have beaten, there is no signature out of conference win in their unless you want to consider a win against Temple on a neutral floor a signature win. (The Owls were favored by just 1 in that game.) They did get rolled by Clemson by almost 30. The Spiders are 2-0 at home in conference play & they have a road win at Davison.

Chris Mooney’s Richmond is coming off an impressive run in the A10 tournament, winning 4 games to win the A10 Championship. As a 12 seed, they scored the upset against Iowa before getting rolled by Providence in the next round. After being on the hotseat in previous years, that postseason solidified Mooney’s job at Richmond for at least the foreseeable future. On the court, the Spiders are once again led by Tyler Burton. This 6’7” preseason all-conference first team player is an absolute beast. He went for 17.7 & 7.5 last season and somehow increased those numbers to 19.4 & 7.8 this year. His 19.4 points per game is currently good for 33rd in the country. The only other double-digit scorer is guard Jason Nelson. This freshman undersized speedy guard is averaging 10.2 points per game & is third on the team in assists. Inexplicably leading the Spiders in assists is their 7-foot center Neal Quinn who is averaging almost 3 per game. Six-foot nine Forward Matt Grace is second on the team in assists. The Spiders’ height is going to cause some problems for Rhody. When Rhody goes man to man, I am guessing Ish will have the unlucky assignment of being matched up against Burton, Martin will have Grace & Samb/Tchikou will be on the seven-footer Quinn.

If Rhody wants to stay in this game to pull off an upset, they need to clean up the turnovers. They can play so sloppy at times that it is maddening. In addition to that, Bray also needs to stop going 1 on 5. One bright side to Rhody’s last game was Tchikou having his best game of the season minus the 3-point attempt. He went for 8 & 6 and had ZERO turnovers. He earned the most minutes he has played since early on this season. While looking at some team comparisons, Rhody averages over 2.5 turnovers per game more than the Spiders while Richmond shoots the 3 ball over 6% better. Not a recipe for success in this one.

If Rhody hopes to pick up their first true road win of the season, they are going to need to play an almost flawless game. Both Ish & Bray need to be on & they need an efficient performance from either Carey or Martin. The Rams have lost 4 in a row to the Spiders including 2 of 3 at the Robins Center. One other thing, I would negligent if I did not mention Rhody has hit the race to 10 points in the first half in 9 of the last 11 games. This one will certainly be plus money on the road (probably +150), so why not. Ha ha. I am guessing Richmond will be favored by about 8 points in this contest. Will Rhody have enough to pull of the upset? Let’s ask the Magic 8 Ball. It says…concentrate and ask again. Damnit. Ok, let me attempt to concentrate. The Magic 8 Ball says…outlook not so good. This way this team has been playing, I may need to start using a different kind of 8 ball. My prediction is Tyler Burton goes for 22 & 11 with the final score being Richmond 73 – URI 66. Go Rhody!!

Opponent
Record:
10-8, 3-2 in the A10
24-13, 10-8 in the A10 (Last Season)

Rankings (URI):
NCAA NET: 129 (236)
RPI: 132 (214)
KenPom: 103 (210)
BPI: 95 (227)
Sagarin: 100 (201)
Barttovik: 112 (202)

Leaders:
Points – Tyler Burton 19.4 (Sr., F)
Rebounds – Tyler Burton 7.8 (Sr., F)
Assists – Neal Quinn 2.9 (Sr., C) (1.3 TO per game)

Historical
Series: 11-18
H: 8-5, A: 3-10, N: 0-3
Most Recent Matchup: 3/10/22 64-59 L at A10 Tournament
Most Recent Win Streak: 4 – Richmond
Match-up Predictor: 11.6% Chance of URI Winning

[section(105)]

Team Rankings now has their #202 ranked, #11 in A-10 URI Rams with 19% chance to beat their # 101 ranked Richmond Spiders.

[NYGFan_Section208]

202...aye yi yi....

[steveystuds06]

82413C48-D9AE-42A2-99B5-37A5294310DF.png (193.9 KiB) Viewed 2653 times

We will need to shoot well to have any shot in this game. Will Bassy finally exhale?

I would try to design a few plays for Samb. We can't do what we did last game and never send it to the post. Maybe Alex keeps playing well?

I think Richmond wins by 8.

[Jdrums#3]

I bet (pun intended ) we are one of the best fastest to 10 teams in the country.

Nice to know we are good at something. All is not lost. Too bad games don’t end on 10.

[PeterRamTime]

Eh Richmond is super inconsistent

Rhody by three!

Because we get unusually hot from three!

We go up 10 with a 1:30 left then almost blow it somehow, but Richmond misses three straight game tying threes in the final ten seconds and thus allowing us to take home the W.

[RamStock]

Eh Richmond is super inconsistent

Rhody by three!

Because we get unusually hot from three!

We go up 10 with a 1:30 left then almost blow it somehow, but Richmond misses three straight game tying threes in the final ten seconds and thus allowing us to take home the W.

Richmond is inconsistent and URI is a horrible team that lacks talent.

[PeterRamTime]

Eh Richmond is super inconsistent

Rhody by three!

Because we get unusually hot from three!

We go up 10 with a 1:30 left then almost blow it somehow, but Richmond misses three straight game tying threes in the final ten seconds and thus allowing us to take home the W.

Richmond is inconsistent and URI is a horrible team that lacks talent.

I'm just being positive and having fun

You should try it!

Richmond lost to freaking William and Mary and got blown out by Toledo

They also aren't good at all. Or that talented. Burton that's it.

The difference between these two teams is marginal.

[rjv]

I believe it will be close in the 1st half of the game with Richmond pulling away in the 2nd half and winning by 11. It is all up to Ish as he goes the team goes. Freeman is not shooting well and his shooting % is down 9% from last year. He needs to pass the ball but we do not have any shooters to take pressure of him..I keep looking for someone to step up but no one has yet.
Maybe someone will this game

[bigappleram]

Every team not named Dayton can be had in this league matchups are always key. Richmond has size but not the athleticism of a Umass. At the rim they can’t challenge our slashing guards like Umass could. To me this will come down to defense and rebounding. Make life tough for Burton and clean up the misses.

[Jersey77]

Eh Richmond is super inconsistent

Rhody by three!

Because we get unusually hot from three!

We go up 10 with a 1:30 left then almost blow it somehow, but Richmond misses three straight game tying threes in the final ten seconds and thus allowing us to take home the W.

Richmond is inconsistent and URI is a horrible team that lacks talent.

I'm just being positive and having fun

You should try it!

Richmond lost to freaking William and Mary and got blown out by Toledo

They also aren't good at all. Or that talented. Burton that's it.

The difference between these two teams is marginal.

They also beat a very good Drake team by 30 points.
They lost to Syracuse in OT and beat Temple in the Empire Classic

Granted Burton is their only star, but they aren't devoid of talent.

We also have zero true road wins and Richmond isn't exactly a pushover at the Robins Center.
Their only loss at home is to Wichita State by 3 points.

Not saying we can't win, but we need to play much better than we have.

[Rhody72]

At least the game will be watchable and listenable.
Bassey was 1 of 3 shooting treys while team avg was 21%.
Every time I dis a player, they have a good game. Way to go Alex.
Remember, this is a road game.

[RF1]

It is now more than a year since Rhody last won a true road game on an opponent's court. The last win was at UMass back on 01-15-2022. I unfortunately do not think the streak will be broken in Richmond on Tuesday.

[KeaneyBluBallz]

spiders by 8. 1 for each leg.

[reef]

Will guess Richmond 70-60

[LoveThoseRams]

Just kills me that Cox passed on Tyler Burton. He would have helped us the last few years.

[Dino611]

Just kills me that Cox passed on Tyler Burton. He would have helped us the last few years.

Couldn’t agree more and the worst part is he wanted to come to URI

[McRam]

Just kills me that Cox passed on Tyler Burton. He would have helped us the last few years.

Cox,thought he was not athletic enough!

[McRam]

I think it asking too much to have Ish play aggressive and effective defense on Burton and also,ask him to score 20 points and lead the offense.

I am intrigued in this one of trying Martin and Westin together so we can free of Ish a little and try to stop Burton with someone closer to his size.

Of course, who do we have to take out- point guard- no, Ish-no, Carey, no.

Food for thought, , for part of game, play without a center and play Martin, Weston and the three guards. I know crazy to go extra small when Richmond has real height, but, force Grace and Quinn to beat us. Thoughts?

[bigappleram]

Just kills me that Cox passed on Tyler Burton. He would have helped us the last few years.

Couldn’t agree more and the worst part is he wanted to come to URI

Burton
Tyler Kolek
Dyondre Dominguez

It’s a long list of high end talent we could have signed and didn’t under DC

[steviep123]

Just kills me that Cox passed on Tyler Burton. He would have helped us the last few years.

Couldn’t agree more and the worst part is he wanted to come to URI

Burton
Tyler Kolek
Dyondre Dominguez

It’s a long list of high end talent we could have signed and didn’t under DC

And sadly Cox wouldn't know how to develop this talent even if he had it (or he'd still be here).

[steviep123]

Hmmm....so does Archie follow the Al Skinner model of letting Burton score at will and shut down everyone else?

[Jdrums#3]

I don’t foresee a win tonight. Too many things (or, most things) have to go right each game for us to win like a high field goal percentage from 2 and 3, 3rd and 4th scorers stepping up, minimal turn overs, rebounding advantage, good % from the line, better 2nd half D (as we have been giving up approx 40 pts in 2nd half of conf games so far).

I just don’t envision all or most of those things going in our favor in this game.

That said, I like our grit to battle and hope that will keep us close enough to avoid a double digit loss.

[ramster]

Review of Rhody from a poster on the Richmond Board

Where Rhody is Strong

Free Throw Shooting: Rhody gets to the line a lot, almost 22 times per game (31st in the country) and makes around 16 of those (24th in the country). Leggett (their best player) is also very efficient at the line, so our suddenly foul prone defense needs to hunker down and keep them off the line. Let them shoot (more on that later) and contest, and get ready for rebounds

Offensive Rebounding: Rhody ranks 58th in the country here, mainly due to their poor shooting, but it's still something to look out for. We're going to see a lot of shots come off the rim and we need to be ready. Hopefully Mooney and coaches did some work on the boards this week especially.

Defending the 3: Rhody has allowed only 6.3 Three point makes per game so far this season. And opponents are only shooting 31.5% from 3 against them. They will look to put pressure up top and so Mooney will need to use the driving and kicking ability of our bigs and quick ball movement to open up opportunities. Otherwise, I think we will shoot poorly from 3 tonight, even at home. We won't be slowing down our 3 point hucking any time soon, so this adjustment is key

Where Rhody is Weak

Simply Shooting the Basketball: This is probably the worst shooting A-10 opponent we're going to come up against this year. They shoot 44.4% from 2 and 29.1% from 3, that is atrocious. We have a tendency to give poor shooting teams a shot to win, but hopefully we can hunker down. As mentioned above, due to this poor shooting, look to see plenty of rebounding chances. If we minimize their offensive boards, that's a great start to win. Leggett is their only real outlier in the shooting department. Control him, control the game.

Defending Offensive Rebounds: Counter to one of their strengths above, they give up a lot of offensive rebounds themselves at 11.8 per game (331st in the country). Look to see the Spiders take advantage of our size in this game and get some offensive boards.

Depth: Rhody only has 2 double digit scorers so far this season. That's not going to win you games. Leggett and Freeman account for a lot of their scoring, and so if they get in foul trouble, they're in trouble. If I was Mooney, I'd go after these two early if we can (Nelson and the Goose will be likely matched up to them, potentially Burton as well). Each at 6-2, we can really push them around to get them into trouble.

[section(105)]

I don’t foresee a win tonight. Too many things (or, most things) have to go right each game for us to win like a high field goal percentage from 2 and 3, 3rd and 4th scorers stepping up, minimal turn overs, rebounding advantage, good % from the line, better 2nd half D (as we have been giving up approx 40 pts in 2nd half of conf games so far).

I just don’t envision all or most of those things going in our favor in this game.

That said, I like our grit to battle and hope that will keep us close enough to avoid a double digit loss.

Somewhere along the sked, all those things mentioned above are going to fall into place. Hey, why not tonite? We are going to beat somebody we shouldn’t beat, why not tonite? Even the blind squirrel can find a acorn. No?

[Rhody72]

We win one upset game this year. Some opponent will look past us in a game where we will play way above average. It oftentimes happens for the worst of teams. Don't give up hope before any game. This is why you have to play every game. GO RHODY!!!

[reef]

Review of Rhody from a poster on the Richmond Board

Where Rhody is Strong

Free Throw Shooting: Rhody gets to the line a lot, almost 22 times per game (31st in the country) and makes around 16 of those (24th in the country). Leggett (their best player) is also very efficient at the line, so our suddenly foul prone defense needs to hunker down and keep them off the line. Let them shoot (more on that later) and contest, and get ready for rebounds

Offensive Rebounding: Rhody ranks 58th in the country here, mainly due to their poor shooting, but it's still something to look out for. We're going to see a lot of shots come off the rim and we need to be ready. Hopefully Mooney and coaches did some work on the boards this week especially.

Defending the 3: Rhody has allowed only 6.3 Three point makes per game so far this season. And opponents are only shooting 31.5% from 3 against them. They will look to put pressure up top and so Mooney will need to use the driving and kicking ability of our bigs and quick ball movement to open up opportunities. Otherwise, I think we will shoot poorly from 3 tonight, even at home. We won't be slowing down our 3 point hucking any time soon, so this adjustment is key

Where Rhody is Weak

Simply Shooting the Basketball: This is probably the worst shooting A-10 opponent we're going to come up against this year. They shoot 44.4% from 2 and 29.1% from 3, that is atrocious. We have a tendency to give poor shooting teams a shot to win, but hopefully we can hunker down. As mentioned above, due to this poor shooting, look to see plenty of rebounding chances. If we minimize their offensive boards, that's a great start to win. Leggett is their only real outlier in the shooting department. Control him, control the game.

Defending Offensive Rebounds: Counter to one of their strengths above, they give up a lot of offensive rebounds themselves at 11.8 per game (331st in the country). Look to see the Spiders take advantage of our size in this game and get some offensive boards.

Depth: Rhody only has 2 double digit scorers so far this season. That's not going to win you games. Leggett and Freeman account for a lot of their scoring, and so if they get in foul trouble, they're in trouble. If I was Mooney, I'd go after these two early if we can (Nelson and the Goose will be likely matched up to them, potentially Burton as well). Each at 6-2, we can really push them around to get them into trouble.
[/quote

Good analysis from the opponents fan base

[ramster]

You could be right 72, tonight could be it.
Anybody can get hot with 3P shots too on any given night - even bad 3P shooters can have a hot night.
Will be interesting to see if Archie makes any changes in minutes distribution following the UMASS loss with 2 of UMASS’ key players unexpectedly out

[SGreenwell]

Review of Rhody from a poster on the Richmond Board

Where Rhody is Strong

Free Throw Shooting: Rhody gets to the line a lot, almost 22 times per game (31st in the country) and makes around 16 of those (24th in the country). Leggett (their best player) is also very efficient at the line, so our suddenly foul prone defense needs to hunker down and keep them off the line. Let them shoot (more on that later) and contest, and get ready for rebounds

Offensive Rebounding: Rhody ranks 58th in the country here, mainly due to their poor shooting, but it's still something to look out for. We're going to see a lot of shots come off the rim and we need to be ready. Hopefully Mooney and coaches did some work on the boards this week especially.

Defending the 3: Rhody has allowed only 6.3 Three point makes per game so far this season. And opponents are only shooting 31.5% from 3 against them. They will look to put pressure up top and so Mooney will need to use the driving and kicking ability of our bigs and quick ball movement to open up opportunities. Otherwise, I think we will shoot poorly from 3 tonight, even at home. We won't be slowing down our 3 point hucking any time soon, so this adjustment is key

Where Rhody is Weak

Simply Shooting the Basketball: This is probably the worst shooting A-10 opponent we're going to come up against this year. They shoot 44.4% from 2 and 29.1% from 3, that is atrocious. We have a tendency to give poor shooting teams a shot to win, but hopefully we can hunker down. As mentioned above, due to this poor shooting, look to see plenty of rebounding chances. If we minimize their offensive boards, that's a great start to win. Leggett is their only real outlier in the shooting department. Control him, control the game.

Defending Offensive Rebounds: Counter to one of their strengths above, they give up a lot of offensive rebounds themselves at 11.8 per game (331st in the country). Look to see the Spiders take advantage of our size in this game and get some offensive boards.

Depth: Rhody only has 2 double digit scorers so far this season. That's not going to win you games. Leggett and Freeman account for a lot of their scoring, and so if they get in foul trouble, they're in trouble. If I was Mooney, I'd go after these two early if we can (Nelson and the Goose will be likely matched up to them, potentially Burton as well). Each at 6-2, we can really push them around to get them into trouble.

This is a pretty good write-up, and it's pretty telling that the only players that even warranted a mention were Ish and (to a much, much lesser extent) Freeman.

[RhodyRams916]

Review of Rhody from a poster on the Richmond Board

Where Rhody is Strong

Free Throw Shooting: Rhody gets to the line a lot, almost 22 times per game (31st in the country) and makes around 16 of those (24th in the country). Leggett (their best player) is also very efficient at the line, so our suddenly foul prone defense needs to hunker down and keep them off the line. Let them shoot (more on that later) and contest, and get ready for rebounds

Offensive Rebounding: Rhody ranks 58th in the country here, mainly due to their poor shooting, but it's still something to look out for. We're going to see a lot of shots come off the rim and we need to be ready. Hopefully Mooney and coaches did some work on the boards this week especially.

Defending the 3: Rhody has allowed only 6.3 Three point makes per game so far this season. And opponents are only shooting 31.5% from 3 against them. They will look to put pressure up top and so Mooney will need to use the driving and kicking ability of our bigs and quick ball movement to open up opportunities. Otherwise, I think we will shoot poorly from 3 tonight, even at home. We won't be slowing down our 3 point hucking any time soon, so this adjustment is key

Where Rhody is Weak

Simply Shooting the Basketball: This is probably the worst shooting A-10 opponent we're going to come up against this year. They shoot 44.4% from 2 and 29.1% from 3, that is atrocious. We have a tendency to give poor shooting teams a shot to win, but hopefully we can hunker down. As mentioned above, due to this poor shooting, look to see plenty of rebounding chances. If we minimize their offensive boards, that's a great start to win. Leggett is their only real outlier in the shooting department. Control him, control the game.

Defending Offensive Rebounds: Counter to one of their strengths above, they give up a lot of offensive rebounds themselves at 11.8 per game (331st in the country). Look to see the Spiders take advantage of our size in this game and get some offensive boards.

Depth: Rhody only has 2 double digit scorers so far this season. That's not going to win you games. Leggett and Freeman account for a lot of their scoring, and so if they get in foul trouble, they're in trouble. If I was Mooney, I'd go after these two early if we can (Nelson and the Goose will be likely matched up to them, potentially Burton as well). Each at 6-2, we can really push them around to get them into trouble.

This is a very good analysis on URI. It's sadly true that Leggett and Bray are the only 2 players they need to contain to win the game.

[Jdrums#3]

If you review our in conf individual player stats, Weston’s stats look good. Maybe he will start getting more minutes than he has been averaging in conference. I’d like to see it because I think he is starting to come around after a slow start to the season.

[McRam]

Hope we try the 5 small lineup for at least part of the game. !! I’m sure we have seen this type of thing work in the past. It makes sense rather than having no one to guard Burton

[adam914]

I knew we gave up a lot of offensive rebounds just from watching, but hadn't taken the time to dig in to the numbers. 331st in the country is pretty eye opening. I don't really care how much offense our front court is providing at this point, but at the absolute bare minimum you have to be able to rebound.

[Jdrums#3]

I don’t foresee a win tonight. Too many things (or, most things) have to go right each game for us to win like a high field goal percentage from 2 and 3, 3rd and 4th scorers stepping up, minimal turn overs, rebounding advantage, good % from the line, better 2nd half D (as we have been giving up approx 40 pts in 2nd half of conf games so far).

I just don’t envision all or most of those things going in our favor in this game.

That said, I like our grit to battle and hope that will keep us close enough to avoid a double digit loss.

Somewhere along the sked, all those things mentioned above are going to fall into place. Hey, why not tonite? We are going to beat somebody we shouldn’t beat, why not tonite? Even the blind squirrel can find a acorn. No?

That would be great, 105. I would be happy to have the team make me eat my post. Go blind squirrels!!

[ramster]

If you review our in conf individual player stats, Weston’s stats look good. Maybe he will start getting more minutes than he has been averaging in conference. I’d like to see it because I think he is starting to come around after a slow start to the season.

Vs UMASS Weston played 5th most minutes. He was the only Ram to foul out with 40 seconds to go. Liked how he got tangled up with big Matt Cross whereby a double technical was called. Weston was not backing down from Cross

Weston Stats:
23 minutes - fouled out
1-3 FG, 0-1 3P for 2 points
4 rebounds
1 block
1 turnover

Maybe he maintains or increases his minutes tonight but he needs better numbers consistently to warrant more playing time imho.

Minutes vs UMASS hi to Lo
37-Freeman
36-Leggett
30-Carey
26-Tchikou
23-Weston
19-Martin
15-Thomas
14-Samb

[SGreenwell]

Weston's fine, but again, he plays the same position as Carey and Martin, who are both better. Miller managed to play the three of them about 61 minutes last game, and it's hard to see how he could get away with much more than that. I think he's at an appropriate level of PT for now. Go out there and bust your ass for 8 to 12 minutes a half, continue the work in the off-season, and he's probably the starting 3 next year.

[Jdrums#3]

Because I didn’t list them in my previous post on Weston: In our 5 conf games he is averaging 50% from 2, 50% from 3, 75% from the line, 6 points, 2.8 rebounds in 17 minutes.

I think he is coming around as the season progresses and would like to see what he could do with more playing time than the 17 minute average in conf games.

Of course, if we are winning a particular game and both Martin and Carey are both playing well that particular game then, the minutes would fluctuate for Weston. Both Carey and Malik have had their moments of good play this season so far but I don’t expect them both to play well every game through the end of the season.

[ramster]

He had the 5th most minutes. Not great output for those minutes that would really warrant more playing time.

He had a -10 as did Leggett. Samb was worst with -11 in only 14 minutes.
Samb may see his playing time reduced. He had zero rebounds - only player with zero.

[Jdrums#3]

Sure, Ramster. And if we were winning, I would agree. But, we are not winning, we are re-building. So, I would still rather see what he could do with more consistent playing time the rest of this lost season.

[ramster]

At 6’5” I’d guess Miller is looking for better rebounding from Weston and certainly from Samb

Samb is 7th in rebounds per 40 minutes in 5 Conf games
Weston is behind Martin, Leggett and Carey in rebounds per 40 minutes

[section(105)]

Weston's fine, but again, he plays the same position as Carey and Martin, who are both better. Miller managed to play the three of them about 61 minutes last game, and it's hard to see how he could get away with much more than that. I think he's at an appropriate level of PT for now. Go out there and bust your ass for 8 to 12 minutes a half, continue the work in the off-season, and he's probably the starting 3 next year.

OK. But the point for me is that if, as an example we are waiting for year three for Weston to start, then the rebuild will take longer. Why would Weston not start next year or see major time with Martin and Carey gone?

[section(105)]

Pregame Varsity app. Why not Steve and Chris? Love Stone, but…….?

[LamonteUlmer15]

Big bounce back game for Bray tonight, rams finally pull one out on the road

[McRam]

I knew we gave up a lot of offensive rebounds just from watching, but hadn't taken the time to dig in to the numbers. 331st in the country is pretty eye opening. I don't really care how much offense our front court is providing at this point, but at the absolute bare minimum you have to be able to rebound.

So if Samb gets zero rebounds, Martin at “center” could not do,worse. On the other hand how would the two tall unathletic big guys for Richmond guard Weston and Martin. Keeps the middle open for our guards

[reef]

Just turned on the game let’s go Rhody !!

[reef]

Why the late start ??

[Rhodymob05]

Tchikou with the start.

[reef]

7-0 Richmond. 1648

Terrible start offensively !!

[RI_Bred]

Tough start.

[Jdrums#3]

Damn. We are in trouble with first to 10. Good thing I don’t bet.