To start with, Saint Mary’s will probably right the ship and wind up looking just fine. Maybe not a 25-win juggernaut, but they’ll be alright. The Gaels are going to exit an incredibly tough stretch here with some lessons learned and some hard truths faced and will resume being the thorn that sticks in Gonzaga’s side for this season, possibly even joined by San Francisco in the upper reaches of the WCC to make it an even more top-heavy conference than it usually is (evening out the bottom of the league where Pacific and San Diego are, and this is a technical term, booty).
But it might be a minute, because the Gaels are going through it right now and, with five more games against top-100 KenPom opponents on deck in their next 10, there isn’t really a get-right game on the schedule for Randy Bennett’s squad for the next little while.
(SIDE NOTE: Pacific might be playing the most cowardly schedule in the nation. One game against a KenPom top-50 in Nevada, two against top-150s in Fresno State and UC Davis, and the rest? Straight sludge, from two non-Division I games to the bottom of the Division I barrel in Le Moyne, Idaho and Mississippi Valley State. Michael Olowokandi would NEVER.)
The problems for Saint Mary’s are pretty easy to diagnose at the moment: they can’t shoot at any level in the game and they can’t force any turnovers. That the Gaels are playing slow, plodding basketball is a feature, not a bug—they were among the nations slowest teams a year ago and that’s unlikely to change. And the Gaels have never been great shakes at forcing turnovers, as they’d rather slow the game to a crawl and grind every possession into a fine powder (although so far the turnovers are also at a level below the typical Randy Bennett team).
But the shooting, which by any objective measure anywhere on the court is terrible (40.3% from the floor, 64.5% at the line, a ghastly 25.9% from three)… that’s not supposed to be like that. Those percentages are among the 100 worst teams in the sport, all of them. Barely cracking 40% from the floor as a team should be nigh-impossible, especially for a team that generates so much of its offense at or near the rim.
But a few weeks ago—not months, weeks—this team was projected to win the WCC. Yes, over Gonzaga. For one thing: God saw that and everything, WCC voters. You’ll answer for it one day, but the more pressing question at the moment is, what the hell Gaels?
Aidan Mahaney is pressing
God man this is just such a bummer. Mahaney, the free-wheeling flop-haired maestro, was a revelation a year ago. Loose. A step ahead at all times. Fun. Watching Aidan Mahaney was just fun.
Right now, it’s not fun. Over the last three games, Mahaney has an assist-to-turnover ratio at 1:1 and is shooting 23.1% from the floor. Their spacing is all fouled up, which means Mahaney is spending a lot of time trying to find a way into the lane to make the slash-and-kick game work and repeatedly being stonewalled. A year ago, Mahaney would simply step back, drain a few threes and get the defense to extend; at 32.4% from 3 this season, that isn’t really an option at the moment. The good news is he’s talented enough to fix it.
Alex Ducas needs touches
Shhhhhh… I’m gonna tell you a secret about last season’s Saint Mary’s team: Alex Ducas was more instrumental to the scoring than Mitchell Saxen. Saxen ran a two-man with Mahaney and Logan Johnson beloved by any who saw it, passed out of the double team as well as any big in college basketball and generally did exactly what you want a massive honky from Seattle to do.
So why was Ducas more indispensable? Because he was a dead-eye three-point shooter who defenses had to keep track of, sagging off him to choke off Mahaney’s driving lanes was not an option and sending a second man on Johnson was a non-starter if it meant wide open looks for Ducas. Saxen worked in the high post as a Jokic-Lite facilitator because of elite ball movement and cutting action, certainly, but also because the second anyone even pretended to pinch the lane to either help on the cutters or pressure Saxen, Ducas could make them pay. Last season, Ducas putting up about 10 shots a night was standard fare to keep the math on Saint Mary’s side.
This season? He’s averaging six shots per game, and didn’t play in the second half against Xavier. He left the game against Connecticut last March with a back injury, something that apparently has happened to him before. More than Mahaney, more than Saxen, more than anything happening or not happening defensively, what Ducas is or is not able to give the Gaels could be the defining issue for Saint Mary’s as the season develops.
Logan Johnson is desperately missed
While Mahaney was the engine and Mitchell Saxen was a revelation in the role game, Logan Johnson was both 1. Saint Mary’s leading scorer a year ago and 2. a damn problem on the defensive end, where he was named WCC Defensive Player of the Year. Johnson was a top-10 steals magnet in the league, but made his bones hassling whoever the other teams’ top scorer was a year ago. He might have given up a couple of inches to him on the gameday program, but Johnson would’ve preferred to die as a small child than allow Dillon Jones to pour in 29 for Weber State.
The good news is Randy Bennett could easily find another Logan Johnsonish person to run with the talent he has. The bad news is, until the NCAA responds to my pleas, in-season transfers remain “disallowed” smh.
I opened by saying it’s not as bad as it’s looked. It has looked pretty bad though, and I don’t think there’s much way to sugarcoat it. Losing to Xavier and San Diego State is, on its face, defensible; that both games turned into double-digit draggings isn’t the best look, but sometimes games get out of hand, early in the season, yada yada yada. Losing to Weber State in Moraga? That’s a tougher look no matter how you try to frame it, unless Damian Lillard snuck back into a Wildcat uniform.
Better suss it out quick though fellas; you’ve got a solid Davidson and a very good Utah visiting Moraga in the next week. Like many enjoying/dreading the upcoming Thanksgiving weekend, you’ve got visitors coming, turkey thawing and the house isn’t quite in order yet. In many families, this calls for the three M’s to tide you over: Malbec, Monopoly and the Macy’s Parade. The Gaels have their own M—Mahaney—and if they can get him right, the preceding 1,000 or so words will look charmingly stupid in about two weeks.