UM thankful to open tourney against Dayton
Among the many things University of Miami men’s basketball coach Jim Larrañaga is grateful for this Thanksgiving is the fact that his roster — decimated by injuries last year — has 14 healthy players heading into Thursday’s noon game against Dayton.
Miami is one of eight teams in the ESPN Events Invitational this weekend in Kissimmee. The field also includes No. 4ranked Kansas, No. 10 Alabama and five midmajors — Dayton, Iona, Belmont, Drake and
North Texas.
The winner of Thursday’s UM-Dayton game (ESPN2) plays the winner of the Kansas-North Texas game in a Friday semifinal at 1:30 p.m. The losing teams play Friday at 11 a.m. The tournament final is on Sunday at the ESPN Wide World of Sports complex.
Dayton is historically a strong team and is led by fifth-year coach Anthony Grant, a Miami High grad who went on to play at Dayton and was an assistant coach at the University of Florida. The Flyers, known for their athleticism, have struggled so far this season. They are 1-3 after a win over UIC and losses to UMass-Lowell, Lipscomb and Austin Peay.
The Canes (1-3) are not taking the game lightly.
“Anthony Grant is an outstanding coach, he and I have battled against each other many times,” Larrañaga said. “Their team this year is very typical of an Anthony Grant team. They have a lot of size, athletes, skills, they run a lot of different offenses and defenses, so our guys really need to mentally prepare because they’re perhaps the best team we’ve played so far.”
The Hurricanes are coming off an 86-59 home win over Florida A&M. Point guard Charlie Moore, who transferred from DePaul, led the Canes with 20 points, including five three-pointers, and had four assists.
In addition to those assists, Moore had several more “attempted assists,” a statistic UM coaches keep to give credit to players who make smart passes to teammates who miss their shots or opt to drive and shoot off the dribble rather than shoot directly from the pass.
“Charlie’s doing a great job,” Larrañaga said. “He’s getting the ball to the other guys, and guys like Isaiah Wong and Kam McGusty are very good at putting the ball on the ground and taking it to the basket off what I would consider a near-assist. It would have been an assist if they chose to shoot it.”
Moore’s teammates say he became an instant leader.
“Charlie’s been in a few programs and has lots of experience playing in different conferences, so he’s seen different styles and he’s huge for us,” said forward Sam Waardenburg. “He helps distribute
the ball a lot and has become a mentor for [freshman] Bensley [Joseph].”
Wong benefits from the addition of Moore to the team.
“He’s one of the top three best players on our team and he can really score at will, can pass, and he can play full-court defense,” Wong said. “I didn’t know that about him. He’s a really good defender. He’s bringing the energy and really wants to win. He has a lot of knowledge and all the players listen to him.”
After the three games this weekend, the tough stretch continues for Miami with a game at Penn State Dec. 1 for the Big Ten/ACC Challenge (9:15 p.m.) followed by the home ACC opener against Clemson on Dec. 4 at noon.
With five games over 10 days, the key is balancing practice with rest, Larrañaga said.
“You don’t want to wear your guys out at practice,” he said. The team took Monday off, practiced an hour and a half Tuesday and will practice for an hour Wednesday. “It’s been terrific having 14 guys available,” Larrañaga said. “We can simulate the other team, run scout teams. We couldn’t do that last season.”