The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Well-traveled Bulldogs ready for home opener
Not one to load up his team’s schedule with guaranteed victories, veteran Yale men’s basketball coach James Jones is a firm believer of exposing his players to challenging environments.
The positive aspect of his philosophy is that Yale has posted winning records in Ivy League play for eight consecutive seasons, a first in the program’s history. The other end of the spectrum is that teams aren’t exactly volunteering to face the Bulldogs and most certainly aren’t likely to come to New Haven to meet a Yale team with more that its share of wins and near misses against teams from the Power 5 Conferences over those previous eight campaigns.
Yale joins Arkansas Pine Bluff and Prairie View A&M as the only Division I men’s basketball programs yet to play a home game this season. The Bulldogs are more than happy to leave that select group when they host Lehigh on Wednesday at 7 p.m.
“Obviously it wasn’t a plan but it worked out that way because the way the schedule goes and the lack of ability to get home games,” Jones said.
Yale has added more eye-opening wins to its resume this season. The season began with a convincing win over California to culminate the team’s trip to China. The last time out, Yale erased a 15-point deficit in the second half to win at Miami. That win was especially therapeutic for the Bulldogs after falling in double overtime at Memphis despite leading by six points with 1:30 to play in the second half and by five points with 43 seconds remaining in the first overtime.
“What we learned from it is making sure you do the little things to be successful,” Jones said. “Our guys did a great job in the Miami game of finishing it, making free throws when they count without turning the ball over.”
More tests are coming especially on Saturday when Yale travels to play No. 3 Duke, a team that was ranked first in the national polls for a couple weeks earlier this season and features the freshman trio of Zion Williamson, RJ Barrett and Cam Reddish, who will be among the top prospects in the 2019 NBA Draft if they choose to turn pro at season’s end. The next two home games after returning from Durham, N.C. will be against Albany and Iona, teams that are off to tough starts but won a combined 42 games a season ago.
The Lehigh game won’t be a walk in the park either facing a team ranked ninth among Division I teams with a 43.4 3-point percentage.
“It certainly is going to be a challenge,” Jones said. “It is a great game for us. Our schedule is extremely competitive. It is nice to be able to have these games to help prepare us for our league.”
Yale is also ranked in the top 20 nationally in 3-point percentage, hitting 41.5 percent from long distance after hovering around 33 percent in each of the last two seasons.
“I think we have a lot of guys who can shoot the 3, a lot of guys to worry about,” Jones said. “Whether this is going to be the best at the end of the day, I don’t know, but we probably have more guys capable of shooting the 3 than we have in a long time.”
Another trademark during Yale’s 3-2 start is the contributions from a variety of players.
Seven different Bulldogs have at least one doubledigit scoring game this season to provide support for leading scorer Miye Oni, a junior guard averaging 18.6 points per game.
“Our offense has been as efficient as it has been for a long time, certainly having multiple guys be a part of that is key for your team being successful,” Jones said. “It makes us hard to scout and who you are going to put your best defender on and all sort of things, so it has been really good to have so many guys contribute.”
Jones believes that the time spent in China has helped the players rely on each other both on the court and off.
“When you are in a foreign country, nobody speaks the language and guys have to look toward each other a little more,” Jones said. “Cell phones didn’t work as well over there as they do here so guys had time to spend together and get close and those are the types of things that help you win games.”