Young players forced to step up for Bobcats

Of Quinnipiac’s top five men’s basketball scorers through four games, none is more experienced than a redshirt sophomore. The Bobcats’ leader in minutes is a senior, but the next five are similarly young.

Especially with junior guard Tyrese Williams out injured since Game 1, the Bobcats have relied on their younger players in their first couple of weeks. They’ve had ups and downs, but to coach Baker Dunleavy, that’s not unexpected.

“These guys, playing high school basketball, most of the time they’re the leading scorer on their team. Their coach leaves them in through mistakes. They don’t have to guard the best player,” Dunleavy said Monday on a MAAC conference call.

“They come to college basketball, they’re adjusting to now being one of the guys and learning a new system, being under a new coach. I think for a lot of these guys it’s learning new habits: You call them habits, but if you don’t have them yet, they’re not habits, so you’re thinking a lot.”

Sunday’s 64-58 win over New Hampshire featured key contributions from some of those young players, but the Bobcats also turned the ball over 20 times and committed 20 fouls.

“It’s just something we need to work on,” freshman Tymu Chenery said after Sunday’s game. “It’s definitely not a characteristic of our team. I’m happy we’re doing it now at the early stages, so when we get to conference play, we’ll be better at taking care of the ball.”

Conference play begins this weekend with Iona and coaching legend Rick Pitino coming in for a Friday/ Saturday series in Hamden. Quinnipiac was to have a conference bye but picked up the Gaels after Iona’s scheduled opponent, Monmouth, had a positive COVID-19 test in its program.

Consistency and predictability, Dunleavy said, are in short supply as schedules get shuffled. But Sunday’s would be a good game to teach off of, he said afterward.

“Whether you’re a McDonald’s All-American at a top-10 school like Duke or Kentucky or our freshmen, new guys in the MAAC, basketball is a sport you play best when you’re playing instinctively,” Dunleavy said Monday. “It’s hard for young guys to play instinctively. They haven’t had enough reps under their belt.

“For us, it’s a combination of getting the reps but also watching film, making sure mistakes are happening less and less in practice. I think over time, for guys who really work it and and study the game, the game will slow down for them, especially our guards.”

Dunleavy said Quinnipiac has worked hard on its man-to-man defensive principles, and he has seen progress there.

“I can’t say I like where we are, but we’ve come a long way since getting started with practice in October,” Dunleavy said. “I like the improvement, and if that improvement continues, I think by the end we can be a good defensive team. The answer’s the same for where we’ve improved the most but where we still have the longest way to go.

“Offensively, we’re rusty. We don’t have great chemistry yet. I think that’ll change over time.”