The road is a treacherous place for the UMass men’s basketball team.
Within the friendly confines of the Mullins Center, the Minutemen have been unstoppable. They’re a perfect 5-0 in Amherst and are outscoring opponents by 13 points per game.
In all other arenas (both true road games and neutral site tournament contests), UMass (6-4) has stumbled. The Minutemen are 1-4 away from home, and their only win came in overtime against UNC Greensboro. They’ll leave New England for just the second time all season when they face North Texas at 4:30 p.m. Saturday at the Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas. It’s not the Mean Green’s home arena, but they only have to travel 40 miles compared to more than 1,700 for the Minutemen.
UMass coach Matt McCall compared it to many Atlantic 10 contests for the Minutemen where they have to practice early, fly out of Boston to a city close to the site then stay in a hotel and not shoot around in the other gym.
“Then we’ve got to go play a really good team that won in the [NCAA] tournament last year, that’s extremely physical,” McCall said. “We’re going to be outside of our comfort zone.”
UMass has played five of its games at the Mullins Center and five away in its nonconference schedule so far. The Minutemen average 17.2 assists and 11.8 turnovers per game at home, those numbers shift to 12.4 assists and 10.4 turnovers in each road game. The Minutemen are winning the rebounding by a board a game in the Mullins Center and losing it by six each time out on the road. They’ve shot 11 more free throws per game than their opponents in their own building, but their opponents get three more foul shots per game in less friendly confines.
“The margin at the foul line and the rebound margin are two huge stats that you’ve got to be able to win to win on the road,” McCall said after the loss at Northeastern on Tuesday.
No matter the venue, the Minutemen have scorched nets from beyond the 3-point line. They have the eighth-best 3-point shooting mark in the nation hitting 41.38 percent. South Dakota leads the country at 44.48. UMass has generated that efficiency with heavy volume, as well. Its 290 attempts and 120 makes are both fourth in the nation.
“We’ve got really good perimeter shooting, so we don’t want to take that away,” McCall said. “There will come games where we don’t shoot a high percentage from the 3-point line, and we’ve got to continue to put pressure on the paint. As long as the ball is hitting the paint first and we’re getting it out there, take all the open ones we want.”
Albany transfer C.J. Kelly has led the charge. He’s draining 53.1 percent of his long range attempts, one of the top 40 marks nationally. Kelly hit five 3s in the Minutemen’s comeback against Rutgers and scored a season-high 24 points.
“I thought him being in foul trouble hurt our team against Northeastern,” McCall said. “I need to do a better job with C.J. of putting him in positions to create. He’s one of our better creators. I don’t think we’ve seen that yet.”
Against the Mean Green (4-3), the Minutemen will have to wrestle for control over the gas pedal. North Texas plays at the third slowest tempo in college basketball, per kenpom.com. UMass prefers a quicker game and tries to force teams into that with its press and an emphasis on pushing the ball in transition.
“We’re going to be in late clock situations on defense. On offense, because of how late they go into the clock we’ve got to take good shots, we’ve got to take care of the basketball,” McCall said. “ We can’t just come down and crank understanding that we’re gonna have to go back down the other end and defend for 25, 26 seconds. I think the game is going to tell us a lot about our team and where we need to get better for the Atlantic 10 season.”