AMHERST — Finals week will challenge the UMass men’s basketball team and off the court.
The Minutemen are wrapping up the semester academically and preparing for one of their toughest tests of the season against North Texas at 3 p.m. Saturday at the MassMutual Center in Springfield (ESPN+).
The Mean Green (8-2) have won three games in a row and have held their last eight opponents under 60 points. North Texas allows the fourth-fewest points in the country (52.4) and the fewest opponent attempts (44.1). Some of that is owed to playing the country’s slowest tempo, per kenpom.com, even slower than notorious ball pounders Virginia and recent UMass opponent Charlotte.
“It’s one of the reasons our defensive principles are what they are, is to try and force tempo on people without all the trapping and running around,” said UMass coach Frank Martin, recalling a story from coaching high school basketball in Florida without a shot clock and facing a four corners offense that they needed to accelerate. “If you start trapping them and all that you’re running into problems, because they’re so disciplined offensively and they got shot makers, and they’re very good offensive rebounding team. If you try to start trapping them, you’re running yourself into trouble. We’ve just got to trust our defensive principles and then be solid, and be aggressive.”
It sounds a lot like how the Minutemen played in the second half against Hofstra last time out. UMass (8-2) rebounded after its second loss of the season and a lackluster first few minutes to run the Pride off the Barclays Center floor.
“It was closer to their home than our home, but I feel like we played together and we had a lot of energy,” UMass guard T.J. Weeks Jr. said. “Not to start, but throughout the game we had a lot of energy.”
Senior guard Tylor Perry leads the Mean Green averaging 17 points point game and shooting 45.3 percent from the 3-point line. He also has a team-high 12 steals. Perry missed the first two games of the season but has made up for lost time.
“Now they’ve rounded themselves back into shape,” Martin said. “They’re right in the middle of hitting their stride, and hopefully that second half of the Hofstra game spurs us to kind of head in that direction, too.”
The Minutemen have their syllabus for their last test, but it will have to wait for them to finish the other ones. They practiced sparingly early this week around test times. Martin emphasizes academics heavily, so he has to balance his priorities.
“I’d rather not play a team like North Texas in the middle of a lull when you have so many days in between games and final exams,” Martin said. “We’ve got to be good her for the next two and a half days, we’ve got to be really engaged and excited about what we’re doing. We have to trust who we’ve worked hard to become. We’ve worked really, really hard to become a pretty good basketball team, and my job is to push us to be better, not to accept who we are but to continue to grow.”
The Minutemen will likely have to do that without point guard Noah Fernandes for the fourth game in a row. He injured his right ankle against Harvard and has missed the last four games. Fernandes is out of the walking boot, and his swelling has gone down.
“He’s close, but I don’t think he’ll be close enough to play this Saturday,” Martin said.
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.