AMHERST — In terms of circumstances, George Mason reminds UMass coach Matt McCall of his own team. In terms of style, the Patriots are similar to Georgia State.
Both of those things concern McCall as his Minutemen get set to play GMU, Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at the Mullins Center.
Like UMass (7-7, 0-1 Atlantic 10), George Mason (6-8, 0-1) is hovering around .500 coming off a blowout road loss to one of the league favorites. Shortly after St. Bonaventure was polishing off its 20-point win over the Minutemen, Rhode Island was cruising past the Patriots by 19.
“They played one of the best teams in the league on the road and it was a challenge for them. We played one of the best teams in the league and it was a challenge for us. We both got our teeth knocked in pretty handily,” McCall said. “Who’s going to come out with a lot of energy, a lot of passion, a lot of emotion? I don’t believe in must-wins, but we have to play well to win the game. We have to play with a lot of passion and a lot of heart to win this game. It’s two teams with similar records in similar situations coming off last weekend.”
More concerning to him is that George Mason, like Georgia State, almost never plays with two big men on the floor together.
“They’re going to spread you out and play four, sometimes five guards, a lot of spread pick and rolls,” McCall said. “They have great guard play. Great speed, great athleticism.
“We have to be mindful of matchups and who we have out of the floor. As much as we want them to have to adjust to us, we’ve seen this year we do struggle when teams put four or five guards out on the floor,” McCall added. “We have to be able to adjust that and go small if we need to.”
Everything Mason does runs through junior point guard Otis Livingston II, who leads the Patriots in scoring (14.2 points per games) and assists (4.1). He’s in a shooting slump of late, making just one of his last 16 3-point attempts. Despite that he still shoots 36.4 percent from deep.
Junior Jaire Grayer’s rebounding ability allows Mason to play a lineup with four perimeter players. The 6-foot-5 guard is averaging 7.6 rebounds per game to go with his 13.5 points. He also shoots 39.6 percent from deep (36-for-91).
Freshman Goanar Mar, a 6-foot-7 forward, has been productive inside averaging 11.9 points (30.2 percent from deep) and 4.3 rebounds.
“Can we guard them off the bounce, especially when they’re small, and can we defend the 3-point line? They’re all very similar outside of Livingston. Everybody else is long, athletic and shoots 3s,” McCall said. “The kid Mar shoots 30 percent from the 3-point line. When he’s at the five-spot, that can cause you a lot of problems.”
When UMass counters with a small lineup, McCall has shown a preference for using Malik Hines as the one big man for long stretches, trusting both his defensive versatility and rebounding.
“I have to control the glass more. I have to be on the glass offensively and defensively,” Hines said. “That gives my teammates a chance to control the tempo of the game.”
McCall had been frustrated with Hines recently, but thought things were moving in a good direction.
“We’ve been hard on Malik going into and out of Christmas. I was pretty animated with him in the first seven minutes in the St. Bonaventure game. I felt like he got away from what makes him good: his versatility on defense, his ability to communicate on defense and being the anchor of our defense,” McCall said. “He’s getting back to that. You saw that in the St. Bonaventure game after I got on him pretty hard.”
DOUBLEHEADER — The game will be the second game of women’s/men’s doubleheader. The UMass women’s team (8-6, 0-1) hosts Fordham at 5 p.m.
Matt Vautour can be reached at mvautour@gazettenet.com. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage