Know the Foe: Davidson at Temple

December 18th, 7 PM, ESPN+

Temple favored by 3 (KenPom), 3 (Torvik)

Sports Fans: if, on the eve of the season, I had offered you an 8-2 start for Davidson with a dominant Quad 2 win, a victory in the Hornets' Nest, and no bad losses -- would you have taken it? The answer for me would be an all caps YES, regardless of how it happened. However, the emergence of Reed Bailey as a legit All-A10 First Teamer and return to traditional Davidson offensive principles is what's truly encouraging. Davidson already has 2 performances with a T-Rank game score of 98 or better (PC and UDM) -- the last time that happened over an entire season was 2021-22. Our 3PT% is up to 36%, which is plenty good enough to have success in the A10.

With all that in mind, why do I still have some reservations?

Well, as much as I've tried to erase the near disaster against Charleston Southern from memory, I haven't quite been able to do so. I also haven't forgotten Bowling Green going bucket-for-bucket against us in the second half, or the times in nearly every game this season where the 'Cats seem to abandon the offense and play disorganized for a spell. Between the inconsistency in Big Games and underperformance in Buy Games, I could really use one more performance to sell me on the team's chances at solid A10 slate.

Enter Temple. A near perfect measuring stick game that will set a lot of our expectations for the rest of this season. A matchup that, on paper, is the purest tossup of the entire non-conference slate for Davidson. KenPom #115 at #118. It's a great opportunity for Davidson to show they can assert their principles against an almost total stylistic opposite, and it's the kind of game that asserts you as a top 100 team if you win. Let's do it, and hope it ends with some revenge for 2018 in Atlantic City.

Temple's Profile

It's year 2 for Adam Fisher, and it's one where big progress is expected in a pretty open American. Outside of Memphis and a pretty good North Texas team, the Owls have the chance to get back among the contenders after improbably reaching the final of the AAC Tournament last year. Dusty May left FAU for the bright lights of Ann Arbor; Andy Kennedy is in a bit of a transitional year at UAB. Temple and Wichita State are in similar situations as traditional contenders with second-year coaches who could shake up the race in the league. The Owls don't have huge expectations, but there is an opening bolstered by a notable transfer class.

Right now they sit at 6-4. Their last outing was a win at Hofstra on Sunday, 60-42. This isn't quite the contending Hofstra that NBY played big minutes for a couple years ago, but that's still a solid road win and their best performance of the season if you're going by Game Score (98). Unfortunately, it happened on FloHoops, so I have no film from this game and cannot confirm it happened. (If a tree falls in a forest with no one around, etc.) Other notable results include a 94-65 thrashing from Villanova at the Pavilion (their worst performance of the year) and 2 performances against A10 teams that are especially worth looking at: an 87-80 win over UMass, and an 83-75 loss at La Salle. These are 2 teams Davidson needs to be better than to be above the A10 pillow fight, so that's one reason this game looks like a serious measuring stick.

Offense

Temple's transfer class is notable because of a couple of quality guards joining the program. The big one is 5th year Jamal Mashburn Jr., and he is very good.

Mashburn (yes, the son of that Jamal Mashburn) could've gone Power 5 easily and earned a big payday to be a secondary scorer, but he chose Temple and the opportunity to be the unquestioned Number One Option. The opportunity for him to be the top dog -- especially after he ended up being the third option on a very good UNM team last year -- was probably a major motivator.

Mashburn has put his money where his mouth is. He's averaging 21.0 a night and shooting 50% from three on the season. He's obviously due for some regression from deep, as he's more like a career 35% shooter, but you should definitely be scared of his ability to go on absolute Heaters at any given moment. He plays 86% of minutes and takes 33% of Temple's shots while he's on the floor. Most come via the PnR, dribble hand offs, or high DHOs into PnR. He's a master of taking one dribble into a jumper, which leads to a lot of midrange twos. He's also a master of the Stop and Pop. The book has been out for a while that he loves the left elbow and wing, so teams try to force him right -- despite him shooting righty. He also won't hesitate to pull from Steph territory (I mean it when I say high PnR). However, the biggest chunk of his offense comes via the aforementioned midrange pull-ups, though his high volume means he's not the most efficient scorer (49.3 eFG%). His playmaking is mostly confined to drive and kicks to the corner; he attempts 7 more FGs a game than anyone else on the roster. Call it chucking if you want. However, the youth these days call it Aura, and I'm a sucker for elbow jumpers.

The other transfer is the more pure lead guard of the two. Lynn Greer III moved across town from St. Joe's, where he averaged 11.9 with 4 assists the last two seasons. However, he just made his first appearance of the year against Hofstra and played only 17 minutes in that contest, so it's TBD whether he's 100%. Temple could really use his facilitation, because the other guards on the roster are kinda Diet Mashburn. The other guy who's played 35 minutes a game for Temple is F Steve Settle III. He's basically a Jack of All, Master of None: fairly efficient scorer (12.p PPG, 52.3 eFG%, 32.4% from deep) who gets a ton of his points at the line (32nd in FTr nationally). He's also a solid passer (his 2.3 assists lead the team) who can bring it up the floor at a lanky 6'10". All this makes for the highest offensive rating on the team at 123.7.

It remains to be seen how much Greer changes things, but it's important to note that as of writing, Temple ranks in the bottom 10 in the nation in assist rate. Basically every guard will take happily take you off the dribble, and they'll do so early in the shot clock without hesitation, which is why Temple plays a bit faster tempo than Davidson. The only perimeter player who spots up often from three is Jameel Brown (37% from deep on a 87% 3PAr). The other non-Mashburn guards and wings are all shooting below 30% from deep, and that's on pretty low volume; as a team, the Owls attempt just over 30% of their shots from distance. Zion Stanford (11.6 PPG) and Quante Berry (8.0 PPG) are the other guards most commonly used, and they have similar profiles. Both attempt only 2 3PTs a game, and they're both not great shooters from out there or the foul line. Starting C Babatunde Durodola plays only 16 minutes a game and has not attempted a three all year, though he's the best rebounder on the team despite being just 6'8'.

Looking at this roster, I'm very thankful Davidson got a lot of reps running a 1-3-1 zone in and looked pretty competent doing so. As we've discussed before, Davidson doesn't have the speed on the perimeter they had last year, but they do have length. Taking away the driving lines and forcing non-Mashburn guards to settle for jumpers is a win when you're playing this team. While Temple's a fine offensive rebounding team at 31%, they're not an elite team that can punish a zone's rebounding liabilities. Temple doesn't have turnover problems, but they aren't a great playmaking team (at least sans Greer). Exploit that to make them spread the ball around the perimeter instead of going into PnR and isolation, which is where they have the Dudes to get you. UMass pressured the Temple guards for 3/4 of the court, and it didn't go particularly well for them. For Davidson it's a similar situation; they're pretty fast and trying to face guard someone like Mashburn is just going to let him blow by you and put you in tough help situations on defense.

Defense

Temple's speed means that basically every guard on the roster is a solid one-on-one defender. Well, Mashburn's numbers aren't great in this respect, but he carries a major load on offense. Temple has been willing to use their athleticism to pressure the ball-handler and help one pass away. Against La Salle they blitzed against ball screens and flashed a 3/4 court press midway through the first quarter. This is reflected in their opponents' possessions lasting 16.9 seconds on average, which is on the shorter side nationally. While they've performed pretty well against jumpers, holding opponents to just 31% from deep thus far, they don't force many turnovers, doing so only about 15% of the time. It wouldn't surprise me at all if Temple comes out aggressively against Davidson to use their athleticism edge, though Davidson has managed much better against the press than I thought we would at the beginning of the year.

Settle and each of the Owls' three 6'8" centers are fine as rim protectors, with Settle posting a quality BLK% of 4.7. I'm curious to see who guards Reed Bailey. Settle has the footspeed to hang with Bailey in the high post, but Reed has at least 25 pounds on him. The other Temple bigs are much...beefier; however, Bailey is a full two inches taller than them and much more fleet footed. I would not be surprised at all if Reed has to flash his great playmaking against a lot of double teams down low. Either way, Temple has the ability to take away a lot of Davidson's cuts -- they're a good 2PT defense.

The other weakness to pay attention to is sub-300 Temple's defensive rebounding. We saw how Zach Laput and Sean Logan both had moments on the glass against a poor rebounding team in UNCC that swung the game in Davidson's favor. For inspiration, I'd look to how La Salle exploited Temple. They had a poor night from deep, going just 7/25 from three, but they turned it over on just 8.8% of possessions and brought in 34% of available offensive boards. Davidson's numbers against Charlotte? 10.8% on turnovers and 41.2 ORB%. The 'Cats have a very real path to an advantage in shot volume in this one if their press can force some turnovers of their own.

Keys to the Game

The thing I absolutely do NOT want to see is for Davidson to start trading buckets with an isolation oriented team. Weirdly, I think Temple's one-on-one ability can help their defense by enticing Davidson into abandoning the Cats' offense in favor of Reed and Connor isolation. That may have worked against lower tier competition, but you don't beat a solid team in their house by playing the game on their terms. If you do, you probably got a bit lucky with shooting variance.

This is where I think the zone helps Davidson tremendously. You need to keep Temple from getting into a rhythm offensively, and keep Mashburn from getting on to one of his heaters. A good night for Davidson defensively is forcing Temple to take 40% or more of their shots from deep. Someone who's not a great shooter might get hot, but it's worth it to take away the Owls' collective dribble drive game. On offense, this will hopefully keep us for getting sucked into a one-on-one game. Stick to the principles; even if the shots aren't falling, Davidson will have the chance to make it up on the glass and in the turnover battle.

A close loss probably doesn't change my opinion of this Davidson team much, unless it's a frustratingly close loss where we let it slip away late, like the cursed 2018 game. A road win, though, would create real expectations to compete for the top 6 in the A10. There's an opening in the middle of the A10, and Davidson has no bad losses and a very solid top 100 win, unlike some of our contemporaries. Get another quality win and the time will come for some exciting conversations. Let's go 'Cats!

Predictions:

1. Reed Bailey is held below 20 but notches another triple nickel at 17/8/5 against aggressive defense.

2. Davidson commits to a zone for most of the game, which keeps Mashburn below 20, but allows a random Owl like Brown to hit 5 threes.

3. Regardless of the outcome, I end up feeling better about the season afterwards.