In a scrappy win not reflected in an 81-66 victory, ASU was able to pull away late. The Sun Devils kept their lead throughout the game due to their prominent athletic advantage over St. Thomas. When the Tommies put together runs at times, the Sun Devils shifted to a pragmatic offensive approach, attacking the paint and either scoring or drawing a foul.
While they only went 18-26 from the free throw line, the Sun Devils were able to slow down the game by getting to the line consistently. The Sun Devils also dominated the glass, snatching 44 rebounds to St. Thomas’ 29. Still, ASU gave up nine offensive rebounds and 16 second-chance points, allowing the Tommies to stay in the game longer than head coach Bobby Hurley’s liking.
“I knew we were going to have to chase them around,” Hurley said. “They’re going to most likely look to try and find someone to break down and shoot the three, and that’s why the differential is what it is. They played a lot of small lineups, so we tried to make a concerted effort to go inside and attack the paint. That was one of the points of emphasis for our guards to hit the paint off the dribble and kick it out.”
The guards did exactly what Hurley asked them to do, as the Sun Devils shot 41% from three, hitting 9 of 20 from beyond the arc. St. Thomas tried to press ASU at times, but they were often unsuccessful. The Sun Devils got past it with ease and scored 15 fast break points to the Tommies’ seven.
On the other side of the ball, “The Hurley Press” was active in the first half after St. Thomas cut ASU’s lead to two at one point. Freshman forward Amier Ali was at the front of the press, and his slender build made it challenging for players to get the ball around him. In the brief time that the Sun Devils pressed St. Thomas, Ali assisted in forcing several turnovers.
“We haven’t worked on it a ton,” Hurley noted. “The way they were moving and cutting us through possessions enabled us to speed the game up a little bit and steal a couple of possessions. Amier is very active and has a good wingspan, so that’ll be a good situation for him to be in.”
The Sun Devils built a 10-point first-half lead that they never looked back from, although St. Thomas hung around for most of the second half before a three-point bombardment helped ASU pull away in the final five minutes. Whenever the Tommies came within striking distance, Hurley diverted to senior forward Basheer Jihad, who provided 20 points.
Jihad also got to the line five times, going 7-for-10, as he backed down a smaller defender every time he got the ball. In a game where virtually every defender on Jihad is smaller than him, his play style is exactly what the Sun Devils needed to separate themselves on the scoreboard late in the game.
“It’s a part of my game,” Jihad commented. “I had the matchup I wanted, so I knew that I was favored in that matchup. I knew they were going to be helping, so I just had to do a better job finding my teammates out of that. But still, I knew I had the matchup I wanted, so I was just trying to be aggressive.”
The Tommies used a combination of small-ball lineups on the floor, mixing and matching with different guards to see who could generate the most trouble. In the first half, the Sun Devils were in a scramble because so many players pestered the ball handler, so Hurley made adjustments to keep the ball moving or up high with the big men, where St. Thomas was ineffective.
“They weren’t very big overall,” Jihad recognized. “When their tallest player is only 6’8, that’s what we’re supposed to do with teams like that. If we play teams that are small like that, we need to dominate the paint, and I felt like we did that.”
This was a game fit for not only Jihad but also freshman forward Jayden Quaintance. Besides Jihad, the 17-year-old put up career highs of 13 points and 14 rebounds alongside three blocks and an abundance of other shots altered. The 17-year-old has begun to look more comfortable on the court now, five games into college, and is still learning as each game progresses.
“The paint is always open,” Quaintance stated. “It’s always good when you can get easy buckets instead of shooting a lot of threes that sometimes don’t fall. Especially if you play inside out, it gets everybody going because all our bigs are willing to pass out and hit guys on the perimeter. So when we get the pick and roll going, everybody else gets going as a result.”
His loudest of the three blocks came in the dying minutes of the game, where he spiked a layup like a volleyball into the front row behind the basket, just another example of his freakish athleticism. Quaintance has always had a knack for playing well defensively, but his build and genetics undoubtedly benefit him in that category.
“I work on getting my feet down quicker,” Quaintance expressed. “Being able to move laterally is always good, but defense has always come naturally to me. I played a lot of one-on-one and five-on-five growing up, so I have decent defensive instincts. My dad was a defensive player of the year in college, and he was always a defensive player, but having a seven-foot wingspan definitely helps.”
Join your fellow Sun Devil fans on our premium message board, the Devils’ Huddle, run by the longest-tenured Sun Devil sports beat writer, to discuss this article and other ASU football, basketball, and recruiting topics. Not a member yet? Sign up today and get your daily fix of Sun Devil news!
