SMU coach Rob Lanier, players ready for NIT 'opportunity'

The way the SMU basketball team ended the season left much to be desired as it hopes to regroup for the opportunity the NIT provides on Wednesday against top-seeded Indiana State.

The Mustangs were one-and-done in their final American Athletic Conference tournament and after Thursday’s loss to Temple, they didn’t know if there would be another game this season. That changed when SMU accepted the NIT invitation on Sunday night.

“Mostly just being able to play with my teammates again,” SMU guard Zhuric Phelps said about playing in the NIT. “The postseason, there’s a lot of teams that’s not playing around this time. We’re just grateful for the opportunity that we get to play in this tournament and I’m just grateful to be able to play with my teammates again.”

Several teams made headlines by announcing they would not accept an NIT bid between ending their respective conference tournament run and the selection, including the AAC’s Memphis. The Mustangs, however, were eager to continue the season.

“I think the NIT is still prestigious and the fact that the NCAA runs it and they want a quality field,” SMU head coach Rob Lanier said. “I think it’s less about the teams that decide not to play, that’s their own business why. This is our sixth NIT appearance in school history. So it’s significant and it’s a by-product of a body of work that these guys put together and so I just think it’s a great opportunity to continue to play and to build on what we started.”

Disappointing finish

There was a difference between what SMU started this season and where it left things in Fort Worth. On Feb. 18, the Mustangs just finished a dominating 27-point win against Memphis for their sixth-straight victory. From there, SMU was 1-5 to finish the season needing overtime to beat East Carolina and a blown double-digit lead in the second half at UAB.

During the six-game winning streak, SMU put itself in position for a top seed in the AAC tournament and even an outside chance at an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. Then it came crashing down.

“We’re going to have to play better. There was an effort that we gave at UAB which is more similar to what had put us in this position in the first place,” Lanier said. “To be honest with you, I feel like one of the coaching decisions that I made throughout the year is that we were going to shoot for an at-large bid. We scheduled accordingly and we played in such a way that we kind of got up to that line and didn’t break through. I think the the awareness and disappointment that we didn’t get those Quad 1 wins affected us in a way that we didn’t rebound from.”

SMU finished 2-5 in Quad 2 games and 0-4 in Quad 1 contests. Three of those came after that big win against Memphis.

“We felt like we built an identity on the defensive end and definitely those six games, it was there and then it wasn’t there,” Phelps said. “So that’s something that we’ve got to work on now, in the future. Just defensively, we’ve got to get back to what we do defensively. … That last game played in the conference tournament, we knew that wasn’t us. We’ve been practicing, (Monday) and in the gym just trying to find ourselves and this last practice I feel like we found ourselves a little bit. We just want to enjoy playing with each other, having fun, that’s the main thing out of this, and just win.”

‘Fresh start’

The issues that plagued the Mustangs from the end of the regular season carried over into the AAC tournament. But with the possible finality of the season followed by the opportunity to keep things going in the NIT is an opportunity to regroup.

“This is a fresh start mentally for these guys,” Lanier said. “Because in their effort to get to the NCAA tournament, because with 10 wins last year why would you schedule the way we did? It really wasn’t logical on paper. Even my colleagues were saying, ‘What are you doing, man? Just compile some wins.’ And instead, we put a schedule together that we thought might put us in a position to do something that wasn’t expected. And we flirted with it, but our guys were calculating that each step along the way and not hitting that mark affected us in a way that I didn’t anticipate. I think this renewed opportunity is good for these guys and that’s the way they responded on the practice floor (Monday) and we’ll get another chance to practice (Tuesday).”

Now they have a chance to get things back on track.

“Three days ago, we didn’t even know if we were going to have a basketball game this week,” guard Chuck Harris said. “So, just that in itself is like another opportunity for us to just go out there. We felt like we underperformed in the tournament and this is just another chance to prove ourselves. So I think just for us to get back to where we are, we’ve just got to come out to play and just be happy to play with each other because when we lose again, it’s really over this time.”

For Harris, it is also a chance to get healthier. An ankle injury kept him out of the loss to UTSA and he re-injured it late in the first half against Temple, keeping him out for almost the entire second half. While he won’t be fully recovered, the extra time will be a benefit.

“Yeah, it’s doing good. It’s the same ankle I had sprained a little bit earlier in the season,” Harris said. “So I’ve just been treating it, doing everything I can to get back to close to 100%. … Everybody at this point in the season is not 100%, so this is all about dealing with the pain and finding ways to win.”

A tree-sized order

While the Mustangs do have an opportunity, it’s no easy task. They will be facing an Indiana State team that won its regular season conference title before falling in the championship game and missing out on an NCAA tournament bid that many thought would come.

The Sycamores finished 28-6 overall and were a dominant 13-1 at The Hulman Center in Terre Haute, where the first-round game will be played. Of those six overall losses, four came against NCAA tournament teams, including Drake twice.

“Great team, we started watching film as soon as we found out and then we met early (Monday) morning,” Lanier said. “They’re one of the best offensive teams in the country. With the NIT, there’s always this question of the motivation to play and all of this and I think they’re a team that’s got something to prove. It’s not in Madison Square Garden, so if you advance, you get to stay close to home and it’s set up for them. So the motivation won’t be a problem for them. So we’re going to have a really formidable test. I think, for us, the opportunity to finish on a different note, I think, resonates with our guys. So it’s a great, great setup for us.”

ISU averages 84.4 points per game, tied for fourth in the country, on a third-best 50.5% field goal shooting. It is also Top 10 in free throw percentage (third, 79.7%), 3-pointers made per game (fourth, 11) and 3-point percentage (10th, 38.5%).

“They’re a really good basketball team, really good offensively,” Harris said. “They’ve got a couple players that can really hurt us and we let them get going. But I think if we come to play and get back to our defensive principles that we can make it tough on them. And we’re going into their home environment in Indiana State, so that’s also going to be a factor, but I think we can get the job done if we come to play.”

The entire Starting 5 for the Sycamores averages in double figures offensively, led by 6-foot-10 center Robbie Avila with 17.5 points per game. His size and efficiency has earned him the nickname ‘Cream Abdul-Jabbar’ and stopping him, or even slowing him down, is no easy task.

“Same thing everybody else did, try hard and try to be smart. But he’s such a threat because he shoots 40% from the 3-point line,” Lanier said of Avila. “So when he picks and pops, you have to deal with that. But then when he puts it on the floor, he’s so savvy, he’s such a great passer if you try to double team him — which we’ve done throughout the year against the post players — he’s a great passer and they shoot the ball so well from every spot on the floor that you do wind up in a lot of pick-your-poison propositions as you go through the game and he’s at the center of that.

“The closest thing that we faced this year was Rice with (Max) Fiedler with his ability to handle a pass, but he didn’t have the 3-point shooting aspect of it. And then they’ve got a point guard (Julian Larry) that is shooting 47% from 3, wouldn’t that be nice? So you really can’t attack them defensively by saying. ‘All right, here’s the weak spot.’ You’re just going to have to do a good job and then you’re going to have to counter that with some quality offense of your own.”

SMU knows the challenge that it faces is more difficult, really, than any during its struggle run at the end of the season. But it also knows anything can happen in those 40 minutes between tip-off and the final buzzer.

“Really, really good team. We watched a couple of films, I got a friend that played there,” Phelps said. “But a really good team, won 25 games, I believe, they were No. 1 in their conference. So, they’re a really good team. Really good atmosphere in Indiana, but looking forward to going there and play.”