Game #1: Bulldogs vs. Catamounts
The Western Carolina Catamounts came to Athens for the opener of the 2022–23 College basketball season. The Catamounts are projected to finish dead last in the Southern Conference, but came to town looking for vengeance after losing a tight matchup with the Georgia Bulldogs last season by six points. After a slight delay due to the Lady Bulldog’s game finishing up late, the Dawgs tipped off the season at 8:39 P.M. on November 7th. The squad started slowly, with only a 2–0 lead after 4 minutes, but then they jumped out to a quick ten point lead at 19–9 at the second media timeout. At the beginning of the game, new Head Coach Mike White rotated players quickly; 11 guys had played by the half-way point in the game. The starters of the game were not what I had expected. Coach White started Syracuse transfer big man Frank Anselem at the five, and Madrez McBride at the three. I had anticipated returning big man Braelen Bridges to earn the start at center and Jabri Abdur-Rahim to begin the game at the three, but Coach had other plans. The defensive intensity started out extremely impressive, but the turnovers on the offensive end kept the Bulldogs from truly pulling away. Kario Oquendo is what makes this team run, and without him I do not know where they would be. Both Oquendo and Bridges tested the waters of the NBA Draft this past summer, and I’m sure Mike White and his coaching staff could not be happier about the pair coming back to Athens for another season. I feel that Bridges may have regressed a little bit in his talents, but this was the first game of the year so we cannot make any huge judgements yet. Bridges had trouble handling the ball, catching passes from his guards, and struggled to finish only shooting 2–8. However, Oquendo did not regress in the slightest. “Super Kario” as he is called by students in Athens comes off screens hard, cuts to the basket with a NBA-like swiftness, and shoots the ball off the bounce and the pass extremely well. He also got in the mix in the transition defense game. Oquendo had three blocks, two of which were chasedown in transition defense. This team is going to play its best basketball when they are sprinting up and down the court, playing freely in transition, and finding shooters to kick out to when the lane gets clogged.
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A few of the newcomers to the Bulldog squad impressed me. One was Justin Hill, a tough-nosed point guard who transferred from the number one team in the Big South Conference last year, the Longwood Lancers. Hill only took 6 shots and hit on 50% of those shots, but his pace of play and hard-nosed style of defense will help his team in the long run. Four star power forward Kyeron Lindsay out of Denton-Guyer HS in Texas looked promising as well. The highly recruited freshman four-man played 21 minutes off the bench and only took two shots, but his defensive energy and positioning was impressive. He moved swiftly on the defensive end and was always in the right place at the right time. He will most definitely continue to improve throughout the year and he will help out the team for years to come. I believe Matthew Alexander Moncriefe will be the defensive staple of this team. WIth a defensive backcourt of Oquendo and Hill, and then a frontcourt of Moncrieffe, Lindsay, and Bridges, this team could be dangerous defensively when fully locked-in.
There were a few worrying moments last night though. The team still likes to turn the ball over when running in fast break, and they move faster than possible at points. Jumping out to a large lead of 18 at one point, the team got comfortable. The Bulldogs had 21 turnovers as a team, but five from each of their big men Frank Anselem and Braelen Bridges. Oquendo had four turnovers of his own, but he has the ball in his hands much more than the two centers. The turnovers are concerning, but I expect the frontcourt play to improve over the rest of the non conference schedule as the big men learn how to play with the new guards around them. I believe the team is going to gel very well together over the next couple of games, but I also do not expect many big wins against these non-conference opponents.
This Friday, the Dawgs head to Winston-Salem, North Carolina to take on the Wake Forest Demon Deacons for their first true challenge of the year. The Demon Deacons lost their two best players Jake LaRavia and Alondes Williams to the NBA, but are still projected to finish ninth out of fifteenth in a deep ACC in 2022–23. The line has not been announced yet, but I’m thinking Wake Forest will open as 6 point favorites over UGA on Friday Night in Winston-Salem.
