Welcome back! And if you’re not returning from Part 1 of our Arizona NCAA Tournament Preview, head over there for a breakdown on why they are one of the favorites in March and what factors inside a game could be their kryptonite.
After doing so, here are a handful of teams to keep an eye on heading into Selection Sunday.
To be clear, this is not to say that any of these teams will beat Arizona, and it goes without saying that fellow title hopefuls like Duke and Michigan would be quite the difficult matchup, too, as those two schools have been alongside the Wildcats at the top all year. We will go over that later if we get there.
It’s that when we look at what we previously labeled as weaknesses that could pose issues, the qualifications are best met by these schools, which could be in Arizona’s bracket. And on Selection Sunday, when Arizona all but likely lands in the West bracket as a No. 1 seed, it should prefer to see none of them in San Diego or San Jose to give it the best chance at a meaningful Final Four return.
Who could be a matchup problem for Arizona?
Florida
Quick disclaimer: Florida has been surging toward a No. 1 seed, and could end up stealing the fourth one from UConn. Every No. 1 seed is hoping that is not the case, as Florida is widely seen as the hottest team in the country. So, think of this more in that lens and how they’d be a brutal Elite Eight matchup if it got to that point, as the toughest draw outside of the undisputed top-3 that Arizona has been a part of with Duke and Michigan almost all season long.
This may be a surprise considering Arizona has been there done that already but the Gators are not the same team the Wildcats saw at the start of November. They’ve got the bodies down low to compete.
Thomas Haugh has a shot to get picked in the lottery, where his ultra-reliable assortment of well-rounded skills has made him arguably the best player in the SEC. Alex Condon has become more productive as a scorer, and the only argument to Awaka not being the best rebounder in the country is Rueben Chinyelu.
Florida is No. 1 in offensive rebounding differential, grabbing an average of 14.3 more than its opponent each game. It would be a bloodbath on the interior like it was in November, when Florida was +5 on the offensive glass.
Florida’s tourney hangs in the balance largely based on its backcourt of Boogie Fland and Xavian Lee, two extremely talented kids that have been inconsistent all year.
Both stunk against Arizona but Fland’s had terrific outings in big games like his eight-assist, eight-steal (!) performance against Alabama and a 23-3-5-4 line on 9-of-13 shooting versus Tennessee. In SEC play, Lee’s scored 10 points or less in nine games but popped for 20 in a big Vanderbilt game and 22 for a rivalry win over Kentucky.
An edge Florida would be incredibly fortunate to benefit from would be at the 3-point line. It is outside the top-300 in 3-point percentage (31.3%), where its four players that reliably take 3s are composed of two terrible shooters (Fland and Lee), a below average one (Haugh) and the lone sniper (Urban Klazvar). And while the Gators are like Arizona when it comes to a prolific record of getting to the foul line (25 FTA/G, 25th), they are not good at keeping opponents off the line, ranking 211th there (20.8 FTA/G allowed).
The question is if Peat could replicate his success that carried Arizona to that opening victory or if that was just a flash in the pan. If not, Arizona would have to rely on its edge at guard, where Bradley thrived in the first matchup for 27 points, or get a massive performance from Krivas and Awaka.
Texas Tech
Yes, even without injured All-American J.T. Toppin, who led the Red Raiders to a win in Tucson in February, there is reason to believe they can still compete at the highest level. Case and point, them giving Iowa State their one-and-only home loss this year at the end of February via 14 3-pointers.
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Then again, the rematch on Thursday resulted in only 53 points for Texas Tech in a 22-point loss, so maybe its ceiling is capped.
Regardless, Texas Tech is the best team from deep in the country when you tally everything up, so that’s always going to be a problem for Arizona.
Firstly, the Red Raiders have a head of the snake in Christian Anderson averaging nearly eight assists per game who puts pressure on the paint to drag in help defenders and open up kick-outs. Anderson is also a massive pull-up threat, armed with a capable trigger man in Jaylen Petty and a sharpshooter in Donovan Atwell.
Atwell has had 11 games with 5-plus 3s, the most of any Power 4 conference player, per Stathead. The Red Raiders are top-25 in both 3PA/G (29.3, 21st) and 3P% (39.6%, seventh), adding up to them making an average of five triples more than their opponent per game, a top-2 mark.
Without Toppin, that is the major selling point. LeJuan Watts is a playmaking 4 that certainly has the talent to step up in a big environment, like he did in Texas Tech’s win over Duke when he was 10-of-17 for 20 points.
He’s also had some major duds, though, including combined 1-for-17 shooting in two matchups with Houston, and a measly nine points and four rebounds in Texas Tech’s OT win in Tucson. The big depth behind Toppin has been shaky all year.
It should be noted that Anderson injured his groin in the Big 12 Tournament. He said afterward he feels good but this is obviously a completely different team if he’s not 100%, let alone sidelined. Anderson is right there with Brayden Burries and Keaton Wagler as the biggest risers in the NBA Draft this year.
Ultimately, this would come down to head coach Grant McCasland bringing his program’s signature thump to cancel out the physicality even with the talent disparity in the frontcourt, and relying on a 3-point barrage from there. That’s how he did it to upset Arizona before. Could he do it again without Toppin?
Illinois
Before Michigan absolutely dominated Illinois in late February through a similar style that Arizona deploys, the Illini appeared to be the toughest draw for the Wildcats out of anyone. Still, this is about as bad of a matchup for them as they can get when it comes to neutralizing strengths and exploiting weaknesses.
The Illini play with brute force through a few unintimidated Europeans and a freshman sensation in Keaton Wagler, who has come out of nowhere to be a potential top-5 pick, and he puts their elite offensive spacing into motion. KenPom grades them as the best offense in the country, with good reason.
Illinois has a great frontcourt, a rugged trio of Tomislav Ivisic, David Mirkovic and Zvonimir Ivisic. They all shoot 3s, which keeps the Illini in true five-out spacing for potentially all 40 minutes if it so chooses, and the first two are also excellent passers.
The team’s ball movement is outstanding and generates good looks from 3 better than almost anyone, where capable-to-great shooters like Wagler (41 3P%), Jake Davis (41 3P%), Mirkovic (37.6 3P%) and Ben Humrichous (35.5 3P%) are waiting.
The Ivisic twins both shoot it below 32% but have had great shooting nights in big-time games and Arizona’s bigs aren’t used to marking guys that are spacers.
Crucially, Illinois fouls less than just about anyone in the country (12.5 FTA/G allowed, first in D1), while putting up great rebounding numbers too (40.8, 1oth).
Where Arizona would have a decisive edge is overall athleticism and length, particularly on the perimeter. Former Wildcat Kylan Boswell is easily Illinois’ best perimeter defender and driver, while inconsistencies from hyped-up transfer add Andrej Stojakovic in those two departments led to him losing his starting spot as a good scorer but not shooter like his pops Peja.
Everyone fights like hell on this squad but Arizona would have its way in the margins that come down to physicality, as Michigan did on the glass and in the paint.
A lot of it comes down to Wagler, who has a chance to be the star of the entire tournament thanks to his composed three-level scoring, highly developed playmaking and 30-foot range on his jumper.
Wagler broke all sorts of records putting up 46 points at Purdue and has shown remarkable poise while getting better seemingly every game, creating a rocket ship’s worth of momentum toward the grandest stage of ’em all. When he’s truly on, Illinois can beat anyone. When he’s not, which has been rare, Illinois goes from Final Four darkhorse to upset candidate.
Alabama
With no disrespect to Alabama, we will be more brief here, because it tried the whole 3-point volume thing and got absolutely walloped by Arizona earlier this year. But the Crimson Tide, who did get one of the Wildcats’ best 3-point outings of the year (10-for-26, 38%), would love to run that math back one more time.
Alabama makes 12.8 3s per game, thanks to attempting a D1-best 35,5 per game. It has eight players that take at least two a night, and five that attempt at least four a game.
Those five — Latrell Wrightsell (36.5 3P%), Labaron Philon Jr. (38.9 3P%), Aden Holloway (43.4 3P%), Houston Mallette (35.1 3P%) and Amari Allen (37.7 3P%) — are all efficient to boot. That’s a lot of shooting.
A top-20 average on free-throws made per game is a nice push over the top offensively for a unit KenPom ranks third. But it also ranks a defense that is borderline unworthy of seeing the tournament 66th.
The lack of a reliable defense alongside a lack of margin-winning elsewhere as a bad rebounding team and bad turnover-generating team, makes it hard to believe Arizona would do anything less than what it did in December.
Tennessee
Honestly, Arizona should cruise past any team seeded lower than fourth. It has too many strengths to counter, the type of ammunition you just won’t find for a team outside the top-15 or so. With that said, in an effort to find one, the best case is Tennessee. And it’s not got a sturdy foundation, thanks to a spotty resume.
The Volunteers lost to Kentucky twice, Alabama and Arkansas once, got killed by Florida and also got dropped by Illinois and Kansas, while splitting against Vanderbilt. Wins over Houston and Louisville provide some sense of legitimacy, but they haven’t exactly proved they deserve consideration as a darkhorse to make the Final Four by beating the type of teams that will be in their path.
Like its SEC counterpart Florida, though, Tennessee can rebound the basketball. It is the only team even close to the Gators’ top rebounding margin, and adds a top-10 assist margin too that spotlights a solid base on both ends.
6-foot-10 freshman forward Nate Ament was a potential top-5 pick before the season, and after starting off slow, he’s quietly emerged in conference play as a two-way game-changer.
Ament is one of six Volunteers that grabs at least one offensive rebound a game through a team-wide philosophy to crash, and the balance comes via senior guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie, the team’s leader in points and assists per game (18 PPG, 5.6 APG).
The red flag beyond the team’s overall inconsistency is 3-point shooting, where Gillespie and Ament are the lone Volunteers attempting more than two triples a game, and do so as a duo of average shooters the team heavily relies on offensively.
But Gillespie got a taste of the tournament in three games last year for Maryland, while Ament profiles similarly to Wagler as a true breakout candidate to become one of the stories of March, and head coach Rick Barnes has started to silent some of his previous demons in the tourney, coming off back-to-back Elite 8 finishes.
Mid-major 3-point barrage wild-card entries
If you’re solely focused on 3s, which is fair, there are some mid-majors that rely on winning the 3-point line to, well, win. That would serve as quite the interesting early-tourney matchup for the Wildcats.
Here are the ones to watch out for, while noting the first two should secure at-large bids and the last shout will need to win its conference tournament.
Saint Louis: The Billikens were a one-loss force for most of the season before dropping three of their last six games in A-10 play. They’ve got the highest average margin in 3-point percentage, a jaw-dropping 11.3%, thanks largely to their five leading players in volume all shooting 40% or better.
They’ve made at least a dozen 3s 14 different times, and 12 is Arizona’s season high. Center Robbie Avila is the type of playmaking hub to ignite the movement to generate 3s.
KenPom doesn’t buy the hype, placing Saint Louis’ offense and defense both outside the top-40, and a guard-heavy rotation would really struggle with Arizona’s size.
Miami (OH): You should know about these guys by now. Prior to getting upset in their conference tournament on Thursday, the RedHawks became the third team in D1 history to go 30-0 or better in the regular season.
Bracket experts still think they’ll get in without the automatic bid, for what it’s worth. They lead the country in field goal percentage, 52.6%, and do that on decent 3-point volume.
While this group obviously knows how to win and won’t get intimidated by Arizona, it’s a turnover-prone squad that gets beat on the offensive glass regularly. Miami (OH) has five players who post over 25 minutes per game, and the heaviest of the bunch is at 215 pounds.
KenPom is also not impressed at all, placing the offense 70th and the defense 139th. It would need to execute at an absurd level to have a chance.
Cornell: The Big Red is the No. 4 seed in the Ivy League Tournament, so they’ll need an upset on Saturday against top-seeded Yale and another in the finals to make the dance. If they do, this is the best shooting resume of any mid-major.
The only team averaging more 3s made than Alabama is Cornell, with 13 a night. Arizona’s season high of made 3s, 12, is a number Cornell has cracked in 17 of its 27 contests, including 19-plus an absurd five different times.
The Big Red’s top trio of Cooper Noard (39.1 3P%), Adam Tsand Hinton (42.5 3P%) and Jake Fiegen (40.8 3P%) combined to take 454, which is nearly as many as Arizona’s entire team (510).
Cornell is tiny and would get annihilated in the paint with a truly terrible defense KenPom ranks 335th. Arizona likely walks ’em. But it would be a fun watch.
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