UC Riverside Game Preview & How to Watch

The Essentials

Date: Tuesday, 12/1/20

Tip-Off Time: 1:00pm PT

TV: NONE

Radio: KJR 950 AM/96.5 FM

Streaming: Flohoops.com ($$$)

If you attempted to watch Sunday’s game against Baylor then you know the drill. It’s $29.99 + tax to sign up for a one-month package which you can cancel at any time. There is no free trial option. If you signed up for it on Sunday then you can use the same account to watch again. If not, this is likely to be a single use pay per view. There’s a single camera operator that sometimes misses things if it’s a quick back and forth and a single announcer who almost openly roots for the best team (which may be favorable to Husky fans this time).

Location: Las Vegas, Nevada

Betting line: Washington -10

UC Riverside 2019-20 (last season) Statistics:

Record: 17-15 (7-9)

Points For per Game: 62.8 ppg (332nd)

Points Against per Game: 62.2 ppg (14th)

Adjusted Offensive Efficiency: 95.8 (294th)

Adjusted Defensive Efficiency: 99.8 (118th)

Strength of Schedule: 258th

2020-21 Game Results: 0-1 with a 60-66 road loss to Pacific

UC Riverside Key Players (stats from most recently played season):

C- Jock Perry, Sr. 7’1, 250: 3.3 ppg, 2.5 rpg, 58.8% FG, 81.8% FT

Perry is a grad transfer from Saint Mary’s and immediately stepped in to lead the team in minutes in their first game. He has legitimate size that could easily give the Huskies problems down low but he only played double digit minutes for Saint Mary’s 9 times in 3 seasons so his production hasn’t matched his size and his pedigree. Plus he sounds like the season 8 villain in a teen drama on the CW that’s given up trying to be original.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 10 pts, 7 reb, 4/10 FG

G- Flynn Cameron, Jr. 6’3, 210: 2.3 ppg, 1.2 rpg, 0.4 apg, 43.5% FG, 30.0% 3pt, 33.3% FT

You thought we were done with the transfers from Oceania? Wrong. Flynn Cameron originally hails from New Zealand but is headed directly from DePaul where he had only one career game scoring double digit points. However, he tied for the team lead in rebounds in their first game at just 6’3 so he could cause some damage from that regard against the UW zone.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 8 pts, 7 reb, 1 stl, 3/8 FG

G- Will Tattersall, Fr. 6’6, 198

The lone true freshman in the main rotation, Tattersall was unrated by any of the major recruiting services however he led the team in points in his first career game. He’s got good size for a wing and in an incredibly small sample size has shown the ability to knock down the 3-pointer and has confidence to let it loose.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 17 pts, 5/10 FG, 3/7 3pt

F- Arinze Chidom, Sr. 6’9, 185: 11.8 ppg, 6.6 rpg, 1.4 apg, 49.4% FG, 43.5% 3pt, 71.7% FT

If this name is familiar it’s because he started his college career at Washington State. Chidom had a pretty good true freshman season but fell under favor during year 2 under Ernie Kent and transferred to UC Riverside. He was the team’s leading scorer last year and he only took 1-2 3-pointers per game but absolutely is a shooting threat at 6’9.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 11 pts, 0 reb, 5/8 FG

G- Dominick Pickett, Sr. 6’3, 210: 7.7 ppg, 2.6 rpg, 1.5 apg, 44.3% FG, 43.5% 3pt, 88.4% FT

Somehow Pickett led UC Riverside in minutes last season at just 26.5 mpg as they rotated guys out frequently. He was by far their best shooter but doesn’t appear to like to pull the trigger as he has a microscopic usage rate. If he decides to let loose then he could cause serious problems against the zone but more likely he’ll continue to be hesitant to actually shoot the ball.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 3 pts, 2 reb, 1 ast, 1/4 FG

G- Zyon Pullin, Jr. 6’4, 195: 4.1 ppg, 2.1 rpg, 1.8 apg, 35.5% FG, 28.6% 3pt, 65.9 % FT

Pullin finished 8th on the team in minutes last season but was just second in assists so he’s one of the more willing passers on the team. He’s not a great shooter/scorer and had issues with turnovers last year but led UC Riverside in assists alongside 0 turnovers in their first game so maybe he’s cleaned those issues up.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 6 pts, 4 reb, 3 ast, 2/5 FG

F- Angus McWilliam, Jr. 6’10, 240: 6.3 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 0.4 bpg, 49.3% FG, 24.2% 3pt, 71.7% FT

We finally arrive at the last of the 4 major program transfers as McWilliam started things out at TCU (and he’s also from Australia!). He only played a combined 6 minutes there however before transferring to UC Riverside and playing last year. McBilly was the best offensive rebounder on last year’s team and could absolutely cause issues there. However, he had 5 assists against 37 turnovers last year so not exactly a threat to pass the ball to an open guy after he gets the rebound.

Debut stat line from Wednesday: 0 pts, 1 reb, 1 ast

The Outlook

It’s not a surprise that Coach Hopkins wanted to get another game in before heading to the conference opener against Utah in a few days. Sunday’s game against Baylor had to have left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth and not letting the team dwell on it is a plus.

Let’s start with the fun fact. UC Riverside has 6 players on their roster from Australia and 3 from New Zealand. They are attempting to copy Saint Mary’s success recruiting from that part of the globe including taking C Jock Perry away from the Gaels. However, they don’t exactly play a brand of basketball as exciting as the Aussie wilderness. They were one of the slowest teams in the country last year and because of that were one of the leaders in fewest points per game allowed and nearly last in point per game scored. Expect them to pass the ball around a ton against UW’s zone and take most of their shots with single digits left on the shot clock.

Unlike Baylor’s ferocious perimeter defense you can’t expect UC Riverside to put nearly as much pressure on UW’s ball handlers. They finished their first game with just 2 steals and 0 blocks and is much more about ball denial than pressuring the guy with the ball. Quade Green should have an opportunity to rebound nicely from his extremely poor outing on Sunday.

UC Riverside has a good mix of size and shooting that theoretically should be able to give UW problems particularly on the offensive glass. However, this isn’t a team absolutely loaded with shooters despite there being a couple on the roster. They shot 30% from 3-point range in their first game and if they shoot much better than that on Tuesday it will be an upset.

This absolutely should be a get right game for the Huskies. However, given the pace that UC Riverside plays at I think Washington could win the game by 8 points and still have it feel like they were soundly in control the entire game. Hopefully this game will give us the answer as to whether Washington is anywhere close to as bad as they were on Sunday or whether Baylor is really just that good which led to such a deflating second half effort.

Prediction

Washington Huskies- 70, UC Riverside- 62

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