NCAA March Madness: How The Baylor Bears Attack Omar Samhan and St. Mary's

Enter Sandman.

The Gaels’ hopes will rest on the shoulders of their big man.

Omar Samhan is a walking contradiction.

He’s half-Irish, half-Egyptian.

He is fat, but has really great feet.

He is foul prone, but plays big minutes.

He’s precisely the kind of player who would have killed us—last year.

Kevin Rogers was many things, but a solid one—on—one low-post defender was not one of them. Fortunately, Mr. Udoh will be in Houston.

St. Mary’s is more than just Omar Samhan. They shoot the ball quite well: 41 percent from three (sixth in the country), 52.5 percent from two (22nd in the country), and 76.3 percent from the line (sixth in the country).

Defensively, their whole goal seems to be to force you into taking two-point shots; they prevented three-point attempts better than almost any team in the country.

They run a bunch of little guards at yours and play a very tight man defense. They wouldn’t do such a good job of preventing three-point attempts if they didn’t get out in passing lanes and force dribble penetration.

Oddly enough, if I had to compare St. Mary’s defensively to a “high major” team, I would suggest they look most like South Region No. One seed Duke.

What we need to do to win tonight is relatively clear and very simple.

First of all, we need Ekpe Udoh to show up and play a man’s game. If I were Ekpe, I would be really annoyed by all the press that Samhan has gotten over the last week.

Now, I don’t think Ekpe is necessarily the kind of guy who wants the spotlight, and I don’t even know if he is the kind of guy who feels slighted. You have to figure, though, that there’s a little part of him that’s pissed off about every sportswriter in America writing an Omar Samhan feature.

Samhan wasn’t fourth in the country in blocked shots. Furthermore, Lomers has five fouls in every game at his disposal, and he better use them tonight. I will have no problem with Lomers if he fouls out, provided that he hacks the crap out of Samhan at every possible opportunity.

Frankly, I wouldn’t mind seeing a bit of Cory Jefferson tonight either. Yeah, he’s rail thin, but he has played good minutes against teams with big men this year, and it would be nice to mix it up defensively against Samhan (and we may need Jefferson’s five fouls).

Let’s be realistic—Samhan’s probably going to get his 20 and ten, one way or another. If we can make it a very difficult 20 and ten, we’ll be in really good shape. If he has 20 points on 13 shots after the first half, we’re in trouble.

We also need to limit McConnell and Dellavedova’s open looks from three. They shoot 51.7 and 40.7 percent, respectively. I hope Drew isn’t stubborn enough to stay with the 2-3 if they come out looking like they’re going to have a good shooting night. Surely, he realizes that the big advantage we have over St. Mary’s in the backcourt is athleticism.

You’re probably saying to yourself right now, didn’t Villanova have the edge in athleticism?

(According to NBA guys, no. Scottie Reynolds is slow with really bad feet, and Fisher is too big to guard quick little guys.)

Last, but not least, Lace Darius Dunn needs to touch the ball almost every time down the floor. I think he has finally reigned in his heat-check tendencies to an acceptable level. I realize that he does dumb things occasionally, but our offense gets way too stagnant when we don’t work it through Lace every possession.

There is nothing more frustrating or painful than seeing the shot clock tick past 15 without so much as a screen being set and realizing that we are going to throw up some junky contested three at the buzzer.

And please, no more Fred Ellis unless it’s absolutely necessary. Please.

Richmond and Nova are good clubs, but they let St. Mary’s get plenty of open looks, and St. Mary’s made them pay for it (49 percent on two-pointers, 42 percent on three-pointers, 71 percent on FTs vs. Richmond, 50/37/77 vs. Nova).

If we harass their shooters, our athleticism will win us this game. If they get open shots, they’ll probably hit them.

Staying in the 2-3 almost cost us against Sam Houston. Here’s to hoping that Uncle Scotty isn’t so stubborn tonight if the time for a change comes.

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