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How Miami Can Avoid A First Round Exit

Trinton Breeze
3 min read
It’s March.

Jai Lucas's squad will take on the Missouri Tigers in a 7–10 matchup in the Round of 64 in the West Region. Miami will travel over 1,200 miles to St. Louis, while Missouri makes a much shorter, two-hour road trip.

As we wait until tipoff on Friday, here’s a CanesInSight review on how Miami can avoid a first round exit against the No. 10 seeded Missouri Tigers:

Make Free Throws

Can’t say it enough...

It’s March, the games come down to every point, every possession. Miami will have to make their free throws starting Friday.

Miami will have to make 80+ percent of its free throws if the Hurricanes want to make a deep run in the tournament, especially the first game, since Missouri and the Miami Hurricanes rank in the bottom 300 in free throw percentage.

This game could come down to the end, and free throws will be lethal. Miami will have to make sure they make theirs more than Missouri. Could be the deciding factor in this game.

No Slow Start

Miami cannot, and I mean cannot, have a slow start versus the Missouri Tigers when it comes to Friday.

Miami does not want to be down 11-4 at the first media timeout or something in that direction. You do not want to play from behind all game.

Miami will have to gain the lead early, control the tempo from there, and Missouri will have to play catch up all day.

No Turnovers

There’s going to be turnovers, but Miami can limit them. Missouri is 191 in the country turning teams over, averaging 11 turnovers per game.

Miami will have to take care of the ball. Missouri turns it over about more than anyone in the country, so Miami will have to have fewer turnovers than Missouri. As I say in my Twitter bio, “The team that turns it over less usually wins the game.”

It’s just a plain fact, and if Miami can have fewer turnovers than Missouri, it will be a key to a win.

Take GREAT Shot Selection

I don’t know what type of Missouri will come out in, whether it’s man-to-man, which is expected coming out of the gate, but if the Hurricanes can expose that, the Tigers will be forced to go into the 2-3 zone where they extend the wings, which is what they did to Arkansas this season.

Miami will have to get it into the middle, that is where the Hurricanes want to go against a 2-3 zone and it forces the defense to collapse. Miami started out the season pretty slow against zone defense, but progressed throughout the season with it.

Miami's shot selection is usually pretty good, but Miami will have to keep that up when the Hurricanes take on the Tigers.

Play physical

The Hurricanes will just have to play physical and tough in the paint.

Just make it a brawl in the paint. They need to stay disciplined, avoid early fouls, and focus on playing Miami’s game.
 

Comments (12)

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Attack the rim. Don't rely on the three. Live by it, die by it.
 
Defend Mark Mitchell. Don't let Jayden Stone run wild either.

I can live with them relying on T.O. for points
 
Make shots. Don't have a bad start. Take good shots. You split the atom, my man.
 
I haven't watched much Missouri at all but seems like a terrible matchup for us - not even considering essentially playing them on the road.

We're both big teams that play a physical brand. Both team's best scorer is 6'9ish post that does most of the work in the paint.

But the bad matchups are their 2 stretch 4's that shoot 40% and 45% from 3. Don't think Reneau can effectively defend Mitchell so it probably needs to be Henderson and there's a big height difference there and putting more pressure on him to defend in the paint vs on the perimeter. Reneau matches up better on one of the stretch 4's.

Not worried about Udeh and their center. Solid and pretty even matchup there. Best case scenario is Anthony Robinson taking too many shots because he shoots under 30% from 3 but has the 3rd most attempts on the team. The rest of their team is pretty effective from 3.
 
JayCane20 said:
I haven't watched much Missouri at all but seems like a terrible matchup for us - not even considering essentially playing them on the road.

We're both big teams that play a physical brand. Both team's best scorer is 6'9ish post that does most of the work in the paint.

But the bad matchups are their 2 stretch 4's that shoot 40% and 45% from 3. Don't think Reneau can effectively defend Mitchell so it probably needs to be Henderson and there's a big height difference there and putting more pressure on him to defend in the paint vs on the perimeter. Reneau matches up better on one of the stretch 4's.

Not worried about Udeh and their center. Solid and pretty even matchup there. Best case scenario is Anthony Robinson taking too many shots because he shoots under 30% from 3 but has the 3rd most attempts on the team. The rest of their team is pretty effective from 3.
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Defending the 3 will be at a premium. Allen is a good perimeter defender and Washington is elite. I think Henderson can handle a stretch 4. He did a good job when he was defending Caleb Wilson.

But we need to create offense from our defense and get the lobs ot Udeh. We need some easy baskets to make up for how few 3’s we take and our poor FT shooting.
 
AtlAtty said:
Defending the 3 will be at a premium. Allen is a good perimeter defender and Washington is elite. I think Henderson can handle a stretch 4. He did a good job when he was defending Caleb Wilson.

But we need to create offense from our defense and get the lobs ot Udeh. We need some easy baskets to make up for how few 3’s we take and our poor FT shooting.
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I think our guards match up well. They don't have any 6'6 wings or anything that have given our smaller guards trouble.

I think Henderson can do fine with Mitchell or one of their stretch 4's but Reneau is going to have a tough day. He's a liability as it is.

Maybe he will be ok since they're not really physical players and being more of just a shooting 4 and he can handle that. Physicality is usually what gets him
 
JayCane20 said:
I haven't watched much Missouri at all but seems like a terrible matchup for us - not even considering essentially playing them on the road.

We're both big teams that play a physical brand. Both team's best scorer is 6'9ish post that does most of the work in the paint.

But the bad matchups are their 2 stretch 4's that shoot 40% and 45% from 3. Don't think Reneau can effectively defend Mitchell so it probably needs to be Henderson and there's a big height difference there and putting more pressure on him to defend in the paint vs on the perimeter. Reneau matches up better on one of the stretch 4's.

Not worried about Udeh and their center. Solid and pretty even matchup there. Best case scenario is Anthony Robinson taking too many shots because he shoots under 30% from 3 but has the 3rd most attempts on the team. The rest of their team is pretty effective from 3.
Click to expand...
They’re a carbon copy of us. Physical, crash the offensive glass, can’t shoot FT’s and have a tendency to not show up for long stretches in games. They also play a decent amount of zone which means if we aren’t making jump shots, we could be in trouble. I don’t see a discernible advantage either team has. It’s a true who’s better that day game.
 
Tournament play:

#1 3’s an absolute must clearly #1we cannot miss , this is our only defense against referees and momentum it gives Mizz

#2 FT must make 80% plus .

#3 bench points will be key in winning this game due to referees will keep us in foul trouble.

This is a home game for Mizz plus referees will be getting us in foul trouble they will push hard for Mizz winning

These is tournament play it will rain 3’s
 
GOCANES05 said:
Tournament play:

#1 3’s an absolute must clearly #1we cannot miss , this is our only defense against referees and momentum it gives Mizz

#2 FT must make 80% plus .

#3 bench points will be key in winning this game due to referees will keep us in foul trouble.

This is a home game for Mizz plus referees will be getting us in foul trouble they will push hard for Mizz winning

These is tournament play it will rain 3’s
Click to expand...
80% is asking a lot of this team. How about 70 for the game, but make the front end of 1 and 1’s, and hit 80% over the last 5 minutes?
 
Reneau and Udeh have to avoid foul trouble

Miami has to get SOMETHING out of Malovec and Dovrat. Either productive minutes or some legit outside shooting.

Miami has to be in the fight late. This team has shown an ability to win games late, I don't trust Mizzou late in games, they haven't shown the ability to consistently make winning plays down the stretch.
 
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