How are we feeling about tonight's game? Senior night festivities being after the game is an interesting decision. Teams (especially senior led teams) often struggle at the start of senior night games, whether due to the festivities or the emotions of playing their last home game. Although baring a run in DC there will likely be one more home game for this group. Hopefully it is a joyous senior night, we win, lock up the double bye and shut people up about the damn GW game. If we dont and SLU wins, Bona twitter is going to be insufferable
Anyhow, I'm heading into this game assuming that Shoon doesnt play or gets a curtain call and thats it. I think Richmond is a tough matchup for a big guy coming back from an ankle injury given how much Golden moves around the perimeter.
Back in 2020 I had a long post comparing Richmond's offense to Davidson's offense, and lucky for me most the Richmond roster is the same. If you want to see what I wrote then here is the link.
https://www.a10talk.com/forums/threads/bonnies-vs-richmond-sat-02-22-6-30-pm.268/
This year's version of Richmond has one notable difference and that is Tyler Burton. He is completely capable of making 1v1 plays when the normal Richmond offense gets bogged down. And if you dont box him out he will turn offensive boards into easy points everytime.
One of the things we struggled with in the first half vs VCU was letting them get every rebound. We cant let that happen vs Richmond if we want to win. Without Shoon this means we need everyone to crash the glass. This means Lofton and Holmes need to be tracking back instead of leaking out looking for fast break points. This team can play that style and played it much of last year. It also means when Adams is in he cant be looking to run off missed shots.
Adams? Yeah I said Adams, I think we play more small ball tonight and the reason we didnt go to it more vs VCU was the stomach bug issue. Playing small vs Richmond and switching everything can bog down their offense. I would love to see (it wont happen but humor me) Schmidt play the matchup game and play AKC when Golden goes to the bench. I think he could dominate Grace in the post, while not getting burned too much on the other end. Golden is involved so much on the ball, either screening, dribble handoffs or just passing out of the high post. I think that will be a difficult thing for AKC to defend.