The George Mason men's basketball team hit the road again Tuesday after arriving home from the Gildan Charleston Classic at 3 a.m. Monday.
If you're counting, Wednesday's game at Manhattan will be the fourth in seven days and the fifth consecutive road contest for a team with only nine scholarship players, due to Patrick Holloway's suspension and Julian Royal's concussion.
“It's brutal,” said coach Dave Paulsen. “The schedule would be brutal if you had either a veteran team or a really deep team. We don't have either.”
But the Patriots (2-3), who return to EagleBank Arena Saturday against Wright State at 4 p.m., may have grown after going 2-1 in Charleston, S.C., defeating Ole Miss 68-62 and Oklahoma State 71-68 (OT) before losing to No. 6 Virginia 83-66 in Sunday's title game.
“You'd like to think so,” Paulsen said about improvement after Tuesday morning's practice, just before the team boarded a bus to New York. “The evidence here in practice today would not necessarily corroborate that.”
The Patriots, after a day off Monday to get back to class, looked a bit tired and Paulsen was displeased with overall focus. “This practice was to be expected,” he said after the grind of the previous days, “but it's not to be accepted.”
The Patriots showed several bright spots in Charleston including:
--Shevon Thompson's inside play. The 6-11 senior averaged 13.7 points and 16.7 rebounds in the three games, drawing compliments from TV analysts and ex-coaches Craig Robinson and Dino Gaudio. Paulsen had praise but also constructive criticism, pointing out that Thompson has one assist and 18 turnovers for the season.
"Shevon played very well in Charleston and I hope that will be a springboard for continued success," Paulsen noted that Thompson needs to continue to work on combatting double teams. "We've been working on this every day and will continue to do so since we expect he'll see a lot more of them."
—The emergence of freshman guard Jaire Grayer. After shooting 7-for-20, including 0-for-9 on threes, in the first two games, Grayer shot 22-for-34 (64.7%) overall and 10-for-15 (66.7%) beyond the arc in Charleston, earning A-10 rookie of the week honors.
"Jaire shot the ball extremely well all week," said Paulsen. "We know that his shooting percentages will go up and down during the course of the season but we want to make sure he continues to be an excellent defender and rebounder every single night."
Paulsen is hoping the lineup gets deeper soon. Royal still has concussion symptoms and Holloway has one more game to serve in his six-game suspension for academic reasons.
“We could use those two,” Paulsen said. “They're veterans who can shoot.”
The Patriots have not gotten much offensively from the bench, shooting 12-for-57 (21%) for the season. Forward Jalen Jenkins, a valuable contributor in his first two seasons, is shooting 23.8% with one assist and 10 turnovers.
Maybe the game against Manhattan will jumpstart his shooting. Last year his 73-footer at the buzzer gave the Patriots a 64-63 victory.
“We need more out of him,” Paulsen said. “He had played well in preseason practices and scrimmages. Now I think he's pressing a little bit.”
