George Mason fell to George Washington 83-74 yesterday and has now lost for the eighth straight time to the Colonials since joining the Atlantic 10. The Patriots are now losers of three straight and appear to limping into the conference tournament. Two weeks ago they were in the conversation of competing for a top four spot in the standings and now they are currently looking at an 8 seed if the tournament started today. Otis Livingston II had his least productive game of the season and was benched towards the end of this game, finishing with just two points and four turnovers. Turnovers were again an early issue for Mason and helped to derail an offense that was shooting over 55% on the day. Defensively Mason had the same problems they did against GW earlier in the season. They struggled to cover Yuta Watanabe and Tyler Cavanaugh as the Colonials did a great job exploiting mismatches. Frustrating to watch considering Mason has been the smaller team against essentially every team they’ve played this season but again failed to make adjustments to counter at all what GW was doing. If that had happened all season long Mason would be in the bottom of the A-10.
On the positive side we saw good games from freshmen Ian Boyd and Karmari Newman off the bench. Boyd had one of his best games of the year scoring a career-high 15 points and Newman continues to be a consistent three-point shooting threat. Both are important guys who will be seeing a lot of action next season so this progress is encouraging to see. Someone had to fill the void with Livingston struggling and it was great to see Boyd come in and do that. In the front court the reserves didn’t have as much success and gave little support offensively when Jalen Jenkins was on the bench. Mason’s defensive effort wasn’t enough to overcome this as it has during earlier parts of the season. They also gave GW a ton of space on the perimeter and a lot of open looks making it far too easy for their top shooters. The aggression and energy level we’ve seen on defense for most of the season just wasn’t there.
Here’s some feedback from Dave Paulsen after the game:
Mason's Dave Paulsen made two points postgame that are worth exploring a little bit.
— Patrick Stevens (@D1scourse) February 26, 2017
1. He argued (correctly, I think) that today was much more about GW playing well than anything Mason did (beyond maybe some silly turnovers)
— Patrick Stevens (@D1scourse) February 26, 2017
The Colonials played a strong offensive game. Took advantage of mismatches and made Mason pay for (understandably) minding Cavanaugh.
— Patrick Stevens (@D1scourse) February 26, 2017
Mason's gotten a lot of mileage out of a roster that has size limitations — especially in terms of developed guys beyond Jenkins. …
— Patrick Stevens (@D1scourse) February 26, 2017
… GW happens to be a team capable of punishing Mason and is smart enough to take advantage.
— Patrick Stevens (@D1scourse) February 26, 2017
[Photos by Bill Bride]
