The first half of the game last night was not pretty for either side. George Mason erupted in the second half with big efforts from Jamal Hartwell and freshman Ronny Polite (career high 17 points). Jordan Miller paced Mason with 19 points and he was really the only player who seemed to be scoring in the first half. They were missing a ton of open looks but made up for it in the second. Something we’ve definitely seen before this season, a slow start and big surge of offense later in the game. It’s fun to watch this team get going and then really turn it on to finish off an opponent. Glad to see we are seeing more of that these days as they will they need that killer extinct to survive this tournament.
Really enjoyed seeing Polite step it up in the second half for this team. They needed a spark to get going and he definitely helped provide. Driving the land and hitting open jumpers he showed us what he can be capable of. Hopefully he will have another big role against Davidson.
Paulsen seemed to make an effort to work the ball inside more in the second half, which was a pretty obvious move. Thy weren’t having early success shooting from the outside and GW would often foul them in the lane. I sometimes hate that they deviate from this game plan getting they have so many different guys that drive the lane well and attack the basket. It will be interesting to see if they stick with that versus Davidson or start off launching threes early again.
Josh Oduro disappeared for awhile in this one which I didn’t like. He shouldn’t have been kept on the bench that long but we’ve seen Paulsen do this all season with the kid. He will need to have a bigger role tonight or they risk being too one dimensional.
I had said yesterday that Javon Greene would be an important part of this team advancing in the tournament. He started off ice cold yesterday and only finished 1-of-8 from the field on the game. That cannot afford another slow start from him or as a group tonight against Davidson. These were open looks they were missing, just like this one:
They will need to take advantage of early opportunities tonight and I think we’ll see a different look from them they we did against GW. Davidson is probably the best shooting team in the A-10 so the defensive end for Mason will be a lot tougher in this one. Don’t surprised if Davidson goes with zone defense to prevent Mason from getting easy buckets inside. If they are forced to settle for jumpers early I don’t know if I like their chances.
