What Akron's coach said about NCAA Tournament matchup vs. Arizona
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Akron is not your average No. 13 seed.
The Zips have won 28 games and have a roster full of players who can fill it up from behind the 3-point line. According to KenPom, Akron ranks No. 16 in the country in adjusted tempo, and they average 84.6 points per game, which is No. 8 in Division I college basketball.
The Arizona Wildcats might be favored by 14.5 points heading into Friday's NCAA Tournament matchup in Seattle, but most experts are predicting a close game. And Akron coach John Groce is understandably confident in his team.
Here's what Groce had to say about the matchup with Arizona during Thursday's media availability in Seattle:
Groce studied Arizona's offense
"No question (the Arizona Wildcats) play fast. I shared this when I did an interview, I actually in studying some programs within the last few years, looked at theirs because their tempo and their pace stands out, right. They play extremely fast, whether it's make, whether it's misses, whether it's an opportunity to run and points off turnovers, their pace. It's been fun watching them previously even before the draw as well as a handful of other programs that tended to play that way."
"So there's no question they play fast and a big part of what they do, at least from watching them, is they score and strike you quick in transition."
Groce on playing a five-guard lineup
"We've not changed our defense a whole lot. To be honest with you systematically. We've tweaked a few things here and there based on this year's personnel. But we've had a team defensively that's historically over our time at Akron been one or two in the league a lot. And if not, then maybe third. So we've always defended fairly well during that time period, aside from year one, and the guys really believe in that."
Groce on Akron playing with no fear
"I will tell you it's one of the loosest groups I've coached in my career as a head coach. Loose, aggressive, confident, whatever, however you want to phrase that. There's times where our staff will tell you, we'll have to get them to dial it in a little bit and focus."
"But this group never lacks having fun, they never lack being aggressive and being confident, being loose. And I would rather have that, quite frankly, and then worry about trying to dial 'em in, which we've been able to do, because they care, obviously they care about each other, they care about winning, they don't want to leather teammates down."
Groce on Arizona's height advantage
"The game is interesting because it's really evolved from the time I started 30ish years ago as an assistant coach in terms of how it's played, and spacing and we could get into that, talk Xs and Os, if anyone knows me for a while. I won't do that to you."
"But I think you see teams playing more five out, more four out, and obviously trickling down from the NBA you see front court players that play on the perimeter quite a bit and have perimeter skill level. So I think it's changed. It's changed some, for sure."
"Sometimes when you get in those situations obviously if you're playing big, and we do this some too and have over the years, you're going to get X, but you might not be as good at Y. So if you play a little smaller, you might be better at X but maybe not quite as good at Y. So you know, like anything else you rob Peter to pay Paul, there's advantages and disadvantages to what you do with that. But it is what it is, it's not something we can control, we certainly recognize their size and they do a great job with their size, they do a great job rebounding it, they do a great job posting it."
Groce on Arizona big man Henri Veesaar
"In terms of Veesaar, obviously it appears just from watching earlier clips in the season until now that his stock is on the rise or he's improved greatly. You can just see it from watching some of the earlier clips and then the later clips in the season in preparation. Obviously he's a big part of what they do with his size, not only defending but also rebounding, and then offensively he can play inside and out and has a good skill level as we were talking about the game changing to feature more five out, four out. He certainly has some modern style front court tendencies of today's game and is a very, very good player."
Groce on defending Arizona guard Caleb Love
"Well, I don't know that you do, because he has an uncanny ability to be able to get shots up on the rim. So you do the best you can to try to defend them and make it as tough on 'em as you can. Obviously we're from northeast Ohio and you hear LeBron say all the time, it's a make or miss league, referencing the NBA."
"I think with a guy like him, like you watch him and I think what some people don't understand is the ability to be able to get a shot on the rim is a skill, not everybody can do that where you just hand a guy the ball and can get one up on the rim, and he has ability to do that, which obviously makes him extremely dangerous."
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-029877d49238355bd3388a94f90e3c72.jpg "Ben Sherman")
Ben Sherman has been covering the sports world for most of his 27-year journalism career, including 17 years with The Oregonian/OregonLive. A basketball junkie, March Madness is his favorite time of the year.