A highly intriguing AAC showdown will take place in Dallas on Saturday, and it involves two teams who are both very different in approach.
Memphis is an up tempo club that likes to force turnovers and push the basketball. The Mustangs of SMU are a slower group with very limited point guard depth. They have proven turnover prone at times, particularly in their half court sets where the passing weaknesses of their off guards typically comes to light.
SMU had a major wake-up call following their loss at USF. While Larry Brown’s club has done an excellent job for the most part this season, a loss to one of the worst teams in the conference is disheartening. They should be fired up coming off that game as they come into this one.
Memphis has incredible guard depth. They feature four guys who can all handle the ball, shoot it reasonably well and penetrate. Three of those players, Joe Jackson, Geron Johnson and Michael Dixon, are smaller guys who have the lateral quickness to stay in front of SMU point man Nic Moore.
Moore has been excellent this season at providing a steady hand to lead Brown’s offensive attack. He not only gets the ball up the floor with little trouble, but he also tends to become a shooting guard at times and is superb at running off and around screens to create scoring options for himself and others.
The other interesting area to note in this match-up is the interior front lines for both clubs. SMU has two really special players in Markus Kennedy and Yanick Moreira. Moreira is a very talented 6’11 center who has missed the last seven games thanks to an MCL sprain.
He will not be back for this match-up with the Tigers, and that is bad news. Memphis counters with Shaq Goodwin and Austin Nichols. Both players are strong on the offensive boards and know how to play quality defense without getting into foul trouble.
Memphis has proven to be a weak club on the defensive glass, but the loss of Moreira restricts SMU’s ability to take advantage there. Cannen Cunningham has played well at times, but he has only played more than 20 minutes a handful of times all year and Brown has been hesitant to increase his PT even in the wake of Moreira’s injury.
Were SMU to be healthy for this game, I’d expect the Mustangs to be about 4.5 point favorites. This opened with the SMU favored by two and has steadily risen to three. The betting market appears relatively split between these clubs. I do not have an opinion on this game, but do think it’ll be interesting to see how they both match-up given their respective strengths.
