So the Cajuns take on Louisiana Christian University, formally Louisiana College.
Just a quick snapshot of this team, as most of us don't know much about them.
This is a team that defeated Centenary by double digits 63-51 earlier in the season, so just by that we should assume they should be a little bit of a tougher test than Centenary. The Wildcats are 5-4 on the season with their best win probably being their last game vs University of Southwest NM last game. They have a double headed monster leading the way of Delor "DJ" Johnson and Bailey Hardy, both averaging 12.9 points per game. Johnson is a 6'4 guard who previously played at Southern Jaguars, so he has some D1 experience. At Southern he averaged 2.3 points and 1.6 rebounds as a freshman. Hardy is a 6'2 Senior from Lake Charles.
The big problem I see for the Wildcats is that they have 7 players who have started a game of which the majority have been started by 4 players. DJ Johnson (started all 9) is 6'4, Bailey (started 8 of 9) is 6'2, KJ Bilbo (started 9 of 9) is 6'4, Ferontay Banks (started 8 of 9) is 6'0. These are also 4 of their 5 leading scorers. The other two guys that have started games are Gary Smith (started 6 of 8) is 6'2 and Malik Cooper (started 3 of 5) is 6'3. These guys make up the top 6 scorers on the team and have scored 474 of their total 580 points or 82% of their points come from these 6 players and not one of them is over 6'4. The 7th leading scorer at 3.0 point per game is Drew Tebbe at 5'10, next is Jamael Owusu at 2.3 points per game is 6'4, then Kylan Williams at 6'6 and Caleb Howe at 6'2, then Branthony Brown at 6'5, then Bryson Hardy at 6'3, then Kobi Johnson at 5'8, then Konnor DeJean at 5'9 and finally Brayden Blakeway at 6'4.
So of their 15 players that have played a game they have two that are 6'5 or 6'6. Their leading rebounder on the season is Bailey Hardy at 6'2 averaging 5.9 per game. You would think that because of their lack of size issue they may be a team that likes to shoot the 3 and they somewhat are. They have attempted 203, which is more than the Cajuns 188 on the season, but only make 33% of them, the Cajuns are hitting at a 39.9% clip. But they do have 2 guys who are shooting 3's at a better than 40% clip and that is Bailey Hardy at 44.4% and Gary Smith at 43.3%. After that no one is super dangerous.
I know we should not expect this game to be close, but you would hope that you would get some opportunities for the big men to get some practice. This is not going to be fair for Terrance Lewis and Jordan Brown who are going to just dominate inside.
Good news is that this might be a chance for guys like Vinny Sigonia, Chancellor White and Isaiah Richards and others to get some meaningful minutes once this game is put away early, which I think will happen.
I say get JB and Lewis out of the game early and keep them healthy for conference matchups coming up. There is no need for a dumb injury vs a team that we don't need to be playing.