NCAA Tournament- First Four

#10 Colorado State (24-10, 10-8 Mountain West) vs #10 UVa (22-10, 13-7 ACC)

9:10 p.m., TruTV

The UVa players and coaches, along with their fans, had to sweat out Selection Sunday, sitting squarely on the bubble. But the wait was worth it as the Hoos got their name called as one of the last four teams into the NCAA Tournament field,

A #10 seed in the Midwest Region, Virginia will head to Dayton for a Tuesday night clash with fellow last-four-in Colorado State, with the Cavaliers and the Rams playing for the right to advance to play #7 seed Texas on Thursday night.

Tomorrow’s First Four matchup is UVa’s first appearance in the round and puts the squad in a very intriguing matchup between two scrutinized conferences. The ACC had a down year but with UVa’s inclusion and NC State stealing the automatic bid, the league still got five teams in the field. The Mountain West, meanwhile, has been the darling of the NET and efficiency rankings, and the conference got six teams into the Big Dance. The MWC is the premier non-power conference in college basketball of late, and while it has continued to get a lot of teams into the field, it hasn’t had a lot of success once its teams have gotten there. San Diego State went on a run to the national title game last year, of course, but no other Mountain West team won a game in the 2023 Tournament. In fact, outside of the Aztecs’ run, the league has no NCAA Tournament wins since 2018 (0-9 outside of SDSU’s 5-1 run).

Make no mistake, however, the Rams are a quality team no matter what league they play in. CSU went 24-10 overall and 10-8 in conference play, after starting the year 9-0 and eventually running their record to 13-1. The Rams had two quality non-conference wins, beating Creighton by 21 on a neutral floor and fellow last-four-in Colorado by five at home. Their only non-conference loss came to WCC champ Saint Mary’s by three. In fact, of CSU’s 10 losses, only two came to teams outside the NCAA Tournament field: an OT loss at Wyoming and a six-point loss at NIT-bound UNLV. In league play, CSU went 5-7 against the other NCAA-bound Mountain West teams, if you include its 1-1 mark in the league tournament. None of those wins came on the road, with one coming on a neutral court last week (Nevada). There was one common opponent between the two programs, with Colorado State beating Boston College by 12 in December. UVa swept the Eagles in two closer games.

The Rams are led by a talented coach in Niko Medved, who previously coached at Furman and Drake. Medved has done a great job in Fort Collins since taking over in 2018-19, with four 20+ win seasons in the last five seasons. The Rams last made the NCAA’s in 2022, when they were upended by Michigan as a 6-seed.

Colorado State ranks 38th in KenPom; for comparison to other teams UVa played, the Rams are two spots ahead of Pitt and a few spots behind Clemson in the efficiency rankings. CSU is top-50 nationally in both offensive and defensive efficiency, so this should be quite a challenge for the Hoos on both ends of the floor. UVa has played just four teams this season that were top-50 on both ends of the floor: Wisconsin, Pitt, Duke and UNC, and lost all four games.

Offensively, Colorado State ranks 42nd nationally in efficiency. The Rams do a lot of their damage in the paint and at the rim, finishing ninth nationally in two-point field goal percentage (57.6 percent). CSU gets just 28.6 percent of its points on 3-pointers, which ranks the Rams 212th nationally; they shoot 33.2 percent from deep, 212th in the country. They take good care of the ball, ranking 48th in turnover rate, and they usually take care of business at the line, where they’re shooting 75.4 percent this season. The area that stands out most though is how well the Rams share the ball. They rank second nationally in assists to field goals made, with 65.7 percent of their made shots coming from assists. Virginia is seventh in the category, so we should see plenty of quality ball movement in this one.

Defensively, Colorado State ranks 38th nationally. The Rams aren’t top-100 in too many categories but are solid across the board. They rank 96th in two-point field goal percentage allowed, at 48.5 percent. CSU ranks 179th in turnover rate and 110th in offensive rebound rate allowed. The Rams don’t block many shots either, ranking 231st in the category. Like Virginia, Colorado State likes to keep teams in front of them and force opponents to play in the half court. The average possession length for CSU’s opponents ranks 360th nationally just in front of Virginia’s defense, which has the nation’s longest possessions.

Isaiah Stevens, Guard

The matchup to watch in Tuesday’s game will be a battle of veteran guards: UVa’s Reece Beekman against Stevens. At 23 years old, he is an experienced player who has been First-Team All-Mountain West three times, and was the league’s freshman of the year in 2020. Stevens leads the Rams in scoring at 16.5 points per contest and dishes out a whopping 7 assists per game. He has been very consistent, scoring in double figures in all but three of CSU’s games this season. And while the Rams aren’t a great shooting team on paper, Stevens is a high-quality shooter, making 44.7 percent from deep, averaging four 3-point attempts per game.

Joel Scott, Forward

The Rams aren’t a particularly big team but they have players, including Scott, who can manufacture points in the lane anyway. A 6-foot-7 senior, he is averaging 12.9 points and 6 rebounds per contest, and comes into the NCAA Tournament on a bit of a heater. Scott scored 20 points against New Mexico on Friday and has scored at least 11 points in every game since mid February.

Nique Clifford, Guard

Another veteran, the 6-foot-6 senior can impact the game with his offense and rebounding. Clifford, who began his career at rival Colorado, is third on the team in scoring at 12.2 points per game; he also adds 7.5 rebounds per contest. He scores a lot of his points on two-pointers and is a bit of a streaky shooter, but when he’s hitting shots it raises the ceiling for this team. Clifford will be looking to shake off a 2-for-10 night against New Mexico on Friday.

Patrick Cartier, Forward

A former D-II star, Cartier hails from the same town in Wisconsin as UVa’s Andrew Rohde and played for a rival high school. CSU’s biggest regular player at 6-foot-8, Cartier is its fourth and final player averaging 10+ points per game at 10.5 Oddly enough, despite his size, Cartier averages just 2.6 rebounds per game. He had some big games early in the season but has been a bit quiet of late, scoring just 25 points over CSU’s last four games. Cartier isn’t afraid to step out and shoot, taking 2.5 3-pointers per game, making 36.1 percent of them.

Virginia will enter this one as a slight underdog and the First Four games are often close or difficult to predict. It should go without saying, but Colorado State is a quality team that Cavalier fans may not be too familiar. Yet the Rams have played very solid basketball this season, particularly at home. And the Hoos have had their fair share of losses to teams outside the power six conferences in recent March memory; UVa has as many losses to non-power conference teams (excluding nationally relevant programs Memphis and Gonzaga) in the regular season over the past four years as they do in the postseason (three each).

We watched a few games to get a feel for them, as we’re frankly not terribly familiar with their style of play either. Stevens is an electric player, in some ways like UNC’s RJ Davis, in that he can pull up from anywhere but also drive and kick to teammates. The Rams will play half-court help defense and try to keep the ball in front. On offense, they don’t seem to play through the post a lot, they spread the floor with a few athletic guards and physical wings or forwards who can slash, shoot, or catch on drives. The offense seems to run through Stevens, though, who pulls up on high ball screens and likes to get downhill and either make plays for himself or find teammates.

This is a tough game to pick, as it’s hard to compare teams from different leagues with very few crossovers. It feels like one where if UVa can lock down on defense, the Hoos can hang around in a game that could certainly end up in the 50’s. But to get over the top, their top offensive guys are going to have to hit outside shots and find ways to score in the paint, which may be a little easier against a smaller Rams team.

Colorado State is a very good team and is favored for a reason, but we’re going to throw caution to the win and take the Hoos in this one. Beekman and Isaac McKneely should be particularly motivated after a tough ACC Tournament exit, and if Beekman can hold Stevens somewhat in check, Colorado State will have to find a Plan B, and UVa might be able to sneak out with a win in that case.

We’re going with the Hoos in what feels like a toss-up, with a lot of different outcomes possible.