Scouting report: No. 8 Arizona Wildcats vs. Northern Colorado Bears

The Star's Bruce Pascoe breaks down the starting lineups, storylines and stats as the No. 8-ranked Arizona Wildcats prepare to take on the Northern Colorado Bears Wednesday night at McKale Center. 

Who: Northern Colorado (6-5) at No. 8 Arizona (9-0)

Where: McKale Center

When: 7 p.m.

TV: Pac-12 Networks

Radio: 1290-AM, 107.5-FM

Social media: @TheWildcaster on Twitter / TheWildcaster on Facebook

PROBABLE STARTERS

ARIZONA:

G Kerr Kriisa (6-3 sophomore)

G Dalen Terry (6-6 sophomore)

F Bennedict Mathurin (6-6 sophomore)

F Azuolas Tubelis (6-11 sophomore)

C Christian Koloko (7-0 junior)

NORTHERN COLORADO

G Matt Johnson (6-2 senior)

G Daylen Kountz (6-4 senior)

F Dalton Knecht (6-6 junior)

F Bodie Hume (6-8 senior)

C Kur Jongkuch (6-9 senior)

How they match up

The series: Arizona leads Northern Colorado 3-1, with each team winning on its home court in 1959-60 and 1960-61. The Wildcats beat the Bears twice during the Sean Miller era: 93-70 on Nov. 21, 2010, and 71-55 on Nov. 21, 2016. Lauri Markkanen led the Wildcats with 17 points and 13 rebounds in the last matchup.

Game contract: The Bears were originally scheduled to face Arizona on Nov. 12 last season in exchange for a $92,000 payment and 100 complimentary tickets. When the NCAA pushed the start of the 2020-21 season back to Nov. 25 because of COVID-19 concerns, the date was moved to Dec. 5, and the Bears’ payment reduced to $70,000 because fans were not allowed. (The contract cited “limitations imposed on the event by applicable governmental and athletic conference regulations.") But the Bears couldn’t make it anyway because of their own COVID-19 pause, and the agreement was scrapped without payment by either side. A new contract was then drawn up on Feb. 22, 2021, with UA offering Northern Colorado a $90,000 fee plus 100 tickets to appear Wednesday night.

Northern Colorado overview: If the Wildcats are still smarting over the 16 3-pointers Illinois hit last Saturday, they have an ideal chance to work out their frustrations against the Bears. Northern Colorado takes 47.1% of its shots from 3-point range, the 25th-highest percentage of 3s relative to overall field goals taken, and they have three players — Daylen Kountz, Matt Johnson and Dru Kuxhausen — who hit them at 42% or higher.

While they don’t have a “point forward” as Wyoming did last week in Hunter Maldonado, the Bears might be somewhat reminiscent of the Cowboys because coach Steve Smiley was the associate head coach under Jeff Linder at Northern Colorado until last season — when Linder took the Wyoming job and Smiley was promoted to take over the Bears.

Smiley was just 11-11 in his first season in 2020-21 while the Bears fought through COVID testing and contact tracing protocols that kept their key players from practicing together all at the same time virtually all season. But this season, Northern Colorado returned its top seven players and as a result is expected to challenge for the Big Sky championship.

Kountz, the former Colorado guard, leads the Bears in scoring (18.9 ppg) and is shooting 40.4% from the field while Canadian big man Kur Jongkuch is nearly averaging a double-double (10.0 ppg, 9.9 rpg). Johnson leads the Bears in assists as their point guard and takes more than half of his shots from 3-point territory; against Division I teams (the Bears have also played a D-II team and a D-III team) he’s hitting 3s at a 42.5% rate. Off the bench, Kuxhausen is even more extreme – he’s only taken four of his 49 shots against Division I teams from inside the 3-point range, and he’s hitting 3s at a 42.2% rate.

The Bears are equally tough defending the 3-pointer, with the 35th best 3-point percentage defense in Division I (28.0%). They don’t go for steals or turnovers -- their defensive turnover percentage of 14.9 ranks 336th nationally – but they don’t foul much either. The ratio of their opponents’ free throws taken to field goals taken ranks 11th nationally.

He said it: “They're a really good 3-point shooting team. They play typically six players over 20 minutes a game, and out of those six, five of them shoot the 3 really, really well. So of course if that's the strength of your team, that's what you're going to play towards. They're taking advantage of it.

“(Jongkuch) handles the ball a lot at the top of the key, initiates offense sometimes and the offense can run through him. He's definitely involved every time down the floor, whether setting the ball screen, rolling, or handling the ball at the top. They have a lot of interchangeable parts once they get on the offensive end. Their four perimeter players and those guys are all interchangeable. They all put the ball the deck, they can play one-on-one, they're athletic and they can shoot it.

“(Kountz) shoots it really well, he drives, can finish. He's a lefty so it's always a little bit different guarding left handed players especially out in the perimeter. He can get to his spots on the floor and he's pretty efficient when he does. The other thing about him is once he drives, he can play make. Johnson can play make. All those guys are good passers.

“They're mainly man-to-man (defensively). They can switch up some of their ball screen coverages. But they haven't played a game for eight days so they've had plenty of time to prepare for us. They could come out and play zone that they played sparingly or they could come in with a new defense. You just have to be prepared.” — UA associate head coach Jack Murphy, who scouted the Bears.

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Key player (Northern Colorado): Daylen Kountz

Visiting McKale Center with a veteran Colorado team two seasons ago, Kountz was limited to just two points on 1-for-4 shooting over 17 minutes. He’s a different player now, a versatile guard who can shoot, pass or drive — and he draws 4.8 fouls per 40 minutes while hitting free throws at a 77.3% rate.

Key player (Arizona): Christian Koloko

Clearly Arizona’s most improved player throughout November, Koloko has struggled offensively in the Wildcats’ past three games after spraining his ankle on Nov. 27 against Sacramento State. With two home games this week, Koloko has a chance to regain some swagger before heading to No. 18-ranked Tennessee next week.

Sidelines

Uber heroes

Before his Wildcats pulled off their 83-79 win at Illinois on Saturday, coach Tommy Lloyd was 0 for 2.

First, upon having his team's charter flight to Champaign, Ill. diverted 125 miles away to Indianapolis on Friday, Lloyd called around to see if he could find a charter bus in Indianapolis to quickly take the Wildcats to Champaign. He was unsuccessful.

Then Lloyd and several other staffers punched in app orders for Uber or Lyft rides to Champaign instead — and Lloyd was again stiffed.

“We’re all getting Ubers and you know how Uber drivers are sometimes? They show up, figure out where you’re going, and then take off,” Lloyd said. “All the Ubers stayed except for mine. So I had to get another one.”

Turned out, Lloyd’s second choice turned out to be a good driver who took the inclement weather seriously, allowing the Wildcats to arrive safely in Champaign at about 10 p.m. local time.

“It was actually scary because we didn't have any idea that the tornadoes were going on,” Lloyd said. “It was raining really hard and our driver had two hands on the wheel the whole time. He said he had to hold it to stabilize the car.”

Murphy also found a heroic driver named Paul while riding in a separate Uber with Benn Mathurin, Azuolas Tubelis, Adama Bal, Shane Nowell and athletic trainer Justin Kokoskie.

“I give Paul all the credit in the world because he stopped so the guys could get some McDonald's and Taco Bell,” Murphy said. “Then when we got into Champaign, he dropped the guys off at the restaurant for a team meal and he took Justin and I to the hotel to make sure everything was situated.

“The streets there were flooded and we had to go through a couple of underpasses. We ended up saying `Paul, you better punch it or we’re not going to make it.’ He punched it and we got through. All the credit to Paul from Indianapolis.”

Worth the wait

Murphy also credited special assistant TJ Benson for ordering “luxury” rideshares that he believed were more likely to accept the longer journeys, while the SUVs also came in handy for transporting big guys such as 7-1 center Christian Koloko, who sat unbothered while watching Illinois’ Dec. 6 win over Iowa on a computer during the drive.

“It was big,” Koloko said of his ride.

And while Lloyd credited Murphy for being the first to bring up the idea of ordering ride shares, Murphy credited Lloyd for trying to secure other buses. “Not many head coaches would be jumping on the phone doing it themselves,” Murphy said.

In the end, Lloyd said, the collective efforts to get the Wildcats to Indianapolis roughly two hours earlier than they would have otherwise may have made the difference in the win over Illinois the next day.

"I think so," Lloyd said. "Because when you're dealing with teenagers and young guys, one thing they don't do good is to sit around. Just sitting on that plane, I think they would have gone a little bit stir crazy.

"So I think coach Murphy made a great call in getting us moving and then once we got there we just said, `Hey guys, OK, stop. Like, we're here. You AAU kids (Americans who played club ball) are used to riding in a car to Vegas and playing three games in a day. You European kids are used to riding on a bus six hours to a game and the six hours back right after, so this is nothing. Let's just get a good night's rest and try to find a way to come out and compete tomorrow.'

Loser buys

Arizona is getting some national run over the fact that it is the only Division I school to have both its men’s and women’s basketball teams still undefeated.

If that changes, well, somebody’s gotta pay.

"She texted me. It was a very simple text and you guys know Adia," Lloyd said of women’s basketball coach Adia Barnes at his weekly news conference Tuesday. "It said 'First one to lose buys dinner.' So that's where we're at."

Numbers game

2 — Dalen Terry’s national ranking in assist-turnover ratio (5.14-1)

7 — Years since Arizona last started a season 10-0. Arizona started 12-0 in 2014-15 while they were 9-0 in 2019-20 and so far this season.

33 — Northern Colorado’s KenPom.com rank in “effective field-goal percentage,” which gives 50-percent more weight to 3-point shots.