Scouting report: No. 5 Arizona Wildcats vs. Montana State

Montana State (7-5) at No. 5 Arizona (10-1)

• McKale Center • 6:30 p.m. • Pac-12 Networks •1290-AM, Varsity Network

PROBABLE STARTERS

ARIZONA

G Kerr Kriisa (6-3 junior)

G Courtney Ramey (6-3 senior)

F Pelle Larsson (6-5 junior)

F Azuolas Tubelis (6-11 junior)

C Oumar Ballo (7-0 junior)

MONTANA STATE

G Darius Brown II (6-2 junior)

G Tyler Patterson (6-8 sophomore)

F RaeQuan Battle (6-5 junior)

F Caleb Fuller (6-5 senior)

C Jubrile Belo (6-9 senior)

HOW THEY MATCH UP

The series: Arizona hasn’t played Montana State since they beat the Bobcats 64-59 in Minneapolis on Dec. 28, 1981. The only other meeting came on Dec. 30, 1939, when Montana State beat Arizona 39-32 in Oklahoma City.

Montana State overview: The Bobcats were picked to win the Big Sky Conference this season, and that’s hardly a surprise. Last season, they became the first team to win both the regular-season and conference titles in the league since 2018-19 and this season they return the conference’s MVP last season, big man Jubrile Belo.

The Bobcats do most of their damage inside, with British big men Belo and 245-pound Grant Osobor, making 52.5% of their two-point shots while doing a lot of damage at the free throw line often. Montana State has the 89th highest ratio in free throws attempted to field goals attempted (34.8%) and hits free throws at the nation’s 32nd best rate, 76.3%.

The Bobcats aren’t grew from 3-point range, however, hitting just 31.4% of long-range shots and they turn the ball over on 20.2% of possessions. Defensively they have been average across the board. Washington transfer RaeQuan Battle (36.7%) is Montana State’s top 3-point threat.

While Montana State won at Long Beach State and North Dakota last month, the Bobcats went 0-3 at the Northern Classic multi-team event in Quebec, losing to UNC Greensboro, Quinnipiac and Middle Tennessee. But they have rattled off four straight wins since then, winning at Southern Utah, then beating St. Thomas, Nebraska Omaha and Northwest Indian at home.

He said it: “They have two guys (Belo and Great Osabor) who both fill that role of the big strong five men that they can kind of play around. And RaeQuan Battle is an elite perimeter score for them. He’s somebody that you really have to guard because you can put 30 points on the board at any time. (Coach) Danny Sprinkle has done a great job since he’s been there. They were an NCAA tournament team last year and probably looking like an NCAA tournament team again this year. So we’re gonna have our hands full.

Their two-point percentage is because of “the bigs — they do a great job of getting good looks out of their post men and they get fouled a lot. They score a lot at the free throw line. Their point guard is a really good distributor. He sets guys up and the rest of the team kind of fills their roles. Battle is a scorer, the two bigs are scorers down low. And then the other guys kind of are shooters and floor spreaders.

Battle “takes the tough ones and he played against us when he was at Washington. He’s not gonna come in here afraid. He knows what it’s all about.”

Defensively “they’ll play tough man to man. They’ll go under some ball screens. As a change of pace, they’ll play some 1-3-1 zone. They’ll double the post a little bit. They’re gonna really try and pack the paint. They’re gonna probably try and play us like Utah did and make us score from the outside.”

— UA associate head coach Jack Murphy, who scouted the Bobcats.

KEY PLAYERS

Montana State

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Jubrile Belo

Despite playing with knee issues that prompted offseason surgery late last season, Belo was named both the Big Sky’s MVP and Defensive Player of the Year. He’s back impacting both ends of the floor this season, shooting 35.5% from 2-point range and blocking 3.6% of opponents’ shots when he’s on the floor.

Arizona

Cedric Henderson

The Wildcats will likely need smaller defenders at forward to help cover what are sometimes four perimeter players on the floor at the same time. They also could use some help off the bench, after no reserves scored on Saturday against Tennessee. Henderson likely will be asked to contribute in both areas.

SIDELINES

Cousin Cats

Montana State won’t arrive into McKale Center as some sort of random one-time opponent. As is often the case with nonconference opponents, there are ties between the staffs that have a lot to do with it.

UA special assistant TJ Benson and Montana State assistant Johnny Hill were both assistant coaches under Dan Marjerle at Grand Canyon, while Benson is also a friend of Bobcats coach Danny Sprinkle and assistant coach Andy Hill.

What’s more, Andy Hill was a longtime assistant to Larry Krystkowiak and has roots in both Montana and Eastern Washington. Krystkowiak’s son, Luc, is now a walk-on at Arizona.

Even Montana State publicist Kyle Cajero has ties to the Wildcats. He grew up attending UA basketball games at McKale Center along with parents Charlie and Cindy as well as siblings Benjamin and Madison.

Eye on the ball

Wondering how the Wildcats will get up for a low-major opponent after knocking off Tennessee in an emotional Top 10 showdown less than 72 hours before?

UA associate head coach Jack Murphy has an analogy to throw at you. After all, Montana State was the No. 14 NCAA Tournament seed in the West Region last weekend, sharing space with — though not meeting — top-seeded Arizona at San Diego’s Viejas Arena.

“You know what I equate it t? I equate it to winning the conference tournament on Saturday night and then you turn around to play your first (NCAA) Tournament game against a really good team,” Murphy said. “And that’s what Montana State is. This is an NCAA first-round opponent.”

Murphy also found it encouraging the way the Wildcats dispatched Texas A&M Corpus Christi 99-61 just 72 hours after beating Indiana in another emotional game on Dec. 10 in Las Vegas.

“We have a veteran group,” Murphy said. “We came off a huge win versus Indiana, came back and played a really good Corpus Christi team and the guys were locked in. I think that we’re going to have to have to have that same type of mindset. We have we have guys that are mature, and have been around.”

Pac-12 honors Jaquez

Maybe life in the new coast-to-coast Big Ten won’t be so bad for UCLA basketball in a couple of years. At least not if the Bruins keep getting performances like the ones Jaime Jaquez put up last week.

While Arizona nominated power forward Azuolas Tubelis for the Pac-12 Player of the Week award, after he collected 19 points and nine rebounds in the Wildcats’ 75-70 win over Tennessee, Jaquez won the conference’s weekly honors after leading the Bruins to an 87-60 win at Maryland and a 63-53 win over Kentucky in New York.

Jaquez averaged 16.5 points and 9.5 rebounds in the two games, along with 4.0 steals and 2.0 assists while shooting 45.0% from the field. He had a double-double of 19 points and 12 rebounds against Kentucky.

USC guard Tre White, meanwhile, was named Pac-12 Freshman of the Week after averaging 13.5 points and 4.5 rebounds while shooting 52.4% during USC’s wins over Long Beach State and Auburn.

Numbers game

9 – Different countries that will be represented on the Arizona and Montana State rosters. Bearcats have three players from Great Britain (Jubrile Belo, Caleb Fuller and Great Osobor) and another from Romania (Luca Colceag). Wildcats have Lithuanians (Azuolas and Tautvilas Tubelis), Estonians (Kerr Kriisa and Henri Veesaar), plus Adama Bal of France, Oumar Ballo of Mali, Pelle Larsson of Sweden and Filip Borovicanin of Serbia.

26 – Years without an NCAA Tournament appearance for Montana State until the Bearcats made it last season. Coach Danny Sprinkle was a Bobcat freshman on the 1995-96 team.

27 – Montana State’s wins last season, a school record.

— Bruce Pascoe