During his UA-videotaped film review with Chase Jeter after the Maui Invitational, UA coach Sean Miller told Jeter to “learn from, grow from” his technical foul and subsequent foul-out against Gonzaga.
“It’s been a while since you’ve played that type of game,” Miller said. Maui “was a great experience of getting this kind of play out of your system.”
With that in mind, apparently, Jeter went back to being the Wildcats’ most consistent player of the season so far. He had 18 points and 10 rebounds against Georgia Southern on Thursday over just 19 minutes Thursday to record his third double-double of the season, setting a career-high in scoring that will likely be broken again.
“Chase has bene solid for us the entire season other than that technical foul against Gonzaga,” Miller said Thursday. “He’s really been consistent. He rebounds. He’s shooting a high percentage. I think we did a good job of getting him the ball a couple of times tonight which in the past we didn’t. But that’s all part of growing as a group, learning what each of these guys can do.”
Miller said Jeter can be a double-figure scorer (he's averaging 12.4 so far), but that his strength has always been rebounding, in high school and with the USA U18 team that Miller served as an assistant coach on in 2014?.
“He does it every day,” Miller said. “A year ago, against Deandre and Dusan, he rebounded so we count on him to do that. I’ve already talked a lot about his defense. He’s intelligent. He gives his body, draws charges. I don’t’ know too many big guys who draw charges and he’s one of them.”
Miller played Alex Barcello only 12 total minutes over three games in Maui, but put him in after six minutes on Thursday and gave him a total of 13 against the Eagles.
Barcello responded with 16 points on 6-for-10 shooting, one assist, one steal and one rebound.
“It was great to see him make shots in the game,” Miller said. “We’ve really stayed with him and Alex is one of our hardest workers. We watch him every day in practice, through the long hours of the summer and fall prepare, and it’s just a matter of him playing with confidence, knowing that we want him to shoot the ball.
“We tried to get him in the game a little bit earlier. Sometimes if you sit there for eight minutes of gametime, it’s not easy to just kind of come in and make the first shot. But the fact that he made six of them is a great sign and we’ve started to see it a little bit playing with more fire and confidence in practice.
Barcello said teamwork helped. UA had 22 assists to six turnovers on Thursday.
“We’re playing really well together right now and finding the open man,” Barcello said. “That helps me built my confidence as I come in the game. it helps my teammates confidence as well."
Similarly, Miller said he was impressed with the effort Devonaire Doutrive put in over 11 minutes, after Doutrive played just a minute in Maui.
“He’s a young player who just keeps coming on,” Miller said. “You watch him every day in practice and he’s working extremely hard. We’ve talked to him about just staying with it and as he has. You can see he got in the game the first half and made some really good plays. He plays with confidence. It’s kind of fun to see a young guy like him develop and I think he’ll be a part of what we do here moving forward.”
Even though UA lost two games by double-digits, Miller more than once talked about how the Wildcats grew from the experience, noting that he didn’t think the bench’s lack of performance in Maui was an aberration.
“The competition there was stiffer certainly than it was tonight,” Miller said. “You can’t judge a team and a group of players in a couple first couple of games. It’s going to take time, more practice and we’ll be a lot more of a finished product as we head toward Christmas.
“The good news is we’ve played the No. 1 team in the nation. We’ve played Iowa State who I believe has a great chance of being in the tournament. You learn, you grow, you improve, when you play against that type of competition.
“Hopefully that competition will help us when we play our first true road game (Sunday against UConn at Hartford) because playing in the Hartford Civic Center – I played there a long time ago, and it’s a great home court for UConn. They have an unreal fan base, a lot like ours. They have a hungry really talented new coach and they return return a lot of guys from last year’s team. We know it’s going to be a hard-fought game and hopefully we’re up to the task.
Our coverage of Thursday's game is attached, along with the box score, UA stats and the UA video.
