Arizona Men’s Basketball controls exhibition against Saint Mary’s with 81-68 win

TUCSON – Good, bad, or ugly, sometimes its just nice to get those first-game jitters out of the way. Arizona Men’s Basketball had the opportunity to do just that on Saturday. In an exhibition game against mid-major force Saint Mary’s, the Arizona Wildcats were in control from start to finish, winning 81-68.

Cats cruise to win

The Wildcats shot 32 of 60 (53.3%) from the field, while holding the Gaels to 24 of 61 (39.3%) on the opposite end. Saint Mary’s won the rebounding battle 39 to 35, while Arizona out-assisted the Gaels 13 to 9. The Wildcats shot just 4 of 16 from three-point range and were an underwhelming 13 of 25 from the charity stripe in their first game back in McKale.

Senior point guard Jaden Bradley led all scorers with 23 points and also tacked on four assists, while junior center Motiejus Krivas played 33 minutes, finishing with an 11-point, 17-rebound double-double and two blocks in his first game back after missing most of last season with a foot injury. Veteran wing Anthony Dell’Orso finished with 13 points on 6 of 12 from the field, but just 1 of 7 from deep, as well as four steals.

The Wildcats used an 11-0 run midway through the first half to take a 37-30 lead into the locker room at halftime. In the second half, it was all Jaden Bradley, who erupted for 15 points, as Arizona leveraged a 16-2 run at the end of the game to break away from Saint Mary’s for its first unofficial win of the season.

Other the other side of the court, former Wildcat Paulius Murauskas finished with 12 points and six rebounds, shooting 4 of 10 from the field and 4 of 6 from the free throw line.

Let’s look at the lineup

As expected, Jaden Bradley, Brayden Burries, and Anthony Dell’Orso got the start for Arizona in the backcourt. The question heading into the game was what Tommy Lloyd would do with the front court. Tobe Awaka, who has been banged up but could have played, wound up sitting the exhibition out, giving Mo Krivas and true freshman Koa Peat the start. Awaka being unavailable led to Krivas’ heavy minutes in his first full game back, but also gave Tommy Lloyd a chance to experiment with lineups, who went small ball at one point with Koa Peat at the five.

Freshmen Ivan Kharchenkov and Dwayne Aristode also got plenty of opportunities off the bench, finishing with 24 and 20 minutes respectively. Kharchenkov dropped in nine points and two assists, but did not grab a rebound, while Aristode did not score, finishing with a rebound and assist.

What’s Next

Arizona has one more exhibition match on the schedule when it hosts in-state NAIA program Embry-Riddle on Monday, October 27, at 7:00 PM MST. From there, Arizona opens the regular season against the defending NCAA National Champion Florida Gators at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Monday, November 3, at 5:00 PM MST.