Rutgers Men's Basketball must find itself again and fast
Flash back to last month.
After the December holidays, the Rutgers men’s basketball team started off the New Year with a bang. It upset the No. 1-ranked team, Purdue, in West Lafayette.
It then won against Maryland handily, Northwestern in a close game on the road near the buzzer, and got revenge over Ohio State. A few days later, it cruised past Penn State and Minnesota before winning at Madison Square Garden over Michigan State.
DON'T HAVE TKR PREMIUM? SIGN UP TODAY FOR JUST $9.95/MONTH!
But it was in that MSU game that everything changed. Mawot Mag tore his ACL in the first half and everyone now sees what a vital piece he was to the team on both ends of the court and off of it. A hard worker, he provided toughness on defense and his offensive game was improving. He was one of the main cast members of Rutgers’ highly-ranked defense per KenPom.
The toughness and defense the Scarlet Knights are known for hasn’t been there. They’ve now lost three games in a row to Indiana and Illinois on the road and Nebraska at home.
“It's on me. I got to get us to play Rutgers defense,” Rutgers head coach Steve Pikiell said.
Rutgers had owned Indiana in recent years, and it had already beaten them in December earlier in the season, but the Hoosiers, thought to be one of the best teams in the Big Ten entering the season, found their way and are one of the hottest teams in the nation right now and are ranked.
Illinois has had Rutgers’ number in Champaign, and it too notched a couple wins going into that game. The Fighting Illini also beat UCLA and Syracuse in non-conference action. No sweat, and it’s not like Rutgers got blown out either. Rutgers led by double-digits against Illinois and never let up versus Indiana.
Indiana though shot 45.8% from the floor and was 5-for-12 from deep. It also got to the foul line where it sank 17-of-24 free throws.
But this Rutgers team hasn’t been the same. There was visible frustration in Tuesday night’s loss to Nebraska, which has won three of its last four games. Nebraska shot 58.2% for the game including 42.86% on 3-pointers (12-for-28) hitting dagger after dagger. Rutgers couldn’t defend the perimeter or inside as the Cornhuskers made 20-of-27 on 2-point shots. That’s unheard of for this Rutgers team.
Nebraska also easily broke Rutgers’ full court pressure. Illinois shot almost 50% against Rutgers and dominated the paint 22-for-36). It was just 5-of-20 3-pointers, but they came in huge spots. The Scarlet Knights also went through a stretch of 10 minutes without scoring which is why they lost.
If there is light at the end of the tunnel, it is that Rutgers is still on pace to make its first-ever third-straight trip to the NCAA Tournament. Right now, the Scarlet Knights are probably around a 7-or-8-seed.
Torvik’s Rutgers page has a lot of green categories on the defensive side throughout the season until as of late. There’s a bunch of blocks of red signaling poor play.
We know Rutgers is never going to be an offensive juggernaut, so it must play defense. Losing Mag hurts, but there’s still capable players in Cliff Omoruyi, Caleb McConnell, Cam Spencer, and Aundre Hyatt. Only Hyatt really showed up against Nebraska as he finished with a career-high 24 points.
The killer instinct is missing, and Rutgers needs to find itself again. Indiana did, now it is its turn.
“Anytime you lose anybody, at this time of year it hurts. He's a starter. He's a really good defender, so he gave us another guy that could guard multiple positions. That was his strength. We've got enough though. We've got enough guys. Aundre played well. I think that was his career high. We scored enough points. I am just really down on myself. We have got to defend and it's on me 100 percent. These guys got a lot of season left. We've got to get that back, because that's what we do."
We’ve seen Rutgers be down on the mat and get back up before. In 2019-20, Rutgers started its home dominance but couldn’t snag a win on the road. It thumped a ranked Maryland team in its final game in Piscataway and then went to Mackey Arena and defeated Purdue to put its stamp on the NCAA Tournament. As we know all, that never happened due to COVID, but when it came to crunch time, the Scarlet Knights got the job done.
In the 2020-21 season, Rutgers got out to a great start in Big Ten play in December and January before Ron Harper Jr. couldn't make a bucket from long range. It then struggled some in February including losing by 21 at Nebraska before topping Minnesota in Minneapolis when it really needed a win on the road to again secure itself a trip to the NCAA Tournament in the middle of a pandemic. That broke a 30-year drought.
Last year, which didn’t go quite as expected with putrid losses early that really ruined their resume, the Scarlet Knights all of a sudden found their way in February. Rutgers fell in a close game at Northwestern in OT, but they gained confidence. It then went on a historic run by beating four ranked teams in a row as an unranked team themselves to get back on “the bubble”.
Rutgers then closed out the regular season with a victory in Bloomington against Indiana and on Senior Night at home against Penn State to make it to the First Four games of the NCAA Tournament in Dayton.
There are five games left for Rutgers before the Big Ten Tournament to right the ship. Per Bart Torvik’s analytics, it is still favored to win four of the five. Will that happen? Probably not. It’s tough to win any game in this league. Rutgers just needs to hold serve.
And while this stretch is concerning right now for Rutgers, it isn’t down for the count. It just has to remember what got it there and get up off the mat. The Scarlet Knights go to Wisconsin on Saturday to face a Badgers team desperate for wins.
“(Rutgers) will bounce back in a big way,” Nebraska coach Fred Hoiberg said. “There is no doubt that they have so much experience and length and toughness. This team will be back in a big way."
DON'T HAVE TKR PREMIUM? SIGN UP TODAY FOR JUST $9.95/MONTH!
Follow Chris Nalwasky on Twitter @ChrisNalwasky.
--------------------------------------------------------------
• Subscribe to our YouTube Channel