Nebraska vs. Gophers men's basketball
THREE THINGS TO WATCH:
HONORING TAYRA – The Gophers will wear patches and pins with initials and have a moment of silence before Wednesday's game to honor the memory of senior guard Dupree McBrayer's mother, Tayra McFarlane, who lost a battle with cancer Monday. Nebraska coach Tim Miles also had his players wear "RIP Tayra" warmup shirts to honor McBrayer's mom as well Wednesday. McFarlane was a big supporter of the team and retired from her job as a prison warden in New York to attend more of her son's games this season. She had a stroke in October and was diagnosed with cancer. McBrayer played the last few weeks knowing she was in poor health, but he still managed to average 10 points in 29 minutes this season, which included 13 points in Sunday's loss at Ohio State. The Queens native and co-captain tweeted Monday that he hoped to make her proud. McBrayer is expected to play against Nebraska.
MURPHY'S FOUL TROUBLE – It's not hard to figure out the No. 1 game plan for every Gopher opponent: go after Jordan Murphy and get him into foul trouble. The Cornhuskers will attack Murphy when he's on defense and try to draw charges on him when he has the ball from the opening possessions Wednesday night. How will Richard Pitino react when Murphy picks up his first or second fouls early in the game? Well, if Sunday's 79-59 loss at Ohio State is any indication the response will be to sit Murphy immediately, especially after foul No. 2. There seems to be a different philosophy on that for every coach. Pitino errs on the side of caution. The game completely changes when Murphy heads to the bench. He had just three points on 1-for-5 shooting playing just 12 minutes in the first half against the Buckeyes. That eventually led to Murphy's worst game so far this season with only seven points and seven rebounds in 24 minutes. As gifted athletically as freshman Jarvis Omersa is he's not producing much so far (1.9 ppg and 1.4 rpg) for the Gophers as the backup power forward. So there's a huge drop off from Murphy's team-best 14.6 ppg and Big Ten-leading 12.0 rpg when Pitino needs to substitute. When Eric Curry is fully cleared and returns to the lineup later this month, the Gophers could either try Curry or freshman Daniel Oturu at forward off the bench. Murphy said Tuesday he just has to play smarter and not pick up careless fouls to make matters worse.
DEFENSIVE IDENTITY – The Gophers ranked 13th in three-point defensive percentage (35.3), 13th in field goal percentage defense (44.3) and 12th among Big Ten teams in scoring defense (70.5) through eight games. Those numbers are eerily similar to last season when Minnesota finished 15-17 playing shorthanded with injuries and a suspension to shot blocker Reggie Lynch, who won Big Ten defensive player of the year in 2017. So what's the reason for the poor defensive play this year? Well, the absence of Curry is part of the problem. He is Minnesota's best post defender and can stick with guards off ball screens. An even bigger issue, though, is the lack of deflections, especially steals. The Gophers rank 333rd out of 351 Division I teams in steal percentage (5.8), according to KenPom. The only major conference team rated worst as of Monday was Utah (4.9), which the U beat the last time it played at the Barn on Nov. 12. Steals per game are down from 5.6 last season to 4.1 this year, which if the season ended today would be the fewest steals per game in program history.
GAME INFO
Time: 8 p.m. CT, Wednesday. Where: Williams Arena. Line: 3.5-point underdog. Series: Minnesota leads the all-time series 54-21, but Nebraska has won six of the last eight meetings, including 78-68 in Lincoln on Dec. 5, 2017 and 91-85 in Minneapolis on Feb. 6, 2018. TV: BTN. Online/Live video: BTNPlus Radio: 100.3 FM.
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