PROVO — As BYU and UT Arlington head into their first round National Invitation Tournament matchup, both teams will be shorthanded.
The No. 3-seeded Cougars will be without starting guard Elijah Bryant, coach Dave Rose announced Tuesday. Bryant re-injured his knee in last week’s loss to Saint Mary’s in the West Coast Conference Tournament semifinals and is done for the season.
The No. 6-seeded Mavericks, meanwhile, will play without starter Jalen Jones, who suffered a season-ending thumb injury the Sun Belt Conference Tournament quarterfinals.
“If you compared, it would probably be pretty similar, what we lost and they lost,” said BYU coach Dave Rose.
Bryant was averaging 11.7 points per game, and Jones was averaging 12.4.
Rose added that the loss of Jones could be a reason UTA is not playing in the NCAA Tournament.
Juggling the lineup is nothing new for BYU, which has already lost two other starters this season — Kyle Davis and L.J. Rose.
“We’re used to this now,” coach Rose said. “We’ve been doing this for a while. This is more normal than abnormal.”
Davin Guinn will get the starting nod in place of Bryant when BYU hosts UTA Wednesday (9 p.m., MDT, ESPN2) at the Marriott Center. It will be Guinn’s first career start for the Cougars.
Meanwhile, the tipoff time for Wednesda's game changed Tuesday. Because the Syracuse-UNC Greensboro game was postponed due to inclement weather, ESPN moved the start of BYU-UTA to 9 p.m.
For the Cougars, this NIT opportunity should provide valuable experience going into next season.
“As disappointed as were in our performance last week (in the 31-point loss to Saint Mary’s), for this group it might be the best NIT invitation that we’ve had because there’s such a young group returning,” Rose said. “Last year, we lost five of our top eight players. This group we anticipate having seven of our top eight coming back next year.
"You look at the NCAA bracket this year, there’s nine teams that I counted that were in the NIT last year with a young group. It’s a really important for these guys to get back in the gym at this time of year. It feels different. It is different. Everything’s different. You’re past your conference tournament now. You need to be able to refocus and find a way to play some of your best basketball. Hopefully that’s what this group experiences.”
“Teams can really build off this experience moving forward into the next year,” said BYU forward Eric Mika. “We’ve got to have the right attitude and realize that we are lucky to be in the spot that we’re in.”
To advance to the second round, the Cougars will have to deal with the Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year, Kevin Hervey, who averages 17.1 points and 8.6 rebounds per game, and guard Erick Neal, who averages 10.4 points per game.
“Neal is quite a guy. He can really take the ball off the ball screen and get anywhere he wants on the floor,” Rose said. “Hervey’s got great size, great skill."
“It seems like he’s a really aggressive guy and he’s a leader of their team,” Mika said of the 6-foot-9 Hervey. “He’s got 100-something offensive rebounds on the season, so you know that he’s aggressive. I think it’s going to be a fun matchup. Offensive rebounding is something I like to do. We’re about the same size. He may be a little bit heavier and I may be a little bit taller, but it will be fun.”
UTA’s style is much different from what BYU has been accustomed to in WCC play.
“These guys are a fast-paced, up-tempo team that shoots a lot of 3s,” Rose said. “They do most of it in transition, not late in the shot clock like our league. … Transition’s going to be a big key for us. We’re going to have to be good at locating the shooters.”
The winner of the Wednesday's game will take on the winner of No. 2 seed Houston and No. 7 Akron.
The Mavericks, the regular-season Sun Belt champions, will be trying to put behind them the disappointment of not getting into the NCAA Tournament, while the Cougars are trying to get past the disappointment of their loss to Saint Mary’s.
“Those are always tough times to recover from, especially when we played as poorly as we did in that game,” Rose said. “So hopefully our guys will be excited to get back out and get playing.”