LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — Evan Miyakawa does more than run an informative college basketball analytics web site. He also studies the numbers and makes observations about teams.
This is one of his takes on the work that new University of Louisville men’s basketball coach Pat Kelsey and his staff did while recruiting a dozen players from the NCAA transfer portal for the next Cardinals’ team.
“The three-point shooting for Louisville should be very good this season,” Miyakawa told me in a message.
Very good jumps off that sentence. For the last four seasons, under Chris Mack, Mike Pegues and Kenny Payne, the Cardinals could not claim their three-point shooting was average.
It wasn’t. It was very below-average. The numbers;
20-21 season: 30.8%, No. 298 in the nation.
21-22 season: 30.9%, No. 300.
22-23 season: 32.9%, No. 228.
23-24 season: 30.6%, No. 324.
In Atlantic Coast Conference games, starting with the 2020-21 season, the Cardinals ranked 15th, 14th, 10th and 15th in percentage of shots made from distance.
No wonder the three-point shooting numbers in the Cards’ portal class registered with Miyakawa, who runs EvanMiya.com, one of the game’s top analytics sites.
Half of the Cards’ dozen recruits shot the ball at 35% or better from distance last season. Three others shot it at 38% or better during the 2023 season.
The list is topped by Kobe Rodgers, a part-time at guard for Kelsey at Charleston last season. He made 45% of 40 attempts.
J’Vonne Hadley was nearly as accurate (42%) on 48 attempts at Colorado, which was unusual because Hadley only attempted 7 shots from distance in his first two college seasons at Colorado and Northeastern. He’s an intriguing prospect.
The player who projects to be Louisville’s most prolific three-point shooter is another guy proven to be comfortable in Kelsey’s system — guard Reyne Smith.
Smith has made 87 or more shots from distance for three consecutive college seasons, topped by his 111 for 281 (39.5%) effort last season. Smith had 14 games when he scored at least four three-pointers as well as five games with 6 or more.
His season-best performance was a 10-for-15 night from distance against Campbell last Feb. 29. Make a note of this: Smith also had a superb turnover percentage, losing the ball on 8.1% of his possessions, which ranked 54th best in the nation.
U of L guards Skyy Clark, Ty-Laur Johnson, Tre White and Mike James all had turnover rates of 15.4% or higher last season.
Koren Johnson, a starter at shooting guard for Washington last season, should also upgrade the Cards’ offensive profile.
Johnson made 41 of 110 threes (37.3%) for the Huskies. Johnson found his rhythm late in the season, making 22 of 42 (52.3%) over the final games, highlighted by a 6 for 10 night when Johnson scored 30 points in a victory over Stanford.
In today’s game the best coaches encourage their frontcourt players to stretch the floor. Kelsey tried to fill that need with the signing of Noah Watterman, a 24-year-old, 6-foot-11 forward who has played parts of five college seasons at Niagara, Detroit and Brigham Young.
In four of those seasons, Waterman shot 37% or better from distance, including last winter when he started and played about half the game for new Kentucky coach Mark Pope.
Waterman attempted more than twice as many threes (154) threes than twos (76) while shooting 37% from distance. He made 3 of 6 against Texas, 4 of 7 against Houston and 6 of 9 against Arizona State.
Pat Kelsey’s last two teams at Charleston ranked among the Top 20 in the nation in percentage of field-goal attempts taken from the 3-point line. The data on his first group of recruits here suggests that trend should continue at Louisville
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