AMHERST — Carl Pierre could sense the boiling point was coming for the UMass offense.
The Minutemen had too many players practicing hard and scoring when the lights weren’t on for the team to devolve into the Pierre and Tre Mitchell show. For the first few weeks of Atlantic 10 play, UMass could only rely on Pierre and Mitchell to score and when they didn’t score enough, the Minutemen typically lost.
Yet Pierre saw how players like Samba Diallo, Preston Santos and sophomore Dibaji Walker were practicing. He saw the potential they were showcasing on a daily basis, so Pierre knew at some point, it would all click.
That night was Wednesday.
UMass put five players in double figures, shot 63 percent from the floor and everyone who played more than one minute scored a point as the Minutemen blitzed Saint Joseph’s, 91-76, at the Mullins Center.
“I’m not going to say I’m super surprised because this has been brewing for a long time,” Pierre said. “Preston, Dibaji, Samba, they’ve been practicing well, we’ve been competing a lot in practice and it’s been brewing. I’ve been able to see that they’re going to find their rhythm and they’re going to be able to play. It felt great to get contributions from the whole team.”
The true breakout performer was Walker, the Cleveland State transfer who was cleared by the NCAA less than a month ago. The sophomore was struggling to find a groove and scored just 32 combined points in his first eight games with the Minutemen. He was settling for 3-pointers, taking more than twice as many shots behind the arc as he did inside it.
Walker wasn’t settling for anything against the Hawks and was in attack mode for all 20 minutes he played. He finished with a career-high 22 points on 9 of 13 shooting by attacking the rim and finding a rhythm between 10-12 feet from the hoop. It was the type of performance people assumed they would see when he transferred to UMass, and even Walker said it was a relief to get his game going.
“It felt really good to let loose and do what I usually do,” Walker said. “I’ve been selling my team short of what I’m capable of the last couple of games, so I’m happy about (the performance), but I feel like this is what I’m supposed to be doing.”
Walker was one of the main beneficiaries of the Minutemen’s simple offensive game plan, which seemingly took the pressure off the entire team. UMass (9-12, 3-5 Atlantic 10) shot 72.4 percent from the floor in the second half, which coach Matt McCall attributed to how basic he made the game plan against Saint Joseph’s (4-17, 0-8). It allowed UMass to directly attack the Hawks’ defense and find openings to exploit for baskets.
In addition to scoring easy points in transition off turnovers and missed shots, UMass also worked the Hawks into missed assignments that left players open on backcuts or off screens. And when Saint Joseph’s did send a double team at Tre Mitchell, the freshman found the open guy and the Minutemen made the Hawks pay.
“They played some zone and we kept getting the ball into the middle of their zone and we were having some success there,” McCall said. “Tre did a tremendous job when they doubled him of finding guys. If we’re making shots like that, it’s hard to double him because it opens up everything on the perimeter. We got some easy baskets, which we’ve always struggled to get those at times.”
The simple game plan also helped UMass’ decision-making. The team had just nine turnovers, only two of which came in the second half. That allowed the Minutemen to have assists on 26 of their 38 baskets. Pierre and freshman Sean East each had seven assists.
UMass only ran away in the second half because of the momentum it created over the final 10 minutes of the opening 20 minutes. Saint Joseph’s made 10 of it first 15 shots to open up a 10-point lead nine minutes into the game. A quick adjustment at the under-12 media break was all UMass needed to go on a 16-2 run that turned the game in its favor.
“We were down 10 because of our effort,” McCall said. “It’s something we preach every single day and it’s something we reward, and the guys who are logging a lot of minutes right now bring that effort. At the beginning of the game, it wasn’t where we needed it to be.”