AMHERST – Under Frank Martin, the UMass men’s basketball team will stand its ground. He’s made the expectations clear ahead of the Minutemen’s season opener against Central Connecticut State at 7:30 p.m. Monday (ESPN-Plus/NESN-Plus).
The game is part of a doubleheader with the defending Atlantic 10 champion Minutewomen, which also open with CCSU at 5 p.m.
“We’re not getting out of the way. We’re not letting people barge in here and knock our door down. It’s not going to happen,” Martin said. “And if they do happen to knock the door down, there’s gonna be a bunch of guys standing in the doorway saying, ‘you’re not coming in here.’ And that’s gonna be our mindset every time we take the court.”
Crafting that mindset began when UMass introduced Martin in March. He said the Minutemen needed to have an identity. Martin then recruited players to try and match that, bringing some with him from South Carolina and identifying potential underutilized diamonds from other programs.
Only two players that saw the floor in UMass’ season-ending loss to Dayton in last year’s A-10 quarterfinals are still on the roster among five total returners: Noah Fernandes and T.J. Weeks Jr. Dyondre Dominguez played meaningful minutes for last year’s team, while Ryan Marcus and John Kelly contributed in practice.
There are eight transfers among the 11 newcomers.
“I’m also dealing with a group of guys that are playing for me for the first time ever, so I can’t lose focus on us right now. It’s continuing to fight, to build us right now is objective number one,” Martin said. “I can’t get wrapped up right now on opponent, opponent, opponent and not pay attention to us. We still gotta fight to learn how to hold each other accountable for our responsibilities. We have to continue to learn. I’ve got to continue to understand them so I can eliminate any doubt.”
They’ll face a CCSU team that brings back eight players from an 8-24 squad that finished ninth in the 10-team Northeast Conference (NEC). Nigel Scantlebury led the Blue Devils scoring 13.3 points per game.
UMass doesn’t know who its leading scorer will be. Or its starters. Or quite how everyone will fit together. The Minutemen practiced with a full squad for the first time Thursday.
“I want to see us do the things that we’ve practiced for countless hours to this point and do those things with confidence and aggression,” Martin said. “Then the other part, which is the part that nobody other than coaches appreciate, and that’s adversity, when things aren’t going your way in a game. When you’re trying to grow as a team, dealing with those adverse moments in games, that’s when you start learning about your team.”
In those moments – and throughout the game, really – Martin has non-negotiables for players on the floor. Don’t ever quit on a play. Don’t bring personal emotions into the middle of the game. Don’t partake in negativity or selfishness.
“In the exhibition, we had a couple guys that mentally were not where they needed to be, and they heard about it from me. They heard about it during the game and they heard about it after the game,” Martin said. “That, to me, is selfishness. You’re bringing personal agendas that have nothing to do with our team into the moment.”
Kyle Grabowski can be reached at kgrabowski@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @kylegrbwsk.