We were returning a team with Perry, Freeny, Dailey, Williams, and Booker. That's five guys who played significant rotation minutes last year and, more importantly, played together quite a bit toward the end of the season. I liked what that group brought defensively. The big question was going to be whether they could generate enough offense.
Arizona, on the other hand, lost a lot of its core players. I believe they return just Kharchenkov and Krivas from their primary rotation. Sure, you could make the argument that we lost Bilodeau, Dent, and Sky, but most of those guys were dealing with injuries toward the end of last season, and we were still playing our best basketball. I just felt that, at this point in the season, we would be further along than Arizona.
Remember, last year we were pretty close to walking away with a win despite Arizona being a significantly more talented team. That's a big part of why I was optimistic about this matchup. I thought our continuity, defensive identity, and experience playing together would give us an advantage early in the season, even if Arizona had more overall talent.
Unfortunately, our last exhibition has me questioning some of those assumptions. The continuity I thought would be one of our biggest advantages doesn't seem to be there in the way I anticipated. Freeny is missing, Williams doesn't appear to be a major part of the plan moving forward, and Booker and Dailey looked like they might have a really difficult time matching up physically with Arizona's frontcourt.
I'm not saying we're going to lose, but it feels like the team that takes the floor will be just as inexperienced as Arizona's. I still like our backcourt matchup better than theirs at this point in the season. I just don't have quite the same confidence that I did a few weeks ago.