Kent State opens the season this Monday at Louisiana as part of the MAC/Sun Belt Challenge. Offensively, the Flashes will look to get back to their identity, to use their defense to create offense and to push in transition for easy baskets. They will look to share the ball, make simple plays and pound the offensive glass. All staples under Coach Senderoff and his staff for the last decade plus.
Of course in order to push and get out and run, getting stops, forcing live ball turnovers and defensive rebounding is important.
With a lot of expected depth and guys that can score, different people can step up on different nights. Between Von Cameron Davis (13.6 ppg last year), newcomer Marquis Barnett (16.4 ppg last year at Presbyterian) and Morgan Safford (15.4 ppg at Miami in 22-23) and others, the Flashes have the ability to be potent offensively.
“We do have a lot of guys who can score the ball so we need to get the ball in and up the court quickly and get great shots in transition, get to the glass, make sure we take care of the basketball so that we can have a lot of shot opportunities and a lot of possessions,” Senderoff said on our Basketball Preview Show Wednesday night on Twitter/X. “In our most recent scrimmage (St. Bonaventure) we had 23 assists on 28 baskets which is awesome. If we can share the basketball at that level we’re going to have a lot of success so we just need to keep doing that.”
Offensively, the Flashes will look to continue to play heavily through the senior Davis. Nicknamed I-95 in the MAC Tournament by Jim Christian, Davis can score and facilitate.
“Von’s amazing how he has developed over his time here,” Senderoff said. “His first couple years here struggled to really pass the ball. If you look at his assist to turnover ratio it wasn’t great but as we moved on in the season, he became one of our best passers, along with being a really good scorer. As you mentioned he scores a lot down low, he’s really physical. But he’s going to be a guy we play through a lot whether it’s the mid post, the elbow, he shoots the ball well enough that everybody has to respect his shot from 3.”
With added depth and scoring punch, Davis has a lot of help. His ability to read defensive coverages and make the right play will be important.
“There’s gonna be a lot of times that we need him to create double teams because of his ability to score one on one, make the right plays out of the post and create offense,” Senderoff continued. “And at the same time we have a lot of guys that can score 10, 15, 20 points in a game so there may be nights that he just has to have six or seven assists in a game and guys are crowding him and he’s moving the ball and helping us in that way.”
With an increased emphasis on physicality this year, playing in the paint off two feet, getting to the free throw line, and crashing the offensive glass will hopefully lead to some rhythm three point shots for Kent State’s very capable shooters.