AMHERST — Matt McCall can run down the list of his transfers and describe their strengths.
After practice last week, the UMass coach highlighted many of the positives fans can expect from the four players who sat out last year after transferring in before the season.
Fairfield transfer guard Curtis Cobb is a proven Division I scorer who “knows the right play to make.” Memphis defect Keon Clergeot has played with “unbelievable energy” in practice and has “lived in the lane” for the Minutemen. Kieran Hayward, who arrived from LSU, has shown he can be a reliable spot-up shooter most days, and McCall was very complimentary of Rutgers transfer Jonathan Laurent, who the coach said could play a variety of positions for UMass.
The issue McCall is trying to avoid is putting unrealistic expectations on players who haven’t played a competitive game in more than a year.
“They’re excited about playing,” McCall said. “But you can’t go in with a preconceived expectation of how things are going to go because you’re immediately going to be let down if they don’t go that way. (They need to) focus on playing really hard, making the right play on offense and put (their) focus there.”
The lack of recent playing time is actually a theme on the UMass roster this season. Only three players who returned this year for McCall’s second season saw significant minutes for the Minutemen last year — junior guard Luwane Pipkins, sophomore guard Carl Pierre and sophomore guard Unique McLean.
The other two key returners from last season — Rashaan Holloway and Khalea Turner-Morris — both missed time for various reasons. Turner-Morris averaged just six minutes per appearance in 24 games, while Holloway was academically ineligible for the second half of last season.
McCall said it will be a slow process for everyone to adjust to playing important minutes
“There’s going to be some rust and there’s going to be some growing that we’re going to have to do as a team as we move forward,” McCall said. “… There’s going to be a transition that we’re going to have to go through here once the lights are on and we’re under the whistle where we’re not going to be playing our best basketball in November; nobody is. If you are peaking in November, you’ve got a problem. The goal is to be playing our best basketball in January, February and March.”
A-10 HONOR: UMass senior DeAndrae Brown was named the Atlantic 10 Conference’s men’s soccer player of the week on Monday after scoring two goals for the Minutemen last week.
His team-leading seventh goal of the season gave UMass a 2-0 lead in an eventual 3-2 loss at Rhode Island on Wednesday. The UConn transfer then scored the winning goal for the Minutemen in the 54th minute of UMass’ 1-0 home win over Fordham on Saturday.
HOCKEY NOTES: Cale Makar’s career-high four points in the season-opening 6-1 win over Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute on Friday earned the sophomore defenseman the Hockey East player of the week honor Monday.
Makar scored two goals and added two power-play assists to help spark the Minutemen’s offense. He helped anchor the UMass defense Saturday in a 3-1 win over the Engineers to help the Minutemen improve to 2-0 this season.
The weekend sweep of RPI helped catapult UMass in the U.S. College Hockey Online poll. The Minutemen received 71 points in the rankings released Monday, which placed them just outside the top-20 as the would-be No. 21 team in the nation. UMass received 15 points in the same poll last week.
In the USA Hockey poll, the Minutemen increased their point total from six to seven despite being jumped by two teams in the receiving votes category.
Josh Walfish can be reached at jwalfish@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshWalfishDHG. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage.
