(Photo: Alyssa Buruato/WCSN)
After being swept by the Los Angeles schools in its final two games of the season, Arizona State men’s basketball finds itself preparing for a first-round matchup against the Oregon State Beavers, who were swept in the regular season by Sun Devils.
Head coach Bobby Hurley and his squad entered the campaign with predictions of a seventh-place conference finish, which would have been an improvement of their eighth-place performance from the previous year. But with a roster full of new players, the Sun Devils stormed out of the gates, winning 15 of their first 18 games and setting historical feats for the best start in program history.
After a remarkable 6-1 start to Pac-12 play, Hurley and company lost four consecutive games, finishing 11-9 in the conference with a 5-8 close to the season.
Entering the final weekend of the regular season, a first-round bye for the Pac-12 Tournament was plausible but would be difficult with road contests against UCLA and USC. With only a couple of games separating teams located in the middle of the Pac-12 standings, ASU hoped the tiebreakers would go its way.
But like the road trip, the hope for winning tiebreakers was futile, as ASU fell to No. 6 in the standings.
“We got Cal one time, but that did not help in terms of the standings,” Hurley said. “I’m sure there were some other factors why teams might’ve finished ahead of us in the standings. The tiebreakers didn’t go our way. Our finish was extremely difficult. For us to get one of those three, I think most people would have signed on for that. We played great competition, especially the last two weeks, and hopefully, that pays dividends and has toughened us up. We’re hitting the crucial part of the season.”
Before conference play began, many Pac-12 teams lost key nonconference games, hindering the competition level in comparison with other Power 6 schools. The conference’s early season struggles hurt ASU’s NCAA Tournament resume, especially in the NET ranking, which is a metric that has implications for Tournament seeding.
“Certain teams were able to get good nonconference wins and bring them into the league. Others unfortunately weren’t. So our league isn’t rated good. As a result of that, even 20-11 is not safe. I think we might have had the same record (as when) the other season was canceled with COVID, and we would have been an eight or nine seed that year if the season stopped. That’s mainly because of a number of teams performed well in the nonconference, and we didn’t have that happen this season. We’re just thinking about this tournament right now and hitting court and trying to win as many games as possible this week.”
Despite the poor finish to the season and the possibility of missing out on the Big Dance, Hurley believes the program made progress this year, citing the resiliency the Sun Devils showed this season. The eight-year head coach also explained how he can relate to this team because he is a “hard-nose guy” like his team.
“A lot of teams fold when they’re facing a deficit and my guys don’t, and they haven’t,” Hurley said. “I have a lot of appreciation and respect for the guys in the locker room and what they have given me all year. That’s why we’re going to go all in and see what we can do and continue the journey. I think this team deserves to play in the NCAA tournament and we’re going to fight like heck tomorrow and the whole week to make that a reality.”
Playing in tournaments brings its own challenges, forcing teams to play games every day and rely on their depth. Throughout the 2022-23 campaign, Hurley has praised his squad’s depth, using a 10-man rotation during the regular season, but the Sun Devils will be without freshman guard Austin Nunez, who has missed the last three games with a concussion. Hurley didn’t rule out the possibility of Nunez returning in the Pac-12 Tournament, as the 6-foot-2 guard is working on cardiovascular exercises.
Hurley is still confident in his team’s ability to make up for Nunez’s absence, explaining the many games key players have played in throughout their careers.
“I think these guys have played a lot of games. Some of our key players, (fifth-year guard) Des (Cambridge Jr.), (senior forward) Devan (Cambridge), (senior forward) Warren (Washington) and (redshirt junior) DJ (Horne) have all played a lot of college basketball so they have that experience.”
