The University of Cincinnati men's basketball team is a few bounces and a couple better late-game stretches away from being 5-0 this season. But the reality is the Bearcats are 2-3 after back-to-back losses.
Cincinnati rallied from a 12-point deficit Wednesday night against South Florida and had a chance to win or at least send the game into overtime. Instead, UC opened American Athletic Conference play with a 74-71 loss in what was the 500th game at Fifth Third Arena.
"We need to become more solid in several areas," Cincinnati coach John Brannen said. "I thought we were there, or at least we were trending in that direction for Tennessee. We took a step backwards tonight. When you have a younger team, that happens. You take steps backwards. Unfortunately, in this 2020 season of two conference games in December, and who knows how many games you're going to get in, you're not afforded that opportunity."
The loss marked only the 85th for the program inside "The Shoe" since it opened for the 1989-90 season. But for this team, it was the second loss in five days. The Bearcats (2-3, 0-1 AAC) fell 65-56 at then-No. 12/16 (AP/Coaches) Tennessee on Saturday.
Up next: Cincinnati will hit the road to take on another Southeastern Conference opponent in Georgia (5-0) on Saturday. Tipoff is scheduled for 8 p.m. on the SEC Network.
What we learned from Wednesday's loss:
Brannen is happy with his team's execution, but not happy with its lack of consistency
Following Saturday's loss in Knoxville, Tennessee, Brannen said his teams' priority before facing South Florida on Wednesday was to "become better at execution," particularly late in games.
The Bearcats held a lead against the Volunteers with less than six minutes to play. It was the second time this season UC was ahead under the 6:00 mark and lost (Xavier on Dec. 6).
But Cincinnati's execution wasn't the problem against the Bulls (5-2, 1-0 AAC),
"We got better at the execution. We definitely did that," Brannen said following Wednesday's loss. "We executed the actions. We didn't always finish them, but we executed them pretty well. But for some reason we slid back and didn't play with enough consistency defensively. And when we did play with enough consistency defensively, we would throw the ball away or we would miss a gimme. We're young."
The Bearcats are young. They're depending on two freshmen, forward Tari Eason and guard Mike Saunders Jr., to play a lot of minutes in important stretches. Their mistakes and miscues, though frustrating, are understandable. But Rapolas Ivanauskas' are not.
The 6-foot-10 graduate transfer, who previously played at Northwestern and then at Colgate, had five turnovers for the second straight game. Eason and senior center Chris Vogt each had two turnovers. Cincinnati's big men accounted for nine of the team's 15 turnovers Wednesday night.
"We have young guys, we have new guys. This is a new level for some of our guys, in fact, for most of our guys," Brannen said. "So we have to be able to make some consistent plays. We have to make sure our seniors are providing consistent emotion."
Cincinnati, especially Keith Williams, still hasn't figured out how to defend effectively without fouling
Senior guard Keith Williams single-handedly carried the Bearcats in the second half. The preseason first-team All-AAC selection went on a personal 12-0 run to tie the game at 68 apiece with 4:30 to play.
"Keith's capable of doing that," Brannen said. "We just kind of needed a little more than 20 minutes."
Williams again was limited after committing two quick fouls for the third time this season. He scored three points in just four minutes in the first half and was unavailable in the final seconds of the game after picking up his fifth foul with :08 on the clock.
"The physicality of our league was a concern for me this year due to our young bodies," Brannen said. "I really harped on it and harped on it. To be honest, I think that's why we foul so much, because we really try to make practices as physical as we can to prepare the guys and how we needed to pull back on the fouling and play solid defense. We just didn't do that."
Williams scored a team-high 15 points in 22 minutes.
Eason continues to impress despite freshman hurdles
The 6-foot-8 Seattle native is quickly developing into a really good college basketball player.
Eason got his third start of the season Wednesday night and finished with a team-high nine rebounds and 13 points, including a 3-pointer with 41 seconds left that pulled Cincinnati within 73-71.
Eason also had three assists, two steals, a block and made four of his six free-throw attempts.
"He's an outstanding player," Brannen said. "It's going to take him a little while to understand the physicality of this league. But listen, the guy's getting 13 and nine. So, bottom line is: He's understanding his capabilities and how important he is to our team."