UA-Northwestern State Scouting Report

Probable starters

ARIZONA

• G Kadeem Allen (6-3 junior)
• G Gabe York (6-3 senior)
• F Mark Tollefsen (6-9 senior)
• F Ryan Anderson (6-9 senior)
• C Kaleb Tarczewski (7-0 senior)

NORTHWESTERN STATE

• G Devonte Hall (6-1 sophomore)
• G Zeek Woodley (6-2 junior)
• F Tra’von Joseph (6-5 junior)
• F Malik Metoyer (6-7 freshman)
• C Ishmael Lane (6-8 freshman)

HOW THEY MATCH UP

The series: Arizona has never played Northwestern State, a Southland Conference school located in Natchitoches, La.

Northwestern State overview: Bored and frustrated with the low-scoring trend in college basketball today? The Demons are your antidote. Northwestern State led the country in scoring average at 84.0 last season, and was second in the two prior seasons. The Demons do it by deploying sets of five players at a time for about four minutes each, keeping everyone fresh while pressing and running frenetically. The flip side is that their defense doesn’t always keep pace. In fact, NSU was the worst in the nation in scoring defense (83.0), even as it won 19 games and reached the CIT. The emphasis is slightly different this season, because the Demons have trusty interior players such as Ishmael Lane, Colby Koontz and juco transfer Levi Yancy, though Koontz has not yet played and did not make the trip to Arizona because of a concussion.

KEY PLAYERS

Northwestern State

Zeek Woodley

Woodley scored a school-record 711 points last season, shot 56 percent overall from the field and 39.8 percent from three-point range. He’s averaging 28.3 over three games so far this season. Need we say more?

Arizona

Kadeem Allen

If Allen is to become the Wildcats’ perimeter stopper coach Sean Miller is hoping for, Sunday night will be a good time to start against Woodley. Though if past precedent is any indication, the Wildcats will rotate in a host of players on the Demons’ demon.

SIDELINES

Up-tempo bliss

The Demons might seem the most exhausted team in Division I, with their up-tempo offense, but that’s not a bad thing entirely. “Everybody’s happy because they’re playing,” Woodley says. Because the Demons wear out five guys, then put in another five guys, that means the team automatically goes at least 10 deep. They all get buckets, too: Already this season, five Demons have scored in double figures: Woodley, Jalan West, Sabri Thompson, Devonte Hall and Lane. Woodley has a 30-point game and a 20-point game. Last season, nine reached double figures, including Woodley’s 31 games of 10 or more and West’s 29 games in double digits. West had four 30-point performances and Woodley had two.

Privateer reunion

If the University of New Orleans was in the Southland Conference back in 2011, UA associate head coach Joe Pasternack and Northwestern State assistant coach Bill Lewit might not be facing each other Sunday night.

Lewit was an assistant coach for Pasternack at New Orleans from 2009-11, the last two years Pasternack coached the Privateers. “Hardest working assistant that I have seen,” Pasternack said. But the two coaches left the Privateers in 2011 after the school began steering toward Division II or Division III in the wake of Hurricane Katrina-induced enrollment drops and budget cuts. Then, a year after the two coaches left, UNO announced it would stay in Division I, and arranged to join the Southland in 2013-14.

Lewit, who coached Cecil College of Maryland to a junior college national title in 2006, also brings some football knowledge to the Demons: He played football at Salisbury (Md.) State along with new Atlanta Falcons coach Dan Quinn.

On the road again

Northwestern State guard Jalan West called the Star at 8:45 a.m., Central Time, on Saturday, just after the Demons hopped on a bus in Natchitoches, La. He had plenty of time to talk: The ride to Dallas would be about four hours, to be followed by a two-hour bus ride to Tucson. “It’s not too bad,” West said. Maybe that’s because he’s a senior who’s used to the grind by now. In an age when high-major teams such as Arizona fly charter to nearly every game, the Demons hit the road, literally, to their Southland Conference games and to reach distant airports when the games are even farther away. “We ride the bus a lot,” West said.

Numbers game

5 Straight seasons Arizona has started a season 4-0, which it can reach with a win tonight.

85 Percent of Northwestern State basketball players to graduate, as of the most recent Graduation Success Report, the highest of Louisiana public school teams.

96.8 Average percent capacity McKale Center has been filled to during the Wildcats’ 41-game home-court winning streak

Bruce Pascoe