Arch Madness Quarterfinal Friday started with a pupil vs. teacher matchup. Anakin Skywalker vs. Obi-Wan Kenobi. Daniel LaRusso vs. Mr. Miyagi.
It was Bryan Mullins, the second-year head coach at Southern Illinois, taking on his former boss, Porter Moser, and his 20th-ranked Loyola Chicago Ramblers for the third time in a week. Loyola Chicago won both previous games, the latter of which needed overtime.
But in St. Louis Friday afternoon, overtime wasn’t even a thought as the No. 1-seeded Ramblers proved why they’re the top defensive team in the country in their dominating 73-49 win over the No. 9-seeded Salukis.
Loyola Chicago held Southern Illinois to 39.6 percent shooting from the floor, including 22.2 percent from outside the arc. Senior forward Anthony D’Avanzo and freshman guard Dalton Banks combined for 30 of the Salukis’ 43 points.
But the Ramblers did it on both ends, assisting on 19 of 27 made field goals — with redshirt sophomore Braden Norris dishing out a season-high nine dimes.
“We want to be a tough, greedy team on defense, then we want to execute offensively,” said Loyola Chicago guard Lucas Williamson, the 2021 Missouri Valley Conference Defensive Player of the Year. Ultimately, that’s why we’ve had success this whole year. We want to carry that into the postseason.”
The surprise performer of the game was freshman big man Jacob Hutson, who dropped 13 points and hit both his three-point attempts to help lead Loyola Chicago to victory. Hutson, who was originally going to redshirt this season as a walk-on, got a waiver because of the NCAA’s “free year” ruling and put together solid minutes for the Ramblers in their three games against Southern Illinois.
After the game, Ramblers coach Porter Moser said Hutson benefits from going up against Krutwig in practice, but he was most impressed with how the young big man filled in for Krutwig when he went down with cramps Feb. 26.
“Jacob’s just kept on getting better and better and better,” Moser said. “We’ve always known he’s been able to shoot it. He shoots it all the time in practice. … But that kid’s development from the beginning of the year to [now] is really great to see and well-needed.”
Southern Illinois wrapped up its play-in game against Bradley just 16 hours before tip-off against Loyola Chicago. That’s not a lot of time to prepare for a game, especially considering SIU entered the tournament with 62 combined minutes of Arch Madness experience.
On top of that, the Salukis were without sophomore guard Lance Jones, who became their leading scorer after sophomore guard Marcus Domask suffered a foot injury. Jones went down with an injury in game one against Bradley but was unable to go against Loyola Chicago.
Salukis coach Bryan Mullins said while he’s proud of how his players handled all that was thrown at them this year, they still had chances to keep close with Loyola Chicago early before the Ramblers ran away with it.
“Losing Lance yesterday … getting back to the hotel at 8:30 and then playing here at 11 a.m, it was a quick turnaround for our guys,” said Salukis coach Bryan Mullins. “We had some opportunities early in the game, I think if some shots would’ve fell, to give us some momentum to weather the storm a little bit. Loyola executed better on offense and defense today.”
Most importantly for Loyola Chicago, though: no one on the roster played more than 30 minutes. That’s important in a tournament setting and the next game is 23 hours after the last game ended.
Moser said even though the Ramblers didn’t yet know their opponent — they had to wait for No. 4-seeded Indiana State to defeat No. 5-seeded Evansville — they’re doing their due diligence to prepare for either scenario.
“We’ve already had the preparations for both teams,” Moser said. “That’s the benefit of having the one seed. We got some time to go back, get some food, rest, relax, see who we play … then we’ll get together at the hotel and game plan, just like all these other coaches doing the same thing [during] these tournaments.”