Rhode Island Basketball: 2019-20 season review for the Rams

Despite The Late Season Fading, The Rams Eclipsed 20+ Wins for the Fourth Time In Six Seasons and Provided A Naismith Trophy Nominee.  All-in-all, that sounds like a good season.

At the start of the season, the A10 spotlight showed brightly upon VCU and Davidson while some of the light spilled over onto Dayton.  No, seriously, they only received one first-place vote!

I digress.

For the Rams, most felt their season would place them in the middle of the pack when it turned out that they were near the top of the heap for a good portion of the season.  At 21-9, Rhode Island earned 7 wins against KenPom Top 100 programs, an increase from 4 the season prior.

Rams faithful knew the schedule was pretty heavy and would’ve liked a few wins out of the grab bag of marquee opponents.  By beating Alabama, Providence, Western Kentucky, North Texas and VCU by an average margin of 11 points?

That’s a successful stretch.

Additionally, the national emergence of Fatts Russell was quite the experience to see unfold.  While his game hit a downward trend towards the end of the season, you can’t discount how red hot Russell was for a good portion of the season.

In fact, in February Fatts was one of 30 names on the Naismith trophy watchlist.  Along with the Rhody guard were some familiar faces: Obi Toppin of Dayton, Georgia’s Freshman sensation Anthony Edwards, Kansas big man Udoka Azubuike, ACC Player of the Year Tre Jones of Duke, and elite scorer in Marquette’s Markus Howard among others.

Expectations can be relative, and if we were to judge the season on what fans hoped for in February then it might be a letdown.  However, if we were to consider expectations heading into the year, then it’s very difficult to consider the 2019-20 campaign anything less than a success for Rhode Island.