Richmond Basketball: 2020-21 season preview for the Spiders

Nick Sherod’s injury has thrown an unexpected wrench into Richmond Basketball’s March Madness hopes. But, the Spiders still have enough firepower to make some noise.

Richmond Basketball entered the season with potential Final Four expectations – before those hopes were dashed by an injury to starting wing Nick Sherod.  Now, the Spiders – still arguably the favorites to win the Atlantic 10 – will start the 2020-21 season as an underdog.

It may be unusual to call a team that finished 24-7 last season and are one of the top three teams in, arguably, the best mid-major conference an “underdog,” but that is just what Richmond is.  They are a senior-laden squad that went 12-20 in 2017-18 and 13-20 in 2018-19 but nearly ran the tables last season in a conference dominated by Obi Toppin and the Dayton Flyers.

The Spiders, led by 16th-year head coach Chris Mooney, are coming off their most successful season in ten years, going 24-7 overall with a 14-4 record in A-10 play.  Backed by an experienced squad of juniors in Jacob Gilyard, Blake Francis, Nick Sherod, Nathan Cayo, and Grant Golden, the Spiders picked up notable non-conference victories over Vanderbilt, Wisconsin, and Boston College, and were guaranteed an NCAA tournament bid last season.

Instead of opting to test the professional waters, those five players – who all started at least 25 games for Richmond last season – returned for one last go with the Spiders.  With Toppin now gone from Dayton, Richmond was undoubtedly the heavy favorites in the A-10 – more-so than the Flyers and the Jordan Goodwin-led Saint Louis Billikens.

Richmond’s potential was recognized nationally, as well.  In late September, Andy Katz placed the Spiders at 25th in his Power 36 rankings, adding onto their repertoire of national preseason rankings from media outlets such as Stadium (#14) and NBC Sports (#24).  A few weeks later, Katz named Richmond as one of his seven “Final Four sleepers.”

All of that was until Oct. 19, when Richmond announced that Nick Sherod – the team’s best three-point shooter and starting small forward – had torn his ACL in his right knee.

Obviously, Sherod’s season-ending injury sets the national expectations a little lower for the Spiders, but that should not prevent the Spiders from making any noise come the 2020-21 season.  They have a few quality options available to fill the hole left by Sherod, and Mooney does still return the other four starters.

This is not a team that has dropped below Dayton and Saint Louis when it comes to A-10 expectations – there is more of an equal playing ground now, undeniably – but the Spiders are also still capable of a deep run in the postseason.  This is not anything new for the Spiders – in the 2011 NCAA Tournament, they defeated Vanderbilt and Morehead State to reach the Sweet Sixteen as a 12-seed.

The Spiders have experience – they return 11 of the 14 players who saw time on the floor last season – and they have some solid depth, too.  With Sherod’s injury, the four returning starters will have to see an uptick in scoring to keep the Spiders successful, but they are more than capable after averaging a combined 52.7 points per game last season.

Thankfully, for the Spiders, Sherod’s position is one of their deepest spots, and Mooney will have the luxury of experimenting without much error until he can find a suitable answer.