A-10 Basketball: 7 positives and negatives from first month of 2021-22 season

St. Bonaventure’s Elite Backcourt

Kyle Lofton has made First Team All-Conference the past two years but in the early season, he looks like a potential All-American.  After averaging 14.4 points per game last season, Lofton has been more aggressive and scored at least 17 points in 5 of his first 6 games.  In fact, Lofton is up to 17.7 ppg, despite just 1.5 extra shots per game.

The scoring improvements stem from a steadier shot and Lofton hunting for mid-range jumpers that he often eschewed for passes in the past. Three-point shooting still perplexingly remains a weakness but Lofton is back above 30% with over 1 make per game after last season’s awful 24% performance.

The belief among media and fans has been that Lofton could become more of a scoring threat but never would, as it would damage his playmaking.  Well, the increase in scoring has caused a negligible difference in his assists totals (down from 5.5 per game last year to 5.3) and his assist rate of 27.3% is good for 6th in the A-10.

Lofton has found a new level of aggression on offense this season, as both he and Jaren Holmes have been more willing to take tough isolation jumpers, especially when their teammates are struggling.  This comes after the two combined to shoot 9-32 in the NCAA Tournament loss to LSU when the Bonnies’ standard offense sputtered out against LSU’s length.  Both guards are Top 10 in the country in minutes played % and appear to be on a mission to prevent a repeat of their poor performance against the Tigers.

The aforementioned Holmes lacks the elite reputation that Lofton has earned but has been nearly as good as his backcourt mate this year.  The fellow senior’s stats absolutely pop off the page this year, going from 13.8 ppg to 16.8, 5.3 rpg to 7.7, and 2.0 apg to 3.5, as he begins to produce results from the secondary playmaking skill he showed glimpses of in prior years.

Even more impressively than Lofton, Holmes’ scoring increase has come without an increase in field goal attempts, but rather a huge jump in free throw attempts (from 2.7 to 7.2). Holmes has been absolutely fearless in going to the basket so far:

Through the first half dozen games, both guards have established that themselves as leaders for a new level of accolades, Holmes as a First Team All-Conference player and Lofton as an All-American.

Tyler Burton: Blake Francis Replacement

This current iteration of Richmond has relied heavily an elite offense to carry the Spiders to victory so there was concern about the impact of losing leading scorer Blake Francis to the pros last spring.  Junior Tyler Burton has quickly jumped up from his side role to take on Francis’ old burden, and more.  On the surface, Burton’s jump from 12.0 ppg up to 19.0 is a suitable replacement for the loss of Francis’ 16.1 ppg but he has actually been an improvement.

Burton has been en fuego with a 45.9% three-point percentage on 5.3 attempts a game and an immeasurable amount of confidence.  Just look at Burton holding the hand up after the flick of the wrist on a dagger shot against Hofstra:

Burton has found a way to provide Francis’ scoring, combined with his own excellent efficiency from last year, as he is 2nd in the A-10 in scoring but his usage rate is outside of the Top 20, largely due to his 8th best effective field goal percentage.

He showed signs of this ability late last season, scoring 18 points in back-to-back postseason games against Duquesne and Toledo with a depleted Richmond roster. This year, he has started with four 20-point outings across 7 games, including a career-high 30 vs Drake.  Burton’s emergence has kept Richmond in the Top 50 nationally in offensive efficiency, despite the struggles of most of his teammates on that end.