Georgetown GLOBL Jam Report

It’s been a little over a week since Georgetown took the trip to Canada for the GLOBL Jam Tournament. These are just exhibitions, and Georgetown was without two massive contributors, KJ Lewis and Langston Love, but there are still some takeaways to be had, both positive and negative. Here’s what I took away from the Hoyas on this trip.

Ball Movement

This roster has guys who played together growing up (Malik Mack, Deshawn Harris-Smith, Caleb Williams, Isaiah Abraham), but even so, I was very impressed by the ball movement from this Hoya group. Georgetown doesn’t have a ton of individual offensive creators, especially without the aforementioned Lewis and Love. Without Love, this roster also doesn’t have a ton of shooting.

The way to overcome that is by moving the ball and doing so with purpose. That’s what the Hoyas did on this trip. Across four games, the Hoyas had 75 assists on 110 made field goals. A 68% Assist Rate would’ve ranked first in the country last year. In particular, Malik Mack averaged 7.5 assists to just three turnovers on this trip, looking more comfortable as a lead guard.

It’s a very small sample size, and one that is boosted by beating up on a Japan team that just isn’t D1 caliber, but the ball movement was a very positive takeaway if you’re a Hoya fan, and one that you have to hope continues during the season.

Moving the ball allows for shooters to get much better looks (which could mask some of the shooting shortcomings on this roster), and keeps the defense honest on all five guys, which will open up driving lanes. Some of Ed Cooley’s best teams at Providence moved the ball very well, and if the Hoyas want to take the next step to making the NCAA Tournament, great ball movement will go a long way.

DeShawn Harris-Smith

Once a very highly-touted freshman, DeShawn Harris-Smith had a promising freshman year at Maryland, which saw him named to the Big Ten All-Freshman team. He took a step back in his sophomore season and announced his transfer to Georgetown. Harris-Smith isn’t coming to the Hilltop with sky-high expectations, but he was impressive in his minutes at the GLOBL Jam.

Harris-Smith suffered an injury at the end of the Canada game, but toughed it out and finished the tournament, despite Coach Cooley saying he didn’t expect to play him.

Harris-Smith stuffed the stat sheet, averaging 12.3PPG, 7.5RPG and 4APG, while shooting 50% from the field. In particular, he excelled in the Championship Game against Brazil, where he put up 17 points and six boards, while shooting 61% from the field. Harris-Smith showed his physical driving ability, and versatility on both ends will earn him more minutes than expected. 

His defense was on display this entire tournament, guarding 1-5, and taking on some pretty tough matchups. Georgetown also shouldn’t expect him to be the secondary offensive option during the season, as he was in this tournament, which should allow him to be more of a glue guy. He showed he could initiate some offense, and is physical enough to play some PF minutes, which he may be called upon to do.

I wouldn’t expect Harris-Smith to light up the score sheet, but he will put up some very balanced efforts, and could be a glue guy that this team will really need.

Three-Point Defense

On the offensive end, ball movement typically improves as you develop chemistry with your teammates. On the defensive end, that’s guarding the perimeter. And where Georgetown’s ball movement shined, their perimeter defense did not.

A lot of the errors came with missed rotations and not understanding assignments (Ed Cooley announced before the tournament that Georgetown wasn’t scouting opponents to focus on what they do, and Brazil was able to exploit this in the title game).

In their two contests against Brazil, a team that was very clearly super well-connected offensively and played a very disciplined game plan, the Hoyas struggled defending the perimeter. Brazil, across these two contests, shot 26/59 (44.1%) from beyond the arc.

In the first game, the Hoyas got up 13 late in the fourth quarter before Brazil made their next six three-point attempts en route to taking a one-point lead, before one of the weirdest endings to a basketball game I’ve ever seen.

Now, some of these threes were certainly just prayers (in particular the one Gabriel Landeira hit late in the game), but Brazil noted this weakness in this game, and exploited it in the Championship Game.

Brazil made 14 threes in the title game, with many of them coming off screens or in rhythm off the catch. Some of this may be Georgetown not scouting, but a lot of this was Brazil finding gaps in Georgetown’s defense (particularly off screen/re-screen actions) and exploiting openings.

Georgetown’s interior defense looked very physically overpowering, but their attention to detail will be something the coaches are drilling in for the next two months. An exhibition against Kentucky, a team with similar offensive principles to Brazil, will be a huge test of the Hoyas' improvement in this area.

Interior Play

The backcourt for this Georgetown group is legit. They have depth, experience and should all be bulldogs defensively. The frontcourt, particularly at the five spot, is a much bigger question.

Vince Iwuchukwu took the lead for the Hoyas, especially in the two games against a very physical Brazil team. His best two games were the two against Brazil, where he averaged 13PPG and 7RPG (compared to 9.5/5.3 across the tournament). He showed he was starting to fit in with this group much better as the tournament wore on. However, the Brazilian big man he went against in those games for most of those minutes was Nathan Mariano, who, while very skilled, is just 6’7”.

Julius Halaifonua, on the other hand, I thought struggled. While the team was practicing together over the Summer, Juice was representing New Zealand at the U19 games, and clearly wasn’t on the same page with some of his teammates in these games. Julius can also really stretch the floor for this Hoyas team, but was 0/8 from three in these games, which certainly hindered his performance. The next two months for Halaifonua are critical to getting on the same page with his teammates and helping him be an effective college big this season and beyond. You can see the potential is oozing with Halaifonua, and we will see if he can actualize it during this season.

Vince Iwuchukwu, I thought, played much better as this tournament went on, but it’s hard to know how much stock you can put into his performance. The bigs will be a question for this Georgetown team, and one that I don’t think we have any clear answers on yet.

Overall

We know this team will have its bread buttered on the defensive end. Some more work on closeouts and getting everyone on the same page should have this team really ready to defend in this league.

Malik Mack and DeShawn Harris-Smith were the two standouts for me. Mack settled into his role as a floor general, and the offense more or less went about as far as he could take them. Hopefully, with Lewis and Love back soon, the Hoyas can rely less on their starting PG and his efficiency can climb. Still, last season, Mack had just three games with seven or more assists. In this tournament, he had three. He’s more comfortable as a lead guard, and in my mind this Hoyas team goes as far as he can take them.

DeShawn Harris-Smith really impressed me. He’s a junkyard dog and showed some vision of the guy he was in high school. I don’t expect him to light up the score sheet, but he’s going to earn more minutes than expected on this team.

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It’s fun to see some basketball back on our TV’s. Before we know it, full preview season will be upon us, and I can’t wait for that to come.

Also, shoutout to the Finger Wag guys for calculating stats across the entire tournament. Saved me a ton of time having to do it myself. If you want to see the rest of the stats across the tournament, they're just below.

PPS: DePaul fans... Atauri is nice. He'll be a fairly productive shooter off the bench. He's tough, that's a nice pickup.