UW Basketball Looks to Rebound Against Xavier in Vegas

The Huskies come off disheartening home loss to Nevada.

After a disturbing home loss, a supposedly star-studded University of Washington basketball team finds itself in Las Vegas on Friday night, looking for redemption against a tough opponent.

The Huskies, built around a pair of former Kentucky starters, takes on a Sean Miller-coached Xavier team in the Continental Tire Main Event in a game that tips off at 9 p.m. in T-mobile Arena and will be shown nationally on ESPN2. San Diego State and St. Mary's also are entered. 

Miller, of course, coached at Arizona for a dozen seasons before he was fired in 2021 following a scandal involving compensated middlemen steering players to his program.

The Huskies (2-1) come off an 83-76 defeat to Nevada the previous Sunday in which they never led, shot extremely poorly from the foul line (9-for-21) and offered minimal offense from 3-point range (7-for-24).

This matchup against Xavier (2-1), which lost its most recent outing to second-ranked Purdue 83-71, would seem crucial to Mike Hopkins' coaching success in his all-important seventh season.

Following fairly mundane 16-16 and 17-15 records, Hopkins has to show a new athletic director in Troy Dannen that he can move the program forward and return to the NCAA Tournament after a four-year absence and, counting Lorenzo Romar's UW, just one appearance over a dozen years.

If Hopkins can't win with all of the talent he's currently assembled — the Kentucky duo, three big men with various skills to offer and a couple of notable shooters — this will be it for him.

For now, everything goes through the following starters: 6-foot-7 senior holdover forward Keion Brooks and 5-foot-9 senior point guard Sahvir Wheeler, the SEC imports, who've teamed with 6-foot-10 Nebraska transfer Wilhelm Breidenbach, plus 6-foot-8 Portland transfer Moses Wood and 6-foot-6 Rutgers transfer Paul Mulcahy. 

Brooks and Wheeler lead the Huskies in scoring, averaging 24.3 and 16 points per game, respectively. It is hoped that Wood will provide a 3-point shooting threat so obviously missing in recent seasons, however he got in foul trouble against Nevada and connected on just 2 of 6 shots behind the line.

"We need Moses in the game," Hopkins said.

Hopkins is attempting to use 10 veteran players in different rotations, an approach that seems a little haphazard so far while trying to establish team chemistry.

The Huskies' second five includes a pair of seasoned big men in 7-foot-1 Braxton Meah and 6-foot-11 Franck Kepnang; 6-foot-2 guard Koren Johnson, who scored 25 points in the season opener; 6-foot-2 Lamar transfer Nate Calmese, and 6-foot-5 Fresno Staste transfer Anthony Holland.

Hopkins also has a touted freshman Wesley Yates III, a Texan who's been injured and unavailable.

The Xavier and the UW traveling parties will have the added challenge of negotiating Vegas while it shuts down the strip on Saturday night and hosts a Formula 1 auto race, making logistics a little strained. A second round of games will be held on Sunday.

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