George Mason heads to South Florida for last non-conference game

The Patriots have their non-conference finale tomorrow at South Florida (TV: MASN), the last of a good group of opponents this year. While they have may have missed their opportunities to capitalize on this tough schedule, this last game is another one that will help them more establish themselves as the leader of the pack in the CAA. It will be important to see if Mason can finally start to show some consistency and follow up that thrilling win against Richmond without another strong performance against a Big East school. 

South Florida has a big front court and Mason's bigs will need to play much better than they have of late. The silly turnovers and ball mishandling has got to stop and it nearly ruined them against Richmond. Johnny Williams seems to be in a bit of a funk and the rest of group just isn't consistent. Something they did improve on in the Richmond game was getting to the free-throw line more. On the other end of that they continue to send opposing teams to the line far too often. And it stems from the forwards, especially Erik Copes and Jon Arledge.  As a whole they need more discipline on defense and need to be more assertive on offense. Teams are going to continue to focus on Sherrod Wright and needs front court scoring to take the load off his shoulders.

With the size of South Florida's lineup we may see more of Jon Arledge, Anali Okoloji, and Marko Gujanicic and less of Patrick Holloway and Vertrail Vaughns. Just a hunch by the way Paul Hewitt has run the rotation against similar teams in the past. Foul trouble could throw a wrench into this plan as we mentioned above and that's where Mason could get into to trouble. Also, South Florida doesn't turn over the ball much and doesn't send opposing teams to the free-throw much either. Three-point shooting could be key for Mason again.

The big question however continues to be whether Corey Edwards can remain the team's starting point guard. He probably had his best career game against Richmond, no forced shots, only one turnover, and he seemed to stabilize the team on offense. Defensively, he's grown into a much tougher guy in the back court, something the team had been missing outside of Sherrod Wright. In some ways, when he's on the court he makes Wright even more dangerous. I think his strong play opened things up in the second half against Richmond for Wright. Paul Hewitt seems to have made the right call with Edwards and Allen and just at right time too. That don't need him to launch threes and score 13 points a night but they do need him to keep the offense running smoothly and it seems he is on his way to doing just that.