Will Wade wasn’t sure whether or not Charles Manning Jr. would admit it, but coming off the bench suits the junior wing’s game.
Of course, that’s just Wade’s opinion, but it’s backed by evidence.
The 16 points on 6-of-8 shooting Manning posted in Tuesday’s 77-50 win over UMBC don’t hurt Wade’s claim.
Neither does the team-high plus-22 plus-minus he posted in 21 minutes, or the three rebounds and a steal he tallied.
“I don’t know if he’d admit this, but I think coming off the bench has helped him,” Wade says of Manning. “I think he’s such a smart player. He’s such a cerebral player. He’s able to see things when he’s out there. Because he’s able to see things and knows what’s going on, once he gets in there, he can just pounce. He can just go.”
The most important support for Wade’s assertion? Manning agrees. In fact, he beat his coach to the punch after the game on the pros of being a super sub.
“Coming off the bench, I like seeing everything first, seeing what I need to do, what areas need help,” Manning said moments before Wade’s comments. “So I don’t really mind coming off the bench. Any way I can help my team. If that’s coming off the bench and giving a spark off the bench, then that’s what I’ll do.”
That’s what he did Tuesday, and his team desperately needed a spark after missing their first eight shots from the field and falling into a 13-5 hole after 11:08. Manning kickstarted the offense with a pair of free throws, before his pull-up jumper made it 13-7 and fueled a 30-6 LSU run.
His second made shot was the product of a Skylar Mays steal. Mays poked the ball free and led the fastbreak, lobbing it up for Manning to throw down.
Good lob mays?? @skylarmays4 https://t.co/bAr8o4PvWS
— Charles Manning Jr (@TheRealCM21) November 20, 2019
That’s the inverse of what the Tigers had grown used to in their first two games, when opponents were turning their turnovers into easy points.
On Tuesday, LSU flipped the script, turning 11 UMBC turnovers into 20 points.
“That’s a key part for our team,” Manning said, “because we’re very athletic, very fast. Once we get stops on defense, get deflections and stuff on defense, that’s going to lead to scoring and open up everything else.”
Manning wasn’t the only LSU newcomer with a strong outing on the night. Freshman Trendon Watford posted his first career double-double, scoring 12 points and 12 rebounds.
Starting with 6-foot-6 Darius Days and 6-foot-7 Emmitt Williams, the 6-foot-9 Watford forms a three-headed monster of versatile forwards who can play inside and out. While Williams (9 points, 6 rebounds in 21 minutes) plays closer to the basket and Days (10 points, 10 rebounds) gives more of a perimeter threat, the mismatches forced by having all three on the court at once pose big problems for opponents.
“I love it,” Watford says. “A lot of teams aren’t that big across the board, especially the two, three, and four spots, with Skylar, me, and Days. I feel like it’s definitely an advantage for us. We can all crash the offensive glass and the defensive glass.”
They crashed the glass on both ends Tuesday, out-retrieving the Retrievers 49 to 31 on missed shots. Defensively, LSU forced plenty of those, holding UMBC to 19-of-61 (31.1%) shooting and 5-of-33 (15.2%) from 3.
The Tigers also minimized their turnovers to 15 – not a great figure, but, in context, an improvement on the 26 and 25 they gave away against VCU and Nicholls, respectively.
For the Tigers, it was an improvement, and Wade admits they needed exactly that before heading to Jamaica and taking on a Utah State team on Friday that’s ranked 15th nationally and whom Wade considers capable of reaching the Final Four.
Fewer turnovers and better defense. A sixth man ready to pounce, and a step in the right direction.
“Overall, we made progress,” Wade says. “We’re not where we need to be. But we’re not where we were either.”