Washington will be playing its fourth game in six days when it hosts well-rested Winthrop on Saturday night in Seattle.
Winthrop (2-3) has been idle since a 92-86 loss at Washington State on Monday. Patrick Good tallied 33 points for the Eagles, all from beyond the arc, but couldn’t quite rally the visitors from a 24-point second-half deficit.
Washington (4-3) played three games in three days in the four-team, round-robin Crossover Classic in Sioux Falls, S.D., from Monday to Wednesday. The Huskies beat George Mason and South Dakota State before losing to Nevada.
After the loss to the Wolf Pack, Washington coach Mike Hopkins said, “You realize energy is really important. I felt like today we just didn’t have the pop.”
Terrell Brown Jr., who is averaging 22.4 points and 3.7 assists for the Huskies, totaled 74 points in the three games, including 32 in the win over South Dakota State.
“For the most part, I felt like we really improved,” Hopkins said after the final game. “We saw what the recipe for winning for us is, and we saw what the recipe for losing is for us. That’s what you play in these tournaments for. You learn a lot about your team.”
Winthrop is in its first season under head coach Mark Prosser, a former assistant who coached for three seasons at Western Carolina before returning to Winthrop.
The Eagles are 1-3 against Division I opponents with road losses to Middle Tennessee, Vanderbilt and Washington State, but were picked to win the Big South’s South Division in a preseason poll.
Prosser doesn’t see that as pressure, saying, “That’s sort of the expectation level at Winthrop. We wouldn’t want to be here if it wasn’t.”
D.J. Burns Jr. averages 16.0 points and Patrick Good adds 15.6 per game for the Eagles, who have 10 players who average at least 13.6 minutes.
–Field Level Media
