TUCSON, Ariz. - The undefeated Arizona Wildcats men's basketball team returns home to the McKale Center for a Saturday matinee against the Colgate Raiders, with tip-off slated for 1:00 p.m. MST on Pac-12 Network. Daron Sutton and Don MacLean will have the call. The No. 2 ranked Wildcats are coming off a 74-68 win against No. 21 Michigan State in Palm Springs on Thanksgiving Day while Colgate defeated Binghamton earlier this week.
STARTING FIVE
1) Sophomore guard Kylan Boswell ranks second in the country in 3FG%, connecting at a 58.6% clip so far this season. He also leads the Wildcats in scoring at 13.5 ppg.
2) Following the Thanksgiving Day win over No. 21 Michigan State, Arizona is Arizona is 13-4 against AP Top 25 teams under Tommy Lloyd, the best winning percentage (.765) in the country. The Wildcats are 9-4 vs. Top 25 teams in road/neutral sites.
3) Caleb Love has an assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.55 this season, easily ahead of his career ratio of 1.28.
4) Keshad Johnson was named MVP of the Acrisure Classic vs. Michigan State, finishing with 13 points, 10 rebounds for his fifth career double-double and first at Arizona. He also made two free throws with two minutes left and blocked a MSU shot in the final 15 seconds.
5) Arizona leads the country in rebound margin (+19.0 per game) and scoring (95.3 ppg).
SERIES VS. COLGATE
• This will be the first meeting between the two schools
NOTING THE WILDCATS
• At least five players have scored in double figures in each of Arizona's six games to this point, becoming the third team since 1996-97 to do that. The other teams were Duke (7 games) and UCLA (6) to start the 2016-17 season.
• Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd is in his third season with the Wildcats and has a record of 67-11 and has started each of his three seasons 6-0.
• In the Michigan State game on Thanksgiving Day, 5.18 million people tuned in to the game on FOX, the most for regular season game on any network since 2008.
• Since the start of the 2021-22 season, Arizona has recorded 20+ assists in 42 out of 78 games to lead the nation. The next best total is 26 games by Utah State.
• Arizona is outscoring its opponents, 290-156, in the paint through six games.
• The Wildcats are one of five teams in the country with two wins over AP Top 25 teams this season (Purdue, Kansas, Marquette, UNC).
• Freshman Motiejus Krivas scored 20 points off the bench against Belmont, the first Arizona post player to score 20 off the bench since Oumar Ballo did it on Jan. 20, 2022 at Stanford.
• The preseason All Pac-12 teams featured four Wildcats: senior Oumar Ballo (first team), senior Caleb Love (second), sophomore Kylan Boswell (second) and senior Pelle Larson (honorable mention).
• Ballo was named to the preseason watch list for the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Center of the Year Award, Love is on the preseason list for the Jerry West Shooting Guard of the Year Award and Keshad Johnson is on the preseason list for the Karl Malone Power Forward of the Year Award.
• The Wildcats return 42% of the minutes played from the 2022-23 season and 41% of the scoring from last year's squad.
• Offensively, UA has just 26% of the 3-pointers made and 27% of the 3-pointers attempted a season ago back on the roster this year.
• Arizona has six returning scholarship players and seven new scholarship players - three transfers and four freshmen - on the 2023-24 team.
• The 2023-24 season marks the 119th year of men's basketball for the University of Arizona, and the Wildcats have an all-time record of 1,868-977.
• Redshirt senior Oumar Ballo was named a preseason All-American by Blue Ribbon Magazine and College Hoops Today. Blue Ribbon along with ESPN.com also named him the preseason favorite to earn Pac-12 Player of the Year. He was also tabbed for the Naismith Trophy, NABC and Wooden Award national player of the year preseason watch lists.
WORLDWIDE WILDCATS
Eight different countries, including the United States, are represented on Arizona's 18-man roster. The countries include Serbia, Sweden, Mali, Estonia, Lithuania, England, Spain and the United States.
NOTING DUKE
The 78-73 win at then No. 2 Duke on Nov. 10 was Arizona's first true road win against a team ranked in the top 2 since defeating No. 1 Stanford in 2001.
LLOYD LOVES IT
Head coach Tommy Lloyd's record is 67-11 in his third season as a head coach. After setting the NCAA record for most wins in his first two seasons (61), the focus turns to the three-year record. The NCAA record for most wins through three seasons is 89 wins by Brad Underwood and Brad Stevens.
KYLAN KONTINUES
After finishing the 2022-23 season on a tear from the 3-point line, Kylan Boswell picked right up where he left off in Arizona's season opener. He finished with a career-high 18 points against Morgan State. His line at No. 2 Duke was equally impressive, tying for game-high honors with eight rebounds and five assists to go with his 12 points and just one turnover. For the season, he is shooting 55.8% percent from the floor (29-52) and 58.6% from the 3-point line (17-29). He was named the Pac-12 Player of the Week after the first week of the season.
Over his last 12 games, including the final six games of the 2022-23 season, Boswell has shot 46 of 75 (.613) from the floor and 28 of 46 (.609) from the 3-point line.
Boswell also spent time over the summer playing for the USA Basketball U19 team at the FIBA U19 World Cup in Debrecen, Hungary. He was a starter for five of the seven games and averaged 6.4 points and 2.3 assists as Team USA went 5-2 at the event.
BALLO'S BUSINESS
Redshirt senior Oumar Ballo is back for his third year in Tucson. He was a First Team All Pac-12 honoree last year and was named to the 2023 Pac-12 Tournament All-Tournament team as well. He garnered MVP honors at the Maui Invitational a season ago on his way to setting new career highs in nearly every statistical category. He shot 64.7% from the floor during the 2022-23 season, which ranked eighth nationally and is the second-best single-season percentage in Arizona history.
He has scored in double figures every game this season while only playing more than 20 minutes just twice through six games. His career FG% currently ranks as the best in Arizona history (.639).
In his last 9 games against Top 25 opponents, Ballo is averaging 14.8 points, 7.9 rebounds and shooting 63.0% from the floor.
THINGS YOU 'LOVE' TO SEE
Senior guard Caleb Love arrived at Arizona this summer after three seasons at North Carolina. He has fit right in with Arizona's free flowing offense.
The St. Louis, Mo. native leads Arizona with 28 assists and has a career-best assist-to-turnover ratio of 2.55. He is 17 of 32 inside the 3-point line, which is also a career-best.
In the season opener against Morgan State, he dropped 12 points to go with three rebounds, four assists and zero turnovers. Then at Duke, he drilled four clutch free throws in the final minute to seal the Arizona win and improve to 3-1 in his career at Cameron Indoor Stadium.
BRADLEY IN FROM BAMA
Sophomore guard Jaden Bradley transferred to Arizona over the offseason after spending his freshman season at the University of Alabama.
Coming off a 13-point effort against UT Arlington, Bradley was 2 of 2 from the field against Michigan State, but drilled a clutch 17-foot jumper from the top of the key with 1:23 left to extend UA's lead to five. Coach Lloyd also noted after the game that Bradley's defense on MSU's Tyson Walker was exceptional.
With the Crimson Tide, he appeared in 37 games and made 22 starts, averaging 6.4 points and 3.1 assists per game with a 1.7 assist-to-turnover ratio.
Arizona was heavily involved in his initial recruitment out of high school before he eventually chose Alabama. A native of Rochester, N.Y., he was a McDonald's All-American as a senior at IMG Academy.
MAS KRIVAS
Motiejus Krivas stands 7-foot-2 with a 7-foot-5 wingspan and has been a force with a soft touch around the rim from the moment he arrived in Tucson. He broke out with 20 points and nine rebounds against Belmont. He is shooting 58.3% from the field, 76.9% from the free throw line and is tied for the team lead with eight blocked shots.
In the Summer of 2023, Krivas, at the age of 18, played for Lithuania at the FIBA U20 European Championships in Crete. In the seven games, he averaged 12.9 points, 9.7 rebounds, 2.4 blocks and 2.0 rebounds.
LOOK OUT FOR LEWIS
Freshman KJ Lewis was a Top 100 recruit in his class, but Coach Lloyd has commented that he may have been underrated. He won the dunk contest at the Red-Blue Showcase and averaged 13.5 points and 5.0 rebounds in two games on the Summer Tour.
Through six games, his hustle and energy on both ends of the floor has been evident. He's averaging 6.7 points, 4.2 rebounds, 2.5 assists in just 18 minutes per game of action. He is 15 of 22 (.682) from the floor and 2 of 5 from the 3-point line. His activity on the defensive end is a trademark of his, evidenced by his five steals in the opener against Morgan State.
BOROVICANIN BUMP
Sophomore Filip Borovicanin appeared in 14 games as a freshman, averaging 1.3 points and 0.9 rebounds in 3.8 minutes per game. He scored a total of 18 points during his freshman season and has scored 21 already this year.
He averaged 10.0 points and 5.7 rebounds over the three games in Israel and Abu Dhabi and connected on 7 of 13 from behind the 3-point line. At the Red-Blue Showcase, he out-dueled Caleb Love to win the 3-point contest.
Over the summer, Borovicanin played for Serbia at the FIBA U19 World Cup in Hungary. In seven games, he averaged 14.1 points, 7.3 rebounds and 2.7 assists while shooting 47% overall from the floor. Serbia went 5-2 and finished sixth.
MORE MURAUSKAS
The other Lithuanian freshman is 6-foot-9 wing Paulius Murauskas. Known for his outstanding shooting ability, he won't hesitate to let it fly from the perimeter. Murauskas is 6 of 9 from long rang this season He scored 10 points on 4 of 5 shooting from the floor in the opener against Morgan State. Against Southern, he grabbed 10 rebounds to go with his five points.
