Davies is Done. What About BYU?

For those of you BYU fans living under a rock, Brandon Davies was suspended for the remainder of the season for an honor code violation.

Short-Term Impact
BYU has two regular season games left.  Assuming that BYU has 6 or 7 healthy guys to put out there, they should be able to win both of those games.  New Mexico plays small anyway, so having an extra small guy out there may actually be somewhat helpful.  Wyoming is bad and don't exactly command a lot of attention in the post anyway.  Davies can do a lot of things at both ends of the floor.  He rebounds well.  But BYU shouldn't need what he brings to the table in these final two games.  The rest of their players, including James Anderson, should be able to handle it and shoulder the load.  Against these two perimeter-oriented teams, Davies could have dominated inside, but BYU can counter with more perimeter players of their own.

Medium-Term Impact
BYU will have a tough time beating SDSU, if the two meet in the MWC Final, without Davies.  His stat line may not have been great this past Saturday, but he had 3 rebounds in the last 3 minutes that prevented the Aztecs from getting second chance opportunities and scoring points and potentially making a game out of it.  A potential matchup against CSU in the Semifinals also gets that much trickier.  James Anderson cannot even slow down the Rams big men, so BYU will need big minutes out of Logan Magnusson and Noah Hartsock.

Depth is a big concern.  BYU was already thin at the 5.  Davies played a lot of minutes there.  Anderson can give you a few effective minutes/game.  Tops.  Hartsock can fill the void (and will have to).  Everyone else has to slide up a spot and play more minutes.  But some guys have already logged a lot of minutes this season.  Certainly no one playing the 4 and 5 spots can get in foul trouble now.  Anderson and Magnusson cannot just be thrown in to use up their fouls: they may need to stay out there for extended periods to give Noah a rest.  No injuries can occur.  At any position.  The team was 7.5 deep.  Now it is 6.5.  If any of those 6.5 can't play every possible required minute, BYU cannot afford to play tough defense.  Everybody who can score will have to pick it up, because Anderson and Magnusson cannot score, and Collinsworth and Abouo won't be as effective at the 4 (if you can call anything Collinsworth has done on offense the past month 'effective').

NCAA Tournament Impact
As far as the NCAA Tournament goes, I think the final impact of Davies' departure may actually be minimal.  The teams that have multiple dominant big men were going to give BYU a problem anyway.  Even with Davies, BYU may have been knocked off by superior inside play.  Without him it will certainly take stellar shooting and team defense.  And the Jimmer.

Davies played well at home against good big men, but wasn't nearly as dominant of a force on the road.  What this really means is: BYU does not have the inside presence to beat many of the teams seeded 1st through 5th, though may still be OK against those seeded lower than that.  It does reduce the possibility of a Final Four run (which, let's be honest, was probably a pretty slim possibility anyway, given that BYU was going to have to survive at least two of those higher mentioned seeds to get there), but I don't think it will impact the opportunity to get into the Sweet 16, and perhaps even the Elite Eight.

Impact on Jimmer
This could actually be a blessing in disguise for BYU's offense.  Davies was a presence inside.  He could score with a variety of moves, and was capable of putting up 20 every night.  He could also step out and hit 10-15 footers with reasonable success.  BYU cannot just put "the next guy" in and duplicate his production inside.  But his presence inside also meant that there were two bodies between Jimmer and the hoop every possession.  Opposing centers could camp there, waiting for Jimmer to beat his man off the dribble.

Now it opens the floor.  Opposing teams 4's will have to move outside to cover the likes of Charles Abouo, Stephen Rogers, and Kyle Collinsworth.  Opposing 5's will have to respect Hartsock's ability to sink the 3, so they can't get too caught up inside either.  Even if teams do stay inside, it leaves Jimmer more room to get out of tight spots and fewer bodies around to clog the lane, it will probably reduce his turnovers, and it will leave capable shooters open on the outside.  Hartsock can post up too (although not nearly as effectively as Davies), there just wasn't much need to with Davies out there.  Though it remains to be seen how effectively he can post-up against opponent's starting big man.  A lot of opposing players and coaches have talked about BYU's ability to spread you out, now that ability will be even more enhanced.  What the Cougars lose in inside scoring, they may be able to make up for with Calipari-style offense (without the recruiting violations): spread the floor, shoot the 3, penetrate off the dribble.

The Team
This particular BYU team seems to rally around adverse conditions.  Well, here is an opportunity to prove how tough they are mentally.  Again.  Can they rise to the occasion?  Again?  I believe they can do that, at least for the next three (easy) games.  I am not sure about after that.  Bonding together is nice and all, but when you don't have the horses, all of the chemistry in the world can't help you.  In basketball, the size of the dog in the fight matters too, and BYU will be running out there with one fewer pitbulls.  Although after watching this team against SDSU on Saturday, it's tough to argue that they will not move on from this and still be a great team.