Saturday, January 20, 2018

Swag, speed and threes: Savannah State is the fastest team in college basketball

The Tigers lead the NCAA in three-point attempts and tempo, but miss a ton of shots. Still, that doesn’t bother them, and the style could lead Savannah State to a tourney appearance.

SAVANNAH, Georgia — A lot of folks say that the Golden State Warriors changed basketball with the way they use pace, space and a fire-at-will mentality from beyond the three-point arc.

It’s debatable whether that’s true or not - if Steph Curry and his fellow gunslingers truly altered the game - but what is an absolute fact is that they’ve started a trend. Take a look at the Houston Rockets, who are attempting 43.5 three-pointers per-game. Or try Villanova, Gonzaga or Marquette, who have all attempted more than 490 three-pointers this year.

And that trend has now trickled to the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.



The Savannah State Tigers are testing the limits of relying on the three-point shot as the primary way to score points. The result has been a mixed bag of ridiculousness and artistry.

Savannah State is both beautiful and bad, both admirable and awful, and always fun, fascinating and – at times for opposing teams – frightful, because if the Tigers get on a roll, they can be uncatchable and unstoppable.

“We just get up a lot of threes,” said junior guard Dexter McClanahan. “We come in and do what we do. That’s shoot three’s, play fast, and try to outrun ‘em.”

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