South Dakota Coyotes
Tuesday, December 9, 8:00pm
Omaha
Last Season: South Dakota went 12-18 a year ago, and won just twice away from the cavernous confines of the DakotaDome. A solid team in DII, the Coyotes have steadily gone downhill since joining D1; after winning the Great West Conference with an 11-1 mark in their second year in D1, they’ve gone 10-18, 10-20, and 12-18 the past three years. Longtime coach Dave Boots, who compiled over 500 wins at USD and had 23 consecutive winning seasons (including three straight after the move to D1), retired in September of 2013, and the late exit left them little choice but to name long-time assistant Joey James as interim replacement.
Last Meeting/All-Time Series: Creighton and South Dakota are old foes from back in the day — they’ve met a whopping 59 times, with near-annual games from 1918 through 1968. Eddie Sutton stopped the series upon taking over at Creighton as he ratcheted up the non-conference slate, and the schools have met just once since, a 2010 matchup in the CIT. The game marked Creighton’s return to the Civic Auditorium due to scheduling conflicts at the CLink, and the 89-78 victory was the second-to-last win for Dana Altman as head coach. CU leads the all-time series 48-11, and has lost just once in Omaha.
Head Coach: James lasted just one year, and after a national search, USD hired longtime Tim Miles assistant Craig Smith as their new coach. Smith had worked with Miles at four different schools; his only head coaching experience came at the NAIA level, where he guided a Mayville State program that had gone 1-25 the year before he left into a consistent power. He compiled a 72-29 record in three seasons, all of which ended with trips to the NAIA national tournament, and in his final season, he took them to the NAIA national championship game.
Top Returners: Senior guard Brandon Bos is a preseason second team All-Summit League pick, after leading the Coyotes in scoring at 11.9 points per game a year ago. He also averaged 3.2 rebounds and 2.4 assists while netting 16 steals.
Tyler Flack, a 6’7″ forward, was third on the team in scoring (8.5/game) and led the team in blocks with 44. He’s a nice spot-up shooter from outside, making 45% (37-55), and has good accuracy from the paint — in fact, he had four games where he didn’t miss a shot, including a 6-6 effort against Peru State.
Trey Norris, a 6’0″ guard, started 28 games at point guard a year ago and led the team in minutes played (29.2/game). He had solid averages across the board, with 8.0 points, 1.9 rebounds, 4.0 assists and 1.2 steals a game, and ranked third in the Summit League with a 2.11 assist-to-turnover ratio.
Key Losses: 6’10” center Trevor Gruis was the team’s leading rebounder (5.1/game) and second-leading scorer (11.3/game), and he’d started 102 consecutive games in the middle for the Coyotes. His graduation leaves a huge hole to fill, literally and figuratively.
Key Additions: Smith has added five newcomers since taking over in April: JuCo transfer Sekou Harris, D1 transfers Tre Burnette and James Hunter, and freshmen Logan Power and DJ Davis.
Of those, Harris is the most likely to make an immediate impact. He started 35 games for South Plains College in Levelland, Texas, in 2013 and averaged 6.7 points, 4.9 assists and 3.2 rebounds a game. Running point, his team went 29-6, finished fifth in the NJACAA D1 poll, and advanced to the Elite Eight. He played at Fairleigh Dickinson as a freshman, averaging 5.5 points and 2.4 assists.