All-access at the Roman Main Event: Day 2 Recap

The Roman Main Event has quickly become 1 of the best 4-team early-season basketball tournaments in the nation, putting itself right up there with other events such as the Hall of Fame Tip-Off Classic and the Jimmy V Classic. This year’s edition features a fearsome foursome of Arizona/Michigan/UNLV/Wichita State. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel is on the scene in Vegas this weekend trying to bring you as much access as possible. He concludes his coverage with a review of Sunday night’s doubleheader:



After having MUCH better luck at the poker table Sunday afternoon than the previous day I grabbed some dinner and walked over to the arena. The Bengals-Raiders game was ending around the same time so there were a ton of fans of both teams walking up and down the Strip. I walked down to the court to meet Arizona legend Jason Gardner on the bench during warmups: he is soft-spoken and super-nice! We reminisced about the 2001 NCAA title game in Minneapolis (my time at the Metrodome that night remains 1 of the saddest sporting results of my life) and I restrained myself from requesting an unprofessional selfie.

I am unsure when Vegas became the capital of the sports world but they are in the middle of 1 heck of a stretch: Blue Jackets-Golden Knights and a world welterweight title fight on Saturday, Bengals-Raiders yesterday, Roman Main Event all weekend, with the Maui Invitational starting today and UCLA-Gonzaga hoops tomorrow night! The only time that Juwan Howard played against Arizona was on December 29, 1993: the good news is that he led the Wolverines with 18 PTS:

The bad news is that Khalid Reeves scored a career-high 40 PTS as #12 Arizona blew out #7 Michigan in Tucson by the score of 119-95:

Speaking of Michigan basketball from the 1990s, you just knew that we would see 1 of these jerseys this weekend:

The upper bowl remained empty all evening and there were not a lot of Wichita ST-UNLV fans who showed up for the 1st game of the doubleheader but atmosphere was still pretty electric. Most tourney champs get a trophy but the winner of this 1 will get a championship belt because it is in Vegas. Let’s get ready to…tip it off!

The intensity was evident early on with players from both teams diving for loose balls left and right. Equally intense was the Michigan fan sitting near me with a calf tattoo of the “Block M”. He told me that he got it in Alabama after Tom Brady’s final college game, when the Wolverines beat the Tide 35-34 in the 2000 Orange Bowl thanks to Ryan Pflugner missing an extra point in OT:

Michigan kept it close for the 1st 10 minutes thanks to Eli Brooks getting into the lane for some layups/runners and Hunter Dickinson being active in the paint on both offense/defense. However, the Wolverines did not make a single 3-PT shot in the 1st half so Arizona was able to build an 8-PT lead by halftime. If you are in Tucson and need a beer, I cannot recommend the bar featured on this t-shirt highly enough:

On offense it was a total team effort: Bennedict Mathurin/Azuolas Tubelis making lots of layups and Dalen Terry converting threes/dunks and then getting pumped up by his teammates (followed by him staring down an entire section of Michigan fans sitting right behind the basket):

The defensive star was Kerr Kriisa: his outside shot was not falling for most of the weekend (3-18 3PM) but he took multiple charges in the paint and was loving every second of it:

Christian Koloko was getting it done on both ends with a couple of baby hook shots:

He also had a huge block on Dickinson that got the Arizona fans out of their seats:

However, he must have been doing something wrong because he received some…spirited instructions from Lloyd after he came out of the game:

The 2nd half was even worse for the Wolverines: Dickinson made a layup/runner in the lane but also had an easy layup attempt that somehow spun out and seemed to signal that it was just not his night. The Wildcats did not get much scoring from their bench but they did not need it because of the strength of their starters. Mathurin made a pair of threes when he was open behind the arc and when he was not open he would drive inside for a runner/floater.

Terry had a pair of breakaway dunks that allowed him to tie his career-high with 13 PTS and he kept sneering at the opposing fans in the stands all night long. The star of the weekend was Koloko, who just kept dunking all over Michigan in the 2nd stanza to finish with a career-high 22 PTS as the Wildcats won it 80-62. My most vivid memory of him during the past 2 years was when he missed a pair of potential game-winning free throws against Oregon in February of 2020…but now it has been replaced with him making 6-6 FTs on Sunday while thoroughly outplaying Dickinson on both ends of the court:

As the buzzer sounded and the players celebrated on the court I decided to walk down and get some photos of the action. I saw Mathurin saying hi to someone in the stands:

Terry showing off the championship belt:

& Lloyd telling everyone back in Tucson to BTFD!:

At the postgame press conference I asked Koloko about his improvement at the line from his freshman year when he only made 7-20. He said that he has been working on his FTs and his goal this year is to be above 80%. He knows that he will get fouled a lot so he knows that he needs to make them:

I wanted to see if Coach Lloyd even remembered what it was like to lose a regular season game (since he has now won 31 in a row as a head/assistant coach dating back to February of 2020!). He pondered things while in his t-shirt (since his gameday gear was soaking wet after his players drenched him with water bottles in the locker room) and said that he is just keeping it simple. He learned from a great mentor in Gonzaga coach Mark Few and is just trying to get his guys ready to compete:

I decided to see what Brooks thought about facing the tallest team in the nation. He said they have a really good inside presence and big men who are active and concluded that, “We need to get back in the lab and solve some problems”:

I wisely refused to see if Coach Howard recalled his 1993 loss to Arizona and just focused on his philosophy when his team is missing 3-PT shot after 3-PT shot. His opinion is that when his guys have open shots he wants them to let it fly because, “Sometimes they do not go in but I encourage my guys to keep shooting”:

I made it through halftime of Game 2 (which turned out to be quite exciting with Wichita State beating UNLV 74-73) and decided to call it a wrap after almost tripping over a trio of tubas in the tunnel:

My only regret is that I did not stay longer for even more basketball in Vegas, as I missed the Maui Invitational quarterfinals at the Michelob Ultra Arena today and will miss the game of the year (Gonzaga-UCLA) tomorrow at the T-Mobile Arena. Oh well, you will not hear me complaining about a Wildcat win so enjoy all the hoops this week and have a happy Thanksgiving!