Akron returns to March Madness after retooling offense around 3-point shooting

SEATTLE (AP) — Akron coach John Groce didn't even wait for last season to end before he started talking about changing his team's approach on offense. He knew the Zips were about to lose three of the four post players on their roster to graduation, including Mid-American Conference Player of the Year Enrique Freeman and two others who averaged over 10 points per game. Meanwhile, they were set to return four experienced guards. It didn't matter that Akron had reached the NCAA Tournament in two of the past three seasons while focusing on the post. Something was going to have to change. "He was walking around the gym and yelling out, 'I want you to shoot 30 3s next year,'" senior Nate Johnson said. "And, I mean, a couple of those guys definitely were not believing that (after) the way we just played. They were looking at him like he was crazy. 'Thirty 3s, coach?'" The Zips didn't quite reach that number, averaging 29.8 3-point attempts in 34 games this season. They made 369 3s, ranking fifth in the country, and their effective field-goal percentage rose from 101st (.523) to 32nd (.557). On Friday, the 13th-seeded Zips — who won the MAC regular-season and tournament titles — face fourth-seeded Arizona in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament's West Region. "I'm just thankful that we've got a bunch of guys that believed in us, the staff, and the system that we were going to play, because it was different than the past five years," Groce said. Last season, when the Zips also made the NCAA Tournament, three of their top four scorers were forwards. This time, Akron's four highest scorers are guards. Reserve Bowen Hardman leads the team with 1.9 3s per game, and six Zips behind him all average at least one. Akron regularly starts four guards, and there's more to the new style than just taking more shots. "A lot of guys think playing fast means shooting quick," Groce said. "That's part of it. First of all, you have to work really hard to get good shots at that pace, and you've got to be in phenomenal cardiovascular condition. They don't think about that sometimes." Better conditioning has been worth it for the Zips, who have had their two best shooting nights in the month of March, including a MAC Tournament semifinal win over Toledo in which they finished 55.6% from downtown. Now that he's persuaded his returning players to change their style, Groce said it may pay dividends in recruiting. "Obviously when you hear some of those things — tempo, 3s, sharing, moving the ball, high assist rate — those things tend to be fairly attractive," he said. "It wasn't like pulling teeth to sell that."