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The Seton Hall Pirates will open their season at home against the Monmouth Hawks on Wednesday. The Pirates were 21-11 last year, punching their ticket to the Big Dance (No. 8 seed in the South Region) for the fifth time in six tries. The No. 8 vs. No. 9 matchup is usually a coin toss. It was no surprise to see the Pirates fall to the TCU Horn Frogs in the Round of 64. Coach Kevin Willard parlayed his recent success into a seven-year, $29.4 million deal to take on the Maryland job. Seton Hall thus turned to Shaheen Holloway for the head coaching gig. Holloway, a former star point guard for the Pirates, was most notable for leading 15th seed St. Peter's to the Elite Eight last season.
Monmouth went 21-13 last season, failing to snag a March Madness auto-bid after losing 60-54 in the MAAC title game to St. Peter's. They relied heavily on a quartet of seniors, including Pirate's transfer Shavar Reynolds and UNC transfer Walker Miller. They have since lost them after graduation.
Seton Hall vs. Monmouth Betting Odds
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ShotQuality Tale of the Tape
It's tough to rely heavily on the ShotQuality matchup breakdown when the players and coaches responsible for the data are gone. Thankfully, ShotQuality allows us to dig deeper, looking at individual player data. Senior guard Jamir Harris returns to Newark for another season. He had an Off Dribble Three Pointer SQ PPP of 1.08 on 78 occurrences last season. The Pirates were 42nd in the country in off-the-dribble three-pointer frequency the previous season. They still had a 1.0 SQ PPP in that category last season, but Harris helped and will help balloon that number. KC Ndefo, a tagalong with Holloway to Seton Hall, was in the 100th percentile in blocks last season, which will benefit an already stout Pirates defense. One of the most glaring issues with the previous season's Pirates team was a 0.96 SQ PPP on shots from pick-and-roll ball screens. Ndefo will also help shore up that issue, ranking in the 88th percentile in pick-and-roll (roll-man) SQ PPP when he was with the Peacocks. Isolation SQ PPP may continue to be an issue for the Pirates, even with a new bench boss in the form of Shaheen Holloway. The 2021-22 rendition of Saint Peter's and Seton Hall had an isolated SQ PPR of around 0.85, well below the league average.
The SQ numbers aren't as relative for the Hawks. They only returned 16.1% of scoring from 2021-22 and came up empty in the transfer portal. Neither of their top returners, Myles Foster and Myles Ruth, played more than 13 minutes per game. The defense was admirable, but a lot of the credit goes to the five seniors who averaged roughly 30 minutes per game.
Seton Hall vs. Monmouth Prediction
Monmouth created a powerful team last season, albeit they did fall short. Unfortunately, the cupboard is now bare, and they will rely heavily on minimal role players from the 2021-22 team. Meanwhile, Seton Hall snagged some excellent transfers with KC Ndefo and Al-Amir Dawes. The difference in experience should be staggering, giving the Pirates a clear advantage in the season opener.
Prediction: Seton Hall -20.5 (-110)
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