Arizona-Abilene Christian scouting report: On WAC’s demise, UA’s quick turnaround and Wildcats everywhere
Abilene Christian (7-3) at No. 1 Arizona (9-0) | McKale Center | 7 p.m. | ESPN+ | 1290-AM
Probable starters
0 G Jaden Bradley (6-3 senior)
5 G Brayden Burries (6-4 freshman)
18 F Ivan Kharchenkov (6-7 freshman)
0 F Koa Peat (6-8 freshman)
13 C Motiejus Krivas (7-2 junior)
3 F Anthony Dell’Orso (6-6 senior)
30 F Tobe Awaka (6-8 senior)
2 F Dwayne Aristode (6-8 freshman)
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2 G Yaniel Rivera (6-3 junior)
23 G Joseph Venzant (6-2 senior)
0 F Zy Wright (6-5 senior)
15 F Bradyn Hubbard (6-5 senior)
11 C Ma’Shy Hill (6-8 junior)
4 G Rich Smith (6-2 senior)
5 G Cbo Newton (6-3 sophomore)
10 C Joseph Scott (6-9 junior)
How they match up
The series: UA has never faced Abilene Christian in men’s basketball.
Game agreement: Abilene Christian is scheduled to receive $95,000 as a one-time appearance fee.
Abilene Christian overview: In a world where mid-major teams get routinely robbed of talent every transfer portal season, the Wildcats of west-central Texas are an outlier. They return seven players, including two starters, from a group that won seven of its 10 final games last season and it has shown so far this season.
ACU won at Pepperdine 71-63 on Dec. 2 before beating New Mexico State 77-69 on Saturday in Abilene, Texas, to finish 5-0 in home nonconference games, though three of those came against non-Division I teams. They have lost at Stephen F. Austin and at Texas State while also losing 92-58 to William & Mary in Jacksonville, Fla.
Abilene Christian has improved its woeful 3-point shooting from last season, improving to 28.9% to 33.6% against Division I teams, though it struggles inside. ACU shoots just 43.9% from two-point range against Division I opponents and gets its shots blocked on 11.0% of possessions. They are much more efficient defensively, holding D-I teams to 49.5% shooting from two and getting opponents to turn the ball over on 20.4% of their possessions.
Key players
Bradyn Hubbard is ACU’s leading scorer (16.4 points) and second-leading rebounder (5.3), while he draws 6.1 fouls per 40 minutes – and converts free throws at a 77.5% rate.
A juco all-American two seasons ago who improved steadily at ACU last season, the versatile power forward is playing at an all-conference level now. He’s ACU’s leading scorer (16.4 points) and second-leading rebounder (5.3), while he draws 6.1 fouls per 40 minutes – and converts free throws at a 77.5% rate.
Arizona guard Evan Nelson (21) attempts to muscle his way into the key against Saint Mary’s during the second half of their exhibition game, October 18, 2025, Tucson, Ariz.
After sitting out the Wildcats’ tight wins over Florida, UCLA and UConn, the Harvard grad transfer played 17 total minutes in UA’s two-game MTE and received a minute each against Auburn and Alabama. The Wildcats’ three remaining home nonconference games could give him a final audition to prove himself as a backup for Big 12 play.
Sidelines
Left for dead in 2024, when Arizona bolted for the Big 12 and nine other schools switched conferences, the Pac-12 will begin resurrecting itself next fall with seven new schools.
The same doesn’t appear as likely for the Western Athletic Conference, which will send a representative to McKale Center probably for the final time on Tuesday for Abilene Christian.
Once a proud conference that included Arizona and ASU from 1962 to 1978, the WAC lately has been something of a bottom-feeder in college-conference realignment, cobbling itself back together after blow after blow of existential crises.
The WAC was rocked last summer when GCU opted to move immediately to the Mountain West, which was reeling from the departures of Utah State, Boise State, Fresno State, San Diego State and Colorado State to join the Pac-12.
A wave of additional departures next spring proved too much: Southern Utah and Utah Tech heading to the Big Sky, Cal Baptist and Utah Valley going to the Big West and Seattle moving to the WCC.
All that left the WAC without a single member west of the Continental Divide after this season. So unlike how conference realignment is leading to a weird numbers reality — the Big 12 has 16 teams and the Big Ten has 18 — the WAC will honor geography by retiring its name.
ACU and two other current WAC members (Tarleton State and UT Arlington) will fold into what’s now known as the United Athletic Conference, along with Atlantic Sun Conference members Austin Peay, Central Arkansas, Eastern Kentucky, North Alabama and West Georgia.
After beating another school that goes by “UA,” Arizona will host teams with the same nickname in three of its next four games at McKale Center.
Six days after hosting the Abilene Christian Wildcats on Tuesday, the Bethune-Cookman Wildcats will visit McKale Center – and on Jan. 7, the Kansas State Wildcats will arrive for a conference game early in the Big 12 season.
So far, ACU is 7-3, Bethune-Cookman is 3-7 and Kansas State is 7-4.
While Arizona’s charter flight skirted out to Birmingham in just under three hours Friday, giving the Wildcats plenty of time to adjust for their game with Alabama on Saturday, the return trip wasn’t so friendly.
Thanks to the late ESPN-televised tipoff on Saturday in Birmingham, the Wildcats’ plane didn’t leave Birmingham until 12:20 a.m. Central Time and took three hours and 32 minutes, according to FlightRadar24.
That put the Wildcats into Tucson at 2:52 a.m. Arizona time, meaning they didn’t get to bed until at least 3:30 a.m. They were scheduled for a light workout later Sunday and then a full day of preparation on Monday before Tuesday’s game.
UA walk-on guard Jackson Francois has been volunteering as the head basketball coach at the Southgate Academy charter school this season, but he’s likely to miss his first game Tuesday: Southgate is scheduled to face Nosotros Academy at the same time that Arizona will host ACU.
Francois said Southgate had been trying to work out moving the game, but if not, UA athletic development assistant director Henry Coleman will take over. Coleman has been an assistant coach for Southgate when time permits.
“He’s been huge,” Francois said.
Southgate is 1-3 so far, coming off its first win on Dec. 11 against Ha:San Preparatory & Leadership School.
Numbers game
7: Arizona’s rank in average height (6 feet, 7.1 inches) as weighted by minutes played.
75: Abilene Christian’s rank in “minutes continuity,” a KenPom calculation of what percentage of a team’s minutes are played by the same player from last season to this season.
104: Arizona’s KenPom rank in minutes continuity.
304: Abilene Christian’s rank in average height (6 feet, 4.6 inches).
Contact sports reporter Bruce Pascoe at bpascoe@tucson.com. On X(Twitter): @brucepascoe
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