FSU basketball hosts Charleston Southern

After picking up their first loss of the season, it’s now time for Florida State (9-1) to get back on track and in doing so, extend their home winning streak to 26 games.

There aren’t many locks in college basketball, but this is about as close as it gets. Charleston Southern (4-5) was projected to finish in the middle of the pack Big South Conference. With Barclay Radebaugh at the helm, there was hope they’d be sneaky good and contend for the conference.

But it doesn’t look like that is going to be the case. They’ve struggled with injuries, and they’ve haven’t been able to replace star guard Armel Potter who transferred after last season to George Washington.

They do have a conference star in 6-4 sophomore Christian Keeling. In their past three games he’s averaged 23.0 points and has made 7-14 (50%) 3s.

Coach Radebaugh calls Florida State College transfer Travis McConico the best shooter he’s ever coached, but he hasn’t been able to translate that to the D1 level yet. He has great size at 6-6, and can play inside or out. He’s scoring 13.1 ppg.

Freshman Phlandrous Fleming Jr. was the pre-season Freshman of the Year in the Big South (and candidate for All Name Team). He was the 5A player of the year in Georgia, and his high flying game has translated well so far. He’s shooting 41% from beyond the arc and scoring 11.4 points per game.

Beyond those three they don’t have many weapons.

Their offense is stymied due to turnover issues (334th nationally), and they’re not good at getting to the line. The one area their offense excels is on the offensive glass, so this will be a good test of FSU’s struggles cleaning up opponent misses.

Defensively, this team is a mess. They give up more 3-pt attempts than any team in the nation, and compound that by being foul prone.

FSU should win easily.

The game tips at 7 PM from the Tuck and will be broadcast on ESPNU. FSU is a 28.5 point favorite.