Arizona basketball: Wildcats’ turnovers are piling up without Parker Jackson-Cartwright

And the frontcourt is partly to blame

Not long ago, Sean Miller lauded his team’s ability to limit turnovers.

“I think this year’s team is a team that can play 40 minutes with single-digit turnovers and that’s a big difference from a year ago,” he said after Arizona beat Sacred Heart on Nov. 18, a game in which the Wildcats committed just seven turnovers.

The game after that — a win versus Northern Colorado — Arizona had just six turnovers.

But that happened when starting point guard Parker Jackson-Cartwright was healthy. Before suffering a high-ankle sprain, Jackson-Cartwright led the team in assists, averaging 5.3 per game, and did so with an assist-to-turnover ratio better than three to one.

In six full games with Jackson-Cartwright running the offense, Arizona committed 11.3 turnovers per game. In the four games without him, the Wildcats are averaging 14.8 per game.

On Wednesday against Grand Canyon, the Wildcats committed a season-high 19 turnovers.

“We’re a work in progress in a lot of ways for a number of well-documented reasons, and I thought one of the disappointing things about tonight’s game on our end is the turnovers of 19,” Miller said after the 64-54 win.

Kadeem Allen, who took over the point guard position in Jackson-Cartwright’s absence, has 14 turnovers in the last four games. Miller said he expects Allen to cut down on them, but the Wildcats’ turnover woes aren’t all on Allen’s shoulders nor Kobi Simmons, who is the team’s backup point guard.

Arizona’s big men have struggled to take care of the ball as well.

“We had three big guys combine for ten turnovers,” Miller said after the win over GCU. “Our turnovers a lot of times were around the basket… for us, being able to play through and learn from that, cut that down, will be very, very important.”

Dusan Ristic and Keanu Pinder each had three turnovers and Chance Comanche had four.

Comanche’s turnovers are especially maddening for Miller, since often times they are picked up on illegal screens. Not only are those turnovers, but they are fouls too, and this short-handed Arizona team has to avoid foul trouble at all costs.

“That’s something he’s gotta really work on, but he’s making the same mistakes constantly,” Miller said of Comanche. “When you set a screen you gotta stop, I mean that’s something that you go over.”

With Jackson-Cartwright out for the next two months or so, Arizona’s backcourt isn’t going to be able to be as turnover-free as it was when he was in the lineup.

Allen and Simmons profile more as off-guards than true point guards like Jackson-Cartwright, so they are going to have bouts with turnovers at times when orchestrating the offense.

Arizona has to live with that.

But the team’s frontcourt players, none of whom consistently handle the ball, do not have the same excuse.

“If your 4s and 5s — especially when they don’t handle the ball a lot on the perimeter — combine for ten turnovers,” Miller said, ”it’s really hard to win.”

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You can follow this author on Twitter at @RKelapire for more Arizona basketball coverage.

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