On Sunday afternoon, the Longhorns opened the season in impressive fashion, discarding the Boston Terriers in a 36-point blowout. The freshman-laden Texas roster looked active, athletic, and managed to at least temporarily placate the preseason fears of many Longhorn faithful.

Of course, there were certainly areas for concern. Texas big men had issues on the boards, while the guards were repeatedly outhustled by the Terrier backcourt for long rebounds. The offense looked stagnant at times, particularly in the first half against the BU zone.

A week from today, Texas will be squaring off with either a highly-talented Vanderbilt team or an NC State squad that looks rejuvenated under first-year coach Mark Gottfried. Today’s opening-round game against the Rhode Island Rams provides one last chance to work on the early-season kinks before facing major-conference opponents in New Jersey next weekend.

By the numbers

Rhode Island Coach Jim Baron, now in his 11th season at the helm in Kingston, loves to push the tempo. In the team’s season opener against George Mason, his Rams played at a pace of nearly 69 possessions per 40 minutes. In six of his 11 years on campus, Baron has fielded teams with adjusted tempos of more than 68 possessions per game, with the 2007-08 squad racing out to a breakneck adjusted tempo of 71.1 PPG.

This year’s team lacks size inside, and will likely have issues on the glass against bigger teams. Today, that might not come into play, as the Longhorns were outrebounded by a smaller Boston University team on Sunday evening. Rhode Island and George Mason were nearly even on the glass, with the Patriots holding a +1 rebounding margin on Friday.

Defensively, Rhode Island’s numbers were rather vanilla. While they allowed a pedestrian 1.001 points per possession, they blocked just 5.2% of George Mason’s shots and forced turnovers on 21.3% of the Patriot possessions. The Longhorns, meanwhile, had a suffocating defensive performance against Boston, posting block and turnover percentages of 25% and 34.2%, respectively.

Meet the Rams

Having lost three starters and two reserves from last year’s team, the Rams can relate to the rebuilding situation on the Forty Acres. Rhode Island welcomes a five-man freshmen class this season and will add two juco transfers in December.

The infusion of fresh blood means that former role players will have to step up this season for Rhode Island. In their season-opening overtime loss to George Mason, senior Jamal Wilson took charge. He exploded for 38 points, an unexpected career-high for a guy who averaged just 5.1 per game last season. The 6’5″ Wilson is an all-everything guy for the Rams, as he can play the 3 or either guard position, and provides rebounding from the wings.

Although Wilson was the headliner in Friday night’s game, the starting five all managed to provide double-digit scoring. Serbian sharpshooter Nikola Malesevic chipped in 12 points, but was only 2-of-7 from behind the arc. As a sophomore in 2010-11, Malesevic’s 45.8% mark from long range was tops in the A-10 and was in the top 20 nationally.

The only other upperclassman in the starting five for Rhode Island is big man Orion Outerbridge, who missed a potential game-winning three-pointer at the buzzer on Friday night. The 6’9″ forward scored 11 points and grabbed seven boards against the Patriots, a significant improvement on his 5.1/3.0 averages as a junior. On a smaller team that lost 67% of its rebounding, Outerbridge will have to be a double-double threat on a nightly basis.

Fortunately for the Rams, freshman Jonathan Holton was a rebounding machine in his collegiate debut. The Miami product snagged 14 boards in his 39 minutes and scored 12 points in the losing effort. In high school, he averaged 25.5 points and 15.5 rebounds as a senior, and scouts were high on his shot blocking skills. True to form, he swatted two George Mason attempts on Friday night.

The other freshman in the starting five is point guard Mike Powell, who struggled a bit in his collegiate debut. While he scored 11 points, he was just 1-of-6 from long range and had a troubling five turnovers to go with his six assits. At just 5’10”, the left-handed Chicago product might run into problems against taller, lengthy backcourts.

Against George Mason, the Rams ran nine deep, although freshman guard T.J. Buchanan played only five minutes. Fellow freshman Dominique McKoy made the biggest impact, scoring six points to go with two steals in 15 minutes. The Atlanta swingman shot 75% from the floor in his debut.

Sophomore Levan Shengalia played 14 minutes off the bench against the Patriots, grabbing five boards. He also committed four fouls, giving him a personal every 3.5 minutes. After missing all but one minute of last season due to a knee injury, it’s safe to say he was a little too amped up in his return to the court.

Freshman Rayvon Harris rounds out the rotation for the Rams. He didn’t make much of an impact in his collegiate debut, picking up three fouls and missing his only shot while leaving the rest of the stat sheet empty.

Keys to the game

1) Get back in transition – The Rams will force the issue this afternoon, looking for easy buckets before the defense gets set. The Longhorns did a great job disrupting the half-court offense of Boston on Sunday afternoon, but they’ll have to change their approach against the up-tempo look from Rhode Island. It will be interesting to see if Texas can once again put up impressive defensive numbers this afternoon.

2) Control the caroms – While Alexis Wangmene and Clint Chapman did grab 11 combined rebounds against Boston, they had even more in their mitts that they failed to control. Whether the ball was knocked out of bounds or it just bounced off their fingertips, it often seemed to be covered in Crisco when the Texas frontcourt was involved. Both big men need to secure the boards that come to them and give Texas a rebounding advantage against a smaller team.

3) Limit the damage from Malesevic – Although the junior was just 2-of-7 in his season debut, his career numbers underscore just how dangerous he is from behind the arc. The three-pointer is widely referred to as the great equalizer, and there’s no dobut that a big game from Malesevic could make things dicey for Texas. If the Horns can replicate their perimeter defense from Sunday, when they limited the Terriers to just 16% from long range, a Rhode Island upset will be much harder to manufacture.