No substitute for experience.

The Yankees are down 4-1 as I type this in a lackluster Game 2 (currently in the 8th). I got to thinking more about my recent conversation with James Whitford, new URI assistant coach, about the team’s roster construction - which now amounts to at least partial reconstruction annually for most schools in the transfer portal era.

Whitford commented that a key component of the roster adjustments made by Archie Miller and staff has been a deliberate push to get older. We know the old adage is “get old and stay old,” though we also appreciate achieving said goal must be attacked differently in this new age of player movement.

Last season, the Rams finished 12-20 overall, 6-12 in league play. According to KenPom, they possessed just 1.47 years of D-1 experience — 257th of 362 ranked teams ranked by the cracker jack statistics engine.

Relative to their Atlantic 10 peers, Rhody ranked second to last in the league in team experience. Unfortunately, the team which ranked lower, UMass, was a statistical outlier and authored a 20-11, 11-7 season — a credit to the job Frank Martin did. But stay with me here… The global numbers offer an interesting narrative… Let’s scan them relative to conference finish —

Let’s pause here. This isn’t a binary analysis and many factors pour into the ultimate performance of a team in a given year (depth, health, positional talent distribution, scheduling, competitor variables, luck, you name it). Yet, there are some interesting threads to pull.

• Richmond, forecast 10th or 11th in most preseason polls last year, was uber-experienced and ended up sharing the A10 regular season title with the right blend of experienced talent assembled by Chris Mooney.

• Keith Dambrot took the 51st most experienced team through the bumps, bruises, and scrapes of the regular season and into Brooklyn, where the Dukes marched to an Atlantic 10 Tournament Championship. They’d move on and vanquish BYU in the NCAA Tournament before falling to Illinois.

• UMass bucked the trend with a largely inexperienced roster, though anchored by a veteran frontcourt of seniors Matt Cross and Josh Cohen. VCU at 213, also persevered through inexperience headwinds, but remember VCU became a significantly more dangerous team when veteran Joe Bamisile joined them midseason.

• Loyola Chicago made a massive jump from 10-21, 4-14 in 2022-23 to last year’s banner year. Oh, team experience jumped about 110 spots for Drew Valentine from 152 to the 39 you see above.

• All nine teams above won at least 20 games.

• No team above ranked higher than 154th, roughly the 42nd percentile in the country.

• All had at least 17 losses. And when the rubber met the road in conference play where games are tight and one decision can impact result, the experienced group pushed ahead to 9-9 in conference play while the chasm widened and this group finished no better than 6-12.

So, for Rhode Island getting older and wiser this offseason was the priority. While this doesn’t dispositively punch a ticket for success, it sure helps. And lacking those extra reps is a significant marker for struggles.

Heading into 24-25, my back of the napkin debatable math tells me Rhode Island’s 11 scholarship players (not including redshirts Damone King and Moek Icke) have a combined 24 years of D1 experience. Divide that by 11 and it’s 2.18 average years of experience across this roster.

It’s a significant bump from the 1.47 last year. We’ll see if this extra mileage correlates to success this season. Time will tell.

You might be interested to know where this 2.18 figure would’ve ranked Rhode Island a year ago. The answer is right around 100 to 107 in the country. Oakland University registered exactly 2.18 years of experience a year ago. How’d they do, you might ask?

The Grizzlies won the Horizon League, finishing 24-12 overall and 15-5 in league play. Once in the NCAA Tournament, they beat Kentucky 80-76 before falling to eventual Final Four qualifier NC State 79-73 in overtime. Not too shabby.