No. 24 Arizona (2-2) vs Davidson (4-0) | Battle 4 Atlantis first-round game | Imperial Ballroom, Paradise Island, Bahamas | 5:30 p.m. Wednesday | ESPN2 | 1290-AM

G Jaden Bradley (6-3 junior)

G Caleb Love (6-4 fifth-year)

F Trey Townsend (6-6 fifth-year)

C Motiejus Krivas (7-2 sophomore)

G Mike Loughnane (6-4 sophomore)

G Conner Kochera (6-5 senior)

F Bobby Durkin (6-7 sophomore)

F Reed Bailey (6-10 junior)

C Sean Logan (6-10 junior)

The series: Arizona has only faced Davidson once before, beating the Wildcats of North Carolina 95-69 in the 2002-03 Fiesta Bowl Classic at McKale Center.

Davidson overview: Longtime Davidson coach Bob McKillop handed over the reins to his son, Matt, in 2022 after 33 years at Davidson. The ride was a little bumpy in the two seasons since then, with Davidson hovering around .500 and becoming one of the worst 3-point shooting teams in the country last season (30.7%). But Davidson returned four starters who have helped the Wildcats win their first four games this season.

The Wildcats start two 6-10 players and rate No. 26th in average height by Kenpom, which adjusts for minutes played. One of their bigs, Reed Bailey, leads the team in both scoring (19.0) and rebounding (7.8). The other, Sean Logan, was the Atlantic-10’s fifth-leading shot-blocker last season and is blocking 10.6% of opponents’ blocks when he’s on the floor.

In some cases, especially if foul trouble hits, Davidson will go with one big man and four perimeter players, often with Durkin moving from small to power forward.

At point guard, Mike Loughnane is averaging more than a 3-1 assist-turnover ratio while shooting 47.1% from the field and hitting 4 of 10 3-pointers. Wing Bobby Durkin has made 13 of 24 3-pointers so far.

As a team, Davidson is shooting 35.2% from 3 while giving up 38.5%, and it knows how to gain an edge at the line. Davidson takes the 51st-most free throw attempts relative to field goal attempts in Division I, and makes free throws at a 77.3% rate.

Davidson’s defense, however, has slipped behind its performance last season so far. Over its three Division I opponents, the Wildcats have averaged 39.4% shooting from 3-point range and 49.5% from two. Davidson is below average in forcing turnovers, too (15.7% of the time).

One of Davidson’s key reserves is another big man, Joe Hurlburt, who spent two seasons mostly on the bench at Colorado.

He said it: “Reed Bailey is a really good player, very adept at scoring down low. Durkin can shoot it from 3. Puts a lot of pressure on you there. And Kochera, he’s their third-leading scorer. Those three guys account for 80% of their offense. They’re a high-octane offense. They can get going, especially from the perimeter. They’re going to challenge you with playing fast and cutting hard. Defensively, they’re going to pack it in the paint. They’re going to probably go under some ball screens and make us score from the perimeter.

“We have to get back to rebounding the ball. Obviously, we lost a rebounding battle last time we played (Duke outrebounded UA 43-30). When we rebound the ball, it helps us in all phases, offense and defense. It allows us defensively to get out in transition and run and offense it gives us second chances. And defensively, we have to defend without fouling. They’re a little like Wisconsin — they’re gonna put pressure on you, and you’ve got to defend without fouling because if they get to the foul line, they can make their free throws.” — UA assistant coach Jack Murphy, who scouted Davidson

With a father who played basketball at Pittsburgh with former UA coach Sean Miller, Bailey not only is shooting 58.3% from 2-point range over Davidson’s three Division I games, but he’s also drawing the fourth-most fouls per 40 minutes nationally (9.6). When he does get to the line, he takes advantage of it by hitting 74.2% of his free throws.

Arizona — Jaden Bradley

What might matter just as much as Bradley’s performance Wednesday is how many minutes he has to log. UA coach Tommy Lloyd tested backup Conrad Martinez in UA’s first two games, but kept Bradley in for an average of 34.5 minutes against Wisconsin and Duke. Those games were at least six days apart from others. Atlantis games aren’t.

Not long after Lloyd became the Wildcats’ coach in April 2021, Arizona and Gonzaga postponed a game scheduled to be played in Spokane, and they haven’t met since.

But, if the Battle 4 Atlantis plays out as expected, they’ll meet in Friday’s championship game.

“I don’t think it’s something that anybody necessarily wants to play to get something up on the other guy. It’s nothing like that,” Lloyd said. “But when you have two great programs, eventually they’re gonna cross paths. But no potential matchup with the Zags until the third day. So I’m not even there yet.”

Coming from a proud mid-major program that will now test itself in the high-level Battle 4 Atlantis, Davidson center Bailey says, “it’s hard not to look at some of the names that are here and just be excited about it.”

His coach knows the feeling.

Matt McKillop was a freshman who came into McKale Center with Davidson to play Arizona in 2002-03, when UA had arguably its best-ever team under Lute Olson.

“That team was Jason Gardner, Hassan Adams, (Andre) Iguodala, Luke Walton, Channing Frye. They were so talented,” McKillop said. “Our starting shooting guard made like two 3s on the first two minutes but then got two fouls. So I played a lot and made a couple of shots.

“I remember it was close at halftime and they beat us by 30 or something.”

One other name also torched Davidson in that game: Sophomore Salim Stoudamire had a then-season-high 23 points to give UA a 95-65 victory.

It’s no surprise that McKillop is now the head coach at Davidson. Not only did he play for those Wildcats, still ranking among the best 3-point shooters in school history (39.3%), but he also spent 14 years as an assistant there.

Also worth noting: His father, Bob McKillop, ran the program for 33 years before Matt took over.

It’s continuity defined at a program that still relies on continuity in the NIL/portal era. Davidson retains players at a high rate, too, returning four starters from last season.

“No one knows exactly how to approach it right now, and everybody’s doing their best,” McKillop said. “Our best is to try to hold on to what has made our program successful, which is stability and continuity.

“There was continuity with our coaching staff in the in the head coaching change, and we’ve done a pretty darn good job with continuity within our roster. When many programs are trying to add the best talent or the tallest guy or the quickest guy, we’ve built into the development of our players and, with those that we’ve added to our program, we’re not sacrificing the values of our returning players.”

While the Battle 4 Atlantis is being held in what’s called “Imperial Arena,” it’s actually known mostly as the Imperial Ballroom. It’s only after workers spend about 10 days taking down 100 chandeliers while installing lighting, audio, bleachers and a floor, that it becomes suitable for NCAA basketball use.

But the ceiling never changes. It’s only 26 feet above the court, making a much different environment, especially for long-range shooters.

“It’s a little bit different,” said Gonzaga wing Khalif Battle, who played in last season’s Battle 4 Atlantis with Arkansas. “We’re used to playing in a stadium but it’s still a 10-foot goal. The basketball’s the same size.”

Louisville guard Chucky Hepburn is also a veteran of the event, playing in the 2022-23 Battle 4 Atlantis with Wisconsin. He shot just 6 of 23 from two but actually made 4 of 9 3-pointers in the ballroom.

“It’s electric here,” Hepburn said. “The atmosphere is beyond crazy. I told (teammates) `It’s gonna feel weird the first couple possessions when you get on the court. But once you get out there and get comfortable, you’re gonna be able to play freely.

“Shots may not go in right away, because it feels a little weird. The ceilings are a little lower, but that’s why we came here and got shots up today (in practice), a lot of shots.”

UA forward Trey Townsend said it was a “cool experience” to play in a similar ballroom environment in the nearby Baha Mar Hoops Nassau Championship in 2022-23, while teammate Tobe Awaka played a minute as a freshman for Tennessee in the Battle 4 Atlantis that season.

Lloyd has experienced the Battle 4 Atlantis as an assistant at Gonzaga, also downplaying the change.

“The first time you walk in, you’re like, ‘Oh, that’s different,’” he said. “And then the moment the ball goes up, or the moment you start practice, honestly, you don’t even notice.”

1: Arizona losses under Tommy Lloyd in potential three-games-in-three-days scenarios, the 2022 and 2023 Pac-12 Tournaments and the 2022 Maui Invitational. (Arizona lost in the Pac-12 Tournament semifinal last season, missing the chance to play a third game in the championship).

3: Tobe Awaka’s national rank in offensive rebounding percentage (25.1), with Awaka pulling down over one-quarter of Arizona’s missed shots.

25: Davidson’s national 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.