Gophers men’s basketball coach Ben Johnson has been leaning on a baseball analogy with his team this season: Hit singles instead of swinging for the fences.

Johnson’s message for players is to make the smart, simple play, and he hasn’t missed many opportunities to bring it up over the first month of the season.

“He’s said it quite often — pretty much every day,” freshman guard Cam Christie said Wednesday. “He’s trying to pound into our minds ‘hit singles,’ make the easy play, make the simple play and take what the defense gives you — stuff like that. It’s a good message. Each day we are working on it. We’re trying to take it to heart and implement it into our offense.”

The Gophers (4-2) have one more tune-up before a pair of Big Ten Conference games with New Orleans (3-3) coming to Williams Arena for a 6 p.m. tipoff Thursday.

The “hit singles” message hasn’t sunk in quickly enough. Minnesota is averaging 14.7 turnovers per game, which was tied for 303rd in the nation going into Wednesday’s games.

In Sunday’s 76-58 loss at San Francisco, Johnson calculated 56 percent of the Dons’ points came directly off Minnesota turnovers or offensive possessions that had no passes or one pass leading to a bad shot.

Johnson and players watched the loss to San Francisco immediately afterward in California. He wants them to not be “casual” with the basketball, and looking to hit singles will lead to extra-base hits later in games.

“Eventually those singles turn into home runs, turn into doubles or turn into triples,” the coach said. “We are not a group that is going to live off being able to hit (home runs) and be successful. I think most of those guys are playing on TNT (in the NBA). We don’t have those guys right now.”

The Gophers’ focus is on themselves — being careful with the basketball and sharing it — but they must contain New Orleans guard Jordan Johnson, who is fourth in the nation in scoring, averaging 23.3 points per game.

“Just trusting the scouting,” wing Isaiah Ihnen said Wednesday. “He is definitely a focus this coming game. It’s definitely our focus to make sure that he will get as small amount of looks as possible. But it’s more so about us. I think a lot of our problems stem from us.”

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