MBB Game 16 @Northeastern, Jan 11 (Thu), 7 PM

[Jojogunne]

Next we travel up to Massachusetts to face our good friends at Northeastern.

The Huskies (5-9) have some nice wins (including victories over BU and ODU), but have lost four of their last five games. They play at Monmouth Monday night, while we are off until Thursday.

The Huskies have a very balanced attack, with six players scoring between 9 and 12 ppg.

The game will be on the CBS Sports Network.

[Wags]

This one and the next one on the trip (at Campbell) are both must wins if the team is going to get on any kind of run in league play and put the Charleston loss in the rearview mirror.

Whether it's putting Thomas in a better position to succeed or reeling Thomas in and giving up some of his missed 3s in favor of spreading a few of those shots around to more high-percentage shots for others, they have to get him to be far more efficient if they are going anywhere. His current 1.14 PPS ain't gonna cut it. He needs to get up near 1.40 PPS.

[triplec2195]

More assists less shots that will be part of the keys for success here but he has to be honest with himself and play TEAM BASKETBALL!! i DON'T KNOW IF THE COACHES AT ANY POINT WILL MANDATE THAT HE PASS THE BALL??

[Polito]

Neither are good - no excuses, show you will win on the road and beat the teams you should. And they should absolutely beat both.

With you guys all the way - what we don't need is another 26 shots to score 22 points from Thomas. Atrocious. Coach and play smarter.

[triplec2195]

Just looking over NE roster and low and behold I see Chris Doherty. It seems to me this guy has been around a long....... time. Two years at Notre Dame and another 4 years at NE including this year. This guy is like a player/coach now 24 soon to be 25. Is this unusual I mean his age I guess there could be guys older then him who started college late and have basketball eligibility. Lol this kid seems to have an infinite amount of player eligibility considering you have kids playing basketball at age 17.

[triplec2195]

This NE team as Polito says is not a very good team yet in this crazy game of basketball they have a win over Bryant who beat FAU(#17) who is/was a top 20 team. Bryant also beat not long ago in consecutive games both Towson and Drexel and scored over 100 points in both games D optional I guess. They also lost to BU by 16 points. BU is not a good team so I guess what I'm trying to say here is that NE could beat us if we don't come ready to play and come out of the gate slow. An expected win for sure but beware!!

[Wags]

Business trip to Northeastern and Campbell. One at a time but need to be focused, ready and TCB with both. If they play how they should, they should win both by double digits.

It feels like this is Doherty's 8th year at Northeastern alone by now.

[Wags]

Northeastern getting blown out at Monmouth by 23 in the second half on CBS Sports Network now (not even a good alternative to the disappointment Washington has been so far against Michigan in the CFP natty). Monmouth looks pretty legit in the CAA this year.

[EvanJ]

Monmouth won 81-62. Xander Rice (Monmouth's coach's son) had 1 turnover and 1 miss before scoring. After that, he scored 29 with no misses and 1 turnover. He shot 11-12 including threes 5-5 and free throws 2-2. Monmouth used 14 players. Northeastern used 12 players, so they have many players even if they aren't good. Masai Troutman played 31 minutes, and was their only player to play more than 27. They had 9 players play at least 11 minutes, and 11 players play at least 7 minutes. Harold Woods led Northeastern with 16 points. Northeastern shot free throws 12-12, but shot field goals poorly. They shot threes 10-32 with more threes attempted than twos. Monmouth made almost as many threes with much fewer attempts as they shot 9-19. Monmouth had 10 steals.

The CAA standings are symmetrical with one 3-0, two 2-0, eight 1-1, two 0-2, and one 0-3.

CBS Sports Network promoted their next CAA game, which is this one. They showed Dubar's statistics and called him consistent for scoring double-digits in every game before talking about Thomas.

[dutchPride86]

Northeastern was missing their starting guard and 2nd leading scorer last night, harvard transfer Luka Sakota, which may help explain how Rice went off and the game got so out of hand (though Monmouth is certainly improved and Rice is playing at a first team CAA level). At any rate, this is a game Hofstra needs to win period, but really should not lose if Sakota is out again

[Wags]

CBS Sports Network promoted their next CAA game, which is this one. They showed Dubar's statistics and called him consistent for scoring double-digits in every game before talking about Thomas.

Even they know which one has been more efficient and consistent.

[HUSID80]

Checked Northeastern's forum and it looks like Sakota is going to be out for awhile although their boards were complaining about Northeastern's lack of transparency regarding injuries. Just like Hofstra!

[triplec2195]

We always seem to have some epic games against NE. Two years ago we blew them out in Boston by 22 points only to play them in Hempstead in February and as good as a team we had that year we were down by 8 points with a minute and a half to go. Zach Cooks hit some big shots in the end and miraculously we won of course it took a miss by Doherty on the front end of a one and one to set up the winning shot. As bad as a team NE has they seem to find a way to make our lives miserable. Hopefully an easy win!!

[HUSID80]

ESPN giving us a surprisingly LOW 66% chance of winning this one, primarily die to the homecourts advantage of Matthews Arena and its frigid floor.

[EvanJ]

We always seem to have some epic games against NE. Two years ago we blew them out in Boston by 22 points only to play them in Hempstead in February and as good as a team we had that year we were down by 8 points with a minute and a half to go. Zach Cooks hit some big shots in the end and miraculously we won of course it took a miss by Doherty on the front end of a one and one to set up the winning shot. As bad as a team NE has they seem to find a way to make our lives miserable. Hopefully an easy win!!

I was happy my dad didn't check the score on his way out when we trailed in that game on February 19, 2022. We went down 10 with 6:02 left, got within 3, and went down 8 with 1:31 left. Northeastern ended with a missed three, offensive rebound and immediate turnover, turnover, Doherty's missing the first of a one and one, and turnover.

https://gohofstra.com/news/2024/1/9/men ... rsday.aspx is our preview titled "National Television Showdown Awaits Pride On Thursday."

https://s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/side ... game16.pdf is our Game Notes.

https://nuhuskies.com/news/2024/1/10/me ... owson.aspx is Northeastern's preview titled "Men's Basketball Returns Home To Host Hofstra, Towson."

https://s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/side ... _Notes.pdf is Northeastern's Game Notes.

https://www.sports-reference.com/cbb/sc ... /2024.html has Northeastern's statistics. They have seven players averaging at least 21.1 minutes.

KenPom expects us to win 73-70 with a 60 percent chance, so that is even less than ESPN's 66 percent. The Coastal Athletic Association
all-kenpom.com Team has Thomas second to UNCW's Trazarien White.

All CAA teams play at 7:00 P.M., and the other games are:

Monmouth at UNCW
William & Mary at Hampton
Drexel at North Carolina A&T
Elon at Charleston on Lowcountry CW
Delaware at Campbell
Stony Brook at Towson

[EvanJ]

This game will be the middle game of the 31 games before the CAA Tournament. After this game, we are scheduled to go to Campbell, who we have never played, but it could get postponed due to weather. It might not be safe to fly there. The good news is that it wouldn't be a big deal to postpone the game to Sunday or Monday because the next game is Thursday and classes are not in session.

[triplec2195]

I'm seeing that we're 4.5 point favorites. Lets hope this isn't another nail-biter.

[dutchPride86]

So I know getting some scoring help outside of the big 3 is a pretty obvious x-factor for Hofstra, but here's an interesting stat I came across that backs it up to keep in mind for tonight and going forward: 7 points for Bryce Washington:

- When Bryce has scored 7+ pts in a game Hofstra is 8-1 this season (he had 8 in the Princeton loss)
- Conversely, Hofstra is yet to win a game this season when Bryce has been held to less than 7 pts (0-6 record).

[daHUPride]

So I know getting some scoring help outside of the big 3 is a pretty obvious x-factor for Hofstra, but here's an interesting stat I came across that backs it up to keep in mind for tonight and going forward: 7 points for Bryce Washington:

- When Bryce has scored 7+ pts in a game Hofstra is 8-1 this season (he had 8 in the Princeton loss)
- Conversely, Hofstra is yet to win a game this season when Bryce has been held to less than 7 pts (0-6 record).

GREAT POINT - he's certainly capable of 8 a game

[triplec2195]

That's an interesting stat but since in some games recently he hasn't been getting the minutes especially when he isn't producing. Games like Duke, St Johns, UNLV, and COC he was subbed for by Farmer. Farmer has come in for him and he has produced next to nothing in these games especially against COC when his D or lack thereof hurt us. We don't have the proper sub for Washington since the combo of Washington/Farmer hasn't been good. When Washington is producing Farmer gets very few minutes. He didn't get any minutes in the Delaware game(Farmer) instead Robinson came in to spell Bryce. Why hasn't Barrouk gotten these minutes. IMO reading between the lines we could see both Tomasco and Barrouk look for greener pastures!