Men’s Basketball: Terriers Face UNH

By: Matt Doherty

Coming off a road loss to the Canisius College Griffins, the Boston University men’s basketball team will return home to Case Gym on Monday night when they host the University New Hampshire in a non-conference showdown.

The Terriers won two contests in a row for the first time all season before they lost at Canisius but they do finally say goodbye to a difficult span of games that featured 8 out of 9 games on the road.

With Cedric Hankerson and Justin Alston out for the year, guard Eric Fanning has picked up the slack off the bench since returning from suspension. The junior transfer from Wagner has averaged 15 PPG in four full games.

The usual leaders on the offensive end, John Papale and Cheddi Mosely struggled shooting the ball during a losing stretch but have regained their form from behind the arc in the past three games.

However, the loss to Canisius was strictly credited to sloppy play as the Terriers turned the ball over 24 times and gave up 20 second chance points.

To this point of the season, BU has had an up and down season to say the least with devastating injuries and rotating lineups the Terriers have not been able to put a winning streak together as they have hovered around .500 all year.

UNH comes into the contest at 7-4 on the season. The Wildcats hold two losses to ranked teams in UCONN and SMU and two losses to Patriot League teams in American and Colgate but have beaten Patriot League foe Holy Cross.

The Wildcats have five players averaging over 10 points per game led by Tanner Leissner’s 15 PPG.

Both teams score 72 PPG but UNH has a positive rebounding margin of 5.3 with forward Iba Camara averaging over 10 a game putting him in the top 20 in the country in that category.

If the Terriers want to pull out the victory they need to hit the glass and prevent UNH offensive rebounds. Dylan Haines has been starting the past couple of games at forward but Nick Havener and Nathan Dieudonne need to play well whether they are in the starting lineup or coming off the bench.

Tip off is scheduled for 7 PM and can be seen live on the Patriot League Network.