Instant takeaways from BU men's basketball's 66-64 victory over Lafayette
The Terriers won their 11th-straight home game to finish the Patriot League regular season undefeated at Case Gym.
BOSTON — And now, the Boston University men’s basketball team waits.
In a regular-season finale with significant Patriot League tournament implications, BU defeated Lafayette, 66-64, at Case Gym on Saturday afternoon to finish the conference schedule at 10-8.
The Terriers (16-15) entered the day in sixth place in the standings, but their record was tied with fifth-placed Navy and was a game behind Colgate and Army in fourth and third. BU was still alive for the No. 3 seed.
With the win and American’s win at Colgate earlier in the day, the Terriers can still achieve a top-four seed and the home quarterfinal game that comes with it. The right to host that game is a big deal, especially for the Terriers, who are on an 11-game winning streak at Case Gym and went unbeaten at home during the PL regular season (BU was only 1-8 on the road).
Where BU ultimately ends up will depend on results throughout the rest of the Patriot League; Navy and Loyola Maryland don’t tip off until 4 p.m in the final game of the Saturday slate.
At the time of writing, Lehigh led Army by 17 points with three minutes to go. Entering the day, there were four scenrios in which BU, American and Lehigh all won — BU was a top-four seed in three of them.
Here are three takeaways from the victory over the Leopards (12-19, 7-11):
BU’s invincibility at home continued.
One of the biggest reasons the Terriers entered Saturday undefeated at Case Gym during league play was because they’d been simply stone cold in clutch time. They boasted an overtime win over Bucknell, a double-overtime win over Colgate and a last-second victory over Loyola Maryland last Wednesday.
In another tight game against Lafayette, BU found a way again.
Tied at 60 with 2:22 to play, graduate guard Miles Brewster sent a perfect entry pass to freshman forward Ben Defty on the low block for an easy layup against 7-foot Lafayette senior Justin Vander Baan.
Lafayette freshman Alex Chaikin tied the game right away with an and-one layup, but he missed the free throw, then BU ran itself into a shot-clock violation at the other end. But Brewster stole a pass on Lafayette’s ensuing possession, and with 54 seconds to go, BU called timeout.
The Terriers went to their go-to end-of-game action, isolating Brewster to get him driving to the cup on his right hand. But Brewster slipped on the drive and had to pass out, only for sophomore guard Kyrone Alexander to eventually drain a baseline jumper. Lafayette freshman Caleb Williams responded with two free throws, but then Alexander created space on a stepback mid-ranger and got the roll with two seconds to play.
The Leopards missed the ensuing half-court heave. It was Alexander’s third consecutive game-winning bucket at Case Gym.
BU was a mixed bag on offense.
Three days after one of the Terriers’ best offensive showings of the year in a 79-68 win at Lehigh, BU’s offense was… weird?
There were a bevy of pretty possessions and stretches of impressive basketball, mixed in with moments of outright ugly offense. Whenever Brewster and Alexander were on the floor, BU’s offense flowed in a way that Lafayette couldn’t keep up with; whenever those two were on the bench, the Terriers looked lost, starved of offensive ideas besides settling for difficult jumpers.
Brewster (14 points, 4-of-8 shooting, 3 of 5 from 3) finished with a positive-7 plus-minus, while Alexander (12 points, 4 of 6 shooting) recorded a positive-8.
All eight players that saw the floor for BU scored, and the Terriers only committed nine turnovers. But after boasting a 14-0 advantage on the offensive glass in the win over Lehigh, BU only corralled four offensive boards on Saturday and was outrebounded, 33-28, overall.
So, yeah. Weird.
In any case, it was enough to squeak out the victory.
BU wasn’t great on defense.
You could tell by head coach Joe Jones’ body language on the sidelines that BU wasn’t defending the way it wanted to, and it was obvious from the very start.
After Lafayette worked two open layups in the first couple minutes of the game, Jones burned an early timeout. But it didn’t get much better from there, as the Terriers appeared to struggle with Lafayette’s actions all game. There were plenty of open layups for the Leopards, and plenty of looks of confusion for the Terriers. Whatever was going wrong, BU was struggling at that end.
Chaikin had a game-high 24 points and made three 3-pointers, and fellow freshman guard Williams caught fire in the second half, finishing with 15 points and three triples.
BU did a good job on 7-foot senior Justin Vander Baan, but it didn’t do a good job overall.